“Phone neighbor”
Jake “Hangman” Seresin x Reader
Summary: You’re bored one night and decide to text your phone neighbor…who happens to be a very hot (and cocky) aviator.
Content: drinking, fluff
Friday nights are so boring. Especially when you have nothing to do for the night.
Your friend, Natasha, invited you to go to the bar she and her aviator buddies frequent. Hard Deck, was that the name? Who knows. Either way, you didn’t think hitting a bar right now would do you much good.
You’d been in a reclusive and lonely mood all week but right now, you were feeling adventurous.
You pull your phone out of your pocket and dial the first nine digits of your number but changed the last number to the following one that came after yours.
Let’s play a game of phone number neighbor.
You: Hi, so this is random, but you’re my number neighbor.
Them: Oh really?
You: Yes… so you’re from Texas too?
Them: Born and raised in Austin.
You: That’s so cool, I was raised in El Paso and Houston.
Them: Nice! Are you still there?
You: Nah, I’m in California. How about you?
Them: Funny enough, I’m in California too. I’m in the Navy, a pilot 🤠
You: Oh shit! You might know my friend, Natasha Trace.
———
Jake smiled down at his phone. “Hey Phoenix!”
Nat turns around, rolling her eyes at him. “What?”
“I think I just met your friend.”
“What?” She looks around. “Where? And who?”
“I don’t know their name, let me ask,” he says. He looks down at his phone, sending a quick text before smiling and telling her your name.
“Holy shit!” She laughs.
“Is she single?” Jake asks.
“She is actually…give me a second.”
———
“Hello?” You say, answering your phone.
“What the hell are you doing?” Nat asks.
You can hear the noise and chatter coming from the bar you knew she’d be at.
“I’m at home doing a face mask,” you tell her.
“No I mean, with Hangman,” she tells you.
“Who’s Hangman?”
“The person you’re texting?” She laughs.
Hangman: So you know Phoenix? How?
You: We grew up together. She’s practically my sister.
“Hey, he’s texting me right now,” you tell her.
“I have an idea.”
Hangman: What do you look like?
You: I’ll send you a picture of you send me one too.
Hangman: What? You want proof?
You: Sure, let’s call it that.
Hangman: [Picture]
Hangman: I’m on the left, that’s Bob in the middle, and Fanboy on the end.
Hangman: Your turn.
You smile, sending him a picture of you with your green face mask, hand up in a peace sign and lips in a duck face position.
Hangman: That’s not what I expected but still hot.
Hangman: Wait a second… did Nat call you?
You: Maybe…
[Incoming call from ‘Hangman’]
“Hello?”
“Hey, mask lady. Nat!” You hear him say. His voice is deep and southern drawl thick. “Tell your friend to send me a real picture of her.”
“Y/N?” You hear her say.
“Hey, Nat.”
“Send this pretty boy your face. He’s desperate and threatening to make me drive him to your house.”
You laugh. “Fine. Should I send the one with my tits pushed up?”
“Jesus Christ, tell her yes.” You hear Hangman say in the background.
“Tell him that I’ll send him a normal one and to stop listening to our conversation,” you tell Nat. “Actually, pass him back.”
“Hi,” you hear Hangman say.
“Hi back, cowboy,” you reply.
“I like that nickname, makes me sound a lot cooler than I am,” he tells you.
You laugh. “I’d like to know your real name, and not your callsign.”
“I’m Jake. Jake Seresin,” he tells you. “You don’t have to tell me your name. I already know.”
“Yeah I figured that much,” you mutter.
“When can I see you in person?” He asks.
“When are you free?” You smile and bite your lip.
“How about now? Come to Hard Deck.”
“I don’t really do bars…”
“Then I’ll come to you. What’s your address?”
You laugh. “I don’t even know you like that. What if you’re a psycho?”
“I wouldn’t be a top pilot in the navy sweetheart.” You chuckle, making him wait before he asks, “Soooo can I come over?”
“Have you been drinking?”
“Not really,” he tells you.
