#it's just gonna be Sugar and Coffee on my blog until I knock this out of the park

[jimlingss]

Sugar and Coffee [15]

Chapter 14 - Chapter 15 - Chapter 15.5 OR Chapter 16

➜ Words: 3.4k

➜ Genres: 99.5% Fluff, 0.5% Angst, Pâtisserie school!AU

➜ Summary: It isn't hard to be a pâtisserie chef, but it's not a piece of cake either. It seems like for you in particular, life keeps throwing in one wrench after another. It always finds ways to make your sweets bitter. The cherry on top is Jeon Jungkook — a rival with a sensitive sweet tooth who always finds ways to complain about you.

cr.

The white noise rings your ears.   It’s cramped — your legs are aching and you try to shift your other butt cheek off to alleviate the soreness of your bottom. There’s a baby crying a few rows away, the lavatory doors opening and closing, and not to mention, the constant whirring of the plane engine.    You look over to your left. The bitch Jeon Jungkook stole the window seat and now he’s oblivious to your suffering. His doe eyes are pinpointed on the small screen in front of him, headphones in, watching some kind of action movie. Your eyes stray to the screen for a second, but the flashing gets too much and you shut your lids.   You should’ve gotten one of those neck pillows to rest in, even if they were grossly overpriced at the airport.   But there’s no other choice. You put your elbow on the armrest, palm trying to hold up your heavy head and support the weight. As you doze off, your head bobs painfully. You lean back again, trying to find a spot, but to no avail. You nod off again and your neck nearly snaps.   Jungkook suddenly takes off his headphones. “Hey. You can use my shoulder, you know.”   “It’s fine,” you mumble, waving him off.   He stares at you for a second and then goes back to watching.   Though out of the corner of his eye a few minutes later, he notices your head lolling down, neck snapping again. He clicks his tongue in annoyance. “Tch.”   And Jungkook guides your head gently to his shoulder. Then, he flops his head on top of yours to keep it in place. Your breathing eventually steadies and he smiles, returning to his movie.   //   It’s a relief when you finally touch down and after several minutes, you’re finally able to grab your luggage and shuffle off the aircraft after hours of sitting there. Every bone in your body aches from the stiff seat, but you begin to feel a lot better when you step out of the airport.   The balmy weather hits you, the warm temperature embracing your being. You inhale the fresh air, able to see the blue ocean hugging the horizon, shimmering in the bright sunlight.    “Welcome to Tahiti, kids!” Namjoon looks over at the scenery with an equally satisfied expression as his wife. “Taxi ride is only six minutes away.”   “How was the flight for you two?” Sejeong asks.   “Not bad,” you answer, stepping on Jungkook’s foot when he mumbles something about his shoulder being sore and he laughs at your feigned ignorance.   The car drives all four of you to the resort and once you arrive, you’re overwhelmed by the warm welcome the people greet you with. The place is called the Intercontinental Tahiti Resort and Spa and it’s especially fancy for what you’re usually used to.   The lobby is grand, white pillars and high ceilings, bustling with tourists. There are people walking back and forth, flowers in their hair and around their necks, women’s dresses flowing, kids running about. The scent of the salted ocean fills your senses as the air conditioning cools your skin. You can’t believe you’re here.   “Feel free to get settled in today, you two. Take a look around and relax. We start baking tomorrow.” Sejeong hands you the confirmation forms to check yourselves in.    Both her and Namjoon are staying at one of the junior suite bungalows. They apologize for only being able to book the standard room for you and Jungkook, but you’re more than thankful already considering that this was a trip all-paid for.   You two are next in line at the lobby as Namjoon and Sejeong wave farewell, dragging their suitcases with them.    The woman behind the desk smiles. “Hello. How can I help you today?”   “We have a reservation.”   “Of course. Let’s take a look here.” She scans the paper and begins typing. “And your name is Jeon Jungkook?”   “That’s me.” He offers an ID and she nods, eyes skimming over it with a smile.   The woman hands over the key card and a booklet set with pamphlets. “Your room is two hundred twenty three on the second floor. Breakfast and lunch is included, this is also non-refundable. Your check out time will be at eleven a.m. There’s a few packages you can take advantage of during your time here. Room service is twenty four hours. If you ever need anything, feel free to call or come down to the lobby and we’ll help you out. Enjoy your stay!”   He nods slowly, but the woman looks off to the next people in line and you stop her before she can call them. “Wait. Is there….uh...my room?” You point to yourself.   She looks at you and then at her monitor. “It says two people are staying in this room. The standard room, correct?”   “Yes, but there’s supposed to be two rooms. One person in each, not one room.”   The woman takes the papers again, shuffling all of them. She types something into her computer and then shakes her head. “My apologies, it still says there’s two people staying in one room.”   “There must be some sort of mistake.”   “Should I call Namjoon?” Jungkook holds up his phone, brows knitted together.   “No, we shouldn’t bother them.” You don’t want to when it was clear they had plans to enjoy themselves for the rest of the day. With a sigh, you lean over the counter to the woman. “Umm...is there another room I can book?”   “Let me take a look here for you.” She clicks away. You wait with bated breath and yet again with your shittiest luck, she shakes her head. “I’m sorry. It looks like we’re fully booked here until the end of the month.”   You’re at a loss and you plead with the woman again as if it’ll somehow help. “Is there really nothing you can do?”   “My apologies. There aren’t any rooms available, so there’s nothing we can do at this time. We can give you free vouchers to the lounge area if you’d like for the trouble you’ve been through.” She takes something from underneath the front desk and slides it across the counter. “We get our wine from the famous winery here in French Polynesia.”   You don’t cry. Even if you want to.   But you take the vouchers since it’s still better than nothing.   When you’re off at the sidelines, Jungkook stands with you, suitcases by your side. “We can go talk to Sejeong and Namjoon.”   “Then what? They’re fully booked.”   “Then you can stay with Sejeong and I’ll stay with Namjoon.”   “They’re at a bungalow, Jungkook. This is practically their second honeymoon and I don’t want to bother them.” You take a deep breath and shrug. “It’s fine. It’s whatever. We’ll just stay together.”   “Are you sure?” Jungkook’s brows lift, eyeing you.   “Psh. Why not? We’re friends.” You bat your hand. “And I don't have germs or cooties like you think I do, Jeon. Promise I shower every day, so you don’t have to worry about it.”   The man scoffs with a small smile. “Fine by me then.”   But in spite of you the both trying to convince yourselves, it’s not a fantastic situation.   The room has a one king-sized bed, not two twins like you had hoped on your way up the elevator. It’s a whopping three hundred and seven square feet to share with Jungkook. One bathroom to your left as you enter, the bed taking up most of the space, a cabinet with a television and one table with two chairs.   You slide the glass doors open to let in fresh air. The private terrace is small too.   At any other time, you wouldn’t mind dorming with your best friend but considering the circumstances of your relationship lately, you can feel the tension in the air. It makes your palms sweaty.   “This is a really nice place,” you breathe out.   “Yeah.” Jungkook drops his duffle bag by the table. “There’s not even a sofa. Should we request one?”   “Where would we even fit it?”   “Right.”   You look around. Even if Jungkook would opt to sleep on the floor, there’s no spot for him unless he wants to lay underneath the table. Or in the hallway by the bathroom door where you could potentially step on him in the middle of the night during a trip to the toilet.   “We’ll make do,” you reassure. “We can sleep with our heads on opposite ends.”   “What if I kick you in the middle of the night?” he asks and when your expression washes over into impassivity, he grins. “Just saying. Can’t promise I won’t….”   “Fine. We’ll sleep normally. The bed is big anyway and sorry, Jeon, but your muscles aren’t as massive as you think they are.”   He laughs and falls back onto the soft mattress like it’s a pile of snow and he’s trying to make a snow angel. In one second, he’s ruined the fresh sheets and wrinkled them. “What do you think you’re doing?!”   Jungkook lifts his head. “What?”   “You’re lying on our bed with your dirty clothes.” You approach and try to push him off to no avail. “We were just on a plane for god knows how long.”   The boy grins and gets up. “God, you’re so uptight.”   “No, I’m clean,” you correct, glaring. “We’re not living like pigs. Try being neat for once. Just for a week.”   Jungkook sighs and as he brushes past you to the balcony, he ruffles your hair tenderly. “You’re lucky I like you.”   You scoff, trying to fix your hair while watching his broad backside, how he leans on the railing to soak in the view.   In the free time that you have, you get yourself cleaned up and take advantage of the bathtub for a bubble bath. You indulge as much as you can, trying to enjoy the resort before you have to start working hard on the cake.   You come out wearing one of your sun dresses and Jungkook looks up from his phone.   “Pretty,” he murmurs while a tiny, modest smile spreads into his cheeks.   You swallow hard, trying to keep your face from heating like a furnace. “Of course. What else would you expect of me?”   Jungkook laughs boyishly. “That’s true.”   You didn’t expect such a genuine response. But he doesn’t pay any mind to how caught off guard you are, merely getting up from his spot and grabbing clothes from his luggage. “My turn. You better wait for me. I don’t want to walk around by myself.”   “Or else what?” you taunt playfully.   Jungkook’s eyes darken right before he shuts the door. “Or else I’ll tackle you.”   Unfortunately for him, of all the things he was worried about, he didn’t consider the bathroom part. The moment the door closes, the scent of your shampoo and body wash surrounds him. It’s suffocating, thick in the air. He’s overwhelmed in your aroma and his pants unwillingly stir.   Jungkook rolls his tongue in his cheek, frustrated by his predicament and it hasn’t even been a full hour yet.   By the time he’s out of the bathroom, you're appalled.   “What took you so long?! Did you take three dumps?!”   “No,” he sharply answers and you don’t push when he’s surprisingly so defensive about it.   “Well, let’s go before it gets too late.” You grab the vouchers and swiftly exit your room.   Jungkook is decked out in a full tourist outfit — khaki shorts and a blue collared shirt. You’re in a floral print dress that would look perfect paired with your sun hat, but you’re saving the outfit for another day.   The two of you walk around, taking a peek at all the facilities they offer — the spa, swimming pool, tiki bar, restaurants, gift shops, and the venue where the wedding is being set up. You run into Chungha and her fiancé too. He introduces himself while she embraces you, thanking the both of you for coming and hoping the flight went well. But the pair of them only linger briefly to talk before they’re running off to take care of other things.   After grabbing a bite to eat, you and Jungkook decide to take advantage of your lounge vouchers.   “Are you sure this is alcohol?” You swirl the deep liquid inside your glass. Taking a sip and smacking your lips together, you try to decipher the taste on your tongue. “Tastes more like grape juice.”   Jungkook smells his own drink. “This one tastes like raspberries. They said it was alcohol though.”   “Huh. It’s pretty good then.”   He hums, taking another mouthful.   “Would you like another, miss and sir?” The waiter comes by with a kind smile and a cloth draped over his arm like a personal butler. “You still have credit on your voucher.”   You look at Jungkook who shrugs. “Might as well use it all.”   “What would you recommend?” You direct your attention to the waiter.    Between you and Jungkook, you both try nearly every kind of wine they offer.   You muse that the woman at the front desk must’ve felt really guilty to give you such a great deal. But you don't feel so upset anymore over having to share a room with Jungkook. At least not once you’ve gotten a taste of all the berry wines, another grape, fruit wine, dried cranberry, and one licorice flavored.    While you’re not a wine expert and there’s little you can comment on, aside from the fact that it’s very fruity and the acidity is high, you can tell it’s delicious. You actually forget it’s alcohol.   You give the beer a chance, but it’s disgusting enough for you to give the entire thing to Jungkook.   You don't keep count on how much you drink with him, but it’s enough that the waiter comes by with some glasses of water.   Your words slur together. “You know what I hate?”    “What?” Jungkook languidly grins, an easy smile on his features that has you feeling some kind of way.   “Everything. But also small spoons. I can’t eat out of a teaspoon! Why do they think I want to eat my ice-cream or crème brûlée with a—”   “Toothpick,” Jungkook finishes your sentence as laughter bubbles out his throat.   Your spine straightens and you look at him in surprise. Did he read your mind? “Yeah! How’d you know?”   “I think you’ve told me before.”   You wonder if you’ve really spent that much time with him that he knows such a small detail, but you’re baffled at how he can recall so easily. “How’d you remember?”   Jungkook shrugs and then burps. You wrinkle your nose until you hiccup too.   The boy is resting his head in his hand, elbow propped up on the table. His lids are seemingly heavy, every blink slow and gradual. But he stares at you intently like you’ve got something on your face. “Do you hate me?”   “Sometimes,” you answer truthfully without missing a beat. “But not really.”   “You don’t hate that I like you?” He leans in closer, but you don’t mind. If anything, he’s too far for your liking. You like it when he’s close.    You tap the tip of Jungkook’s nose like he often does to you. “I couldn’t hate you, hate you. You’re my best friend, silly.”   “I can’t be more than that?”   “I don’t know. I don’t really wanna talk about it.”   “I do.”   You pout, eyes straying off and then you gasp. “Look! The sun’s going down. You know what I’ve always wanted to do, Kookie? Walk on the beach to watch the sunset. We should go look!”   He follows after you, but not before stopping to ask for the bill until the waiter reminds him that it was all free of charge.    You and Jungkook happily hop across the resort with you leaning on his arm. “You think we’d get kicked out if they knew we were drunk?”   “Why?”   “Cause public intoxication. Is a resort public?”   “I think so. Just don’t make it obvious.”   “How do I not make it obvious?”   “Maybe stop giggling and whispering to me,” Jungkook says louder than what your voices have been and laughs at your reaction. The pair of you get onto the beach, stumbling together.   The sky is painted in orange and pink hues, the golden hour glowing on your skin. You can hear the sound of the waves lightly crashing against the shoreline, the spray of the salty mist in the air, the tide bubbling and fizzing away.   But it’s hard to enjoy it when you’re bumbling all over the place. “Ugh! I hate the sand!”   “Then why’d you wanna walk on it?” Jungkook giggles, holding onto you before you trip.   “I don’t know. Cause ‘s romantic, I guess.”   But at the moment, it isn’t romantic at all. There’s sand grating in between your toes, exfoliating your feet and hurting with every step you take. You swear it’s going to get in your underwear somehow.   You step towards the shore where the sand is flat and softer, wet by the water and where it’s more bearable. “Woah. The water’s so blue.”   Jungkook treads right up to where the tide kisses the beach. He quietly observes, watching the ocean and you come up behind him. When the timing is right, you shove the boy with all your might.   “Fuc—” He shouts, loses balance and puts his weight onto his knees, kneeling in the water.    You laugh hysterically, cackles coming from your stomach. You bend over, hugging your stomach. The boy stands up in dismay, shaking water from his hands. His khaki pants are completely soaked like he peed himself. “Why I oughta—”   “Stop! Jungkook!” You shriek with tipsy laughter as he starts chasing after you. “I’m sorry!”   “Too late!” He screams back and sprints after you as fast as he can with a dark vengeance. You obviously don’t make it far with sand flailing everywhere and his legs being longer than yours. Jungkook ends up grabbing you by the waist and pushing you into the sand. “Ha!”   He starts to laugh in absolute mirth, taking pleasure in your demise as sand gets into your underwear. Now it’s going to follow you around for the rest of your life.    “I just showered!” You laugh, getting up and trying to get rid of the tiny grains to no avail.   “How do you think I feel?” His grin is infectious and Jungkook tries to wring out his soaked khakis. Watching him makes you giggle. “It’s fine. We can shower together afterwards. It’ll be quick and painless.”   “Yeah? In your dreams, Jeon Jungkook!”   “Oh, it’ll be in my dreams alright,” he teases, astounding you with his outright shamelessness.   The both of you eventually calm down enough to realize you probably look crazy screaming at each other on the beach during the calm sunset. You slowly make your way back, still infected by drunken giggles that seem to be unable to stop.   Jungkook tries to walk without his wet shorts sticking to his skin and you take off your sandals altogether, attempting to clap them free of sand. On your way back, however, you’re interrupted by a cute lifeguard getting off her shift. She’s a beach blonde with a beautiful tan who boldly introduces herself to Jungkook. She even shakes his hand and invites him to a beach party happening tonight, leaving the two of you utterly stunned.   When she leaves, you wiggle your brows.   “What was all that?”   “You tell me.”   You grin at him. “Are you going to go to that party?”   “Nah.” Jungkook throws his arm over your shoulder, keeping you from losing your balance before you make it back to the hotel room. “I’d rather spend time with you.”   “Psh. Sorry to say, Jeon, but I’m pretty boring.”   “No, you’re not.” He looks down at you, an endeared smile gracing his features that makes you divert your vision elsewhere.   You feign nonchalance. “She was cute. You should totally go for it! Get it while you’re still young. You’re not always going to attract the ladies like this, you know! Gotta take advantage of it as it comes.”   Jungkook laughs in that boyish way that makes you feel funny. “Why would I need to when you’re the only person that actually matters.”   You almost choke on your own spit.   Jungkook laughs, lightly knocking his head against yours.   “I’d rather you’d be the one to notice me.”   Little does Jungkook know you do far more than notice him.

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Small Town Secrets

Warnings: noncon/rape, mentions of cheating, fuck machine, oral, blackmail, no edit.

This is dark!Lee Bodecker and explicit. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: The sheriff knows your secret and wants to share it.

Based on these drabble requests:

Lee Bodecker + “I’ve done so much for you, don’t you think you owe me?” + Blackmail + (I hope you can do this) I would like to consider this as a form of continuation of the story that you uploaded a while ago, it does not have to be this way if you do not feel comfortable. Lee continues to blackmail the waitress, when he is in the restaurant talking to her, he sees how her husband arrives to spend time with her and he gets jealous, so when he goes to see her at night he decides to make her his forever so he gives her the gift of having his babies [Sorry I will not be continuing this fic in a drabble if I do a sequel but I am more than happy to write a drabble with your prompts)

Lee Bodecker + “I heard you last night. I hear you every night.” + fuck machine + As always I’m leaving it up to you @sweetkingdomstarlight-blog​

Lee Bodecker + “You took the condom off?” + Blackmail + Lee forces himself on the reader one day and she tells him to at least put a condom and he never does and then that line comes on when he says something and she realizes he took it off and will impregnate her.

You poured another cup for the sheriff and took out your cloth to wipe away a clumsy dribble from the table. You tucked the rag back into your apron as Bodecker reached for the sugar bowl. 

“Anything else?” you asked. The diner was dead, it was almost midnight as the sheriff came off duty.

“How about you sit?” he looked around, “isn’t very busy and you don’t need to be prancing around on my behalf.

“I really shouldn’t--”

“Oh come on, Jethro’s home sleepin’, he won’t know you been sittin’ on the clock,” he coaxed, “and ‘sides, I’d say I outrank him.”

You looked at him and hesitated. You put your hand on the corner of the table and slid onto the seat opposite him. You set down the carafe lightly. He stirred his coffee and watched the cream swirl and pale the brew. His lips twitched as his eyes flicked up.

“I heard you last night…” he said.

“What?” you chuckled.

“I heard you last night. I hear you every night,” his tongue poked out and he sat back smugly, “sneaking into Lawrence Hayes’ Chrysler, just outside the old hole down on Tulsa Avenue.”

You frowned. You gulped as your blood ran cold and you tried not to flinch.

“I don’t know what you mean, sheriff, and I should get back to my work,” you tried to stand and he caught your hand on the table top. He jerked your arm and you sat back down.

“You think Annie Hayes would be interested to know what you’re doin’ with her husband?” he arched a brow, “not hard to guess but considerin’ what I’ve heard, I can be assured my guess is correct.”

You stared at him. You ripped your wrist from his grasp and crossed your arms.

“Why are you bringing this up, then?” you hissed.

“How ‘bout you meet me down on Tulsa tonight,” he smirked, “don’t worry, I treat you better than Larry, I ain’t like fuckin’ in no back seat.”

You looked at the carafe. You glanced over at the kitchen then at the clock above the counter.

“I don’t get off till four a.m.,” you said.

“I can wait,” he gulped down and mouthful and watched you over the cup, “I already been waitin’.”

“Why are you doing this?” you asked.

“I’ve done so much for you, don’t you think you owe me?” he taunted.

“Done what?”

“Kept your secret. You really wanna be known as the town whore?” he tilted his head, “nah, we can keep that ‘tween you and me.”

👮🏻‍♂️

The sheriff drove in silence. The anticipation and the knowledge of his intent kept you quiet too. His wandering eyes found you in the mirror as he pulled up to a house outside your small town. The sheriff lived out in the fields among the farmhouse, almost at the very centre of his county.

His door closing jarred you from your dread. He opened yours and grabbed your arm. The gravel gritted under your thin soles as he swept his arm around your waist and ushered you up the porch steps. The leather of his jacket squeaked as he pulled back the screen door and pushed open the thicker one.

He nudged you ahead of him and took off his hat. He hung it on a hook by the door and bent to untie his boots.

“Do me a favour, honey,” he said, “you go up and get yourself ready for me. Last door to the right.”

“I…” your voice trailed off, “I don’t…”

“Get naked, relax,” he snipped as he stood and kicked off his boots, “I’ll bring you something ease your nerves.”

You looked away and turned slowly. You went to the stairs and paused as your hand rested on the bannister. He passed by the steps and continued down the lower hallway. You climbed heavily and followed his direction to the last room. You looked around at the flowered canopy and the patched quilt.

You remembered the sheriff’s wife died a few years back. Everyone heard about that, they said he was crueler since then. In that moment, you would agree with them.

You undressed a piece at a time and shivered. You thought of keeping your clothes on and escaping through the window but you’d only hurt yourself in the drop down. You wouldn’t far neither out in the fields.

You sat on the end of the bed, legs crossed and arms hugging your chest. The dawn began to brighten outside the panes and the morning nip made you shiver. Bodecker entered and set down a glass in the dim. He flipped on a lamp and looked you over. He brought you the dark wine in the tall pint glass.

“You drink that down while I get set up,” he said, “you gonna want to drink it all.”

You took it and watched him. He snapped his fingers at you as he went to the closet. You turned away and sipped the acrid wine. It made your nose wrinkle and your throat tighten. You heard a creak and but kept staring at the door, your escape taunting you. You could leave but that meant your reputation and possibly everything else.

You’d come this far, you thought. You knocked back a large mouthful and coughed. You finished the rest and your chest burned darkly. You got up to put the glass aside and shyly spun back to the sheriff as he came up to the side of the bed.

You gaped at the odd machine he wheeled closer. The big wooden box had an arm attached to it and rubber extension in the shape of a man’s member. You covered yourself again and shook your swimming head.

“Go on,” he pointed to the bed, “on your knees there, let me see your ass.” You blinked at the odd machine and he huffed, “you’re makin’ me real tired of repeating myself.”

You got closer and crawled up on the bed, all pretense of modesty gone as you turned and exposed yourself to him. Your arms shook as you turned your ass to face him and his large hand spread across your flesh. He slapped you and groaned as you heard the wheels. He pushed it so that the rubber poked your ass.

“Get on higher,” he grabbed your hip and repositioned you, “that’s it.”

The rubber tip poked at your cunt and he slid a finger between you and the toy. He felt around until he found your clit and stoked with two fingers until you quivered. You bit back your voice as the cool air and the wine mingled with your reluctant arousal.

“Alright,” he pulled back his hand and pushed the machine against you once more. He guided your hips and rolled the machine to the very edge of the bed until it stretched your walls. You squeaked as he sheathed the entire length inside of you. “Now hold still and keep your legs locked,” he tickled your thigh, “we’ll go slow.”

He flicked the switch and the toy moved back. It shot forward again, then back, the forward, a steady but easy motion as you grew wet around it. You looked over your shoulder and he slapped your ass again. You clenched around the toy and he pointed over your head.

“Eyes forward,” he said, “I’ll give you something to focus on.”

He fiddled with the machine until the arm moved faster, a mechanical whir bit through the air. You groaned as your body responded to the constant fucking. Bodecker came around and walked across the bed on his knees. He undid his fly and pulled himself out. He stroked his dick as he grabbed the back of your head.

“I bet you ain’t never had it from both ends,” he purred and pressed his tip to your lips, “don’t even know what it is to be filled up completely.”

He shoved himself into your mouth and you gagged around him. Your throat squeezed around him as he invaded it and he soon matched the pace of the machine. His hips bucked as he moans floated around you. You hummed helplessly as your breath grew laboured and your eyes watered.

Your body tensed as the machine made you cum. You whined and the sheriff caressed your scalp with his fingers as he slowed your head. He slid out of your mouth and watched the strings of spit hang from your lips. He winked and growled as he backed off the bed.

“That wine must make you feel so good,” he said, “makes it easy, don’t it?”

He went around you and stopped the machine. He pulled it out of you and you twitched. He wheeled it back and you pushed your legs together.

“Don’t you worry,” he went to the dresser and turned back with a square in his hand. He peeled open the condom and slid it onto his hard dick as he neared, “we don’t want an accident now.”

He went behind you and pushed your ass down until you were on your stomach. He climbed up and kneaded your ass and thighs before he straddled you completely. He forced his hand between your legs and angled his dick against your opening. He leaned on you heavily, his arm across your shoulder and thrust into you.

You lifted your ass you ached around him. He went even deeper, the wool of his pants and his linen shirt scratching your sweaty skin. He moved his hips evenly, his hot breath against the back of your head, panting hungrily as he fucked you.

“You like that?” he asked, “Tell me Hayes ever make you feel like this?”

You groaned and pushed your face into the quilt. Your fingers curled around the stitches and you arched your back. He pulled back, entirely out of you, and slammed back into his limit. He jerked your body entirely and you cried out. He repeated the motion over and over, each time he seemed to sink further than the last.

“Mmm, any man’d keep this a secret, huh?” he purred.

Your head lolled back and forth, you whined and drooled like an animal as he rutted into you. Your walls tightened around him and your thighs tingled with another orgasm. You barely smothered it against the blanket but he kept going.

“I’m gonna give you a nice little gift,” he snarled, “we’ll see if he still wants you after.”

He slammed into you and you spasmed. He puffed into your neck as his weight made your body ache. He came with a tortured groan and you felt a warmth seep into you. Your eyes snapped open and you turned your head.

You shoved your hand down under you as he pulled out and threw himself off of you. He fell onto his back as his cum dripped down your fingers.

 “You took the condom off?” you rolled over and sat up.

“Mmm, you like keepin’ secrets, don’t you?” he sneered, “that’ll be a tough one.”

👮🏻‍♂️ 👮🏻‍♂️ 👮🏻‍♂️

Reblog and let me know what you think! Please and thank you!

[collapse-and-comfort]

Love your blog! Can I ask for a sick fic with some comfort? The whumpee ignoring symptoms and pushing on until they collapse. So the caretaker carries them to bed, and looks after the whumpee the next few days. The whumpee is weak and scared because they’ve never been that badly sick. But they don’t want to go to hospital (maybe bad experiences before).

🌡🤒🌡Thank you so much!!! Sorry this took so long. It just kind of kept going and ended up being a little over 4K words! I hope you enjoy! (I'm going to tag @lurkingwhump because I know you were interested in a story like this! I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention @i-write-whump because her prompts were constantly on my mind while I was writing this.) 🌡🤒🌡

Whumpee watched their interviewee’s retreating back. They’d been less a lead and more an aggravation. The beat of an eighties pop song made their headache (and their mood) worse and they closed their eyes and pinched the bridge of their nose.

“You good?”

“Yeah,” Whumpee said as they tapped a thumb on the table and tried to ignore the growing ache in their throat. “Let’s go.”

They walked back to Whumpee’s apartment to review information. It amounted to tirespinning and tail chasing. The longer the evening went, the more difficult it became for Whumpee to concentrate. They tossed a file onto their coffee table with the rest of the information they were pouring over. They leaned back on their couch and closed their eyes. No matter how they tried to will their headache away, it continued to compound itself. An ache and a chill were working their way into Whumpee’s body. They didn’t need to look at Caretaker to know they were watching them with questions on their tongue and concern in their eyes.

“Getting late,” Caretaker said.

“Late” was several hours ago.

“Mmhhm,” Whumpee said without opening their eyes. They weren’t taking the bait. “You’d better get going. We’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

“Right,” Caretaker said with a dubious quirk in their brow. They left, but they gave Whumpee ample time  to reconsider, to tell them they needed a break, or help. Or something.

Whumpee sat on their couch in silence as the chill in their body intensified. They refused to believe they were getting sick. Allergies, exhaustion. Had to be. They couldn’t even remember the last time they were ill. Whumpee groaned as they heaved themself up. The room spun and they closed their eyes until the dizziness passed. A string of expletives played in their head as they found their way down the hall and into the restroom.

They dry swallowed some pills that had likely exceeded their expiration date and they avoided catching sight of the flushed, hollow-eyed specter they would see if they looked in the mirror.

They didn’t bother struggling out of their clothes before curling up beneath their covers and dropping into a fitful sleep.

Whumpee woke to someone banging - no, just insistent, undemanding knocking the way their partner always did - on their door. They pawed at their nightstand in search of their phone, but it was nowhere to be found. They peeled their eyes open and wondered how long Caretaker had been knocking. They disentangled themself from their covers and slowly rolled their way off the mattress.

Too hot, they thought as they willed themself, one foot after the other, to make the distance from their room to their door.

When they opened up, Caretaker stepped in with a coffee in each hand. Their affable expression faltered when they looked at Whumpee. If Caretaker noticed Whumpee was wearing the same clothes they’d been dressed in the previous evening - and of course they did - they didn’t mention it.

“Shit,” Caretaker said as they handed Whumpee a cup. “Guess I should have brought you tea instead, huh?”

“As long as it had sugar in it,” Whumpee said before clearing their throat and grimacing at the sensation and the way their voice rasped. “Just give me a minute.”

---

“We can pass this off,” Caretaker suggested by mid-morning. They could. They knew several of their teammates were dying to sink their teeth into this case and there was no harm in letting them.

They watched as Whumpee rested their head against the passenger side window. Whumpee didn’t respond, but Caretaker knew what they would say. They couldn’t put this on hold; they had to finish it. Besides, I’m fine.

