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hiro--aoki · 20 hours

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TWD X TUMBLR Chapter Three: Stick Together

Tw: Mentions of rascism, use of N-word slur (again 😰), mentions of drugs, catcalling, say bye bye to a character

A/n: procrastination really is my enemy atm. literally kept you guys waiting longer than i intended, my bad fam. this is a very long chapter 💪🤫🧏‍♂️🤫

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Rick picks up the gun Merle dropped, checking the ammo, “Look here, Merle. Things are different now. There is no n***** anymore. There are no dumb as shit, inbred white trash fools either. Only dark meat and white meat. There’s us and the dead. We survive this by pulling together not apart.”

Merle slowly turns his head to Rick and says defiantly, “Screw you, man.”

Rick takes a breath, “I can see you make a habit of missing the point.”

“Yeah, well screw you twice.”

“Outa be polite to a man with a gun,” Rick brings Merle’s own gun to his head, mocking him with his own words, “Only common sense.”

The rest of the group watch the interaction, still recovering from Merle’s minute long power trip.

“You wouldn’t,” Merle challenges, “You’re a cop.”

Rick lowers his gun, “All I am anymore, is a man looking for his wife and son. Anyone who gets in the way of that is gonna lose.”

The two of them hold silent eye contact for a few seconds.

Rick breaks the silence again, and starts to check Merle’s pockets, “I’ll give you a moment to think about that.”

He pulls out a little box. He recognises it instantly from his years as an officer. Rick grabs Merle’s chin, forcing him to look up.

“Got some on your nose there,” Rick gives a flick to his nose.

“What’re you gonna do? Arrest me?” Merle mocks.

It’s only at this point he notices Rick walking over to the edge of the roof. Rick tosses the drugs over the side of the building.

“Hey! What’re you doing?! That’s my stuff! If I get loose, you better pray!” Merle says, pulling his wrist, trying escape his restraints.

Rick starts to walk to another side of the roof, Morales following.

“You hear me, you pig? You hear me?!” Merle continues to rant over his drugs like a Scooby Doo villain would after they’ve been caught.

“Yeah, your voice carries.” Artemis says, shooting a much-deserved glare at Merle.

“You filthy pig!” Merle ignores her and keeps trying to twist his way out of the handcuffs.

Rick leans against a ledge, looking over the city. The streets are still filled with the relentless walkers. Thunder rolls in the distance, louder than Merle. Morales stands next to Rick.

“You’re not Atlanta PD.” He states, “Where are you from?”

Rick thinks for a second, before answering, “Up the road aways.”

“Well Officer Friendly, from up the road aways, welcome to the big city.”

They both turn back to the shuffling, decaying nightmares as they moan and groan their way around the city. The streets are infested with them. There’s no way out. Every direction they turn there’s just as many.

On a different ledge, Andrea, Jacqui and Artemis peer over that side.

“It’s like Time’s Square down there.” Andrea states, worry for all their safety is obvious in her tone.

Morales and Rick make their way back to the rest of the group.

“How’s the signal?” Morales asks.

“Like Dixon’s brain.” T-Dog says blankly, “Weak.”

Merle just flips him off in return.

“Keep trying.” Morales orders.

“Why? There’s nothing they can do.” Andrea says, “Not a damn thing.”

“Getting them to come and help us would be telling them to come to their deaths.” Artemis adds.

“Got some people outside the city as well.” Morales explains to Rick, “There’s no refugee centre, that’s a pipe dream.”

“Then she’s right, we’re on our own. It’s up to us to find a way out.” Rick says, his stubborn nature really shining through in such a dim situation.

“Good luck with that.” Merle interrupts, “These streets ain’t safe in this part of town from what I hear.”

Merle then glances at Andrea, shamelessly checking her out, “Ain’t that right, sugar tits?”

That comment makes everyone look over at Merle with some form of disgust. Andrea even looks somewhat offended.

Merle doesn’t stop there, “Hey, honey buns, what say you get me out of these cuffs, we go off somewhere and bump some uglies? Gonna die anyway.”

“I’d rather.” Andrea states bluntly.

“Rug muncher. I figured as much.” Merle mutters.

“Streets ain’t safe. Now there’s an understatement.” Morales says, standing with Rick.

“What about under the city?” Rick suggests.

“The sewers?”

“Oh man.”

Morales turns to Glenn, “Hey Glenn, check the alley.”

The rest of the group look up at Morales and Rick. Glenn jogs over to the side of the building where he has a clear view of the alley.

“See any manhole covers?” Morales asks.

Below them, in the alley, two walkers are standing idly but no sewer entries in sight. Glenn jogs back to the group.

“No, must be all out on the street where the geeks are.” He concludes.

Jacqui speaks up, “Maybe not. Old buildings like this, built in the ‘20s. Big structure often had drainage tunnels into the sewers in case of flooding down in the subbasements.”

“How do you know that?” Glenn questions.

“It’s my job -was-.” She clarifies, “I worked in the city zoning office.”

“I’m surprised, those office jobs do come in handy.” Artemis says.

______________

Morales, Jacqui, Rick, Glenn, Artemis, and Andrea make their way down to the subbasements of the building. They reach the opening of the tunnel. The deep, dark, and damp tunnel. The group point each of their flashlights down into it, illuminating the tunnel slightly.

“Very welcoming.” Artemis mumbles.

“This is it? Are you sure?” Morales asks the group.

“I scoped this place out the other times I was here.” Glenn says, “It’s the only thing in the building that goes down…but I’ve never gone down it.”

“Very promising too.” Artemis adds to her earlier statement.

“Who’d want to, right?” Glenn asks rhetorically.

The group glance over at Glenn, he looks back at them.

It takes him a few seconds to realise; he is the human sacrifice.

“Oh. great.” He mutters.

“We’ll be right behind you-“Andrea tries to say.

Glenn interrupts her, “No, you won’t. Not you.”

Andrea takes this to slight offence, “Why not me? Think I can’t?”

“I wasn’t-“Glenn tries to backpedal.

“Speak your mind.” Rick says firmly.

Glenn takes a minute to think about what he’s going to say.

“Look, until now, I always came by myself. In and out, grab a few things; no problem. First time I bring a group; everything goes to hell.” Glenn says, before adding, “No offense.”

There’s another moment of awkward silence between the group.

“If you want me to go down this gnarly hole, fine…but only if we do it my way.” As he continues talking, the confidence in Glenn grows a bit more, “It’s tight down there. If I run into something and I have to get out quick, I don’t want you all jammed up behind me, getting me killed.”

“I’ll take one person.” Glenn states.

Rick looks as if he’s just about to volunteer but Glenn stops him.

“Not you either. You’ve got Merle’s gun and I’ve seen you shoot.” Glenn explains, “I’d feel better if you were out in that store, watching those doors, covering our ass.”

Glenn then gestures to Andrea, “You’ve got the only other gun, so you should go with him.”

He then turns to Morales, “You be my wingman. Jacqui and Artemis stay here. Something happens, yell down to us, get us back up here in a hurry.”

“Okay.”

“Yes sir.”

“Okay, everyone knows their jobs.” Rick confirms, giving Glenn a pat on his back.

Glenn and Morales start to descend into the very friendly tunnel of hope. After making sure they’re down safely, Andrea and Rick head back up to the shops.

______________

Artemis and Jacqui watch as the other two pairs go and do their assigned jobs. There’s not a long silence before Artemis speaks up.

“What do you think about that Rick guy?”

“He seems decent enough.” Jacqui admits.

“Came out of nowhere and already has your trust? Must be aa sign or something.” Artemis jokes as she leans on the railing of the tunnel.

“You trynna say he’s the ‘chosen one’ or something?” Jacqui smiles.

“Might as well be at this point.”

They both chuckle, enjoying what could be one of their last moments. That is if Rick’s plan doesn’t go accordingly.

_______A Few Minutes Later_______

Morales, Glenn, Jacqui and Artemis come back up to the shops just in time to see the first set of glass doors chatter. The walkers flood the small space that they achieved, leaving only one set of glass doors between them and their dinner.

Rick keeps his eyes on the small army of walkers, “What’d ya found down there?”

“Not a way out.” Morales answers.

“We need to find one. Soon.” Andrea states.

The group agrees, before heading back up to the roof as quick as they can.

_____________

Rick scans across the viewable parts of the not so fabulous city through a pair of binoculars.

“That construction site, those trucks; they always keep keys on hand.” He points out to the desperate group.

Rick passes the binoculars to Morales. Morales looks from the construction site to the streets practically flooded with walkers.

“You’ll make it past the walkers.” Morales mutters.

Rick turns to Glenn, “You got me out of that tank.”

“Yeah, but they were feeding. They were distracted.” Glenn argues.

_______A Few Minutes Later_______

The groans, moans and shuffling surrounds Rick, Glenn and Artemis as they slowly shuffle through the streets. The stench practically fuming off them and the walkers is nauseating. They walk terribly slow, trying to blend in with the walkers like kids on their first day of school. They slowly inch closer to the yard where they need to get to.

Glenn looks over at the walking corpses. They used to be people. They probably died scared, suffering and alone. Thunder rolls and echoes throughout the streets, interrupting his intrusive thoughts.

Rain starts to slowly and gently fall. Rick looks back at Glenn and Artemis. Glenn’s face holds a stunned expression, whereas Artemis’s holds a worried expression. Rick subtly gestures for them to move faster.

As they near the fence surrounding the construction compound, wakers start to notice that they are in fact, not walkers, and start to walk towards them.

“Shit.” Artemis whispers, as if whispering could save them now.

“Go. Run. Come on.” Rick says.

The group start to run along the asphalt. The walking corpses reach and grab at the three of them. They reach the gate and start climbing. Artemis looks between Rick and Glenn and the oncoming tsunami of walkers. They won’t make it in time.

She pulls off her bag and shoves into Glenn’s hands.

“What are you doing?!” Glenn asks in concern.

“Being a distraction.” She hisses back.

“Are you crazy?!”

“Probably.”

“You can’t be serious.”

Artemis grabs Glenn’s shoulders, “The group needs you to survive. You and Officer Friendly over there. You’re like a brother to me, and if anything happened to me, I would beat myself up so bad if your girlfriend doesn’t beat me to it.”

With that she let’s go of him and starts to move along the fence, in the opposite direction to Glenn and Rick.

“Glenn, come on!” Rick yells.

_______Meanwhile_______

“It’s late, they should’ve been back by now.” Amy says as she paces in from of the RV.

“Girl, calm down, you worry too much.” Delilah says as she makes a daisy chain for Kayden while teaching Lily how to do it.

“They’ll be okay, they’re with Glenn and Artemas.” Lily says as she copies whatever Delilah does with the small flowers.

Dale pokes his head up from working on the RV’s engine, “Worrying won’t make it better.”

Amy lets out a sigh and walks off to occupy herself, in hopes it will make the others return quicker.

“Start it over.” Shane chuckles as he tries to teach Carl how to tie a tight knot.

Carl giggles and does as he says. Kayden watches Carl with fascination. His laughter and determination capturing her in a trance, like pretty much anything Carl does. Lori watches Shane and Carl interact from the clothes like.

The CB comes on, and they hear T-Dog’s voice, “Hello, base camp? Can anybody out there hear me?”

People start to gather around the radio again.

“Base camp, this is T-Dog. Anybody hear me?”

Dale answers it, “Hello? Hello? Receptions bad on this end. Repeat.”

“We’re in some deep shit here.” T-Dog admits, sounding distressed, “We’re trapped in the department store.”

Worried murmurs come from the others and Delilah looks over to Lily with wide eyes.

“Glenn will be okay. He’s the kind of guy to refuse to die until he says, ‘I love you’ one last time.” Lily says to comfort her best friend.

“Geeks…surrounded…of em…” T-Dog’s voice cuts in and out over the line.

“T-Dog can repeat that last bit?” Dale asks.

He just gets static in reply.

“He said the department store.” Lori clarifies.

“I heard it to.” Dale says.

“Shane-“

“He cuts Lori off, “No way. We do not go after them. We don not risk the rest of the group. Ya’ll know that.”

Amy speaks up, “So we’re just gonna leave her there?”

“And Glenn?” Delilah speaks up, her friend’s earlier comfort no longer working.

“Look, Amy, Lilah, I know that this is not easy-“

“They volunteered to go!” Amy argues, “To help the rest of us.”

“I know, and they knew the risks, right?” He states, keeping calm as to not aggravate her any further, “See, if they’re trapped, they’re gone. So we just have to deal with that. There’s nothing we can do.”

“She’s my sister, you son of a bitch.” Amy says as she storms off.

“Dude, your dad is such a downer. “Lily mumbles to Delilah.

She finishes her daisy crown, fitting it nicely on Carl’s head, as Delilah puts the chain around Kayden’s neck.

_______A Few Minutes Later_______

Since the last communication, the mood around the camp has been less than cheerful. The only thing lifting spirits now is Kayden and Carl running around the camp, pretending to be fairies, are being chased by the evil witches, Lily and Delilah.

Suddenly, the loud engine of what can be assumed to be a sports car, echoes throughout the quarry. A bright red car comes into view, driving towards the camp, and stopping right next to the RV. Glenn steps out of the car and looks around the group.

He’s bombarded with people around him, asking if everyone’s okay, telling him to turn the blaring car off, asking him what happened.

Glenn pops the bonnet of the car and Shane turns off the noise. Glenn looks around the group and almost instantly spots a flabbergasted Delilah with a bright pink blush.

He jogs over to her and wraps her in a tight hug. He rests his head on her shoulder and looks like he doesn’t intend on moving for a while. Delilah gathers herself and grabs his face her hands and presses their lips together.

“Ew!” Kayden and Carl squeal, carl covering Kayden’s eyes.

“Yeah, ew!” Lily chuckles and throws grass at the pair.

They break apart and immediately shy away from each other.

“Glenn, where are the others?” Dale asks.

“Coming.” Glenn mumbles, still very much flustered.

Just as he says this, a small truck drives up the road, parking behind the sports car. The group step out. Amy practically jumps tackles Andrea. Morales is just glad to see his wife and kids are still in one piece.

“How’d you all get out of there?” Lori asks.

“Thought you guys were trapped.” Jim adds.

“We were. The new guy got us out.” Morales says.

“New guy?” Dale asks.

“Yeah, crazy vato just got into town. Hey helicopter boy, come meet everyone!” Morales calls out to the truck.

Rick steps out of the truck, taking a few steps towards the new group of faces. He stops in his tracks. Carl and Lily turn to see him. Rick starts to walk toward them, Carl starts sprinting to Rick, his flower crown flying off, Lily not far behind.

“Dad!”

Carl jumps into Rick’s arms, and Lily hugs them both. After a few seconds Lori joins the hug as well. Carl is sobbing, Lily is also sobbing silently shedding a few tears and Rick is fighting back his own tears. Lori is in shock that Rik is alive after all this time, as is Shane.

The rest of the group watch with wide eyes as the once broken family reunite.

Taglist:

@kookiekult @smutinlove @far-cry-from-finality @zomb-1-egutzz

@shadowybasementmiracle @vaniniweenie @sleep-queen

@frankcastleautism @hisdahlia @carlslvr @zzombiegirl

@lunarnightt @carlmipololo @herrera2k @txrasbae

@a-vampire-bat @coveofthesiren

#the walking dead #twd #twd x tumblr #artemis everdeen #delilah walsh #kayden walsh #lily grimes

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holduwheremyheartis · 1 year

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#day 2 of my internship #idk im just traumatized from previous social situations #but im already crying bc i know I'll never escape the complete hell that is getting used to new places and people #and im also thinking about how i always need very clear instructions about everything ever #or else i just literally dont know what to do #I'm doing everything the teachers are asking me to do #and im trying to observe as much as i can to see if there's something they're not saying but are expecting me to do #but i ALWAYS miss these unspoken things people expect from me #(also even if i notice something most of the times i feel like im not allowed to do anything ever if people dont give me #permission explicitly)#so i was thinking about talking to the teachers im helping about these things #so they know that if im not doing something they expect (and is obvious i should be doing) is not bc I don't want to or something like that #and that sometimes i just need very clear instructions about everything people expect from me wjhwhss #but then im scared that if i bring this up I'll just make the situation weird idk #this has been a issue my whole entire life and now im too self aware to not feel anxious about it lmao #in previous situations i just noticed things like years after #now I'm paranoid so im always acared to be doing less than expected bc people usually dont explain the obvious stuff #ANYWAYS i haye being like this i need a new brain #camtalks

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priniya · 1 month

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ᯓᡣ𐭩 FORTS AND DADDY TIME! ᡣ𐭩ᯓ

pairing. oscar piastri x leclerc!wife!reader

summary. when you need to stay at work for longer than expected, you leave oscar with your daughter. when you come home earlier than your husband thought, the cutest scene plays in front of you.

notes. tysm for loving my previous dad!oscar fic!!! this one’s also not proofread but lets pretend like there is not a single mistake in here 😙😙😙

days like this were the hardest, especially with the thought of oscar’s summer break inevitable ending occupying your mind. every year, you wanted to make sure you had spent the maximum time with him and chloe, before parting your ways for a while again. going back to the office, while you were spending the precious time with your husband and daughter, was something you hated, mostly, because chloe was the biggest daddy’s girl on earth. some people might’ve gotten jealous over the fact that they’re not their baby’s favorite parent, but you loved watching oscar interact with chloe.

but honestly, leaving them alone was still a bit of a stressful situation for you and your emotions were all over the place as you tried writing down all the necessary things just in case oscsr forgets, which wasn’t likely to happen, but still — you wanted to be more than sure.

“baby, i know how to look after chloe.” oscar laughed softly, his arms wrapped around your waist as he stood behind, placing a single kiss on your neck. “we’re gonna have much fun today, right, squish?” he asked, when the little girl leaned on his leg, looking up at the two of you with a sweet smile. she nodded eagerly, earning a small chuckle from you.

“i good girl.” chloe replied confidently, wrapping her arms around oscar’s leg, wanting to stay as close to him as possible, despite it was you the one leaving (even if it was for a few long hours). “mommy good girl, too! and daddy good girl, too too!” the two of you had to stifle a laugh as your daughter praised you on being good girls.

a few minutes later, quite a couple of reassuring words from your husband, a few wet, sloppy kisses on your cheeks and a literal push out of the door and oscar was left with your little squish. at first everything was calm, chloe was sprawled out on the carpet, playing with her little’s pet shops collection, making a little voice-over, while your husband was preparing a strawberry smoothie for her.

though, before he knew it, he was dressed in one of your dresses, wearing a plastic tiara on his head with stickers plastered all over his cheeks, while sitting at chloe’s small, colourful table with some of her favorite plushies (a panda named jimmy, a koala named arty [after her favorite uncle], ginny the giraffe and daphne the dolphin).

“c’mon, princess squish, do a spin for daddy.” oscar smiled, watching as his daughter did a spin. he helped her get into her purple tutu dress, put a tiara and a few hair clips in the strands of her blond hair. to make her princess tea party experience even better, he took some of your eyeshadow palettes and put some on her to match her purple dress.

“i so pretty, daddy!” she squeaked happily, doing a little dance. “tea?” she asks as she plops down on her dad’s lap, pouring a pretend tea into his pink cup. “tasty, tasty.” she nodded, taking a sip.

“yeah, you’re my pretty princess, squish.” oscar chuckled, earning himself one of the most beautiful views in the world — his daughter grinning, showing him her baby teeth. your husband couldn’t help but to grin back at her, feeling her little arms wrap around his neck as she went in for a hug.

oscar was a sucker for moment like those, as much as he wished you were there to witness it, he loved spending time with chloe, seeing her grow up every day, noticing those slight changes in the way she constructed her sentences and how the incoherent babbling started to turn into actual words and sentences. he was counting down the days till she was old enough to not tire you out whenever on a flight, so he could see her happy face after a race and to show her the beauties of the world on a free day. god, she was the the most important person in the world for him in a way he could drop everything to make sure she was happy.

his heart ached painfully, every time he was away from you and chloe for longer than a few days and with his hectic schedule. everything seemed to be a lot better, when his lucky charms were next to him.

the princess tea party went on for almost another hour until the princess hosting it started to slowly get tired and tired, snuggling up to him after they finished cleaning everything up. it took them some time, because she had to give each of her plushies a few kisses before placing them in her bed, tucking them in. “you’re such a sweet girl, aren’t you, baby?” he chuckled, watching her as he leaned on the doorframe of her room.

she tilted her head with a tiny smile as she ran towards her dad, unfortunately, she tripped on the edge of the carpet, scraping her knees at the friction as she fell. tears started falling down her cheeks in an instant and oscar’s heart broke in half. he knew accidents happen all the time, but he wasn’t prepared for one involving his daughter, when he was all alone, even if it was just a small scratch.

“shh, hey, what’s with the fuss?” he asked in a calm voice, gently picking her up. your husband placed a few soft kisses on chloe’s wet cheek to calm her down. “s’okay, daddy’s gonna take care of your ouchie.” he reassured as she nuzzled her teary face against his neck, sniffling quietly.

“fait mal, daddy.” she sniffled. oscar was glad that once in a while, your brothers wanted to mess with him and spoke only in french before chloe was born, so he could pick up on what his daughter was saying. hurts.

“i know, squish.” he sighed, gently sitting her down on the couch, telling his baby to sit still, while she tried to wipe away her flowing cheeks. he sprayed antiseptic on her scratches, holding her hand with his free one. a small gasp left his daughter’s lips as the spray coated her ouchies. “such a brave, girl.” he coaxed, placing two band-aids on her disinfected knees (with puppies, of course). when her face was no longer in tears, a sad pout appeared on her lips, making oscar’s stomach turn.

“how about, we make a blanket fort and watch some cartoon before you go to sleep, hm?” he suggested, the pout disappearing in a second, being replaced my a grin. a blanket fort? that sounds super cool. he pulled a few chairs together, putting a blanket on top of it as chloe’s eyes widened in shock and excitement.

the final product was breathtaking, at least for chloe, because oscar did everything he could to make the blanket fort look magical as he put pillows on the floor, put up lights and brought his ipad to play chloe’s favorite movie.

before he knew it, his little girl was curled up against his side, his hand gently moving up and down against her back as her head rested on the side of his chest. her eyes were slowly closing, but she wanted to stay in the fort and he wasn’t in the mood to deal with a tantrum of a sleepy, cranky little girl.

when you came back from work, the apartment looked clean, as if oscar sedated your little ball of energy and hired a cleaning company. that was your thought process, until you noticed a blanket fort in the living room and your heart melted like a chocolate in a water bath. you quietly took off your shoes and tiptoed to the fort, peaking inside. seeing the view completely shattered your heart in the most positive way possible.

“you’re back already?” oscar asked quietly, not wanting to disturb chloe’s sleep as she was laying down on his chest. “thought it’d take a little longer.” he smiled affectionately at you.

“think there’s some room for me?” your mouth curled into a small beam as he nodded, quickly taking a spot next to him, finally noticing that he’s wearing one of your dresses and you had to stiffle a laugh.

oscar noticed your expression and groaned quietly. “we had a princess party.” he explained, though the pretend angered look quickly dissolved, replaced by a playful smile. “your daughter didn’t let me be a prince, so i had to stole one of your dresses. i’ll show you the photos tomorrow morning.” he kissed your temple as you snuggled up closer, your hand gently rubbing chloe’s back.

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ceilidho · 8 months

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take me home, country road

[ao3]

prompt: 1800s price/reader…. reader flees to his town where Price is the sheriff after a murder in her previous town only to be mistaken for the mail order bride that Price just sent for ….and he’s not interested in hearing any of her excuses when she tells him that he’s got the wrong girl (part 3) part 1, part 2

“Neglecting your husband already?” he asks when you pull away from the arm curling around your waist. It’d migrated there from your back during the walk away from the courthouse.

“You know I’m not—I’m not some horse that you can just…break in,” you seethe, glaring up at Price. Your arms are crossed tight over your chest, putting the slightest boundary between you and him. It’s more of a mental boundary than anything, a self-soothing gesture; you know it hardly even registers to him because the man still looks down at you with that unimpressed expression, like dealing with a particularly vexing child.

“I hadn’t noticed,” he says dryly, looking you up and down. It’s a scorching, hungry look and it makes you shift from foot to foot.

The two of you stand outside the front door of his house, the front door still shut tight. You put up a fuss on the walk from town as the reality of your situation finally sunk in, squirming in his hold until he threatened to just load you over his shoulder and carry you off. His tone leaves little for you to doubt. Nothing about him brooks skepticism; until the end of time, you’ll look at John Price and think, this is a man of action. This is a man that will move heaven and earth.

You clam up after that, lips pursed shut though turned down at the corners.

It’s a bigger house than you might’ve expected for a single man, but perhaps it was built with a wife and children in mind. The thought makes you swallow. A wooden two-story thing with a porch out front and an adjacent stable for his two horses with a pen around back. Speckled Appaloosas that look up at the sound of his boots and keys, attentive for all of a few seconds before losing interest.

You know without asking that Price must have built this house with his own two hands. It’s not shoddy by any means, but his house has that indefinable quality that some places have. Organic. Homegrown, almost. It’s hard to put up against the houses of your youth, but then again, you grew up in the cramped quarters of the city, apartments thick with the scent of sewage on bad days and dust on the good. The two are hardly comparable. It’s even harder to put up against the estates that you’ve spent the better part of the last few years cleaning and learning inside out, but at least his house doesn’t make your stomach turn at the sight.

There’s a moment when you first turn to him where you wonder if he’ll look for approval in your face, some sign to set him at ease, but when you meet his gaze, it’s steady and impenetrable. Quietly self-assured. It’s incongruent with the machismo you were raised around, the constant need to impress or transcend. It puts you on edge. It makes you almost feel like baring your teeth.

Your comment had come from seeing the horses and the house and the porch with the two rocking chairs, your hackles raising every step closer. Price built his house big enough for children because he anticipated a baby in his future. Children he’d have with his wife, which, though a fuzzy memory as far as memories go, you quietly stepped into the role of not half an hour ago.

You’ve thought about it before. Motherhood; marriage, domestic living, settling down with a man to start a family. The reality of your life has always made it seem like a problem for the future. Years chipping away like flakes of faded paint off the walls of your bedroom, still living with your aunt and uncle well into adulthood, trying desperately to scrimp and save and stay afloat. Disappointing but not surprising that you’d never been considered the marriable sort, not with scrubbing other people's toilets for a living.

And now look at you, ring on your finger and whisked home to be bedded. A shiver roles down your spine at the thought and you scowl at Price instead of sinking into the strange thrill.

When he wraps a hand around your wrist to pull you towards him (his fingers easily overlapping; another thrill), you snap.

“That is quite enough with all the touching!”

His eyes narrow. “I’ll have more than my hands on you by the end of the night.”

A more proper woman would gasp. You barely hold yours back.

You know in the back of your mind that you’ve already lost any semblance of an upper hand in this situation. It has long spiraled out of your control. His ring sits on your finger all nice and pretty, and though you signed your marriage license under a different name—your own rather than the name of his actual intended—that Price hadn’t even bothered confirming, you are, for all intents and purposes, his to touch as he pleases.

“I’m—” your eyes dart around, the urge to bolt a sharp and sudden compulsion lodged in your chest, “—I know I said yes, but I—there’s always the possibility of an a-annulment if we don’t…if…”

You flinch, startled, when he pulls you into his chest only to cup your face again. He has big hands with callused fingers, rough against your skin. Up close, you can see the way his beard is cropped closer than his mustache and mutton chops. It gives him a grim air, almost somber until you catch his eyes staring down at you with an affection that feels unearned, meant for someone else.

“Deep breaths, darling, there’s nothing to fret about just yet. You’ll work yourself into a state like this,” he murmurs, dropping his head to sip a kiss from your lips again.

You’ve been in a state since the moment you walked into the sheriff’s office and laid eyes on this man. Turned around and knocked sideways, like you’ve walked into a storybook without noticing. If only it hadn’t all been so sudden, you might’ve been able to approach the situation with a clearer head. You might’ve been able to think up some other way out of it beyond giving Price a fake name and waiting anxiously for your true identity to be painstakingly drawn out over the course of a week.

“Don’t know why you keep working yourself up,” Price says softly, then slots your lips together for another tender kiss. “Figured you might be a little skittish, but…’m gonna be such a good husband for you, honey. Not gonna want for nothing.”