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“You can come over. But bring food, I’m starving.” You tell him.
“Same,” he tells you. “And it’ll give you enough time to get ready and wash that face mask off.”
Fuck I forgot about that.
“I’ll see you soon.”
———
A face wash, makeup application, and teeth brushing later, you hear Hangman—Jake—ring the doorbell.
After changing into some cute sweats, you run downstairs and answer the door.
“Hey,” you say.
“Hey yourself,” he says. He’s a lot taller than you thought he’d be. And a lot hotter than you thought too. He holds up a bag of takeout and a gym bag. “I brought food and a change of clothes.”
He’s wearing his khaki Aviation uniform still.
“Yeah, come on in.” You step to the side, allowing him to come in. “Bathroom’s down the hall and to the left.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” he smiles.
God his smile made him so much hotter.
When he comes back from the bathroom changed and in gray sweatpants and a Texas Longhorns shirt, you smile and wave him over to your couch.
“What’re you watching?” He asks.
“Nothing that the moment,” you tell him. “I was waiting for you.”
“How sweet.” He smiles. “This has to be the best first date I’ve a been on in a long time.”
“Who said this was a date?” You ask, raising your eyebrows.
“Oh, did I assume?” He cockily smirks at you which makes your cheeks turn red. “And from the way you’re blushing, I’d say you’d like this to be a date.”
“Shut up,” you mutter, a smile playing on your lips.
Two hours later, Jake is still at your place and your head is resting on his shoulder.
“That was a cute movie,” he tells you. “Why did I cry so much?”
“Because Toy Story 3 is ruthless,” you sigh, wiping your eyes.
“Either way, I don’t think I can sleep if we don’t watch something else.”
You sit up and face him. “Why? You too sad to leave?”
“No, I don’t want to leave yet,” he says truthfully. “Plus, it’s my turn to choose a movie.”
“Which is?”
“Legally Blonde.”
You smile, scoffing before laughing and shaking your head. “You surprise me.”
“In a good way, I hope.”
“Definitely,” you nod.
“Can I surprise you one more time?” He asks, voice barely over a whisper.
You shrug and smirk. “Depends on what it is.”
He places a hand on your cheek, snaking his fingers to the back of your neck.
“Can I ask you one more thing?”
“That counts as a question,” you whisper.
He chuckles. “That one doesn’t count.”
“Go ahead.”
He takes a deep breath, leaning in close to the point his nose touches your own. Your heart is pounding, excitement and anticipation flowing through your body.
“Can I kiss you?”
“Please do.”
So he does, soft and sweet at first. That is, until you pull his head in, deepening the kiss. Your mouths race, devouring and exploring every inch of your mouths. You shift your body, straddling Jake’s lap and wrapping your arms around his neck, something you notice feels so normal, you don’t want it to end.
“Take me upstairs.” You order.
“Yes ma’am.”
151 notes
·
View notes
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
01: AND YOU MAY ASK YOURSELF (WELL, HOW DID I GET HERE?)
pairing: peter parker/mutant!reader
summary: you tutor peter parker. you dodge a robbery. you get run over and are somehow unhurt. all in a day's work, i guess.
word count: 4.1k+
series masterlist | next installment
You were beginning to regret promising your tutoring services to Professor Sorensen.
The early morning sky was pink outside the library’s picture windows, and you stared wistfully as you spread your things out across one of the empty tables, wishing that you were still in bed. But Sorensen was maybe your favorite professor ever, and when she stopped you after class last week and asked you to tutor for the general education English classes in exchange for a meager pay and some extra points on your final essay, you didn’t have the heart to tell her no.
You couldn’t imagine, though, what kind of linguistically-inept STEM major would be desperate enough for tutoring to schedule an appointment with you at eight o’clock on a Wednesday morning. You kind of wanted to beat them over the head with your laptop. Instead, you took a searing gulp of your coffee and opened your current required reading for Sorensen’s class. If you were going to be up this early, you might as well make some use of the time beyond tutoring.