“Right,” Caretaker said. They felt as though that one, marginally passive aggressive word, was becoming their personal mantra. They couldn’t make Whumpee do something they didn’t want to do, and while they’d never seen Whumpee with so much as a sniffle, they knew Whumpee would run themself into the ground regardless of whether or not they had a job to do.

God forbid you take care of yourself, Caretaker thought.

The day wore on like that. Caretaker doubted the small measures Whumpee was taking to make themself less miserable - resting or rubbing their eyes, pulling their coat tighter around themself - were cries for help. Each time they asked Whumpee if they were okay, they were rewarded with a glare or a surly shrug.

The evening found them back in Whumpee’s apartment. Caretaker had grown genuinely worried about Whumpee. They watched as Whumpee stared at the same paper they’d been holding for the past ten minutes. They shut their eyes and slouched forward in their chair before closing their eyes. Caretaker frowned at the way Whumpee’s jaws were clenched, the way their shoulders were bunched, and the way their face was flushed. Whumpee’s clothes looked rumpled and uncomfortable. Not exactly surprising since they were the same ones they’d been wearing the previous day.

“You’re half asleep, Whumpee. Why don’t you at least change into some fresh clothing?”

They expected a brusque reply, but Whumpee put down the paper and nodded without looking at Caretaker. That set off warning bells.

Whumpee used the coffee table to steady themself as they rose and Caretaker reached out to help when they saw how badly Whumpee’s arms were shaking.

“I’m fine,” Whumpee muttered as they stood to their full height.

“Bullshit,” Caretaker said as they stood too. They’d spent the entire day watching Whumpee suffer needlessly and they’d had enough. “You can’t keep pushing yourself.”

Caretaker waited for Whumpee to tell them how they’d be better in the morning, or they’re just tired, or...

Whumpee swayed on their feet and their eyes rolled back before their knees buckled and dropped to the floor with jarring force. Caretaker swore as they quickly closed the distance between them and caught Whumpee’s upper body before they could fall the rest of the way. Whumpee let out a distant-sounding moan as their forehead rolled on Caretaker’s shoulder. As Caretaker held Whumpee’s chest against their own, they were shocked at the heat rolling off of Whumpee.

How the hell did Whumpee let themself get this bad?!

Caretaker didn’t berate Whumpee for neglecting themself. Rather, they gathered Whumpee in their arms. There was a flash of confusion, then annoyance on Whumpee’s face. Caretaker pretended they didn’t see the latter emotion.

“Just gonna get you to bed,” they said.

Then possibly to the hospital, they added in their head.

Whumpee didn’t put up a fight as Caretaker carried them back the hall and to their room. Caretaker angled themself so as not to run Whumpee’s head into a wall or door frame. They were unsurprised to find that Whumpee had left their covers a tangled mess. They set Whumpee down and helped them into a seated position while they straightened the covers as best they could. Caretaker circled back around to where Whumpee sat and all the aggravation they’d felt at Whumpee for not taking better care of themself fled them completely.

Whumpee’s arms hung at their sides, their mouth was part way open and their eyes were glassy. Without worrying about Whumpee’s sensibilities, Caretaker put their palm on Whumpee’s forehead.

“You’re burning up, Whumpee,” they said. That Whumpee was running a fever was far from surprising, but the sickly heat that was coming off of them was no less worrying to feel. “Jesus, how long have you been sick?”

“Few days,” Whumpee said. They looked up at Caretaker with wounded pride and they tried to pull away when Caretaker cupped their neck with their hands.

“Sshh,” Caretaker said as they gently pressed their fingers against Whumpee’s throat. They winced at how swollen Whumpee’s glands felt beneath their fingertips.

They frowned and idly swept a damp lock of hair from Whumpee’s forehead and decided what to do.

“Okay,” they said. “Is there anything we need to bring with us to the hospital?”

Whatever indignation and bravado were left in Whumpee disappeared. Whumpee’s eyes went a little wider and they shrank back from Caretaker as they drew in several sharp breaths as they shook their head.

“No. No hospitals.”

“Whumpee, you passed out and you’re running a high fever. I really-”

“No!”

Whumpee tried to stand, but Caretaker stopped them before they could land on the floor again. Caretaker put one hand on Whumpee’s shoulder and held onto one of Whumpee’s arms, trying to hold them as steadily and as gently as possible.

“Woah, woah, woah,” Caretaker said. They kept their voice low as Whumpee landed back on the bed and began to struggle. “Easy, Whumpee. Hey, it’s okay. Calm down. It’s okay. Hey, hey, look at me.”

Whumpee’s energy flagged and finally, their wary, fever-bright eyes found Caretaker’s.

“That’s it, Whumpee.”

Caretaker knew Whumpee had a thing about hospitals, but they never would have guessed it was this bad. Had their fever amplified that fear, or had it simply laid it bare?

“No hospitals.”

Caretaker sighed and nodded. It wasn’t going to do either of them any good to drag Whumpee, half out of their mind with a fever, into an emergency room. Maybe they could talk Whumpee into it if it came to that. Or maybe they’d call an ambulance. Caretaker let go of Whumpee’s arm and rubbed their shoulder. Their heart went out to Whumpee when they felt their breathing hitch beneath their palm.

“Okay,” Caretaker conceded. “No hospitals. But we have to get your temperature down. Where do you keep your thermometer?

“I’ve never been this sick before,” Whumpee said. Their voice was thick and apologetic as they dropped their gaze.

No thermometer, then, Caretaker concluded as they alternated between rubbing and patting Whumpee’s shoulder.

“Okay, what about some Tylenol?”

Whumpee paused and thought about it.

“Above the bathroom sink.”

Caretaker located the bottle. Empty. They sighed, discarded it, and moved to the kitchen. They rummaged through Whumpee’s fridge, but settled on taking them a glass of water. Whumpee sat where they left them.

“I want you to drink some of this,” they said as they pressed the glass into Whumpee’s hands. “I’m going to go pick up a few things, okay?”

Whumpee looked from the glass and back up to Caretaker. They nodded and took several sips of water before setting the glass on their nightstand. Caretaker took note of the way they winced each time they swallowed.

““Do you think you’d be more comfortable in different clothing?”

Whumpee gave them a tired mmhmm and tried to lift themself again.

“I got it,” Caretaker said as they put up a staying hand. “Let me help.”

Whumpee directed them to the bottom drawer of their dresser. Caretaker selected a pair of black athletic shorts and an overly large gray tee shirt. Whumpee didn’t protest when Caretaker helped them out of their old clothes and into the new ones. Whatever energy Whumpee had was depleted and they allowed themself to be helped down to the mattress without complaint. They used one arm to unevenly pull their covers back over themself. Caretaker refrained from helping them pull the covers more completely over them.

They didn’t want to leave Whumpee like this for any amount of time, but if they were going to help them, they needed to. Caretaker fetched Whumpee’s cell phone from the living room and put it on the nightstand next to the water.

“I’ll be back soon, but if you need anything, just call.”

All told, it took them about a half an hour for them to visit a drug store and a convenience store - both within walking distance - to gather what they needed and return. They organized everything on the counter, then took the immediate essentials to Whumpee’s room.

Whumpee was asleep beneath their covers and the water sat, untouched, on the nightstand. Caretaker regretted that they needed to wake them up. They put a hand on Whumpee’s forehead - still far too warm - then patted their cheek.

“Hey, Whumpee,” they said. “I need you to wake up for a minute, okay?”

“Mmm?” Whumpee mumbled as they looked up at Caretaker with bleary, half-lidded eyes.

“Just gonna get your temperature,” they said as they held up the oral thermometer they’d bought.

Whumpee frowned.

“It’s clean,” Caretaker said, though they doubted that was Whumpee’s objection. They leaned down and put the tip of the thermometer to Whumpee’s lips. “C’mon.”

Thankfully, Whumpee did as they were asked.

“Keep it under your tongue,” Caretaker told them, letting memories of their mother be their guide.

Whumpee kept their eyes closed while the thermometer worked, but they opened them again when the beepbeepbeep sounded. They reached for the offending instrument, but Caretaker halted them.

“Just leave it for a sec,” they said. Part of them didn’t want to see the reading, didn’t want the numbers to force their hand with Whumpee’s care.

They removed the thermometer and turned it so they could see the segmented, digital numbers.

“One-oh-three point nine,” Caretaker said, frowning at the thermometer as though it were to blame.

Not great, Caretaker thought, though they knew it could be worse. They tried to remember if they’d seen Whumpee eat anything the past couple of days. They picked up the new bottle of Tylenol, but paused when they saw Whumpee’s face. Whumpee’s jaw clenched as they clumsily wiped a tear away, They crouched down at Whumpee’s side - the pills rattled as they did so - and they put a hand on Whumpee’s arm.

Caretaker cursed themself for not stepping in earlier, for not seeing just how sick Whumpee was, for not making Whumpee take better care of themself. The latter was easier said than done, of course, but now it seemed the confirmation that they were sick was too much for Whumpee to bear.

“Okay,” they said, speaking more gently than they could ever remember speaking to Whumpee. Overt tenderness, or any other sort of tenderness for that matter, had never been a part of their dynamic. Whumpee let themself sniffle and that led to a coughing fit. Caretaker seated themself on the mattress next to Whumpee and patted their back as they waited for the coughing to pass. “It’s okay. I know this sucks. We’ve gotta work on getting your temp down, though, so I want you to take these pills.”

Caretaker helped them lean up and take the pills.

“You need to drink more, too,” Caretaker said, careful not to sound like they were scolding them. They wondered how much longer Whumpee would have let themself go without some sort of aid. A niggling thought worked its way into Caretaker’s mind. There was the very real possibility Whumpee had never had anyone to care for them in this way.

Caretaker gave Whumpee’s forearm a squeeze and then stood.

“Be right back,” they said.

They returned with a cool, damp washcloth. Caretaker swept Whumpee’s hair back and put the cloth on their forehead.

“Cold,” they murmured without opening their eyes.

“I know,” Caretaker said as they sat down on the edge of the bed. “Just don’t want your brain to get cooked.”

Whumpee hummed in agreement and laid still. Their breathing evened out and Caretaker removed the cloth when it had taken on as much of Whumpee’s body heat as it could. Whumpee didn’t stir while Caretaker repeated the process several times.

Once they were sure Whumpee was resting soundly enough, Caretaker went about the business turning their case over to other, equally competent hands. They didn’t look forward to telling Whumpee, but they’d cross that bridge when they had to.

When Caretaker returned to  Whumpee’s room, Whumpee was curled on their side. Their mouth was open and their breathing was deep. Caretaker risked placing the back of their hand on Whumpee’s forehead. Still warm, but it was better.

All was quiet until just after one in the morning. Whumpee stirred and Caretaker sat upright in the recliner in the corner of the room. Whumpee rolled onto their back and pawed at the covers.

“Hey,” Caretaker said as they walked over to the side of the bed. They put a hand on Whumpee’s shoulder and shook it a little bit. “You good, Whumpee?”

Whumpee’s eyes slid open and settled on Caretaker. It took a moment, but Caretaker could see the memory of the evening return to them.

“Too warm,” they rasped.

“Fever’s breaking,” Caretaker said with a nod as they helped Whumpee off with the covers. To Whumpee’s chagrin, Caretaker got their temp again, though that time it was a much more agreeable ninety-nine point eight.

“Don’t have to stay,” Whumpee mumbled as they rubbed a hand over their face.

Yes I do, Caretaker thought.

“It’s no problem,” they said with a shrug. “Besides, I know your WiFi password. Can I get you anything?”

Whumpee swallowed and grimaced as though there was a bad taste in their mouth.

“Drink?”

Caretaker brought them ginger ale, more pills and chapstick. Whumpee was quick to fall back to sleep after that.

Whumpee’s fever spiked again in the morning, though it was nowhere near as harrowing. What worried Caretaker was how pliant Whumpee had become. Just more evidence of how run down they’d let themself get.

After they took a shower, Whumpee set up camp in the living room and Caretaker took the opportunity to change the bedclothes. It was a small thing, but sometimes those provided the most comfort. Caretaker knew they were well on their way to becoming a mother hen, but they couldn’t quite bring themself to care.

Caretaker waited for the inevitable questions about work, but they never came. Caretaker wondered if Whumpee already knew what they’d done. The day wore on and Whumpee alternated between dozing and trying to watch whatever brainless actioner Caretaker opted to play. Their blanket was on. Their blanket was off.

Caretaker intermittently cleared away tissues when they began to accumulate around Whumpee. Caretaker plied them with a steady stream of drinks (Tea with honey seemed most effective.), and in the early evening, despite their declaration that they weren’t hungry, Whumpee managed to eat some soup. Caretaker extended a hand to take the dishes away when Whumpee was done. Whumpee started to say something, but their words fell off and they looked down at their lap when Caretaker took the dishes from them.

Caretaker wanted to reassure them, but they knew whatever they said in that moment would sound useless and patronizing to Whumpee. Maybe the best thing they could do was give Whumpee some alone time. At least for as long as it took Caretaker to pick up some things from their own place.

When Caretaker got back Whumpee was ready for bed. Caretaker regarded them. Their cheeks were flushed again and their eyes were glassy. Caretaker asked them the same questions they’d been asking them all day. How’s your throat? You okay? Do you need anything?

“I’m just tired,” Whumpee said as they started off with shuffling steps towards their room.

“Okay.” Caretaker calculated the time they’d remind Whumpee to take more pills like the world’s most proactive medi-minder. They chewed their lip as they watched Whumpee go. They hoped they got some rest. “Let me know if you need anything.”

That night, Caretaker dozed in the couch, but a single whimper from Whumpee’s room woke them. They crossed the room and fumbled for the lamp’s switch. The golden light revealed Whumpee, sweating and tangled in their covers. Their eyes were dazed and frightful; their mouth opened and they let out a pathetic groan as they pulled themself toward the edge of the bed.

“Whumpee,” Caretaker said as they put a hand on Whumpee’s shoulder; they were looking at them, but they weren’t seeing them.  “Hey, Whumpee.”

“Nonono,” Whumpee said. Their voice was far off, but it sounded no less distressed. “Stop Don't Please. It Hurts. N-”

Whumpee came awake and they panted as they braced themself on their elbows. They recoiled from Caretaker’s touch with a whimper and their feet worked at kicking their covers away.

“It’s okay, Whumpee,” Caretaker said. “Ssh. You’re safe. I promise you’re safe, Whumpee.”

They risked putting a hand back on Whumpee’s shoulder. They reminded themself to stay calm for Whumpee’s sake. A sob escaped Whumpee as they fell onto their side, breathing hard. Their feet stil moved ineffectually under the covers.

Caretaker pulled the blankets off of Whumpee and they stopped trying to escape whatever was hunting them. Caretaker grabbed the thermometer and the tissue box before sitting down next to Whumpee and began rubbing the curve of their shoulder.

“It’s okay,” they repeated. “Shshsh. Just a bad dream.”

Was it, though? How dramatically had their fever spiked?

After a bout of coughing, Caretaker offered Whumpee a tissue. Whumpee blew their nose before Caretaker tried to get them to take the thermometer in their mouth. Whumpee turned their face away and pursed their lips. Caretaker might have found humor in the sheer petulence of the gesture had Whumpee not looked so scared.

“C’mon, Whumpee. I’ve gotta see your temp.”

“No,” Whumpee said as they reached with a weak hand, trying to bat away the thermometer.

Caretaker caught Whumpee’s clammy hand and lowered it to the bed.

“I’ve gotta know how bad it is, Whumpee. It’ll just take a minute.”

“Don’t…” Whumpee said as they looked at Caretaker with unfocused eyes. “Don’t take me to the hospital. I can’t be there.”

“I’m just-”

“I can’t.”

Caretaker took a breath. They couldn’t let Whumpee work themself into a lather.

“You’re just coming out of a nightmare, Whumpee. Just give things a minute to make sense.”

“I-”

Whumpee cut themself off; Caretaker hadn’t said whatever they’d expected to hear.

“Just focus on me for a minute. Can you try to do that?”

They nodded, blinked and looked at Caretaker as though they were actually seeing them. Silence fell between them. Whumpee took a deep breath and rested their head back on their pillow and stared at the opposite wall.

“Okay,” they said finally. They allowed Caretaker to place the thermometer under their tongue. It seemed to take an eternity for the thermometer to beep. Caretaker took it back and before looking at it, they prayed to whoever or whatever might be listening that they didn't have to get Whumpee to a hospital.

“One-oh-two point six,” Caretaker said with relief. “That's not so bad. Just a bad dream that did a number on you.”

The lines of Whumpee’s face relaxed and they rested on the pillow, but some sort of melancholy had taken the place of Whumpee’s fear. It was an equally disheartening sight.

“Need anything?” Caretaker asked after they went through the routine they seemed to have established in nursing their friend.

“No.”

“Okay, ” Caretaker said. “Just let me know if you do.”

Caretaker stood and pulled a blanket back over Whumpee, who took its edge in their hand and pulled it to their chin.

“Wait,” Whumpee said when Caretaker turned.

Caretaker paused and looked back at Whumpee.

“Can you…” Whumpee looked at them, their eyes begging Caretaker to understand. “Can you stay?”

What had they dreamed that had them so rattled?

“Of course, ” they said. They settled back down next to Whumpee and swept Whumpee’s hair out of their face. “Whatever you need.”

Whumpee slept late the next morning and Caretaker took the time to tidy the apartment and ask for updates on the case. It had been solved.

When Whumpee came out into the living room, they made a beeline for their recliner. Though Caretaker was constantly present, they exchanged few words and Caretaker could tell Whumpee was putting effort into avoiding their gaze. The news that the case had been resolved seemed to do little to cheer them.

After cleaning the lunch mess, and doing dishes Caretaker sat on the side of the couch that was closest to Whumpee.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Whumpee said without taking their gaze off of the TV.

“It’s no problem.”

More silence. Whumpee dozed off and Caretaker channel surfed.

Caretaker chose a book from Whumpee’s shelf.

Caretaker read the same sentence five damn times before giving up and putting the book on the coffee table.

Whumpee jolted awake with a gasp. Their fingers dug into the armrests and their eyes darted over the room as though they’d woken up somewhere entirely foreign. They cursed and let out a harsh breath.

Caretaker guessed embarrassment, and not sickness, colored Whumpee’s cheeks.

“It’s fine,” Whumpee said before Caretaker could ask.

Whumpee stood, shakily at first, then walked to the kitchen. Caretaker knew any attempt to help them would be rebuffed, so they waited for Whumpee to stare into the refrigerator before they selected a bottle of water before moving back to their seat.

Whumpee sat and sipped.

Caretaker needed to address the elephant in the room. Or at least let Whumpee know the elephant could stay where it was.

“We don’t have to talk about it. You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to,” Caretaker said. “But I hope you know you can if you need to.”

Whumpee’s fingers worried at the armrests.

“I do. I do know. I’m just not used to...” Whumpee’s voice was low but solemn as they gestured toward all the signs of care that had been taken on their behalf. “... to any of this.”

Caretaker wanted to pull them close and tell them how sorry they were to hear that, that they never needed to hesitate to ask for help. They didn’t know what they could possibly say to make it better. Instead, they flashed the easygoing smile that had been missing from their features for the past couple days.

“Well,” they said. “Get used to it.”

[lue-arlert]

Hi! I'm a new follower, nice to meet you! I'd like to participate in your event, but feel free to ignore this if it's only reserved to the first 100 followers. Speaking of which...congrats!! 🎉 I'd like a first date with Eren. Now, as much as I'd love to ask for something wholesome, I am too thirsty for the guy 😭 so I'm gonna go with a nsfw scenario, and I'm not a sugar baby. Thank you and have a nice day!!

Since you're understandably worried about minors...nope, I'm old, I'm 26 😂 you have no idea how happy it makes me to see other people my age in this fandom!

Hello Jamie, thank you so much, I’m happy to have you here!!! 💛

Have fun with Eren 🥰

WC: 1.2k

18+ minors and ageless blogs do not interact

You never expected to experience the thrill of a hot air balloon—it was never at the top of your bucket list, but when Eren Jaeger suggested it for your first date, you couldn’t exactly say no. When a beautiful man wants to take you on an adventure, you say yes and let him sweep you away.

And now you were leaning over the side of the gigantic basket, looking over the teeny tiny people and buildings, a wide grin over your face. Your limbs trembled as you gazed down, adrenaline coursing through you.

The touch on your back, Eren’s large hand resting on you, pulled you away from your focus and you looked over your shoulder at him with wide, excited eyes.

“It’s so beautiful up here!” You exclaimed, nearly squealing.

He chuckled and dragged his hand up your back, into your hair and cupping your head. “I was hoping you’d like it.”

“This is amazing.” You returned your gaze to the beauty of the earth beneath you, your hands tightly gripping the wall of the basket.

Your heart fluttered at not only the sheer height of your travels, but the feel of his hand brushing over you.

Eren had introduced himself to you months ago, running into you on your way to work and knocking your coffee onto your chest. He wouldn’t stop apologizing and offered you his number so he could buy you a new shirt, and as much as you appreciated his willingness to make right his accident, you took his number for his kindness, and not the promise of a new blouse.

Over time, you talked and tried to set up a date, but your schedules never lined up, until today. As soon as you both confirmed your mutual day off, he booked the event and set up the date.

And now, half a mile in the air, you were in awe, in awe of how powerful you felt being so high up, and of how beautiful he looked with the sunlight pouring over his tan skin.

With a content sigh, you folded your arms on the edge of the basket and leaned down, resting your chin on your forearm, gazing at the city in the distance.

As you admired it, you felt hands on your hips and turned to look over your shoulder to see Eren standing directly behind you, hips flush against your ass.

“Eren?”

He bent over you and nudged your chin to face you forward again, shushing you quietly with his lips grazing your ear. “You look so pretty right now.”

You blushed and looked at the city again, then your jaw dropped when you felt his fingers dip under your skirt and press against your pussy.

“Eren!”

“It’s okay baby, just wanna make you feel good.”

You nodded and dug your chin into your arm, sighing as he worked his fingers over your clothed slit. While he worked his ministrations, your eyes fluttered shut, no longer able to focus on the scenery beneath you. When he touched your clit and began to circle it, you let out a whine, squeezing your thighs together.

He chuckled behind your ear and pulled your panties to the side, shoving his middle finger into you without warning, causing you to gasp.

You didn’t want to stop him, it was obvious he knew what he was doing, he was making you feel so good.

Your fingernails dug into your elbows as you held tightly onto yourself, biting your lip and struggling not to rock your hips.

“You’re getting so wet, baby.” Eren whispered in your ear, laying over your back and reaching around to cup your breast.

“Making me wet,” you whined, burying your face into your arms.

“Good.” He kissed the side of your head and slipped another finger in you, stretching you and prepping you, so ready to put his cock inside of you.

And you were ready for him, too. Your hips finally began to roll, his knuckles pressing into the lips of your cunt as he finger fucked you, squeezing your tit and kissing your shoulder through your shirt.

You let out a soft moan, biting your lips and looking over your shoulder at him.

You half met each other’s gazes, and before your orgasm built up, he slid his fingers out of you and unbuckled his belt, shortly after pulling his cock out of his pants and pushing the tip against your clenching hole.

“‘M sorry baby, need you now.” He panted in your ear, flipping your skirt up over your ass and sheathing himself inside of you, groaning loudly.

You gasped with him, your head falling back and fingers digging into your arm and the basket.

As he let you adjust to his size, you let out a sigh and pushed back against him, hunching your shoulders, whining, “I’m ready, please fuck me.”

You didn’t have to tell him twice for him to start thrusting his hips into you, his hands gripping tightly on your hips.

He groaned and stood straight to get a better angle to fuck you, watching you rock forward into the side of the basket as his hips snapped against you over and over.

The exhilaration of being so high up and his cock twitching inside of you had you feeling like you were on top of the world, filled with ecstasy and tingles pricking your skin.

After speeding his thrusts, Eren leaned forward and placed his hands on either side of you against the ledge, kissing the back of your head. “You’re tight, pussy is so tight, don’t ever wanna pull out.”

You groaned and whined at the feeling of his balls slapping against your clit with each thrust, your cunt clenching at his words. “Don’t cum in me,” you growled, then felt him nod against your hair.

“Okay, okay baby, I won’t.” He slid his hands up your sides and around to hold your breasts, gripping them tightly and using them to pull you back against him, drawing a high moan from you.

Between his dick in your pussy and his hands on your tits, you felt yourself fluttering and knew your release was coming.

“Eren,” you whimpered, using your muscles to push yourself back against him more, his tip brushing your sweet spot until it broke you, your climax rocking through you and squeezing his cock tight.

“Oh, fuck!” He pulled out of you and quickly fucked his fist, shooting hot spurts of his seed all over your ass and panties, wheezing as he came down from his sex-induced high, resting his forehead on your back and placing gentle kisses over your shirt.

You both stayed as you were, bent over and breathing heavily, until he rubbed your back and stepped away from you, pulling his pants back up.

You flipped your skirt back over your ass, covering his cum as you felt it soak into your panties, making a mental note to wash them when you got home.

He spun you around and pulled you against him, placing kisses on your lips and wrapping an arm around your waist.

The two of you made out for a while, exploring each other’s mouths and sucking on each other’s lips, before Eren pulled away and held your face close to his, smiling wide. “We should go back down.”

“Can you go down later?” You gave him a sly grin, and his eyebrows raised as he nodded, catching your meaning.

“Hell yes,” he chuckled, kissing you again before turning to the steering handle, lowering it to make the balloon descend back to the earth.

Lue Arlert’s 100 Follower First Date Event - CLOSED

[bokunoheroanalysisforthefuture]

Hello hello to all the new followers! However you came across this blog, thanks for being willing to put this on your dashboards. I still have half of this chapter left to go, but hopefully I’ll be able to knock out a larger chunk of it since it’s gonna flow better… at the least, I’ll try to get to where Episode 1 of the anime cuts off.

...huh, damn, now I’m curious about exploring differences between anime and manga… I don’t have time for that, this manga thing is already more of a time-eater than expected… plus considering how many chapters I need to get through… yeah no, I will leave anime-manga comparison to others.

Anyways, into today’s pages! I wanna get this chapter done this week!

[No. 1 - Midoriya Izuku: Origin]

...you, I’m gonna translate you.

[transliteration of sign: 頭上 (zujou) [overhead] 注意 (chuui) [caution, being careful, attention (heed), warning, advice]

[Translation: caution, overhang 2m]

I mean, it’s obvious because of the context, but now I know how to pronounce it! And I guess you guys can as well. No, I will not be ashamed of spending fifteen minutes on this. I’m probably gonna stay in the habit of translating stuff as I come across it.

Anyways, to the chapter itself. Izuku doesn’t do that ‘All Might impression’ thing here like he does in the anime, just basically hypes himself up with grit teeth and determination. Which is a shame, but it makes sense since that sort of thing would look/turn out better in animation anyways. Still a little weird he had a flashback there, but like whatever, it’s supposed to give readers context into the setting and character, this whole opening chapter’s gonna be a bit weird like that.

The villain comes up out from the holes in the sewer grate, and holy fuck does this come off as just a bit of a horror manga, if I saw that I’d be terrified.

You know, out of context this is REALLY disturbing… no wait, in context this is disturbing too, nevermind. But yeah, look at that terrified kid, that is not the face he was wearing earlier against Katsuki, making it even more obvious that he wasn’t scared at that point.

The villain pounces on and envelops Izuku, covering his nose and mouth and making Izuku realize he’s been attacked by, you know, a villain. Which I would share the image of, but honestly it’s graphic as hell, if you wanna see it go look at the manga yourselves.

Yeah, it’s a wonder Izuku didn’t have nightmares for months after this, or have issues with water or potentially drowning/suffocating. Also, honestly, with this hijacking the body thing, I’m looking at the amount of mass of the sludge and the size of Izuku, and I have to remind myself again that this is a shounen manga with urban fantasy magic, logic isn’t a concern here.

But yeah, the villain is super vague about who the ‘he’ he’s avoiding is, while Izuku is frantically trying to scrape at the sludge to no effect. Also, after being in the sewers, that HAS to be some nasty gunk, yikes, how did Izuku not come down with something?

Izuku’s struggles makes him drop his charred notebook while panicking about his death and begging someone to come save him. The book flips open to his conceptual hero costume, which we know is going to end up the ‘first’ version of his costume, though obviously it’s going to undergo some revisions as the series progresses (which is a small thing I like about the series a lot). If I recall right, this is also what prototype!Izuku’s costume was going to look like!

Fortunately for Izuku, in the next page All Might punches his way up out of the sewers, letting both the villain and Izuku know he’s there, and- god, I wouldn’t trust those groceries for any sort of safe consumption, even if they are… two bottles?? That’s it?? What-

Sure, whatever, two bottles of soda, I guess, isn’t that not good for people who have had their stomach removed because of too much sugar or something? Is him being down a stomach even actually canon or just popular fanon? I suppose we’ll find out soon enough.

Anyways, All Might showed up and punched the villain away from Izuku, basically only hitting with the shockwave to avoid hurting the kid too much. Also, we get this gem of a face:

Incredible.

Izuku passes out, and wakes up a bit later to All Might slapping his face, which like, sir, sir, that’s not how you take care of a victim of a villain attack that definitely isn’t an allegory for another kind of assault. But yeah, All Might is sort of out of ‘character’ while waiting for Izuku to get up, and then shoves himself back into it once Izuku’s awake, which is… interesting, and makes sense.

Izuku naturally freaks out, and All Might does a pose while apologizing for his mistakes and explaining his sloppiness with the villain - he’s new to the area, and besides that, he’s ‘off camera’. Which, yeah, you really get the sense this is his TV persona pushed forward. He also thanks Izuku for success in finally containing the villain, and Izuku gives us this hilarious gem:

Ah, meta jokes. Izuku looks around for his notebook for an autograph, only to see it’s already been signed. He bows enthusiastically and says he’ll keep it as a family heirloom, and All Might heads off to take the villain in and to ‘catch him again on tv’.