His slow kisses drag out longer than back in the courthouse, languorous and decadent. As if he has all the time in the world now. In a way, he does, now that he’s helped collect your belongings from the inn and brought you home. When you think of pulling away, the hand wrapped around your wrist lets go and slides to your back, pulling you flush against his chest. Your breasts flatten against his chest, pulse skittering like mad when you feel the hardest of his chest against yours and the muscle holding you in place.

You can’t help the whimper that escapes your lips when the hand on your cheek slides to the nape of your neck and grips, holding you in place. The kiss deepens, the heat on your cheeks feeling palpably hot, vision swimming until your eyes have no choice but to flutter shut. Your suitcase sits forgotten somewhere in the dirt, toppled over onto its side. You pant low, hot breaths into his mouth when he breaks the kiss, letting his lips just hover over yours.

“There we go, darlin’,” Price mumbles against your mouth, sliding the hand on your low back down to grip the plump flesh of your ass through your dress, lips twitching when you make a broken, affronted sound. “Isn’ that better? Not thinkin’ so hard?”

You can’t think at all, in truth. When he kisses you again, your thoughts evaporate up into the clouds, the tongue licking into your mouth dispelling any ideas or notions you might’ve had. It disappears into the heat and lust and the fingers digging into your backside, groping at the flesh there without shame or compunction. You go with him when he clutches you closer, gasping again into his mouth when you feel something hard press against your low belly. He grunts when you twitch against it.

“John—John—” you gasp, pulling your mouth away and whimpering when he chases after you, letting him steal another wet, slick kiss before your trembling hands clutch at the fabric of his shirt. “Enough—it’s not—it’s not proper—”

“No prying eyes around here,” he grunts. “‘Sides, who’s going to tell a man he can’t kiss his own wife?”

Trembling all the harder at his words, you dig your nails into his shirt sleeves and hope you pinch the skin underneath. All twisted up inside. The ring on your finger glimmers when it catches the light, brighter even than the sun this close to your face. When Price feels your nails dig into his arms, he groans, fingers pressing harder into your bottom and making you squeak. All the pent up lust finally trickling out of him and into you.

“C’mon, honey, let’s get you inside.” He finally lets you go after giving your bottom lip one last wet suck, pulling it into his mouth while his half-lidded eyes stare into yours. It’s somehow more intimate than kissing.

You’re still reeling when he turns around to pick your suitcase off the ground, certain that your knees will give way and send you tumbling as well. Every point of contact on your body sizzles, aches. You watch from outside of yourself as he turns back to you, suitcase in his hand now, eyes still dark and fixed on you. Hungry. Your eyes widen when they flit down to find a thick bulge at the crotch of his pants.

Like a cold bucket of water has been dumped over your head, you hiss and back up three steps when he takes a step towards you. “Oh no, you don’t take one step closer! I won’t have anything to do with—with that!”

You must look like some feral barn cat, back all puffed up, teeth bared to the man trying to coax you towards him. Price must see it too because he grins, amused. “Still spittin’ mad, huh? Felt those claws in me before, darlin’…gonna love feeling them with nothing between us.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Price doesn’t bother clearing anything up, but you intuit it the second he takes another step in your direction, whirling around and sprinting towards the house. It feels counterproductive to seek shelter in the man’s house, but dusty plains stretch out in every direction apart from back into town, where you know not a soul will lift a finger to help you. His house is the only shelter you’re going to get.

You hurry up the porch stairs, tearing open the door before glancing over your shoulder to find Price not far behind. He advances on you at a walking pace, but each stride of his long legs matches two of yours, making you shriek and scurry up the staircase. You dart for the first open door you see, slamming it shut behind you and leaning your whole weight against it. Glancing down, you perk up at the sight of a lock on the door before flipping it.

It’s not long before the sound of boots clomping up the staircase meets your ears, headed straight in your direction. You shake when you hear him pause right outside the door, then startle when he tries the knob.

“You gonna let me in, darling?” Price asks, grin in his voice. Even raps his knuckle against the door for good measure.

“No,” you snap.

“Not even for your things? Got your suitcase right here.” You hear him set it down, a little clunk against the wood floor.

“I can manage like this. I’ve slept in my dress before.”

He pauses. “Have you?”

You tilt your chin up proudly despite the door blocking his view. “Yes, and I don’t mind doing it again. You can just stay on the other side of that door until you…until you put that thing away.”

“Can’t do much about that thing, darling; it’s sort of grown on me over the years anyway,” Price chuckles. “Well, not much I can do with it behind this door. I’ll go tend the horses ‘till suppertime comes ‘round and then come back to tend to you.”

“Licentious…reprobate,” you hiss through the door.

He laughs, the sound deep in his throat. Your stomach flips.

The stairs creak under the weight of his boots as he descends back downstairs. You wait until you hear the front door open and shut behind him, until the house is completely quiet save for the blood pumping in your ears before you hastily unlock the door and dart a hand out just to pull your suitcase in. You shut and lock the door as soon as it passes the threshold.

It takes a while to settle your nerves and for the trembling to subside. In the meantime, you sit on your bottom at the foot of the door, with your back still pressed firmly to the wood, and take stock. There’s a bed in the room, one you hadn’t noticed in your mad scramble to lock yourself in. A bigger bed than the one you’d slept on back at the inn, but just as sparse, with gray flannel sheets and a blue quilt folded and draped over the end of the bed.

The rest of the furniture in the room—two end tables, a chest of drawers, a desk, and two chairs situated in the corner of the room—appears so consistent in its design that you have to wonder if Price made them by hand as well. Hardly a reason to question it. You think to yourself that you’ll have to ask him how he finds the time only to quickly shake that thought away. Can’t be getting too chummy, certainly not if you don’t expect to be around in a month’s time. Hopefully less than that.

You chew on your lip at the thought of fleeing in the night.

It trickles into your thoughts while you open your suitcase on the bed and riffle around for your nightwear. Price will likely keep you under lock and key for at least the first week of your marriage, giving you little opportunity to take off any time soon. If only you’d held your tongue and played the demure bride, he might’ve had some cause to trust you. Certainly not now, after your most recent display.

Your own stupid fault, as usual. It’s not the first time your temper has gotten the better of you. You’ve faced worse consequences for it.

Outside the window on the far end of the room, a horse whinnies. You pause, remembering that Price hadn’t gone very far. When you glance out curiously, you see him letting the horses into the pen, giving one a good rub down the bridge of its nose. The horses seem to melt under his touch.

It’s strange watching him from far away. From a distance, it’s hard to reconcile him with the man that bent you over his desk not an hour ago and tanned your bottom. You cringe at the memory. It’s not that Price doesn’t seem like a man that would take his wife over his knee if he saw fit to do so, but you still can’t imagine yourself as that woman. When you think about it, it feels like a play, something you saw happen to someone else. Not you wailing and squirming like a cat in heat.

As if feeling your stare, he glances up at the window and winks when he catches your eye. With a squeak, you leap away from the window, scurrying back over to the bed.

A couple hours pass in restless contemplation, practically biting your nails to the quick. Eyeing the windowsill like you still might go over there just to check on what Price is up to outside. You hear him come back into the house once or twice, tensing up at the sound of his boots, only to be left vaguely disappointed when you hear him leave and the screen door slam shut behind him.

You spend so long holed up in the bedroom that you miss lunch entirely. Below you, you hear Price puttering around downstairs in the kitchen—the sound of a knife chopping vegetables and then the sizzle of meat on a pan. The hunger pangs nearly make you break, but you’ve gone without food before.

Your heart skips a beat when you hear him ascend the staircase again and place something just outside of your door. He doesn’t try coaxing you out this time, just heads back down the stairs and out the front door. Again, you ignore the pang of disappointment; ignore the urge to open the door and holler down the stairs for him to stay gone.

He leaves anyway.

Curiosity needles at you though, so you open the door up a crack when you’re sure you’re alone. There’s a plate at the foot of the door with vegetables and meat, slightly cooled but still fresh, the plate still warm. He must’ve known you wouldn’t try coming downstairs and fixed you up a plate.

You eat in silence at the desk, bad mood ripening. Angry at yourself and everyone else. Even John. Especially John. The audacity of fixing you up a plate, of thinking of you in the first place. Irritated enough to stand boldly by the window this time, hand clutched in the curtain, tracking the movement of his shoulders and hips when he moves with the horses and fetches water from the well. You lose sight of him a couple times as he finishes up the day’s chores around the house, but the flutter in your belly always settles when he comes back into view.

It’s easy to let yourself admire him from afar, somehow less humiliating without his eyes on you. He’s a solid man, body carved into its shape from the rough labor that’s part and parcel of living out on the frontier. A wide back tapering down to lean, narrow hips and thick, muscled thighs hewn from lifting and pulling and all manner of physical work. You bite your lip when you remember what it felt like to cling to that back and dig your nails into his arms.

You give your head a shake. It’s dangerous to let a thought like that latch on.

In the few hours between lunch and sunset, you occupy yourself by reading one of the books stowed away in your suitcase. Then get bored and refold your clothes. The horses bray when they’re taken into the stables for the evening. The crickets out in the bushes in the yard chirp as the sun sets pink in the far distance. It’s quieter out here in the plains than back in the city, you think, something you haven’t yet had the time to appreciate.

When Price comes in for the night, you’re firm in your resolve to keep the door shut. If lunch at the door was just an attempt to butter you up, he has another thing coming. In a house this big, there’s likely a guest room or somewhere else to sleep—a sofa or a sleeping bag tucked away under the stairs. He’ll just have to make do while you take the bedroom. There’ll be no sharing a bed with the man that grabbed your backside like a piece of meat.

He doesn’t come up the stairs right away. Like before, you hear him rustle up supper, spatula scraping against a pan and knife coming down on a chopping block again and again. Not enough time has passed since lunch for you to feel more than peckish. You’re thankful for that when you hear him sit down to eat.

The knock at the door startles you. You hadn’t heard him come up the stairs. “Ready to talk now?”

You stare balefully at the door. “No.”

“We have to figure this out sometime, darling.”

“No, we don’t.”

“I’m sorry if I gave you a fright earlier, but, honey, that’s how husbands kiss their wives. Nothing improper about it.”

“I’m not frightened, I’m just not—we don’t need to do any of that,” you huff, embarrassed all over again. “You’ve hardly given me any time to even think. I didn’t know you from Adam this morning and now we’re married.”

Price sighs, the sound muffled through the door. “What am I going to do with you, honey?” It’s said to himself, a fond exasperation that puts you on edge all over again. He has no right to be amused with you, no right to be delighted and charmed by your ire.

“Well, you can sleep somewhere else for the time being. I’d prefer the bed to myself.”

He lets out a low, dark laugh. “There’s not a chance in hell that I’m sleeping anywhere but with my wife from this point on. You oughta come to terms with that quick.”

“Well then, you can sleep out there because I’m not unlocking the door!”

He lets out a mean sound, almost mocking. “Yeah, ‘bout time I addressed that, huh?”

His words make you frown until you hear a floorboard creak as Price does something on the other side of the door. Then the doorknob jiggles. Horrified, you watch as the door unlocks and the knob turns, your husband’s body filling out the door frame. You’d forgotten how well he could fill one out. He almost has to duck to come inside, mused hair from working outside all day brushing against the top of the frame.

“Always put a key on the top of the door, just in case,” he explains, pinching the little silver key between his thumb and forefinger before shutting the door. Your heart jumps when he locks it behind him. “Ready to talk now, honey?”

#ceil writing #cod mw2 #cod x reader #captain price #captain john price #john price #cod price #price x you #price x reader #price/reader #john price x reader #mail order bride au

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entitled-fangirl · 8 months

Text

Two idiots in love.

Joel Miller x anemic!reader

Summary: Ellie notices the two lovebirds, and decides to ask Joel about it after the reader falls asleep.

Words: 1,584

Warnings: talk of death, anemia, mutual pining, cursing, Ellie being a shithead as always...

Author's note: The way I write about this man all day long but none of the fics go together 😦

Part 2!!!

Masterlist

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Joel decided to set up camp for the night, only outside of Boston by 10 miles.

Tess had just died, and things were still tender between Joel, Y/N, and Ellie.

Tess was Y/N’s older sister, and she looked up to her more than anyone.

And so did Joel.

Tess was their rock. Their steady hand in hard times. And she was gone.

But at least Joel and Y/N had each other.

They had been in an awkward “Are they? Aren’t they?” Situation for the past two years.

They liked each other, that much was clear by the stolen glances and small smiles they gave one another. But they hesitated.

They didn’t want to invest too much in each other just to watch the other die in front of them.

So, they remained friends.

Friends that like each other a lot.

And Ellie noticed it too.

She saw the way the two “friends” would share food. His hand was always placed on her waist or shoulder. Her eyes always flickered to him in a situation.

She knew they loved each other.

Y/N sat her pack down, her body sore. She sat down, leaning back against the trunk of a tree.

Joel immediately took notice of her exhausted behavior, “Hey.”

She looked up, her voice soft, “…what?”

He kneels down next to her, “…you alright? Not… hurt or nothing?”

She pulls up her sleeve, revealing a nasty bruised where an infected had grabbed her.

He immediately pulled her arm in front of him, studying it.

“I’m fine…really. Just a bruise….”

His thumb grazes over her forearm lightly, his mind wandering a million miles an hour.

But that mind stilled when she spoke again, “…you alright, Joel?”

He nods, “Yeah. Fine.”

She takes that as an answer, studying the frown lines in his face with a smile of her own. She couldn’t help but like the older man. How kind he was to her. The caring touch he always gave her. She always felt her heart jump when he’d give her a soft look after practically murdering someone in front of her. In a way, it was… sweet.

Ellie had a shit eating grin on her face, watching the exchange with a careful eye.

If Joel noticed, he didn’t care enough to comment, his worry focused on the woman in front of him. “You take your meds?”

She sighed, her shoulders falling slightly, “…no.”

His eyes hardened, “Take them.”

A small smile came to her lips, “…Joel…”

“I fucking mean it. Take them. Now.”

Her smile fell, realizing how serious he had become. Her eyes watched the micro-expressions in his face change too.

She pushed herself up slightly with a huff. She pulled her pack to her, flipping the top up with a bit of an attitude. She dug around for a while. Finally, she found them, pulling out the orange pill bottle with a content sigh.

Joel reached back, pulling out his canteen, handing it to her. “Go on…”

She took the pills, taking a drink from his canteen and handing it back to him.

He smiled, “Good girl.”

And with that, he stood, going to check the perimeter.

Ellie watched him walk away, her eyebrows furrowing. She stood up, walking closer to Y/N. She then kneeled down, not much differently than Joel had. “What, uh… what was that?”

The woman scoffed softly, “…you’ve never heard of medication before?”

Ellie rolled her eyes, “No. I know what that is. I meant… you two. Like… what… I don’t know… what are you two?”

The woman looked up at the sunset. Or, at least, what she could see over the trees. She sighed, “I don’t know, El. Don’t ask things that there’s no answer to.”

Ellie huffed, moving back to her previous spot.

…

A few hours later, when the sun was long gone, the three of them sat around a small fire. Ellie sat across from Joel and Y/N, occasionally looking over at them.

Y/N’s eyelids were slightly drooping. They had been like that since they stopped for the day. It seemed that she couldn’t keep herself awake.

And Joel noticed. Of course, he did.

So, he let her lean against him, her head resting on his shoulder.

He leaned his head down, his mouth in her hair, “Wanna sleep, sweetheart?”

Her grip tightened on his arm just slightly, “no… I… I’m fine… I’m awake…”

Joel chuckled. “Nah, honey. Go to sleep. Ellie and I will watch, right?”

Ellie’s head perked up and she nodded quickly.

Y/N seemed to take that for an answer, slowly beginning to move to set up her sleeping bag.

Joel grabbed her wrist, “Hey. Just… stay here, yeah?”

She turned to look at him, her eyebrows coming together in confusion. But the confusion didn’t outweigh the exhaustion, because she quickly nodded and moved back.

She leaned against his shoulder once again, feeling his arm snake around her waist to hold her against him.

“Just sleep. I gotcha, darlin’.”

She let her eyes close, the sleep calling to her.

A silence resounded through the forest, only the cricket’s chirping being heard.

Joel held her close, relishing in the feeling it gave him to know she was there. Safe in his arms. He could see her resting next to him, her chest moving up and down with each breath.

He lightly kissed the top of her head.

It seemed only then he remembered Ellie’s presence, because his gaze shifted her her.

She had a large smirk on her face, her eyebrows raised.

Joel scoffed, “Oh, shut up.”

“I didn’t say nothing.”

“You said enough.”

She laughs to herself, going back to staring at the fire.

Y/N shivered lightly, her body temperature dropping.

Joel immediately shrugged off his jacket, moving her in his arms to wrap it around her.

It woke her up, just barely, as she began to mumble. “No… don’t… I… I’m not cold...”

He wrapped her in it, pulling her further into his arms, trying to transfer some of his heat to her.

“…Joel…”

He leaned his head down, “It’s alright… I wanted to… Let me look after you. Please, sweetheart.”

A soft breath left her lungs as she relaxed again, presumably falling back asleep.

Ellie studied the transaction, curious about something.

Joel rolled his eyes, “What now?”

Ellie continued to stare at the woman, “What’s wrong with her?”

Joel’s jaw clenched. “There’s nothing wrong with her. She just… has a harder time than most.”

“...Well, that was vague as fuck.”

“Ellie… Goddammit. Just… ugh.”

“...Well…?”

Joel sighed, “…it’s anemia. She’s anemic.”

Ellie stared at the fire, thinking, “I don’t…”

“It’s a blood disease.”

Her mouth formed a small ‘o,’ her eyes moving back to him. He took this as a sign to continue.

“The body needs oxygen. And a lot of it. There are these… carriers, I guess you could say, and they carry the oxygen through the bloodstream to different organs. They’re called blood cells.”

Ellie nodded, trying to follow along.

“Well, she doesn’t make enough of them. Her body doesn’t get enough oxygen. Makes her tired… and… whatnot…”

“So, that’s what her medicine is for?”

Joel nodded. “Hard to come by but… better than nothing.”

Ellie gulped. “And… when she doesn’t have any more?”

Joel's gaze hardened. “She has enough for the trip, alright. This is the most strenuous thing I’ll ever make her do,” his hand rubs across his face, “…fuck..” He sighed under his breath.

“So… it makes her tired and…what?”

Joel looks back up at her, “…dizzy, nauseous… she passes out sometimes, but… it’s rare. Out of breath… she’s having a harder time right now because… well.. you know…”

Ellie’s stare was blank, “…how the fuck do I know?”

Joel sighed again, his voice slightly raised, “Goddammit. Her… time of the month…”

“Oh. She’s on her period?” Ellie said with a smirk.

“Yeah. Yeah. So… even more less blood to go around… so… we’ll take it easy the next few days… give her a break.”

Ellie nods. Silence sets in before...

“You love her, don’t you?”

Joel’s head perks up, a surprised look on his face. “…What? No, I don’t…”

“Yeah you do.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Look at yourself, Joel.”

Joel looked down. His arm was wrapped around her waist, the other arm rubbing up and down her leg to create heat. He let out a grunt, “This is why I don’t fucking tell you things.”

Ellie scoffed, “You didn’t fucking say it. I’m looking at it, idiot.”

“Go the fuck to bed.”

“Wow. Just... wow. Way to be an adult, Joel. Real mature.”

“Goodnight.”

…

Y/N woke up a little while later to Joel moving her in his arms. She shifted, her eyes starting to open.

“Shh…. Go back to bed, baby," Joel whispered in her ear, "Just… go back to sleep for me.”

She was laying in Joel’s sleeping bag with him, his arms wrapped around her tightly, her head resting on his chest.

She hummed, “mmm… but…”

She could feel his smile, “None of that. Sleep, sweetheart. I’ll be here when you wake up. I always am.”

…

Surprisingly, Ellie was the first one to wake up that morning. She sat up, craning her neck to check for her companions.

And God, she wished she had a camera.

The two were wrapped in each other’s embrace, Joel’s soft snores echoing.

They were just two fucking idiots in love.

And Ellie made it her mission to get them together by the end of the trip.

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Author's note: I made a part 2!!!

#fanfiction #joel miller imagine #joel miller fic #joel miller x reader #joel miller tlou #joel tlou #tlou fanfiction #tlou #tlou imagine #tlou x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us fanfiction #the last of us fanfic #pedro pascal fandom #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal x reader #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal

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dyaz-stories · 9 months

Text

hands shaking from holding back from you || Hyun-Su x f!reader

summary: Spring is here, and Hyun-Su offers to take you out on a date, which soon leads to more between the two of you

word count: 3.5k

warnings & tags: some fluff, angst because it's sweet home, kissing, heavy make-out session, gets pretty suggestive but never explicit, monster!hyun-su makes an appearance, the pronoun 'her' is used once in reference to the reader

first one-shot · previous one-shot

A/N: to give a little context, reader and Hyun-Su were in high school together, reader was only there for a year before going to another high school, and therefore has no knowledge of the bullying which hyun-su was a victim of. this one-shot can be read independently (there's nothing intense plot-wise that requires having read the other parts), but I do recommend reading them for context.

There is something strange about spring returning in a forever changed world. It had been so fitting, the apocalypse starting with winter, when everything was dead and desolate. Now, nature is starting to bloom again. The streets should be filled with noise and people, and you should be studying for your exams. Instead, you’re rationing your food, and you haven’t been outside in forever — you don’t need to, now that you have a knight in his torn hoodie to make sure you have everything you need.

Hyun-Su truly is the silver lining in the situation. The only good thing in the world as it is. He’s been more confident around you lately, more at ease. Still, it surprises you when he comes by on a sunny afternoon, and offers, with this soft, cautious voice of his:

“Do you want to go out today?”

You’re putting away some fresh fruits he picked for you, and you turn around in confusion.

“What do you mean, out?”

‘Outside’ is dangerous. ‘Outside’ is a place you only go when you’re desperate, and you plan as efficiently as possible, to ensure you spend the least amount of time there. ‘Outside’, everything is a threat, and you can only breathe when you’re back at the house.

‘Outside’ regularly takes Hyun-Su from you.

Sure, he’s around a lot more, these days, but he still has to leave every now and then. You’ve come to understand that you’re not the only one who relies on him, but he hasn’t provided an explanation, and you haven’t pried. It burns a little every time he leaves, and yet…

And yet, the fear that he wouldn’t answer if you asked is worse. The fear that he might not come back if you didn’t let it rest. The fear that if he had to choose, he wouldn’t choose you.

“It’s nice out,” he answers, and you notice him retreating even as he’s still speaking. “But you don’t have to, if you don’t want to—”

“No, I’d love to,” you cut him off before he can doubt himself further. “I just— Wouldn’t that be— dangerous?”

“Oh.” He smiles, and it’s mesmerizing. It’s not the bright, joyful smile you were used to seeing, back in high school, but being more subdued doesn’t make it any less genuine. “I’ll keep you safe. I promise.”

There’s no cockiness in his voice, just confidence.

“Then… Sure. I’d love to go out with you.” And you’re not usually the type to say that, because you don’t have the guts for it, but you feel comfortable enough with Hyun-Su to lean towards him with a playful smile. “It’s a date then?”

He lets out a brief, surprised laugh, then glances down at his feet while his cheeks and ears turn red.

“Sure. It’s a date.”

Even if you were the instigator, you still feel your face burn at how soft his eyes are when he looks back at you.

He looks at you like you’re one of the seven wonders.

You see him lick his lips as his eyes fall on yours. You could always take the step to fill the distance between the two of you, but Hyun-Su rarely initiates, so you want to give him the chance to do so. When he does, it’s always so soft and so careful, like he’s afraid of breaking you. After a few seconds, he clears his throat, looks away again — and it’s alright. You won’t rush him.

“I’ll go get ready,” you hum, stepping out of the room.

You miss the way Hyun-Su follows you with adoring eyes.

When you emerge back from your room, Hyun-Su is waiting for you, and you follow him, heart rate spiking when you go through the door. Being outside again, without the need to go get some specific and vital item, is— strange. Your eyes dart around you, constantly taking in your surroundings. There are surprisingly few monsters, compared to the chaos that was early winter. In front of you, Hyun-Su walks casually, seemingly without paying much attention to what is happening around him. You trust him, you really do, but there’s you still find it unnerving about that.

When you jump at some faraway sound, that turns out to be just birds flying away, scared by your approach, he offers you his hand, an amused smile on his lips. He might even suppress a laugh, but you can’t tell for sure.

“Is that okay?” he asks you softly as he closes his fingers around yours.

He treats you like you’re made of porcelain.

“It’s much better,” you reply with a smile, even if you feel a little sheepish.

For a second, he stares into your eyes, before he looks away and lets out a deep, long exhale. You don’t question him, just give his hand a squeeze, hoping it comes off as a silent reassurance.

He squeezes back, then pulls you with him as you keep going through the city.

“Is there— Is there nothing here anymore?” you ask. It feels like you should have seen a monster by now.

“They’re here,” Hyun-Su replies casually, like monsters aren’t a death promise. “They just know better than to approach.”

You swallow. You understand what he doesn’t say — they know better than to approach him — but it’s not that much of a reassurance, for you. You quicken your pace to stay closer to him. It says a lot about how far he’s come that he doesn’t jump when your shoulder brushes against his.

“They’re not all dangerous,” he says. You know he intends for it to be reassuring, but all you can do is grimace in response.

“They might not be,” you answer — you remember a flash of wings as an unseen monster ripped the snake-like creature that was trying to enter your home —, “but it’s not like I have a way of knowing which ones are safe and which ones aren’t.”

There’s a long silence as Hyun-Su keeps walking.

“But isn’t that true of humans, too?” he asks you in the end. He sounds so— sad, and yet you don’t know what to tell him to make it better. He’s not like them, you want to assure him. You’d never conflate him with the ones that tried to murder you — but it’s not like you can forget about them altogether either. Being wrong about trusting a monster, being wounded once could sign your end.

“It is,” you reply slowly. It’s especially true in this new world, where humans have dropped all their inhibitions. “I guess it’s just— Humans have been less of danger to me, you know?” A brief laugh. “But it’s not like I’m running after them either, right? I haven’t stepped foot near the shelter.”

Your dad didn’t trust the military, and you’re distrustful of authority. There might be strength in numbers, but you wouldn’t feel safe being surrounded by men with machine guns while you have nothing.

Hyun-Su hums at your answer. It does seem to have brought him some comfort, and yet you feel the need not to leave it at that.

“You know I trust you, right?” He freezes and turns to look at you. “Both sides,” you insist. “I know you’re safe.”

His lips part as if to say something, before he closes them again and his Adam’s apple bobs up and down. Finally, he nods.

“I feel safe with you, too,” he says. The sentence catches you by surprise, almost makes you want to laugh, because— who in their right mind would think you’re a threat? But Hyun-Su says it with such gravitas that you can only assume that there’s something that you don’t know about under there. Truth be told, there’s a lot you haven’t talked about with him. He’s not talkative, not anymore at least, and it’s hard to know which questions you can ask before reaching a painful subject. And there are countless of these, for everyone, since the Apocalypse hit. “Come on,” he adds after a few seconds. “We’re almost there.”

He pulls you towards a half-broken down outside staircase. You can’t make your way up on your own, so he grabs you by the hips to help you up, and you let out a surprised yelp when strong hands pull you close to him, his chest against your back, to lift you up. Immediately, his body tenses up and he stills, which means you’re all too aware of how close he is now, of his breath on your neck and his body against yours.

“Sorry,” he says. “Is that okay?”

Gosh, he’s sweet to ask, but you’re really happy he cannot see your expression right now.

“It’s fine,” you squeak, “just caught me off guard. Don’t worry about it.”

He seems to hesitate for a second, and oh, you’re so aware of his fingers on your hips, before he lifts you up as if you weighed nothing, first on his shoulder, then easily higher, so you can grab the bottom of the staircase.

“All good?” he asks once you’re up there.

“All good! Do you need—”

But he’s made his way up before you can finish your sentence, and you blink. Right. Some people are athletic.

“Go ahead,” he says, gesturing towards the stairs. “I’ll catch you if anything goes wrong.”