“Excuse me,” a voice calling your name cut through the otherwise silent main reading room of the library a few minutes later, and you looked up to find a tall boy with messy brown hair standing at the other side of your table. He had a frayed backpack slung over one shoulder, and a look of exhaustion in his brown eyes that was very familiar to you. “Am I in the right place for Professor Sorensen’s English tutoring?”
“Uh, yeah,” you nodded, shutting your book and briefly glancing down at the email from Sorensen open on your laptop to catch his name. “Peter Parker?”
“That’s me,” he nodded, offering a small smile as he slid into the chair to the right of you.
“So, you’re taking Beginnings of American Lit with Professor Liu, right?” you asked, checking the email once more.
“Yeah. She’s kind of a tough grader, and if I don’t score an A on my next essay it’ll fuck with my GPA,” Peter explained, glancing over at you sheepishly as he dug through his bag, eventually producing a thin stack of rumpled papers. “I was hoping we could edit this one together? Maybe you’ll be able to explain what she’s looking for, ‘cause I really don’t know.”
“Yeah, Liu is… particular, but not impossible,” you told him, reaching forward to slide the essay toward you. “Luckily, I’ve taken her twice, so I think I’ll be able to help.”
“Oh, thank god. I was starting to feel hopeless,” Peter said, and you couldn’t help but snort at the complete earnestness in his voice.
“So, I take it you’re not a humanities major,” you observe, and Peter laughs, shaking his head.
“Definitely not. I’m a chemistry major, actually. Science has always come easily to me, but writing not so much. S’why I put off taking my literature requirement until Junior year.”
“That’s what I did with my lab science requirement,” you said. “And now I’m struggling through a biology lab that might actually kill my GPA. Okay, so, your intro paragraph looks pretty good. Thesis is solid. I think your trouble is probably in the body– Liu is a real stickler for thorough analysis of quotes and citations. And by thorough, I mean extensive to the point of near-redundancy.”
“Alright, I already know I’m gonna have to beef up the middle, in that case,” Peter sighed, taking the first page of his essay to look over the few line edits you had penned in with red ink. “Hey, about your biology lab. I can help, if you want. As a thank you for helping me with Liu’s class.”
“Yeah? That’d be a lifesaver, honestly,” you said, raising your brow at him. “I don’t really know anyone in the department to help me find a reliable tutor. Not that I know you’re a reliable tutor. You could be a really shitty chemist, for all I know.”
Peter let out a theatrical gasp, bringing a hand to his chest in mock hurt. “I’ll have you know that I’m a very good chemist. And, lucky for you, a perfectly average biologist. Good enough to get you to pass that lab with an A, I bet.”
“Well, then, I’m gonna hold you to that, Mr. Parker.”
“Just Peter’s fine. Mr. Parker makes me sound geriatric.”
“Okay, Peter,” you hum. “Look, this quote you have at the top of this paragraph? It’ll be really easy to beef up your analysis if you introduce how it speaks on gender roles in American culture at the time. In fact, you could probably get a whole extra paragraph out of it, if you provide enough context.”
“Would you mind writing that in the margin? I’ll forget otherwise,” Peter asked and you complied, writing the potential edit in small, neat letters next to the paragraph. “If you’re free Friday afternoon, we could go through some of your biology work.”
“I actually am free then,” you said, eyes roaming over the last paragraph of his essay. You scribbled a few notes and line edits in, before stacking the pages neatly and sliding them back towards Peter. “Tell you what, you make the edits we talked about today, and we can go over the next version of your essay then, too, yeah? Make sure it’s up to Professor Liu’s standard?”
“You’re an angel,” Peter said, glancing up from where he was absorbing your edits to shoot you a grin. “Hey, sorry to be so abrupt, but I gotta run. How does same spot, two o’clock on Friday sound?”
“Works for me. Thanks for volunteering to help, Parker.”
