#keep thinking about a few fics in particular

[chernabogs]

For da prompt... ‘  i’m  tired  of  being  a  prince.  i  think  i  would  actually  enjoy  being  a  frog.  ’ with Malleus...🐸

can u imagine froglleus...

Hop To It

Inc: Malleus Draconia, Reader/Yuu, 1 goat, 1 cow, 1 frog Warnings: None bc this is actually a really sweet fic I promise. I diverted from angst and more into feel good for once LMAO. WC: 4k Summary: Your nocturnal friend invites you to an event at a local zoo. If he could've adopted that goat from Fleur City, he probably would've.

It’s not often you find yourself able to catch a break. Usually, your weekends are filled with needing to deal with the mountain of homework that’s grown over the week from neglect—not at your fault, of course. When you have a housemate with the mentality of a two-year old toddler, two friends that are magnets for chaos, and an overblot a month, things tend to pile up without you noticing.

But on this fine, dare you even say perfect, weekend you finally find yourself capable of catching your breath for a moment. You glance at your alarm clock to see that it’s well past the time that you usually wake up, and so with a languid air about you, you reach out to grab your phone and check the notifications.

You have a few text messages from the various group chats that you’re in—study ones save for the first year's chat—and then a few private messages. Your eyebrow raises at one in particular as your thumb drifts down to click it open. 

Ominous and to the point, isn’t he? You suppress a low chuckle of amusement as you pull up the keyboard. Despite both you and the Shroud brothers working overtime to teach Malleus the ropes of modern technology, including texting etiquette, he still seems to not grasp it in its entirety.

You think it a perfectly reasonable thing to ask. You know that your friend is of nocturnal affinity, but you’d think he’d realize you’re not apt to reply at 3 am by now. Within seconds of sending your message your phone buzzes again with a reply. 

Cut and dry, much like the man himself. He reminds you vaguely of an older parent trying to get their child's attention as you click the call button and heave a sigh. It rings once, then again, before the sound of someone picking up has a slow smile pulling on your lips. 

“I’m in your 3 am thoughts, am I?” You muse as you roll to the side to keep the charger cable from pulling too much. 

“Incorrect. Small mammals, in fact, are my 3 am thoughts.” Malleus’ smooth voice cuts down your hopes in 10 words as your brow furrows in confusion. 

“Elaborate.” In your time of knowing him, you’ve also come to realize that, to those he feels comfortable with, Malleus has a habit of streamlining his thoughts with little to no interruption from his brain to his mouth. Around politicians and strangers, he was perfectly composed in all ways. Around you, he was a certified yapper. 

“I have been made aware of the Sage Island Zoo hosting an event I’m most keen on attending, and considering what I know of you, I’d say you’d share the sentiment.” You hear a clattering sound from the other side of the line, followed by a mumbled curse before Malleus continues. “I want to pet a goat.” 

“I…” You click the speaker button on your phone before pulling up your browser to type in the zoo. “Hold on, I need to figure out what’s in your brain right now.” 

“Let me know when you succeed in doing so.” Malleus shot back as you scrolled through the zoo’s feed. You soon come across a post that seems to tell you what the man is going on about. There’s a petting zoo and expo happening at the zoo this weekend. Present will be the usual armada: lambs, goats, pigs, and alpacas. But they also highlight a special reptile and amphibian petting area as well. 

You give a small ‘ah’ of understanding as you share the post via text message with him. You doubt he’ll look at it—the complex multitasking of looking at a text message and talking on the line is still something that surpasses your young apprentices’ abilities. “You mean the petting event at the zoo, yeah? They got goats and such there.” 

“Correct! Well done, Prefect. I knew your fantastic abilities of deduction would get you there eventually.” 

You wish you could reach through the phone to pinch his smarmy face for that comment as you roll onto your back again. “And you thought of me when you saw that? Aw, Malleus. I am your 3 am thoughts!” 

“Did you want to go or not? I can easily invite Lilia, or Sebek, or Silver… although I fear Silver may end up falling asleep in the petting area. Or drawing far too many of the animals to him again…that might be quite the mess…” Malleus trails off into a thoughtful silence, which is another thing you’ve come to realize your friend does a lot. 

“Fortunately for you, my super busy calendar actually has an opening today that I can squeeze some ‘you’ time into.” You sit up with a groan of protest before looking over to Grim’s bed, where your companion is still snoring away, his belly and paws to the sky. “I don’t think Grim will be coming with us, though.” 

“That is fine. I fear he may not be compatible with the animals anyway.”

Your eyes narrow at how quickly Malleus is to agree that it would just be you and him going as you shoved the blankets off your legs. “Okay, then. Can you give me 30—” you pause and tug at your shirt sleeve for a moment before grimacing, “—actually, give me an hour. Then we can head out. The event starts at 10?” 

“According to their poster, yes. I saved it so that I may check to be sure.” Malleus sounds pleased of the fact that he’s managed to save an image from social media without a crisis happening. 

“I’m proud of you for that. If that’s the case, then let’s grab a drink beforehand.” You yawn as you finally rouse yourself, unplugging your phone and sliding your feet into your slippers. The floors of Ramshackle still manage to be brutally cold in the mornings, even with the new renovations done. You’d need to question Crowley on the furnace in the future. “I need some kind of breakfast.” 

“Perhaps if you woke at a reasonable hour, breakfast would not be a concern.” You hear the teasing lilt in Malleus’ voice. He’s in a playful mood today—more so then usual. 

He’s probably just pumped to get out and about again. 

Your nose wrinkles as your finger hovers over the ‘end call’ button. “Not everyone is nocturnal. I’ll see you soon.” 

____________________

An hour later finds you yawning in the lineup of a local coffee shop. The weather outside is continuing to be promising, with its blue skies and temperate air. You’re basking in the ambience of it all while Malleus, bless his heart, is pushing a pair of sunglasses onto his face. 

“It isn’t even that bright out,” you smirk at him as the two of you move closer in the line. A few patrons are staring at Malleus as he remains close to your side. You can’t quite blame them. Some might be gawking at the fact that the crown prince is standing in a coffee shop line like everyone else. Others might be doing so at the fact that he’s out again post-overblot. 

It’s been a bit of an uphill battle to get him on his feet—which is partially why you’re keen to keep him in this rare, uplifted mood. 

“To you,” he shoots back as he crosses his arms. A beige bag is slung over his shoulder, and he’s surprisingly dressed down for the occasion, wearing simple black dress pants and a dark long-sleeve shirt. You think the fact that he’s managed to wrangle up a pair of hiking boots from somewhere is quaint, too. He almost looks like he’d fit into a petting zoo environment. “To me, it is borderline blinding.” 