It shouldn’t feel reassuring, should make you think that you’re at risk, but you meant it when you said you trusted him. Knowing he’s there to watch over you… It’s like having your own personal guardian angel.

There are no issues, however, and you soon arrive on the rooftop — which takes your breath away. This had to have belonged to someone with money, because there is a whole garden there. Overgrown grass, flowers, and even a few trees. Birds are chirping, and it feels… Well, it feels like the kind of places you’d go to laze around on a sunny afternoon with your friends, like an actual park. Being secluded and high up, it is however much safer than any park you could actually go to now. When you turn around, you’re met with an impressive view of the city. It looks peaceful from up here, just a quiet spring day.

Then you notice that Hyun-Su is staring at you, and what you see takes your breath away. He’s smiling. Actually smiling. Wide and bright.

You’re quick to look away, embarrassed by the emotions you’re sure are obvious on your face. Tilting your head up, you let yourself receive the sun.

It’s been a long time since you’ve been this happy.

Hyun-Su often feels that, when he’s with you, all he can do is stare. He likes watching you when you’re at home, going about your day in the house, or sitting by a window and reading. It makes him feel so— welcome, knowing that he can just be there, with you, and that you’ll never mind his presence, never ask him to leave.

Never ignore him and pretend he doesn’t exist.

It makes him feel like he belongs, being around you, makes him feel at peace.

Or, at least, it did, because the emotions swirling under his skin right now are much more complex than they used to be.

He met you, or met you again, in the winter, when you were bundled up under coats and scarves and layers upon layers of clothes. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t noticed the change in your wardrobe lately.

It makes sense, of course. Days are getting warmer. Not only is there no need for you to keep wearing pullovers and disappear into huge coats. But the way your clothes are hugging your body these days, how they accentuate your curves, how your t-shirt rides up to reveal the skin of your stomach…

He can’t say that it makes it more difficult to be around you, because he doesn’t think that anything could do that. You make him feel like he can breathe again, like he’s finally coming up to the surface after spending ages lost in dark waters, not knowing which way was up and which way was down. It’s just that it— takes a lot of place in his mind.

He can already barely stop thinking about you as it is, knows that the Kid and Yi-Kyung have noticed already how his mind always seems to wander away from them. This, though, this is a whole other can of worms. Because he doesn’t know how to act about it. Doesn’t know how you’d feel if you knew. Doesn’t know if you’d look at him with pity, if you’d tell him you never want to see him again, if it would disgust you.

Yet, no matter how much he tries to stop himself, he always comes back to staring. You tilt your head up towards the sky, close your eyes.

You’re beautiful.

If he was another man, he’d walk up to you to wrap his arms around you, he’d whisper something in your ear, he’d kiss you.

Just as the thought crosses his mind, his leg twitches. It takes him a second to understand that it’s not just an involuntary muscle reaction. Inside him, the monster is swelling, clawing its way up towards the surface.

If you don’t do something about this, I will, it whispers inside him. And let’s be honest, maybe that would be for the best, because what could you do? At least I wouldn’t be afraid to touch her.

Hyun-Su tries his best to force it back down, to ignore the sting of the words, but the monster refuses to let up. Finally, he takes a step in your direction, then another. The closer he is to you, the less the monster puts up a fight — but it still refuses to go down completely.

You turn to look at him when he reaches you, tilting your head in quiet questioning.

Hyun-Su feels himself lifting his hand to touch your cheek, and it’s so spontaneous, so natural that he can’t really say who’s in control there. Your skin is soft under his, and as he leans in to kiss you, he cannot forget how fragile you are compared to him. How one wrong surge from the creature he harbors inside himself could end it all, how careful he needs to be.

And, when his lips brush against yours and you kiss him back without hesitation, he’s reminded of how you either don’t know that or don’t care.

There must be something in the air, because without thinking, his hand comes to your waist, then the small of your back, pulling you close to him. Again, he can’t tell if it’s the monster making its own decision, or if it’s just natural and he’s just doing what he truly wants to do. Both thoughts are worrying.

But you’re not aware of all the questions going on his mind, and all you do is tilt your head up to give him better access to your mouth — and it makes his pulse rush and his mind goes haywire.

Normally, he’d know better. Right now, he feels your hands, trapped against his chest, gripping his hoodie and pulling him down towards you, just a little closer, because there isn’t much space left between the two of you anyway.

He tilts you back now, still without thinking — there isn’t enough space for that in his mind at this moment, not when it’s so filled with you you you — hands firmly holding you against him. His tongue pushes against your lips, and you part them almost immediately, welcoming him in your mouth. His blood is pumping, his whole body feels scorching hot, and you’re right there, running your fingers along his jaw and over his neck, leaving burning trails everywhere you touch.

His tongue intertwines with yours and he feels, more than he hears, you whimper into him.

Immediately, a sense of urgency forces him to pull back. One second, he’s pressed against yours, the next, he’s taken two steps back, and your eyes open in confusion.

“Are you okay?’ he asks, searching for a way he’s hurt you, anything indicating that something’s wrong. But all he finds is swollen lips that you press together as you glance away from him.

“Um, yeah, everything’s fine,” you mumble, and it takes an embarrassingly long time for him to understand what kind of noise that was.

Oh.

He’s immediately desperate to hear it again.

He brings you back against him to kiss you once more, and there it is, coming from the back of your throat.

He’s not sure what happens, who initiates what, if he’s in control at all, but soon he knows that your back is against the grass, and he’s above you, kissing you just as fiercely. Your hands are wandering now — his shoulders, first, then his arms, then tracing the muscles of his chest and down to his abs. He wants to respond in kind, wants so badly to feel you, but the second he moves his hands, fear assaults him again.

“Is that—” He breaks the kiss to look at you in worry. “Is that okay?”

He illustrates the question with the softest of touch on your skin. You let out a brief laugh — not a mocking one, though.

“You really don’t have to keep asking that,” you say, and your eyes are adoring. Then, when he stays still, you push yourself on your elbows to press a kiss to the corner of his lips. Then his jaw. Then his neck.

Hyun-Su can only stay there, frozen in bliss, as you pepper his skin with kisses. Finally, as you’re reaching his collarbone, you take his hand in yours to bring it back on your body, and then you lie back down, allowing him to take the lead now.

His hand is shaking as he slides it under your t-shirt, all of his senses overwhelmed with need. He wants you so bad, he has a hard time understanding it. Kissing you is familiar. The way your body arches against yours, pushing into his touch— isn’t. His immediate want for more, more of the sounds you make, more of your body, more of you, that is all new, too.

He feels feverish as he mirrors your previous actions, kissing down your neck and lingering in one spot when he discovers it makes you whimper. Now that you’re not muffled with his mouth, your sounds echo louder, and they’re music to his ears, in a way that fuels the fire you’ve lit inside him. His hips press down into you, and a jolt of pleasure jolts through him, which when he realizes that he’s—

He tears himself away from you for the second time, stumbling back to end up just a couple meters away from you.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, “sorry about that.”

You sit up, looking a little confused.

“Are you okay?” you ask softly.

It’s his line, and it takes him a while to piece together what you could mean by that. It’s not like there’s any way for you to hurt him. If anything, you should be disgusted by him. There’s no way you didn’t feel him, which means you know he’s hard. But you’re just looking at him in concern.

“Sorry,” he repeats. “I shouldn’t— I shouldn’t have—”

“Hyun-Su,” you call gently as you scoot over towards him. “It’s all good. I didn’t— um— I didn’t mind. But we— we can stop here for now, if you’d rather.”

Inside him, the monster protests vaguely, but this time Hyun-Su has no issue sending it back to the abyss it came from. He’s overwhelmed, heart beating erratically, and he doesn’t know what would happen if things kept going. He wasn’t in control, not really, and he— he can’t risk it. Not with you.

“Sorry,” he repeats, feeling miserable.

Slowly, you put your arms around him. There’s nothing suggestive about it. You’re just doing your best to bring him comfort.

“It’s okay,” you whisper. Your fingers run gently through his hair in appeasing motions. He rests his head against your shoulder.

He’s not alone.

You’re just there, talking to him, touching him, right against him. You’re not doing anything to move away, not looking at him like he’s some mistake, and it feels like his heart is trying to jump out of his chest.

“Thank you,” he mumbles.

Your fingers still for a moment, before you go back to your ministrations.

“For what?”

And, God, the fact that you don’t even know, that you don’t even realize everything you’re doing, everything you’ve done for him since that first day when you spotted him in the street and ran after him…

He draws in a trembling breath.

“Thank you,” he just repeats.

You don’t ask any more questions, just keep gently playing with his hair.

The sky’s blue, the birds are singing, the town is quiet. It’s just you and him, sitting in the grass, on the rooftop.

If someone were to miraculously pass by and see the two of you there, they’d probably think that you were, indeed, on a date.

okay, I hope you're enjoying this little series! I'm not sure what I'll work on next. i know i'm eventually going to write smut for them, though it's going to be very soft because... well it has to be between them lol. someone has also said they wanted to see them tackle the world together a bit more, so I'm also thinking about writing a one-shot where they meet ha-ni and ho-sang, because i thought that ho-sang's intense dislike for hyun-su could imply they've met before. anyway, yeah, i have a couple different ideas.

i would really appreciate it if you left a comment, whether here, in the tags or in a reblog, and tell me anything you're liking in this series! interactions really motivate me and keep me writing :)

next one-shot

#hyun su x reader #cha hyun su x reader #sweet home #sweet home netflix #cha hyun su #sweet home x reader #sweet home season 2 #cha hyunsoo #cha hyunsoo x reader #hyunsoo x reader #sweet home imagine #sweet home fanfic #my writing

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hannieehaee · 10 months

Text

18 + / mdi

content: idol!mingyu x idol!reader, established relationship, jealousy, possessiveness, afab reader, smut, semi-public sex, penetrative sex, creampie, etc.

part 1

wc: 2410

a/n: ppl rlly liked my first gyu x idol!reader fic so i decided to make a pt. 2! im working on a long fic for idol!gyu x idol!reader rn (its a diff universe from this one tho hehe) which should be out this month <3

masterlist

it's been a bit hard.

dating an idol as an idol would really seem like the ideal situation, except when it wasn't.

yeah, you had been absolutely ecstatic upon finding out mingyu had been carrying a torch for you for years. you had felt the same, only ever entertaining your other friends' flirting out of mere desperation for the man to finally notice you. after he suddenly blew up, declaring his love for you, you thought it'd just be smooth sailing from here, except you hadn't really thought much past that.

maybe you were being unreasonable. i mean, you had never dated a fellow idol before! maybe it was all in your head. or maybe you just weren't too used to the dynamic just yet. you weren't too sure. but you had no idea how much longer you could take watching mingyu flirt his way through life anymore.

fans, staff, other idols, male or female, you name it. mingyu simply had an overly flirtatious demeanor towards absolutely everyone. you, personally, always kept a very clear line in fan service, or any other type of flirtatious scenarios (sans your previous attempts to make mingyu jealous). mingyu did not afford you the same courtesy, consistently following requests to call fans his girlfriends and even going as far as initiating the flirting in both fancalls and physical fan meetings. okay, maybe this was something you could put up with. these interactions were very short lived, so they never went too out of hand, but these were not his only offenses.

you looked past the flirting with idols, chalking it up to being played up for the cameras for entertainment purposes. you looked away whenever it went far enough to have fans speculating online. you knew idols were professionals at delivering fan service, always wanting to give people something to talk about. hell, you did it too! this was a bit annoying to watch, but you trusted your boyfriend and your idol colleagues, so you let it slide. it was other things that were harder to look past.

was there any need for him to flirt up a storm among all the female staff members? he was behind the scenes, for fucks sake! there were no cameras nor any benefit from entertaining their giggles and subtle touches of his muscles as they pretended to be interested in what he was saying. you knew your boyfriend probably didn't realize that he was flirting, having simply grown too used to doing it that it was second nature to him by now, but it was still frustrating! specially when no one knew that mingyu was taken. as far as any of his staff members knew, mingyu was still just your best friend, and any sighting of the two of you together (always accompanied by another member of the 97s or a fellow group mate of his to avoid suspicion) was always assumed to be strictly platonic. even now, as you walked into his dressing room, only to find his stylist - and a few of the members' stylists - flocking around him as he told some stupid joke that probably wasn't even funny.

it was sickening, really. the way none of them saw how desperate they came off. how none of them realized that if they all flirted with him at once, it truly had no effect, as he wouldn't pay special attention to any of them in particular. you felt like a hater, but being real, you were starting to become one. you watched him for a good five minutes, wondering if he'd ever notice your presence from across the room. when he did, he immediately went over to you, cutting off any of the girls who had been flirting with him in favor of welcoming you. he was amicable, giving you a simple hug. but his eyes told a different story. anyone who knew mingyu knew those eyes were reserved for his loved ones. that made you calm down a bit, even hugging him back and daring a short peck on the cheek.

today was yet another shoot at the hybe building. you had the fortune of belonging to the same company as your boyfriend, which meant you could stop by whenever you wanted (as long as you kept a low profile). you'd often drag jungkook along with you for appearances' sake, but had decided to go solo today. gyu was clearly happy to see you, interrupting his stylists to take a quick breather with you, heading over to one of the empty changing rooms and finally indulging you with less platonic affection.

"baby! wasn't expecting you today?", despite that, he was clearly enthusiastic to see you, attached to you like a magnet now that he had locked the door behind you, making sure no one was around to see his affections towards you.

"yeah, clearly ..." you couldn't help but grumble, disconnecting yourself from him.

mingyu didnt give you much of a chance to create distance between you, immediately holding onto you again, this time by wrapping his arms around your waist, yours instinctively leaning against his hard chest.

"baby, what's wrong? what do you mean?", a pout made its way to his face. of course he was unsuspecting. the mingyu you knew was far too into you to ever seriously hit on someone else when he had you.

you responded with a sigh, "mingyu, do you have to flirt with every girl you meet?"

"w-what? what are you talking about?"

"did you seriously not notice all those girls giggling at every word you said? they all want you, gyu. and you never put a stop to it."

"i dont .. the stylists? baby, ive never flirted with anyone in our staff, what? i work with them, of course i'm nice, but its always strictly platonic, you know that."

"the fact that you dont even realize it!", you separated yourself from him again, facing away and crossing your arms across your chest like a petulant child.

"baby ..."

"no, gyu. i'm not in the mood. i came to see you, but again, you're hitting on some other girl."

he wrapped his arms around you for the third time now, pulling your back to his chest as he nuzzled his face on the crook of your neck. he was trying to break you down before you even managed to get fully angry at him

"princess, i'm sorry. i swear i didnt realize i was doing it. i- im just too friendly, i guess. why would i wanna flirt with anyone when i have you right here, hmm?", the kisses he began leaving along your neck did not help matters. he knew your weak points.

"forgive me, baby? please? don't want any of them. i'll tell them. i'll tell everyone, okay?"

"gyu ..." you whined, but still angled your neck for hin to keep kissing, leaning against his hold.

"yeah, pretty? i'll tell the whole world. it's just you for me," he paused, letting out a quiet chuckle as he shook his head, "it's kinda funny, though. now you know how i felt any time the boys would flirt with you."

"gyu! how is it my fault they liked me? and i only flirted with jungkook one time before we were ever together."

"and? still hated seeing you with anyone else. you're mine. you've always been."

he turned you around then, holding you close to him as he looked into your eyes. he smiled at you, kissing your nose before chuckling at your whines of annoyance at him. even when you wanted to be mad at him you couldnt. he'd always turn the situation around and swoon you somehow.

"let me show you, baby? show you that you're mine? maybe we can show those mean mean stylists too, huh?", okay, he was just teasing you now, lips drawn way too close to yours as he ran his hands up and down your back.

"gyu ..." you whined, making no effort to actually pull away.

"you'll let me. won't you, baby?" his eyes were glued to your lips, in a similar fashion to your own. you knew he could tell how badly you wanted him to close the gap, but you refused to make the first move. then he'd win. he'd be the voice of reason, which was something you just couldn't have.

"c'mon baby, just kiss me. you know you wanna. dont you wanna show them ill all yours? maybe leave your lipstick print all over my face for them to clean up? give me a hickey to- hmph!"

you had to shut him up eventually. he was driving you crazy. but he was also right. knowing you could make a statement about your relationship without actually having to explicitly say anything about it sounded too good to pass up, so you might've gone a little extra nastier with your kissing, running your lips all over his mouth, letting your tongue do all the work for you. mingyu had no complaints, even turning pliant under your touch.

huh.

he wanted you to be jealous, didnt he? he mightve not flirted on purpose, but now that he knew you were jealous he mustve felt some type of ... pride? at knowing how badly you wanted him to be yours and yours only. well. in that case, you were gonna give it to him.

you're not sure how it happened, but you ended up sitting on him, both your shirts thrown off as you ground on his lap as he sat back on the couch. the lower part of his face, along with part of his neck, were covered in lipstick stains, matching the smudged red along your own lips. you had left a few hickeys (okay, maybe five) on his chest area, not wanting to make the stylists work too difficult. the are with most damage, however, had been his hair, as you had messed it up in all directions possible through your incessant pulling. his hairstylists might have had complaints, but mingyu sure didnt have any. he kept moaning and sighing against your lips, hands guiding your hips from the moment you sat down on him.

"baby ... give me more ... please," you didnt blame him for growing frustrated at the lack of action. you yourself felt like you were at the precipice of pleasure, just needing to sit on him to find the way to your climax.

you helped him lower his pants enough to free his cock, playing with it for a bit before allowing it to slip under your skirt, panties shoved to the side in favor of creating a safe passage for his dick. you couldnt help the loud whine of pleasure you let out at the intrusion, feeling accompanied by mingyu and his own groan.

"gyu! shit ... feel so good- so big ..."

"i know, baby ... so pretty n so tight for me ... how could i ever want anyone else when i have my pretty girl so perfect for me. hole so wet and needy ..."

you cried at his words, speeding up as you angled yourself back to allow your clit to grace against him, making your eyes roll back even more.

"that's it, pretty. gonna cum for me? gonna let me fill you up, beautiful? that'll- fuck ... that'll show them who i belong to, huh? all yours, baby. just like y- you're all mine."

"yours! gyu, fuck! y- yours!"

"and im yours, baby. dont forget."

he kept poisoning at you from below, dragging your hips so you'd bounce up and down at a pace that had your toes curling. he always knew how to fuck you in ways that had your mind going completely blank, like right now. neither of you paid mind to the dressing room next door that was full of staff who could likely hear your muffles whines against each other's lips. you relished on it, even, knowing that once you walked back in the room they'd know who mingyu really belonged to.

"cum, baby. need you to cum so i c- shit ... so i can fill you up."

"almost there, gyu, just ... fuck! just like that! i'm cumming! gyu!"

"yeah, shit. gonna fill you up now, okay, baby? want you to keep it all in. show them im yours, yeah?", his hips never slowed down despite being you being on top. you were now just a rag doll he was using for his own pleasure. nothing had ever felt this good.

he filled you up soon after, with most of it spilling out due to the massive size of his load. he used his fingers to push it back in, then lifting them to your lips for you to lick clean, which you did with no complaint.

"oh, baby ... my nasty girl. how could i ever look at anyone else when i have my nasty baby so desperate for me? hmm? you're perfect for me, angel. dont care about any girl that flirts with me. you're all i want," he used his fingers to push down on your tongue as he said this, groaning at the way you sucked and sucked while looking at him with wide eyes.

"gyu ..." you whined as soon as he left your mouth alone.

"but im still sorry, angel. i didnt realize it bothered you. i get it. kinda wanna fight any of ur male fans when they get a little too friendly with you. that rookie at mnet last month? wanted to take him out back for the way he was looking at you when you performed."

"gyu!," you knew your boyfriend had been jealous of your friend group due to their former crushes on you, but he'd never told you that he felt the same way about literally any man you'd come across as an idol.

"what? im just saying, i get it! im also possessive and jealous. thats why we compliment each other. now come on. lets get you dressed, baby. gotta go have a very awkward conversation with my stylist so she can fix everything you just did to me."

"me?! look at me! im covered in cum!"

"hmm yeah. so pretty, angel. you better have it all in you by the time we get home, yeah?"

you huffed, but agreed, rolling your eyes at the innocent peck that landed on your cheek as he helped you look presentable.

you knew things would be awkward around his staff from now on, but it had been worth it.

#seventeen fanfic #seventeen x reader #svt fanfic #seventeen #svt #svt x reader #seventeen imagine #seventeen oneshot #seventeen smut #svt smut #mingyu imagine #mingyu scenarios #mingyu smut #mingyu x reader #mingyu oneshot #mingyu fanfic

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feeder86 · 5 months

Text

Breaking Boundaries

“Oh wow! Look at him! He’s gorgeous!” Sam shouted over the deafteningly loud music of the club.

Craig looked over, seeing yet another short, skinny, well-groomed twenty year old dancing away with a couple of other guys. He had no butt on him whatsoever, with narrow shoulders and thin arms; not Craig’s type in the slightest. Not that he would ever say that to his housemates. As close as they all were, he wasn’t so sure that Sam and Wes were ready to hear that not everyone found these boring little twinks so compelling. And they certainly weren’t ready to know that, at twenty years old, Craig was actually still a virgin.

“He’s pretty,” Craig nodded, pretending to be in agreement. “You should go dance with him.”

“I actually think you should go and ask him yourself,” Sam shot back, prodding Craig in the side to get up. “He keeps looking over this way, right in your direction.”

Craig squirmed slightly. He had noticed the guy checking him out, but had deliberately kept it to himself so that he wasn’t forced to get up and dance with yet another person that Sam and Wes thought was hot. “I’m really not…” he protested, despite being pulled to his feet.

“Don’t be so boring!” Wes cried, keen to get them all paired off that evening now that one of his regular fuck buddies had just entered the club and was smiling suggestively across the room at him.

“Alright, alright!” Craig relented, seeing that the boys were not going to let this go. “I’ll just get us some more drinks first,” he explained, using the tactic that usually got him out of situations such as these. Everything moved so fast in clubs like these, apart from the line of people waiting to be served.

Craig’s hypothesis was not wrong. He returned from the bar with three shots, seeing that Wes was nowhere to be seen. As was his usual habit, once Wes had found someone to hook up with, he didn’t bother with the simple courtesy of saying goodbye. Likewise, Sam was up on his feet, dancing with someone in the corner. With their table abandoned, it had been acquired by a new group of people who had just come in.

Downing one shot to save carrying them all, Craig made his way over to the dancefloor to check in with Sam. There, he was stopped by security, not allowing him to take the shots onto the dancefloor. And so, Craig stood, like a stereotypical third wheel, watching as Sam’s flirtatious dancing led to dirty grinding and the inevitable, passionate kissing. Then, out of the club the pair of them went; most likely back to the house for a night of fun. Yet again, Craig had been abandoned.

Sighing in frustration, Craig downed the two shots, one after the other. As nice as it was to find two other college students who were freshly out of the closet; moving in with them for his third year had hardly been the dream that he had pictured in his head all summer. He just wasn’t like them in so many ways. His brain was simply wired differently. The guys they chased just didn’t interest him in the slightest, and the endless quests to get laid were exhausting. Sam, who had a thing for sex in the shower, would probably be running all their hot water as soon as he got his new lover home; running up the energy bills for all of them, yet again.

Sometimes Craig felt he was ten years older than he actually was. Why did it need to be so damn noisy in here? He could feel the bass thumping through his body as the three shots and many previous drinks made his head feel light and ever so slightly dizzy. There was that skinny guy, making eyes at him again as he danced only a few feet away; there for the taking if Craig would only step forward and introduce himself as he had promised the boys he would.

But Craig was alone here now. He didn’t need to please Sam or Wes, given that the pair of them were back at home, getting down and dirty. He turned to leave the dancing area, stumbling carelessly straight into what could only be described as a wall of man; his face falling into a large chest and his body bending slightly over a large protrusive stomach; warm and comforting.

“I’m so sorry!” he shouted, backing up to get a better look at the man he had just bumped into.

What stood before Craig was the most handsome guy he had ever seen. Tall, stocky and marvellously overweight. He had a broad, handsome face, with a delicious double chin and large cheeks. He wore a tight, fitted and super casual short-sleeved t-shirt that hid nothing of his giant ball gut underneath it. His arms were strong, his lightly tattooed forearms bigger than any Craig had ever seen, and his hands big and plump. Unusual for this venue, the man wore relaxed sweatpants that clung to his thick thighs and groin. And, as every sense flared with arousal, Craig picked up the unmistable musky scent of what he considered to be pure masculinity.

“Careful!” the guy replied with his deep, slightly gruff voice, taking his eyes on a tour of Craig’s body in return, and nodding with approval.

The two of them finally walked by each other, with the big man crossing the dancefloor to stand at the opposite wall and watch all the guys dancing away. He looked so out of place, his shape, his clothing, his sheer size; like a straight guy who had just got off the couch after an afternoon of beers and watching football. In Craig’s head, he could just imagine the comments that would spew from his housemate’s mouths if they saw him: taking aim at his large gut, poor dress sense and overall slob-like appearance. As it was, Craig felt nothing but excitement and curiosity as the loud music battered its way into his head and the sticky heat of the club became almost uncomfortable. Deciding he needed another drink, he snuck off to the bar, returning to see the big guy standing in exactly the same spot.

Like slabs of meat on a tray, the large man was surveying all of the young twenty-somethings on the dancefloor. His eyes flicked up towards Craig, making Craig’s eyes drop to the floor in embarrassment. Then the cycle started all over again. If Sam and Wes had still been there, Criag would never have allowed himself to indulge in the fascination he felt towards this man as he continued to watch from afar. The next time their eyes met, Craig forced himself to hold it for at least a short while, feeling a buzz of pure adrenaline for each microsecond that he managed to keep holding on. Then the ritual started all over again; eyes looking across the dancefloor until they met once more. This time, Craig was emboldened, holding the guy’s gaze and feeling his arousal growing for each second that he did so. One… two… three seconds. It was all Craig could manage as his hardness awoke and stretched itself in his groin. However, now Craig could tell that the guy was still staring at him, even as his own eyes tried to avoid looking in his direction. The man’s gaze was fixed, locking onto him like prey. Then, like a giant striding across the dancefloor, Craig saw the big man heading straight for him.

“Like what you see?” the big man grinned, suddenly standing in front of Craig and seeming larger than ever.

Craig’s heart was beating too fast. Without the biggest of voices, he always struggled to make himself heard in the deafening club. What would he even say if he could? Instead, he looked around, seeing that no one else was watching them, and then allowed his head to nod very gently.

The big man stepped closer, taking Craig’s drink and putting it gently on the side. Then he came in towards him with large hands that cupped Craig’s face. Their lips touched and tongues slid into action. Craig felt himself being pushed up against the wall, with the monstrous guy seemingly inflating his giant stomach out as large as it would go to keep Craig pinned to the wall. It was, without a single doubt, the most erotic moment of Craig’s life.

Craig knew that he would never have felt comfortable getting to know a guy so big and large in the club had Wes and Sam still been there. Rick was everything he had ever secretly wanted, as the pair of them shouted down each other’s ears, trying to make conversation in the deafeningly loud club. There wasn’t long left of the evening and both of them knew they didn’t want their time together to end, heading straight back to Craig’s place. Just as Craig had anticipated, the bathroom was soaking from Sam’s long, horny shower session and moans of pleasure were still sounding from both his housemates’ rooms.

Rick lay back on Craig’s bed, laughing at how small it was. Not being quite a full double bed, the big man absolutely dwarfed it in whatever direction he tried to lay. The sight gave Craig pure joy and he began undressing himself for the large man, letting him see exactly how aroused he was by him. Rick took the lead as it came time to get dirty, which Craig was more than grateful for. For the first time ever, he was having his butt lubricated up, ready to be taken, lying on his side as Rick began; simultaneously taking Craig’s erection into his large hand and gently bringing them both to a climax at exactly the same time. For his first experience of sex, Craig could not have wished for anything better.

A few hours later, the pair of them woke up together; Rick’s large hands cupping Craig’s small glutes and pulling him into him. They made out and spoke at length about how much they had enjoyed themselves the previous evening, settling back into another round of making each other climax.

“Do you want to come with me to get some breakfast?” Rick asked; his giant stomach rumbling as he pulled his hastily discarded underwear back on.