“ ‘Course. We should exchange numbers, in case anything comes up. I never check my email,” Peter said, pulling his phone out of his back pocket. He passed it along to you, the contacts page opened, and you entered your information, sending a text to yourself so you had his information in return.
“See you Friday,” you smiled, handing the phone back to him.
“Friday,” Peter confirmed, taking a few backward steps away from the table before turning around. He glanced over his shoulder once more, waving, before he disappeared into the hall.
***
“God, this shift couldn’t be any fuckin’ slower,” Mickey groaned, dropping her head against the bodega’s countertop. Her red curls fanned all around her head, dripping over the edge of the counter.
“Closing shift is always slow, Mick,” you reminded her, leaning against the wall with your arms folded over your chest. The thick of the after work rush had been over for about an hour, leaving the bodega deserted, aside from the two of you and Gary, the ancient orange bodega cat.
“Dontcha ever just wish somethin’ interesting would happen around here?” she asked, picking her head up in order to blow a big pink bubble from her lips.
“Interesting things happen in this city every day,” you countered. “Spider-Man fights some new fuckin’ loser every week, man, and that’s just him. Daredevil broke Mrs. Llewellyn’s kitchen window, like, four days ago.”
“That shit’s not interesting anymore; you said it yourself, it happens every day,” Mickey said, stepping around the counter to pretend to organize the shelves. “Tell you what’d be interesting: if we found out who Daredevil or Spider-Man or any of the others are beneath the mask. And if not that, I’d settle for Daredevil crashing through my bedroom window tonight. That man is fine.”
“How would you know? Nobody’s ever seen his face.”
“He’s built, baby. That’s how I know,” Mickey scoffed.
You shrugged. “I’d rather the cape types stay away from my bedroom window. Or my general vicinity. I’ve got enough going on between class and this job and tutoring without getting involved in one of their situations.”
“Oh come on, you’re telling me the thought of some sexy superhero literally crashing into your life isn’t appealing at all?”
“No, dude. I don’t want the drama. Or, I’m sorry, the adventure,” you doubled down. “You can have it.”
“Amen,” Mickey nodded. “I hope Daredevil heard you say that somehow.”
Before you could respond, the mostly quiet night was cut through with the sound of police sirens, loud and close and then fading slightly as they passed down the street.
“Wonder what’s going on,” you murmured, craning your neck to follow the red and blue lights down the block.
“Whatever it is, I hope a man in tights responds to it.”
“God, Mickey, you are incorrigible,” you groaned, turning away from the window and grasping the handle of the broom, looking for something to do.
“Don’t use your fancy English major words on me, woman.”
“Incorrigible is not a fancy–” you started, but were cut off by your phone ringing in your pocket, the specific song you assigned to Mr. Browne, your boss.
“Hey, bossman, what’s up?” you asked, answering. Concern laced your voice; it wasn’t like Mr. Browne to call during closing shift. He trusted you and Mickey not to burn the place down, and his watching reruns of Jeopardy! time was basically sacred.
“Honey, listen,” his gruff voice filtered through the speaker. “I want you and Mickey to close up and go on home now.”
“What? Why? There’s still an hour until closing,” you asked, furrowing your brow.
“I just saw on the news that there’s a robbery going down in the neighborhood, and I don’t need you girls getting caught up in any danger, okay?”
“Oh, guess that explains the police cars,” you said, more to yourself than to him.
“You see? Lock up and get out of there,” he said, his voice firmer. “And no dilly-dallying, you hear? I got a bad feeling.”
“Okay, Mr. Browne, you got it. We’ll close up now and go straight home,” you promised.
“Good. Just feed Gary before you go.”
“Will do. G’night, bossman,” you said, before hanging up the phone.
“What’s that all about?” Mickey asked, brushing a piece of her wild hair away from her face.
“Apparently those police cars that went by are responding to a robbery in the neighborhood,” you informed her. “Mr. Browne wants us to lock up and go home now before we get caught up in any of the trouble.”