“My condolences for the weakness of your eyes.” You focus your attention back to the menu ahead as you feel his elbow hit into your side, making you hiss before chuckling. This coffee shop in question has become somewhat of a routine visit for you both whenever you’re out in town together, which is often done a) late at night and b) in the company of the rest of the quartet. Your attendance has been frequent enough though that you now know both yours and Malleus’ usual order. 

He likes his coffee black. You like yours with enough sugar that it might appeal to Sebek’s tastes. 

“I feel like you’re being ingenuine with that.” Despite the hurt in his tone, you know it’s all bullshit by the smirk that touches on the edge of his lips as you finally shuffle to the front of the line. After stating your orders to the slightly nervous looking barista behind the counter (who must be new, considering that the others are all used to Malleus by now), you spot Malleus reaching for his wallet in your peripheral. A sharp swat of your hand on his arm stops him in his tracks as you tap the debit card Crowley so kindly loaned you on the machine. 

“You didn’t need to do that.” He sighs as the two of you step aside to wait for the orders as you shrug and lean on the counter. You don’t mind buying something for your friends—especially if it’s Crowley’s money you’re spending. “I have more than enough funds to afford a cup of coffee.” 

“It isn’t about the money, it’s about the satisfaction it brings me to buy you something as a token of appreciation for inviting me out.” You pat his arm as the barista sets your cups on the counter before you hand it to him. You selectively ignore the way his fingers touch your hand for longer than necessary before withdrawing with his beverage. 

“Anyway, let’s go wrestle a kid, hm?” 

____________________

Malleus manages to get his revenge swiftly and without mercy when the two of you arrive at the zoo. Before you can even shift your cup into your other hand to grab your wallet, he’s stepping in front of you and setting down more than enough madol to purchase two passes. A part of you wants to tease him over this matter, but the man looks so damn proud when he turns and hands you the ticket that you just shake your head with a smirk and let him have it. 

Another thing about your friend—you can’t expect to do something for him and not have it returned in kind. You know he’s felt indebted to a lot of people ever since his overblot, and small gestures like this make him feel better in a way. You really have missed seeing his smile. 

You come to a stop when you get into the zoo itself to pull out the map of the area. “Right, so we need to figure out where—”

“Goats.” Malleus is looping your arm with his before you can even finish your sentence and hauling you to the side, leaving you to yelp at the suddenness of the motion. His bicep feels like solid stone against yours, which leaves you to accept the fact that you’re not getting out of this any time soon—and that you should really take Jack up on those workout suggestions. 

You continue to feel the stares as Malleus leads the charge towards whatever destination he has set in mind. A few people scatter off the walkway, and one particularly curious child points up at Malleus’ horns while boldly asking his mother ‘why does that man have horns?,’ but Malleus has blinders on as the two of you finally spot a sign for the petting exhibition ahead. 

The sign is large—as is the crowd. 

“Shit,” you mumble as you step closer to your companion. Usually you’re good with lots of people, but considering that it’s both hot out and now you’re entering a crowded space, you feel a knot of anxiety forming. Malleus’ other hand comes to rest on yours as he easily manoeuvres around with a few murmured apologies. His gaze is sharp and he seems far more alert now.

You figure it must be innate at this point. As a crown prince, being aware in crowds is a given, especially considering the high risk of kidnappings and assassination attempts that seem to plague the upper class of NRC. It’s only when a loud bleating sound cuts through the air that a smile graces his lips again as he pulls you aside. 

“Oh, marvellous,” he chuckles as he releases your arm (your poor, poor arm) and leans against the fence. A small grey goat is standing by the post, a few bits of hay hanging out of its mouth as it languidly chews. It looks like every other goat you’ve seen before—and yet Malleus is beaming like the thing is a divine gift. “Remember when that goat followed me around at Noble Bell, Prefect?” 

“Hard to forget. Sebek wanted to punt it across the square.” You lean against the fence next to him as he reaches down to pet the goat's head between its horns. The goat bleats again and tips its head back to bite at Malleus’ sleeve instead. “Probably because it kept doing that to you.” 

“Oh, you are bold, aren’t you? Unfortunately, I am not the snack that you seek.” Malleus sighs in mock despondence as he pushes the feeder closer to the goat. You jump onto his comment pretty quickly. 

“Did you just call yourself a snack?” You lean forward more to look up at Malleus, who diligently ignores you in face of cooing over the goat. You know this technique—it’s another one that your friend loves to do. 

The ‘I can’t hear you’ method. 

Well, you’re happy his confidence is back at least. You stealthily take a few pictures of him fawning over the animal to send to Lilia later before pocketing your phone and moving down the line. A few piglets are romping around their pen, as well as some ponies in the next, and a baby calf who looks up at you with doe-like brown eyes. It’s enough to make you stop and give the little guy some love as Malleus finally returns to your side. 

“See? Even you cannot resist indulging.” Malleus reaches out to scratch behind the calf’s ear with a smile as the small creature shuffles closer to the fence. “Innocence has a way of pulling us in. This calf knows nothing but what it has seen in the few areas it’s been carried to. It knows its mother, what it eats, its handlers, the stars, and not too much else.” 

“That’s a pretty sentimental way of looking at it,” you concede as you withdraw your hand and straighten up. The calf looks to you with those big brown eyes again before lowering its head to eat some of the hay off the floor. 

It seems utterly at ease with both you and Malleus—which is more than what could be said with the crowd. The stares towards your companion have amplified, and you can see it’s beginning to make him irate by the way he keeps casting a few dark looks over his shoulder. His one hand grips the fence hard enough that you’re worried he might snap the wood in a moment. In a bid to retain some of the peace of the day, you loop your arm with his, which causes his attention to snap back to you in surprise as you slot yourself easily against his side. 

“Wanna see what’s in the reptiles and amphibian section?”

____________________

You must admit, a part of you wants to see if any of the animals would react to Malleus. The man is a dragon-fae, after all. You know that bats flock around Lilia, and you’ve seen more than a few black-feathered birds cluttering around Crowley’s office window, but you’ve never seen any lizards or frogs responding to Malleus. So, when you enter the darkened room with the many tanks illuminated by heating lamps, you’re hopeful to see something amusing. 

Instead, you find that half of the cold-blooded fellows are still in their morning siesta. 

“It appears we’ve come at an inopportune moment for them.” Malleus seems more at ease now with both you at his side and the smaller crowd milling in the reptile section. Because of the darkness of the room, less people take note of the prince as you two make your rounds from tank to tank. A few ball pythons stir and look at you, and a gecko is plastered against the tank at another section, but most of the creatures lose interest and settle back to themselves within a few moments. 

Until you reach the frog tank. 

A sign posted at the side which reads ‘lift the lid at your own risk’ prompts a glimmer of interest in Malleus’ bright green eyes as he nudges the lid open to peer inside. Most of the frogs seem to still be dozing in their makeshift burrows, but one stirs awake when the lid pops open. The frog yawns and reaches a hand to rub its belly, blinking lazily as it does. 