“I don’t think we have much in,” Craig replied.

“No. Not here,” Rick chuckled. “Let me take you out for some breakfast.”

Craig felt a little guilty at the idea of Rick paying to take him out. He’d always liked to pay his own way, never accepting drinks from guys who tried to flirt with him in bars. He attempted to explain this to Rick, but was quickly put at ease. Earlier that morning, Rick had spoken about how he worked in highway maintenance; committing to long shifts at sometimes very unsociable hours, in return for a pleasing salary. “I want to treat you,” he smiled. “I had a great time last night. Won’t you let me say thank you?”

Twenty minutes later, Craig found himself in a very greasy looking cafe that Rick seemed to know very well. They sat at a table and a server came straight over, pouring coffee for the pair of them.

“Two Mega Breakfasts please, Rachel,” Rick stated, as Craig hesitantly went to pick up the sticky-looking laminated menu.

“A Mega Breakfast?” Craig asked after she left. “That sounds pretty daunting.”

Rick chuckled. “You’ll manage it. You’re a college boy. You need feeding up. Plus, anything you can’t eat, I’ll finish for you,” he smiled greedily.

The breakfast meal, once it arrived, was every bit as massive as Craig had pictured in his head. Rick’s eyes had lit up, his mouth salivating, and he began consuming it, stacking sausages and egg onto one of the several rounds of toast; devouring it with the expertise of a man who had taken it on many times before.

“That’s not a bad effort, for a first attempt,” Rick nodded twenty minutes later, seeing that Craig had politely cleared at least half of the giant meal away. “You’ll know what to expect next time.”

Craig rubbed his achingly full stomach. He couldn’t imagine ever wanting another piece of bacon or fried toast again, let alone coming here for a giant breakfast in the future. He watched with relief as Rick switched their plates around and the big man began dutifully clearing the rest of Craig’s meal away. What was it about a big man gorging himself that was so damn sexy to watch?

“I would quite like to do this again sometime,” Rick smiled, kissing Craig goodbye as they parked up outside his house once more. “Maybe you could let me take you out for something to eat more often?”

Craig nodded, excited by the idea of dating Rick. He accepted another kiss and felt Rick’s hand slip from cupping his face, down towards his small, tightly packed stomach. Then, tearing himself away, up Craig got; crossing the street and waving one last time before heading inside.

“Who the fuck was that?” Wes asked as soon as Craig was infront of him. He shouted towards Sam in the kitchen. “I just caught Craig making out with some fat guy in a car across the street,” he explained.

“A fat guy?” Sam asked, immediately disgusted by the idea. “Was that who I heard pouding around in the bathroom this morning? Did you hook up with a fatty?”

“I only saw him inside his truck, but the guy looked pretty massive to me,” Wes continued. “He looked like he had tits and a massive double chin!”

“That’s gross!” Sam winced. “What the hell were you doing with that?”

“His name’s Rick,” Craig shot back, emboldened by the amazing time he had had with a guy who epitomised his type. “We’re going to be dating.”

“Why?” Wes asked. “Why would you settle for a fat guy? You’re hot. You could have someone much better. If we weren’t housemates, I’d probably have fucked you myself by now.”

Sam nodded in agreement. “Same,” he mumbled, looking Craig up and down.

Craig huffed in irritation and walked away. Was that the boys’ idea of a compliment? He couldn’t think of anything worse than dating someone who was anything like either of them. There was only one person who put butterflies in his stomach, and Craig wasn’t about to be talked out of dating him.

“You’ve got to admit, those were the best doughnuts you’ve ever had, right?” Rick grinned as the pair of them headed back to his truck one evening.

“They tasted exactly like the ones we had in the place we went to last time,” Craig chuckled as he slipped inside the vehicle.

“No!” Rick laughed in disbelief that his boyfriend could say such a thing. “Those doughnuts are nothing like that place! You need educating about what real tasty food is like.”

Craig nodded, feeling his tight stomach. All their dates seemed to revolve around Rick demonstrating his vast knowledge of food places around the city; a world that Craig, with his limited income and lack of transport, had no means of exploring until now.

“Will Dumb and Dumber be there when we get back to your place?” Rick asked, firing the engine into life and turning out of the parking lot.

“I think so,” Craig nodded, knowing exactly how Rick felt about Wes and Sam. “I’m sure they will be a bit more pleasant with you today. They were both just a little stressed about their assignments and stuff last time,” he lied.

Rick chuckled in a way that suggested he did not believe the excuse in the slightest. “It’s alright. I know they don’t think I’m good enough for you because I’m fat. I’m fine with that.”

Craig looked across at his boyfriend; confusion etched upon his face. “How can you be okay with that?” he asked.

“Because, guys like Wes and Sam, they don’t stay slim forever. You only have to look at how much they drink and the foods they eat to know they won’t be twinks for much longer.”

“Really?” Craig asked, feeling surprisingly fascinated by Rick’s observations. “How can you be so sure?”

“Trust me,” he smirked. “I’m sure! Give it another few months and you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about.”

“Do you have some sort of sixth sense?” Craig joked.

Rick laughed. “I wish!” he nodded. “I mean, it’s not just those two. Your stomach is going to start pushing out into a little tummy soon. But that’s going to be all my fault… because I’m going to spoil you and pamper you so much!” he teased, rubbing Craig’s thigh as he drove.

Craig laughed, not knowing how serious his boyfriend was actually being. But, even so, Rick did seem oddly determined that they spend a lot of their time enjoying good food together. Perhaps Rick really wouldn’t mind if he gained a few pounds…

Over the next few weeks, Craig started to realise that what he found so unrelentingly attractive about Rick, was his impressive confidence in his own body. Even though he knew that Sam and Wes disapproved of Craig dating such a fat guy, Rick never failed to pull off his shirt whenever he arrived at the house; seeming to revel in their scorn. When he stayed over, he never got dressed to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, becoming Wes and Sam’s biggest complaint to date. That was, until Rick had left one weekend, deliberately planting a pair of his enormous underwear in the corner of the bathroom, like he had simply forgotten them. Wes had come in, holding them out in front of him with a large pair of barbecuing tongues that had seemed to have appeared from nowhere, and holding his nose as he dropped them in Craig’s room whilst giving him a thorough lecture about how his gross boyfriend was staying over far too much.

Wes wasn’t wrong; Rick was there at least four nights every week. He was comfortable in their house. However, although he had tried several times, Rick couldn’t really fit into their shower, meaning that there were a few nights when he and Craig would sleep over at Rick’s place instead, where the big man lived with his older cousin, Bob, in the suburbs.

Bob was much the same as Rick himself: large and round, with the same laid-back attitude to his body. It was obvious from the layout of the house that the pair of them cared little about the space being anything more than functional. Several take-out menus adorned the refrigerator door and not a single piece of fruit or vegetables lay inside. It was clear how much Rick looked up to his older cousin; rarely talking about his actual, overly-educated parents, except to say that they fell out some years ago when he refused to go to college. Bob had been the first black sheep in their family, and in moving in with him, Rick had become the second.

“Bob just gets me in a way that no one else in my family ever has. He got me my job when I left school and we’ve never had an argument, even after seven years of me staying here,” Rick explained as he introduced Craig to him for the first time.

It was clear to Craig that he was meeting someone very special to his boyfriend. The fact that Rick’s relationships with the rest of his family were so strained only mirrored Craig’s feelings about his own family. The pair of them could bond over their tales of uptight mothers and absent, but expectant fathers. It all felt so much easier when someone else understood these situations from a similar perspective.

However, with both Rick and his cousin, Bob, on the same shift pattern, it was rare that Craig stayed over with them. Rick always made the excuse that Bob was entertaining a variety of lady friends back at their place; a fact that would probably surprise many people, looking at his monstrous size.

“Smells good!” Rick sang as he arrived one Friday evening and smelt the aroma of Wes and Sam’s take out pizzas. “Are these from the place I told you about?” he asked them, pretending that they were all friends. “It’s so much cheaper than anywhere else. It just doesn’t keep so well the next day,” he explained, seeing that the boys were quitting with half a pizza remaining. “I’d try and finish that if you can. It won’t be any good once you need to reheat it,” he advised, winking at Craig and letting him know that he was only playing with them. It was something he had been doing for weeks now; introducing them both to beers and letting them try large amounts of the take-outs he had bought for himself when he stayed over. Despite not liking him, the boys had never failed to accept his generosity, just as Rick had secretly wanted.

This charade came as a relief to Craig. He’d felt his own pants starting to pinch a little more than usual in the last couple of weeks. Perhaps his little weight gain didn’t necessarily have to cause a relationship drama, like it would with most couples. Maybe people could just get used to seeing him in his sweatpants a little more whilst he sorted this out. Rick wasn’t exactly precious about his own weight and, indeed, he seemed to find the idea of Wes and Sam putting on a few pounds to be highly amusing.

The weeks rolled by. Craig sat himself down and pulled out his laptop. There were plenty of places for students to study on the college campus, but Craig had come to prefer this coffee house for its relative peace and quiet. He had been engrossed in his reading, not realising that he was being observed from a distance, until a tall, slightly pot-bellied man, a little older than him, suddenly came and stood in front of him.

“I’m really sorry to bother you,” the man explained, taking the spare seat on Craig's table. “I just recognised you from your boyfriend’s socials and I thought…” He seemed to sigh at this point, not appearing to know why he needed to speak to him, or how to explain exactly what it was he was trying to say. “It’s about Rick. I’m not sure you really know who he really is.”

Craig looked across at the guy with suspicion. What had he been doing, lurking on Rick’s social media and taking the time to commit Craig’s face to his memory? His stalker senses were spiking.

“I’m Geoff,” the guy explained, reaching his hand out to shake. “I’m certain that Rick has definitely not spoken to you about me.”

Craig shook his head, not committing to opening his mouth and engaging in a conversation he wasn’t sure he wanted to have.

“I was in high school with him. In fact, I was his boyfriend for quite some time as well,” Geoff continued. “We broke up about four years ago.”

“Then what are you doing still looking up his socials?” Craig asked, allowing a little of his suspicion and irritation to filter through his voice.

“I just didn’t want anyone else to go through what I went through with him,” Geoff replied. “Let me ask you, has Rick ever spoken to you about his high school days?”

“Not really,” Craig huffed, wondering what sort of relevance Rick’s time in high school would have on anything these days.

Geoff was busily finding a picture on his cell phone. “I bet he never told you that he used to look like this…” he mumbled, turning the screen around so that Craig could see. The face of the handsome eighteen year old in the picture was so familiar to him, but the body below it was so far beyond what Craig had anticipated. A shirtless, chiselled and muscular Rick smiled away from the cell phone. Six-packed and lean, Rick looked the epitome of athleticism and strength.

“That’s not real,” Craig shot back.

“I assure you, it is,” Geoff nodded, swiping through more and more pictures: Rick playing football, partying and posing with a much younger and slimmer Geoff, back when they were dating. “I’m guessing he just told you he’d always been a fat guy?”

Craig considered the question. He didn’t think Rick had said much about anything from his past; certainly not high school. And, besides, what would it even matter?

“This might shock you, but… Rick atually gained all the weight on purpose,” Geoff stated frankly. “I’m guessing you’ve met his cousin, Bob, as well? He did the same thing: a high school jock, but fattened himself huge. I was dating Rick at the time. He was fascinated by it, watching Bob stacking on the weight. He said that the pair of them understood each other in a way that no one else did.”

Craig nodded. Rick had said pretty much the same thing to him several times before.

“So when Rick left high school and moved in with Bob, he started to do exactly the same thing. I was away at college at the time and came back to find my boyfriend had gained fifty pounds in three months. Fifty pounds!” he boomed in exasperation. “I thought he was depressed. I thought something was really wrong. Rick didn’t tell me about all of the deliberate overeating he was doing; the special weight-gain shakes he and Bob were making for each other at night; spurring themselves on,” he grumbled, shaking his head in disapproval. “Bob was dating a girl called Helen back then as well. She lived not far away, so she was with them more. Now, she could tell you some stories!” Geoff added gravely.

“What do you mean?” Craig asked, feeling thoroughly invested in the story now.

“She was devoted to Bob, even after he started getting so fat. She said that she could tell that Bob was pushing his bad eating habits onto her. She was putting on weight; a lot of it; very quickly.”

Craig sat back, unimpressed. “People always make excuses when they gain weight. They want to find someone to blame.”

Geoff nodded in complete agreement. “I said the same thing. I even told her as much when she broke up with Bob. But after I dropped out of college and moved back here, I noticed that Rick was doing the same thing to me. He’d obviously been watching how Bob had done it to Helen and decided to have a go himself. He took me out for food constantly, telling me that he loved spoiling and pampering me. He said that college had made me skinny, and that I needed feeding up.”

Craig listened, feeling an odd sense of familiarity about the whole thing. “What happened to you?” he asked.

Geoff leaned back and showed his stomach to answer that question. “I put on a lot of weight. Gradual at first, but then it seemed to spiral. Rick was so sweet, and I thought, by not making a big deal about it, my weight struggle might help to make Rick feel less insecure, as he was starting to get quite obese at that point. I still loved him. I didn’t realise that his weight gain was on purpose, nor that mine was being orchestrated.”

Despite everything, Craig felt a pang of jealousy as Geoff talked about his ex as if he knew him so well; a secret, shared history that he himself could never be a part of.

“I got to almost 270lbs before I finally left him. It’s been four years since we broke up and I’m still over two hundred pounds now. It’s so hard to get it off once you gain weight,” he complained, shaking his head.

Craig didn’t know what to say. The conversation had suddenly paused at a very awkward spot.

“The reason I’m telling you all this is because I can tell that Rick is planning on doing the same thing to you. The pictures I see of you two together. It’s like history repeating itself all over again. This is all probably some kinky little fantasy in Rick’s head, fattening up some little chubby-chasing college boy.”

Craig’s teeth ground together as Geoff referred to him as a ‘chubby-chaser’, setting his mind against the guy altogether. Wes and Sam had mocked him for it endlessly since he had started dating Rick. So what if he was a chubby-chaser? Geoff probably looked way better with all the extra fat on him anyway. Who could blame Rick if he had fattened him up a bit?

“Well, thanks for the info,” he snapped impatiently. “But I think I can look after myself, thank you very much.”

“Don’t you want to know more?” Geoff asked, surprised that he was being turned away. “I can give you a contact number for Helen? She can tell you about her experience as well.”

Craig refused and turned his attention back to his assignment until a bewildered Geoff finally got the message and walked away. His cell phone buzzed in his pocket and he picked it up to read the message that had popped up on the screen. ‘I’m finishing early this evening,’ Rick explained. ‘Let me take you out to that Italian place tonight. We can get ice cream and doughnuts afterwards…. I can’t wait to spoil you rotten!’

“Have you noticed Wes getting a little softer recently?” Rick asked a couple of weeks later. “His clothes are always so fitted, there’s no hiding the little lovehandles he seems to have acquired.”

Craig nodded. Of course he had noticed. The same thing had started to happen to Sam as well, with his tight little butt beginning to put on more mass and a flush of extra coating filling out his normally slender face. “It’s your fault, getting them both onto those cheap beers and take-outs.”

Rick chuckled to himself. “Guilty,” he nodded playfully. It was no secret that Rick was not a fan of either of the boys, so he certainly wasn’t about to show any remorse at the fact that the pair of them were now struggling with maintaining their weight.

Craig laughed, despite the guilt that he felt at Wes and Sam’s newest predicament. He had had no idea that inviting Rick into their house would have such an impact on all their lives. The truth was that no matter how surprising the extra pounds looked on Wes and Sam, it was nothing in comparison to what he was feeling himself. His previously slow gain of 15lbs had begun to spike quite sharply, doubling in the last three weeks. He had felt it in his stomach and butt, but also in his face, as fat began to disribute itself under his chin in much the same way as it was with Sam

“Watch this,” Rick whispered to Craig, sitting back with a clearly mischievous glint in his eyes. “Sam… Wes!” he called out loudly, not getting up from his chair.

The two boys appeared from around the corner, each carrying a can of Rick’s beer that he had brought over; having helped themselves, just as Rick always insisted they do.

“I got paid today, so I’m taking Craig out for some doughnuts to celebrate. You boys want to tag along?” he asked. “My treat.”

Of course Wes and Sam took him up on the offer, smirking at each other at yet another opportunity to take advantage of Rick’s generous nature. Then Craig looked across at his boyfriend who appeared to be even more pleased with himself. A great, wicked plan was unfolding right before his very eyes; yet Craig had never felt more drawn to him.

By the following weekend, Craig had packed on a further 5lbs, gazing into the bathroom mirror as Rick slept on in his bedroom. He couldn’t get over how much his body was altering in such a short space of time. His chest had become softer in a matter of weeks and his flat stomach had rounded out, appearing fleshy underneath the skin. Even in his arms, which had always been naturally quite toned, Craig began to feel softer and less conditioned. But as he spun himself around, Craig awkwardly tried to get a look at his butt, which had been causing him the most clothing problems with anything other than the great array of sweatpants Rick had been buying in for him; arriving with these as if they were a token of his love, and professing to have chosen them for him based upon their interesting colours or style. Those previously tight and petitie glutes of his were taking on a whole new swollen shape. Craig found that he could actually grab almost the entire cheek in his hand and bounce it in a way that he never imagined before; the great soft mass of it going up and down feeling utterly bizarre.

Craig turned back again, looking down and seeing something else that had been worrying him lately. All the blood in his body had seemed to rush into his groin as he surveyed his physique in the mirror. He wondered why he wasn’t like Geoff, feeling completely outraged by the subtle ways Rick was manipulating him to overeat like he had been doing. But then he looked again at his body: the doughy stomach and fleshed out nipples; all those features that spoke of chubiness and excess weight; all the things that he admired so much in others and found so irresistably attractive. Even Wes and Sam were looking more appealing of late. Something was happening to him in this relationship, and Craig started to realise that, rather than being furious, he was actually aroused in a way that he never would have predicted.

“Whose idea was it to go on a double date?” Craig asked a few weeks later, as he slipped on the brand new shirt that Rick had bought for him that afternoon.

“Bob’s,” Rick explained. “He’s super into this new girl. It’s been a while since I’ve seen him this smitten.”

“And what do you think about her?” Craig asked, having realised that Rick was actually a surprisingly good judge of character.

“She’s nice,” Rick nodded. “Quite quiet, like you. But she shares some of my cousin’s interests, which I know he is really enjoying at the moment.”

“What sort of interests?” Craig shot back.

Rick’s cool composure briefly slipped and he looked suddenly caught out by the question. It was clear that he had not expected Craig to seek clarification. “Oh, um… you know. They both like cooking and stuff…” he mumbled, changing the subject almost immediately.

Craig and Rick arrived at the buffet place first, sitting themselves down at the table and politely sipping their drinks, despite the fact that the food smelt so good. About ten minutes later, an obviously very much loved-up couple strolled into the restaurant, giggling from jokes in their own private love laguage. Dark haired, overweight and wearing a dress that was far too small, Bob’s date still looked far too slim to be with him and his giant ball-like gut. They sat down after Bob had courteously pulled out a chair for her, giving her chubby butt one final pat before it disappeared underneath her oversized body.

The conversation didn’t exactly flow, but it was hardly awkward either. The giggly mood that Bob and his date had arrived in, continued as they began their first couple of rounds from the buffet. It was obvious that the pair of them only had eyes for each other and, although they did ask the occasional question of Rick or Craig, it was clear that they weren’t really listening. Bob’s hand kept sliding under the table and Craig wondered, more than once, whether the man was rubbing or patting his date’s belly in a way that would suggest she knew that he liked to feed up his women.

“Get those down you,” Bob smirked, handing over a plate of chicken wings to his younger cousin some time later. Craig had sensed a quiet competition between them both as they had gorged themselves; with Bob remaining a smug plate in the lead the whole time.

Rick nodded, never one to turn down a challenge.

“I’m stuffed!” Bob’s date declared, dropping her fork. “I couldn’t eat another bite!”

Bob smiled at her. “That’s okay, babe. You did very well. You managed five and a half plates of food,” he grinned, looking over at his cousin as he said it; as if taking another victory.

“How many plates have I had?” Craig asked Rick, suddenly suspecting that a secondary, simultaneous competition was taking place.

“Four,” Rick replied quietly, beginning to suck on his chicken wings.

So this was a competition, Craig realised. Not only had Bob eaten more than Rick, but his girlfriend had been greedier too. The reason for the whole double date now became very clear.

Craig got himself up without a word. He could sense the eyes of the others on the table as he collected a fresh plate and began filling it up, mounding it as high as he could.

“You’re still hungry, babe?” Rick asked with delight as Craig got back to the table,

Craig simply nodded and chewed. “Do you think we could go to that cheesecake place afterwards as well?” he asked, knowing that Bob was listening in.

“Yeah, babe. Of course we can,” Rick beamed, rubbing Craig’s thigh in approval. “You can have whatever you want.”

Hearing only a faint sigh from Bob’s direction, Craig knew that he had at least evened the score between the two cousins. Now he just needed to focus on getting all the food down.

It had been some time since the three housemates, Craig, Sam and Wes, had been out to the gay clubs. But with Rick set to make a small fortune working nights over the weekend, Craig finally had an evening with nothing to do. He put on his new shirt and pants, heading out to the clubs carrying an extra forty pounds than the last time he was out. But despite his remarkable weight increase, it wasn’t his size people were looking at. Clearly still in denial about their gains, Wes and Sam were still trying to squeeze themselves into the same twink-like outfits that had worked for them in the past. But despite how well these clothes continued to fit the boys in the shoulders and arms, the cheap material clung unflatteringly to their bloated middles and lovehandles, emphasising them even more than Craig’s own. It was almost embarrassing; especially when Wes got up to dance and gave the unsuspecting crowds an eyefull of his ass crack.

“He’s quite cute, I suppose,” Sam muttered as the end of the evening approached and he had still had no succes in catching anyone’s attention.

“His friend is pretty hot as well,” Wes nodded in agreement.

“Go talk to them,” Craig smiled encouragingly, trying not to show his amusement at their choices. The two guys they were checking out were like him: chubby and soft; not at all the sort of guys the two horny boys would have resorted to only a few months earlier. Yet, there they were only half an hour later, leading them back home. Beggars, it seemed, couldn’t be choosers.

“Who’s the little chub with Wes?” Rick asked the following weekend, whispering as the housemate arrived home with company.

“His new boyfriend…” Craig grinned.

Rick laughed in surprise. “Wes has a boyfriend? I thought he was all about keeping things casual?”

Craig shrugged. “He says they’re perfect for each other. Sam’s out on an actual, proper date as well. I guess they’re both growing up.”

“More like ‘growing out,’” Rick laughed mockingly. “There’s no way the old Wes would have given a fat guy like that a chance.”

“I guess…” Craig nodded slowly. They both knew that Wes and Sam’s gains were mostly down to his meddling. Now Rick looked positively delighted with himself.

“Bob and I were talking,” Rick began next, dropping his massive body down onto the sofa and slipping his arm over his chubby lover’s shoulders. “Maybe you could save a little money next year by moving in with us.”

Craig snorted on his beer. An invitation to move in with Rick had been the last thing he had expected.

“It would be so much fun,” Rick continued, rubbing his chubby hands up and down Craig’s doughy torso. “Bob is totally up for the idea. Just imagine it, I’d be able to spoil and pamper you every single day…”

“But we’ve only been dating eight months,” Craig mumbled.

Rick’s hands were lost in the massaging of Craig’s body: his soft stomach and sensitive nipples. “I know. But I think you’re ready,” he whispered seductively.

Craig pondered his boyfriend’s odd choice of phrasing. He sensed that everything Rick had done up until now had been some sort of preamble for this next stage. Quietly fattening him up to 200lbs was nothing in comparison to what he had done to Geoff. Now it seemed, Rick’s attention was thoroughly locked on taking him a lot further.

“You’d love living with me, wouldn’t you?” Rick asked teasingly; beginning to stroke the hardness that he had discovered swelling in Craig’s pants, even though they were both still in the shared living space.

A moan escaped Craig’s lips as his eyes rolled back into his head. “We can’t do this here,” he whispered, looking over to the door and worrying that Wes could walk in any second.

“Well then, I guess you should hurry up and tell me you’ll move in with me,” Rick teased, speeding up his stimulation of Craig, rather than stopping.

Craig’s whole body shuddered and he knew he could probably climax with rapid speed if Rick just kept doing what he was doing. Sometimes Rick could get him to orgasm faster than seemed natural for most guys.

“I really want to. But…” Craigh sighed, trying to make his brain think of how to phrase his concerns.

“You don’t want to be spoiled and pampered by me every day?” Rick asked, whispering now as Wes and his new boyfriend’s voices seemed close to the door.

“That’s exactly what I’m scared of!” Craig shot back, pulling his sweatpants back just in time as Wes entered.

“We’re just heading out for some food,” Wes explained, after introducing his overweight boyfriend to Rick.

“Take these,” Rick insisted, pulling out some coupons for the pizza place a couple of blocks away. “That’ll save you some cash and you can get a few beers while you’re out,” he smiled cunningly. “In fact,” he grinned, looking down at a still flustered Craig, and pulling out a twenty from his wallet, “why don’t you boys make sure you stay out for a couple of hours and give us some space?”

Wes never had a problem with accepting anything from Rick; nodding in agreement and shuffling out of the house after his chubby new lover.

“Cute couple,” Rick chuckled as the door finally closed behind them both. “Now,” he grinned, pulling off his shirt and releasing his giant belly. “We have the whole house to ourselves. Where I…” he rambled, getting down onto his knees and lifting Craig’s shirt off him as he sat on the couch still. “...can spend some time trying to convince you that moving in with me will be a great idea.”

Craig had to wriggle on the couch as Rick pulled down his sweatpants and underwear, until he was entirely butt naked; his hardness getting sucked on with perfection by his giant lover.

“You are so hard tonight. I can feel your dick pulsing in my mouth,” Rick chuckled, taking a quick break.

“Well, you’ve got great skills,” Craig smiled back.

“You’re not wrong. If you want a decent blow job, you should always ask a greedy guy. Someone who knows how to push a lot into his mouth,” he teased seductively, knowing that it was always that sort of confidence in his size that never failed to get Craig going.

“What about me?” Craig asked. “Do I give good blow jobs?”

“Would you like to be good at it?” Rick smirked wickedly, rubbing Craig’s doughy pot belly.

“Yes,” Craig nodded with submission.

“I’ll train you up then,” Rick nodded slowly. “When you move in with me, I’ll teach you exactly what it means to have a big, greedy mouth,” he smirked, actually pinching at Craig’s belly fat and jiggling it gently. “Would you like that?”

“Yes!” Craig shot back, his eyes wide as he actually felt an orgasm building simply from having his fat handled.

“Are you going to move in with me then? And let me train you?” Rick teased, shaking Craig’s belly fat even more.

“Yes!” Craig whimpered through gritted teeth as his erection actually erupted there and then, streaming down the shaft in great waves and pooling between his thighs. What had he just signed up for?

Sam and Wes were annoyed when Craig told them he wouldn’t be taking the room for his final year in college. They had little comprehension of how merciful he was actually being, freeing them from the meddlesome grasp of Rick who would no longer be able to torment them, nor their waistlines.

The summer arrived and Craig headed home to spend a couple of months with his family. He braced himself for the looks and comments he would get about his weight gain, but on the whole, it was fairly muted. He hadn’t had a huge circle of friends in high school, and those he did have were on the larger side anyway. His mother was the only one who caused a fuss, talking about how out of shape he looked and how out of breath he seemed once he had to resume his old chore of taking the trash out for her. As he showed her pictures of his boyfriend, Rick, she visibly bristled at his size, not holding back her thoughts on who was to blame for Craig’s additional pounds; especially when she hit the bottle.

Away from Rick, the weight didn’t feel quite as erotic as it had before. He felt every bit as trapped as he had been back in high school, trying to manage his mother’s silent issues with alcohol; leaning on Rick for support and to take his mind off things whenever he called each evening.