Izuku wants him to wait, because he still has something to ask, but All Might says he’s got no time, and crouches to jump away, with just a shot of Izuku’s desperate face before All Might takes off, the ‘thanks for your support’ dragging after him like the words themselves couldn’t keep up, and again that is just a cool fucking effect and use of shape and warping to give effects otherwise not possible in text and just- gah, I love comic/manga art for these reasons, so freaking cool!

You’re an all star.

Sorry not sorry. But yeah, the bottles are still there in his pockets - his definitely totally secure open pockets. Honestly, with or without Izuku, he might have dropped those bottles because what the fuck All Might. 

All Might tries to shove Izuku off until Izuku reminds him that he will die if he falls, which gets him to pause and go ‘true enough!’ Izuku says he’s got a lot of things to ask, and All Might asks him to close his eyes and mouth to avoid the wind drag. All Might coughs and grunts, with a drop of blood escaping from between his teeth, and him swearing about it.

Onto the next page, and we have some background kanji that I am definitely going to waste time translating, because that’s just who I am.

Top windows/hanging sign: 卜 (uranai) [divination, fortune telling] 黄葉 (kouyou/momiji) [autumn/fall colors, leaves changing color, layered colors in garments (resembling autumn colors)] 

[rough translation: fortunate garments / lucky coloring.]

I’m gonna assume this is something to go with Japanese culture and their beliefs around what certain colors mean. 

Middle banner/hanging sign: Su/Ta/De [study] 

Not confident at this one but I cannot grok how messy those katakana are and so I just have given up on that for now. If someone can confirm, that’d be sweet of you.

Lower windows/hanging sign: [事]務所 (jimusho) [office]

Lower banner: Ma/a/ke/t/to [Market]

Shop overhang: Fu/ra/shi/[mu?] [Flashy] 喫茶 (kissa) [teahouse/coffee shop/cafe]

Flashy Cafe makes sense, but I’m not confident in the katakana when we can only see three of them and no way to know about modifiers,,,

Victory.

Alright, now that I’m done crying over that, onto actual chapter analysis. We get the ‘whoosh’ of something falling, before seeing the POV of the sludge guy coming back to consciousness, frustrated with All Might, and we also get a peek at some kids approaching… aka Katsuki and his minions.

First off, the branding on the can is hilarious and weirdly suited to the situation. Secondly, you can just see Katsuki kicking the bottle in the bottom left corner there, which probably knocks it open for, you know, the upcoming events. And huh, both of the minions smoke, which Katsuki chastises with displeasure in the panel after next. 

So Katsuki blames Izuku for ‘messing with him’ and that Izuku being ‘full of stupid dreams like when they were kids’ pisses him off. Which he emphasises by blowing up the can in his hand. I wonder if that’s meant to be a reference to him thinking Izuku’s just paying lip service to being a hero just to annoy Katsuki, at least in his POV?

But yeah, Katsuki shakes his hand after that - which meant he DID feel some backlash for blowing up a can in his hand, or perhaps the superheating of the metal before it went? Either way, backlash! He turns back to yell at the two about their smoking and how it’d go on his record, and the two freak out and point behind Katsuki, before we go to their POV:

But yeah, another decent stopping point here. There should only be two posts after this for chapter 1, based on my skimming of the rest of the pages. I really want to have the All Might convo separate, and then the whole sludge fight and aftermath… but we’re getting there! :D

[missnxthingg]

hiii, loved your last angst request! could you maybe write one where the reader and peter were best friends, and they both like each other, but are too shy to tell the other, and after something happened between them, they grow apart but they are still habouring feelings for the other? i don't know if you understood it haha

A/N: Uhmm, I think I understood your request, but I don’t know if this is what you wanted. I created the whole story based on what you liked, but created a whole new thing out of my head, aaaand I hope you like it!

Words: 6.7K

Warnings: swearing, mentions of sex, angsttt, and some fluff in the end.

Pairing: Peter Parker x Best Friend!Reader

masterlist | main blog | gif source

IT WAS JUST A MISUNDERSTANDING

It was six o’clock when your alarm woke you up, and it’s been a long time since you last got up this early. One of the perks of being on vacation was to wake you at any time you wanted to, but now that it was over, that meant that you needed to start waking up early again. It wasn’t something you liked, but after this month home, you need to start doing things you don’t really like. For example, you took your shower and got ready for school just like you always did, and while you were finishing packing everything you needed for classes, you heard a knock on the door.

“Good morning darling.” Your mom got her own head inside your room and smiled.

“Morning mum.” You smiled back and finished packing your stuff.

“I’m so sorry my love, but I have to leave earlier today and can’t make coffee for you, or lunch. But there’s money over the couch so you can buy something to eat.”

“Okay, thanks mum.”

“Hey, but maybe you could find Peter to have lunch with you today.” Your chest ached at those words, hearing his name still was very difficult for you.

“Mom, I told you that I’m not friends with Peter anymore.”

“I know darling, it’s just… I miss you too together.”

“I miss it too, but we have to deal with the fact that he’s not my friend anymore and won’t ever be again.”

“Don’t say such thing.”

“It’s the truth mom. But I’m sure I can get MJ, or maybe Betty to have lunch with me. Don’t worry, honestly.” She gave me a sympathetic smile and waved goodbye.

“Bye, my dear. And I promise we’ll make a nice dinner to repay you today.”

“Okay, see you later mom.”

 Not having you mom to do you breakfast was something you used to like a lot. That meant you had to find somewhere else to eat, which meant breakfast at the Parker’s apartment, or maybe the same old coffee shop across the street you used to go with your best friend since you both started high school. But now things were different, and you didn’t have anyone to have breakfast with.

It didn’t take long until you were out on the street, glancing at the two coffee shops you knew. On your left, the one where they had good coffee, but it was too expensive and wasn’t worth all that amount of money. On you right, the one you were used to always go with Peter, but after the fight you two had, you didn’t feel like going in there right now. And you still could remember the last time you had breakfast together.

You woke up excited that day, knowing it was the last day of classes and that later you would have a party to go to with you friends. The first thing you always do in the morning is checking your phone for texts or anything, and there were many of them. One from your father wishing a good day at school, one from MJ trying to start a debate on a book you were both reading, one from Betty wanting to know what you were going to wear for the party, but only one caught your attention and made you smile.

 Pete: “Hey, good morning! May isn’t driving me to school today, so breakfast on the coffee shop? My treat.”

You: “Good morning Pete. Of course! How could I deny free coffee?”

 One good thing about living in the same building as your best friend is how easily you could go down two store by the fire escape on your bedroom window, and meet them at their apartment. And today you decided to go with a beautiful black dress that made you feel so comfortable and pretty at the same time. Today had everything to be a very awesome day. You knocked on Peter’s window and he opened up in seconds, smiling right after he saw who was it.

 “Morning dumbass.” You greeted with a smile and he helped you come inside.

 “Morning.” He kissed the top of your head and watched you fix your dress. “Wearing a dress for school, that’s new.”

 “I’m trying new things today. And also I want today to be a very good day. We have a party to get to and our last day as sophomores. It’s gonna be awesome.”

 “Chill, (Y/N). It’s just an ordinary day.” 

 “Yeah, but nothing is gonna break my day.” He smiled of how cheerful she was being, and pulled you into a side hug.

 “Come on, we’re gonna be late if we don’t hurry up.”

 You two sat by the same booth in the same old coffee shop, turning on the building you live and letting the good coffee scent fill you. Peter ordered your coffee, just because he knew your regular by heart, just like you knew his. It didn’t take long until he took the seat in front of you, with a small grin on his face, pushing the coffee towards you. For a second, you could take him in, just because know you had the time. He was wearing the blue flannel you gave him once just because you thought it would look pretty on him, and he had shaved, considering that it was just yesterday when you said he needed to do it, because his facial hair was starting to look gross on him. But the way he focused on adding only one teaspoon of sugar on his coffee, and two on yours just how you liked it made him look even cuter than usual.

 “Why are you staring at me with a smile?” He furrowed his eyebrows and you smiled widder.

 “I’m just glad to be here with you. Thank you for the coffee, Pete.”

 “Anytime, (Y/NN).”

 Now when you think about turning right every morning, you turn left, going inside the other coffee shop. It was much emptier, and it smelled different, and felt different. It didn’t feel like home at all. It wasn’t a place where you had memories and cherished them so much, and somehow it would always draw you back there. But it’s a new start, and you needed to make the new coffee shop feel like home. You now sat at the table by the window, and you opted on drinking tea instead of coffee. New habits, they suck! But they are necessary, and that’s why you’re doing it. But it doesn’t warm your heart up like coffee, and drinking it alone makes you feel so lonely, more than you ever felt in your life. But you were positive that today was going to be okay, and you would make everything to be sure it would.

 So you took the subway, just like any other ordinary day, and soon enough, you got out of Queens and were in front of Midtown High, watching everyone meet again with their friends, sharing exciting stories about their time away. You never did it on first days, just because you usually met with you friends all summer, but this time you didn’t, and you didn’t have any friends to go to and talk about your days away from that place. You wanted someone to talk about how changing was, but you didn’t have anyone you trusted enough to let them listen to you rambling for long. The only person you had was the one that made you want to change.

 Instead of meeting Peter and Ned by the parking lot behind school, you went straight to your locker and organized your stuff before class started. Everyone was talking excitedly on the halls, and you still managed to listen to all of it without crying for feeling so lonely. So you put on your earphones and walked quickly to class, sitting in the back, where you used to sit with Peter.

 “It’s because I can see everything that’s happening around me from back here, that’s why I sit in the back.” You used to say to him when he questioned why you like to sit in the back so much.

 You watched the classroom fill with familiar faces, none interested enough to talk to you. Soon, some more familiar faces started to appear. Betty got inside holding Ned’s hand, since they started dating and since your fight with Peter, she stopped talking to you, just because Peter was Ned’s best friend, and this was an act of loyalty for her boyfriend and his friends. But she gave you a small smile, which you ignored, since you like to show very clearly when you were upset with someone. MJ came in right after, just being the same old MJ. She said hi to you, which you said back, and sat in front of you. She’s always been nice to you, and you worked a lot together in projects, but never been that close, even though she knows too much about your life.

 It was almost when the bell rang when Peter came in. He looked different, but still the same. He was wearing the same old jeans May gave him for his birthday, but today he was wearing a new blouse, a dark gray one, that popped the necklace you gave him a long time ago, and somehow, he didn’t take off, even after all of that time. He’d let his hair grow a little bit and maybe he was a bit taller? Your eyes met with his, and you both froze, not knowing what to do. He pressed his lips together, waiting for a response, but you looked away, glancing down to your own notebook, where you wrote “be fucking strong, or else…”.

 Seeing Peter again brought back so many happy memories, that the progress you had on forgetting about him over the summer went to space once you laid your eyes on him, not paying one second of attention to class all day. The only thing you wanted to do was jump on his embrace and tell him you were sorry, but still, what you were sorry for? He was the one who ruined everything at that party. You didn’t need to feel sorry at all.

 You were almost ready for the party. You and Betty had agreed that today was going to be epic, and that today was the day you both were going to confess your feelings for your crushes. So she suggested that you both dressed up nicely, and took a shot of courage (tequila) and spilled it out. She chose what you were going to wear, which was a tight black skirt and a lace bodysuit, with a denim jacket over it. Totally sexy, and would be good enough to impress a guy like Peter. Even though you knew that he was a simple guy and wouldn’t need much to impress him, but you wanted to feel sexier, so you could feel more confident.

“Is this hot enough, Pete?” You asked the boy sitting in your living room watching an episode of a cartoon he liked, when his eyes focused on you, widening and making him choke. 

 “Very hot indeed. Why are you dressed up like this?”

 “To impress someone. Also, to cause chock on everyone there, just like I choke you.”

 “Well, you’re doing a good work.” He nodded and you laughed.

 “I just need to apply some lipgloss and I’m ready.” You said returning to your bedroom and he followed you there.

 “Can I know who are you trying to impress?”

 “Nope.” You popped your mouth on the end of the word and glanced at him. Thank God, you were an extremely good actress, and wouldn’t give anything away “Just some guy I’ve been wanting to kiss for a long time, but don’t worry Pete, I’ll always be yours.”

 “You better be.” He smiled and glanced at your neck from the mirror, seeing you were wearing the necklace matching his. “And yeah, I think I’ll also ask Liz if she’d kiss me.”

 You turned around, furrowing your brows at him. You never knew that Peter ever wanted to kiss Liz Allen, a senior that just graduated and would go away very soon. A tiny bit of jealousy hit you like a train. Even though you would deny it until death, it still was Peter’s name carved into your heart. That completely shattered your plan on making a move on him You knew you weren’t going to work out, that’s why you shoved those feelings deep inside you, never letting them pop out eventually, but still, it was undeniable that your heart races every time he’s around.

 “I didn’t know you liked Liz Allen.”

 “I kind of do, for a long time now. I mean, she’s pretty, and she’s moving away in a month, so this might be the last time I get to kiss her.”

 “You should go for it.” It hurt you to say that, but you knew you couldn’t hold him back, it’s his life and you couldn’t hold him back. “I mean, I can’t see the point why a girl would turn you down Pete, you’re amazing.”

“No, I’m not. I’m just a dorky nerd that fantasizes about having something with the most beautiful and popular girl in school.” That stinked like alcohol over an opened bruise.

 “Peter, you’re the most amazing and beautiful guy I’ve ever met. If she turns you down, that means she’s an idiot and doesn’t deserve you.” You rested you hand over his chest and he pulled you into a hug.

 “I love you, you’re the best friend in the world.” It took you a second, but you threw your arms around him, hugging him tightly.

 “I love you too Pete, so much.” He kissed the top of her head and pulled her by the hand.

 “Come on, May’s waiting for us downstairs.”

 May was always like a second mom to you, and always found a way to make you smile. She was listening to some old disco songs while waiting for us. She drove us to the party listening to hits like Super Freak or Boogie Wonderland, and singing to it with all of her lungs. You loved when she did it, and sang along with her to some songs you knew the lyrics to. But you were more excited about getting to the party.

 Flash Thompson might be a pain in the ass and a show-off, but he really knew how to throw a party. It was awesome, with good songs playing, lots of foods and drinks, and nice people. Everyone in school was there, including Liz Allen, a senior, the hottest girl in school and, unfortunately, Peter’s crush. He smiled at her when their eyes crossed and the jealousy said hi to you again, making your hand tighten your grip around Peter’s hand. You were relieved when you met with MJ and Ned, glad they would be an ice breaker and that you had your best friends there to have fun with you.

 “MJ, I loved your dress.” She smiled at you. Sometimes MJ knew how to be more opened to people.

 “Thank you (Y/N).”

 “Ned, I told you to get rid of the hat.” Peter said to his best friend and (Y/N) made an angry face to him in disapproval.

 “Shut up Peter. Ned the hat is great, keep it on.”

 “Do you think Betty will like it, (Y/N)?” He asked with a sparkle on his eyes.

 “I’m sure she will Ned. Now I’m gonna go talk to her.” You pointed at the blond girl talking with Harry Osborn in the corner and smiling at you, catching your attention. “Excuse me.”

 “Hey (Y/N), you look super hot! Loved the outfit! And I’m sure you’re gonna break hearts tonight.“ She smiled at you once you approached. 

“The only heart I wanna break tonight belongs to Liz Allen. But I’ll find something else to do. Anyway, say nice things about Ned’s hat when you go over to talk to him. He’s really hoping you like it.”

 “He is?” Her eyes sparkled and you laughed.

 “Oh God, I hate when people are in love.” You turned to the table full of drinks and prepared yourself a gin and tonic just to get you started.

 “Says the girl who’s been in love with Peter Parker her whole life.” She spilled and you choked. “And you know, I don’t think he really likes Liz." 

“Of course he likes her. She's… perfect.” You sipped your drink and looked to Liz dancing with some friends, being totally flawless

 “Come on (Y/N). You know I’m a very observant person, and nobody can hide anything from me. You should make a move.” 

 “Well, I won’t, because he likes Liz.” You turned to her. “Also, we’d never work, he’s my best friend. He knows me like the palm of his hand.“

 “Exactly.” You rolled your eyes and walked away, leaving Betty alone.

 “Not something I want to discuss tonight Betty. I’m already hurt enough. But maybe I’ll find something fun to do.” You glanced to Harry Osborn having a drink all across the room, and smiled to him. “Or someone to do.”

 You walked to towards him, and he somehow noticed your staring and smiled back, waiting for you to arrive and talk to him

“Harry… It’s so nice to see you here! Didn’t know that those from the Upper East Side hanged around the suburbs.“ You smiled confidently and he shrugged.

 “I don’t mind hanging around here, (Y/N). And you look so pretty tonight.” He smiled and pulled you by the waist. Harry was one of the prettiest guys in school, and every girl wanted him, but not everyone could get him. He was very reserved, but somehow, he was always opened to you.

 “Does that mean I don’t look pretty the other days?” You played and he shook his head no.

 “Of course not, you always look pretty.” You blushed at what he was saying. “Hey, wanna see the beautiful view from Flash’s balcony?”

 “I’d love to.” You followed him around, not before looking around for Peter, regretting it ths moment you saw he was on his way to talk to Liz. That hurt, a lot. You knew that this night would be a game changer on any sort of relationship you hoped to have with Peter, but you went on with Harry.

Harry Osborn was really pretty. His dark locks were dreamy, and his smile was perfect, also, he was a real gentleman. He always knew what to do to make a girl fall for him, but still there was something missing in him and you knew exactly what it was. He wasn’t Peter. Even though you tried to deny it, he was all you could think about, but right now, all you wanted was to have fun, and if you didn’t go get some with Harry, you would have to watch the love of your life after the girl he actually likes, which is not you.

When you last saw it coming, and after two drinks or maybe a bit more, you were sitting in Harry’s lap on a bench in the corner of Flash’s balcony, making out with him in the dark. He was a good kisser, maybe the best kiss you ever had, but still, just like before, there was something missing. But in that moment, was all you needed. Once you two were tired enough, you got out of his lap and pulled him to the dancefloor. You both danced together for a long time, to every song Flash played, and everything was going great. Harry had his body glued behind you, and his mouth was kissing your neck while you swayed to the song. But your eyes opened for a moment and met with Peter kissing Liz intensely by the food table. Your whole world dropped, and suddenly you weren’t enjoying yourself anymore.

“Excuse me, I need one more drink.” You said to Harry, walking up to the drink and making another gin and tonic, which you knew you get you much more drunker than you already were. It’s a strong drink and you knew it, but you drank it anyway, which resulted on you vomiting on Flash’s equipment, ruining the music and in consequence, the whole party. Betty helped you get out of there and found the closest bathroom to help you. 

“Say something that will cheer me up Betty.” You asked her and she smiled.

“I have a date with Ned.” You smiled weakly, happy for your friend.

“All I wanted was Peter liking me back.” She caressed your cheek and nodded.

“If you want to, we can talk about it when you’re sober.” A knock on the door interrupted their conversation.

“Betty, it’s Peter, I wanna talk to her.” You nodded, letting her open the door, getting out so he could talk to you. “(Y/N), what were you thinking?”

“I’m sorry Pete, I didn’t mean to get this drunk.”

“No, I mean. Harry Osborn, really?” He furrowed his eyebrows and locked the bathroom door. “I thought you had at least some loyalty to me. You know, I can’t stand him.”

“Well, you were with Liz, so why does it matter? I don’t like her either.” You rolled your eyes and leaned against the wall behind you.

“Still, it shouldn’t be Harry there, it’s just… wrong.” He leaned against the sink and you sighed.

“Why is it so wrong to be with him while you’re out there sucking some other girls face? You like Liz, and I like Harry, so that’s it.”

“Why him?” He asked.

“Why her?”

“That’s not fair, you know I like Liz.” He threw back and you gasped.

“What? I didn’t fucking know until today Peter. You kept something from me, and I stayed quiet. So you don’t get to say a fucking thing about what I did. And you know, if you’re not here to help, maybe you should go away.”

“Yeah, maybe I should.” He said, opening the door.

“And don’t fucking worry, Parker. I’m sure there’s people that care about me that will make sure I get home okay.”

“Good.” He shot back and you didn’t see him again that night.

“Miss (Y/L/N), can you answer this question for me?” The math teacher asked, getting you out of the transe you got into.

“X equals 0, and Y equals 1.”

“Wrong, we’re not even in that exercise. Pay attention to the class, miss.”

“Sorry sir.” He nodded, turning to Peter, sitting in the front.

“And you, Mr. Parker. Can you answer the question miss (Y/L/N) didn’t get right?” Peter shot his head up to the board and thought about it for a little bit.

“The limit does not exist.” He answered and the teacher rolled his eyes.

“Quoting Mean Girls is not getting the answer correctly, Mr. Parker. And I don’t know what kind of problem you and (Y/N) have, but I’m very pissed that you’re not even listening to me.”

“Sorry sir, it won’t happen again.” He answered and the teacher nodded, continuing with the class.

Lunch was harder than the rest of the day. You decided to eat alone, since no one talked to you all day. During that time, your book was your best friend, still, you couldn’t pay much attention to it. Somehow, your attention was always brought to Peter having a great time with Ned, who had his arms around Betty’s neck, and MJ, who even dropped her book to laugh with the rest of the group. You missed them, and still, it was sad to know that they didn’t talk to you anymore just because of Peter.

For the first time after a long while, you felt the urge to cry your heart out, and that’s what you did. You skipped the rest of classes, hiding yourself at the parking lot where you used to skip class with Peter and Ned, to curl up and have a good cry. Things turned upside down just because of a kiss, and if you could go back to that night, you would just rather had stayed home to have some pizza with your parents, May and Peter, and maybe have a board game session with them. Everything would be fine now.

You remembered every moment with him, putting your whole heart out through tears and finally giving up on them once you felt too tired and lied down on the floor and slept over your backpack. You hated when you cried so hard you felt the urge to sleep, and it was stronger than you. Suddenly, you were dancing in your dreams, with Peter watching you with those beautiful brown eyes.

“(Y/N), wake up.” Somebody shook your body, and you could recognize Ned’s voice. “Why did you sleep right in the middle of the parking lot?”

“I just felt like it.” You shot your eyes opened and sat straight again. You look up, and saw that Ned wasn’t alone, and Peter was a few steps behind him, but not looking directly to you, which made your heart sink even more.

“Were you crying?” He asked and you shook your head no. 

“No, it’s just… I didn’t sleep last night, and this is the only place I know I can ditch and don’t get caught.” You shot your eyes to Peter, and right now he was looking at you, but pretending not to care.

“Are you really okay?” Ned asked again and you nodded.

“Yeah, I think I’ll just head home. Thank you for caring, Ned.“

It was easier to walk away now, and to not expect something from Peter, but you still had to be very brave to do it. You stood strong, but couldn’t wait to get home and die over your bed. It was something you used to do when everything went down, and you remember your mom coming in one day, so worried about you, and you two shared a talk that really helped you.

“I can’t believe I fucked up this badly with Pete, mom. I saw things ruining out of my plans, and fucked it up.”

“I know that’s not true, but you felt like it, and I know it hurts you so much now. But you’re not alone, even if you feel like it right now. You have so many people that love you, and that including Peter. Maybe he just needs some time to see it.” She caressed your hair and you smiled.

“I hope it’s soon mom.”

“Yeah, me too.”

But again, that day, you cried yourself to sleep again, maybe a little bit too early, but still you did it, going to bed without a single thing to eat. Your parents went off to some dinner with friends and you stayed home alone, and that gave you time to just be alone for a while. But you were woken up late at night with some knocks on your window. You looked over and a masked figure was standing in your fire escape. You rolled out of bed and sat by the window, opening it up.

“(Y/N), help me.” Spider Man had his hands over his stomach and his voice was weak.

“Peter, what the fuck!” You pulled him inside and helped him lie in your bed. “What happened?”

“I have a really bad bruise on my stomach. Was too distracted.” He leaned back and got his hands off the wound, letting some blood spill.”

“Stay still, I’ll get my first aid kit.”

You ran to get your kit, and returned in the blink of an eye, finding Peter almost passed out in pain, now without his mask on. You removed his suit with a single press on the spider on his chest, leaving him only with his underwear. You cleaned the blood and saw that the wound wasn’t too deep, but needed some stitches. You learned how to do it over time, just to help him. You’d stay up through many nights worrying about Peter, and sometimes he’d sleep over just because he was too bruised to go home. It didn’t matter what he did or how mad you were at him, if he came to you for help, you would do anything for him.

“You never get distracted.” You told him while you were piercing his skin with stitches. There were times where he’d hold your arms with strength to try to control the pain. Tonight, he has holding your sheets tightly.

"The guy was too strong.” He breathed out when you finished stitching him up. “And he had a knife, but I took him down. He’s not gonna bother anyone again.”

“What kind of bad guy was he?” You asked, aa you used to do every night he came over for some nursing.

“Mobster kind of bad guy. I’ve been trying to take him down for a month now.” He adjusted himself in your bed and you helped him remove the rest of his suit. He finally took a good look at you, analyzing every detail of your body now that he wasn’t blinded in pain. You had dark circles under your eyes, and they were puffy and slightly red. You were wearing one  of Peter’s hoodies, that you loved to use with only your panties over it. His right hand reached for your hand and he caressed it.

“Peter, why are you here?” You asked, finally trying to get a answer to the questions that’s been on your head since the knock on your window.

“You were crying today.” He said, glancing down to his hand, drawing circles on the back of your hand. Even though he was the reason you cried all day, he still managed to calm you down only with his touch. You shut your eyes closed for a second, but soon they shot open, and you looked away.

“So?” You furrowed your brows, and pulled your hand away from his grip.

“I worry about you.” He said, a little upset that she was pulling away from him. 

“Since when?” You let out a laugh, but the angry kind of laugh.

“Since always.” He shot back almost immediately. 

“It didn’t seem like you care. It’s been a while since you last directly looked me in the eyes. And still, you don’t seem like you can look me in the eyes.”

Peter took a second to look around the room. It was different from the last time he was there. The picture wall you used to have with photos with all of your friends was gone. It only had some post-its with notes, lost in the now white wall. He noticed that you weren’t as organized as you used to be. Sometimes, he’d climb up to your bedroom to hang out and ended up teasing you about being too organized. But now your books weren’t organized by color, or by genre. And there were clothes all over your room, your bed wasn’t made, and you had notebooks opened all over your desk. But there’s still one thing that hasn’t changed. The small Spiderman action figure over her desk.

“Why now Peter?”

“I wanted to talk about that party.”

“There’s nothing to talk about. You were with Liz, and I was with Harry, and honestly, I think you are pretty happy now with her.”

“What? I never dated Liz. We made out once, and that’s it.”

“I thought you liked her.” You whispered, almost praying for Peter to not listen, but he did. Oh, he always found a way to capture your voice.

“I did.” He paused, and glanced at her, who was now looking down to her hands, being held by his. “Well, I thought I did. But there was always something missing, and I didn’t know what it was.”

“You know, what you said to me that night really fucking broke me, Peter.” You broke into tears, and tried to wipe it with your only free hand, since he couldn’t let the other go. “I thought you had my back, and I was so drunk. I only hoped that you would have helped me, but Betty was the one who got me home.”

“I’m sorry. I was so blind by jealousy.” He let some tears escape like you, but now he couldn’t look at you anymore. Peter prefered to glance down to her hands full of rings, including the one he stole from May when they were little just to give it to her. She was always wearing it. He touched it and smiled. “Hey, look at the ring." 

"Why were you jealous?” She ignored him, even if her emotions were all over the place

“Because all you did that night was to impress Harry, and I hate his guts. I wish you were there to have fun for yourself, and maybe hang out with me.” He glanced up and was now staring at her soaking face.

“And just because of that, you completely shut me off your life?" 

"I did it to try to forget about you. And honestly, it never worked, and I thought that maybe I would try fixing things up now that we were back in school, but I got so hurt tonight.” He glanced down to his belly, and she touched his bandaged wound. “Baby, I saw so many bad things tonight, and I really thought I was gonna die before talking to you ever again.”

You froze at the nickname. He never called you baby, except for the times he had woken up extremely flirty, which happened sometimes. But tonight it was different, and it was like he really meant it. Maybe it’s because it was the first time he ever called you something cute in months.

“I was almost passing out in pain once the guy stabbed me, and all I could think about was you. If I had died there, I would be gone and you would never know how much I love you."Your heart ached, and warmed up at the same time. You wanted to kiss and slap him. But all you did was let go off his hands and stand up, walking away from the bed.

"If you love me so much as you say, why did you say those things to me that night? Why did you leave me there alone, vomited and crying? You try to hide behind your jealousy Peter, but you know that’s not gonna work with me.”

“I deeply regret doing that, cross my heart.” He stood up, so he could be in the same level as you. You crossed your arms and looked outside the window. Anywhere, but his eyes. “And I was the biggest idiot ever to even leave you there, all alone. But I was so hurt that I didn’t even want to look at you.”

“How did I hurt you that night Peter?” You finally looked back to him and he was only wearing his underwear, his suit sitting on your bed. And God, how much you missed that body, even though you never really had it. His eyes were blood red, and some tears were forming on his water line.

“Because you fucking made out with Harry Osborn!” He shot angrily, and sat down in bed again. 

“You were with Liz! You had someone, I had someone. Big deal…”

“It’s a big deal to me, because it shouldn’t be Harry there, it should have been me.” His statement made you shut up and try to process everything. You leaned back into your desk and rested one hand over your chest, which was pretty sure about to explode. “God, (Y/N)… Do you know for how long I’ve been in love with you? And seeing you with him was the most heartbreakful thing in the world. Not because it was him, because after a long time I realized it could have been anyone in his place, I would have reacted the same.” You were speechless, trying to come up with a reply, but all you wanted was to take in everything he was saying.

“So why didn’t you make a move on me first? Why didn’t you kiss me that night Peter?” He sighed and looked down to his hands, fidgeting his fingers over his knees.

“Because you said in this very room that you were trying to impress someone, and in my mind, it could have been me, but I wasn’t sure. But I woke up that day hoping I’d finally kiss you in the party. I looked for you, everywhere, but when I found you, well… Let’s just say you were strandling Harry’s lap, and I was pretty sure you were having sex right there by the moviments you were doing.” You rolled your eyes and shook your head.