You hear Malleus give a small ‘oh’ as he leans closer in interest. “My, he seems quite at ease, isn’t he?” 

“Probably thinks you’re his cousin or something,” you snicker as you look down at the other frogs in the tank. Malleus shoots you a narrow-eyed look before leaning back again. 

“... it’d be quite nice to be a frog, hm?” He gives a sigh before his gaze drifts to the other amphibians. “No stress, no conversation. Just hopping and eating.”

He does another pause of contemplative silence before continuing. “I’m quite tired of being a prince, you know. I think I would enjoy being a frog.” 

You lean back and look at him with a cross of both concern and amusement on your face. “Don’t the frogs usually try to become princes in the stories?” 

“I like to shake things up.” He flashes you a sharp-toothed grin as he looks back in the tank. Despite the amusement in his words and the smile he gave, you can still see the edges of exhaustion and frustration at the recesses of his expression. The crowd rubbed him wrong. He’s been on edge ever since his overblot, and it’s small things like that which send him back into makeshift pits of both despair and doubt. 

You don’t want to see him go back there, and you certainly don’t want Lilia questioning (again) why Malleus is in a sour mood (again). After the whole fiasco with him, the poor man is stressed enough as is without the addition of Malleus’ mental health. 

“You know what?” Your words come out as stern, causing his attention to snap to you in concern. “I know few people may say this, and many may not feel this way, but I like to consider myself somewhat of a different stock. So, I just want you to know, upon my heart and all the tuna I can offer Grim—”

You pause for a moment to draw it out, relishing in the way Malleus seems increasingly concerned before you finish. “—I’d still like you if you were a frog.” 

Malleus blinks slowly as your words tumble through his mind for a second before his expression falls flat. “I… really, Prefect.” 

You can’t keep the facade of sternness any longer as a grin appears and you nudge your companion in his ribs. A reluctant look of amusement crosses his features at this. “Let’s step outside for a second. This crowd is going to drive me insane.” 

____________________

The air feels fresher once you’re free of the crowds as you settle beneath the shade of a tree to finish your drinks. A breeze brushes over your skin and manages to cool some of the anxiety that blossomed from being amongst so many people after so long of being confined in your dorm on weekends. Malleus seems to grow more at ease as well when it becomes just the two of you again. 

“So.” You begin as you pop the lid off your coffee to slot it into the now empty cup. “You looked a little tense back by the cow pen.” 

Malleus is quiet for a moment as he sips his drink before clearing his throat. “Did I?” 

“Mhm. Are you doing okay?” A glance up at his face reveals his gaze fixated on the crowd beyond. He doesn’t answer you immediately as he takes another drink. When he does speak, his tone is less-guarded then before. 

Another thing about Malleus: somehow, throughout the trials and tribulations, he’s become a lot more open about how he’s feeling with everyone. 

“Not particularly.” He finally comments as he crushes his empty cup and tosses it into a nearby trash. “I don’t like to admit it—for it feels rather ridiculous to get upset over—but it still bothers me to a degree when some people… well. You saw.” 

You toss your cup into the trash alongside his. “Why is that ridiculous? You’re entitled to how you feel about something, you know.”

“It’s below my station.” A frown dances on his lips at this. You send him a sharp look in return. 

“Emotions aren’t below your station, Malleus. You’re allowed to feel upset if something is upsetting to you. Just because you’re a prince doesn’t mean you need to bottle things up all the time. I would hope you’d realize that by now after everything that happened. You and the others all needed a lesson in emotional intelligence.” 

Malleus doesn’t reply, which leads you to keep talking to fill the silence. For a certified talker, he was certainly being mute about this. “I understand that it sucks, like really sucks, when people don’t want to talk to you, or treat you like an outlier because of your looks or your status. I know that you want people to engage with you, and you’re putting in the work to do that! You’re going to the coffee shop and talking to the barista’s; you’re coming out to places like this where people will be. The more they see you and get to know you, the more relaxed they’ll feel.” 

“It takes a long time.” His response is curt as he stares at the crowd. You give a sigh and shuffle to stand in front of him. He doesn’t seem aware of what you’re about to do before you’re moving forward to drag that man into the best hug you can give a guy whose arms are crossed in a huff. He tenses under your hold for a moment, and you begin to think that maybe he really is carved from stone, until he finally relaxes and lets you do what you need to do.

The guys probably only received a hug a good six or seven times in his life. You feel like you both need this. 

“It may take a while, but it does happen. The barista’s talk to you with no issue now, and the new one will get that way too. Again—you’re putting in the work, and I can see that, so please don’t try to bottle up all your feelings again. Or Lilia will kill us both.” 

You feel him huff a chuckle as his hand comes to rest on your back. His touch is warm in a way that doesn’t make you feel uncomfortable or overwhelmed, and you sink into that contact with a content sigh. The two of you remain in this embrace for a few seconds longer before you withdraw and awkwardly pat the prince’s arms. 

“Thank you,” he murmurs as he looks at you, gratitude easing its way into his features. You clear your throat and offer him a lopsided smile.

“Wanna try petting the goats one more time?” You ask softly. “Maybe they won’t try to eat your clothing the second trip through.” 

Malleus exhales, his shoulders relaxing as he takes your arm into his once more. “Yes, although I don’t hold much hope about that being true.”

[lucysarah-c]

Following your answer on homosexuality in AoT, how would sexism in AoT be handled on both sides of the spectrum, female and male, on Paradis and in Marley?

Hi, dear! How are you?

Ah, that's such a good question. You know, I did a post about it a LONG time ago, but it’s a topic I touch on a lot in my fics and here from time to time.

I'll set the context of my reply with three ideas. First, sexism or misogyny ALWAYS exists. It exists in our society like oxygen does. In many countries, it’s not the same sexism as in the 1800s, but it still exists. Second, the Scouts PER SE are the "wokes" of their time; they don't have the same views, lives, and beliefs as regular people inside the walls. So I always think that the Scouts are a bit of an "exception" from the rest of Paradis.

Third, and I state this because my blog is Levi-centered, Levi is ALREADY a person, and in particular, a man, with a very different and unique upbringing. I DO believe that Levi has a more "modern" or "woke" view on "women," "women's rights," and "house chores" than the rest of the men. I'll simply say this: a man who saw his mother being treated like garbage because she worked as a prostitute, a man who had to raise himself, and a man who RAISED a girl out of pure heart. I hardly think he judges women on how they dress, who they sleep with, or thinks that "a man shouldn't cook or clean/take care of the kids." So Levi is kind of an exception for me. This doesn't mean he doesn't have internalized misogyny or "micro-sexism" (which I'll talk about later).