“Must be my lucky day,” Mickey grinned. “You get the keys, I’ll feed Gar.” You did as she said, retrieving the keys, your jacket, and your bag from behind the counter. Already, you were lost in thoughts of going home and crashing immediately in bed. You had been out and about for over twelve hours that day already, and you were practically asleep on your feet. You had half a mind to walk down the block and thank the robbers for cutting your shift short.
A minute later, the two of you were standing out on the sidewalk. You could hear shouts and the sirens as more police responded to the scene, even the drone of a news copter overhead. The robbery must be closer than you expected, and maybe a bigger problem than you were assuming, too. There was a bank two blocks down and one over; you wondered if it was all going down over there.
“Alright, text me the minute you get home,” Mickey said sternly.
“You, too,” you responded. The two of you lived in opposite directions, so you wouldn’t have the comfort of each other’s company on the walk home.
“We’ll be fine,” Mickey responded with a dismissive wave of her hand. “I bet the neighborhood is safer than usual– bet nobody else will try shit with the place crawling with so many cops. But still text me when you get home, got it?”
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She pulled you into a quick, tight hug before waving and heading down the block towards home. You turned in the opposite direction, back towards your apartment in Hell’s Kitchen. The night was cool for the beginning of October, and you pulled your flimsy zip-up tighter around your middle, hiding your hands deep in the pockets. Your head swam with all the things you needed to do for the week, wondering if you should get a jump on some of it with your newfound hour of free time, or actually give yourself a rest for once. You were leaning toward the former; if you hurried, you could probably finish the reading you started at the library before Peter showed up, and the corresponding question set.
With that thought in mind, you cut through a nearby alley, shaving off a block from your walk. You wouldn’t normally, but you had a feeling that Mickey was right, the high concentration of cops in the area would deter any other criminals. Probably you’d be fine. You stuffed your earbuds in your ears and pressed play on whatever had last been going, lost in thought as you tried to plan the rest of your week around class and work shifts and your new tutoring session with Peter.
As you cut through a second alley, bringing you just half a block from home, chin tucked in and head down against the wind, you didn’t hear the squeal of tires as they turned around a corner and sped down the street you were just on. You didn’t hear as they abruptly turned into the alley, doors scraping against a dumpster. The hair-raising screech of metal on metal finally cut through your music, and you turned around just in time to find a large, black SUV barrelling straight towards you.
There was nowhere to go. The alley was hardly wider than the car itself, and fear or shock or some horrible mix of both at the sight of it coming toward you had rooted you to one spot on the wet asphalt.
Fuck. I am about to die, you thought as you stared down the headlights, so bright you couldn’t see whoever was driving the thing.
The next ten seconds– because, really, it couldn’t have been any longer than that– occurred in a blur. The impact, your body on the wet ground. Front right tire crushing over your torso, the back tire following half a second later. Vaguely, with the small part of your brain where synapses still seemed to be firing, you knew there must be immeasurable pain, but all you felt was cold and static. There were too many things happening at once, too many pains and thoughts all garbled together that you couldn’t feel or register any of it.
You laid there, staring up at the dark, gusty sky, expecting death to collect you at any moment. When, after several minutes of slow blinking and shallow breathing, you were still alive, you figured you might have experienced a miracle. Maybe the tires had passed over you in just the right way to preserve your life? Not that you thought such a thing was possible. Getting crushed by a speeding SUV felt like a very final kind of thing.
Slowly, your senses started coming back to you. Hearing first, as you registered sirens rushing past at the mouth of the alley. You grimaced, tensing as you waited for them to also cut down the alley and actually kill you this time, but they passed by without incident. The pain started next: a horrible, dull ache across your ribs and a sharper, prickling kind of hurt along your shoulder blades, but nothing like you thought you should have been experiencing. You were worried that it was still all a trick of the mind, that you’d muster up the courage to lift your head and look down to take stock of the damage and find your torso resembling roadkill more than anything human. But you couldn’t lay there forever, you reasoned, and so went to work testing appendages to see if they were in order.