“You really thought that was the way I was going to lose my virginity? Please…” You sighed and approached the bed again, sitting in front of him. He now finally looked at you, but not directly to your face. “And you know one thing Peter, I only got with Harry because before we left this very place, you said you were going to try kissing Liz Allen. When I saw you talking to her at that party, I thought my plan had gone to shit! And Harry was there, making a nice conversation with me, and we hooked up. Big fucking deal! When I got back you were making out with Liz anyway. And that’s why I got trashed in first place.” You pointed your index finger at him, spilling everything out for once.

“I only kissed her because you kissed him. I never really wanted it. I mean, she’s pretty and for a while I had a crush on her, but this was so many years ago. You were the only person in my mind ever since we met, and once freshman year was ending, I realized you were the one I truly liked.”

“This is such a bunch of misunderstanding! You never communicate! You could have come talk to me the next morning, but you prefered to completely ignore me the whole summer.” 

“I was really focused on getting that guy. I was so busy with my Spider duties. But now it’s over, I realize I only did it to keep you out my mind, and it didn’t work. And I don’t want to fight anymore, because I’m so hurt, in every single way. What happened tonight was horrible and all I wanted was to hold you.” He hugged his legs and hide his face there.

Now’s the time you have to be strong, and put all your principles and pride behind to support the one you love the most, and now that you knew that he loved you back, it hurted even more. You had some stuff to get through, but now you had to just be with him. So you sat closer and rested one hand on his shoulder, making him look up almost immediately, face soaking and red eyes. You moved your hand to his cheek and caressed it.

“We need to talk more about that night. And I needed to get it all off my chest. But right now, I need you to be alright.” He rested his face against your hand and closed his eyes, giving a small kiss on your palm. He sat straight and you sat on his lap, pulling him in your embrace, resting his head on your chest, and you resting your chin over his head.

“I’m so so so sorry baby.” He whispered. “I’m sorry for everything. I missed you so much! I love you.” That’s what he wanted to say to you all night, and you let him. Right now, you couldn’t be mad at him. Maybe later…

“I love you too.” You kissed to top of his head and he tightened his grip around your waist. “Come on, let’s get some sleep, we’ll talk tomorrow.”

You got out of his lap and lied in bed, under the covers. Peter lied behind you and pulled you closer to be the little spoon. In that moment both of you knew it was going to be alright. You only needed to talk some stuff through. But when the other needed you the most, there’s nothing you wouldn’t do to make them better.

…………………

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[katecarteir]

I want these words to make things right (but it's the wrongs that make the words come to life)

pairing: eddie kaspbrak/richie tozier [reddie] rating: teen & up word count: 10,531 summary: Richie Tozier runs an anonymous tip for superheroes in the town of New York City. Sounds like a great idea, until you throw in the ex boyfriend superhero he's still in love with, and the weird blue eyed man who somehow figured out the man behind the blog ⤹ a NOT birthday fic for the lovely leigh (@s-s-georgie) 

perma taglist: @jwilliambyers, @stebbins, @isaacslaheys, @s-s-georgie, @transrich@eddiefuckinkaspbrak, @edstozler, @emgays, @anellope, @thorn-harvester-ven, @wheezyeds, @vipertooth, @tozierking, @billdenbrough, @starrystoziers, @trashmouthtozierr, @willelbyers​ @itfandomprompts, @loserslibrary (let me know if you want added!)

read on ao3

Spotted!: The one and only FlyBoy, rescuing not one, not two, but six students of New York University from a late night fire in the little coffee shop down on Old Broadway. Damages to the building were extensive- and it’s going to be closed for a very long, unknown future- but nobody was harmed thanks to our very own eye in the sky. FlyBoy, we salute you and I think we can speak for everybody when we say that we sleep better knowing you’re out there. 

Richie sent out the blast, still smiling at his phone. He’d barely even opened his eyes when he’d rolled over to grab his phone, which wasn’t anything abnormal. Richie ran one of the most popular blogs in New York City, completely anonymously. It had started out as his own interests, keeping taps on all the iconic heroes of their great and crime ridden city. It had quickly grown in regular viewers and subscribers, everybody realizing how coinvient it was to one location with all the information. More reliable information than the actual news, if Richie did say so himself.

“Really? FlyBoy again?” Richie’s roommate, Beverly Marsh, barged into Richie’s bedroom without knocking. “Don’t you think you’re getting a little too hung up on this guy? You’re running an update blog, not a FlyBoy fanblog.”

“FlyBoy is the guy to watch for.” Richie shrugged as he rolled out his bed, reaching out blindly for his glasses that he’d left on his bedside table. Beverly was standing at the edge of his bed with her hands on his hips. “Why are you looking at me like that, Mom?”

Beverly grabbed an NYU crewneck off the floor and threw it over his head. “FlyBoy isn’t the only superhero in the city, Richie! You’re falling off your brand and you’re going to lose your following. And in case you hadn’t noticed, your following pays most of our bills.” 

Richie rolled his eyes. He grabbed his lucky jeans off the floor and slipped into them without changing his boxers, getting a little too much enjoyment out of Beverly’s cringe. “Would you chill out? I’m still just reporting the news, Bev. It’s not like anything else happened last night.”

“Dr Incredible stopped a bank robbing,” Beverly pointed out without even needing to look at her phone. “You didn’t say anything about that. Not to mention- Captain Fast literally saved an entire family from plunging off a bridge in their car last night. You know, Eddie Kaspbrak? Your best friend? The love of your life? I think maybe that would be a little newsworthy, don’t you?”

Richie scraped his black curls into a bun at the top of his head and started throwing textbooks into his backpack. “Beverly, I have had my eyes open for all of ten minutes, and seven of them have been you lecturing me on how to run a blog. I will post the rest of the events from last night and anything that happened this morning on the way to class that I need to go to. Because I have a life, so unless you wanna take over all the blog responsibilities… get off my dick.” 

Beverly scoffed as Richie pushed past her out the door to his room, shouting at him that there was brewed coffee on the counter even as they both knew that Richie was going to be stopping at Starbucks for something that was more sugar and syrup than actual caffeine. 

Richie went to the same Starbucks every morning before class, and every evening after classes let out. Stanley from his Psychology 101 worked there, and he never failed to give Richie shit about his nasty habits. He was a scrawny man, with tight curls. He was always well dressed under his work apron, light coloured button ups and pressed jeans. He always looked so put together and proper that Richie wanted to frazzle him and mess him up completely.

Stan’s customer service happy expression dropped into a look of disdain. “You’re back. Again.”

“Everyday, Stanny, you know me.” Richie leaned against the counter and winked at the unimpressed barista. Stan turned away from him, putting Richie’s regular order into the register. “Gotta get that caffeine fix.”

“I’d hardly call this caffeine by any means.” Stan let out a scoff as he finished ringing up the order. Richie handed Stanley the cash, and tried to chase the barista down the line in the process of making Richie’s entirely familiar order.

“You can’t lean over the counter like that.” Stan said in a low, bored tone. “You know, you’re lucky it's in my job description to be nice to you.” 

Richie chuckled, watching as Stan applied a double spray of whipped cream that Richie certainly hadn’t paid for. “If this is you being nice to me, I would hate to see you mean.”

“Yes, you would.” Stan placed Richie’s pale drink down onto the counter and slid a straw over to Richie without Richie needing to ask. Richie grinned, and took a long, overly dramatic sip before turning away. He nursed the drink throughout his short walk to his campus building, and tossed it- half finished- into the garbage before ducking into his lecture hall. He slid into his regular seat in the far left side of the hall, then frowned as somebody sat down on the other side of him. 

It was a cute enough guy, with soft brown hair that flopped into his face. His eyes were an icy blue and there was a scar running through one eyebrow. Richie felt goosebumps jump up on his forearms as the boy stared at him.

“You’re R-R-Richie T-Tozier, right?” Bill said, voice pleasant even in the low tone. It soothed Richie in an odd way, and he felt himself lowering his guard even as he wondered why he was doing it. 

“Yeah…” Richie said slowly, lifting his pen towards his mouth and biting down on the bottom end. “And you are?”

“My name is B-B-ill.” He said, before glancing over his shoulder. He bit down on his bottom lip and leaned in closer to Richie’s space. “You’re the runner of Spotted!, right? The superhero tracker blog?”

Richie blinked at him. His teeth threatened to break through the plastic of his pen. He cleared his throat awkwardly and looked forward at the professor, droning on about something Richie couldn’t care less about, especially with how his heart was pounding in his chest. “Sorry, man. I think you’ve got the wrong guy.” 

Even as Richie refused to let his gaze waver from the front of the room, he could feel how Bill’s eyes continued to burn into the side of his head. “Well.” Bill said, voice somehow seeming much closer to Richie’s ears than he felt it should be. “If you a-ar-are the m-man behind the sc-screen, I th-thought you sh-should know that Pr-Professor Fly will make an app-appearance tonight.”

Richie jerked his head to look at Bill, but the other guy was already standing and making his way through the lecture hall. He didn’t even turn around as Richie unabashedly stared at him. Professor Fly had once been the biggest, most known superhero on the NYC scene. Along with the flight powers that his name implied, he’d also been strong and fast. He’d had a plethora of powers, so many it was beyond abnormal. Nearly three years ago, Professor Fly had stepped onto the scene with a mentee- none other than FlyBoy- and only six months after that he’d completely dropped off the face of the Earth. FlyBoy continued to work in the city, and make a bigger and bigger name for himself, but Professor Fly had not been seen in over two full years. 

It was juicy information, no doubt. The kind that made Richie’s stomach tense up and his palms sweat. If Professor Fly was coming out of retirement, that could only mean somehow seriously Bad was on the scene. But Richie didn’t run a gossip blog, and he would never post something he didn’t have any proof on. Not even something as huge as a potential Professor Fly comeback.

Spotted! Just a little  recap of last night’s busy activities in the city that never sleeps: Dr Incredible bringing a bank robbery to a skidding halt, making sure all our favourite rich bitches and Wall Street moneybags have their millions safe for another day! Thanks, dude! And OF COURSE, the adorable and flawless Captain Fast saving an entire family from certain doom, and looking absolutely mouth watering in that spandex as always while doing it. Keep it up, babe. The public loves you :*

“RICHIE!”

Richie hardly reacted as the apartment door busted open and Eddie Kaspbrak stormed into the living room. His hair was damp, flattened to his forehead from the rain outside. The same rain that had left stains all over his grey NYU shirt and blue jeans. His fists were tightened at his sides, and he looked absolutely adorable.

“How can I be of service, dear Edward?” Richie asked, punching at the buttons of his xBox controller. Eddie stomped forward and grabbed it from his hands, tossing it across the room. “Hey! What the fuck?”

“You can’t fucking flirt with me on your stupid blog!” Eddie cried, running his hands through his hair. “Okay? People are gonna… they could figure out who you are if you keep doing that!”

Richie sat up straight on the couch. “Okay, do you know how little sense that makes, right? I make flirtatious comments about every hero I post about. Except Dr Incredible, I think guys a fucking sham.” Eddie rolled his eyes as Richie carried on over him. “And even if I did flirt with you more than the other heroes, they’d still need to know who you are to connect the dots to me. So take a breath. If you don’t want people commenting on your spandex, don’t wear it.”

“This isn’t about spandex.” Eddie said, though Richie could see that the anger he’d been wrapped up in when he’d come into the apartment was quickly seeping out of him. “This is about you. I don’t want you in danger, Richie.”

“You’ve made that beyond clear, Eds.” Richie stood and stretched his hands above his head. “It’s pretty much all I’ve heard from you.”

“Rich…” Eddie said sadly, but if there had been anything further to that sentence it evaporated right from Eddie’s mouth. 

Eddie and Richie were diaper buddies, a real sandbox love. Richie couldn’t remember a point in his life without Eddie in it. They’d grown up inseparable, and Richie still remembered vividly when they’re relationship had begun to grow into something more. Junior year of high school, when Richie finally, finally found the nerve to ask Eddie out on an official date. And the next couple weeks after that were bliss in a way that Richie had never known. Until suddenly, Eddie had started blowing him off. Cancelling dates, and dodging Richie’s calls. When Richie had moved to confront Eddie about his behaviour, to beg him to at least end it and not keep him hanging on, Richie had learned the truth of Eddie’s powers. Apparently, it ran in his family and his mother had tried her hardest to keep it from Eddie, in desperate hopes that Eddie would be different but the powers can come nonetheless. Some smaller ones- a heightened sense of touch, and an acute sense of knowledge of a person or object by touch which Richie lovingly called his Vibe Checks- and of course, his speed. Eddie had always been a fast runner, ever since they were kids, and he had been shaping up to be a big track star before the Powers had appeared to him. Afterwards, however, Eddie could run the length of the entirety of the country in mere seconds. 

They’d stayed up together that whole night, talking and crying and kissing, and they’d felt so good about everything. Richie thought having a superhero boyfriend was maybe the coolest thing that could ever happen to anybody, even if he wasn’t allowed to tell another living being. While still living in Derry, things hadn’t been so different with Eddie having powers. Things really changed when they moved out to New York City. Richie had always known Eddie was a good person, the best person, but he’d never accounted for how Eddie’s powers would come into play when they were suddenly in a city with other Supers and a sky high crime rate. 

They’d tried to make it work, Richie beyond supportive in Eddie’s crime fighting causes. (Hello, superhero boyfriend? Still the coolest shit ever!) but one misstep, one single incident where Richie’s safety had been put on the line, and Eddie had stopped them in their tracks. It hadn’t even been because of Eddie’s identity, Richie had been in a strictly wrong place wrong time sort of situation but Eddie had lost it. Claimed that their relationship was a liability for Eddie, that Richie was Eddie’s biggest weakness and that Eddie couldn’t risk Richie’s safety like that. Richie had argued tooth and nail, claiming that breaking up didn’t mean that they weren’t in love and that Eddie shouldn’t be giving up his personal life for these powers but it had fallen on deaf ears. Eddie had packed up his belongings and left their shared apartment. They’d tried to stay friends, but the love between them kept things strained. 

Richie padded into the kitchen and grabbed a can of pop from the fridge. He offered one up to Eddie, who shook his head as Richie knew that he would. He hopped up onto one of the seats on the counter and stared Eddie down. Eddie leaned forward on his elbows. 

“We can’t keep having this same argument, Richie.” Eddie said in his prim and rehearsed voice. “It’s not because I don’t love you-”

Richie squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head quickly. “God, you just said we can’t keep this argument. I don’t need to hear this fucking speech again. You gave it to me when we broke up, you gave it to me six months ago on my birthday after we got drunk and-” Richie broke off and exhaled hard. “I’m sorry I talked about your spandex on my blog, I’ll try to tone down the flirting when I talk about you.”

“No.” Eddie sighed, resting his chin in his hands. “I overreacted. You didn’t say anything you wouldn’t have said about anybody else on there. And you’re right, people would need to know who I am to connect you to me. And nobody knows who either of us are.”

Richie blew out a long breath, flicking his thumb against the tab of his pop can. “Actually, Eds… somebody might know who I am. So, yeah, I should be more careful when talking about you on there. You’re the one who was right as usual.”

Eddie’s mouth dropped open and he pushed away from the table to round on Richie. He grabbed him by his shoulders and forced Richie to meet his gaze. “Richie. What are you talking about.”

“I’m not really sure, honestly, it was weird.” Richie ducked out of Eddie’s touch, frowning as the memory of his class that morning washed back over him. “It was some.. Guy in my theory of screenwriting lecture? He just sat down beside me and he addressed me by name and then asked if I was the one who wrote Spotted!. I told him I wasn’t, because you and Bev are both always on my ass about keeping it a secret, and then he told me…”

Richie stopped and looked up at Eddie. Eddie stared back at him, holding Richie’s eye line longer than he had in the two years since they’d called an end to their romantic relationship. “What, Rich? What did he say?”

“He said that Professor Fly would be making an appearance tonight.”

Eddie’s expression remained blank for several moments before the usual chaotic energy took him back over. “Why would he say that? How does he know that? How does he know you? There’s no way that’s true, nobody has heard anything from Professor Fly for almost three years. Not even FlyBoy knows where he is, he’s retired. There’s nothing he’d come back for, not unless it was the end of the world big. Is this the end of the world big? Richie?”

“I don’t know, Eds. He didn’t give me an itinerary for the night's events.” Richie said. “I think he just wanted me to post it on my blog like I’m some sort of gossip column. It’s not a big deal.” But Eddie didn’t look convinced and Richie could practically hear the little hamster wheel in his head running. “Unless you know something that’s going to happen tonight?”

“No.” Eddie said immediately, shaking his head. “I haven’t heard anything besides minor crimes and car accidents the last couple weeks. It’s been… almost too calm. I don’t like the sound of this guy, Richie, and I definitely don’t like what he’s suggesting. I’m gonna- I’m gonna talk to some people. Don’t leave this apartment and don’t post on Spotted! until I get back.” 

“You’re not my boss!” Richie cried as Eddie tore out of his apartment like a tornado. 

Eddie returned quickly, as Eddie was prone to do. He stumbled into the apartment as dusk began to settle outside, a tray of coffees in his hands. “Okay, we only have a few hours to figure this out.” 

Beverly had been just getting into the apartment when Eddie had come in and nearly crushed her behind the door. She frowned as Eddie handed her one of the steaming paper cups and somebody came into the apartment behind him.

“Stan from Starbucks?” Richie asked with a frown, watching as Stan and another tall, black man he didn’t recognize came into his apartment. “Eds, I get you wanted coffee or whatever but you don’t need to bring the store back with you.”

Stan placed the only non-hot beverage down onto the counter. “I’m going to tell you something, and you need to promise not to be weird about it.” Richie stared at Stan with his drink raised half way up to his lips, and Stan let out a low sigh. “I’m FlyBoy.”

Richie whipped around to glare at Eddie, pointing an accusing finger at his chest. “FlyBoy has been Stan from Starbucks this entire fucking time, and you didn’t think to tell me that?”

“It isn’t exactly my secret to tell anybody.” Eddie said with a chill to his voice. “And honestly, even if I could have told you, I wouldn’t have. You have a weird crush on him and the last thing we need is you running off and getting some high stress relationship with a superhero.”

A superhero who isn’t me. Eddie maybe didn’t say it, maybe wasn’t even aware that he’d implied the words at all, but Richie heard them perfectly clear. Richie scoffed, dropping his drink onto the counter and stepping away from the group just slightly. “You don’t really get any say in who I do or don’t like, Eddie. It’s actually none of your business at all.”

“It is if it’s something that’s going to put you in danger, Richie!” Eddie snapped back, hand cutting through the air. A manic gesture of Eddie’s that Richie usually found cute, but could only manage to find irritating in this moment. “You put yourself in harms way enough with this stupid blog and just even knowing me, I would never let you-”

“Let me? Let me?” Richie chuckled humorlessly. “You are not the boss of me, Eddie. You’re not my parents, you’re my boyfriend. So, thank you very much for all the over the top concern about whether or not I’m getting myself into trouble but I’m going to have to politely tell you to mind your fucking business for once in your life.”

Eddie gaped at him, almost forming words before losing them again. The black man who had come into the apartment with Eddie and Stan cleared his throat. “I’m sorry but this seems like a pretty serious personal issue, and we have something important we need to handle, so...”

“Yes.” Eddie said, voice cracking. Richie glanced at him and tried not to let the hint of tears that were pooling in Eddie’s eyes. “Richie, this is Mike Hanlon. You probably know him as-”

“Freezie.” Mike held his hand out and Richie only hesitated for a moment before Mike laughed. “Don’t worry, man. I have to actually want to turn you into ice for it to happen. Though I do have some horror stories when I first started developing my powers, I’m not gonna lie.” 

“Mr Medusa.” Richie said with a grin, gripping Mike’s hand firmly and giving a body moving shake.  Mike gave a laugh while both Stan and Eddie rolled his eyes at his antics. 

“You know how misleading that nickname is, right?” Stan asked dryly. “Mike turns people to ice with his hands, Medusa turned people to stone by looking at them and her head full of snakes. It’s really not even that close of a comparison, it just implies you don’t know anything about Greeky mythology.”

“Excuse me, I’m a gay Gen Z. Of course I fucking know Greek mythology. I read Percy Jackson.” Richie said with a wave of his hand. Stan gaped at him for a moment before Eddie blew the wrapper from Richie’s straw at Richie’s head. 

“He’s also a fucking Ancient Civilization minor.” Eddie said in a mixture of fondness and irritation. “Don’t let him fool you with his stupidity, he’s actually incredibly smart.” 

“Okay, yeah, this is great.” Beverly spoke up suddenly, dropping her shopping bags onto the kitchen counter. “But do you guys wanna tell me what the hell is going on exactly?”

“Yes, I’d like to know, too.” Stan said, taking a seat at the small, banged up wooden table. “Eddie didn’t exactly give much details as he was superhero sprinting around the Starbucks and making like $30 worth of product he didn't pay for.” 

Eddie waved Stan off. “We might be in for a long night.” He said, dropping into the seat beside Stan. Mike and Beverly both moved to take the last two seats around the table and Richie jumped up to sit on top of the table between Eddie and Stan. He maybe positioned himself a little bit closer to Stan, just to watch Eddie’s jaw clench.

“Richie, why don’t you tell everybody what you told me earlier.” Eddie said in his very best teacher voice. 

Richie sighed. “I still think you’re making too big a deal out of this, Eds, really. But basically some guy came up to me in class today, and accused me of running the Spotted! Blog and then told me that  Professor Fly is going to come back tonight.” 

Stan’s head jerked to look at Richie, eyes wide. “That’s impossible. Who told you this?”

Richie shrugged. “I don’t man, some weirdo. Think he said his name was Bill?”

Beverly startled at her seat, knocking one of the coffees to the ground. Everybody turned to look at her and her face had lost nearly all colour. “Uh… did he have a scar running through his eyebrow?” 

“Yeah… how do you know that?” 

Beverly scratched at the side of her neck. “I went on a few dates with him last semester, he's a weird dude. I wouldn’t read too much into this, I’m sure he’s just trying to stir up drama. His brother died when he was young, and he never really got over it.”

A shoulder crossed over Stan’s face and he sighed sadly. “Georgie Denbrough. That was…. A tragedy.” 

Mike and Eddie made matching sympathetic sounds and Richie pulse jumped. “Okay, you all clearly know what the fuck is going on, from your super secret like Justice League meetings or something, but anybody want to catch me up? Who is Georgie Denbrough and what happened to him?”

“Georgie Denbrough was Professor Fly’s biggest shame. His failure as a hero.” Stan said, voice almost completely monotone. “It was just before he started training me to take over for him, I’ve always suspected it was the reason why he was choosing to retire. The Professor was trying to save a group of children from a predator and somehow the battle got really intense. The predator had powers that The Professor hadn’t anticipated, and The Professor’s powers back fired when he tried to catch the man. It caused the building to explode. Most of the children were okay, scrapes and bruises, maybe a broken bone or so, but Georgie Denbrough… He lost an arm in the explosion and he bled out before help could arrive. The boy died and the villain got away. He never really recovered from it.”

“Neither did Bill Denbrough,” Beverly jumped in. “When we were going out, it was pretty much all he talked about. How Professor Fly killed his little brother and ruined Bill’s life. He hates superheroes because of it. He probably doesn't know shit, but at least suspects that Richie knows some heroes and will tell them what he said. It’s a set up.”

Stan nodded. “There’s no way The Professor is going to be out tonight. Nothing would pull him out of retirement, trust me.”

Eddie rubbed his hands together. “Maybe.” He said shortly. “But we don’t know that it’s a trap for us. It’s possible this Bill guy has something planned tonight to try and bring Professor Fly out. We can’t risk people getting hurt because we don’t know what this guy's plan is. I think we should have all hands on deck tonight if we can.”

“Eddie’s right.” Mike said. “Even if it is a trap for us, we agreed to this sort of risk when we started acting as heroes. We knew what we were getting into, we can’t just sit around and do nothing when lives are at risk. Best case scenario, this Bill guy is full of shit and just running his mouth and nothing happens but we need to prepare for the worst.”

“I can’t imagine him going so far out of his way to figure out who’s running that blog just for it to be nothing.” Stan said quietly. 

“Maybe that’s part of the plan,” Richie jumped in. “He wanted me to post about Professor Fly’s return, probably to lure out people and heroes to whatever it was he was going to do. Maybe if I don’t post it then he’ll just drop the whole thing because he’s not getting the audience that he wants.”

“You should post it.” Beverly said suddenly, using some of the shitty dollar store dish cloths to wipe up the spilled coffee all over the floor. A large round of disagreement spread out amongst the heroes until Bev held her hand up for quiet. “I might not know much about this whole superhero world, or whatever, but how are you supposed to catch this guy if he doesn’t go through with his plan? You can’t exactly go after somebody for figuring out that Richie is caught up with superheroes.”

Eddie muttered something under his breath that sounded a lot like “I can fucking try” but none of the heroes had any sort of argument against Beverly’s claims. 

“Spotted! Isn't a gossip column!” Richie cried, tossing his hands in the air, nearly taking Stan’s eye out. “I’m not posting some unfounded bullshit about Professor Fly and killing my brand for this Bill dude’s fucking vandetta.”

“Your blog’s brand is more important to you than saving lives?” Mike asked, giving Richie big, sad puppy eyes.

“We don’t know it’ll save lives!” Richie argued. “For all we know, sending out a blast could be what gets people killed. If you think we should all go out and keep on eye on stuff, then fine but-”

“Whoa, whoa!” Eddie cut him off quickly. “What do you mean we? You’re not coming with us if we go out there, Richie. You and Bev aren’t leaving this apartment tonight, you could be a target!”

“YOU’RE NOT MY BOSS!” Richie leapt off the table and stalked away from Eddie, hands trembling at his sides. “I’m so sick of you telling me what I can and can’t do! You can’t control me, Eddie.”

Eddie’s head jerked back as though it had been slapped, and a wounded look crossed his face that Richie wouldn’t let himself feel bad about. “I’m not trying to control you, Richard. I’m trying to keep you safe.”

“Oh, really?” Richie laughed. “So, you making a point not to tell me you knew who FlyBoy was when you were under the impression I might have a crush on him wasn’t you keeping me safe, and not at all you not wanting me to date somebody that isn’t you.”

Eddie stood up and walked around to where Richie was standing angrily behind the counter. He didn’t touch him but his hands hovered just above Richie’s arms. “I didn’t tell you who FlyBoy was because it's a secret identity for a reason. It’s not like it was really my place to SAY anything to you about it, alright? You can date whoever the fuck you want, obviously, because I didn’t stop you from going on those dates with Connor Whathisfuck last year and I hated that guy so much it actually burned my soul. I want you to be happy, okay? I’d never stop you from dating somebody. Stan is right there if you wanna go ask him out right now, you pleeb.” 

Richie glanced over Eddie’s shoulders at where the people around the table were all staring at them. Stan wrinkled up his nose. “Please don’t.”

Richie rolled his eyes and snorted. “Don’t worry, Stan my Man. If I’d known FlyBoy was somebody as boring as you, I wouldn’t have dedicated so much time to him in the first place.” 

Richie tried to ignore Eddie’s relieved sigh in his ear. 

Eddie didn’t budge on his statement that Richie and Beverly would be staying behind at their apartment, as Richie didn’t budge his refusal to post false information on this blog. “If you want me to make some sort of announcement, it has to be something true. That’s just how it is.”

“You could post about seeing the three of us teaming up.” Mike suggested as Richie was really just focusing on not looking at his bare chest as he changed into his suit. “That will be enough to get the public's attention and let this Bill Denbrough know we’re taking him seriously without having to leak false information about Professor Fly.”

Richie nodded in agreement as Eddie padded over him to his little tight red spandex supersuit. Richie’s breath caught as it always did when he saw Eddie as Captain Fast. “Don’t say anything until you’re sure we’re a decent way away from the apartment. Just because somebody figured out that you run the blog doesn’t mean that we should be leading towards the place you live. Play it safe, Rich.” 

“Yeah, yeah.” Richie waved it off, but they both knew at the end of the day even as much as Richie fought it, he was going to follow Eddie’s advice. As the group moved towards the front door, Eddie suddenly spun around and grabbed hold of Richie’s waist. He tugged him into a tight hug, pressing his face against Richie’s shoulder.

“Please, please, be careful, Rich.” Eddie whispered into Richie’s body. “I have a really bad feeling.”

“Yeah, Eds. I’ll be careful.” Richie squeezed Eddie tightly until the other man pulled back. There was a split second where Richie was certain that Eddie was about to lean in for a kiss. The moment broke as Eddie’s cheeks turned pink and he looked away. He pulled the matching red mask over his eyes and followed the rest of Mike and Stan from the apartment. 

Richie wallowed in his poor, confused little gay heart for roughly ten minutes before he took out his phone and sent out the blast. 

Spotted! What must be the coolest new trio in NYC: FlyBoy, Captain Fast and Freezie heading out on the town. Is this just a  (super)mans night out- or is something much more sinister in the works for not so little city? I think we can all only wait and see. This blogger advises his readers to stay home tonight, and keep an eye on the news and little old me for your updates.

Richie didn’t even have a chance to put his phone back into his pocket before Beverly was stomping into the room and tossing a black hoodie over his head. He pulled it away and caught sight of Beverly with her red hair tied up in a long red, curly ponytail. She wore black jeans and black tank top that showed off a black triangle tattoo on her left arm. She raised her brow and nodded at him. “Hurry up, get into something dark and let’s go.”

“I didn’t know you had a tattoo.” Richie said slowly. 

“There’s a lot of things you don’t know about me.” Beverly said. “Now hurry up and let's go. We have stuff we have to do.”

“I told Eddie I was gonna stay in the apartment.” Richie said, fidgeting with the fabric of the hoodie in his hands. “I think we-”

“I thought Eddie wasn’t the boss of you.” Beverly said, cocking her brow. Richie’s face burned as he tugged the plain back sweater over his head and put his feet back into messy converse sneakers. Beverly was already halfway down the hallway before Richie was even out of the apartment’s door. When they exited the stairway into the lobby, there was a man waiting there in matching all black outfit with the same triangle tattoo on his left arm. He had thick muscled arms, but chubby cheeks and wide eyes that seemed to still hold onto some sort of childhood innocence. 