Overall, despite both societies allowing "women" in the military, I don't think their views on women or men's roles are much different. I believe there are a few clear examples of this in the manga. If my memory serves me correctly (and take this with a grain of salt because I know that Isayama gave multiple interviews, and a lot of them were edited), he said on one occasion that the Scouts were different because usually, everybody helps with all the chores, like cooking, cleaning, etc., because they work more united and as a family than the rest of the military divisions. Second, he said in one interview right after the manga ended that when he draws "military boards or higher ranks," he always keeps in mind not to add women because they aren't allowed.

Other scenes that quickly come to mind that make me think that Paradis (and I'll speak mostly of Paradis because we don't see much of Marley as a society) is a very sexist society with traditional views:

Most of the time, when we are shown military members from the Garrison OR the MPs, they are mostly men.

Which women are shown that are "recalled" from the Garrison? Riko and Anka… What role does Anka have? Being a secretary for Pixis, more or less, a very stereotypical role for a woman.

A very memorable woman from the MPs is Hitch, and there's a scene where it's clearly said that "there's only one way a woman like Hitch can get into the MPs," basically stating that she made sexual favors to get into that position.

Not a single scene from the military board or higher-up positions shows a single woman.

All the mothers of the characters shown in the story are "housewives" or "stay-at-home moms," which is absolutely fine if a woman decides to dedicate her time to her family as long as it’s a decision she made and not because she didn’t have "other options." Even Eren's mother, Carla, is shown to work as a waitress before she became a mother and a housewife.

All this makes me conclude that probably women inside the military never reach far, either because they aren't allowed (men are preferred over them, offered better positions, promoted first) or because once they get married, they are expected to become stay-at-home wives. I can clearly imagine people thinking that if you get promoted as a woman, it's because you're sleeping with your boss, or if you haven't gotten married and had kids at a certain age, "you're wasting your time" or "a woman's role is to be a mom; they only feel fulfilled like that."

This creates a power dynamic: women are expected to be wives; therefore, men are expected to be the main providers. And this is something I can see men, particularly Levi, being affected by. In my fic, I wrote once that Levi gets very offended when the reader invites or pays for him because she comes from a wealthy family. For Levi, as internalized misogyny, HIS role as a man is to provide. What kind of man is he if he's not paying? Especially for the Scouts' men, it's said that the Scouts have the lowest salaries in the military. If they can't provide, their chances of getting married are probably low. Even today, a lot of men get sensitive or offended if their wives make more money than them. Or men get irrationally jealous and butthurt if their women are more successful than them.

Another way men might get the sour end is in terms of emotional availability. While women's harsh reality is known, men's struggles often aren't. For example (one from Marley), Reiner's mother suffers a lot of social prejudice because she had a kid out of wedlock, and her only "salvation" is that Reiner becomes a warrior. Even today, men struggle with being emotionally available and having more feelings than just "lust and anger." I can totally see men all over the AoT world having to be these "very tough" guys who are only allowed to be "human" when they are alone with "their girl/wife." This happened a lot after WWI; men were sent back home with horrible memories of war and society expected them to just "toughen up and be men." Go, work, and provide for your family; and if you're suffering from everything you lived, then learn to be a man.

It's like I can literally imagine Erwin perhaps complaining that he's having a hard time, and Zackly or any other dude would be like, "You know what you need? A wife; she will take care of the rest."

"I don't have time to dedicate."

"Doesn't matter, a good wife always understands."

"… my salary isn't that good."

"Oh well, you know it's never too late for you to change divisions and settle down." pat on the back lmao end of the advice, and Erwin has the same emotional stress as before.

Overall, I think their views are probably as traditional as they were only a couple of years ago. This is completely ignorable for the sake of fanfiction and having fun; not every piece you write has to send a message or be political. But if you ask me how I think canon AoT characters are, I believe a good part of them, if not most, would be very traditional.

Hope this helps! I tried to cover everything I could remember while being as concise as possible. Thank you so much for your question!

Lots of love!

[jlf23tumble]

is there any masterposts on harry x alessandro? never noticed anything like more between them besides friendship and mutual admiration but maybe i’ve missed something 👁️

anon 2: That pic of Harry that Alessandro posted on IG yesterday was taken by Lloyd LOL!!!! They were all praising it and saying how Alessandro was a better photographer than Lloyd. They quickly changed their tune when they found out Lloyd took it. So hypocritical. I love Lloyd's pics and wish they would leave him alone. But now I want to know why Alessandro posted that pic a day before Harry and Lloyd did. Does Lloyd send him pics of Harry? Cuteee. I see that Harry's been working on his Italian because it's improved since last year and he can speak it quite well. I really want to know if he is learning it because he wants to live over there, there was a story years back about him getting a place done up over there, or if it's just an interest. I assume Alessandro is teaching him because last year at his show Alessandro was by the front and Harry joked about him teaching him rude words lmao. I wonder if Harry will still be over there or back in London by the time Louis does his festival over there.

------

anon 1: If there are any, I'm blocked, which is fine because I've seen the most RANCID takes, and sometimes god does work in my favor/against my baser instincts. For me, there's something so tender/special about Alessandro referring to him as Dionysus and leaving these insanely CRAZY italian captions/comments on posts over the years, I think Suus might have captured a few? I'd have to troll their blog, but no, I haven't seen anything detailed. The fact that Harry's once again living his best live, laff, love summer in Italy, no doubt in spitting distance, just adds a certain something dolce vita to it!

anon 2: YESSSSSSSSSSSS, all of this, I love you, come kith me on the mouth

[caelum-in-the-avatarverse]

Fandom can do a little gatekeeping. As a treat.

So I finally decided to archive-lock my fics on AO3 last night. I’ve been considering it since the AI scrape last year, but the tipping point was this whole lore.fm debacle, coupled with some thoughts I’ve been thinking regarding Fandom These Days in general and Fandom As A Community in particular. So I wanna explain why I waited so long, why I locked my stuff up now, and why I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m a-okay with making it harder for people to see my stories.

Lurkers really are great, tho

I’m a chronic lurker, and have been since I started hanging out on the internet as a teen in the 00s. These days it’s just cuz I don’t feel a need to socialize very often, but back then it was because I was shy and knew I was socially awkward. Even if I made an account, I’d spend months lurking on message boards or forums or Livejournals, watching other people interact and getting a feel for that particular community’s culture and etiquette before I finally started interacting myself. And y’know, that approach saved me a lot of embarrassment. Over the course of my lurking on any site, there was always some other person who’d clearly joined up five minutes after learning the place existed, barged in without a care for their behavior, and committed so many social faux pas that all the other users were immediately annoyed with them at best. I learned a lot observing those incidents. Lurk More is Rule 33 of the internet for very good reason.