You wiggled your fingers and toes first, surprised, frankly, that you were able to do so. If you could wiggle your toes, everything below your ribs must still be connected to everything above your ribs. Good sign. You bent your arms at the elbow next, which reignited the flame of pain in your shoulder blades, but they moved fine otherwise. Bent your knees, turned your head from side to side. You were… okay, you concluded. Physically not dying in a dirty alley, at least.
A jolt of effort, and you sat up all the way, despite the protest of pain across your ribs and shoulder blades. Looking down, you took stock of the dark tire track running across the front of your sweater, but more importantly, the very uncrushed nature of your ribs and internal organs.
“How the fuck,” you muttered to yourself, brushing your hands tentatively down your front. The contact of your palms against your middle was like irritating a nasty bruise, but that was it. That was… impossible, you were pretty sure. Maybe you could gaslight yourself into believing it was if it had been some tiny, dinghy little car that had run you over, but it was a fucking monstrous SUV.
Blinking, you reached back toward the wall behind you and used it to hoist yourself up onto your feet. A terrible panic was creeping up on you now, and you preferred to deal with that in the privacy of your bedroom, not on the streets of Hell’s Kitchen. As you turned to stumble your way out of the alley, you noticed something else: the pavement beneath where you had fallen was crushed in a peculiar shape, almost like wings and six feet across.
“What the fuck,” you said, louder this time. Whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck. This situation was getting stranger by the second, and you were pretty sure you were about to experience a mental break, if you weren’t already.
Maybe I actually am dead, and none of this is happening right now, you mused as the alley spat you back out on the street. Your feet headed in the direction of your apartment on their own accord, your mind caught up in bright headlights and wing shapes stamped into asphalt. A horrible headache was building behind your eyes, and all you wanted was to get to the safety of your own home, dead or not.
The walk seemed to take an eternity in your dazed state, but eventually the familiar redbrick corner building that had been your home for the last two years loomed in front of you. You fumbled in your jacket pocket for your key, gripping it in your shaky fist as you punched in the key code to the front door. Up four flights of stairs, a fight with the apartment door as the lock rejected your key like always. You went through the motions in a dream state, so many thoughts tumbling through your head, but none of them sticking. Before opening the door, you shucked off your sweater and balled it up in your arms, in case either of your roommates were up and about. You really had no idea how you’d be able to explain the tire tracks across the front.
Inside, the lights were dim and a Bob’s Burgers rerun was playing at low-volume on the little television. An electric blue pixie cut shot up over the back of the couch at the sound of the opening door.
“You’re home early,” your cousin, Winona, called to you. “What’s the deal?”
“Uh…robbery. Down the block. Mr. Browne wanted us to leave early to be, um, safe,” you stammered out, toeing your shoes off at the door. Each subtle movement sent more pain lancing through your ribs, and you struggled to keep a straight, unbothered face.
Winona wasn’t convinced. After living together for two years and knowing you since birth, she was familiar with all of your little idiosyncrasies. She could tell when you were just a little irritated, so of course she could tell when you… well, when whatever the fuck just happened, happened to you. Her thick, dark brows drew in until they met at the center, brown eyes narrowing as she scrutinized you.
“What’s going on with you?” Your cousin was not one to beat around the bush.
“What do you mean?” you asked, skirting around the question.
“Somethin’s wrong with our girl?” a sleepy voice called from the other end of the couch. A second later, Odie’s head of wild brown waves popped up over the back of the couch. Winona’s best friend since grade school and your other roommate, she was extremely protective over you. Always had been, since she met you when you started freshman year at Midtown High and she and Winona were seniors.
“There’s nothing wrong,” you huffed. Even that extra expansion of your lungs caused the pain to flare. “I’m just tired. It was a long day.”
Winona frowned at you, clearly disbelieving. “I made lasagna earlier. You hungry?”
“Ate a bunch of junk at work with Mick. But I’ll bring some with me for lunch tomorrow,” you promised, and wrenched open your bedroom door and disappeared behind it before either of them could question you further. You pressed yourself against the door once it was closed, then jumped away quickly as the action sent an explosion of pain through your shoulder blades. You’d forgotten about it that fast.