Beverly pressed a quick kiss to his lips and Richie blinked. I didn’t know you had a boyfriend. The words died on Richie’s tongue as a weird feeling overcame him in that moment. “Richie, this is Ben. Ben, Richie.”

Ben held his hand out and Ben’s shake was warm and firm. Somehow Richie felt like his skin was crawling as Beverly pressed her hands between Richie’s shoulder blades and began to push him out towards the front of the building. 

“I uh” Richie cleared his throat, heart hammering in his chest. “Where are we going? Eddie’s probably right that we should stay inside, we don’t know what’s going to happen.”

“Don’t be such a chicken shit.” Beverly grinned at him, and Richie shivered as a chill rushed through his spine. “Aren’t you at all curious about what might be going on? Come on, it’ll be fine. It’s not like we’re actually a target for anything. Denbrough was probably just trying to use you for your site.”

Immediately, Richie had been curious- almost morbidly so. Until this very moment when all he wanted to do was run back to his apartment and spend the rest of the night hiding under his blankets. But Richie Tozier had never been very good at trusting himself or any of his instincts, and he allowed Beverly and Ben to guide him into the black car parked out front. 

Then didn’t drive far, and pulled up to some sort of abandoned warehouse. Every couple of seconds there was a flash of light from inside the cracked and shattered glass windows. Richie’s breath started catching in his throat with every attempt to breathe. “What- where are we?”

Beverly turned to where Richie was trying to fade into the back seat of the car, and looked almost sad. “I’m sorry, Rich. It wasn’t supposed to go this way.” 

xxx

Eddie actually hated wearing spandex, but it was an incredibly durable fabric. With the amount of moving he did, it was the most logical choice in costume. But Eddie was never truly comfortable when in costume.

“If I ask you something, could you answer without getting bitchy?” Stan suddenly whispered in his ear. He, Mike and Eddie had only reached the main core of the Lower West Side. Eddie turned to him and narrowed his eyes as best as he could home to do with a mask covering half his face. “Do you ever think of giving it up? Hanging up your suit and just being a normal person. Letting yourself really love Richie?” 

Eddie’s face burned nearly the colour of the suit. He spent the better part of the last two years trying not to think about how he was in love with Richie Tozier and in the last three years, it was the only thing at the front of his mind. “I try not to think about it, honestly, because it’s not an option. I didn’t choose to have these powers, or this life. But as long as I have them, I have to do the right thing. I don’t have a choice.”

“I don’t know.” Stan said slowly. “I think you should be able to do what’s best for you. You deserve to be happy.”

“I’m happy enough.” Eddie lied. “Do you think we should split up and cover more ground?”

“Yeah.” Mike jumped in as the conversation changed back into the professional task at hand. “Especially since we don’t really know what the situation is, so keep your ear pieces in and buzz into the others if you come across anything.” 

“Alright,” Stan agreed, though he shot Eddie a this isn’t over look from the corner of his eye. “Eddie and I have a much easier way to travel, so Mike you can stay in this area.” Stan and Eddie agreed on their own sections of the general NYU area- the area that had always been protected by Professor Fly in the height of his career- and Eddie took off running. Eddie had always loved running, and it was the only part of being a hero that he still enjoyed. Sometimes, on nights when Eddie just couldn’t be bothered to care, he’d just run for miles. Just see how far he could go. He’d reached the Canadian border once before he decided it was a waste of his gift. 

Eddie slowed down into a simple walk once he reached his section of town, when somebody reached out and grabbed hold of Eddie’s arm. Eddie gasped at the feeling of utter desperation that sort through him belonging to the person who touched him. A pair of icy blue eyes under a scarred eyebrow met Eddie’s and Eddie’s heart leapt right into his mouth.

“What are you doing here?” Bill Denbrough demanded. “You’re not supposed to be here! Didn’t Richie tell you about my warning?”

“Your- your warning?” Eddie squawked. “So, you tracking him down and telling him some bogus tip about Professor Fly was supposed to be a warning? A warning of what- that you’re insane?” 

Denbrough shook his head, brown hair falling into his head. “No. No.” He said desperately, nails digging into Eddie’s skin. “Professor Fly would never return, FlyBoy would know that. Didn’t you tell FlyBoy? It’s a trap, you were all supposed to stay home! You’re all in danger!” 

Eddie tried to pull his arm free but Denbrough’s grip was too tight. “You’re hurting me!” Eddie cried, chest starting to feel the too familiar pressure of an asthma attack- though he hadn’t one a single one since his powers had come in. 

“I k-k-know you have more powers than just sp-speed.” Denbrough said, stepping even further into Eddie’s space and grabbing hold of his other arm. “You can s-s-sense me, r-right? You’ll no-no-know if I’m d-dan-dangerous!” 

Eddie felt a lot of things about Bill Denbrough. Guilt, fear, desperation. There was something bleak and sad under the surface but there was no hint of a threat to him. “What do you want?” Eddie asked in a shaking voice.

Bill Denbrough’s eyes darted around Eddie. “Where’s R-R-Richie? Is he w-w-ith you? Where is h-he?”

“He’s safe.” Eddie promised even as his own heart stuttered and panicked. “He’s back at his apartment with his roommate, they’re both-”

Bill’s eyes widened in horror. “NO! No, you can’t t-t-t-t-fuck- trust Beverly! She’s n-n-not who you think she is!” 

Eddie started shaking his head. “No offence, but I’ve known Beverly for a year and I’ve only known you five minutes and you seem pretty unhinged. Why should I believe you when you say I can’t trust her, if I have no reason to trust you?”

“Have you ever tou-tou-touched her?” Bill demanded. “In the yuh-year you’ve known her, ha-have your body ev-ever even graze-grazed hers?” Eddie opened his mouth but froze. “No. It ha-hasn’t. I know it ha-hasn’t, be-because she knows if you ha-had ever tou-touched her, you’d kn-know the truth about her. And everything would have been ru-ruined.”

Eddie shook his head. “What’s she going to do to him?”

Bill frowned. “This wuh-wuh-wasn’t the plu-plan. I don’t- there’s only one place s-sh-she’d take him. But you have to tr-tr-trust me.”

It wasn’t in Eddie’s nature to be particularly trusting, and Bill wasn’t exactly somebody who was inspiring much benefit of the doubt. But his hands were still digging into Eddie’s arms and the only thing Eddie could sense was fear and deeper down- guilt that Eddie suspected he felt at all times. “Okay.” Eddie said, and as Bill let go of him, Eddie flicked on this ear piece’s speaker. 

Bill didn’t lead Eddie too far away, the pair of them travelling in silence and Eddie secretly wishing that Bill would simply tell him where the location was so Eddie could run there. If something happened to Richie while Eddie was wasting his time walking, he’d never forgive himself. Eventually, Bill led him over to the warehouse with lights that flashed through broken windows. He could make out figures walking around inside as he and Bill attempted to sneak into the warehouse without being noticed. 

There was a large glass sphere in the middle of the room, surrounded by what looked like burn white lightning that occasionally sparked brighter and caused the room to brighten as though large fluorescent lights flicked on overhead. Richie was seated a few feet away on the floor, bound against a large cement pillar that connected all the way up to the ceiling. He appeared unharmed, if not mildly annoyed. Eddie’s heart raced all the same Beverly and a man Eddie didn’t recognize both paced around the same space.

“Billy…” Beverly came to a full stand still. Bill froze at Eddie’s side. “There’s no need to sneak around. Come out, we have a lot to talk about, don’t we?”

Bill pressed a single finger against his lips, before turning and stepping out of the shadows. “You’re m-may-making a big m-m-mistake, Beverly. He’s n-n-n-not who he says he is.”

“I think you’re the one who’s not who he says he is.” Beverly said, turning around and facing Bill with her arms crossed. “Going behind our backs and telling Richie some crap about Professor Fly? Bringing your existence to his attention? You forced our hand, Billy. Mr Scratch isn’t going to be pleased.”

“He-He’s not guh-good, Bev!” Bill cried, hands clutched at his side. “What do you th-th-think he’s going to do with it wuh-wuh-when he gets it? He-He’s puh-playing you both!”

“He is not!” Beverly cried. “He’s going to do exactly what told us! Why did you have to go and fuck up the plan?”

“Excuse me!” Richie cried, voice dripping with sarcasm. “But if I’m going to be killed, can you guys at least do me the decency of letting me know what you’re talking about in my final moments.”

“You’re not going to die.” Beverly’s male friend said softly. “Nobody is going to get hurt.”

“You’re a fuh-fool if you buh-believe that, Ben!” Bill said, taking steps closer into the room. “Richie, this mach-machine has the ab-ability tr-train a super-superhero of their p-p-powers. Mr Scr-scratch hates heroes and he-”

“Like you’re any better!” Beverly shouted over Bill’s explanation. “You’ve been with him longer than either of us! Heroes killed your brother, you hate them just as much as the rest of us. Maybe ever more! They ruined all our lives!” Beverly turned towards Richie and took a few steps towards him. “I lost my parents when I was little. My father was an awful man, he chased my mother away when I was only six. He died when I was 11, and my aunt took me in. For two years, I experienced happiness for the first time. I loved my aunt and she loved me, took care of me for the first time since I could remember anything. She was a good person, and superheroes came and ripped my only true family apart. My aunt took into selling drugs after she adopted me, just to get ends to meet. She wasn’t proud of it, but she did what she had to do for me. She was smart, she never would have been caught if the superheroes minded their own business and let police handle things. A bunch of hyped up vigilanties took my aunt away from me, and I went into foster care. I was only 13. When I was 17, Mr Scratch found me. Told me there were others like me, who wanted to even the playing field.”

“By killing all the superheroes?” Richie asked, voice breaking. “Beverly, you have to admit that sounds fucking insane!” 

“It isn’t going to kill them.” Ben added. “The Deadlight doesn’t kill them, it only drains them of their supernatural abilities. Makes them human, normal. Just like everybody else.” 

Richie scoffed, in higher octaves than regular voices. “And then what happens to their powers? They just what? Evaporate?” 

“They’ll be trapped in the Deadlight.” Ben answered. “Forever. No more superheroes.”

“You’re an i-idiot.” Bill said coldly. “Sc-Scratch is obviously going to tuh-take the powers! Guh-get rid of the sue-supers and make himself invisible. Undefeatable.”

“You’re full of shit.” Beverly snapped. “He wouldn’t do that! We’re not evil, or some fucking supervillain cult! All we want in equality! We’d never use any of these powers against anybody!”

 “You two wouldn’t.” Bill said darkly. “I’ve wuh-wuh-wondered if he was really who he suh-said he was for- a luh-long time. But I suh-saw plans in his uh-office. About how to ruh-ruh-reverse the Deadlights. He’s guh-gonna take the puh-powers for him-himself.” 

“You’re a fucking liar!” Beverly screamed. “He wouldn’t do that! He-” 

A suddenly crashing brought Beverly’s screams to a halt. The doors busted open and Stan dropped in, with Mike leaping off his back. Beverly took a step backwards, eyes open wide and Ben moved over to stand almost directly in front of Richie. 

“Where’s Eddie?” Mike demanded, glancing around the room. Eddie cringed and slapped a hand over his forehead, as Beverly and Ben exchanged a shocked expression. Richie looked around wildly, with huge, terrified eyes.

Beverly crossed her arms and looked back to the same shadows that Bill had appeared from. “Okay, Eds. You can come out.”

“Don’t call me that.” Eddie said sharply as he stepped out as well.

“Eddie…” Richie said a quiet, almost broken voice. Eddie tried to give him a reassuring look, but he knew that Richie would be able to see his own fear underneath the attempt. 

Beverly sighed and rolled her eyes. “Alright, this isn’t exactly how I planned on tonight going, though I have to say I did expect to see you all here after I took Richie.”

“Let him go.” Eddie said furiously. “He doesn’t have powers, he isn’t part of this. Let him go.”

Beverly smiled sadly. “No can do, sorry. Richie is actually a key factor to this whole mission. Why do you think I’ve been so encouraging of his little blog? He’s a natural talent, and he’s been so helpful in our acquiring the true identities of these so-called heroes.”

Eddie glanced at Richie, who looked like he might be physically ill. All Eddie wanted to do was rush over and wrap Richie in his arms and keep him safe, but he couldn’t show that weakness in this moment.

“We found Richie through you, though, Eddie.” Beverly said, looking almost… amused. “We didn’t know who you were, but Richie was at most of your scenes and we figured that he knew you. It was Big Bill’s idea that one of befriend him, and figure out what he knows. Does it sting a little, knowing you gave your future with Richie to protect him but you lead us to him anyway?” 

It more than stung, it burned. Eddie’s entire body felt like it was vibrating as he stood there, staring down at women he’d thought of as a friend for more than a year. A woman who’d been living under the same roof as Richie, but wanting only to use him and potentially cause him harm. 

“Oh, Eddie, don’t look like that.” Beverly said, sounding almost genuinely upset. “I already said we aren't gonna hurt him. Nobody is going to get hurt, Bill is just- I don’t even know what he’s trying to do.”

“I’m trying to wa-warn you!” Bill cried. “You’re buh-bluh-blinded stupid but your own luh-loyalty that you cant’ see the uh-aub-obvious truth in fr-fruh-front of you!!”

“This was your cause!” Ben came quickly to Beverly’s defence. “You hate superheroes maybe more than anybody! How can you say this wasn’t what you wanted?”

Bill’s jaw clenched and his bottom lip trembled. “I… I wanted the h-her-heroes gone. But I duh-didn’t want anybody to guh-get their powers and uh-use them for them-themselves.”

“You’re the only person who's acting like that’s going to happen.” Ben snapped. Eddie thought this was his moment, the first time he’d been able to see a true path of entrance. Everybody’s eyes were torn between Bill and Ben, this could be Eddie’s chance to get over to Richie and free him. Eddie, maybe for the first time in his life, misjudged his position. 

Beverly’s hands collided hard with Eddie’s chest, the strength of her anger and resentment hitting him hard and shocking him to his core. He understood now more than ever why Beverly hadn’t made the mistake of touching Eddie in the year they’ve known one another. He may not have felt any true evil inside her, like he had felt in many a foe before, and there was still a lingering of a sad, scared little girl at her core but none of the vibes she was giving to him at this moment was reassuring. He would have kept her far away from Richie, he would have figured out enough about her, and this plan would never have worked.

Beverly taking Eddie by utter surprise had given her even more of an advantage. He knocked Eddie backwards and he stumbled backwards, crashing directly into the Deadlight. An electric charge drove through every nerve in his body and he was thrown across the empty warehouse by a bolt of white lightning. He heard Richie scream his name, but it was like a buzzing deep in the back of his mind. 

The harsh impact to the hard ground jarred Eddie back into himself, though a small bit dazed. He’d landed not far from where Richie was tied up. He shuffled backwards, groaning as the oddest sensation of discomfort shot through his body, but he didn’t stop until he could rest his head against Richie’s knee. 

“Holy shit, Eds!” Richie gasped, fighting against his bindings even as it shook Eddie’s resting head. “How the fuck are you alive right now? You just got yeeted across the room by lightning!” 

Eddie grumbled as he reached blindly behind their bodies to untie Richie’s bondings. It must have been a testament to how shocking the last few moments had been as nobody attempted to stop them. Richie winced and rubbed at his hands for a moment before reaching out and cupping Eddie’s face. Eddie smiled as his eyes flushed shut and he leaned into the touch. 

“Are you okay?” Richie said in a low voice. It wasn’t quite a whisper, Richie never actually whispered, but it was soft and worried and so full of love that Eddie felt he might cry. 

“Yeah.” Eddie said back. “I’m okay. Promise promise.” 

Richie’s face broke into a relieved grin and pressed a hard kiss to Eddie’s voice. Maybe it had been the actual bolt of lightning that had just gone through Eddie’s body, but it felt so charged that Eddie even let out a small gasp. Then it all hit him and his eyes blew open wide. “Richie, I can’t feel you.”

“What? You can’t feel anything?” Richie asked in a panic. 

“No!” Eddie cried, shifting to sit up properly and grabbing Richie’s hands to tangle them together. “I can’t feel your spirit, your mood. It’s like… before.”

Richie and Eddie turned in unison to look at the Deadlight. The others all turned to follow their lead. It seemed to be glowing brighter, the lightning revolving around it faster. Eddie’s powers now fueling it. 

“Holy shit.” Mike said at the same time Beverly gasped. “It works.”

“Of course it works,” a deep voice came as a man in a long black cloak appeared out of nowhere. “You doubted me, Beverly? Thank you, you’ve all played your roles perfectly.” Bill startled as the man- Mr Scratch- turned to him and grinned. “Oh yes, even you Dear Bill. I always knew that your moral compass would bring you to betray me. I accounted for the variable since the beginning of our time together.”

As Mr Scratch moved around the circle, Beverly stepped out of his way as though she didn’t even notice she was doing it. She collided with Bill’s torso, and the man reached out to grab at her hand. She didn’t pull away from the touch, pale and shaking as she watched Mr Scratch rounded on the group.

“Stanley.” Mr Scratch said in a slow voice, grin spreading across his face. Stan was standing still as a statue, fists tightened even as tears filled his eyes. “You know who I am already, I can see it all over your face. Well, I never doubted your intelligence. Go ahead and tell them, there’s no need to keep it a secret amongst old friends.”

“Robert Gray.” Stan said through a clenched jaw. A single tear slipped from his ear and trailed down his cheek. “Professor Fly.”

Richie gasped and squeezed Eddie’s hand tightener. Ben stumbled away and crashed into the cement pillar that Richie had just been tied up against. Mike looked at Stan in shock as Beverly slapped a hand over her mouth. Bill pushed past her, rage evident as his face. “YOU MOTHERFUCKER-”

Gray  barely even flicked his wrist and Bill soared off his feet and slammed up against a pillar, easily twenty feet off the ground. “Stupid boy.” Gray said fondly. “You will never be a match for me, and you’ll never outsmart me. I have been planning this moment for nearly a decade. Your brother’s death started a fire that will destroy the entire world of supers as we know it.” 

Bill struggled against the invisible hold Gray had against him, Richie turning his head away from the scene and pressing his face against Eddie’s neck. Eddie could feel how Richie’s hands were shaking where they were connected.

“None of you are giving me enough credit.” Gray said in a bored tone. “Do you have any idea how much work I had to put into this entire thing? I didn’t just have to create the Deadlights, I had to hand pick every single person who would help me. Bill was a no brainer, even as I knew I could never trust him fully. Beverly and Ben had to be vulnerable enough that they would never question me, and that Bill would never feel confident in telling them what he’d figured out.”

“You left the pl-pl-pla-”

“Yes.” Gray interrupted. “I left the plans out on purpose. Haven’t you figured that I don’t leave anything to chance, William? I accounted for every possible outcome. I had to choose Stan very carefully, choose an heir that would follow my orders but never question me when I told him I could not be contacted after I retire. That I would simply never return.” 

Stan turned away bitterly, trying to wipe at the tears on his as inconspicuously as he possibly could. 

“Even after that, I had to pull so many strings. Made sure that Richie and Stan would cross paths, had to let Beverly believe that Richie’s silly little blog was her idea to let them both feel important.” He shot Eddie a slimey grin. “Had to make sure that Richie got caught in that hostage situation just after they moved to NYC so Eddie wouldn’t consider their relationship worth Richie’s life and end things, so there would be space for Beverly to make her move on Richie. I will admit I was hoping that Richie would fall in love with her, but I underestimated his love for Eddie. A small loss, but nothing damaging to the overall scheme.”

Eddie’s body thrummed with rage. Richie had nightmares for a year after that fucking bank heist, and this man had done that to them on purprose for the simply purpose of breaking them up? Richie still had panic attacks and made Eddie or Bev go with him if he needed to do any sort of banking he couldn’t do online. 

“You said nobody was going to be hurt.” Beverly said, tears streaming down her face. “You said- you said you wanted to even the playing field! You’re a monster!”

“Nobody will be hurt.” Gray said. “You will all be free to go, once all the supers have touched the Deadlight and given up their powers. You’ll all be able to go on with your lives, and I will be able to go on with mine. Once your powers are gone, you’ll have no reason to oppose me and I will have no reason to bother you again.”

Beverly and Ben stood directly in front of the Deadlight, the pain on their faces from the flashing bursts of lightning behind them. Stan was staring directly at Gray, face a mask of rage even as tears fell from his eyes. Richie hadn’t moved from where he’d hidden himself against Eddie.

“You killed my brother on purpose.” Bill said from above them. He was still fighting against Gray’s grip. 

For the first time, Gray’s composure slipped. “No.” He said shortly. “That was a tragic accident. That moment changed me forever. It was when I realized that all of those with powers, even myself, were capable of death and destruction. That we were all inherently evil. The day, I knew that I could not allow another person to hold such powers over another being again. You know, Billy- your brother is the reason for all of this. He gave his life for the new world order-”

Bill let out an intelligible scream but Gray could so much as speak, Mike Hanlon had launched himself from the crowd and latched himself onto Gray’s back. Eddie watched with mouth gape as Gray struggled against the hold before clear blue ice began to spread across his body in a matter of seconds. As the ice completely covered Gray, Bill began to free fall. Stan didn’t waste a single moment before launching up into the sky and catching Bill mid-fall and lowering them both to the ground. He let go of Bill as they touched down and rushed over to Eddie and Richie, one hand finding its way into Richie’s hair and the other falling on top of their joined hands.

“That’s the trick to villains.” Mike said, not even sounding out of breath. “You gotta get ‘em while they’re monologuing.” 

Beverly, face hard, stepped forward and kicked at Gray’s frozen chest. He tittered and fell backwards, shattering into pieces as he hit the ground. “I think it’s safe to say he didn’t account for those variables.” 

They were quiet for a long moment, Stan helping Richie and Eddie to their feet and holding onto them as they all moved towards the shattered ice pieces in the middle of the room. Even in the chilly night, they could see the beginning signs of melting.

“We nn-n-need to d-d-estory this fucking thing.” Bill said suddenly, all of them turning towards the Deadlight. Hums of agreement moved through the room. 

“Wait.” Richie said, tightening his hold on Eddie’s waist. “You said that the powers could be taken out right? We need to get Eddie’s powers back!”

“Oh, yeah!” Bill said quickly. “I- I’ll s-s-see if I can find the instructions ag-again.”

Do you ever think of giving it up? Hanging up your suit and just being a normal person. Letting yourself really love Richie?

“Wait.” Eddie said, throwing out a hand. “Don’t. I don’t want them back.”

Every eye in the room turned to him, Stan smiling even as tears still hung in his eyes. “I never wanted them,” Eddie carried on. “I didn’t want to be some hero, saving people. I wanted to run track and fix cars and be with my love of my life.”

Richie turned slowly, eyes wide and painfully hopeful. “Eddie, don’t do this for shit for me. Please, okay, I-”

“I’m not doing it for you.” Eddie turned and slid his arms around Richie’s shoulders. “I’m doing it for me. I don’t need these bullshit powers. I can run perfectly fine with my own two normal feet, and I would love to be able to touch a person without knowing their moral count or pick up something in somebodys house without knowing if its fucking haunted or not.”

Richie chuckled wetly.

“And I love you so much.” Eddie continued. “And all I want is to be with you, it’s all I’ve ever wanted since the fucking sixth grade. I’m tired of loving each other and being forced apart and just hurting each other over and over. Especially over these stupid powers I was cursed with. I don’t want them back. I wanna be with you and I wanna be happy.”

Richie ducked down and pressed his lips against Eddie’s. This time Eddie knew the sparks that seemed to shoot through him was no lightning shot- just love. 

Spotted! FlyBoy, Captain Fly and Freezie teaming up with three civilians and your truly to foil a truly evil plan, saving not just our city but possibly our entire world. (Eyewitnesses may claim that Freezie did all the work, but that remains to be proven.) And in case you missed it, there was an epic conclusion to an equally epic love story. You know what they say, all’s well that ends great… or however the saying goes!

[phoebehalliwell]

Hi! I’ve recently fallen down the Charmed rabbit hole again and I fount your blog, which is amazing btw !! I LOVE YOUR CHARMED NEXT GEN FIC!!!! I also really enjoyed your thoughts about Phoebe's kid! I wish they would have lived in the actual show. How do you think Phoebe’s child living would have impacted her relationship with Coop? And the whole twice blessed prophecy?

!!!!!!!!!!! thank you!! and i’m so glad you like my fic (which i promise i am still working on)!!

as far as phoebe’s kid + the twice blessed prophecy, i have written on that au here, but i think if the baby really had been born it would not be the twice blessed but i do think they would still probably give that plotline to wyatt just bc. i also think that having a child and being a single mother would really further the need for coop bc dating as a single mom while still having a career is hard enough but dating while you’re a single mom with a full time job and a magical half demon baby who was lowkey the antichrist for the better part of the first trimester is a whole new can of worms. i think she still would have had a relationship with jason dean but i think it would be very short lived as i don’t think that he would be ready to commit to a family. and then by the time we hit season six and piper and leo have broken up and jason has left phoebe and yada yada yada phoebe would really be like huh. love isn’t real. we’re all gonna die alone.

and so she’s sitting at a cafe with paige at the end of love’s a witch and is completely ranting about how love is dead or whatever and paige is just like yeah. uh huh. yep. totally. yeah. yeah. i know what you mean. yeah. uh huh. bc it’s totally Not the time to bring up the fact that she has a date with richard on friday and phoebe’s just going on and on like “okay bc look at olivia! she was doing what she was doing out of love!! and she was killing people!!! just an evil, sad, lovesick, ghost. like me. you know cole was my longest relationship? that was like,,, the most successful relationship i had, and it wasn’t even remotely a success!! he turned me evil, paige. i became evil. because that’s what love does. it bring out the worst in people.” and paige is sitting there like jfc i think i need to bring in a shrink or something when all of a sudden the dude pulls up a chair at their table and is like “hi hate to interrupt but i couldn’t help but overhear and you’re wrong” and phoebe’s like who the hell are you and paige is like yeah fuck off buddy private conversation here and this guy’s like “look. love is the strongest magic we have” and paige is like “ehh i think other, stronger magic” and phoebe’s all like “okay, i don’t know who you are, but you don’t know me and you don’t know what i’ve been through okay so you don’t get to sit down here and try to talk to me about love. bitch.” and this guys just like “actually, i do. my name’s coop. it’s nice to meet you, officially.” and he holds out his hand for a handshake and phoebe’s looking at him like imma judo flip u motherfucker but then something catches her eye and she snatches his hand and flips it over, staring at his cupid ring and she’s like no. she grabs her coffee and storms out leaving coop and a Very Confused paige sitting at the cafe table. she turns around at the exit and gestures to paige like come on let’s go get out of here so paige grabs her croissant and purse awkwardly and leaves and coop’s like “i hope everything goes well with richard!” and paige is like????? so she pulls phoebe aside like Who Was That and phoebe’s like “that was the most annoying, pesky, interfering magical creature there is out there. that was a cupid.”

and later that night phoebe would be tucking her child asleep (who in this story is a little girl named prudence) when she hears “you love her, and it doesn’t seem to bring out the worst in you.” and she whips around to find coop leaning in the doorframe and she’s like “you better leave before i vanquish you” and coop sorta just laughs softly and he’s like “i get it. you’ve been burned before. but actively fighting love? it’s not you, phoebe.” and she’s like “tf do you think you know about me” and coop’s like “i know you believe in love. true love. the kind that takes your breath away, where it's the first thing that you think about when you wake up in the morning. you wanna know how i know that?” and phoebe just glares at him in a very defensive stance like yes i want to know but no i will not play into your stupid little monologue and coop’s like “i read your column. not many people could write like that. you help people find love every day, you help them reach out, take risks, open up their hearts-” “okay you know what i’ve had enough of your little sugar coated soap opera speech. go bug someone else.” and phoebe pushes her way past him and beelines for her bedroom, slamming the door and coop’s like :|

and the next morning phoebe’s eating cereal and by eating a i do mean just pushing wheaties around in a pool of milk while dency and wyatt play in the playpen and piper comes in with a mug of coffee like “good morning how are-” “am i a cold hearted cynic?” “...you doing this fine friday morning??” “i’ve got a cupid on my ass” “i’m going to hope you mean the magical kind and not some bad tattoo situation” “i mean, yesterday i was saying that love brings out the worst in people and now i’ve got this 6′2″ cupid with a square jawline following me around. but like,,, don’t i have the right to say that??? all love has done is hurt me. i’m allowed to bitch a little about it!! like! mind your own business??? goddamn! and you know-” “phoebe i just woke up save the onslaught until after 10am please” and phoebe just sorta pauses and goes back to pushing her cereal around and piper says “and i’m not calling you a cold hearted cynic but... you have changed” and phoebe’s completely ready to rant again like “pfft of course i’ve changed you think you can be married to the source of all-” “zp! not til after 10!” and phoebe slumps back and watches as dency draws a small pattern in frost on the tile floor and you can tell she’s sorta mulling over what coop said blah blah blah this episode is the vortex demon she gets knocked into a world based on her innermost desires and in it she’s happily married and in love in an apartment of her own raising her daughter and writing her column blah blah blah she takes one look at her finger that very much has a wedding band on it and is like “cupid!!!! cupid u fuckin bastard get down here!!! cupid!!!” and no response and she’s scowling like “coop??? coop!!!!!!!!” and he’s no where to be seen and she’s like wait shit i think this is the alternate whirlpool vortex things i gotta find my sister blah blah blah chris knocks paige into phoebe’s world and paige is like “okay what’s the catch” and phoebe’s like “what catch” and paige is like “you know, the catch! what makes this not reality. like in my world, magic was practiced openly, and everyone knew about it. come on, chris said the realities were shaped my like our fantasies or wants... is anything different here??” and phoebe’s like “oh you know uhh not really everything basically the same um but you know i have my own apartment here where i live with dency...” “oh my god wait where is she now who’s taking care of her?” “oh uh well that would be my husband.” “cole’s alive????” “no! not cole! i don’t know who he is actually but he seems nice :)” and there’s a beat where you can tell paige really wants to Get Into What This Means and phoebe really Doesn’t Want To Talk About It but then they both seem to agree that they’re being hunted by a demon so maybe this can take a back seat rn blah blah blah they kill the demon and the end of the episode paige is about to go on her date w richard and her and phoebe have a little heart to heart and paige is like i think you should talk to the cupid bc i think maybe your whole hating love thing might just be a front like i think you’re trying to convince urself of something blah blah blah and phoebe’s just like :/ maybe so.

alright blah blah blah next episode phoebe’s like “coop?” and coop, suddenly appearing behind her is like “yeah?” and phoebe’s like “i give up. so uh work your little cupid magic or whatever and i guess let’s do this thing.” and coop like lights up he’s like so happy and he’s all like “great! let’s get started!” and phoebe’s mentally preparing for a series of really boring dates but then coop surprises her by not doing that??? like he doesn’t set her up with anyone at all bc he’s all like you need time to heal and find urself again???? which honestly phoebe isn’t complaining about and like phoebe will be feeding baby dency in the kitchen and coop will pop in like “what are your thought on taking a pottery class?” and it’s happened before where she’s been so swamped with work that she doesn’t have time to pick up supplies for dency so coop will just go out and like buy diapers?? and gradually phoebe feels herself opening up more and more and one night she’s at p3 and this guy come up to talk to her and she doesn’t just scowl him away and she finds herself having a great conversation and she see coop wink at her from across the bar.

and you know things go well with this guy yada yada yada but one night she goes out on a date and her sisters weren’t able to watch lil dency for her so coop was babysitting and she comes back home to see coop sending out small pink glowing projections from his ring and her baby just laughing uncontrollably trying to catch them and phoebe gets why she has been ready to dive fully in to the guy she’s been going out with. coop says it’s just nerves bc of her past relationships and that it’s completely fine and understandable but phoebe knows better. or at least now she does. she’s in love with coop.