Lurking isn’t bad or weird or creepy. It’s perfectly normal. I love lurking. It’s hard for me to not lurk - socializing takes a lot of energy out of me, even via text. (Heck it took 12 hours for me to write this post, I wish I was kidding--) Occasionally I’ll manage longer bouts of interaction - a few weeks posting here, almost a year chatting in a discord there - but I’m always gonna end up going radio silent for months at some point. I used to feel bad about it, but I’ve long since made peace with the fact that it’s just the way my brain works. I’m a chronic lurker, and in the long term nothing is going to change that.

The thing with being a chronic lurker is that you have to accept that you are not actually seen as part of the community you are lurking in. That’s not to say that lurkers are unimportant - lurkers actually are important, and they make up a large proportion of any online community - but it’s simple cause and effect. You may think of it as “your community”, but if you’ve never said a word, how is the community supposed to know you exist? If I lurked on someone’s LJ, and then that person suddenly friendslocked their blog, I knew that I had two choices: Either accept that I would never be able to read their posts again, or reach out to them and ask if I could be added to their friends list with the full understanding that I was a rando they might not decide to trust. I usually went with the first option, because my invisibility as a lurker was more important to me than talking to strangers on the internet.

Lurking is like sitting on a park bench, quietly people-watching and eavesdropping on the conversations other people are having around you. You’re in the park, but you’re not actively participating in anything happening there. You can see and hear things that you become very interested in! But if you don’t introduce yourself and become part of the conversation, you won’t be able to keep listening to it when those people walk away. When fandom migrated away from Livejournal, people moved to new platforms alongside their friends, but lurkers were often left behind. No one knew they existed, so they weren’t told where everyone else was going. To be seen as part of a fandom community, you need to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known, etc. etc.

There’s nothing wrong with lurking. There can actually be benefits to lurking, both for the lurkers and the communities they lurk in. It’s just another way to be in a fandom. But if that is how you exist in fandom--and remember, I say this as someone who often does exist that way in fandom--you need to remember that you’re on the outside looking in, and the curtains can always close.

I’ve always been super sympathetic to lurkers, because I am one. I know there’s a lot of people like me who just don’t socialize often. I know there’s plenty of reasons why someone might not make an account on the internet - maybe they’re nervous, maybe they’re young and their parents don’t allow them to, maybe they’re in a bad situation where someone is monitoring their activity, maybe they can only access the internet from public computer terminals. Heck, I’ve never even logged into AO3 on my phone--if I’m away from my computer I just read what’s publicly available. 

I know I have people lurking on my fics. I know my fics probably mean a lot to someone I don’t even know exists. I know this because there are plenty of fics I love whose writers don’t know I exist.

I love my commenters personally; I love my lurkers as an abstract concept. I know they’re there and I wish them well, and if they ever de-lurk I love them all the more.

So up until last year I never considered archive-locking my fic, because I get it. The AI scraping was upsetting, but I still hesitated because I was thinking of lurkers and guests and remembering what it felt like to be 15 and wondering if it’d be worth letting a stranger on the internet know I existed and asking to be added to their friends list just so I could reread a funny post they made once.

But the internet has changed a lot since the 00s, and fandom has changed with it. I’ve read some things and been doing some thinking about fandom-as-community over the last few years, and reading through the lore.fm drama made me decide that it’s time for me to set some boundaries.

I still love my lurkers, and I feel bad about leaving any guest commenters behind, especially if they’re in a situation where they can’t make an account for some reason. But from here on out, even my lurkers are going to have to do the bare minimum to read my fics--make an AO3 account.

Should we gatekeep fandom?

I’ve seen a few people ask this question, usually rhetorically, sometimes as a joke, always with a bit of seriousness. And I think…yeah, maybe we should. Except wait, no, not like that--

A decade ago, when people talked about fandom gatekeeping and why it was bad to do, it intersected with a lot of other things, mainly feminism and classism. The prevalent image of fandom gatekeeping was, like, a man learning that a woman likes Star Wars and haughtily demanding, “Oh, yeah? Well if you’re REALLY a fan, name ten EU novels” to belittle and dismiss her, expecting that a “real fan” would have the money and time to be familiar with the EU, and ignoring the fact that male movie-only fans were still considered fans. The thing being gatekept was the very definition of “being a fan” and people’s right to describe themselves as one.

That’s not what I mean when I say maybe fandom should gatekeep more. Anyone can call themselves a fan if they like something, that’s fine. But when it comes to the ability to enjoy the fanworks produced by the fandom community…that might be something worth gatekeeping.

See, back in the 00s, it was perfectly common for people to just…not go on the internet. Surfing the web was a thing, but it was just, like, a fun pastime. Not everyone did it. It wasn’t until the rise of social media that going online became a thing everyone and their grandmother did every day. Back then, going on the internet was just…a hobby.

So one of the first gates online fandom ever had was the simple fact that the entire world wasn’t here yet.

The entire world is here now. That gate has been demolished.

And it’s a lot easier to find us now. Even scattered across platforms, fandom is so centralized these days. It isn’t a network of dedicated webshrines and forums that you can only find via webrings anymore, it’s right there on all the big social media sites. AO3 didn’t set out to be the main fanfic website, but that’s definitely what it’s become. It’s easy for people to find us--and that includes people who don’t care about the community, and just want “content.”

Transformative fandom doesn’t like it when people see our fanworks as “content”. “Content” is a pretty broad term, but when fandom uses it we’re usually referring to creative works that are churned out by content creators to be consumed by an audience as quickly as possible as often as possible so that the content creator can generate revenue. This not-so-new normal has caused a massive shift in how people who are new to fandom view fanworks--instead of seeing fic or art as something a fellow fan made and shared with you, they see fanworks as products to be consumed.

Transformative fandom has, in general, always been a gift economy. We put time and effort into creating fanworks that we share with our fellow fans for free. We do this so we don’t get sued, but fandom as a whole actually gets a lot out of the gift economy. Offer your community a story, and in return you can get comments, build friendships, or inspire other people to write things that you might want to read. Readers are given the gift of free stories to read and enjoy, and while lurking is fine, they have the choice to engage with the writer and other readers by leaving comments or making reclists to help build the community.

And look, don’t get me wrong. People have never engaged with fanfic as much as fan writers wish they would. There has always been “no one comments anymore” wank. There have always been people who only comment to say “MORE!” or otherwise demand or guilt trip writers into posting the next chapter. But fandom has always agreed that those commenters are rude and annoying, and as those commenters navigate fandom they have the chance to learn proper community etiquette.

However, now it seems that a lot of the people who are consuming fanworks aren’t actually in the community. 

I won’t say “they aren’t real fans” because that’s silly; there’s lots of ways to be a fan. But there seem to be a lot of fans now who have no interest in fandom as a community, or in adhering to community etiquette, or in respecting the gift economy. They consume our fics, but they don’t appreciate fan labor. They want our “content”, but they don’t respect our control over our creations.