Slipping back into his old diet and lifestyle at home, Craig found the weight to be dropping off him fairly swiftly. Although he knew this would probably disappoint Rick when he next saw him, for Craig, it was a welcome relief. In allowing himself to climax at having his fat jiggled, he felt like he had reliquished a little more of his true desires than he had bargained for. By losing weight and getting back to his old habits, Craig would be able to stand his ground and maintain a physique that more resembled his appearance at the start of his relationship with Rick. That, more than anything else, would help to prove that he wasn’t really getting off on becoming so out of shape.

“Well, look who it is!” Rick smiled, grabbing both of the heavy bags Craig was carrying out of the airport and putting them down on the floor. Although he had ended his time at home on a very sour note with his mother, an immediate surge of passion swelled through Craig at seeing the large man again. Was Rick’s stomach even rounder than it had been before? It certainly looked bigger, with his belly peeking out of the bottom of his undersized t-shirt. “Someone’s pleased to see me,” the big man teased, seeing a bulge forming in Craig’s pants after their embrace.

Craig looked down, embarrassed, but Rick simply chuckled and started to lead the way out. Craig was cursing his body. He’d spent all summer psyching himself up for taking back some control in this relationship and already his hardness was letting him down. In fact, it was getting worse; flooding with blood more and more as he followed behind the massive glutes of his boyfriend; now that he carried the two massive bags in each hand, Rick actually looked wider than the back end of a car..

After throwing the bags into the back of his truck, Craig felt the entire vehicle rock as Rick climbed inside; yet another little detail about dating such a big man that Craig loved, and had almost entirely fogotten during his time at home. Rick looked around the parking lot, seeing that it was fairly clear. Then he turned his attention to the tent that was pushing up the material in Craig’s pants and slid his hand over the top of it. “Summer’s over,” he whispered seductively into Craig’s ear. “You’re all mine now!”

Even as the pair of them raced upstairs upon immediately getting home, Rick didn’t mention Craig’s thirty pound weight loss. The moment seemed to be entirely consumed by Rick’s new size as he balanced his large stomach on Craig’s back and set to work.

“What’s that doing in here?” Craig asked afterwards as they lay together in bed.

“It’s our new refrigerator,” Rick smiled. “It’ll save us having to go downstairs for snacks all the while.”

Craig mumbled in disapproval. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to sleep all that well with the humming nose.”

“You’ll get used to it,” Rick laughed, rolling over to cuddle his lover better and making the entire bed rock and squeal. “You’re going to be getting used to a lot of new things this year…”

Living with Rick was a complete culture shift after the summer. His fourth and final year in college was more intense than any of the years that had come before it. Rick’s place was further away from campus, and so Craig now took the bus pretty much everywhere he had to go. Bob and Rick lived on take-outs and turned their noses up whenever Craig tried to make something wholesome and homemade; like a couple of five year olds refusing to even try a vegetable of any kind.

To Craig’s surprise, he soon learned that Bob and Rick hired an older lady, called Pam, to come in and take care of the place for them.

“Such dirty boys, these two,” she gumbled to Craig as he tried to work at the kitchen counter on an assignment. It was clear that she had deep affection for both Rick and Bob; however, that didn’t mean they were above her criticisms. She busily cleaned out take-out containers and put them away for recylcing. “Some days I come in here and want to cry. I’m amazed they don’t have rats.”

Craig nodded awkwardly in agreement. Maybe if the pair of them ever left even the slightest crumb from all the food they consumed, rats and mice could indeed have become a problem for them.

“And Rick was such a handsome boy when he moved in,” Pam went on, pulling a pair of enormous underwear from the washing machine; the elastic in them obviously coming to the end of its life. “It’s such a shame!”

At this, Craig’s interest was caught. “You’ve known the boys that long?” he asked. In all the time he had been dating Rick, Pam was only the second person he had ever come across who had spoken about the Rick’s former physique.

“Oh, yes! I met him when he first moved in here with his cousin,” she began. “There had been problems at home. He hadn’t wanted to go to college, despite being so clever. Then he didn’t want to play sports, despite being so gifted. They all thought Bob was a bad influence, which I can’t say I disagree with,” she nodded fairly. “As soon as Rick moved in he started piling on the weight, just like his cousin had a couple of years earlier. I remember looking at him one day and noticing this little paunch had popped out on him. His face got chubby. Then his whole body just bloated and got bigger and bigger.”

Craig wrigged awkwardly in his seat, feeling an odd arousal as he imagined Rick undergoing such a transformation. “He had another boyfriend back then, didn’t he?” Craig asked, wondering just how clued up Pam really was on the goings on in this house.

She thought for a moment. “Yes. Now, what was his name?” she pondered, before Geoff’s name came to her again. “He was another lovely boy.”

“Was he a big guy as well?” Craig questioned.

Pam thought back. “Yes,” she nodded, looking away slightly as she tried to recall. “I remember him having quite the big stomach on him. But only after he moved in here with the boys.”

“Geoff moved in with them?” Rick asked next, surprised that this had been the case.

“For quite a few months,” she nodded. “Rick used to spoil him rotten!” she smiled.

“He does the same with me,” Craig blushed. He’d only been living there for a couple of weeks and already he could feel his stomach reinflating. He knew that Ben and Rick had a pair of scales somewhere, but they weren’t placed anywhere obvious so that he could have free access to them and check his suspicions.

“Well, you just be careful,” Pam smiled at him. “I love Bob and RIck dearly, but I know they’re no angels either. I’ve watched quite a few of Bob’s girlfriends get pretty big over the years.”

“And you think that will happen to me?” Craig shot back, feeling a great spike of arousal at the thought. After all, he was still quite far from his starting weight, back when he met Rick for the first time.

Pam glanced down towards Craig’s slight double chin. “You just be careful,” she repeated again in a motherly fashion; perhaps holding back her true thoughts of what was really about to happen next.

Portion sizes became Craig’s greatest enemy over the following weeks. After a day of manual work, the boys filled their plates to astronomical levels, and they did the same for Craig; whether he’d asked for it or not. At first, he left plenty of it on his plate for Rick to finish off. But, these days, Rick was starting to nag him for wasting food. “Just get the fries down, at least,” he’d sigh, seeing the large mountain that remained on the plate. Then: “You can’t leave all that meat,” he’d grumble.

Craig had hoped that Rick and Bob would start to put less on his plate, but they never did. He’d sometimes catch their knowing looks; smirking as they piled the food up more and more. With Bob back to being single, Craig suddenly felt that he had become the boys’ sole focus of their entertainment.

By the time Thanksgiving came around, Craig was right back where he had started, with his stomach bouncing back to the size it had been at the end of the summer semester. However, the regained weight had deposited differently on his body now that he had lost the weight and put it back on. His butt and thighs were softer and larger this time, his nipples more sensitive. His facial cheeks had blown up more, and Craig had decided to keep his spreading double chin concealed underneath a camouflage of short and very necessary facial hair.

“Oh, I love this time of year!” Bob sighed, plopping himself into his big armchair by the TV after a ginormous Thanksgiving meal and beginning to snack on the leftover buffet food from the evening before. “Nothing but endless food now, until the beginning of January!” he beamed, tapping his large stomach. “A fat guy’s dream!”

Craig considered tidying up, but he knew that Pam was coming in the morning. Instead, he took his swollen and sore body over to the couch and threw himself lazily down next to his boyfriend, snuggling into his large body. Rick hadn’t worn a shirt since finishing work on the Tuesday, and his overstuffed tummy had never looked larger. Despite the unusually cold November that they were experiencing, it was obvious that the large guy was experiencing what Rick referred to as ‘the meat sweats’.

“You wait until you see how crazy we go over the holidays,” Bob teased Craig just as RIck burped uncomfortably from all the food. “Our Rick here is king of the eggnog!”

“I’ve already made Craig a batch of my special eggnog actually,” Rick explained to his cousin.

“Oh, have you?” Bob smirked, getting a quick look at Craig’s swollen belly. “I see.”

“I was actually going to go see my mom this Christmas, but…” Craig pondered aloud. As the weight had piled back on him in the last couple of months, all he could imagine was his mother’s sarcastic voice in his head, telling him things that he didn’t want to hear; blaming him for everything that was wrong in her life.

“But he knows he’ll have a better time with us!” Rick told Bob, finishing off Craig’s sentence for him; saving Craig from having to explain his awkward relationship with his mother.

“Excellent!” boomed Bob. “We’ll look after you,” he winked. “Won’t we, Rick?”

With his arm draped over Craig’s shoulders, Rick rubbed the top of Craig’s arm, like the boy was his dutiful student. “Definitely,” he nodded. Then came the daunting phrase that Craig had heard all too often. “We’ll be spoiling you rotten!”

It was strange to see people that Craig had met many times in the past and not have them recognise him. That was exactly what was starting to happen as the Spring finally arrived. It was all the fat Craig had gained in his face. It had changed his appearance quite considerably; especially with his facial hair. Over the winter months, his weight had been building and building. It was his own fault. He hadn’t been fighting Rick and Bob, as well as their manipulations to ensure that he over-ate in the same way that they did. However, it was also the case that gaining weight was just so easy. Rather than having the traumatic experience of feeling his clothes tighten and a lover who disapproved, Rick was constantly slowly updating Craig’s wardrobe, subtly ensuring that his transition into obesity was as smooth as possible.

Now when Craig looked in the mirror, he saw the shape of man he would have been very much attracted to himself. He had all the fat features that he adored so much, on his very own body. Back in the days before he met Rick, he had longed to play with a guy with such jiggly nipples as he had now. The back fat, the arm blubber and jiggly thighs: they were all things he had adored. He couldn’t believe that he had such a protrusive stomach, nor comprehend the width of his swelling butt, meaning that he frequently knocked things over as he tried to glide into tight spaces that would not have been a problem for him eighteen months ago. What turned him on even more was the fact that he never envisioned himself inhabiing a body like this. He held up his underwear in disbelief. Did he really need such oversized clothes now? Had he really allowed his kink to take him this far? All because he’d fallen for a big man with a secret desire to feed him up?

The sex with Rick was even more astonishing as Craig had grown. He senseed there was a closeness and connection between them both that could not be matched. He felt admired and appreciated like never before. The way Rick’s hands travelled across his expanding body, reaching for all the softest parts, assessing the great width of his shape and marvelling at the pure fat that had taken over his body. Finally, Craig had found the one man who understood his attraction to all of this, like no one else he had ever met in his life.

The acceptance came easy after that. By the summer, Craig was well over 300lbs and lounging about on the couch, just the same as the other two when Pam came around to clean for them all. He couldn’t believe his luck as he was hired by a company straight after his graduation, working from home three days each week and only needing to commute into the city on the two other days.

“Maybe we could start thinking about getting our own place soon?” Craig smiled as he scanned his first paycheck with pride.

“I’d really like that,” Rick nodded, unbuttoning the shirt of his pot bellied boyfriend after his hard day in the office. Living with Bob had been great, but after two years of being together, the time felt right for the pair of them to branch out on their own.

Collectively, the pair of them saved and set money aside over the following months; planning their move for sometime in the Spring. The whole idea gave them both a glow of bubbling excitement; with their loved-up contentment ensuring that the pair of them continued to swell up even more.

“That has to be the best Chinese place in town,” Craig smiled, as he leaned back and rubbed his large, tight stomach a few weeks later. All three of them had gorged on their own banquet meal for two and there wasn’t a single thing left to show for it. “I hope there’s somewhere just as good in our new place,” he commented offhandedly to Rick, thinking about their imagined new apartment.

“What new place?” Bob jumped in, sounding immediately irritated.

Craig winced, remembering that Rick had asked him not to mention it to Bob until they had time to all sit down and discuss their move properly, mouthing a silent ‘sorry’ to his boyfriend as he could tell that he had just dropped his foot in it.

“You plan to move out together?” he asked Craig in a surprisingly aggressive tone.

“Not yet,” Craig smiled, trying to calm the suddenly tense atmosphere. “But in a few months, maybe.”

“That’s bullshit,” Bob laughed. “Rick’s not moving out. We’ve lived together for years. He loves it here.”

Rick breathed in awkwardly, knowing that he needed to set his cousin straight. “It’s just something Craig and I think might be a good next step for the pair of us,” he offered, as if dipping his toe into very hot water and then taking it straight out again.

“Bullshit!” Bob snarled. “Are you just saying that to keep him happy?” he pointed rudely at Craig.

“No. It’s…” Rick mumbled. “It’s something we’ve been talking about for a few months now.”

Bob shook his head angrily. The idea of Craig breaking up his living arrangements with his cousin had sent him into a fiery temper that Craig had never witnessed before. “Do you know what he calls you behind your back?” he snarled at Craig. “Your precious boyfriend over there?”

Craig sat there motionless, wondering where this sudden anger had come from.

“Dude!” Rick cried, attempting to make his cousin see reason and not hit out like it was obvious he was about to do.

“He calls you his ‘pet pig,’” Bob shot back. “You wanna know why you’re so fucking fat now?” he growled angily across to Craig. “It’s because he made you that way. He pours appetite stimulants into your pasta sauce, calorie boosters into your milkshake and whipping cream into your coffee. And that’s only the half of it!”

Craig looked across at Rick’s anxious face.

“He doesn’t actually love you. He’s just a kinky little fucker, like me. He gets off on making you fatter. That’s all.”

“Cool it, Bob!” Rick shouted now, clearly getting angry.

“Do you know how many times he’s asked me to help him get a measuring tape around that fat stomach of yours when you’ve drifted off to sleep, slumped on the couch? He even keeps a notebook.”

Rick’s head slipped into his hands, hardly believing that all of this was unfolding. Meanwhile, Craig’s wild eyes simply switched back and forth between the pair of them.

“And…” Bob added, laughing aggressively at the next piece of information he decided to share. “You want to know why you always get the munchies right before bedtime?” he blasted on. “It’s because Rick trained it into you. He looked up online how to do it; dosing you up with sugar for weeks until you started to do it all yourself. You really think he loves you?” he scoffed. “Two years you’ve been together and the only conversations he’s ever had with me about you is getting my advice on how to make sure you get even fatter.”

Craig got up, feeling Bob’s onslaught was getting too much for him. He heard the two cousins shouting at each other as he climbed the stairs and took himself into the bedroom. Was this it? Was his relationship over? Had every affectionate word that Rick ever said to him been a complete lie?

“You probably have some questions for me?” Rick gingerly asked as he stepped into the room a few minutes later. “I know you must be upset. Bob doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

“Really?” Craig shot back angrily. “You’re going to try and pin this all on Bob?”

Rick paused for a second and then nodded in defeat. “You’re right,” he agreed. “I’ve been out of line. Those things Bob said about the appetite stimulants and calorie boosters… that was all pretty much true,” he mumbled sheepishly.

“Of course it was,” Craig sighed impatiently. “You think I didn’t know all that? I like fat guys. And you… you clearly like fat guys too. The whole feeding thing was just our quiet, kinky little game. But I didn’t think that was where our relationship started and ended. I thought you were in love with me.”

Rick looked hurt by the pain in Craig’s eyes. “I do love you!” he cried, stepping further into the room and kneeling by the side of the bed. “I just… I just let this whole kinky shit get the better of me. I watched Bob fatten up so many of his girlfriends, even when he was in high school, and I guess I let it all get into my head. Bob doesn’t understand real relationships. He’s just missing that little part in his brain. That’s the only reason why I don’t talk to him about all the mushy stuff between us.”

“Would you choose me over Bob?” Craig asked, having always felt secretly anxious that Rick’s cousin meant more to him than he did.

Rick sighed and dropped his gaze. “Of course I would. But you’ve got to understand. Bob was there for me at a very difficult time.” He sighed, as if about to relinquish the greatest secret of his entire life. “I didn’t always used to look this way. Back in high school… I was kinda… athletic,” he admitted begrudgingly.

At this, Craig couldn’t help but laugh a little. Of all the secrets that had come out that evening, this one hardly merited the gravity that Rick seemed to instill upon it. “I know,” he smirked. “Pam did mention it once or twice.”

Rick’s eyebrows rose up. Perhaps he had forgotten how much Pam liked to talk. “I hated it,” he grumbled. “I had this desire in me to grow and get fat. Yet no one around me could understand why I was having these feelings. No one… apart from Bob. We could talk for hours about it; this compulsion inside of us to get fat. I’d seen Bob doing it to himself after high school. It literally blew my mind! So when I finally got my job and was earning enough to pay Bob some rent money, I moved straight in here and followed in his footsteps. I lost my abs and packed on a belly in a matter of weeks. It was…” he sighed with pleasure, “the best feeling in the entire world!”

“But what about Geoff?” Craig asked next.

Rick scratched the back of his head awkwardly. “Pam told you about him too, huh?” he whispered.

Craig shook his head, finally recounting the story of bumping into Rick’s ex, just as he should have done over eighteen months ago.

“So you knew all that, and yet you still stuck by me?” Rick asked in utter disbelief once Craig had finished, leaving nothing unsaid. “What the hell did I do to deserve you for two years? Ever since I was eighteen, I had Bob telling me that he was the only person in the whole world who would accept me for who I really was. Yet, there you were, standing by my side this whole time.”

“It’s a mess, isn’t it?” Craig sighed. They’d both been so immature about this whole situation; each of them holding pieces of the same jigsaw and not sharing. Only now could they piece them all together and see that they’d both only ever been completely happy.

“Do you still want to get a place with me?” Rick asked, allowing a little bit of hope to shine through his voice.

“I think so,” Craig nodded. “But… do you still want to make me fatter?” he asked in response.

Rick squirmed, being asked so directly about something he had concealed for so long. However, this was a fresh start: a time for them both to be honest with each other. “Yes,” he stated, knowing full well that it could be the end of his relationship. “I don’t think I’d ever want to stop fattening you up.”

Craig nodded. Finally, the truth had been revealed: the feeder, thoroughly exposed.

“Okay,” Craig sighed, bracing himself for what needed to happen next. “But we do this together from now on. We communicate. We say what we’re really feeling, when we feel it.”

Rick was nodding in complete agreement; the smile spreading across his broad face. This wasn’t the end after all. It was only the beginning.

#gainer fiction #gainer stories #gay feedee #gainerstory #gainerfic #gainer story #gayfeedee #gainerstories #gayfeeder #gainer fic

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amomentsescape · 3 months

Note

Slashers x reader with wings. Reader's wings are bound, hidden and look heavily damaged from that.

How do the slashers find out? How do they react?

Add the crow guy, Eric, I think?

Slashers with Winged! Reader

Slashers x Reader (Separate)

Includes: Freddy, Michael, Jason, Thomas, Bubba, Brahms, Norman, Billy, Stu, Vincent, Bo, & Eric

A/N: I am once again sleep deprived, so I apologize if there are any typos or nonsense that I didn't catch reading through this. Thank you for your request!

Freddy Krueger

As mentioned in many previous posts, you can't really hide anything from Freddy

Whenever you sleep, you're in his territory, and he can do whatever he pleases

And one of the last things he'll ever let you do is hide yourself from him

He could see the damage from all the years of hiding your wings, binding them up in hopes no one would notice

And this honestly pisses him off a bit

Why would you ever want to be like everyone else?

Your wings were beautiful, and they made you that much more special

The moment he sees your wings free, you better believe he'll never let you hide them again

Anyone who even gives you the slightest look will be dealt with that same night

Michael Myers

Another one that you can't really hide anything from

He may let you think that he doesn't know about your wings

But in reality, he's known about them this whole time

However, he won't push you to reveal yourself to him until you're ready

It's not like it's a huge deal to him anyways

He's neutral about the whole situation

Wings or no wings, nothing will sway his opinion on you

Just don't wait too long to talk to him about it though

The more time that passes, the more irritated he'll become

Because after this much time together, you have to fully trust him now

Right?

Jason Voorhees

Jason is pretty much clueless from the start

It's not that he isn't observant to you (he watches you 24/7)

It's just that he fully respects your boundaries and won't even hold your hand unless you tell him he can

So when he accidentally walked in on you one day and saw your damaged wings, he just stands there in shock

He snaps out of it when he notices your bashful and worried face however

He's just so confused on why you would hide this from him

He thinks your wings suit you perfectly

In fact, it makes him feel even more assured that you two are meant for each other

He also grew up wanting to hide a part of himself

But having each other means fully embracing the insecurities of the other

He doesn't ever want you to hide your wings from him again

Thomas Hewitt

He honestly would have never even knew about them if it wasn't for his need for late night affection

He just wanted to cuddle up next to you in the middle of the night

But he was met with something out of place on your back

He couldn't help but peek, and the moment he did, he was stunned

But did he even think about running?

No. He just decided to wait until morning to talk to you about it

When he asked you, he could tell you were uncomfortable

And because of this, he did everything he could to reassure you that he wasn't upset or grossed out by your wings

He loves them!

He took them in his hands gently and carefully removed the bindings

There will be no more hiding from him after that

And he'll happily caress your wings every night until you feel reassured

Bubba Sawyer

Bubba didn't mean to walk in on you like this

But the moment he sees the wings, all decency goes out the door

He stumbles in further, his hands reaching out to them

They're breathtaking... but why are they so damaged?

It physically hurts him to see you in any type of pain, and yet you've been carrying this around with you this whole time?

He's a bit hurt you didn't feel comfortable talking to him about this, but he's even more hurt by the fact that they look painful to you

He doesn't even let you protest before he's breaking the ties and freeing the wings

He's blubbering to you, making you promise to never hurt yourself like this, especially when it's something so cool

He spends the next few days playing with your wings, admiring them like a kid with a new toy

Brahms Heelshire

The day he finds out about your wings is one of betrayal

Brahms refuses to let you keep secrets from him, and hiding such a big thing from him upsets him greatly

How can he trust you?

You’ll need to give him some time to cool down, but once he does, he’ll be on you

Will force you to free your wings so he can play with them

It honestly hurts him a bit to see the destruction brought to them

He empathizes with you a bit

He has also spent a good portion of his life hiding a part of himself

But it’s because of this experience that he refuses to let you do the same any longer

You’re with him now anyways

He’ll never let you leave the house

So there will never be another soul to judge this part of you ever again

Norman Bates

He’s kind of speculated for a bit that you were hiding something

He didn’t know exactly what, he just could feel it in his gut

This insecurity was beginning to eat away at him until the day he finally saw the truth

It would be a lie to say that he wasn’t a bit scared at first

Angels have wings, but so did the devil

But seeing your pained expression reassured Norman that you were far from something evil

Once he let everything soak in, he’ll be all over you asking questions

He wants to know everything about you and your wings

He doesn’t want you to hide them anymore, and he’ll take the time each night to clean them and help heal them from years of damage

These are a part of you, and he loves everything about you

Billy Loomis

Billy doesn't really speculate anything

He's confident that he would be able to tell if you were keeping anything from him

Until the night he sneaks in through your window in hopes of surprising you

But instead, he's the one with the surprise

He sees you looking sadly at yourself through the bathroom mirror, your damaged wings on full display

He spends the next few days going radio silent towards you

But on the fourth day, he storms your room and interrogates you on your wings

Why the hell would you lie to him?

He doesn't care that you have something that makes you "different"

He's simply hurt that you kept it from him

However, it only takes an open conversation for him to calm down

He's still a little pissy but happy to know the truth

Just don't keep anything from him again

Stu Macher

This boy is absolutely clueless

But his unconditional, completely suffocating affection is what finally makes you feel comfortable to open up to him

And when you do, his eyes widen and his jaw drops

You almost think he's going to be upset until he speaks

"That's fucking sick"

Has you unbind them immediately with the promise that you won't keep them hidden away like that anymore

He constantly reassures you that anyone who sees them will have the same reaction as him

There are thousands of people that would kill to have wings like yours

Stu included

So don't ever hide something that literally makes you so unique

He loves them

Vincent Sinclair

You honestly told him about your wings right away

It was after a deep conversation about his own insecurities over his appearance and scars

He showed you his face, and you showed him your wings

It was a raw moment of vulnerability between you two, and all it did was strengthen your bond

After that night, you rarely saw him wear that mask, and he refused to let you tied up your wings like that again

He wants to love the real you

And any part you hide from him is a part of you that he can't love freely

He thinks your wings are beautiful, and you become even more of a inspiration for his art

You are quite literally an angel in his eyes, and he won't ever take advantage of that

Bo Sinclair

He was being flirty and touchy, as Bo does

And the moment he felt your back, he was throwing questions at you left and right

There was no lying or hiding the truth from him any longer

Bo hates secrets

So when you fully reveal yourself to him, he's shocked

He doesn't really know what to say at first

He didn't think something like this was possible

But after finally accepting the reality of the situation, he angrily begins tearing off your bindings

How dare you hurt yourself like this? How could you willingly lie to him after all this time?

He's a good mixture of disbelieving and pissed at you

It'll take a couple days to fully understand the situation

But once he does, it's smooth sailing

Eric Draven

Eric is all-knowing

And he knows that you're keeping something from him

But unlike a lot of the others, he's not upset or angry about it

You'll tell him when you're ready, and he trusts you enough to know it isn't anything terrible

And once you do open up about it, he's in absolute awe

His companion is a crow for goodness sake

To think he was ever going to react in any way other than admiration would have been stupid

He does get a bit emotional seeing your wings all tied up and damaged however

He's gentle with you as he sets them free

To see that pain you put yourself through really upsets him

He doesn't ever want you to do something like that again, especially when he sees this as a true gift

He'll spend the rest of the night cleaning and taking care of them, lulling you to sleep

631 notes · View notes

mammomlette · 5 months

Text

OBEY ME OLDER BROTHERS AS SOULMATE TROPES!

part 1 part 2 part 3 (WIP rn)

Includes: Lucifer, Mammon, Leviathan, GN! Reader/MC, possible cringe

Notes: This is literally my first ever fan fic I’ve published (if head cannons count as fan fics lmao) so apologies for any mistakes or weird formatting! Constructive criticism is more than welcome, I’m ASKING for it if you have any🙏

Alsoo they just kept getting longer and longer, I don’t know why and I’ve gone through lucifers to try and make it longer but I just can’t so sorry😭

LUCIFER: you can’t see their eye colour until you meet them.

* It wasn’t really that bad, being unable to see red.

* Being unable to see the colour of your blood as it oozed out of a cut wasn’t really that bad, even if it just looked like grey tar pouring out instead which is equally gross

* It wasn’t really that bad to just never be able to see a single colour, everyone had to put up with it at some point

* But it was sad how rose bouquets always looked dull, and how hearts would always be grey

* It was sad how you couldn’t just imagine up a new colour to fill the void that not being able to see red left

* You knew that the colour you couldn’t see was called red, and you could learn as much as you’d like about it but that didn’t meant you could imagine it let alone see it for yourself

* Not until you were teleported into a large, court-like room one day

* You looked up from whatever you were doing and stared up at the man who had begun to cheerfully talk in front of you. His hair was that familiar gray that you recognised as red

* He introduced you to your situation and the school, and in your panic your eyes darted across the room

* Then, you suddenly made eye contact with a man in a dark coat, hair a matching colour and eyes that were also a dark colour

* but a new dark colour

* Not that gray you had been familiar with your whole life, but a fierce mix of orange and pink, the way the colour red had been described to you your entire life

* You saw through your periphery some orniments on the wall and the previous man’s hair and jacket come to life with colour, but you couldn’t pull your eyes away from the dark haired man before you

* He had frozen, just like you, afraid to blink, afraid that he’d lose this enticing new colour again after missing it for so long if he were to let it go for less than a second

* When he finally looked away, he saw how different decorations in the room that had previously been gray lit up with the colour of your eyes, the world never seeming so alive in all the thousands of years of his life as they did in that moment

* For the first time in his incredibly long life, he saw the beauty that was your eyes and all the beauty they brought with them.

MAMMON: the red string of fate.

* Your entire life you had been accompanied by that obnoxious red string.

* Whenever you glanced down to your non-dominant hand, the first thing you noticed was the red string all tangled up and wrapped around your hand

* Sometimes you’d get bored and tie nots in it or rest it on a surface and pull it to make shapes, but as soon as you took your attention away from it it’d return to normal, pointing in the direction of your soulmate

* And for some reason, the direction would always be down

* Not always directly down, sometimes diagonal, but it always managed to go into the ground.

* Was your soulmate miner or something???

* You had tried and tried countless times to follow it, going into basements and even considering going cave exploring in case your soulmate was some kind of cave creature trapped down there

* There was even a time you considered that they could be in hell, because where else could they be that’s so low down?!