“Fuck,” you whispered, closing your eyes against the burning of tears suddenly threatening to come. “Oh, god. What the fuck. What the fuck.”
What was even the next move? You couldn’t very well go out there and tell Winona you’d been crushed by an SUV earlier in the night. Nothing about your current state would corroborate the claim, why would she, or anyone else, believe you? And honestly, that was the least of your worries. More pressing issues: why weren’t you crushed by the SUV? Why weren’t you fucking dead? What was up with the weird, wing-shaped damage in the street below you? What had actually happened in that alley?
Something was deeply, deeply not right. You could feel the wrongness of it all buzzing through every inch of your body. You knew that the feeling would overwhelm you if you let it, and you were dangerously close to just sinking to the floor and letting it take you.
Your phone buzzed in your back pocket. Opening your eyes, you fished it out and brought the too-bright screen to your eyes.
Make it home okay? The text from Mickey read.
No, you wanted to say. Got hit by a fucking car but somehow I think that might be the least of my problems. I think something’s really wrong.
Your thumbs hovered over the keyboard, but of course you didn’t type it. You shot off a text confirming that you did– because really, you supposed, you did get home okay in some sense of the word– and asked if she did, too.
After Mickey texted back that she did get home safe, you set about the task of peeling off your uniform. Every movement hurt like a bitch, and you reminded yourself every five seconds that you should be grateful for the pain. You didn’t even have a single broken bone. You weren’t dead. You could handle some aches and bruising.
You worked your jeans off first, then your shirt and bra, heaping them in the corner of your room and plucking a random t-shirt and pajama shorts out of your drawer. Before pulling on the t-shirt, you caught a glimpse of yourself in the mirror tucked in the corner. As you suspected, a thick line of bruises was already purpling along your ribs, the width of a car tire. You sighed, turning to see how far they stretched on either side and paused when your back came into view.
Two thick lines of what looked like red, irritated scar tissue traced along the lines of your shoulder blades. It looked as though someone had surgically cut them open, and recently. You brought a hand to your mouth, suppressing the gasp threatening to worm its way out. You felt like all the crap you ate at work was about to make a reappearance.
Those certainly hadn’t been there this morning. You would know: you stood naked in front of this very mirror after your shower, sleepily trying to pick out your outfit. The skin of your back had been smooth, unscarred. Obviously. You would have remembered if you had gone through something that would have resulted in scars like this.
“Okay, no,” you muttered, throwing the t-shirt over your head as quickly as possible in your bruised, hurting state. This was all too much to deal with in one night, you decided suddenly. You were tired and hurting and you had a busy fucking day tomorrow, damn it.
You pulled your blankets back and turned off the light, climbing gingerly into bed. Maybe if you were lucky, you would wake up in the morning to all of this having been some wild fucking nightmare. Not that you were ever that lucky.
17 notes
·
View notes
floyd/riddle valentine's day headcanons 💙❤️
(okay, this post is more overly detailed than i originally planned because i ended up writing a whole scenario about what their first valentine's day after they start dating could be like. but i still want to share it, so here it is.)
riddle is somewhat conflicted about valentine's day. on the one hand, he was always a bit of a romantic, and as a kid there were times when he dreamed that someday he'd have a special someone to spend this holiday with. but he's changed since he was a kid, and regardless of how he might or might not feel, this year he happens to have an exam coming up in a few days and thinks that studying for it would be a more practical use of his time.
besides, floyd will also be busy working at the mostro lounge that evening. each year they hold a special valentine's event with discounts for couples, and floyd seems to be very focused on helping jade and azul plan for it. what makes valentine's day so important, anyway, when the one you love should be special to you every day? they can just go on a date whenever they like.
he still wants to try and respect the rules of the holiday, though. he knows from books he's read that it would be wrong of him not to get his boyfriend a gift, and he also knows that it's a popular tradition to make handmade chocolates for your partner on valentine's day.