And even worse--they see us as a resource. We share our work for free, as a gift, but all they see is an open-source content farm waiting to be tapped into. We shared it for free, so clearly they can do whatever they want with it. Why should we care if they feed our work into AI training datasets, or copy/paste our unfinished stories into ChatGPT to get an ending, or charge people for an unnecessary third-party AO3 app, or sell fanbindings on etsy for a profit without the author’s permission, or turn our stories into poor imitations of podfics to be posted on other platforms without giving us credit or asking our consent, while also using it to lure in people they can datascrape for their Forbes 30 Under 30 company? 

And sure, people have been doing shady things with other people’s fanworks since forever. Art theft and reposting has always been a big problem. Fanfic is harder to flat-out repost, but I’ve heard of unauthorized fic translations getting posted without crediting the original author. Once in…I think the 2010s? I read a post by a woman who had gone to some sort of local bookselling event, only to find that the man selling “his” novel had actually self-published her fanfic. (Wish I could find that one again, I don’t even remember where I read it.)

But aside from that third example, the thing is…as awful as fanart/writing theft is, back in the day, the main thing a thief would gain from it was clout. Clout that should rightfully go to the creators who gifted their work in the first place, yeah, but still. Just clout. People will do a lot of hurtful things for clout, but fandom clout means nothing outside of fandom. Fandom clout is not enough to incentivize the sort of wide-scale pillaging we’re seeing from community outsiders today.

Money, on the other hand… Well, fandom’s just a giant, untapped content farm, isn’t it? Think of how much revenue all that content could generate.

Lurkers are a normal and even beneficial part of any online community. Maybe one day they’ll de-lurk and easily slide into place beside their fellow fans because they already know the etiquette. Maybe they’re active in another community, and they can spread information from the community they lurk in to the community they’re active in. At the very least, they silently observe, and even if they’re not active community members, they understand the community.

Fans who see fanworks as “content” don’t belong in the same category as lurkers. They’re tourists. 

While reading through the initial Reddit thread on the lore.fm situation, I found this comment:

[ID: Reddit User Cabbitowo says: ... So in anime fandoms we have a word called tourist and essentially it means a fan of a few anime and doesn't care about anime tropes and actively criticizes them. This is kind of how fandoms on tiktok feel. They're touring fanfics and fanart and actively criticizes tropes that have been in the fandom since the 60s. They want to be in a fandom but they don't want to engage in fandom 

OP totallymandy responds: Just entered back into Reddit after a long day to see this most recent reply. And as a fellow anime fan this making me laugh so much since it’s true! But it sorta hurts too when the reality sets in. Modern fandom is so entitled and bratty and you’d think it’s the minors only but that’s not even true, my age-mates and older seem to be like that. They want to eat their cake and complain all whilst bringing nothing to the potluck… :/ END ID]

-

“Tourist” is an apt name for this sort of fan. They don’t want to be part of our community, and they don’t have to be in order to come into our spaces and consume our work. Even if they don’t steal our work themselves, they feel so entitled to it that they’re fine with ignoring our wishes and letting other people take it to make AI “podfics” for them to listen to (there are a lot of comments on lore.fm’s shutdown announcement video from people telling them to just ignore the writers and do it anyway). They’ll use AI to generate an ending to an unfinished fic because they don’t care about seeing “the ending this writer would have given to the story they were telling”, they just want “an ending”. For these tourist fans, the ends justify the means, and their end goal is content for them to consume, with no care for the community that created it for them in the first place.

I don’t think this is confined to a specific age group. This isn’t “13-year-olds on Wattpad” or “Zoomers on TikTok” or whatever pointless generation war we’re in now. This is coming from people who are new to fandom, whose main experience with creative works on the internet is this new content culture and who don’t understand fandom as a community. That description can be true of someone from any age group.

It’s so easy to find fandom these days. It is, in fact, too easy. Newcomers face no hurdles or challenges that would encourage them to lurk and observe a bit before engaging, and it’s easy for people who would otherwise move on and leave us alone to start making trouble. From tourist fans to content entrepreneurs to random people who just want to gawk, it’s so easy for people who don’t care about the fandom community to reap all of its fruits. 

So when I say maybe fandom should start gatekeeping a bit, I’m referring to the fact that we barely even have a gate anymore. Everyone is on the internet now; the entire world can find us, and they don’t need to bother learning community etiquette when they do. Before, we were protected by the fact that fandom was considered weird and most people didn’t look at it twice. Now, fandom is pretty mainstream. People who never would’ve bothered with it before are now comfortable strolling in like they own the place. They have no regard for the fandom community, they don’t understand it, and they don’t want to. They want to treat it just like the rest of the content they consume online.

And then they’re surprised when those of us who understand fandom culture get upset. Fanworks have existed far longer than the algorithmic internet’s content. Fanworks existed long before the internet. We’ve lived like this for ages and we like it.

So if someone can’t be bothered to respect fandom as a community, I don’t see why I should give them easy access to my fics.

Think of it like a garden gate

When I interact with commenters on my fic, I have this sense of hospitality.

The comment section is my front porch. The fic is my garden. I created my garden because I really wanted to, and I’m proud of it, and I’m happy to share it with other people. 

Lots of people enjoy looking at my garden. Many walk through without saying anything. Some stop to leave kudos. Some recommend my garden to their friends. And some people take the time to stop by my front porch and let me know what a beautiful garden it is and how much they’ve enjoyed it. 

Any fic writer can tell you that getting comments is an incredible feeling. I always try to answer all my comments. I don’t always manage it, but my fics’ comment sections are the one place that I manage to consistently socialize in fandom. When I respond to a comment, it feels like I’m pouring out a glass of lemonade to share with this lovely commenter on my front porch, a thank you for their thank you. We take a moment to admire my garden together, and then I see them out. The next time they drop by, I recognize them and am happy to pour another glass of lemonade.

My garden has always been open and easy to access. No fences, no walls. You just have to know where to find it. Fandom in general was once protected by its own obscurity, an out-of-the-way town that showed up on maps but was usually ignored.

But now there’s a highway that makes it easy to get to, and we have all these out-of-towner tourists coming in to gawk and steal our lawn ornaments and wonder if they can use the place to make themselves some money.

I don’t care to have those types trampling over my garden and eating all my vegetables and digging up my flowers to repot and sell, so I’ve put up a wall. It has a gate that visitors can get through if they just take the time to open it.

Admittedly, it’s a small obstacle. But when I share my fics, I share them as a gift with my fellow fans, the ones who understand that fandom is a community, even if they’re lurkers. As for tourist fans and entrepreneurs who see fic as content, who have no qualms ignoring the writer’s wishes, who refuse to respect or understand the fandom community…well, they’re not the people I mean to share my fic with, so I have no issues locking them out. If they want access to my stories, they’ll have to do the bare minimum to become a community member and join the AO3 invite queue.