* You had grown to hate it, the way it would taunt you and while it showed your friends their soulmates, it just showed you the dirt on the ground

* Hopes of finding your soulmate and curiosity to where they could be grew into despair, concluding that your soulmate was either a mole person or dead

* Both results meant that you’d never meet them and would forever be tormented by that hideous, obnoxious, torturous red string that was eternally tied to your ring finger

* You were waiting in a lobby for a job interview when you suddenly popped into the devildom

* A man was happily introducing you to the courtroom(?) and all of the people sat inside of it

* There was a man named Lucifer, followed by his younger brothers, all of which noticeably sharing names with demons. This place was called the Devildom, they’re demons, is this hell?Someone must be pulling your leg or something, right?!?!

* You were cut of from your thoughts by the dark haired man- Lucifer- telling you to call his younger brother.

* You hesitantly took the phone-like device called a ‘DDD’ from Lucifer’s hands and dialed the number you were told to, fidgeting with the string on your ring finger that nobody else could see

* You waited for Lucifer’s younger brother, Mammon, to show up, still fiddling with the string, when you felt a sudden jolt on the string

* You looked down, to see the string moving slightly, left to right to slightly up, and noticed that it was no longer going into the ground. It was right at the doorway to the room.

* A man stormed into the room, immediately charging in your direction and shouting about your ‘nerve’ to summon ‘the great Mammon’

* Safe to say the shouting died down when he took a look at your hand and noticed how your strings were connected

* Awkward silence filled the air until it was interrupted by the Avatar of Lust, cooing at the situation when he put two and two together and realised what was going on

* You were too focused on the red string connecting you to his hand to noticed the red slowly covering mammons face

* Internally, you laughed. Of course you found your soulmate in Hell.

LEVIATHAN: you make choices for your soulmate.

* You woke up to the sun shining through your curtains. Your soulmate, for whatever reason, didn’t allow you to shut your blinds. He didn’t even decline it, just left it on read.

* Why did you even have to request to do something so mundane?!

* Your soulmate forgetting to respond to your requests was a common occurrence, usually in the morning, but any time could be victim to your soulmates negligence to your requests.

* You went downstairs and opened your fridge and grabbed the first thing you saw: a pancake filled with red bean paste, in a box labeled ‘Azuki-tan, cute companion!’

* You had zero clue what that meant, you just remembered seeing it for sale at a grocery store a couple days ago

* Again, you had to send a request to your soulmate over whether you could eat this or not.

* Almost immediately, it was accepted. You didn’t really stop to think about the fast reaction time to the request, just thankful this wasn’t another ignored request

* Just as you were about to put it into your mouth, you were teleported to a large room that resembled a court room and contained a lot of chairs and 6 scary-looking men

* You kind of zoned out for most of that discussion until you started asking questions, but safe to say the pancake was forgotten, still in your hand.

* You made your way to where you would be staying with the demon assigned to look after you, Mammon, when a request from your soulmate popped up:

* ‘Soulmate would like to: Ask his brother for his money back.’

* You accepted, wondering what harm could be done, and entered the building with Mammon.

* You were just chatting with the white haired boy when all of a sudden a boy with purple hair started yelling at him “How about this? I vote for YOU to die, Mammon!”

* They started to yell at each other about money, which you found to be an odd coincidence. Would this even be considered as asking for money though? It’s more like bullying.

* You watched the argument unfold and brought the pancake to your mouth, about to take a bite, when the purple haired boy froze and stared at you, which made you stand there awkwardly with your mouth about to bite into the pancake for a few seconds waiting for him to say something

* “Is that Azuki-tan?!”

* “Umm… I think that was on the packaging… why?”

* Very awkward. Oh look, a request!

* ‘Soulmate would like to geek-out about Azuki-Tan and The Magical Ruri Hana: Demon Girl franchise.’ You accepted. How random.

* You had no time to ponder the randomness of the request because the purple haired boy, Levi as Mammon had introduced him, began to spout random nonsense about the pancake? No, a girl called ruri hana- wait no, now he’s going on about voice acting- who’s that voice actor?- wait what show is he going on about now?!?! You really wanted to tell this guy to slow down or shut up!

* He paused for a quick moment and pressed a button in the air, continuing with his tangent when you yelled at him to just slow down!

* He paused. He stared into your soul. He looked like he was rebooting, or something.

* “You’re my soulmate?” He said, voice shaky. You asked him what he meant, and he just started going on a rant about an anime where this very thing happened and- he’s off topic again, he’s going a mile a minute! You asked the voice in your head ‘can I please tell him to shut up?!’

* He stopped and stared at you, now yelling how you were asking him to shut up and how rude than was!

* Oh shit. He’s right? He’s your soulmate? And you just asked your soulmate to shut up the annoying guy in front of you?? Whew boy.

* You awkwardly mutter apologies to eachother, flustered, both the pancake and his older brother forgotten.

#obey me #obey me!#obey me solmare #obey me mammon #obey me lucifer #obey me leviathan #obey me mammon x reader #obey me lucifer x reader #obey me levi x reader #obey me x reader #x reader #btw the reason Levi was forgetting to respond to the requests esp in the morning is because #he was busy gaming or slept in😞 I didn’t make that clear soz #I’ll make the younger brothers tomorrow probs #constructive critism welcome

459 notes · View notes

adascore · 6 months

Text

Fouled Dreams | L. Oberdorf

pairings: lena oberdorf x dutch!reader (+ plays for bayern) / netherlands national team x reader / german national team x dutch!reader

warnings: netherlands losing. crying. swearing. changed some things about the match, but the result is the same. fouls. mentions of bruising and swelling.

author’s: been obsessed with her lately so just had to write something. writing about nations league losses have become my thing I fear :(

masterlist

•••••••

February, 2024

They'd know beforehand that this situation could happen, yet when both their teams lost in the semifinals, it was hard to grasp the reality that one needed to beat the other in order to go to the Olympics in Paris.

Herself and Lena had played plenty of times against each other, with both their respective clubs and national teams.

However, this felt different.

Their previous international meetings had merely been friendlies in preparations for other competitive events like the World Cup a year prior.

This was for a spot at the Olympics.

Y/N had been at the previous edition in Tokyo with the Dutch team, where they had stranded in the quarterfinals against the United States on penalties.

Lena had never played at the Olympic Games, something she greatly wanted to achieve with her German teammates.

Both teams also wanted to redeem themselves after disappointing World Cup exits.

There were many things at stake.

Of course, headlines and articles had been made about how the couple was going to go head-to-head in a very important match for both sides.

Prior to their arrivals at the stadium, they hadn't seen each other for a few weeks. Lena played for Wolfsburg, while Y/N was a striker for Bayern Munich.

Although, Lena's upcoming transfer to Bayern would assure they would only have to miss each other during international breaks.

The young footballers had gotten together about a year prior, all credit to Lynn, Dom and Jill who had played matchmakers.

The distance was difficult at first, but they eventually found a nice balance. It sounded cliche, but communication really is the key to a good relationship.

Y/N was strolling around the pitch with her teammates when the German team appeared in the tunnel.

She didn't notice her girlfriend at first, too occupied in a conversation with Andries and Sherida.

It was Lynn, who so ''sweetly'' screamed for her best friend to ''get her ass over here'' that got her to excuse herself from the discussion with her captain and coach.

''Echte uitslover jij, waar was je nou weer over aan het lullen met hen?'' (''You're a real teacher's pet, what were you bullshitting about this time with them?'') Lynn teased her as she approached her, Lena, Jule and Lea.

Y/N sarcastically smiled at her fellow Dutchwoman. ''Jouw dikke kop!'' (''Your big head!'') She retorted, with Lynn playfully giving her a shove afterwards.

Her eyes lit up once she spotted Lena. Despite the tension of the upcoming match, seeing her face brought a sense of comfort amidst the nerves.

''Hey, everyone.'' Y/N moved to embrace Lea and Jule first, their proximity making them the easiest targets for her initial greetings. She let out an awkward chuckle as she made eye contact with her girlfriend again, but went in for the hug as well.

''Missed you.'' Lena whispered softly, her arms wrapping around her partner's waist in a comforting hold.

''Missed you too.'' Y/N replied, her voice equally gentle.

Their embrace was brief, acutely aware of the prying eyes of the photographers stationed around the field. It wasn't that they were afraid of showing public displays of affection, it was more the discomfort that came with the knowledge that every moment captured on camera would be scrutinized and analyzed by the media and fans alike.

They were far from being a secret- their relationship was an open secret among their teammates and the wider football community. Yet, the constant surveillance felt suffocating at times. So, when they could help it, they kept the PDA to a minimum, opting for subtle gestures and fleeting touches that spoke volumes in their own right.

''My mum and dad are coming tonight.'' Y/N said to Lena, the pair quickly disassociated to their own small bubble.

The German grinned. ''Yeah? That's nice, haven't seen them in a while.'' She replied, her tone warm and genuine.

Y/N nodded, a sense of anticipation building within her at the thought of her parents' arrival. She had a good relationship with her family, they'd been supportive of her love of football from the moment she started and went to almost every game if they could.

''My mum did make a small sign for you, cause she thought you might get upset with her.'' She playfully rolled her eyes at the recalling of her mother sending her a picture of the small poster that said 'Go Lena!'.

Lena chuckled at the mention of her girlfriend's mother's thoughtful gesture, a smile tugging at the corners of her lips. ''That's very sweet, I can't wait to see it in person.''

''She's probably gonna want to take a picture of you with it, so you're warned beforehand.'' Y/N laughed, knowing her mother wanted photos of everything and everyone.

''I'll be sure to smile extra wide for the camera then, like this.'' Lena pretended to grin very big, showing off her teeth.

Y/N burst into laughter at her exaggerated pose, her eyes crinkling with amusement. ''Perfect, Obi! Exactly what she wants for a heartwarming photo.'' She teased, mimicking Lena's antics.

''Hey, you two,'' Lynn interrupted their moment, the entire group staring at the couple, ''the loser sleeps on the couch or what?'' The Dutch defender laughed.

Her national teammate mockingly rolled her eyes. ''Lynno, we don't even live in the same place. Idioot dat je bent.'' (''Idiot you are.'') Y/N responded.

Lynn chuckled in response, waving off her friend's playful insult with a dismissive gesture. ''Details, details,'' she replied, a mischievous twinkle in her eye, ''just make sure you've got that couch ready, wherever it may be.''

''I'm sure she has chosen a nice place.'' Lena retorted, chiming in on the banter.

Y/N's mouth gaped dramatically, and her eyes widened, exaggerating her reaction to the playful exchange. ''Actually, since you like breaking ankles, you can just sleep on the floor.''

Lena raised an eyebrow in mock surprise at her girlfriend's response, which drew another round of laughter from the group. ''Oh, I see how it is,'' she teased, ''floor it is, then. I'll bring my sleeping bag.'' She accepted.

She threw her arm around Lena at the feigned sadness over having to bring a sleeping bag, her pout being too cute to not fawn over.

It was a nice moment to have with the group, temporarily forgetting an important match would have to be played a few hours later.

There was a mixed atmosphere in the tunnel as both teams started gathering in a line, familiarizing themselves with their small mascots, who were all looking up at the players with wide-eyed excitement.

The Netherlands' usual captain, Sherida Spitse, had been forced to withdraw from the starting lineup due to a last-minute injury sustained during the warm-up. In her absence, Y/N found herself unexpectedly thrust into the role of captain for the crucial match.

As she entered the tunnel, the weight of the captain's armband felt both familiar and foreign at the same time. While she had stepped into the role of captain before, it had always been in moments of crisis, when Sherida was substituted during a match and Y/N was hastily given the band by one of their teammates.

It was not only a great moment for her, it would be one for her family as well. Though they weren't particularly patriotic, knowing that their daughter had been chosen by the entire Dutch team to lead them out for such an important match filled them with a sense of pride and honor.

Her usual spot in the line would be at the back, next to Lena. It had become almost routine for them to have a small chat before their matches, even when they were with Bayern and Wolfsburg, they were always the last players to enter the stadium.

Y/N held the pennant in her hands tight as she approached her girlfriend, careful to not make a big deal out of it since they were already filming the players as they waited for the officials to walk out.

A small pat on her arm was enough to grab Lena's attention, the German turning her head before a small, but nervous, smile broke out on her face once she noticed who it was.

''Hey, Captain.'' She grinned, her eyes briefly glancing towards where the armband was comfortably wrapped around her partner's bicep.

Y/N smirked once she noticed, but didn't say anything about it. ''Hi,'' she softly said, ''good match, alright? And please, don't break my ankles.'' She teased.

''No promises.'' Lena chuckled, playfully raising her eyebrow.

They shared a final glance before the striker made her way to the front of the line-up, only to be stopped by Dominique. ''Ze gaat sowieso je enkel breken.'' (''No doubt she's going to break your ankle.'') The Dutch defender said, a mischievous look in her eyes.

''Ik weet het.'' (''I know.'') Y/N sighed.

''Dom was right.'' The captain muttered under her breath as she was yet again taking to the ground by one of the German defenders.

It hadn't even been close to half-time yet and the Bayern Munich player had been assaulted from all sides. Funny enough, none of the challenges had been made by Lena- so far at least.

Danielle helped her get up from the ground, quickly checking in. ''I'm fine, Daan.'' Y/N reassured the older player, wiping her knees clean.

The first half proved to be eventful, yet no goals had been made by either side. The goalkeepers were making amazing saves, but both teams had also missed serious chances at scoring the opening goal.

Despite being deployed in Sherida's position as a defensive midfielder, Y/N managed to make an impact in the attacking third. She found herself with two golden opportunities to break the deadlock, however, luck was not on her side as both strikes rattled off the woodwork, denying her the chance to put her team ahead.

The opening minute of the second half was marked by a somewhat surprising moment:

Lena fouled Y/N.

The referee blew the whistle, signaling the late challenge made by the midfielder. Y/N, with a dramatic flair, collapsed to the ground, clutching her leg in feigned agony.

Recognizing the playful nature of the moment, Lena quickly understood that she was only hamming it up for the sake of a breather for her teammates and to ruin the Germans' momentum. However, she still bent down beside her girlfriend.

''You shouldn't go into acting anytime soon.'' Lena chuckled, briefly letting her hand caress over the part that 'allegedly' hurt so bad.

The captain let out a small smile. ''That's mean, you should get a yellow card for descent.''

The midfielder's eyes sparked with amusement as she helped her back up to her feet. ''Maybe later.'' She quipped, playfully nudging her girlfriend's shoulder before they resumed their positions on the field.

It didn't take too long for the fun to be over as Klara put in the first goal of the night, which had been assisted by Lena. About 10 minutes later, another Bayern teammate put one in the back of the net as Lea also got herself on the scoresheet.

As the game wore on, Y/N became increasingly determined to make a difference on the field. However, despite her best efforts, none of her attempts seemed to find the back of the net. Her teammates were not clinical enough, or the shots were deflected by the German defenders.

The more attacks she created, the more aggressive the fouls of the German grew on her.

They seemed determined to shut down Y/N's advances by any means necessary, resorting to increasingly rough challenges to disrupt her rhythm.

She managed to keep the ball from Nüsken, and send a pass to Esmee when a German player made a reckless tackle from behind, catching her off guard. The force of the challenge sent her crashing to the ground, a sharp pain shooting through her ankle.

A wave of concern washed over the stadium and the Dutch team as they watched their most vital player of the evening being abruptly taken out by Giulia.

People close to her rushed to her side, including Giulia who didn't have the intention to actually hurt her Bayern teammate. The referee swiftly intervened, issuing a yellow card.

''Shit, I'm sorry- didn't time it well.'' The midfielder apologized immediately, knowing right away it wasn't a great or necessary challenge.

Y/N made a gesture with her hand, which translated to ''it's okay, just give me space now,'' which Giulia understood, the pair having a great relationship at Bayern.

Lynn was the first of her teammates to reach her, shouting profanities at Giulia and the referee for letting the fouls on her best friend get to the point where she needed the medical team.

''Alles goed, meid?'' (''Everything okay, girlie?'') The Wolfsburg defender asked, concern etched on her face.

''Ik denk dat me enkel er elk moment gaat afvallen.'' (''I think my ankle is going to fall off at any moment.'') She sarcastically replied, rolling her eyes.

Lynn chuckled at her friend's attempt at humor, though the worry still lingered in her eyes. ''Ik hoop van niet, we hebben die nog nodig.'' (''I hope it doesn't, we still need it.'').

Meanwhile, the medical team arrived, quickly assessing Y/N's ankle to determine the extent of the injury. The other players quickly backed off so the staff could work in peace.

Lena noticed her club teammate's concerned expression and approached her quietly. ''How's she doing?'' She asked softly, her eyes flickering toward Y/N, whose ankle was covered in bruises.

Lynn sighed, her hand smoothing down her hair. ''I think she's trying to make it out as if she isn't bothered by it, but it's obvious it hurts- look at it, completely blue.'' The Dutchwoman motioned towards where one of the physios was icing her foot.

The midfielder nodded. ''I hope it's nothing too serious.'' She observed the way her partner was hissing at the way the staff was assessing her ankle, visibly agitated by the pain. She wished she could do more to help, but all she could do for now was offer her support from the sidelines.

The Dutch team held their breath as Y/N gingerly tested her weight on her injured ankle, her expression a mix of determination and discomfort. Every eye on the sideline was fixed on her, silently praying that she would be able to continue.

''As soon as the match is done, you're coming with us to the medical room. I'm surprised you can walk still.'' Their physiotherapist ordered her, glancing down at her iced and taped up ankle.

Andries sent her a thumbs up, asking if she was okay to continue. However, Y/N knew they had used up all their substitutes so there would be no use in forfeiting the game, so she confirmed with a nod that she would carry on.

She could walk on her own to the side of the pitch, though there was a limp in her step. The striker carefully jogged onto the grass as the referee gave her permission to join the match again.

A few tense minutes later, the shrill sound of the referee's whistle pierced the air, signaling the end of the match.

Amidst the disappointment of the Dutch team, the German players erupted into jubilant celebrations. They hugged each other tightly, their faces beaming with joy and relief as they reveled in their hard-earned victory.

The Oranje Leeuwinnen on the pitch dejectedly gave each other hugs and consolations, most with tears in their eyes.

Y/N had lowered herself onto the ice-cold grass, the throbbing pain in her ankle too much to bear. She winced as she cautiously propped herself up against the turf.

She suddenly felt two pairs of arms slip beneath hers, lifting her gently off the ground. Startled, she looked up to see Esmee and Kerstin, their expressions filled with concern as they looked at their captain.

''Kom op, meid,'' (''Come on, girl,') Kerstin gently said, ''je was echt een beest op dat middenveld.'' (''You really were a beast in the midfield.'') The Manchester City player chuckled, trying to lighten up the somber mood.

Esmee nodded in agreement, her grip firm yet gentle as she supported Y/N's weight. The two youngsters guided her towards the waiting medical staff, who had been watching the scene unfold from the sidelines.

Some of their teammates and staff patted their heads and ruffled their hair as they walked across the pitch, offering words of sweet nothingness.

With a reassuring nod from the physiotherapist, Esmee and Kerstin carefully lowered her onto the stretcher, ensuring she was comfortable before the medical team began to carry her inside the stadium for further examination.

The injured player could hear the applause from the bystanders, but it wasn't much solace as the pain and disappointment hit her like a truck. Unable to hold back her emotions any longer, Y/N felt a sob escape her lips, the sound muffled by her hands as she covered her face.

The staff of the Dutch team carrying the stretcher watched with downcast eyes, feeling for the young player who had literally given her body and soul this match.

After what seemed like an eternity of navigating the labyrinthine corridors of the stadium, they finally reached the treatment room. With practiced efficiency, they set to work assessing Y/N's injury, carefully removing her shoe and sock to examine her blue ankle.

As the physiotherapists administered treatment, taping up her ankle and applying ice packs to reduce the swelling, the striker remained silent, lost in her thoughts and emotions.

Once her ankle was securely taped and she was given the green light to proceed, Y/N wasted no time in making her way back to the pitch. The pain was barely noticeable anymore as she walked with quickness in her strides, simply wanting to be with her team.

Surprisingly, the German and Dutch players were still exchanging handshakes with one another, acknowledging each other's efforts or catching up with teammates.

The Dutch captain delicately walked onto the pitch again going for the officials who stood in the center of the big field. On her way there, she shook hands or gave hugs with either her national teammates or club teammates, each of them praising her performance of the night- though the striker didn't feel deserving of it.

With a firm handshake and a nod of acknowledgment, she greeted the officials. One of them had asked about her injury, but the player assured her that she was alright. With a suppressed smile, she turned away from them.

''Y/N…'' She heard a voice next to her, immediately recognizing whose it was.

The Dutch striker tried to beam the best she could, a strained grin plastered on her face. ''Hey.''

Lena hesitantly motioned for a hug, not confident in how to handle the situation. Her girlfriend nodded, opening her arms, and welcoming each other in an embrace in the center of the pitch.

''I know it doesn't look like I am, but I am very happy for you and the girls.'' Y/N mumbled into Lena's neck, her voice thick with emotion as she fought to hold back her tears.

The German midfielder brushed her fingers gently through her hair, a soft sigh escaping her lips. ''Danke,'' (''Thank you,'') she whispered in response, her voice quiet but filled with gratitude. ''I know you're happy for us, you don't need to say it.''

Their embrace lingered for a moment longer, each reluctant to let go. But eventually, they pulled back, their eyes meeting in a silent exchange.

''How's your ankle?'' Lena asked, discreetly peeking at her girlfriend's taped up ankle.

The Dutchwoman shrugged her shoulders. ''It's just very bruised, that's it,'' she dismissed, ''you played really well- nice assist, by the way.'' Y/N changed the subject, not wanting to linger on the topic of her physical well-being.

Lena's cheeks flushed at the compliment. ''Thank you. I meant to score, though.''

The German glanced around the stadium, scanning the crowd. ''Where are your parents sitting?'' She asked.

Y/N pointed towards a section of the stands where her parents were seated, their faces alight with pride and excitement as they waved to them from the crowd. The couple happily waved back at them, Lena lightly chuckling at the poster that her girlfriend's father hastily pulled out of his wife's bag, motioning it around for Lena to see.

''They're so sweet.'' She remarked, her voice filled with affection as she glanced back at Y/N. But as Lena turned her gaze back to her girlfriend, she noticed a sudden shift in her demeanor.

As Y/N watched her family in the stands, a flood of emotions washed over her. She felt a lump form in her throat as she took in the sight of them, their smiles radiating nothing but support for their daughter and her national team. However, it was once she glanced down at the fans around them, downed in orange decorations and clothing, that her true feelings about the outcome of the match came to the surface. The sea of orange seemed to mock her, a painful reminder of the missed opportunities and shattered dreams that had taken place tonight.

The team had fought tooth and nail to simply make it out of the group stages, the late drama at the match against Belgium had filled the squad with newfound confidence and resilience. They'd come so close to their ticket to the Olympics, it was practically in their hands before it had been taken away from them and ripped in millions of pieces.

She couldn't help but feel a sense of profound loss. The weight of the defeat lied heavily on her, feeling somewhat the most responsible for the defeat, as if she had been the only player on her team. Deep down, Y/N knew this was far from the truth- football was a team effort, and their loss was a collective outcome. But the pressure she had felt was immense, spurred on by the absence of key players like Jill, Victoria, and Vivianne.

In the eyes of the Dutch media, Y/N had been hailed as the team's ''saving angel,'' a title that now felt like a heavy burden on her shoulders. She had been the one to step up in critical moments, delivering crucial assists and last-minute goals that had propelled the Netherlands to victory in the past. But tonight, she couldn't replicate that success- something she feared she would be crucified for by the fans and pundits.

Lena's heart ached at the sight of her girlfriend's distress, the lines of worry etched into her brow as she struggled to maintain her composure.

With a gentle touch, she reached out to Y/N, her fingers lightly brushing against her arm as she offered silent support. Lena understood right away what she was thinking as she watched her observe the crowd, it's what she had felt at the World Cup, it's what she had felt when Wolfsburg were knocked out of the Champions League.

Utter and complete disappointment.

''Hey,'' Lena murmured, her voice barely above a whisper as she sought to break through the walls of self-doubt that surrounded Y/N, ''it's okay, you did well.'' She comforted as she pulled her into another embrace, her arms caressing the Dutchwoman's back.

Y/N buried her face against Lena's shoulder, her tears soaking into the fabric of her jersey as she clung to her girlfriend's warmth. ''I wanted it so badly,'' she admitted, ''and I played so fucking bad, missed so many sitters.''

It was frustrating for Lena to hear, especially since her partner was easily one of the best players on the field tonight, and was the sole reason the Netherlands were still in the game the entire match. ''Do you know how hard you made it for us? You kept taking the ball from me.'' She tried to convince her, her voice resolute.

Y/N sniffled, her breath hitching as she struggled to hold back her tears. ''But I could have- I should have done so much better.'' She lamented, her voice muffled against Lena's shoulder.

Lena pulled back slightly, cupping Y/N's face in her hands so she could look into her eyes. ''You did everything you could,'' the midfielder reassured her, her gaze unwavering, ''you were playing out of your position the entire time, you were constantly creating chances for yourself and for your teammates, you were my player of the match- and I'm not just saying that,'' she interrupted herself before her girlfriend could, ''you're a phenomenal player, and I was so proud watching you tonight.''

Y/N's eyes widened with surprise and disbelief at Lena's words. She had been so consumed by her own self-criticism that she hadn't realized how much her partner valued and appreciated her efforts on the field.

She wrapped her arms around her, giving a swift peck on the cheek. ''Love you.''

''Love you too.'' Lena reciprocated, landing a kiss on her girlfriend's cheek as well.

The Dutchwoman glanced to her side, seeing the German team starting to form a huddle with one another. ''Obi,'' she caught Lena's attention, signaling towards her teammates, ''go and celebrate, we'll talk tomorrow, alright?''

As Lena hesitated, Y/N gave her an encouraging smile. ''Seriously, go join them, you're going to Olympics, have fun with them. I'm gonna be mad if you don't.''

''Okay, but we face time tomorrow?'' The young midfielder asked, needing the reassurance.

Y/N chuckled softly, touched by her partner's concern. ''We will. Now go, and party- oh my God.''

With a final nod of understanding, Lena gave her girlfriend's hand a gentle squeeze before reluctantly turning to join the German team in their huddle.

As Y/N watched her disappear into the celebratory chaos, a bittersweet smile touched her lips. She could see her own team waiting for her, already standing in a circle.

She took the spot next to her best friend, as Lynn made space for her to join.

A slight grimace crossed her face as the entire team listened to Andries, prompting the defender next to her to furrow her eyebrows. ''Je enkel?'' (''Your ankle?'') She asked.

With a wry smile, Y/N shook her head. ''Nee, de rugpijn die ik ga hebben na het slapen op de grond.'' (''No, the back pain I'll be having after sleeping on the floor.'') She responded, a teasing smirk on her face.

lena requests are always welcome!

#lena oberdorf x reader #woso x reader #woso fanfics #woso imagine #woso fic #woso fics

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homeslices · 8 months

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Euphoria (Azriel x pregnant!reader)

Summary: You and Azriel find out you’re pregnant.

A/N: Thought his idea was cute and I’m thinking about making this an entire series of dad!Azriel. Also I’m sorry if this isn’t good, it’s my first time writing anything for acotar, but I do really like it so I plan on writing more in the future.

Pairings: Azriel x pregnant!Reader

Warnings: suggests smut, slight angst about not being able to conceive a baby (fluff to make up)

Word Count: 1.0k

Azriel and you had been trying to have a babe for a while. While the only people in the Inner Circle who had a child was Rhys and Feyre, you have been mated for hundreds of years and were beyond ready.

Having children was something you had to have many lengthy discussions about first. Azriel’s trauma with his family as a child and your own trauma being an Illyrian women whose wings got clipped before being cast out of your home only too be found and taken in by Rhys’s his mother, were all things you both had to think about before even considering bringing a babe in this world. That’s not even mentioning the war you and all of your loved ones fought in and somehow survived. However, seeing Feyre and Rhy being amazing parents to their son, and just seeing Nyx in general, has confirmed what you both have wanted for a while.