[robinrunsfiction]

Weapons of Clairvoyance - Chapter 10

Chapter 9

Song recommendations for this chapter: Stay Frosty Royal Milk Tea - Fall Out Boy and Heroes by David Bowie

Your stomach was growling fiercely by the time you finally made your way downstairs to the kitchen where the group was assembled.

"There's Sleeping Beauty," Frank said with a wink. Out of the corner of your eye you saw Gerard shoot Frank a glare.

"Aww you think I'm pretty?" You asked with a sarcastically sweet tone, picking up on the tension between the friends. Frank just grinned, knowing it was winding Gerard up.

"Ok, so the plan is Mikey and Frank are gonna start looking for possible leads on warehouses, we're gonna go with Andy to meet his friend, sound good?" Everyone nodded in agreement before Mikey and Frank got up and headed out.

After finishing your breakfast and downing a mug of coffee, you, Gerard, and Andy headed to his friend Patrick's apartment. You walked up the three flights of stairs until you came to a door at the end of the hall. Andy rang the bell and you waited. He rang the bell again and knocked and you waited. And waited. Andy got out his phone and dialed Patrick's number.

"Yea, we've been out here 5 minutes," Andy said into his phone, exasperated. A moment later the door flung open and a shorter man with headphones around his neck ushered you in.

"Shit, sorry, come in, come in. I couldn't hear the door with these things on," he said gesturing to the headphones. "I'm Patrick."

You and Gerard introduced yourselves as Patrick continued to apologize.

"Sorry again, follow me, I think Pete's up," he said leading you down the hall to the bedrooms. He knocked on the door and Pete shouted to come in.

"Hey, did you hear the doorbell?" Pete asked barely looking up from the game he was playing on his phone when Patrick opened the door.

"Yea, it's my friend Andy here to see you, why didn't you just get the door?" Patrick asked exasperated.

Pete just shrugged and set down his phone. Patrick just shook his head before leaving.

"So you're Andy? Who are you two?" Pete asked.

"I'm Gerard, this is (YN), and we're trying to find our friend and take down an evil corporation in the process."

"Sweet, I'm in." Pete replied quickly.

"Really? That easy?" Andy asked.

"Oh yea, any chance to stick it to the man, I'm in. What do you need me to do?"

"Can you get into Restoricom's network and find where they're keeping a Ray Toro? And maybe what information they have on a few people if you're able to find anything. We thought we had destroyed their servers, but who knows what kinds of backups they have," Gerard explained.

"Totally, let me get your info and I'll get to work."

Everyone exchanged contact information and headed back to the living room.

"Yo, Patrick, you didn't tell me your friends were so cool," Pete said at his roommate, but there was no response, as Patrick had his headphones back on, working intently at his computer.

"Eh, he's back at his composing. He won't even notice you guys left. I'll let you know what I find," Pete said as you headed out the door.

~

It was a quiet evening once you got back to the house. Andy had gone up to his room as he explained that he could no longer neglect his blog dedicated to animal rights abuses. Mikey and Frank hadn't returned yet and you had fallen asleep on the couch next to Gerard as he quietly sketched. When you sat up awake, he smiled over at you.

"Anything interesting?"

"Yea, but I couldn't tell if it was a vision or just a dream, you know?"

"What was it?" He asked closing and setting down his sketch book.

"We were at a fancy party. You had on a suit and I had on this blue dress and we were dancing. I assume it was just a dream though, why would we be anywhere like that?"

Gerard shrugged and got up. He walked over to a cabinet and opened up to reveal the record player inside. He stooped down, shuffled through the albums, and pulled one out, putting it on, choosing the song carefully. You didn't need any special abilities to recognize the song instantly when it started.

"Bowie? Nice," you commented as you heard “Heroes” begin.

Gerard sashayed back to where you were sitting on the couch, offering you his hand. You smiled and took it, placing your other hand on his shoulder. He put his free hand on the small of your back and you swayed around the room. You tossed your head back laughing, amused by the rare, but appreciated moment of levity.

"I, I will be king, and you, you will be queen," he sang softly. You didn't even know he could sing, but you felt your heart melt a little more at the discovery. You grinned at him.

"You sing so well," you commented.

"One of my many talents, Sugar," he said with a cheeky grin.

You wrapped both of your arms over his shoulder and you danced closer than before as he continued singing to you.

Chapter 11

Tag List: @deadlovers, @breakfastwiththesun I’m tagging you because your boy finally appeared in the story!

[yoosungiib]

I love your blog! Can I have a request if you don't mind? Can you have MC leave town for a few days to visit her family so she left her spouse(RFA+V+Saraen+Vanderwood) in charge on watching their child(ren)? Let's just say hell breaks loose and stuff goes down, but in the end it turned out okay. You can use "hell breaks loose" however you want! Btw... I love you ^^

I love you too, hun!

I ended up only doing the RFA because this was getting suuuuper long and other things started piling up on me. If people really like this and want me to do the minor trio as well, feel free to request it and I will get to it. :)

RFA troubles when left alone w/ their child while MC is away for a few days

~~~

★ Yoosung ★

“Bye, MC! See you in a couple days!” Yoosung kissed you goodbye, his lips lingering against yours before pulling back only so he could kiss your cheek.

“Bye, mommy!” Your 4 year old son chirped from below, his little arms reaching up for you. Happily, you lifted him up and pulled him into a tight embrace, kissing the side of his head before handing him over to Yoosung.

You gathered your things and turned the two you loved most in this world and waved goodbye, promising to bring them both back some souvenirs.

Yoosung smiled at your son who had a toothy little grin whilst looking at the cookie jar on the counter. Yoosung shook his head before setting him down and watching him run to it.

“You can have one, but only one, donut,” Yoosung said handing him a chocolate chip cookie, which the little boy ate greedily. “Daddy has to take a shower real quick but then we can do whatever you want! We’re gonna have fun this weekend, right?”

“Yeah!”

Yoosungs lips curled into a large smile once again. “Good! I’ll put some cartoons on for you, so just sit tight.”

While Yoosung was taking his shower, the little boy sat on the couch but after five minutes he got bored of what was showing on the television.

He wanted to play with his toys so he pushed himself off the couch and went to his room to get his toys. But a colourful array of figures suddenly caught his eye.

A small gasp came from the small boy as he saw the collection of LOLOL action figures through the doorway of yours and Yoosung’s room.

He remembers times seeing them before when running to you guys after a nightmare, but he never got to see them up close before!

These LOLOL figures are the only thing that Yoosung has organized to be honest, and he takes pride in that. As he’s told you numerous times when you go to dust the shelf, “No! They’re in the wrong order! They need to be organized by guild, here let me do it.”

The little boy rushed into the room and immediately grabbed for them.

No restraint.

Curved his arm and pushed them all onto the floor, following the toys to the ground and immediately beginning to play with them.

However, your son messes up the figures more than you ever have. He’s tearing off the heads and arms and mixing them up.

He puts a few in his mouth and leaves quite a few nasty teeth marks on the bodies.

“Donut? Where are you?” Yoosung calls now done with his shower.

“Honey, where are-” He stops mid-sentence, his jaw dropping to the floor as he walks into his room to see his son sticking two LOLOL monsters up his nose while smiling at his father.

“Daddy, look!”

Yoosung is frozen in place for a few moments, a look of horror on his face as he stares at his precious figures a mess on the ground.

Finally, he lets out a child like squeal before running towards his son, pulling the figures out of his small hands and nose.

“No! These aren’t to play with- Guild leader johnnnn, nooo!”

When you come home after what was a long weekend of Yoosung trying not to break down over the loss of his figures, you see your son sitting grinning on his lap while the two watch the Lego Movie.

After your son gives you a hug then runs to his room, you plop down on the couch next to Yoosung and cuddle up to his side. You look up and see the frown displayed on his face.

“Honey, what’s wrong?”

That’s when the tears come.

Smol boy is a mess on your lap, bawling his eyes out.

“They’re gone, MC! Every single one of them! They’ve all gone to heaven! Half of them drowned in snot!”

“What’s gone?”

“My LOLOL figures!!!”

♪ Zen ♪

Zen never liked when you left for long periods of time, but he understands you wanting to spend time with your family.

He decided to look at the bright side of things. For one, he was finally going to be having quality time with his daughter!

A whole weekend just for the two of them,

And he was totally gonna spoil his princess.

“Remember, her bedtime is at 7 o’clock. She is not aloud to watch tv past 6 o’clock. Her favorite book to read before bed is Goodnight Moon, and you have to leave a glass of milk on the bedside table-”

Zen shut you up with a loving kiss that was broken by the fact he was smiling so much. He stroked your cheek, chuckling before saying, “Don’t worry, Jagiya, I know what to do. You go have fun with your family. We’ll be right here in one piece when you get back!”

The moment you left through the door, Zen lifted his giggling daughter over his head, spinning her around. “Ready to have some fun!?”

He loved his daughter’s laugh. It was so high pitched and sweet, always filled with joy. He asked her what she wanted to do first.

One of her most favorite things in the world was listening to her father practice his lines for his upcoming show because he always made funny voices and extravagant motions.

Zen sat the little girl on the couch, gave her a bowl of ice cream - now that you’re not here, your not able to stop him from giving her too much sugar - and began to present his script.

Everything was fun and going nicely until Zen stopped at the sudden buzzing against his leg.

He frowned, looking down at the screen reading his director was calling.

He put the script down and told the girl who would be back in a little bit.

For about ten minutes, she waited in the other room with her legs swaying back and forth as she listened to the muffled sound of her dads phone call.

She looked at the script left on the table, a small smile appearing on her face as she rushed to get her coloured pencils.

I’m going to make it pretty for daddy!

She dumped all the pencils onto the ground, picking up batches at a time, scribbling all over the skript to the point nothing could be read.

These were not proper drawers but absolute scribbles, a failed attempt at a rainbow.

Zen finally finished his call and was walking back to his daughter, but he gasped when he saw her starting to tare at the script.

“NO! Honey, what are you doing?”

“I’m making it pretty!”

He flipped through the pages and the script was completely destroyed and unreadable. He sighed, putting it down and looking at his smiling daughter. He put a fake smile on his face, lifting her up and declaring they were going to go for a walk.

“What about finishing the show, daddy?”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that now, honey.”

❀ Jaehee ❀

The little girl you and Jaehee adopted shortly after you two got married was incredibly jealous that you were getting to fly on an airplane to see your family back in your hometown.

Ever Since she was two, the little girl was fascinated by airplanes!

The best gift she ever got, thanks to Mr. Han even with his resentment of Jaehee quitting, was a trip in his private jet.

Jaehee was really sad to be honest when you told her that you were going to be staying with your family for a bit. Mainly because she was going to miss you. But she was looking forward to the quality time she was sure to spend with her daughter.

The little girl gave you a hug before practically climbing up Jaehee who had to find a way to situate the girl on her hip while she hugged and kissed you goodbye.

“I’ll see you both in a few days! Be good you two!~”

“Bye, mommy!”

When you left, Jaehee looked down at the little girl with a small smile on her face. To be honest, Jaehee was a little nervous to be taking care of her all by herself while you were away, but even so, she was more excited than nervous.

Just as she was about to say something, her phone starting to ring in her pocket. She rolled her eyes a bit when she saw it was one of the waiters at the cafe. “Ah, just give me a minute, mouse,” She says going to the bedroom and closing the door.

The girl shrugged, lifting up her toy airplane and pursing her lips so she can make a vroom sound as she runs around the room, lifting the plane up and down in the air.

All was going well, however, until she accidently knocked Jaehee’s cup of coffee all over her computer.

She quickly put the plane down and rushed to clean up the mess, but only being four, she grabbed what was closest to clean up the mess,

Which was Jaehee’s paperwork.

The flimsy paper did nothing but make more of a mess, pushing the liquid down onto the floor.

Panicking a little bit, she tried to hide the mess by taking some of Jaehee’s books and putting them over the puddles of coffee.

But oh god, she forgot all about the computer which was completely dead now.

The girl thought if she got rid of the computer, Jaehee wouldn’t notice anything was wrong. So she tried to pry the computer off the desk, which only resulted in pulling the whole entire desk to the ground.

At the loud bang of the desk crashing, Jaehee dropped her phone and bolted to the main room in which you were in, and let out a loud scream at the mess everywhere.

At her scream, the little girl started to cry afraid that Jaehee was going to be mad at her.

I mean, Jaehee was not happy whatsoever but she couldn’t be mad at her daughter, especially when she was crying.

When you came home, you were surprised to find the main room looking empty now that the computer and desk was gone.

When you asked Jaehee about it, she just shook her head and said that you guys needed a new computer and desk.

☂ Jumin ☂

Jumin kissed your temple, his hands lingering just above your waist. “Driver Kim will you have you at your parents house in less than three hours, and he will be there to pick you up when you’re vacation is over on the dot.”

You let out a small chuckle, pulling your husband in for a proper hug. “Don’t worry, it’s just my parents. Nothing is going to happen. No need to be so protective. Just enjoy the time you have with our son.”

Jumin nodded, looking down at the little boy who clung to your leg with a few tears in his eyes.

You frowned, kneeling down to kiss the boys head. “Don’t worry, honey, mommy will be home in a few days. You and daddy are going to have a lot of fun together.”

The little boy nodded, moving to cling onto Jumin, who grinned at the affection your son gave him.

It always made him happy when the little boy clung to him.

“I love you both, I’ll see you in a few days!” You said gathering your things, helping Driver Kim to put them in the car.

You waved goodbye through the window, and soon, the car was off in the distant and Jumin was left alone with his son.

He picked the boy up, bringing him back up to the penthouse and putting him down on the couch, turning the tv on for him.

“I have quite a bit of work to do, but I promise you when it’s done we can spend some time together. Just watch some TV for now and do some colouring.”

So much for enjoying the time you have with your son.

Markers, coloured pencils, scissors, coloured paper and glue was put in front of him and the TV was turned on to his favorite channel.

The little boy watched Jumin disappear down the hallway before entering his office and closing the door to work.

The boy began working on his arts and crafts, not really paying attention to the TV.

He stopped working though when he heard a small mewl and looked down to see Elizabeth the 3rd looking up at him.

“Kitty!” The boy claimed, sharing his father’s love for cats, and grabbed poor Elizabeth the 3rd who struggled a bit onto his lap.

His pets were kinda rough, but it was harmless! He loves Elizabeth as much as Jumin does.

The boys eyes lit up when he remembered a time that Jumin mentioned over dinner how much he wanted a scarf made of Elizabeth’s fur. The boy thought if he could glue together a scarf of Elizabeth’s hair, than maybe daddy would stop working and come play with him!

Grabbing the pair of scissors from the table, he started to cut Elizabeth’s hair, right down to the skin. Of course, he didn’t hurt Elizabeth though.

And at this point Elizabeth had basically given up on struggling and just accepted her fate, letting the little boy cut her hair.

When the boy was done, Elizabeth had some fairly noticeable bald spots.

The boy tried to glue together the hair in the shape of a scarf, but of course, it wouldn’t work, and the innocent boy began to cry as he found his project was a failure.

Hearing his son crying, Jumin immediately stopped his work and rushed to his son, but he stopped dead in his track as he saw all the fur scattered everywhere.

He then looked towards Elizabeth’s bed and let out a howl at the sight of all the bald spots and her fur cut off.

“S-son, what did you do?” he asked looking down at the crying boy.

“I wanted to make the scarf you wanted,” he said rather defeatedly.

Jumin sighed, calling the maid to come clean up the mess. He lifted his son up and decided work could be done later. He needed to spend time with his son now.

And then he would have to think of some way to make it up to Elizabeth for enduring the manhandling she surely would have faced.

☺ Seven/Saeyoung ☺

“I’m going to miss you so, so, so, so much!” Seven squealed swinging your laughing form around in his arms, the little girl that mirrored him laughing as well at her father’s silliness.

You grinned, bending down to kiss the top of her little head, her red hairs tickling your nose slightly.

“You’ll come home soon, right mommy?” The girl peeped.

“Of course,” you grinned. “You have fun with Daddy now. I’ll see you guys in a few days.”

The last thing you heard walking out the door was a squeal of joy as Seven lifted the little girl over his head and spun her around before running into the bunker.

He set the little girl down on the couch next to Saeran who was trying to watch tv.

“Now, little hacker, daddy has to do some work for a couple hours or Ms. Vanderwood - “Oui!” - will get mad at me. Can you be a good girl and sit here with your uncle and watch TV?” Seven asked with a cheeky grin and a higher pitched voice that had a little bounce to it.

The girl nodded, cuddling next to an uncomfortable Saeran. Seven gave her a nodd and a thumbs up before skipping off.

The little one did as her father asked for about an hour until she got really bored and Saeran had dozed off at this point.

She untangled herself from a blanket, careful not to wake her uncle, and went to the kitchen to get a snack.

She could hear the vacuum coming from the ‘headquarters’, which is what Seven calls his work room, so she knew that Vanderwood would not be there to stop her from getting any food.

Carefully, she climbed up on the counter and started rummaging through the shelves.

All that was in there were honey buddha chips.

Not really meaning to, she kinda… brushed them out of the shelves, and not expecting them to be open for god sakes, Saeyoung chips started flying every way and scattering all over the floor.

Panicking a little she jumped off the counter, landing on chips and ran to get Vanderwood for help. She didn’t want her father to see the mess she made.

However, Vanderwood had a bit of a mental break down when he saw the mess, and that ending up getting Seven and Saeran’s attention.

Seven wasn’t mad, he found the whole thing hilarious, and enjoyed taking pictures of the distraught Vanderwood in a pile of potato chips.

He became upset when he was tased though.

~~~

Check out my masterlist page to see rules for requests!

Masterlist

[tbehartoo]

Marshmallows and Mistletoe

for @haru-no-hikaru  and @mlsecretsanta​ for ML Secret Santa 2017 Characters: Alya Cesaire and Nino Lahiffe

Rating: General

Genre: Fluff

Summary: Nino knows that Alya hasn’t always had the best history with happiness at Christmas time. He’s determined to make their first Christmas together in their first apartment perfect.

Word Count: 3580

On AO3              on FFN

“What the-” Alya stopped in the middle of the doorway looking down at her barking pomeranian puppy. When she left in the morning he had been a tan little puff ball, but now all that could be seen was his little foxy face and tiny tail, everything else was covered in a hideous, knitted confection of forest green and crimson. “Malin has an ugly sweater! My life is complete!”

“I’m glad to hear that,” Nino said as he gave his wife a kiss. “I guess that means we can cancel Christmas and I can return your presents.”

“Don’t you dare Lahiffe!” she said with a mock growl. “I need that Himalayan salt scrub and those fizzing bath bombs.”

“You weren’t supposed to know about the bath bombs,” he tutted at her as he took her computer bag and briefcase to put them on her desk in their shared office.

“Don’t leave your Amazon page up and not change any of your passwords,” she replied as she checked the pans on the stove. She inhaled deeply and her mouth started watering at the scent of onions and ras el hanout. She knew the other pan on the stove would be a fluffy couscous to go under the simmering stew in front of her.

“Babe, have I ever told you that I love it when you make me Moroccan food?” she said when Nino returned to the kitchen and dining area.

He stepped up behind her to give her a hug. “Just about every time I make it.” He gave her a quick squeeze and kiss on her neck. “Have I ever told you how much I love being able to kiss you at the end of a long day?”

Alya put the lid back on the pan before spinning around in Nino’s arms and putting her own arms around his neck. “Maybe you should remind me,” she said with a grin.

Nino happily obliged.

Eventually they had to disengage to keep the food from burning.

Nino moved the chickpea stew off of the hot burner while Alya got the dishes. They served themselves at the stove and moved to the couch. Nino set his plate on the coffee table and returned for glasses and something for them to drink, while Alya fetched utensils and napkins. Once they were seated Malin whined until Alya picked him up so that he could sit with his people. Ultimately both humans and puppy were situated in comfort and dinner began in earnest.

Nino decided to wait until after dinner was over and the dishes were done before broaching the subject that had been on his mind all day. He wasn’t quite sure how to bring it up as Alya was touchy about things like family and Christmas being mentioned in the same sentence.

“Stop eating all the marshmallows Lahiffe, I want some too,” she teased as they made some hot cocoa before watching their saved tv shows. She looked closely at her husband. He was shoveling the mini-marshmallows into his mouth on automatic and didn’t even seem to be chewing them.

“Hey,” she said quietly as she put her hand on top of the one reaching for another one of the fluffy, white squares. His hand stopped moving.

“Nino?” she started brushing her thumb over the back of his hand. “What’s bothering you, hon?”

“Huh?” he looked down at their hands and then into Alya’s concerned face. “Oh, um, just thinking about something.” He picked up his mug and headed back to the couch, “But I‘m pretty sure you’re not gonna want to hear it.”

She picked up her mug and grabbed a handful of the marshmallows as she followed him back. “Come on Nino,” she said gently, “If there’s something worrying you, I want to hear about it.”

“Okay, just hear me out,” he said as he turned and only partially faced her. “This is our first Christmas in our own place and it might be small, but it’s ours.” He gestured to the tiny apartment. “And Christmas is a big deal in my family.” He set his mug down and picked up Malin. He started petting the puppy, he continued talking but didn’t look up. “I’d like to be able to have a family Christmas party-” Well she hadn’t said no right away. Maybe this could still work? “-and, and invite everybody.” He continued to pet the pomeranian but side-eyed Alya.

Alya reached out and gave the dog a pet on his soft head. He started to lick off the remains of the sugar still stuck to her fingers.

“You want to invite my family over for Christmas,” she said blankly.

Nino nodded.

“All... of my family.”

Another nod.

“You do recall our wedding reception?”

Nino just continued to pat the dog while Alya’s fingers were thoroughly inspected for any sugary molecules by the puppy. The silence continued to stretch out. Nino was about to tell her to forget about the whole thing when Alya sighed.

“If you want to invite my family over for Christmas, be ready for somebody to get stabbed.”

And that was all she said before grabbing the remote and turning on “Scène de Ménage.” Nino smiled as he riled Malin up then set him free to dash around the room.

He grabbed Alya and pulled her into a hug. “Thanks babe,” he choked out. “That really means a lot to me.”

Alya hugged him back. “I know.” She gave him a kiss on his temple. “You wouldn’t ask to do it if it wasn’t important to you.”

He let her go and heard her grumble as she sat back, “It’s a good thing I love you.”

Nino couldn’t help but grin at her. “I love you, too.”

From that moment onward Alya could look forward to new holiday surprises every time she came home. Nino put out garland and candles one day. The next evening Alya found ropes of twinkling lights crisscrossing the ceiling. Marinette had been called in to decorate the tree within an inch of perfection, and she succeeded beyond the wildest of expectations. Unfortunately, no one told Malin that the tree was not for his personal amusement. Marinette was called in again to do damage control and a childproofing gate was erected around the base of the tree. Late in the week Alya came home to find brightly wrapped packages in every nook and cranny.

“Nino, what happened here?” Alya asked in disbelief.

“Adrien brought over some boxes and we wrapped them up,” Nino said as he fished for the scissors under the couch where Malin had knocked them.

She tried to pick up one of the larger boxes and couldn’t even lift it. “Nino! What is in here?”

“Huh?” he looked up to see what she was talking about. “Oh that,” he said as he ducked his head and finally managed to snage the scissors. “You don’t want to move that one or any of the other big ones covered in red with gold bows. We decided to wrap my speakers so it would be safe to stack stuff on them.”

Alya smiled down at him. “You’re really going all out for this, babe.”

Nino stood and wrapped Alya in a hug. “Well you deserve the best first Christmas ever,” he said earnestly.

“So do you,” Alya replied. “Listen Nino, you don’t have to keep killing yourself over this.” She looked around their apartment. He had turned it into a scene that wouldn’t look out of place in one of those home and garden magazines. “Our place looks amazing. Please don’t think you have to keep adding to this.”

Nino simply smiled at his his wife, having not let go of her it was easy to swoop in for a few reassuring kisses. “There’s just a couple of more things and then it’ll be perfect.”

Alya sighed against his lips, “You’re perfect already.”

“Thank you, my lady, my light, my love,” he gave her a light kiss between each phrase. “But it takes one to know one.” And with that he cut off all other conversation for awhile.

The last decoration that Alya noticed were the stockings that Nino hung across a faux fireplace mantle. The fireplace had a fake fire inside with a light and fan to make the fabric flames flicker. Across the mantle were stockings that Marinette had to have sewn since they were far too personalized for him to have found at any store. His had musical notes, his DJ table, tiny flickering lights, and was embroidered with his stage name at the top. Hers was made from what looked suspiciously like one of her old shirts from lycée and was embroidered with Ladyblog articles and the name of the first magazine to hire her after she graduated from university. Malin had a stocking that was bigger than both of theirs combined and was covered with animated, foxy faces along with pictures of all his favorite toys. Alya had looked at the arrangement and laughed. It’s like her best friend knew that they both would be stuffing their dog’s stocking full of his favorite treats. She sighed as she looked around again at all of Nino’s hard work and resolved that nothing was going to ruin it.

The day of the party dawned with Paris covered in snow! It wasn’t completely unheard of for them to get it, but it often didn’t last. Nino was determined to make the most of the unexpected opportunity. Alya had taken a few vacation days so she wouldn’t be stressed about this whole party thing and wanted nothing more than to stay bundled up in their warm, comfortable bed.

“You can’t force me to go outside!” she yelled from inside her cocoon of blankets. “It’s gonna be cold and wet and miserable. I’m staying here.”

“It’s Malin’s first time to encounter snow!” Nino yelled back as he struggled to get the ugly sweater onto the excited puppy. “So either you put on something willingly or I’ll throw you in the snow without your pants.”

Alya threw back the covers and glowered at him. “You try that Lahiffe, and I will end you.”

“There’s my girl,” he said as he threw a hoodie and some jeans in her direction. “You know you’re going to want to get pictures of the dog seeing all that cold white stuff for your blog. It’s going to be adorable.”

“You’re right,” she said as she scrambled to get dressed. “It’ll be too cute for words.”

“I’ll make your coffee,” he said as he left the room with Malin in tow.

Nino had been right. Malin’s first confrontation with snow was enchanting. He had stayed under the awning of their apartment building as he sniffed at the white stuff. Then one paw ventured a test and was quickly pulled back. He sniffed again getting his nose thoroughly covered and pulled back shaking his head. Alya held her breath while the puppy stared at the vast expanse that was the little courtyard between buildings and then he dived into the drifts head first. He romped and played with the snow as if it was an old friend that hadn’t been seen in far too long a time. Nino had brought down Malin’s favorite ball and Alya was able to record several moments of Nino attempting to teach the puppy the concept of a game of fetch. If the dog wasn’t cute enough to go viral, the sight of her tall handsome husband loping around the tiny square calling for the dog to drop the ball certainly was. Eventually everyone was wet and cold and Alya called for a return to the house.

Nino put Alya on Malin duty while he made breakfast and she was glad she had taken the time to give the dog a bath and blow dry. She found more than crepes and coffee waiting on the kitchen table. There was a whole scene from the North Pole laid out on her best platter. Santa’s elves made with fruit faces and crepe hats were gathered around a giant Christmas tree festooned with more fruit and topped with powdered sugar.

Alya sighed, “Your pancake skills are certainly improving,” she said as she sat down at the table. “Did you already Instagram this for Adrien to see?”

“Do you doubt me?” he asked with a mild scoff. “The Agreste-Lahiffe breakfast battle is trending again.” There was a twinkle in his eye. “Just because his croissants came out looking perfect doesn’t mean he won today.” He sat down as he placed mugs of hot cocoa topped with both marshmallows and whipped cream in front of them. “Besides, he has an unfair advantage with Tom helping him all the time.”

Alya dug into an elf and made an appreciative moan. “I can hardly wait to see what you two come up with for your combined holiday spectacular,” she said through a mouthful of fruit.

“It’s going to be epic,” Nino agreed. “I think we’ll definitely break the internet.”

Alya laughed. She loved to see Nino like this, enthusiastic and passionate. She had worried at times last year that she wouldn’t see him like this ever again, but they had both learned to roll with what life gives you and to help each other out of the morass of despair.