And y’know, I’ve said a lot about fandom and community here, and I just want to say, I hope it’s not intimidating. When I was younger, talk about The Fandom Community made me feel insecure, and I didn’t think I’d ever manage to be active enough in fandom spaces to be counted as A Member Of The Community. But you don’t have to be a social butterfly to participate in fandom. I’ll always and forever be a chronic lurker, I reblog more than I post, I rarely manage to comment on fic, and I go radio silent for months at a time--but I write and post fanfiction. That’s my contribution.

Do you write, draw, vid, gif, or otherwise create? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you leave comments? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you curate reclists? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you maintain a fandom blog or fuckyeah blog? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you provide a space for other fans to convene in? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you regularly send asks (off anon so people know who you are)? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you have fandom friends who you interact with? Congrats, you're a community member.

There’s lots of ways to be a fan. Just make sure to respect and appreciate your fellow fans and the work they put in for you to enjoy and the gift economy fandom culture that keeps this community going.

[lucyandthepen]

sweet cream, cold brew | lmh ( m )

something about mark lee keeps you up at night, and you’re pretty sure that it isn’t the lingering smell of espresso on his shirt.

alternatively: mark is shy until he isn’t.

read the second part here!

pairing: nerd!barista!mark x reader verse: college au rating: r ( minors, do not interact! ) warnings&tags: unprotected sex, oral (f!receiving), fingering, slightly possessive/jealous dialogue, mark has a thing for tummy bulges because why not, implicitly that also means he has a big dick, a slight???? exhibitionism kink (not actually something that happens, only talked about), johnny exists in this simply to trigger something vaguely feral in mark, reader is a little bit assertive and schemes to get mark's attention, jaehyun is a nosy lil eavesdropper, i think that should be it?? word count: 26.4k

a/n: hello so this was a mess and honestly not a fic i would say showcases my best plot-wise but… what can I say apart from booty wurk mark has me in a chokehold and I needed to release some thoughts and feelings !!! please do not expect too much from the development of the story; i fear it’s quite long and choppy because my ideas were all over the place and i was wringing my hands and brain constantly and i was eager to get to the spicy parts !! this is also not beta’d/proofread, it’s currently almost 1am, and i’ve been writing this on and off for a full week with very few breaks so it honestly felt like a fever dream for me LMAO please forgive any oversights and mistakes; i’ll try to go back on them another day and fix them little by little! finally and …most importantly belated happy birthday, my beloved morkly!

p.s. this will probably be flagged as ‘mature’ by tumblr, which means there’s a high likelihood it won’t appear in tags or searches. please consider reblogging to boost the fic, if you feel so inclined!

You’ve heard tell of how caffeine has inherently addictive properties. 

The more of it you have in your lifetime, the more likely you are to experience symptoms of withdrawal whenever you try to have orange juice for breakfast in its stead. It sounds bad, actually, considering most addictive substances are, but you suppose that its benefits somehow outweigh its milder drawbacks. You’re not much of a coffee connoisseur the way some people — see: your best friends, Yeji and Jisu — are, trying one cafe after the other in pursuit of being able to nominate the winning beans of 2023 (an annual heated debate they participate in for no better reason than their own slow and useless entertainment during their six-hour long breaks), but you do know you’ve only ever experienced good things from having a cup every so often: better energy, a more focused approach to mental activities, and the ability to drive through fifty percent of a road trip without needing pop punk music blasting out of your speakers to keep yourself alert. 

The three of you are generally particular about the coffee you drink, only in different ways. While your friends have a tendency to demand only the best from any establishment — lest the staff hear fiery commentary about the flatness of the brew or the evident coarseness of the grind — you, on the other hand, are a singular individual of rather simple tastes. All you need to survive long days is a glass of vanilla sweet cream cold brew. No modifications to the sugar level or fancy new milk types are necessary; you’ll drink it as it’s served in a grande cup (or a venti, when things prove particularly grueling). 

Of course, you’re strict about other things in the experience of consumption —  like where it’s served and, more importantly, who serves it to you. 

While Yeji and Jisu have rated the Liberal Arts building’s on-campus Starbucks branch as a five with the strict label of POEO — ‘passable on emergencies only’ — branding the menu as “nothing revolutionary” and criticizing most baristas for subpar brewery, you happen to be extremely drawn to the place. Initially, you may have argued that this has to do with the fact that it’s walking distance from most of your classes, confined to the same general compound on campus, so you can always grab a quick recharger whenever needed, no matter how short the timeframe to do so is. Sometime later on, you may have found yourself asserting that the layout of the cafe, albeit small, is very convenient, considering that every table is situated next to an electrical outlet, so you’re never out of battery (important to other students for their laptops and powerpoint presentations, important to you because you have an unhealthy obsession with passing time on TikTok, scrolling past video after video of ASMR girls clicking their twenty-inch long acrylics with their crazy candyland designs), and this makes you feel at ease. 

A month ago, you finally came clean to yourself and, soon after, to your friends, and they came to understand, albeit begrudgingly and with no small amount of amusement, what made this Starbucks unbeatable in your eyes; it had one thing no other coffee shop could lay claim to.

What you know of Mark Lee is accrued from two major sources: long, surreptitious glances in the Modern World History class you share, and irritatingly brief interactions when you place your order from the other side of the counter behind which he stands, long fingers always poised to punch in your order at the speed of light. Sometimes, those encounters get cut even shorter when irate upperclassmen start prattling their orders out before you can even say anything past your own, except even this has its own consolation prize — an apologetic smile at you that seems only for you, although you’re not sure how much of this assumption is true. You’ll just believe it as you feel it. 

And what you’ve learned about Mark Lee has funneled down into two key points for you: first, he is single, a fact you were clued into when a group of his friends came to the coffee shop and sat around the table next to you. You hadn’t been eavesdropping; they’d just been pretty loud, but you’d also perked your ears the moment the one everyone seemed to call “Hyuck” — you aren’t sure if it’s his full name or a nickname, and you don’t particularly care — had leaned in for a conspiratorial whisper about having a vague master plan to set Mark up with an old high school friend’s younger sister that he was just waiting to spring on said Mark, busy slaving away on their six impossible orders near the espresso machine. 

You don’t really know what became of that plan, nor if anyone had telepathically been on your side to outright call it crazy (someone should have had a better reason than you, anyway) since the next moment, Hyuck’s voice becomes significantly louder when it orders the one named Jisung to collect the completed coffee and snacks waiting for them on the counter. However, you feel safe in the assumption that even if it had happened, no repercussions had followed, seeing as Mark still presently comes and goes from his shifts alone and in no clear hurry to meet any cute girls that are sisters of high school friends of his friends. Or, maybe you’re just ignoring what could be truth, but that’s whatever. 

Second, you’ve learned that Mark Lee should not actually be your type — at least, in theory. 