so he buys some chocolate-making supplies and molds--the molds are shaped like hearts and roses, so they're sure to make floyd think of riddle when he eats them. and he does the best he can, knowing floyd will still love them even if they're not perfectly made.
he also buys a card with a simple yet elegant red and gold design, and makes sure it's blank inside rather than having a cheesy prewritten message, so that he can write his own message thanking floyd for bringing so much excitement and joy into his life.
the card he picks probably looks something like this:
he plans to take the chocolate and the card, along with one white rose and one red rose from heartslabyul's gardens, to floyd in the morning and see if they can plan to spend a day together after the exam.
while on his way there, he starts to feel a little embarrassed and wonder if the roses are too much. he doesn't really care about the holiday (or so he claims, but he sure did spend a lot of time preparing for it) and surely floyd doesn't care beyond exploiting it for business purposes, so this is a bit silly, isn't it?
wrong! for floyd's part, they don't have valentine's day in the coral sea, so he's actually been pretty excited for it--which riddle had guessed, since for the last few days he's been constantly asking riddle for advice on decorations and menu items for mostro lounge's event as well as spending quite a lot of his spare time there, presumably helping prepare things.
what riddle fails to realize is that floyd's excitement is about far more than just making money at the lounge.
so, riddle is standing outside floyd's door and about to knock when floyd suddenly comes rushing out and absolutely lights up upon seeing riddle there.
he doesn't even give riddle a chance to get a word in before tearing the gifts from his hands, popping a rose-shaped chocolate in his mouth, and doing a goofy little laugh as he tells riddle he loves him. riddle hopes floyd doesn't see the blush on his face.
"goldfishieee!" he exclaims. "i got you something too, and i just know you'll love it!!"
he runs back into his dorm room and comes out holding a small, very messily-wrapped box of store-bought white chocolate truffles, a plushie of a pink hedgehog holding a heart, and an envelope containing one of those fancy pop-out valentine's cards--specifically, one with a goofy pun on it. i'm picturing something like these:
riddle opens the card and rolls his eyes at the pun while trying to pretend that he's not smiling fondly at it.
he's about to ask about their plans when floyd leans over and drapes his arms around riddle's shoulders, and then says that he absolutely has to come to the lounge tonight for a very special surprise.
riddle is genuinely shocked at this, but he agrees, somewhat reluctantly because he's supposed to be studying--but also secretly excited at the thought of floyd having planned something just for him. he has to enlist cater's help to find something decent to wear.
floyd grabs riddle by the arm and drags him over to a table within seconds of him getting to the lounge. jade takes their order, they talk and tease each other and laugh together like they always do, and they also have fun chatting with some of their other friends who are sitting nearby with their own dates.
riddle almost forgets that floyd was supposed to have some kind of surprise for him, until floyd suddenly excuses himself and then shows back up a few minutes later with a small heart-shaped cake, covered in strawberries and other elaborate decorations.
it turned out that floyd had baked and decorated this cake for him. riddle felt guilty because he'd already eaten more than he meant to for the day, and especially because this must have taken much more work than the chocolates and roses he'd given floyd.
he tells him as much but then floyd tells him he's being silly before snatching the fork from his hand and going "if you're not going to eat it then i guess i'll have to!"
riddle feels a flash of anger because floyd can't just try to take his food, there are rules against such a thing. he takes the fork back and tries a bite of the cake, reasoning that it would be rude not to. it's strawberry flavored and possibly the best thing he's ever tasted.
when they leave the lounge that evening, they end up going back to heartslabyul together and for some reason floyd all of a sudden decides that they're playing tag and makes riddle have to chase him into the rose garden.
floyd didn't have any extra surprise for him, he just wanted riddle to keep having fun with him for a little while longer.
at the end of the day, riddle finds that he doesn't regret having lost a bit of study time for this, and he makes sure to tell floyd how grateful he is. he has to admit to himself that maybe there is something special about valentine's day after all.
106 notes
·
View notes