The first people to show for the party were Marinette and Adrien, of course. They had left Emma with Tom and Sabine so that they could help with wrangling any disgruntled guests. They also brought a ton of cookies and a couple of costumes for Nino and Alya. Nino had changed immediately but Alya had taken one look at what Nino was wearing and locked herself in their room. It had taken Marinette half an hour of talking to the locked door and then several more minutes of one-on-one conversation to convince Alya to at least look at the clothes she had made for her.

“Mari, he’s dressed as Santa!” she exclaimed for the hundredth time. “There is no way I’m going to dress up as dowdy old Mrs. Claus for a party that I’m worried is going to turn into World War IV.”

Marinette simply hugged her friend and tried to reassure her. “We made it through World War III at the reception, you can make it through this.”

Alya shook her head, “This means so much to him Mari. He’s put so much time and energy into this and my folks will be in the same room and won’t be able to be civil to each other, while the twins take sides and my aunt will just …”

“Alya, you’ve got to trust Nino,” she gave her another hug. “Besides if anyone starts getting out of line, Adrien or I will politely escort them from the building.” She opened the box containing the costume. “Now come on and try out what I’ve made for you. I promise if you don’t like it, you don’t have to wear it.”

Alya sniffed a little. “Okay, but the only reason I’d ever dress as Mrs. Clause is for the cookies. I want to make that clear. It’s absolutely the only reason.”

Marinette laughed. “Understood.”

In only a matter of moments Marinette was standing in the hall that led to the bedroom and proclaiming, “Ladies and gentlemen, mesdames et messieurs, the Lahiffe-Cesaire Christmas party proudly presents...Mrs. Alya Clause!”

The strains of “Santa Baby” began to play from all of the speakers, wrapped or otherwise, and Alya stepped out into the living room. She was wearing a red, sequined, strapless dress that hugged and accentuated her figure. There was a trimming of white, faux fur at the top of the dress and a slit in one side that ended at mid thigh. The red high heeled sandals matched the color of the dress perfectly and showed off the pedicure that nino had treated her to the day before. The straps on her shoes looked to be made of satin ribbons and ended in red bows at her ankles. Her hair was down and curling softly at the ends while an ornate red Santa hat finished the outfit.

She started moving to the music and Nino’s mouth dropped open.

“Dude,” he said to Adrien who was sitting next to him, “I’m gonna marry that girl.”

Adrien merely nodded at him. “You better do it soon,” he agreed as Alya slinked toward them, “before someone else does.”

Alya ended by draping herself across Nino’s lap. “Do you like it?”

“Babe, you are the most gorgeous woman in the world,” Nino whispered. “The dress looks nice, too.” He started kissing his wife passionately who returned his kisses just as enthusiastically.

“Calm it you two,” Marinette said with a practiced air. “Your other guests will be arriving soon and there’s still one more thing Nino wanted to put up before anyone else got here.”

“Oh yeah,” he said as he moved back from kissing her. “There is one more important thing that has to go up.” He stood up and planted Alya’s feet on the floor before moving away. “Come on Adrien, I need your help.”

At last everything was in readiness and the guests started arriving. Once it was determined that all the guests who were going to show were already in attendance, Nino stood before the front door with Alya at his side to make an announcement.

“Dudes!” he began. “Welcome to our first Christmas in our new home.” He waited for the murmuring to die down. “I’d like to bring your attention to the decoration hanging over Alya’s head,” he said pointing to the giant ball of mistletoe and ribbon that hung there. “From the the times of the Druids and on down mistletoe has been considered a magical plant. Branches used to be placed over doors to ward off evil spirits and to prevent the entrance of witches. Since all of you were able to enter I guess we can assume that none of you are witches,” There was a polite smattering of chuckles.

“In Scandinavia this a plant that represents peace. Standing underneath it is a place to declare a truce, or even to kiss and make-up.” He gave Alya a slight peck on her cheek. “Since it is a custom that is hundreds of years old I’m going to ask all of you to honor the tradition to bury old grudges and declare a truce here, if only for the night.” He smiled at all his guests. “I know that not everyone in this room gets along with each other, but please for tonight just try it. After all, you’re already dressed up and here.”

His face grew stern, an unusual expression for him to wear, “If any of you cannot abide by our terms, you and your warring party will be brought to stand under the mistletoe. If you find it in your hearts to kiss and make-up you can stay, if not then maybe an evil spirit snuck in with you and you’ll have to go. Santa has asked his elves to help with this endeavor,” Nino pointed at Marinette and Adrien who were wearing green Santa hats with elf ears on the sides. “They are making my list of naughty or nice children, and depend on it, they will put you on the correct list.”

Nino then smiled again at his guests. “You are the most important people to us so let’s get this party started!”

Suddenly Christmas music began to play and everyone began talking to each other again.

“Do you think it’ll work?” Alya whispered in his ear.

“It’s worth a try,” he said as he gave her another kiss. “We’re still under the mistletoe,” he answered to her unasked question.

“You’ve never needed that excuse before,” she smirked.

“If only Mari hadn’t threatened me with grievous bodily harm if I started a make-out session with you during our party,” he sighed.

“I guess we better attend to our guests,” she said as she tore herself away from his arms.

He nodded and turned to start working the room.

Many hours later, when the last guest had been ushered from their home, Nino turned down all the lights except for the ones on the tree, started the playlist he’d put together just for this moment, and grabbed Alya. As the strains of Michael Buble’s “I’ll be Home for Christmas” began to play, he started serenading his wife. She stood there with the lights twinkling behind her smiling serenely at him and he thought he’d never seen a more beautiful sight in his entire existence. Alya pulled him in and started swaying with him.

“You did good, Lahiffe,” she said as she laid her head against his shoulder.

“It was all for you,” he said as he pressed a tender kiss to her forehead.

She shook her head. “It was all for us.”

“Yes, all for us,” he echoed gently.

It took a moment for Alya to realize where Nino was steering them, but once she caught on she couldn’t help but laugh. As they stood beneath the mistletoe again, she couldn’t help but remember one more tradition associated with the magical plant. It was said that if a couple in love kissed beneath it, they could expect a long life of happiness. Keeping that in mind, Alya determined that she and Nino would have a happy eternity together.

[bazypitchandsimonsnow]

Warmth

Rating: T

Genre: Fluff

Word Count:  1233

Summary: Baz wakes up very cold.  Based on "steamy kiss" from Askfic Kiss Meme.

Read on AO3

AN:  Alright so I reblogged a kiss fic request and this was one of them. If you wanna request from it, the list is on my blog here

Baz

I shiver as I wake up. A cool breeze is coming in from the open windows. Slowly, my sleep bleary eyes adjust to my surroundings. The hardwood floor is covered in clothes and various other bits of junk. I’m on a bed with Spider Man bed sheets. The thin fleece blanket is bunched up at my feet. Ah, I know where I am. Simon and I had a late night studying, so he let me crash at his flat. It’s no wonder I’m freezing, then. Snow has kicked off my only defence against the cold.

I turn over so I can face the other side. Simon is on his front, head buried in the pillow and drooling with his mouth open (mouth breather). His bronze curls are messy with all the rolling around he does in his sleep. He doesn’t have a shirt on as always, his wings pulled against his back. I can feel the heat radiating off of him. Even without his ever burning magic, he’s still a walking furnace. Especially compared to me.

With a bit of wriggling, I shift closer to him. I throw my arm over his bare skin and nuzzle his neck with my nose. Simon still smells something I’d gladly eat, but I’m not scared I’m going biting him. That temptation has faded away in favour of just wanting to be close together. Can’t very well do that if I drink all his blood. My fingers trace around the base of his wings. I feel him shudder slightly.

“What are you doing?” he mutters.

“Trying to get warm,” I say. “ Someone kicked the blanket off.”

He frowns slightly. It’s adorable. “It was too hot.”

“Not all of us are living fireballs, Snow.”

“Well, you did call me the sun once.”

I roll my eyes. “That was in a very different context.”

Simon rolls on his side to face me. His eyes slowly open. I’m greeted by that gorgeous blue gaze, as I have been for many mornings. But it still makes my chest flutter. He reaches out to pet my hair, a lazy smile on his face.

“Good morning, darling,” he whispers.

I lightly squeeze his side. “Morning, love.”

“Have a nice sleep?”

“M-hm. Until I woke up shivering.”

He chuckles and shakes his head. “You’re not gonna let that go, are you?”

“No. It’s a grave a injustice.”

Snow’s face breaks out in a devilish grin. He tangles his fingers in my hair, hauling me closer. “Then let me make it up to you.”

His hot lips crash onto mine. I gasp a bit, pulling back enough so our teeth don’t knock. Warmth most certainly spreads through me. I smile into the kiss and push back. My hand slides across his skin. Our bodies are practically lined up against each other from head to toe. It’s magical.

The sweet kissing quickly turns into full blown snogging. (What a way to wake up.) Our heads move side to side, looking for the best angle. Simon’s tongue traces along the seam of my lips. I open to him, and groan as he moves inside my mouth. He explores anywhere he can with characteristic eagarness. I reach out hold his face, running my thumb along his cheek.

“Baz,” he sighs. My stomach does somersaults when he says my name like that.

“Simon,” I reply, pulling him closer.

He gets on top of me, throwing a leg over my hips. He kisses me like I’m oxygen and he’s been drowning for years. I bury my hands in his infuriatingly beautiful messy hair. I don’t want a single bit of room between us. My nails scrape along his scalp. I feel him moan into my mouth, vibrations causing me to shiver. He runs his hands up and down my sides, eliciting embarrassing sounds from me with every touch. Under my half lidded eyes I see Simon’s wings spread out above us. It’s his way of protecting us, protecting me. Even while we’re making out he still wants me to be safe. Crowley, I love him.

I work my hands under his shorts, digging my fingers into his thighs. He giggles and responds by pushing up my shirt and running a finger across my stomach. I hook my thumbs in his waistband, slowly inching them down.

That is, until the bedroom door bursts open.

“Hey boys, do you- Merlin and Morgana! My eyes!”

“Penny!” Snow shouts.

“Bunce!” I add in an equally pissed off tone.

Simon hastily jumps off me and pulls up the blanket to hide our... obvious arousal. Bunce is covering her eyes while shaking her head.

“I could’ve gone all my life without seeing that,” she whines.

I growl slightly. “Well that’ll teach you to bloody knock.”

Snow elbows my side. “Be nice, Baz.”

“She busted in on us!”

“Well excuse me for not assuming that you two would be canoodling at 10 AM a Sunday!”

“Well, you keep telling us not to ‘canoodle’ on the couch, so excuse us for doing it in the room where we’re supposed to.”

Simon elbows me again, and adds in a glare, first at me then at Bunce. “Be nice, both of you. Now what was it you wanted to ask, Penny?”

“I was wondering if you two wanted any coffee. I’m making some.”

“Sure. Lots of sugar, please.”

“Baz?”

“No thank you. I’ll make my own.” I turn over so my back is to the door. It’s beyond petty, but Bunce ruined my fun, so I don’t feel bad at all.

I hear her sigh with an annoyed tone. “Very well. I am sorry about bursting in, guys.”

Simon rubs my shoulder. “Just knock next time, alright?”

“Will do. Promise.”

I hear her walk away and close the door. Snow slides down so we’re laying next to each other again. He runs a hand along my neck, a comforting motion he knows I love.

“You alright, love?”

I scowl a bit. “What do you think?”

“It was an accident.”

“She should’ve just knocked in the first place.”

Snow sighs and nods. “Yeah, I know. But at least she apologised and promised to knock, right?”

My pissed off expression falters. “Yeah.”

He snuggles in closer, until our noses are touching and I can feel his hot morning breath on my face. His smile is like a sunbeam. “Did I at least warm you up?”

The corner of my mouth tugs upwards slightly. “A bit.”

“A bit?!” He sounds taken aback, but there’s a smile on his face. “Well I can do much better that.”

“I don’t know, Snow.” I cock an eyebrow. “Can you?”

He leans towards me again. I move forward, hoping to close the small distance. But the bastard pulls away. He’s grinning ear to ear.

“Coffee first, then snogging.”

I groan and fall onto my back. “You’re an awful tease, Simon Snow.”

“You’re one to talk, you goading git.” He stands up, stretching his thin arms high above his head. The muscles in his back move beautifully. I resist every urge to tackle him onto the mattress.

He throws on a backless shirt for some semblance of decency. I make one last huff and emerge from the blankets myself. As we walk out the door, Simon slips his hand into mine, our fingers lacing together like that’s all they’re meant to do.

That’s all I really need to feel warm.

AN:  Hope you all liked it. More kiss fics to come! :D

[hale-of-stiles-heart]

Destiel prompts? "Damnit, Cas! That was my pie!"

I was initially gonna go with Cas eating Dean’s pie but I thought that might be too obvious so I went a different route. Hope you enjoy it! (also on ao3!)

The list of foods that Cas knew how to make was extremely short. It included peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, pop tarts, and microwave popcorn.

Yet there he was in the Men of Letters kitchen, trying to bake a pie.

A quick glance around the kitchen, at the mess spread over the counters and the various dirty utensils strewn over said counters, provided evidence enough of the great effort he had put into his endeavor. Cas was never one to do anything half-assed, which is sort of how he would up having to bake a pie in the first place.

A few days prior, Dean had decided to treat himself with a decadent slice of cherry pie from a diner in Missouri. He insisted that he deserved it after both single-handedly figuring out what the creature they were hunting actually was — a redcap, thus why it was stealing blood from its victims — and finding a way to kill it — an oak stake through the heart.

Sam and Cas had both conceded that Dean had in fact earned it, especially after getting tossed around by the goblin before he managed to kill it. For once Sam hadn't bothered to say a single word about his brother's unhealthy diet, merely rolling his eyes when Dean placed his order for dessert.

The slice of pie itself was a beauty to behold; bright red cherries, gold flaky crust, intricate lattice work on top. A dollop of whipped cream topped off the pie, two scoops of vanilla ice cream beside it on the plate.

It had looked so good that Dean had made Sam take a picture on his phone, even though he often made fun of people who took pictures of their food, muttering about something called Instagram. Cas didn't understand how a gram could be instant or what that had to do with pictures of food but he kept his concerns to himself.

Especially since a moment later, Cas completely ruined the evening.

When their waitress, a pretty brunette with big brown eyes who had been flirting with Dean throughout their meal, had delivered his slice of pie along with a flirtatious wink, Cas had been in the bathroom. The angel's hands had been messy enough after finishing his barbecue bacon cheeseburger, his fingers covered in sweet, tangy Kansas City style barbecue sauce, that he had excused himself to the bathroom to wash his hands.

After drying his hands as much as he possibly could with the tissue paper thin napkins the diner provided, Cas returned to the table. Dean lifted his plate to show off his slice of pie, like a cat proudly presenting its owner with the dead bird it had killed, as Cas walked down the aisle of the diner towards their table.

Before he could slide back into the booth, a man strode past him, shoulder checking him in the process with enough force to send him crashing into the corner of their table. In addition to spilling a piping hot coffee all over both himself and his seat, the arm he held out to brace himself ended up knocking Dean's plate out of his hands.

Cas had been certain that he had heard Dean's heart shatter as his beautiful piece of pie landed on the floor.

Astonishment and disbelief, mixed with some grief, had quickly melted away to reveal pure frustration. Dean had thrown his hands up in angry exasperation as he growled, "Damn it, Cas! That was my pie!"

The flirty waitress had returned to their table to find Cas apologizing profusely, kneeling on the floor as he desperately tried to clean up the splattered cherries and melting ice cream. She had handed him a few extra napkins, wrinkling her upturned nose at the mess, before flouncing back to the kitchen to procure Dean another slice of pie.

With no one else around to see, Cas had used a tiny bit of his grace to make the clean up easier, still mumbling apologies. Their waitress returned again as Cas was mopping coffee off of his seat, regretfully informing Dean that there was no more pie left.

She had trailed her long bright red nails over the line of her cleavage as she insinuated that if Dean wanted something sweeter than pie, her shift ended in half an hour. Cas' heart had lodged itself in his throat as he wiped up the spilled coffee with renewed fervor, valiantly trying to tamp down on the jealousy flaring up inside of him.

To Cas' infinite relief, Dean had declined. Instead, he had asked for the check and tossed a few singles on the table as a tip.

Dean had brooded the rest of the way back to the Bunker. Cas had been wracked with guilt the entire drive.

After returning to the Bunker, Cas had dedicated himself to making it up to Dean somehow, well aware that he had completely ruined the hunter's evening by spoiling his little indulgence. But after visiting several local diners, and some that were a few towns over, Cas hadn't found any cherry pies that compared to the one he had desecrated in Missouri.

Thus, he had decided to make his own pie.

Of course, he had immediately run into the hurdle that was the fact that he did not know the first thing about making a pie. But the internet was a marvelous thing even if he still did not fully trust computers.

He had spent two days simply researching. Researching the best ways to keep pie crust from falling apart when rolled. Researching different lattice patterns and other ways to top pies. Researching how to make ice cream that he could serve with the pie.

Only after researching all of that and the hundreds of other questions and concerns he had about pies and pie making did Cas finally begin looking up pie recipes. Specifically cherry pies.

He compared dozens of recipes, checking their ratings when the websites hosting the recipes included five star scales and reading through every single comment. He was not having much luck deciding on which recipe he should use until he found a recipe that he knew Dean would greatly appreciate.

The title of the recipe was rather straightforward: Cherry Whiskey Pie With Crumb Topping. It immediately caught Cas' attention as he scrolled through a recipe blog on something called Tumblr.

The pictures showcased a glorious looking pie, garnished with a liberal, but not gratuitous, pile of brown sugar crumb topping. In other pictures, single slices of pie were shown, highlighting the cherry filling, scoops of vanilla ice cream plopped on top.

Cas had instantly decided that was the pie he was going to bake in order to properly apologize to Dean.

He was pleasantly surprised to find that the recipe did not include any anecdotes that were completely irrelevant to the recipe itself. He did understand what long winded stories about children's birthday parties or detailed descriptions of local farmer's markets had anything to do with baking but he simply dismissed it as yet another human thing he did not fully comprehend.

Following the recipe to the t, Cas mixed flour, salt, butter, and ice water together to make the pie crust; soaked and cooked the pitted cherries in some Jack Daniel's; and combined brown sugar, flour, and butter for the crumb topping. In the process, he had made quite a mess of the kitchen but a mere wave of his hand would rectify that before Dean returned.

Earlier that afternoon, Dean had left to go shopping for some new clothes, pointing out that he needed some new jeans. He had invited Cas along, reminding the angel that he could use some new clothes himself.

As much as Cas would have liked to go with Dean, always enjoying their time together, he knew that he might not get another chance to bake Dean his pie. Not wanting to outright lie to Dean, having done that enough in the past, Cas had simply explained that there was something that needed his attention.

Dean had just grinned and announced that meant he could play his music as loud as he wanted without having to hear anyone complain. With a few quick goodbyes, he had grabbed his keys and made his way to the Bunker's garage.

The closest Walmart was in Hays, nearly two hours away, meaning Cas had an ample amount of time to make the pie. He made the crust, mixed the whiskey and cherries, prepared the crumb topping, baked the pie, whisked up some whipped cream, and hand churned a batch of vanilla ice cream.

He even had time to clean the kitchen without the use of his grace before Dean returned. Cas knew it the moment Dean re-entered the loft, so attuned to Dean that he immediately picked up on the familiar sound of his heartbeat.

Even without his enhanced senses, he could hear the slam of the garage door and the thudding tattoo of Dean's heavy boots. Sam lifted his head and turned to smile widely at Cas from where he was sitting at the kitchen table, a book spread open in front of him.

He had helpfully read the various recipes aloud for Cas from his phone so Cas didn't have to keep looking back and forth as he worked. For reference, he had shown Cas the picture he had taken of the pie from the diner in Missouri, the angel striving to replicate it as much as possible.

The second he heard Dean's heartbeat, before he was within a mile of the Bunker, he launched into action. He carefully arranged a large slice of warm pie on a plate, sticking his tongue out in concentration as he laid a dollop of whipped cream on top of the slice and scooped some ice cream onto the plate.

"Perfect," Sam commented, giving Cas an enthusiastic thumbs up and a radiant smile. When Cas bit his lip and glanced skeptically at his presentation, he insisted, "Really, Cas. He's gonna love it."

As if on cue, Dean's footsteps grew louder as he wandered down the hallway towards the kitchen. Tramping further into the Bunker, he called, "Yo, Cas! I got ya the coolest shirt, man."

He appeared in the doorway a moment later, carrying several plastic bags in each hand. His mouth was open to say something but he paused before uttering a single word, teeth clicking as he closed his mouth, blatantly sniffing the air.

"Someone bake something?" Dean asked, setting his bags down in the doorway before taking a few more steps into the kitchen. He snorted out a laugh when he noticed the apron Cas was wearing, splattered with cherry filling and traces of whipped cream.

When Cas glanced over at Sam, he found him nodding his head and making a rolling motion with his hand, mouthing 'now'. Nodding in response, Cas grabbed the plate of pie he had arranged. Holding it up to Dean for inspection, Cas intelligently announced, "Pie."

"Yeah, I can see that, Cas," Dean chuckled, taking the plate from Cas' hand with only a glance at the pie. He did a double take, shaking his head in disbelief and blinking down at the slice of pie. "This looks like the pie from that diner. Did you go b—"

Cas shaking his head was enough to make Dean cut himself off. Folding his hands behind his back, Cas admitted, "I baked you a pie. To make up for the one I made you drop at the diner."

"You baked me a pie?" Dean murmured softly, staring down at the pie with undisguised awe and palpable surprise. Raising his eyes to meet Cas' as Sam made a discreet exit, tiptoeing out of the kitchen, Dean went on, "Just because I dropped a slice?"

"You were rather upset," Cas pointed out, chewing his bottom lip again. Tipping his head to the side, he quietly elaborated, "I wanted to apologize. You were very excited about having pie and I ruined it."

"Aww, Cas..." Dean drawled, slumping his shoulders as he set the plate of pie back down on the counter. He reached over to run his hands down Cas' arms, grabbing Cas' hands to run his thumb over the angel's knuckles. "I was tired and crabby. I wasn't actually mad at you."

"I know," Cas claimed, gently squeezing Dean's hands in his own. With a small smile, he explained, "But you were disappointed. And you deserved pie. You still do."

The second the words left his mouth, Dean startled a gasp out of Cas by grabbing him by the hips and hoisting him up so he was sitting on the counter beside the plate of pie. He stretched his arm out to dip his finger in some of the melting vanilla ice cream.

After gathering some ice cream, he dragged the pad of his finger over Cas' bottom lip, slathering it with vanilla. Dean dipped his head a moment later to capture Cas' lips in a deep kiss, Cas' lower lip cooler than usual as he enthusiastically returned the kiss.

"Y'know, angel," Dean breathed, breaking the kiss to run his nose over Cas' cheek. "You're even sweeter than pie."

Send me Destiel prompts!

[theartofbeinganerd]

you are so amazing at writing the bickering omg!! loved the swamp fic and i have to ask for FS academy era ft. bickering and whatever else you want!!! whatever comes to mind! i just love your writing sm i could read anything you wrote ever not joking :)!

Here’s day six of my week-long blog anniversary celebration (which…um I finally thought to double-check the date and…the anniversary is actually today so oops - but I’m still going to post the last prompt tomorrow, don’t worry, sorry I’m such a mess)!

@poursuislesetolies So first, thank you for the prompt of course, but also ahhh thank you so much for saying that!! It means so much for me to hear, truly, so thank you again! :)

Here’s some Academy Era bickering, feels, and…baking? Enjoy!

-

“Alright, what is it?”

Jemma glanced up from the neurobiology textbook she’d beenleafing through, meeting Fitz’s knowing gaze. “What’s what?” she askedinnocently.

Fitz rolled his eyes, not believing her terrible attempt atplaying dumb for an instant. “C’mon Simmons, you’ve been on the same page forthe last fifteen minutes – you could’ve had the whole bloody thing read in thattime. Not to mention you’re fidgeting.”

“I am notfidgeting,” Jemma argued defensively, but the protest was a bit much because sheactually had been tapping her feetand drumming her fingers off and on for the past few minutes.

“Simmons.”

Heaving a sigh, Jemma closed the textbook, placing it on thecoffee table in front of the couch in Fitz’s living room. “Oh alright, I’vejust been thinking…”

“About?” Fitz set aside the magazine he’d bought earlierthat day specifically for the article it contained on Tony Stark’s latestinvention, giving her his full attention.

Jemma released a quiet breath, nervously wringing her handsin her lap as she tried to find the right words. However, what came out was ablurted, “I want you to teach me how to bake.”

Fitz’s eyebrows darted up his forehead, then furrowed inconfusion. “What?” he asked blankly. Clearly, whatever he’d been expecting, ithadn’t been that.

“I was going to ask your mum,” Jemma admitted, the wordscoming out in a rush now that she’d started, “but she’s so busy with worklately, and she’s always talking about the days you two used to spend in thekitchen together and she’s taught you everything you know about it, so…”

“Yeah, okay, but…” Fitz made a face, shaking his headabsently. “Why?”

Jemma sighed, her shoulders sagging slightly as sheexplained, “Well, you know how I’m not…fond of…lacking in certain areas –”

“You hate not being perfect at everything, you mean? Yeah, Iknow a thing or two ‘bout that,” Fitz surmised, smiling knowingly at her scowl.“Well, do you deny it?”

She let out an insulted huff, crossing her arms over herchest…but a moment later, she answered grudgingly, “…No.”

Fitz smirked triumphantly. “So…what? You hate the fact thatyou can’t bake cookies? I mean, you had two PhDs by the time you were sixteen –I don’t think anyone’s gonna look down on you because you don’t fit someridiculous stereotype. And if they do? Screw ‘em.”

“It’s not because of stereotypes, Fitz.” Jemma sighed,gazing at him imploringly. “I can’t really explain it. But…will you just helpme? Please?”

Fitz studied her for a brief moment, likely attempting todiscern the true reason she wanted to learn how to bake. But, it wasn’t longbefore he answered, “Yeah, alright. But only ‘cause you said ‘please’.” He gotup from the couch, nodding for her to follow him as he headed through thedoorway into the cozy little kitchen his mum loved so fiercely. “And, uh…justpromise me if you blow the place up or something, you’ll take the blame? Ithink my mum would murder me if she thought it was my fault.”

“So you’d rather she murder me?” Jemma asked in mock-insult,leaning up against the counter next to Fitz as he gathered the necessarysupplies.

He scoffed loudly, peering around the cupboard door to giveher a disbelieving look. “Oh, come on.My mum loves you – she wouldn’t harma hair on your head! In her eyes, Jemma Simmons can do no wrong.”

Smirking, Jemma shrugged innocently. “Well, I can’t help itif your mum loves me, Fitz. Perhaps I’m just a loveable person, have you everconsidered that?”

“Yeah, maybe, to people who haven’t studied for final exams with you. They don’t know thePerfect Score Monster living inside of you, not like I do.”

Jemma rolled her eyes, groaning in annoyance. “Ugh Fitz, you’re so dramatic. So what if westayed up late a couple of nights? You aced all of your exams, did you not?”

“Stayed up late a couple of…” Fitz put down the glass bowlhe’d retrieved, turning to face her completely, his mouth agape. “Simmons, you kept me awake for forty-eight hours, shouting questionsfrom your flash cards and throwing things at me until I got the right answer!”

“But you aced all ofyour exams,” Jemma repeated, emphasizing the words. When Fitz continued tostare at her in disbelief, she rolled her eyes and asked pointedly, “Are yougoing to teach me something about baking, or are you going to continue to gapeat me like a dead fish?”

“That’s the monster talking,” Fitz muttered under hisbreath, but did turn to finish gathering what they’d need. When all of thesupplies and ingredients had been laid out on the counter, he turned back toJemma and said, “Okay, so the first step is easy: just pre-heat the oven.”After she had proudly done so, he went on, “Next, you’re going to melt thebutter.”

“That’s easy,” she commented happily, picking up the stickof butter, removing the wrapping, and dropping the butter into the glass bowl,which promptly went into the microwave. And when the timer went off, sheremoved the bowl and held it out proudly.

“It’s not melted enough,” Fitz observed, shaking his head.

Jemma gaped down at the melting butter in the bowl. “Whatare you talking about? It’s perfect!”

“I think I’ll bethe judge of that.” He took the bowl from her and replaced it in the microwave,setting it for a bit longer and completely ignoring Jemma’s disgruntled look.  When it came out this time, Fitz noddedapprovingly. “Okay, now you’ll mix it with the sugar.”

Jemma eyed the small group of ingredients gathered togetheron the counter, taking a deep breath and nodding. This was just like chemistry,and she excelled at chemistry – howmuch harder could using food instead of chemicals be? “Alright, so I mix thebutter and the sugar. Easy enough, I suppose.”

Taking the wooden spoon Fitz handed her, Jemma stirred togetherthe butter and sugar as he monitored. “Okay, now it’s time to add the flour,baking powder, salt, and vanilla,” he instructed after a few minutes.

Overwhelmed, Jemma glanced back to the remaining ingredientson the counter, then to the mixture of butter and sugar in the bowl.

“It’s easy,” Fitz encouraged, handing her a measuring cup.“It’s just like measuring out chemicals, okay? And you’re great at that.”

Except, Jemma apparently wasn’t great at it when it came to baking ingredients, given that when shedumped the flour unceremoniously into the bowl, a cloud of it went up and hadthem both coughing and sputtering, now partially covered in the fine whitedust.

“Be a bit morecareful with your pouring,” Fitz advised, automatically shying away from thefierce glare Jemma shot at him. “I’m just saying.”

“Thank you, Fitz,”she ground out, carefully pouring therest of the ingredients into the bowl. With that finished, she picked the spoonback up to mix all of it together now.

“Simmons! Be careful! You’re going to…” Fitz trailed off,heaving a sigh and planting his hands on his hips as he stared down at theflour and baking powder that had been forced out of the bowl and onto thecounter. “…make a mess,” he finished after a beat. “Well…at least it wasn’t methis time.”

“It still could be,”Jemma pointed out, and he held his hands up in surrender, staying mercifullysilent as she finished mixing it up.