But, as much as you both wanted a child, it just did not happen. It’s been years since you started trying, and as much as you love to be with Azriel intimately, it started to feel more like a task rather than something fun. There have been a few nights that Azriel has woken up because you forgot to close the bond and was flooded with your feelings of self-loathing. All he could do was cup your tearstained face and whisper reassuring and loving words to you. You blamed yourself and as much as Azriel denied it, those thoughts just didn’t go away.

After the third night of that happening, both you and Azriel decided to just stop trying. Of course you both would continue to not take the tonic, but your goal while being intimate was no longer having a baby, it was to enjoy each other. After a time, sex was pleasurable again, your mindset improved, and while you did have moments of self doubt, Azriel was always there for you as you were for him. Similarly, your family was amazing the entire time. While Azriel and you were fairly private about the situation, you didn’t hide what was going on with them. Their support helped you heal, both of you. It’s been a few years since then, Nyx was now six and it is true that time heals all wounds.

Azriel was the one who noticed it first. The sun was starting to rise, light beginning to stream through the window of Azriel and your shared bedroom. It was one of those rare occasions that neither of you had to go anywhere that morning, however, Azriel was so used to being up before the sun that he was already awake. Your face was peaceful as you slept, your bare figure tangled in the sheets, and the only noise heard was your soft breathing. His hazel eyes watched your calm face, all the while having his shadows watch both of your surroundings. Weirdly enough, his shadows also kept brushing over you, almost like they were scared to let you out of their grip. It reminded him of when you first mated, at least one of his shadows had to be with you at all times once both of you got out of the frenzy.

There was something different, something unusual that Azriel could sense that made him feel uneasy, but not on edge. It bothered him, however, as your eyes fluttered open and you shifted your body to face your mate, it hit him. Well, your scent hit him. Before, the room smelled of the previous night’s activities, but with your change in position, he could now make out that your scent has changed. It was subtle, but the slight sweetness in the air was all that was needed to figure out what was so strange.

Azriel’s face was the first thing you saw as you woke up. Despite being able to mask how he’s feeling extremely well, his slightly widened eyes, along with the millions of thoughts running rampant behind them, were all telltale signs that he was in shock.

You hum curiously before speaking.

“What is it?” you question while reaching up to cup the side of his face, rubbing your thumb along his cheek. You could feel the coolness of his shadows brushing all over your body, it was comforting yet slightly unusual to wake up to.

“You're pregnant.”

Sitting up suddenly, as if a bucket of ice water had been spilt on you, you look at him bewildered.

“I’m sorry, what?”

A grin filled with pure joy took over his face as he answered you once again.

“You’re pregnant.”

All you could feel was disbelief and elation. You could now tell that your scent was different and all you could do was look at your husband, your mate, incredulously. His deep laugh fills the room, only further showing his happiness. You beam at him as he lifts you in his arms and settles you on his lap. His bare skin felt warm against yours, and the chill that continued to brush over you from the shadows felt perfect against you. The only time you’ve felt this overjoyed was when you found out you were mated to Azriel. You brush your lips against his as he cups your face, brushing away the tears you didn’t know were falling.

You knew things were going to change from that point on. You knew how male got when their mate was pregnant, how protective they became. You saw first hand when Feyre was pregnant with Nyx, she could never move more than a few feet away before Rhys was next to her once again, and if a stranger came up to her, everyone could feel the power he unleashed to get them away. Rhys had mentioned it was similar to how males are after first being mated, but also said that that is nothing compared to how protective he felt of his mate carrying his child.

You knew that this was only the beginning of troubles you would face. But at this point in time, wrapped in one another’s embrace, tenderly kissing tears of joy off each other's face while the morning light poured in, all you could feel was euphoria.

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panickedscribbles · 10 months

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I've been thinking about Star Wars discourse lately, and I think a lot of the reason so much of the fandom is constant back and forth arguments is because a lot of the time, two characters can be right simultaneously while also disagreeing completely with each other.

Take the whole "Too old, he is" thing.

On one hand, obviously wrong. Anakin is nine, he's at most a few years behind, and textually managed to catch up pretty well. Like, if Palpatine and the Sith Plan weren't constantly messing him up, there is every possibility that Anakin could have become a well adjusted Jedi. Nine is by no means too old to learn a skill.

On the other hand, the council demonstrates perfectly in that scene that they are completely unequipped to deal with a nine year old who hasn't been raised in their culture, especially one from a heavily traumatized background. The pop-quiz they ask him would be perfectly acceptable for a nine-year-old youngling, but Anakin literally just walked in. They are giving an end-of-year exam to a kid who has never even seen a school. And they assume this is fine, because that's just what you do with nine-year-olds.

More to the point, they are completely failing to take into account the previous nine years of his life. They ask a kid, who up until all of about 18 hours ago had been enslaved since birth, to be open and honest about his emotions, in a room full of complete strangers, most of whom answer to "Master"! They have somehow engineered a situation so psychologically damaging that Palpatine is taking notes in the corner, entirely without realizing. When the council says they shouldn't take him in, they are one hundred percent right. Nine is WAY too old when you've spent that time as a slave, and are being entrusted into the care of people who have never had to raise a nine year old who wasn't raised like they were.

Or how about Anakin not being made a master. Was he right to insist he get the title, or was the council.

Well, Anakin should be made a master, you see, because,

He's one of the main Generals fighting and coordinating the war

And he's one of their most successful warriors. Like, he's the guy they call in whenever they need an impossible mission completed

He's more or less the face of the war effort, as "The Hero Without Fear"

As an ex-slave, obtaining the title of Master would be a huge psychological weight lifted off his shoulders.

Since they're making him part of the council for espionage purposes, making him a master as well serves as better cover

Giving him more reason to stay loyal to the Jedi after they just asked him to betray the trust of one of his oldest and closest friends wouldn't be the worst idea

Like, if ever there was a reason to give someone a promotion, those are some pretty good ones.

However, on the opposite side of the issue, literally none of that has any bearing on "Mastery" as the Jedi define it. Being a Jedi Master is all about mastery over oneself, having a deep understanding of the force, and a certain level of inner peace.

You'll notice that at no point does being really good at large-scale violence, being well known for being really good at large-scale violence, or wanting it a lot factor into being made a Jedi Master. Everything Anakin is good at, Everything Palpatine, and the war, and the council have pushed Anakin into being good at, do nothing to bring him any closer to Mastery, and in fact often push him further away from it.

In both of these examples, you can make a very compelling argument in either direction. Hell, you can make a compelling argument in both directions at the same time. And I think that's really neat.

#star wars #star wars meta #anakin skywalker #jedi #jedi council #palpatine

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sl-ut · 2 years

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you should probably leave

pairing: pre-outbreak!joel miller x fem!reader

description: joel is enamoured by his new neighbour, but old patterns will always be his downfall.

warnings: UNEDITED, slight age gap, slight smut, implied unprotected piv, protected piv, swearing, alcohol consumption, insecurity, angst, reader is given a birthday (she's a sag like me)

words: 10.8K (my longest fic to date)

date posted: 14/03/23

part two

(inspired by you should probably leave by chris stapleton)

OCTOBER 12, 1998

The weather was something that she was unsure if she could ever get used to. For her entire life, she had spent the entirety of the late autumn months dreading the first snowfall of the season before lugging out her extensive collection of knitted sweaters and fur-lined boots. Instead, her little archive of winter clothing was left in a cardboard box in her childhood bedroom, along with the majority of her other belongings that she had not brought with her on her grand adventure–if you could even call it that.

The University of Texas at Austin had not been her first choice of school, or her second, or third; she actually had never even imagined going to school any further than a few hours from her hometown in Pennsylvania, and yet there she was, standing in front of her brand-new home, sweltering under the harsh Texan sun as she struggled to unload her packed car all on her own. Well, to call it her home would be a pretty tight stretch, as well as to label it as “brand-new.”

The small bungalow-style house had caught her eye on a flyer in the grocery store, a listing for one female roommate in a cul-de-sac not too far from the city. It wasn’t exactly her dream home by any means, with an ugly yellow exterior and a kitchen that could certainly use an updating, but it she had recently been forced out of her own apartment due to her previous roommate preferring her boyfriend to live their with her instead and it was the nicest of the few places within her price range that would also accommodate the mutt she’d rescued during her first year. All things considered, it was quite literally perfect for her situation–plus her new roommate seemed to have been at least more considerate of her boundaries than the last, which gave her some hope that things might actually work out.

Y/n grunted at the weight of the box, cursing herself internally for enrolling in school and owning so many textbooks as she lugged it up the front steps, dropping it just inside the door. She couldn’t help but grimace as she glanced up, meeting the watchful gaze of Manny, his furry little head tilting curiously–likely wondering why she was making so much ruckus and interrupting his nap.

“Lazy ass,” she muttered under her breath at him, kicking the box to the side before trudging back out the door.

The next few boxes were filled with clothes and shoes, fortunately for her spine. She hauled several out, dropping each of them to the pavement of the driveway carelessly as she wiped at her sweaty forehead, apparently too enthralled in the work to notice the beat up truck as it turned into the neighbouring driveway.

“Hey there,” she turned to find a young man, his hair combed back to expose his effortlessly charming face to her, “You need a hand?”

She glanced down at the boxes at her feet, “I wouldn’t wanna bother you.”

A young girl appeared at his side, wide eyes peering over at the older female curiously. The man shrugged, puffing out his broad chest as he moved. Y/n almost laughed at how obvious he was being, only seconds after meeting her. The man gave off the impression that he had always thought fairly highly of himself, probably the quarterback of the high school football team, maybe even involved in the armed forces–the navy, she was betting. He crossed the barrier between the two driveways in two long strides, extending his hand out to her as he came closer.

“I’m Tommy,” he flashed her a grin, his accent coming out thicker than it probably would have normally. He glanced over his shoulder, motioning for the young girl to follow him into the neighbouring yard, “This is my niece Sarah.”

Y/n smiled politely, shaking his hand lightly, “Hi, I’m Y/n. I guess it’s nice to meet some of my new neighbours.”

“Well, Sarah, here, is your neighbour. Me, I live–”

“What happened to Stephanie?” Sarah interrupted, “I didn’t know she was moving.”

Y/n turned her attention to the young girl, “She isn’t, we’re just living together now.”

Sarah’s mouth formed an ‘o’, the gears visibly turning in her head as she formulated her next question, “Are you guys dating?”

“Sarah!” Tommy choked on his spit, “I’m sorry–”

“It’s okay,” Y/n chuckled at his response before turning back to the young girl, “No, we’re not. I guess she just didn’t wanna be living here all on her own anymore.”

Tommy’s shoulders relaxed, the mortified expression leaving his features in favour of one that she might have even considered relief. He shook his head at his niece, giving her a hard stare, “I’m sorry about her. I figured that she would have some better manners by now–my mistake.”

Sarah swatted at him, a pout appearing on her lips as her brows furrowed. The girl didn’t quite understand how the question may have been taken with offence by some, and was quite miffed by her uncle’s insult.

“No, no, it’s okay,” Y/n affirmed, “I think it’s actually a good thing that she knows about that kinda stuff.”

Tommy glanced down at the boxes, clear discomfort appearing on his features, “Alrighty then, how about these boxes?”

Y/n gave in, offering Tommy one of the heavier of the three boxes, while shifting the smallest and lightest to the young girl, who had been adamant in helping out. She instructed them to just drop the boxes to the floor by the door, not looking to take up much more of their time.

A loud gasp escaped Sarah, her wide eyes falling on the mutt, who had appeared to have been equally as excited to see her as he rushed over, tongue lolling out of his mouth and tail flapping wildly. Sarah squealed when he barrelled into her, a fit of giggles leaving her mouth as he brought her to the ground and began to cover her face in slobbery kisses.

“Manny!” Y/n groaned, grasping the dog’s collar and pulling away enough for Sarah to sit up off of the floor, “Sorry, he’s just convinced that everyone wants to be his friend.”

“I’ll be his friend!” Sarah beamed, reaching out and squishing the dog’s face in between her palms, “I mean… Can I?”

Y/n shrugged, “As long as it’s okay with your…” She glanced at Tommy for help, unsure about Sarah’s parentage situation. He’d already made it clear that he did not live next door, but had never explicitly stated who did.

“You’ll have to ask your dad, Sarah,” He chastised her, “Anyway, we should get out of your hair now, let you settle in.”

Y/n nodded, “Yeah, thank you for the help, though.”

“No problem, ma’am,” He winked, southern charm on full display as he stepped out onto the front step, “Anytime for a pretty girl like you. C’mon, Sar.”

Sarah begrudgingly offered the needy pup one more affectionate squeeze before following after her uncle, leaping off of the step and bounding across to her own front yard. Tommy paused, hand resting on the railing of the step and giving it a firm shake. His lips pursed into a line as he let out a small huh as the bannister shifted out of its place, then back in under the pressure.

“Yeah, Steph said there were all kinds of little things wrong with the place,” Y/n noted, “But hey, if it’s got four walls and a roof, it’s good enough for me.”

He chuckled at her, shaking his head, “You know, my brother and I are contractors, we could come over and help you fix things up if you guys wanted.”

She hummed, “I’ll mention it to Steph. Wouldn’t wanna just start making changes to her house while she’s not here, would I?”

Tommy hummed, “‘Spose that’s true. Anyway, I should go see where she ran off to, but I sure hope I’ll be seeing you around.” He shot her a cheeky wink before jogging back over to the neighbouring yard, leaving her and Manny among the mess of boxes in the entryway.

Y/n huffed, glancing around at the mess, then at the furry little beast at her feet, who waited patiently for her to begin offering him her love and attention. She rested her hands on her hips, shaking her head softly, “Well, let’s just get this done, boy.”

– – –

Joel grunted as he clambered in through the side door of his home, sighing in relief as he slipped out of his heavy work boots and dropped the armload of groceries onto the kitchen counter. He could hear the TV on in the living room, drowned out by Sarah’s yell of a greeting. He rushed to put away the groceries, sticking the brown paper bags in the recycling before stepping into the dimly lit sitting area.

Tommy was reclined on the couch, slumped into the worn leather like a pile of mashed potatoes as he balanced his can of Budweiser on his bent knee. He nodded to his brother briefly as he lifted the beer to his lips, hardly taking his eyes off of the football game on the screen as Joel plopped down next to him. The older brother leaned forward, pressing a small kiss to Sarah’s head so as to not disturb her as she worked on her homework on the coffee table in front of the couch before finally copying his brother’s position.

“The hell took you so long? You left the site the same time I did, and I had to go pick this shithead up from school,” he playfully kicked at Sarah’s leg, “plus I helped your new neighbour move in.”

“Supermarket was a zoo,” Joel moaned as he ran his palm flat over his face, then furrowed his brow, “What new neighbour?”

Tommy nodded his head back in the direction of the mustard yellow house, “Chick next door got a new roommate.”

“Uncle Tommy was flirting with her,” Sarah chimed in, not taking her eyes off of the math textbook in front of her.

Joel rolled his eyes, “Now tell me why I’m not surprised.”

Tommy shook his head, taking another large gulp of beer, “I know what you’re thinking, but this girl’s different. She’s not from ‘round here. Not sure where, but she’s got an accent. Canada, maybe.”

“You know what a Canadian accent sounds like?” Joel scoffed, knowing that his brother was prone to drawing his own conclusions.

“Well, no,” Tommy frowned, “But I imagine it might sound like that. Doesn’t matter, I think I’m gonna ask her out.”

Joel grunted in response, turning his eyes to the game on the screen.

“She wasn’t flirting back,” Sarah grinned up at the two men, her eyes lighting up at the sight of her father’s growing smirk and giggling as his own laughter came tumbling out. Tommy kicked her again, only this time with a little more force, “What? You invited yourself over there and were all,” She puffed her chest out and deepened her voice, “Anything for a pretty girl like you.”

Joel rested a palm on his belly as he shook with laughter, his other hand landing on the top of his daughter’s head affectionately as Tommy crossed his arms, sulking.

“I think she was flirting back,” he argued.

“She wasn’t,” Sarah reaffirmed.

Tommy leaned forward, “Now how the hell would you know anything about flirting, huh? You been doin’ a lot of it at school?”

Her face burned in embarrassment, sputtering for a response, “No, that’s gross!”

Joel frowned at her, shaking his head in feign sternness, “You better not be. Otherwise I might need to break out grandpa’s old hunting rifle.”

She didn’t utter another word, simply gathering her things in her arms and rushing off to her bedroom, slamming the door shut behind her as the laughter of her father and uncle followed her every step.

OCTOBER 17, 1998

Just under a week had passed since he’d first caught wind of his new neighbour, and Joel had yet to even see this woman. He’d noticed the new car in the driveway, and he’d picked up on the presence of the dog fairly quickly, especially after he’d caught Sarah tossing some of the vegetables from her dinner over the fence for him. Joel hadn’t paid it much mind, he was far too busy to be concerned with some young girl who didn’t seem to be causing much issues.

He’d had words with Stephanie several times in the past; once for blatantly smoking pot on

her front step when they were heading out for the day, then for leaving her garbage bin too close to his driveway, causing him to back into it and scratch the paint on his truck, and then once more when she’d had a little get together that ended up lasting until 4am, when the police arrived. He would normally have called himself a narc for having the party shut down, but it was keeping Sarah awake and the door had been shut in his face when he went over to ask politely.

The day had been long, and normally he would have refused Tommy’s invitation to head over to one of the local dive bars, but after dealing with the shit-show that had gone on at the job site that day, he really needed a drink. Sarah was out of the house, anyway, having slept over at a friend’s house, so there was quite literally nothing keeping him away.

“Brother’s night, my ass,” Joel grumbled into his glass, glancing over to the corner booth, where his brother had joined a pretty brunette, leaving Joel to himself at the barside. He waved at the bartender, motioning for another top-up of his whiskey.

A figure appeared at his side, leaning onto the bartop to call out to the bartender. Joel glanced over, his eyes raking over her radiant side profile in awe. He shot his gaze back to the glass of amber liquid in front of him, then briefly over to the girl once more. His eyes narrowed in on her pursed lips, noting how her brows furrowed in frustration as the bartender migrated to the other side of the bar. She turned to him suddenly, and Joel whipped his head back around to ensure that he wouldn’t appear to be some creep–though he was positive he certainly had been.

“Is it always like this here?” She asked him, tilting her head. “I swear, I’ve gone to three different spots along this bar, and buddy keeps looking in the other direction.”

He cleared his throat, “You not from around here?”

She smiled sheepishly, “Is it that obvious?”

Joel chuckled, “Just a little. You gotta get his attention, be firm. Here,” he tucked his index finger and thumb into his mouth and let out a loud whistle, nodding at the bartender as he rushed over.

“Two vodka crans, please,” The girl smiled prettily at the bartender, then scoffed as he turned to begin pouring the drinks, “Shit, I guess I could stand to learn a thing or two.”

“It comes with time,” He frowned, realising that he may have implied that he was at the bar every other night, “I mean, not that I’m–”

She touched his arm softly, electricity running through her fingertips and into his bicep, “Hey, I’m not here to judge you if you’re not here to judge me, heh?”

He nodded, opening his mouth to speak once more when another figure appeared at her side. His smile dropped, taking in the sight of his next door neighbour, probably one of the last people he wanted to see on his night off.

“What the fuck is taking you so long–oh,” Stephanie narrowed her eyes at the older man, who simply turned and took another long swig of his whiskey, “Hello, Joel.”

“Stephanie,” he drawled, “How you doin’ tonight?”

She smirked at him maliciously, “Fine. Y/n, this is the guy I was telling you about.”

Oh, this is Y/n, he thought to himself, suddenly understanding Tommy’s instant interest in the girl.

“All good things, I hope,” he sighed into his glass.

She shook her head, “Oh, just that you’re the neighbour from hell, and that you’re a narc.”

Y/n tucked her bottom lip in between her teeth, visibly uncomfortable at the confrontation. His eyes fell to her mouth at the movement, wondering what it might feel like to take that same lip in between his own teeth.

“You keep telling yourself that if it helps you sleep at night, Steph,” he huffed, praying to any god that would listen that she hadn’t completely turned Y/n against him.

Stephanie sneered at him, grasping one of the drinks from the bartop and stomping off, leaving a thick tension over the remaining two. Joel met Y/n’s gaze once again, noting the visible embarrassment on her face as she began to laugh slowly.

“Sorry about her,” She laughed nervously, “For the record, I know that she’s a little dramatic.”

“‘T’s fine,” Joel grumbled, swallowing the last gulp of whiskey, “You ain’t gotta apologise for her, she can feel however she wants about me.”

Y/n chuckled, a genuine one this time and Joel couldn’t help but carve the melodious sound into his memory, “I’m Y/n, by the way.”

He nodded, accepting the soft handshake that she offered, “So I’ve heard.” He noticed the slight furrow of her brow before he clarified, “I’m Sarah’s dad.”

Realisation crossed her face, “Oh, Sarah! She’s a real sweetheart.”

“Yeah, she is,” he smiled softly at the complement, “She sure likes you, and I’m assuming that it’s your pup that I’ve caught her feeding her broccoli to?”

Y/n giggled at him, “Huh, I’d noticed that he was especially gassy lately. Here I was thinking it was something in the water.”

Joel let out a loud laugh, then realised that he had not actually introduced himself, “Shit. Sorry, I just–” he coughed, “I’m Joel.”

“So I’ve heard.” She repeated to him, clearing her throat before turning to gaze at him through her lashes with a soft smile, “So Joel, is this seat taken?”

– – –

Y/n had not expected to have enjoyed herself quite so much when Stephanie forced her to go to the grubby little saloon, feeling incredibly out of place among all of the southerners. She had been hesitant to leave Manny on his own so soon after moving in, but the last thing that she had wanted to do was get on Stephanie’s bad side so early on. Then, she’d stumbled upon the devastatingly handsome man sitting all on his own at the bar, and her tune changed drastically.

She sat on that stool for the better part of two hours after Stephanie had fucked off, leaving them to become acquainted with one another. Joel had offered her another drink, which she accepted under the terms that she would buy the next round, and against his better judgement, he found himself doing a shot of tequila with her as well. She smirked to herself when she took note of the flush that had crawled into his cheeks, and how cheerful his dark chocolate eyes looked under the dim lighting of the bar.

Y/n had noticed Tommy in the corner booth, and how he had been blatantly pressing his southern charm onto the brunette under his arm in the very same way that he had to her, which made her feel much better knowing that he couldn’t possibly be that upset about her doing the exact same to his brother.

Her hand had come to rest on his knee, leaning across to invade his personal space animatedly as she spoke, her own cheeks flushing each time that he grinned or laughed at her words, and she had lost count of the amount of times that she had rubbed her thighs together or considered smashing her lips to his.

Tommy appeared at his side, clutching his shoulder in his firm grasp, “Hey Joel, you think you’re ready–oh, hey, Y/n.” His cheeks had turned red, one hand self-consciously rising to rub at his cheek, where the stark red lipstick stain had once acted as a trophy and was now an admission of guilt. Tommy pursed his lips, “Wasn’t expecting to see you here tonight.”

She shrugged, “Steph forced me out.”

He nodded awkwardly, unsure of how to save himself in this situation.

Y/n turned her head, catching sight of her roommate’s drunken attempt to seduce the bouncer before turning her attention back to the older of the two brothers, squeezing his knee once before sliding off of the stool, “Speaking of, I should probably leave, she’s gonna get us banned from here any minute now. It’s been nice, talking to you, Joel. See you, Tommy.”

Both men watched as she disappeared into the crowd, eyes trailing after her figure longingly.

Tommy huffed, “You think I still got a chance?”

Joel’s shoulders shook in a drunken fit of giggles, lifting his own hand to proudly show off the nine digits that had been marked into his skin, “Nope.”

Tommy’s jaw dropped, clear disappointment on his features before it was quickly replaced by pride, “Well fuck, brother. Didn’t think you had it in you.”

OCTOBER 31, 1998

Y/n wiped at the sweat on her brow, breathing picking up in delight as she turned the corner and the blinding yellow house came into sight. The sun had already begun to set by the time that she and Manny had set out on their evening walk, now settling low on the horizon and casting a golden hue to the world below it as Manny tugged on his leash, obviously also desperate to escape the heat.

A loud honk sounded from behind her, muffled slightly by the music playing over her bulky headphones, drawing her attention to the dark pickup truck as it sped past, Sarah hanging out the back window with a grin on her face as she waved dramatically. Y/n chuckled at the young girl, allowing Manny to lead her into a faster pace as they grew closer to their house.

She slid the headphones down to rest around her neck, pressing pause on her walkman as Sarah rushed towards them. The girl paid very little mind to the woman holding the leash, instead dropping to her knees and reaching out for the excited dog’s face, laughing as he began to lick enthusiastically at her cheek.

“Hi,” her gaze rose to find Joel as he rounded the bed of the truck, hand resting on the top of the tailgate as he tried his best to look casual, “sorry, this one never shuts up about that dog.”

Y/n smiled at him, warmth flooding through her cheeks. She’d only actually spoken to Joel a handful of times since that night at the bar, mostly simple greetings while Sarah occupied herself with Manny. Joel was too awkward of a person to try anything with Sarah present, and Y/n was too compassionate to question him about why he hadn’t bothered to call yet in front of his daughter.

Y/n shrugged, “To be fair, he never shuts up about her, either.”

“Oh did he tell you that?” The man asked, brows raised playfully, “I didn’t know you spoke dog.”

“There are many things you don’t know about me yet, Joel,” She smirked at him, “Oh, happy Halloween, by the way.”

“Right,” Joel raised one hand to stroke his hairy chin, “Yeah, you too.”

Sarah glanced up from Manny’s pleading brown eyes, “Dad forgot.

Joel sent a sharp glare to his daughter, then smiled sheepishly at her, “Not too concerned about a holiday that’s got nothing to do with me, anyway–this one decided she’s too cool for trick-or-treating with dad this year.”

“Oh don’t feel too discouraged, I gave my dad the boot when I was even younger.”

“See?” Sarah pressed, glancing back at her father, “You don’t even like Halloween, I don’t get why you’re mad.”

Y/n widened her eyes and clutched her chest dramatically, “What do you mean, you don’t like Halloween? It’s like, one of the best holidays!”

Joel rolled his eyes, “Oh don’t tell me you’re one of those people.”

She pursed her lips, “And just when I was starting to like you, Miller.”

His eyes met hers, curiosity pooling into the dark mocha irises as he considered her words. He almost appeared apologetic; could he feel guilty about not calling her? Y/n did her best to not appear too shaken by his lack of contact–she hadn’t expected anything from him the next day, but after two weeks and still no call? She’d taken that as a sign that he’d been a tad too drunk when he had been so shamelessly flirting with her, and that he had no intentions of ever pursuing anything.

Y/n was thankful when Sarah interrupted the pair, preventing her from spiralling into a nervous breakdown from her own inner monologue, “What are you dressing up as?”

The woman shook her head with a mischievous smirk on her lips, “I guess you’ll just have to wait and see when you come knocking at my door, huh?”

“No big plans?” Joel tilted his head, “I figured that roommate of yours would have you out on the town.”

She shrugged, “Steph’s out of town. Something about the drinks and the guys being stronger. Looks like it’s just gonna be me and my little guy here,” she gently clapped a hand against Manny’s side, “Well, us and a selection of horror movies.”

Sarah stood up, leaning into her dad’s side with her elbow, “How convenient, my dad will also be home alone tonight.”

Joel dropped his head in embarrassment–just leave it to Sarah to blatantly play the role of her father’s wingwoman. He refused to meet Y/n’s amused gaze, ears burning as Sarah continued.

“And he totally loves horror movies. He watches them all the time.”

“Oh really?” Y/n did her best not to burst out laughing, enjoying the sight of both Joel’s embarrassment and how confidently Sarah was trying to talk up her own father. She crossed her arms over her chest, doing her best to not make it too obvious how much she actually wanted to invite him to join her, but she didn’t want to display too much interest in him if he genuinely had none in her, “Well then maybe he should head to Blockbuster before all of the good ones are rented.”

She raised her brow at him, signalling to him that it was his turn to make a move, as she would not be making any more. He nodded at her, red flooding his cheeks as he tried to muster up the courage to discuss the clear tension between them.