“You’re going to add the egg next.” Jemma obliginglyretrieved the single egg from the counter. “Use the side of the bowl to crack it,”he suggested, and she took the advice, knocking the egg against the edge of thebowl and promptly breaking it apart in her hand. “No no no! Simmons, stop!” Fitzfrantically pulled the bowl away from her, immediately beginning to carefullypick out the tiny pieces of eggshell that had landed in the dough with the yolk.“Christ, just drop the whole egg inwhy don’t you!”

“Well how was I supposed to know that it would break apartlike that?!” Jemma demanded, planting her hands on her hips.

“They’re eggs,Simmons! I didn’t think I had to tell you they were fragile.” Sighing, heglanced from the meager amount of shell pieces he held in one of his palms,then grimaced at the dough. “Well…I guess a little bit of eggshell never hurtanybody. Okay, stir that up, then we’ll add the chocolate chips.”

Taking the bowl back from Fitz and grimacing down at it,Jemma mixed in the egg yolk (and the remaining pieces of shell, of course),then picked up the opened bag of chocolate chips Fitz had been sneaking everyso often (she’d been pretending not to notice).

And without preamble, she began pouring the contents of thebag into the bowl.

“Wait! That’s too much!” Jemma lowered the now empty bag, wincingat the pile of chocolate chips now lying on top of the dough.

“Sorry,” she apologized, sighing softly. How had shepossibly managed to screw up almost each and every step? It was baking cookies!

“Y’know what? Don’t apologize.” Fitz nudged her shoulderlightly with his. “A little extra chocolate’s never killed anyone, yeah?”

“Well, actually, depending on the circumstance I can imagine–”

“Simmons.”

Shrugging at Fitz’s clearly exasperated tone, Jemma told himplainly, “You did ask me a question – I was just trying to answer it.”

He groaned, dropping his head back and rolling his eyestoward the ceiling. “Just stir in the chocolate chips, alright?”

Jemma did as instructed, and once the chocolate chips hadbeen worked in as well as she could manage, Fitz made room on the counter for abaking tray, talking her through separating the dough into little round balls.

“Make sure you keep them small, okay?”

“Okay.”

“No no, that’s too small.”

“Alright.”

“That one’s too big.”

“But it’s bigger than the last one!”

“Yeah, but now it’s toobig. They need to be somewhere in the middle.”

“Fine.”

“And…try to smooth them out a bit more, okay? They’re a bit…lumpy.”

Releasing an exasperated sigh, Jemma replaced the chunk ofcookie dough she’d been holding back in the bowl and whirled around to facehim. “Fitz, do you really have tomicromanage the way I’m rolling cookiedough?”

Fitz let out a startled laugh, his eyebrows shooting nearlyup to his hairline. “Do I have to…? You’re kiddingme, right? Simmons, you’re practically the queenof micromanaging! You’re always complaining about my part of our projects,trying to tell me how to do my job,not to mention telling me what to eat, when to sleep, how much to study!”

“Oh, you should be thankingme for that. The amount of unhealthy habits you have is ridiculous, Fitz. At this rate, you’ll be dead before you turnfifty!”

“Yeah well at least I wouldn’t have you constantly naggingme anymore,” Fitz muttered. When Jemma threw a dark glare in his direction, henodded toward the still nearly empty cookie tray. “Just…go back to making yourcookies.”

Letting his snide comment go, Jemma focused back on rollingthe cookie dough into balls that weren’t toobig and weren’t too small. When the bowl was empty and the tray was covered withthe uneven, chocolate-chip-infested cookies, she finally placed them in theoven and turned to Fitz. “I guess we’ll know in twenty minutes if I’ve failedhorribly or not.”

“I bet they’ll be fantastic,” Fitz told her optimistically,but Jemma wasn’t so sure.

However, as the twenty minutes passed, she began to growmore and more hopeful that, despite all of the mistakes she’d made, the endresult was going to be much better.And by the time the oven timer was going off, she was nearly bursting withexcitement once more, winning out over her upset at her disastrous firstattempt at baking.

“How do they look?” she asked Fitz, bouncing anxiously onher toes.

“Well…” Fitz cleared his throat, and Jemma felt her heartsinking once more.

“Oh.” Shoulders sagging, she dropped her gaze to the floorand blinked rapidly to stop herself from tearing up. It was just a silly batchof cookies, nothing to really beupset over, but…

“Hey, wait, no. Simmons, don’t cry, okay?” Fitz opened theoven, putting on an oven mitt and removing the tray to place on top of thestove. “So they’re a little…oddly-shaped, but I’m sure they taste great.”

Jemma sniffled, rolling her eyes and hugging her arms aroundherself. “Fitz, you don’t have to say that, alright?”

“I’m not! Really, I can’t wait to try one.” The amount of excitement over the disgustingcookies he managed to infuse in his voice brought a grateful little smile toher lips.

“Fitz…”

“I mean it!”

And sure enough, about fifteen minutes later, when thecookies had cooled down, Fitz actually picked one up and took a bite out of it. The big grin he was wearing for her benefitfaltered just slightly, but ultimately remained plastered on his face as hechewed and swallowed, giving her a thumb’s up.

“They’re awful, aren’t they?” Jemma asked knowingly, smilingsadly.

Fitz let out a little cough, then cleared his throat acouple of times, made a face, and admitted, “Yeah, wretched, actually. Mighthave to have my stomach pumped.”

“Fitz!” Jemmaslapped his shoulder, very much not amused with his ill-humored teasing.

“Sorry, sorry!” He tossed the rest of the cookie in the bin,giving Jemma a supportive smile. “Hey, so you can’t bake perfect cookies onyour first try – you can’t be born great at everything, it’s just not fair tothe rest of us.” When she smiled slightly, he elbowed her lightly in the ribs.“Hey, all you need is some practice, okay? I’m sure if you work at it enough,you’ll be a genius in the kitchen just like you are in the lab.”

“Thanks Fitz,” she murmured, sighing softly.

-

When Fitz woke up a few mornings later, he knew his motherwould’ve already left for work and he’d be alone in the house for the day, buthe was sure Jemma would be up for chatting on the phone, which brightened hisday considerably. After all, neither of them had much else going on in theirlives at the moment.

However, when he descended the rickety old stairs andentered the kitchen to make some simple toast for breakfast, he was startled tofind Jemma herself sitting at his kitchen table.

“Simmons?”

She looked up at his surprised call of her name, beaming,though it seemed to be tinged in nerves. “Hello Fitz! Your mum let me in, Ihope that’s alright.”

“Yeah, um…” He threw a quick glance at a nearby calendar,but the days of Jemma’s planned visits were circled in red – and today wasn’tone of them. “We didn’t make plans that I somehow forgot, did we?”

Jemma laughed, shaking her head reassuringly as she stoodfrom her seat. “No no, don’t worry.” She didn’t move from her position in frontof the table, and her strange behavior was beginning to freak Fitz out a bit.

“So…? I mean, not that I’m not happy to see you, but…what’sgoing on, Simmons?”

She blew out a nervous breath, nodding to herself. “Okay,um…” Turning around, she picked something up off the table from behind her, andwhen she turned back around, Fitz realized it was a cake (a lopsided cake, but a cake all the same). “Happy Birthday,Fitz.”

Fitz knew he’d been staring blankly for too long now, but ithad finally hit him why Jemma had been so desperate to learn how to bake, andhe was absolutely floored that she’dgone to all this trouble just to make him a birthdaycake.

Shifting a bit anxiously at his lack of response, shehurriedly explained, “I knew your mum was going to be working, so you’d be allalone and she wouldn’t have time to make you a cake and I know you likehomemade ones more than store-bought, so…” She chewed her bottom lip briefly,then went on, “I hope it’s alright.”

Swallowing thickly, Fitz finally found words to tell herhoarsely, “It’s perfect. Thank you, Simmons.”

Her beaming smile was back, seeming to brighten up the wholekitchen. “Oh you’re welcome, Fitz.”She held the cake out to him, asking excitedly, “Would you like to have a slice?I haven’t tried it, but I’ve worked on perfecting my baking abilities eversince my unfortunate attempt with the cookies.”

Fighting back the warmth bubbling up in his chest and makingit difficult to breathe, Fitz blurted out the first thing he could think of totry and get himself back on even footing. “You sure it’s edible? If I take abite of that cake and die, I’m gonna haunt you for the rest of your life,Simmons.”

“Of course it’sedible! Ugh Fitz, would you quitbeing so dramatic? I’m never doing anything nice for you ever again!”

Chuckling at the indignant look on his best friend’s face,Fitz gently took the cake from Jemma and set it back on the table. “Come on,Simmons, I’ll get plates and forks and if your poison cake is gonna kill us,then we’ll both die and haunt Professor Vaughn together.”

It was clear she was trying to fight it, but Fitz could seea tiny smirk tugging at the corner of her mouth. “Oh hush, Fitz.”

After he’d retrieved the plates and silverware, he pulled upthe chair beside Jemma, watching as she carefully cut into the poor lopsidedcake, and he felt that swell of warmth rising once more in his chest.“Simmons?”

“Yeah?”

He paused long enough that Jemma glanced up curiously, andhe took a deep breath before repeating sincerely, “Thank you.”

Jemma smiled widely, handing him his plate of cake andsurprising him completely by ducking closer to press a quick kiss to his cheek.“You’re welcome, Fitz.”

[brimbrimbrimbrim]

Hello! I just want to say I absolutely love your writing and your work and I am so glad I found your blog! I wanted to see if I could request like a mini fic if at all possible because you are honestly one of the few people who manage to capture Wrenche's personality perfectly? I'm having a lot of issues with depression today and it's particularly bad and I was wondering what a goofy adorable Wrench might do to try and cheer someone up?

Anon, I’m sorry to hear you’re having a rough patch. I’m glad I can provide something nice for you to read in the hopes it makes you feel a bit better. Thank you for your wonderful compliments! I have a larger Wrench fic in the works, but hopefully, this will work for now.

I have also posted this on AO3 for an easier read. LINK

Something was up. You only know that because the garage has been quiet for the past hour. At first, you hadn’t realized what that tickle in the back of your head had been, but you realize now that it’s the lack of power tools and robotic sounding ‘fucks’ coming from Wrench’s ‘special’ corner that troubles you. When that particular black cloud decided to hang over your head - which happened at random, lasting however long it wanted - you rarely paid much attention to the outside world. The fact that Wrench’s garage is dead silent, and that you noticed it at all, could only mean he’d stepped out when you weren’t looking or… more realistically, that a bomb was about to go off.

From behind your shoulder, you peer across the bright, dusty expanse of the hangar, spotting Josh’s green hooded-back, researching HaDoCk’s latest batch of emails in his own quiet way. You blink with a slow measure of bleakness, exhaling darkly against the blanket you had draped over your head for the past twenty-four hours. Saftey; you think morosely. The scratchy weight of the fabric doesn’t really help, but you feel a little less like falling into the floor with it blocking out the world around you.

Same principle as hiding under the blankets to escape the monster when you were a kid. The monster was gonna eat you if it wanted, and even as a kid you knew that, but you still hid under the covers anyway. Looking out across the messy garage, you realize why you were more able to keep your chin up in this corner than if you’d been camped out on the hood of the old caddy - the place was pure chaos. Like a grenade went off in here, you think, frowning.

It was Wrench’s garage after all. Maybe a grenade had gone off at some point.

Fuck it… you think, twisting back towards your computer screen with a loud, metal screech. You don’t startle, just wheeze at the animated sight before you - spikes, leather and mischief. There, sitting cross-legged on the desk is Wrench; emotes of double carets staring at you and one of those party crackers in his hands.

Please… no….

“Congratulations!” He exclaims, pushing on the plunger, showering you in confetti and cheap paper streamers. For a second, emotion flickers in your chest, but it’s definitely not the type meant to be in response to party favors. In a deep, mocking announcer voice, he continues, “What has she won Jimmy?! What’s that? Is it - it’s a neeeewwww… no, it’s not new, but it is handsome if not a little rough around the edges.”

Wrench gives you a tilde-caret wink as the last of the party fodder drifts down around you. Your heart flutters just enough to tell you you’re not completely dead inside, but your lips just don’t care to twitch, let alone smile. Poised there, on your desk, Wrench leans forward as if waiting for the laughter you must surely be about to rip.

With a heavy breath, you blink and part your lips, demanding, “What?”

Even to you, the question sounds dead. Not even your prescribed medication, meant for moments like this, have helped any. If Wrench wants some attention, then he’s better off finding it anywhere but here. You’ll only disappoint him and that, you’ve come to realize, is not something you want to do. Wrench won’t help, just like the pills haven’t helped and if anything, his little attempt at cheering you up just annoys you.

In all honesty, these past few days of feeling empty nearly allows you some perverse enjoyment in being frustrated by him. It’s something at least, though it sucks about as much as that raw, hungry sensation in your core.

Wrench clears his throat, double carets flattening out into underscores before he - inelegantly - reaches forward to sweep the confetti and crap off your blanket-covered shoulders. You side-eye his hand, watching the bones and veins flutter underneath his incognito dude tattoo.

“Well, I’ve done all I can. Time to take you out to pasture,” he tells you, voice chipper but hesitant as he flicks a bit of paper off the top of your head. Double x’s pop up and with a short huff of laughter, he kicks a foot up on the edge of the desk, throwing an arm over his knee before finishing with, “I bought a dozen donuts as a backup plan, you know… in case I had to raise this situation to a DEFCON two.”

As if to clarify he adds, “I’m not going to put you down… just FYI.”

Most of that passes through one ear and out the other. A voice in the back of your head whispers that whatever Wrench is doing is meant to make you feel better, but it’s not worth it. You sigh, billow out your blanket of shiny crap, rearrange it over your forehead and huddle back into code-compiling mode.

Left without a response Wrench twitches, shifting on the desk; legs collapsing over the edge. His ankles swing back and forth. He hums off-key, eventually whistling something that sounds like ‘It’s a Small World’  until you send a pointed glare his way.

Instead of leaving you alone to wallow in misery, his mask blinks double carets, “I know what you need!”

In a short second - so fast the computer screen shakes - he’s off the desk and darting away like a fucking felon, but he’s gone and that deflated part of you that was trying to be social sighs in relief, settling back into a dark pit; making itself scarce once again. Some part of you appreciates the effort, but a greater part of you doesn’t care at all about Wrench trying to ‘cheer’ you up.

He comes back five minutes later with a cardboard box in his hands. You watch with half-lidded eyes as he crawls up over the desk, knocking over a speaker.

“Oo, sorry,” Wrench mumbles, sounding… a little cute, but mostly you exhale, realizing he doesn’t sound like much of anything. He leaves black scuff marks as he skids up, standing on the desk with only a slight wobble. Your fingers pause, hovering over the shift key as he steps over the screen, legs spread with one foot on either side of the keyboard. Gently, Wrench lowers the cardboard box over the monitor with double zero’s and x’s flipping back and forth over his mask.

You blink slowly, watching him crouch behind the monitor, knees on either side of the cardboard box that happily reads, ‘SuNshiNE & PiZZa.’

“My treat, but if we don’t get pineapple on half, I’ll leave your ass at the Pier.”

It takes a lot of effort, but you manage a weak, “…not hungry.”

If you were capable of feeling any worse, you’d feel shitty for the dejected way Wrench plucks his custom made monitor cover off the screen, shuffles his way off your desk and accidentally kicks over the speaker for a second time, before hopping out of sight.

Two more times he shows up - once with a dirty apron on, holding a car jack like a dog while spouting off hammed up lines from ‘Silence of the Lambs.’ The second attempt at cheering you up ends with fire. You’re not sure how he manages to set the cement floor on fire, but it’s only sorta, not really amusing to watch him out the corner of your eye as he stomps out flames with ‘Come Sail Away’ on full blast behind him.

After the smell of burning rubber fades away and the garage is silent once again, you decide it’s safe to say Wrench has finally given up.

For ten solid minutes, you’re left alone… or maybe the time on the computer is off, and it’s been four hours. It feels like it’s been forever when the reassuring keys under your fingers rip away - someone is dragging you by the back of your chair. The computer screen grows smaller and smaller and stagnant air ripples the edges of your safety blanket. Without reason, a blush rushes into your cheeks as Wrench’s mask slips close against the back of your neck. You can hear his static-laced breath beyond the thick blanket as he drags you and your chair across the garage.

Fingers white on the armrest and knees tucked up; you hold on with muted surprise as Wrench spins you around. Your world swirls like a bad drunken night for a few seconds before he halts your chair; your body jerking at the sudden stop.

Laid out in front of you is his table saw, cleared of all the metal dust and plastic chips. For a moment it almost looks like he’s scrubbed it down, but you blink at the telltale smudge of oil and feel your eyebrows pinch.

“Voila! Welcome to Casa de Wrench,” the forced French accent doesn’t work when filtered through his mask. He sounds like if HAL and Mario had a baby… wait Mario was Italian… ugh, you can feel your brain literally sigh as a tattooed hand, sporting rubber black bracelets, starts waving across the ‘spread.’

“We’ve got these round things with sugar. These - these are… also round, but! - these are fitted with the choicest of dulce and sprinkles. Just imagine the poor unicorn that had to cry those things out for you.”

It’s nice - it really is but-

“I also got you a black coffee with two sugars and a shot of battery acid,” he rants off, so quick and… awkward that it actually throws you for a loop. With a curious expression, you peer up at him past the drape of the simple checker-print blanket and find him looking down at you with running ellipsis.

Say something; you’re more apt mind whispers.

With a frown, you look back at the mess of donuts - most of them crushed as if Wrench had accidentally sat on the box at some point - and the extra large paper cup of coffee.

There’s a little plastic seal sitting off to the side… you note that it’s been placed further away as if Wrench hadn’t wanted to make the little extra addition as obvious as the donuts and coffee.

Coffee and donuts were easy to pass off as a friend looking out for another friend, but a little trinket like that? With a careful hand, you reach out, crossing the spectacle of sugar and caffeine to pluck up the plastic seal. It’s cheap - one of the gimmicky things those t-shirt vendors by the waterfronts sell to tourists, but… it tickles your chest; makes you feel just a little bit lighter, and while you can just barely hear Wrench mumble excuses for the gift, your lips twitch upwards.

Beside you, Wrench goes quiet.

For the first time today, you slip the weight of your blanket off your head and smile. The gesture doesn’t even feel forced - it doesn’t hurt to make, and the soft sound of Wrench’s exhale only makes the faint smile curl further. There’s still a pit in your stomach - a heaviness weighing you down, but it doesn’t feel as dark. Even the world seems a little less gray and pallid.

When you turn towards him, he’s leaning back with two thumbs up, swaying them to and fro in a silent question. Better or worse?

“…better,” you whisper, eyes crinkling with a little wave of contentment.

Your weak response literally causes Wrench to jump for joy, arms in the air, releasing a loud ‘whoop’ of noise.

“Fucking awesome!” he shouts, turning at the waist just to throw a finger at Josh across the garage, who’s staring blankly at the two of you, “Fucking told you I had the magic touch.”

“I,” Wrench inhales dramatically, “am The Whisperer.”

“Usually that term is meant to follow a noun, also acting as an adjective-” Josh interjects.

Beside you, Wrench’s mask drops into underscores, followed by inward arrows of frustration, “Oh my god, shut’the’fuck’up. It’s an overall term.”

To demonstrate said ‘overall’ term, Wrench caresses the air into a circle, spiked shoulders hunched forward. It’s serious and yet not - much like Wrench’s personality is. He’s always full of piss and vinegar - rainbows and dynamite. It’s infectious.

An amused sound trickles into your ears as Wrench mimes his ‘overall term’ while Josh grimaces. It isn’t until Wrench is looking at you with question marks and Josh is staring wide-eyed that you realized you’d laughed. Giggles bubble up under your oversized hoodie, and they only rise into fits of laughter as Wrench’s fist pumps the air, whispering about how majestic he is.

By the time your throat is raw - breathless with laughter - it feels like all that black tar settled in your gut is gone. You shift in your chair, smiling, feeling ten times lighter with the little toy seal gripped in your hands. Colors come back - the world brimming with crisp edges and glitter. The tuned down thrashcore in the corner filters into your ears and as if on cue, your stomach grumbles.

When was the last time you’d eaten? Yesterday morning, maybe.

Only slightly oblivious to Wrench watching you eat - hiding the heart emotes under his hoodie - you take a sip of perfect, hot coffee and ready your tongue for a round hollow disk of deliciousness.

Wrench, you decide, is a fucking national treasure.

[animationnut]

To Gravity Falls, From Piedmont: Chapter 19

Summary: It’s a long way until next summer. Until then, Dipper and Mabel share their daily antics and life problems with their lifelong friends and attentive great-uncles through an endless string of e-mails. Distance makes the heart grow fonder after all, and there’s no place Dipper and Mabel love more than Gravity Falls.

                                                   Chapter List

To: Dipper Pines (GhostHarasserfan); Grunkle Stan (StantheMan); Grunkle Ford (Highsixer)

From: Mabel Pines (ShootingStarRainbowUnicorn)

Subject: New Year Resolutions

Hey!

The New Year is almost upon us, and Dipper and I have planned a bash loaded with sugar and action movies. I've already got my resolutions figured out, so I totally have to know what your New Year's resolutions are going to be.

Much love,

Mabel

As Dipper carted several plastic bowls into the living room his phone beeped, indicating he had received an email. He set the dishes on the coffee table before checking the message. His eyebrows raised and he called, "Mabel, one of your New Year resolutions is to give up sugar!"

"I know!" she answered from the kitchen, over the noise of cupboard doors opening and shutting.

"Yet you just said to Grunkle Stan and Grunkle Ford that tonight was going to be a complete sugar fest!"

Mabel appeared, carting with her bags of potato chips, packets of gummy candies and a pitcher of Mabel Juice. "A sugar fest which is happening before the new year," she pointed out, starting to pour the snack food into the bowls readily laid out. "Once it hits midnight I'm stopping."

"I want to point out that you've never successfully completed a New Year's resolution."

Straightening at that, Mabel narrowed her eyes at her brother. "I have too! I'm great at keeping my resolutions!"

Dipper immediately raised his hand and started to tick the examples off of his fingers. "Last year you were going to finish making that house cozy. Year before that you vowed to take synchronized swimming lessons. Year before that you claimed you were going to start and finish your own web series. None of these things were accomplished."

"You've got a real nasty memory," said Mabel with the pout.

"Nasty for you, maybe," said Dipper in amusement.

"I thought synchronized swimming would be a lot more free and creative, but they wouldn't let me do my own routine."

"You wanted to include dolphins in your routine. Any sane person would have told you no."

"And that house cozy was just getting too big," she continued. "I was running out of wool and I had other crafts I needed to work on."

"On the bright side Dad has a car warmer."

"And the web series would have worked great if my lead actor would have cooperated with me."

"Ashes doesn't do anything but sleep."

Setting her hands on her hips, Mabel declared, "You're not one to talk. What about that model of the sphinx you were going to make out of building blocks?"

"You knocked it down!"

"It was an accident! It wasn't all of it, anyway. You could have started it over. And what about the research report you were going to submit to American Science Digest?"

Dipper shifted his eyes back and forth. "Uh…I ran into some obstacles…"

"Or what about the time—?"

"Okay, okay." Dipper raised his hands in a surrendering manner. "I'm a hypocrite, no surprises there. Look, it doesn't matter anyway. New Year's resolutions are hardly ever kept, anyway."

"I don't mean to break them," insisted Mabel. "I try but then it all goes kabloom. But it's going to be different this year."

"Mabel." Raising his eyes heavenward for a brief moment, Dipper retrieved the pitcher off of the table and shook it, causing drops of glitter-infused pink juice to splash over the edge. "Of all resolutions, you choose to cut out sugar. I'm telling you right now that you're not going to be able to keep it. You are ninety-five percent sugar."

"It's so hard having a brother who doesn't believe in me," lamented Mabel.

Before Dipper could respond, a dual-ping sounded, alerting them to their great-uncles' response. Mabel was typing out a response before Dipper had even wrangled his phone out of his pocket.

Mabel Pines: Hey! The New Year is almost upon us, and Dipper and I have planned a bash loaded with sugar and action movies. I've already got my resolutions figured out, so I totally have to know what your New Year's Resolutions are going to be.

Grunkle Stan: Yeah. Eat, sleep and be merry.

Grunkle Ford: Which has been the closest thing he's ever come to a New Year's resolution.

Mabel Pines: I don't think anyone is taking me seriously here.

Grunkle Ford: What makes you say that?

Mabel Pines: Dipper's picking on me.

Dipper Pines: I was making observations that you didn't particularly care for.

Grunkle Stan: What did he do this time, sweetie?

Mabel Pines: He doesn't think I can keep a resolution because I haven't succeeded in previous years.

Grunkle Stan: You're not supposed to keep New Year's resolutions.

Dipper Pines: Thank you.

Grunkle Ford: Come now, you two. Attempting to accomplish a resolution is an admirable feat, even if you didn't manage to finish it. What's your goal for next year, Mabel?

Mabel Pines: I'm going to give up sugar!

Grunkle Stan: …

Grunkle Ford: …

Dipper Pines: I really don't think any more needs to be said.

Mabel Pines: I can totally do it!

Grunkle Ford: Dear, I think you're underestimating the amount of food you consume that has sugar in it.

Mabel Pines: Well…maybe not all sugar, then.

Dipper Pines: Backpedaling already.

Grunkle Stan: Ssh.

Mabel Pines: Hey, there's nothing wrong with creating parameters! I'll give up all candy, all soda, all sugary drinks, anything that has a high percentage of sugar.

Dipper Pines: You realize that means no more Mabel Juice.

Grunkle Stan: Not that I don't have faith in you, but it seems like a tall order, pumpkin.

Mabel Pines: I don't see any of you making any resolutions. Not that you'd stick with them anyway.

Grunkle Stan: Whoa there missy.

Dipper Pines: Annnd here we go.

Grunkle Ford: I admit its been many years since I attempted to keep a New Year's resolution, but I think I have enough control to stay with it for more than an hour.

Grunkle Stan: Is that a jab at the time I gave up potato chips?

Grunkle Ford: Yes.

Dipper Pines: Which obviously lasted a pitiful hour.

Grunkle Stan: Hey, I was young and reckless. Now I'm old and reckless and competitive. I'm gonna trounce all you dorks.

Dipper Pines: There's the gauntlet.

Grunkle Ford: All right then. What's your resolution?

Grunkle Stan: To not eat vegetables.

Mabel Pines: Boo!

Grunkle Ford: Leave it to a conman to manipulate his advantage in a challenge he knows he can't win.

Grunkle Stan: I can keep any resolution.

Mabel Pines: How about you promise not to trick people out of money?

Grunkle Ford: Very good, dear. That shouldn't be a problem, right Stanley?

Grunkle Stan: No problem at all. Just as it shouldn't be a problem for you to give up all-night research sessions.

Grunkle Ford: …touché. You're on.

Dipper Pines: Am I the only normal one here?

Grunkle Stan: Don't fool yourself, kiddo.

Mabel Pines:  How about you, Dipper?

Dipper Pines: I'm not taking part in this.

Mabel Pines: You could give up going on those dumb conspiracy theory blogs.

Dipper Pines: Isn't the point to select your own resolutions?

Mabel Pines: What's wrong? Afraid you're going to lose?

Dipper Pines: Right. Consider the gauntlet accepted.

Grunkle Stan: You're all going down.

Grunkle Ford: We shall see.

Morning rays spilled through the kitchen window, creating yellow ripples across the tiled floor. Grabbing a banana for breakfast, Mabel ate it on her way out the door, leash gripped in hand as Waddles scampered ahead of her. She graciously stopped to allow excited children to pet her pig and they eventually reached town.

Mabel stopped by the post office on an errand for her mother and then went to the park. As Waddles sniffed along the grass, she paused by a white snack stand and bought a rainbow slushie. She cheerfully took the first sip, the sweet fruity flavour splashing against her taste buds.

Her eyes widened.

"Oh. No."

Shifting her eyes between the nearest trash can and her slushie, Mabel took another long slurp as she accepted her fate.

"Should have chosen something other than sugar…Dipper is going to be impossible to live with after this one."

…

Feet propped up against the arm of the couch, Dipper listened idly to the documentary playing on the television. He browsed the Internet on his phone, automatically clicking on the notification that alerted him that his favourite blog had just made an update.

"Aliens and Bigfoot; How They're Related," he read aloud. "Ooh."

He was halfway through the essay when he realized exactly what he was doing. Mabel arrived back home then, shuffling into the living room with Waddles. He stared at the slushie in her hand and she knew by the instinctual way he angled the phone away from her what he was reading.

After a beat of guilty silence, they both burst into laughter.

To: Dipper Pines (GhostHarasserfan); Grunkle Stan (StantheMan); Grunkle Ford (Highsixer)

From: Mabel Pines (ShootingStarRainbowUnicorn)

Subject: Well so much for that

Hey,

All right, so making a resolution to give up sugar was probably way too much, especially for me. I sort of forgot but then when I remembered I couldn't throw my slushie away, because that's like a crime. Then I thought about how I would have to avoid slushies for a whole year...so I kinda gave in.

Much love,

Mabel

See all messages in this thread (Expand)

Grunkle Stan: Yeah…I swindled a diner out of a free meal after complaining of a hair in my soup—the hair in question belonging to me. This may or may not have happened three hours into the new year.

Grunkle Ford: I don't have a very good concept of time. When I looked at the clock it was ten, and when I looked again it was five in the morning.

Dipper Pines: Yeah, completely forgot about my resolution. Considering it's only January the third, I think we're all pretty terrible when it comes to making resolutions.

Mabel Pines: It was a lot harder than I thought. I think I'll focus on my new resolution, which is to be a good person and try to make the world a little bit of a better place.

Grunkle Stan: How about we just elect Mabel president of the world?

Grunkle Ford: If only it were that easy.

Dipper Pines: Happy New Year, guys.

Grunkle Stan: Happy New Year, runts.

Grunkle Ford: Happy New Year, kids.

Mabel Pines: And regardless of our resolutions, let's do our best to make it a good one!