Y/n smiled politely at them both, then glanced down at the heavily panting dog at her feet, “Well, I better get this guy out of this heat. See you guys in a bit, then?” She led the dog past them, glancing back over her shoulder, her lips pursed as she watched Sarah poke at her father’s side sharply.

The young girl smirked at her dad knowingly, remaining silent, though the expression on her face made her thoughts very clear to the man. She scowled at him, crossing her arms over her chest, “Christina’s sister is so right; all boys are stupid.”

The man scowled at his daughter, watching in silence as she moved around him without another word, disappearing through the front door without so much as another glance. Joel scoffed, shaking his head at her, and wondering how the hell his nine year old could be so goddamn right about the situation.

– – –

Joel wiped his hands anxiously across the expanse of his thighs, attempting to rid himself of the nervous sweat that had collected in his palms as he stood on Y/n’s front step, mustering up the courage to finally knock.

“The fuck am I doing,” He cursed to himself, shaking his head as he ran a hand over his face.

Y/n was younger than him; not by a lot, but they were still in very different stages of their lives. He wasn’t willing to admit that he genuinely did like her, and considering that she was still a young woman and still in college, he wasn’t entirely sure what she was looking for with him. Was it just some quick fuck that she wanted? Joel wouldn’t be opposed–hell, he was ashamed that he’d imagined such a thing more than a few times since meeting her–but he wasn’t sure if he could jump into bed with her and then move on with his life, nor could he expect her to be willing to just pick up the role of step-mother to his little girl.

Joel had woken up on October 17, hungover as hell and struggling to recall any of his memories from the night before. He’d forced himself out of bed much earlier than he would have liked, needing to pick Sarah up before her soccer game. The man had stumbled his way into the shower, blindly going through the motions of bathing himself as the warm water slowly began to remove the fog from his mind. It was then, as he had reached out for his bottle of body wash that he noticed the smudge of blue ink on his skin, and then jumping in surprise at the memory of the beautiful woman who had given him her phone number–the woman who had him laughing like he hadn’t in so long and blushing harder than he thought possible–the woman who he hoped was now lying peacefully in her bed next door, preferably all on her own.

The few times that he had seen her since then, he had thought about apologising for not calling and telling her the truth of what had happened, despite his embarrassment. He wanted to ask for it again, but every time, Sarah was there, making a fuss over the little pooch that never seemed to leave Y/n’s side. He wished that he were more confident in himself, more willing to speak to other women even if his daughter was there, but he simply would never be able to look at the young girl again if Y/n were to reject him.

“Shit,” He swore loudly as he turned to rush off of the step, instead booting one of the carefully carved jack-o-lanterns onto the pavement of the driveway and watching in horror as it shattered on impact.

“Joel?” He froze at the sound of the door creaking open behind him, smiling bashfully at the young woman as he did his best to not appear too guilty. Her eyes fell from his flushed face to the mess of orange at his feet, a surprised chuckle leaving her lips, “Damn, you really do hate Halloween, huh? Enough to come over here and start destroying my decorations, anyway.”

He sputtered for an answer, “I–it was an accident, I just knocked it off by accident on my way out–”

“Your way out?” She questioned, crossing her arms over her chest and leaning against the doorframe, “So what, you were just loitering on my front step?”

He scoffed at her, “I was actually on my way to apologise, but if you’d rather I just get lost…”

Y/n raised a brow inquisitively, “I’m listening.”

“I just–I’m sorry for not calling,” Joel admitted with a sigh, debating whether or not it would be best to explain exactly why, “For what it’s worth, I would have if I hadn’t washed it off by accident.”

An amused expression crossed her features as she mulled over his explanation, “You…washed it off?”

He shrugged and scratched the back of his neck sheepishly, “I did.”

She narrowed her eyes at him, as if she were trying to decipher whether or not he was being truthful, “Okay.”

His gaze shifted from side to side, uncertain as to what she meant, “Okay?”

“Okay,” She affirmed, “So what time did you wanna come over tonight?”

Joel swallowed the lump in his throat, “Tonight?”

Y/n shrugged nonchalantly, ignoring the butterflies that slammed at the lining of her stomach and threatened to erupt, “Tonight. You said it yourself, Sarah’s gonna be gone all night, so would you rather be home alone or come over? Otherwise, I’ll just be here by myself, scared and in need of a devastatingly handsome cowboy to protect me from Michael Myers.”

Blush spread across his cheeks, his hands coming up to rest on his hips, “I don’t know about ‘devastatingly handsome’, but I think I could handle some asshole in a mask.”

She grinned at him wickedly, “That’s what everyone thinks, but I guess we’ll see tonight, around eight?”

“Eight.” He confirmed, then glanced down at the mess at his feet, “And sorry about your pumpkin.”

“It’s alright,” Y/n smirked, “You’ll just have to work extra hard to make it up to me.”

– – –

Joel anxiously adjusted his shirt, frowning at himself in the window of her front door. Despite dismissing Sarah’s teasing by claiming that this was in fact, not a date, he’d taken her advice in showering the moment that he had gotten into the house.

He was aware that she was flirting with him, but until he had gotten out of the shower, towel sitting low around his waist as he wiped the steam away from the mirror and took in his shaggy appearance, he had not been at all concerned about what activities the night might lead to. Staring at his own reflection, nervousness quickly began to settle into his bones.

He had made quick work with the clipper, shortening the length of his facial hair after several weeks of negligence and leaving his lower face to be covered by a light stubble. He put a little more effort into his hair than usual, running a thin layer of gel through it while noting to himself that it was probably time for a haircut. He even took things a step further, dabbing a few drops of some woodsy cologne onto his skin; the bottle had gone untouched for two years, having been a Christmas present from his mother.

“Are you wearing cologne?” Sarah asked as she appeared at his side, face painted to resemble a circus clown, “I knew this was a date.”

“It’s not a date,” He argued, doing his best not to jump in fright at her appearance, “Shouldn’t you be out on the town by now, Ronald McDonald?”

“You showered, put on cologne, and you’re bringing candy? It’s a date.” Sarah listed, “And I’m Pennywise, by the way. Christina’s sister is coming to pick me up soon. She says that guys always dress up when she goes out with them because they want her–”

Joel grunted, glaring at his daughter, “I want you to stop hanging around Christina’s sister.”

Sarah ignored his comment, “Is that what you’re wearing?”

Joel glanced down at his outfit–a clean pair of jeans and an old t-shirt that he’d probably gotten out of a beer box or something, “What’s wrong with this?”

“What’s right with it?”

Joel considered his parenting style for a moment, wondering if he would be free of this headache if he had spanked his daughter once or twice in her life. Sometimes he forgot that the girl was only nine years old with how intelligent she was and how much more mature she seemed in comparison to other kids her age.

“It’s not a date, Sarah.”

She rolled her eyes, “It could be. Come on.”

Sarah rushed past him, leading him into his own bedroom as she began to dig through his closet. She frowned with almost every piece that she picked out, tossing them behind her recklessly and ignoring her father’s scolding for the mess that she had quickly created.

“Hah!” The girl pulled out an egg-plant button down and shoved it into his grasp, “I knew you had to have something that wasn’t that ugly.”

He grunted at her, but didn’t reply out of respect for her brutal honesty as he quickly shed himself of the worn t-shirt he’d previously been wearing in favour of the one that Sarah had chosen. Now, as he stood at her front door and internally decided for himself that this was a date, he couldn’t help but thank God for his daughter’s awareness.

Finally, after tugging at the hem of his shirt, he raised a fist and knocked heavily on the door. Joel choked on his own saliva when she appeared in the window, smiling sweetly at him when she pulled the door open. She had already changed into a pair of black yoga pants and a sky blue shirt that exposed just a tasteful amount of her midriff.

“Hi, again,” she breathed, a smile forming on her face, “You look nice, purple is definitely your colour.”

Joel burned, “I–thank you. Sarah picked it out.”

Y/n turned to the girl, who had already ushered the dog up onto the sofa with her, “Well she has a clear eye for style.”

“She definitely thinks so, that girl damn near harrasses me about my clothes everyday.” Y/n laughed out loud, Joel’s ears tingling at the melodious sound, “You look great, too.”

Y/n beamed down at her outfit, shrugging to herself, “Thanks, I thought about keeping my costume on but I wasn’t entirely sure how much you would be into Strawberry Shortcake.”

Joel chuckled at her, glancing down at the object in his hand, “I brought beer, by the way. Wasn’t sure if I should bring anything, or if you even like–”

Y/n reached out, snatching the six pack from his grasp, “Ever the gentleman, cowboy. So, you coming in?”

– – –

The house was filled with laughter, both having nearly finished their first beer as they shared stories freely. Halloween played quietly in the background, though neither of them paid too much attention. Y/n did her best not to physically melt when she felt Joel’s arm drape across the back of the sofa behind her, resisting the urge to tease him for attempting to cover it up by faking a dramatic yawn.

She brushed her fingers along the top of his thigh, smirking to herself as she watched his leg slowly shift closer to her, though he didn’t address the affectionate touch. He spoke to her softly, and made an effort to hold eye contact with her as he did to–she was starting to feel some guilt about the conclusion that he’d drawn about him after he’d failed to call her. Her own gaze continuously fell to his lips as he spoke, and she was sure that he had noticed by the way that his lips began to curl confidently. Her heart hammered in her chest, wondering how much longer she would need to wait before he finally made a move.

Joel, however, was wondering exactly how he possibly could make a move. While feeling confident around her, there was no way to escape the fact that he hadn’t been on a date in at least a year, and he could count the amount of women he’d slept with since Sarah’s mother on one hand. At various points throughout the night, he had considered leaning in to kiss her, but had successfully siked himself out each time. The first time, he’d been interrupted by the pooch who had been jealous of his owner’s attention being focused elsewhere, though he could only blame every other time on his own insecurity.

“Do you want another beer?” Y/n asked as he swallowed the last gulp out of his can, “Or I have wine and pop?”

“Pop,” he scoffed, chest rumbling with quiet laughter.

She raised her hand and slapped his pec as she stood up from the couch, “Fine, you don’t get anything.”

He laughed, watching as she disappeared into the kitchen and shamelessly admiring the shape of her backside in the darkness of the dimly lit living room. He sat there for a few moments, staring at the movie in discontent, sighing as he ran his hand over his face and murmured a nearly silent fuck it, and following after her.

“Is it too late to apologise and get that beer?”

She glanced over her shoulder at him, smirking as she shrugged coyly as she turned and leaned her back against the front of the refrigerator and holding the perspiring can out in front of her, “You’ll have to come get it yourself.”

Joel crossed the small room in two long strides, stopping as the can met his chest, though he paid it little mind as she stepped away from the fridge, pressing a fleeting kiss to his lips. He froze for a second, stomach clenching at the soft touch.

“Sorry,” Y/n whispered, though her tone betrayed how unapologetic she truly was, “Was that okay?”

He didn’t respond, quickly taking the beer out of her grasp and tossing it onto the counter as he cupped her face, capturing her lips with his and pressing her back against the fridge once more. She smiled against his lips, fingers bunching in the material of his plum coloured shirt and tugging him even closer.

His lips were chapped against her own, the telltale sign of a busy man who hadn’t been too concerned with his physical appearance up until now, though she could not picture another kiss that she had received in the last several years that would even compare to Joel’s.

One of his hands fell, fingers splaying around her waist as he pressed even closer, parting his lips as he felt the tip of her tongue prod at the seam and allowing her to seek out his own. He moaned at her taste, fingers wandering to her hip and hesitating, almost as if he had been asking for her permission to move even lower. She grasped his hand, guiding it around to cup her bottom.

Pulling away for air, she giggled softly and fluttered her eyelids open to find him already staring at her with blown pupils. One of her hands slid up his chest, tugging at the collar of his shirt before her fingers trailed over his patchy beard affectionately, “I don’t know if this is too soon, but do you wanna move to my bedroom?”

Joel chuckled at her, squeezing her cheek through her yoga pants, “Lead the way.”

– – –

Joel worried that he might have gone into cardiac arrest as he struggled to catch his breath, back slouched against the headboard as Y/n slumped flush against his chest. The cotton sheets pooled around her hips as she continued to move softly, working them both through the aftershocks of their climaxes. The man sighed in appreciation as her lips continued to slide against his jawline and leave gentle kisses in their wake, her fingers still lost in his dark curls.

Joel’s own hands squeezed her hips as she finally slowed to a stop, helping her slide off of him and smirking to himself at the whine she let out at the loss of contact. She shifted, moving out of his lap and curling into the cool sheets on the bed next to him.

“How was that?” He panted, “Have I done enough to make up for lost time?”

She grinned at him, her own chest rising and falling with her slowing breaths, “I think I recall doing most of the work, actually.”

“Bein’ on top doesn’t mean you were doing any work, sweetheart, I think we both know that.” His eyes fell on the digital alarm clock on her bedside table, grunting to himself as he took note of the late hour, “Shit–how the hell is it ten-thirty already?”

She glanced over to the clock briefly, then back at him, “Time flies when you’re having fun.”

Staring down at her nude form, guilt began to eat away at him as he began to slide off of the mattress and begin gathering his clothes that had been scattered around the room.

“Are you leaving?” His back was turned to her as he pulled on his jeans, though he could only imagine the look on her face from the emotion that dripped from her voice; she was disappointed, facing the reality that she would be abandoned after doing something so intimate.

“I mean…” Joel coughed, “Yeah, I should probably leave. Gotta work early tomorrow, and Sarah’s got soccer practice, and–”

“You don’t have to explain yourself,” She sat up, hugging her knees to her chest in an attempt to regain her modesty, “I get it.”

Joel couldn’t help but wonder how many times she’d done this. She seemed disheartened, but not entirely surprised at his decision to head out, as if she was expecting this time to be different from the others–as if she was expecting Joel to be any different from the other shitty guys she’d met since moving to Austin.

“Darlin’,” Joel cooed, coming to sit at the edge of the mattress and cupping her face in his large palms, “It’s not like that. I want nothing more than to stay the night, but I know that I won’t sleep a wink tonight if I do.” His thumb stroked her bottom lip as her mouth slanted into a small, saddened smile. He leaned in, pressing three kisses to her lips, each one longer than the last before pulling back, “Can I get your number? I promise I won’t ask for a third time.”

Y/n smiled at him, kissing him once more before snatching a pen off of the bedside table and scribbling on his hand, “You won’t get it if you ask for a third time, Miller.”

MARCH 12, 1999

Y/n sighed blissfully, gnawing at her lip to prevent any moans of pleasure as Joel worked himself into her over and over, his hips meeting hers with slow, meaningful movements as he did his best to keep both of them quiet. Joel wasn’t normally one for booty calls, though he had hardly seen her in the past few days and couldn’t resist when his mind had wandered while in the shower–and for the first time in what felt like decades, he could rely on the help of soft, feminine touches rather than his own fast and rough tugs.

Her thighs shook, teeth biting into the pillow beneath her face as she pressed her hips back against him and arched her spine in pleasure. She met his thrusts enthusiastically, fingers winding into the sheets tightly.

“Shit,” She gasped, “Joel, I’m gonna–”

“I know,” He rasped, “Shhh baby. Let go, I’ve got you.”

She didn’t hold back, allowing the white hot pleasure to run through her veins, muffling her cries in the plushness of the pillow. Her walls clenched around him, gripping him for everything that she could manage as he fucked her through it, head rolled back in pleasure as his own orgasm teetered over the edge. His fingers tightened around her hips, hauling her back against him a few more times before his seed painted the inside of the condom.

His hands slid up from her hips, one pressing on her back to force her to lay flat against the mattress while the other cupped the soft flesh of her belly to roll her over. Joel took in her figure, eyes scanning her face for any signs of discomfort before dropping to her breasts; the man was absolutely entranced by the shape of her breasts, eagerly pawing at them during makeout sessions and suckling at them with the utmost love and desire as he fucked her. She smiled at him tiredly, hooded eyes admiring his own figure as he slipped out of her, sliding off of the bed and disappearing into the ensuite.

When he returned, he wore a pair of black boxers and carried a maroon washcloth in his hand, carefully parting her legs and sliding the cloth through her folds, puffy and sore from his touch. He whispered an entirely disingenuous apology as he pressed lightly against her abused clit, chuckling to himself as she jumped. Tossing the cloth aside, he settled into the mattress next to her, sliding an arm around her waist and tugging her into his side, sighing in relief at the physical contact.

The rising sun had slowly begun to peek through the blinds, filling the room with a soft glow in the aftermath of the third round. Y/n glanced at the clock on the far wall, sighing to herself as reality settled into her bones. She hadn’t intended on staying so long, especially after how eagerly the both of them had initiated the first round, having allowed herself to remain at his side until she felt his member begin to grow against her thigh once more. Now, after taking him inside of her three times over the past six hours, she knew that she would eventually need to get up and leave–a habit that they both had and hated when they were finished.

She pressed careful kisses into his flesh, lips moulding to the sweaty skin of his shoulder and neck affectionately while her palm rubbed circles into his firm chest. Joel nuzzled his head into her hair, his own lips pressing to the crown of her head as he, too, appreciated the afterglow.

Y/n’s body and heart screamed at her as she finally pulled herself away from him, hopping out of the bed and collecting her clothing from the floor. Joel watched her with sunken eyes, his attempt to remain stoic as he easily recognised what she was doing proving fruitless.

“You don’t–you don’t gotta go just yet,” he called to her, desperation lacing his voice, “Don’t gotta be at the site till eleven tomorrow–”

“Today,” she corrected, “And that’s in seven hours. Besides, I don’t wanna fall asleep and risk having to run into Sarah. I should probably leave.”

He nodded slowly, continuing to watch her as she dressed and fixed her appearance, preparing herself mentally and physically for her four A.M. walk of shame. Joel wanted to call her back to bed again, to convince her to stay with him and promise breakfast in the morning, but instead watched helplessly as she disappeared into the dark hallway, and closed his eyes disappointedly at the sound of the front door closing behind her.

JUNE 2, 1999

Golden rays of sun peeked through the blinds, trailing up the length of the bed with each passing moment before finally gracing over the soft skin of the woman next to him. Joel laid in his bed as still as possible, one arm around her shoulders to keep her flush against his chest, savouring the intimate, domestic moment before it would eventually come to an end–it always did.

The alarm clock flashed the time tauntingly at him, as if mocking him for wanting to keep her there for much longer than he knew he could. This was undoubtedly the latest she had stayed in his bed; it was nearing six A.M. and she had yet to stir from her deep slumber.

His eyes trailed the length of her bare back, his fingers pressing gently at the indent of her spine as he pushed her body impossibly closer to her and bathing himself in the feeling of her nude body against his own. Joel resisted the urge to shake the growing ache out of his leg as pins and needles crawled up the length of his limb, too afraid to move and wake her–he knew what would come once her eyes had opened, as she had done it countless times now.

It was the twitch of her fingers against the soft flesh of his belly that alerted him to her growing consciousness, nails following the pattern of hair that covered his abdomen softly, drawing a quiet moan of delight from the man beneath her. He felt the curve of her lips against his shoulder, turning his head to meet her eyes as they fluttered open.

“Morning, cowboy,” Her throat was dry and her voice was scratchy, but her words still held the power of causing an eruption of butterflies in his gut.

“Morning,” He leaned closer, the tips of his nose brushing her own before she swatted him away, covering her mouth self-consciously and mumbling something about morning breath. Joel chuckled at her, moving her hand away and planting a soft, closed-mouth kiss against her lips.

Her smile grew, hazy vision flickering around the sun-lit bedroom as realisation dawned on her, “What time is it?”

Joel’s own smile faltered as he cleared his throat, glancing over at the alarm clock again, “Five-to-six.”

“Shit,” She groaned, a hand settling on her forehead, “I should probably leave. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

Joel shook his head at her, “You ain’t got nothing to apologise for. I like having you here.”

She pecked his lips again, fondness creeping through her at the man’s admission, “I like being here. But I should go before Sarah wakes up.”

Joel caught her arm as she moved to crawl out of the bed, “Stay.”

“What?”

“Sarah knows you’ve been coming around and leaving early in the morning.” He told her, thumb smoothing circles against her wrist, “She says she’s happy for me, but she said that she won’t approve until you start bringing that damn dog of yours over here when you come.”

Y/n chuckled, her eyes growing a thin red rim along her waterline, “What are you saying?”

“I’m asking you to stay. Every damn night you spend here, you go rushing out like this is just a quick fuck, but I think we both know that it’s a lot more than that. Just come back to bed, please.”

Y/n shook her head at him, glancing over at the rising sun through the blinds in contemplation before she finally shrugged, crawling back into the bed and settling against his naked form with a sigh, her hand resting on his chest as she massaged small circles into his sweaty flesh. Both of them relaxed into one another, enjoying the silence of the early morning and dreading the unavoidable fate of the alarm going off in the coming hour.

NOVEMBER 27, 1999

Y/n tapped her nails against the hardwood of the tabletop rhythmically, doing her best not to make her dissociation too clear as her friends and family chattered back and forth. Her mother was busy on her left hand side, sharing dozens of her favourite childhood photographs to Y/n’s friends with a fondness that only a mother could have, while the seat to her left was empty. The watch that she’d received as a gift from her parents sat on her wrist, the time ticking away as grief settled in her stomach, the realisation that he simply wasn’t coming eating away at her pride.

Her birthday was not something that she generally liked to celebrate, but knowing that her parents, siblings, and a few members of her extended family had orchestrated a trip to visit and celebrate with her had her counting down the days, especially after she had convinced her unofficial boyfriend to join them for dinner at one of the nicest wallet-friendly restaurants in Austin. Now, as she sat silently and watched as her friends laughed and cooed over possibly the most embarrassing photos of her while picking at their slices of birthday cake, her mind only wandered to where exactly he was, and how much more fun she would be having if she were warding him off of any of those photographs–especially all of the ones from her junior high years.

She hadn’t had the chance to speak to him at all that day, having woken up after he had already left for work and dropped Sarah off at school. At the time, Y/n had smiled to herself, thanking him mentally for allowing her to sleep in on her birthday, though she was beginning to wonder if she should have taken the lack of birthday wishes as a sign.

She actively avoided Stephanie’s gaze, wanting to escape the oncoming I told you so, and made as little eye contact as possible with her mother, who watched her sympathetically, and her father, who silently raged over the presence of the empty chair. Y/n now felt embarrassed over how much she’d actually gushed over the man to her family before dinner, wondering if maybe she was more invested in him than he was in her. After all, he had yet to officially ask her to be his girlfriend, despite the fact that she and Manny had taken up residence in his home at least four nights a week and that she had been included in more recent movie nights with him and Sarah.

Maybe she was reading into it too much–something must have happened. Something happened to Sarah, or maybe Tommy had been locked up again. There was no way that Joel had forgotten her birthday, there was simply no way.

– – –

Joel’s feet ached, crying out in pain with every step and sighing in relief as he finally kicked off his heavy boots. The crew that he’d brought on for his most recent and highest paying job to date had given him hell that day, leaving him aching for nothing more than a hot shower and a peaceful night at home with his best girls. He hated having to tack on extra hours to his day, but not arriving home until after ten was something that he would have to deal with in order to finish the job, and he was hoping to save up to take Y/n and Sarah on a little getaway for a weekend in the near future.

The kitchen was dim when he stepped in, and he was somewhat surprised when he discovered no plate of food left for him in the microwave, nor was there a pan of leftovers in the fridge. Instead, there was a single empty carton of a microwavable dinner on the counter along with an empty can of Pepsi. Not wanting to seem ungrateful, he shrugged it off, though he had grown accustomed to Y/n bringing dinner over and making sure that it was ready for him on days that he worked late.

Soft footsteps rushed down the stairs, Sarah rounding the corner with a wide grin on her face as she held a small piece of paper in her hands.

“Hey babygirl,” Joel kissed her head softly as he moved into the living room, even more confused when he did not find Y/n curled up on the couch with a stack of her textbooks, as she so often did while waiting for him to return.

“Hi dad,” Sarah’s smile dropped, glancing back into the entryway in confusion, “Where’s Y/n? I made this card at school today but I figured I’d wait until after you guys came back to give it to her.”

The blood in Joel’s veins ran cold, his heart skipping a beat at the sudden realisation of why his house appeared to be so void of his girlfriend, “Fuck.”

“Dad?” Sarah’s wide eyes narrowed, all too used to her father’s undiagnosed case of short-term memory loss, though he had never ever forgotten something like this before.

“Shit,” He swore again, snatching his keys off of the counter and rushing to jam his feet back into his uncomfortable boots, “Sarah, go to bed. I’ll be back later tonight.”

The girl watched helplessly as her father raced out the door, tears welling in her eyes as she stared down at the happy picture she had pasted into the card and frowning as she feared the worst.

– – –

Joel arrived at the restaurant just before eleven. He knew it was a long shot, as the reservation was for seven-thirty, which he had purposefully written down and stuck to the fridge so that he would not forget. The few remaining staff inside shook their heads in pity at the man, quickly coming to understand his situation as he rushed inside, asking about the reservation with a bouquet of flowers in his grasp.

His shoulders slumped as he parked in his driveway, trudging across the lawn into the neighbouring yard and knocking firmly on the door. He waited a few moments, cursing quietly as he got no response and knocking again.

His frown deepened when the door swung open, a fuming Stephanie standing in his way. Her face burned scarlet, fists clenched at her side as she took in Joel’s pitiful appearance. She took a step forward, joining Joel on the front step and closing the door behind her.

“The fuck do you want?”

“Where’s Y/n?” He asked, ignoring her bluntness.

“She doesn’t wanna talk to you,” the girl sneered at him. “It’s one thing to stand someone up, even to forget their birthday, but to embarrass her like that in front of her family?” She scoffed, “you know, I warned her about you, but I took no pleasure in being right. You should have seen her tonight, barely spoke at all.”

The metaphorical knife in Joel’s gut twisted at her words, the fist clenching the bouquet tightening even further around the stems. He could picture her; all dolled up, chatting with her family as she eagerly awaited his arrival, her pretty smile dampening as time passed and eventual tears in her eyes as she realised the truth–he had forgotten about her.

“Just let me talk to her,” he begged, “Please.”

Stephanie shook her head, “I think it’s best if you never show your face on my property again, Miller.”

“Joel?” Both of their eyes turned at the sound of Y/n’s voice, finding her peeking around the door curiously. “Steph, can you give us a minute?”

The woman sent Joel one final glare, patting her roommate on the shoulder before slipping back into the house.

If the knowledge of what he’d done hadn’t been enough, Y/n’s appearance was the final blow to his gut. Her eyes were bloodshot, cheeks swollen and marked with visible remnants of tears. She wrung her fingers together anxiously, keeping her gaze lowered in shame as she closed the door behind her and turned to face him.

“Baby–”

“Don’t.” Y/n interrupted, “Just explain.”

He sniffled, “I can’t explain it, or excuse it. We got held up at work, and I really need this job to be done and over with already. I’m so sorry, baby.”

She shook her head, lifting her sleeve to wipe at the underside of her nose, “You didn’t even say goodbye before you left this morning. Did you even remember at all?”

Joel bit his lip, “I’m sorry. Let me–”

“Joel,” Her voice cracked, “I love you.” His heart soared as she spoke those words for the first time, then shattered as she continued, “I understand that I’m not your first priority–that’ll always be Sarah and I can’t blame you for that. But, fuck, you suggested the restaurant, Joel. You spoke to my mom over the phone and promised her the best steak in town, and she sure seemed to like it, but you weren’t even there. I won’t ever be your first priority, but I can’t be your last, either.”

“Y/n–”

“I think my cousins liked it, you know.” She continued, wiping at her cheeks, “They’re the type to pray for your downfall, and I’m sure they were loving every second of the dinner once everyone realised that you weren’t coming. Hell, all I did all night was talk about how amazing you were, and then–” Y/n cut herself off with a quiet sob. “You should probably leave.”

“Don’t do this,” Joel cupped her face, dropping the flowers to the deck recklessly as he wiped the tears away from her cheeks with his thumbs, “Tell me what to do. Hit me, yell at me, do something, but don’t ask me to walk away.”

She looked into his eyes, and for a moment, Joel felt hopeful that she might actually listen to him, though all hope was quickly diminished as he removed herself from his grasp, reaffirming her statement as she stepped back into the house.

“You should probably leave.”

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