Saying you’re out of his league would be a bit juvenile, but if you had only so many words to describe the situation, you’d say so under duress. It isn’t so much that he’s beneath you in any way, but your interests and general social circles run different routes. Yours tend to be more classically patterned after constantly changing trends, and the people you interact with all seem to have similar goals; you like to call it ‘vibe networking,’ which, from experience, involves connecting with both groups and individuals that are equally aware that they will benefit in some way from any resulting acquaintanceship — whether it be by climbing the social ladder a couple of rungs or being able to call in a quick, off-the-charts favor for something very important and/or very exclusive down the road. You and your friends spend a significant amount of time in a year watching your style and image, something quite a lot of kids in the first couple of years of college tend to do, which means that while you don’t particularly like to spend your time following your grade trajectory, you do have quite a lot of pseudo-friends that all seem to offer something entertaining or helpful to you. 

Mark, on the contrast, prefers to keep his circle very close to his heart, it seems — that which acts as a receptacle for all his interests. You can tell that he likes to be up to date less with trending movies and more with comic books, a separate beast of a world that’s rather unknown to you. More than once, you’ve overheard him chat with his friends about Spider-man Issue Number Whatever-It-Is or engage in somewhat lively (sometimes rowdy, thanks to the Hyuck fellow) discussions about some webtoon you’ve come to understand is called Solo Leveling, which seems to have to do with monsters and hunters — two things you know next to nothing about. You’ve also never seen Mark holding anything remotely close to a magazine; his hands are always filled with either a freshly opened comic or a beat-up textbook. Maybe once or twice, you’ve seen him on his phone, but when you peeked over (surreptitiously, of course) on those occasions, you were met only with brightly colored panels and a singular word: BAM. 

In conclusion — you and Mark Lee live very different lives, likely never truly meant to intersect. 

And yet, you want him — not even in a way that speaks only to your curiosity, but in a manner that feels slightly delusional. More than once, you’ve found yourself having to shut your jaw close after realizing you’ve been watching him steam milk with your mouth slightly agape. Maybe it’s his side profile, which gives you a great view of the way his jaw tenses every time he puts whipped cream on someone’s frappuccino. Maybe it’s his eyes, which always seem to twinkle like he’s harboring some special secret every time someone in line asks for his recommendation on how to spice their order up. Maybe it’s his hands, steady and agile, with just the right showing of veins through the skin to tell you they’ve probably got significant strength to them too. Or maybe it’s just his mind — that thing he always manages to show off in class, working faster than lightning even when the rest of you are in your natural eight-in-the-morning stupor.

Whatever the reason for your interest, Mark Lee makes sure the Liberal Arts building’s Starbucks has you as a regular customer. 

You’re fully aware that this is the twenty-first century, which is why you could, as Yeji and Jisu have so kindly made known, simply ask him out. Under normal circumstances, you would have.

Unfortunately, in this particular area of your life, separate from all others, you’re something of a traditionalist. 

Actually, you just want to know what Mark asking you out would look like. Curiosity has fully gotten the better of you — how can it not, with how he breaks eye contact with you the moment it happens by accident in class, or with how pleasantly and shyly he smiles when you say ‘hey’ to him once you’re about to order? You’d like to see, first-hand, as a recipient of the experience itself, what he would look like taking control of a particular situation like that — something someone like him, so mild-mannered and laid-back, never really seemed to do upfront. 

You’d like to think you’ve given him clear signs. There’s a reason you always come in during his shift times, and it’s the same reason for why you have the same damn drink from the menu over and over again despite not even caring too much about coffee in the first place (something he admittedly doesn’t know and probably wouldn’t puzzle out, given how often you’re in that Starbucks, anyway). It’s that you want him to remember you.

Selfishly, it’s that you want him to think just a little bit more about you every single day. 

But if he does, Mark has never made it very clearly known; apart from taking your order in his genial customer service demeanor or letting a look of brief recognition pass his face over when you cross paths in the hallways, he’s never really shown heightened inquisitiveness about you. For all your differences, only you seem to actually care.

Frankly, that frustrates you, because if you have to think about him unhealthily, it would only be right for him to do that for your sake too. Still, you’ll shrug that hit on your pride off for as long as you can get his attention one way or another.

All you really need is for your plan to pan out as well as you think — and hope — it will. 

The thing is, you’re not even that bad at math. You’ve never really excelled at it, of course, but you wouldn’t go so far as to say you’re in dire need of help from anyone — the kind of help that feels like babysitting, at least.

However, Mark Lee doesn’t know that, and you’re not compelled to make that fact known to him when you notice that he’s leaning on the counter with his elbows, shoulders rolled forward and head bent down. He’s twirling his ballpoint in hand, wrist hovering over a worksheet, and you’re briefly distracted by the rapidly moving shadow underneath it.

His head snaps up when you gently knock on the counter, and the rest of his body follows suit, straightening as he shoves the paper away, one edge crumpling in on itself as it meets resistance in the form of the pastry display glass.

“Hey — hi, _________.” He knows your name, says it easily, and while you’d like to believe it’s because of his unprecedented interest in you, you know that it’s just because you’re always here and always having him write your name on the side of your cup. “Can I get you the usual?”

There’s no particular reason you order what you do; maybe it’s just rooted in the fact that when you first asked Mark for a recommendation, he said that the Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew was pretty good, and you were inclined to believe him (while pointedly ignoring the fact that it was, at the time, a new item all of the baristas were required to push to indecisive, slightly moony-eyed customers such as yourself). Whatever the case, you found the drink generally palatable, and you were also able to score the first of many smiles that fed into your two-semester-long infatuation with him, so it was basically a win-win scenario for all. He even got to do his job by getting some rube (see: you) into trying a new product.

“Hey, Mark.” You’ve long since given up pretending that you don’t know his name and have to check the tag on his cute green apron (why is it cute? You don’t know. It’s the same, standard, Starbucks green, but Mark makes it look homely and natural, somehow). You’ve been here way too many times over the last academic year for a nonchalant, were you talking to me? approach to work, anyway. “That, plus a lemon loaf, if you don’t mind. What’ve you got there?”

His eyes follow the trail of yours over to his wrinkled worksheet. “Oh — no, sorry. It’s nothing.”

“Is it secret?” Your bottom lip juts out, and you see his Adam’s apple bob dangerously, a small telltale sign of minute nervousness before he lets out a short laugh. “Didn’t know we kept stuff from each other.”

You don’t know what makes you say that so naturally. The both of you don’t do much beyond exchanging pleasantries.

“We — uh, well, it’s just a worksheet. For Park Hyosung’s class. College algebra?”

“I’m in Kim Junghwa’s. Can I have a look? I want to know if you’re suffering just as much as I am.”

He pauses, considering your request for a moment, likely wondering if there’s any harm in it before he smooths the paper out and turns it towards you. His handwriting’s a little messy, but his solutions are extremely neat. You see, like, one erasure, max. You also don’t see anything that interests you — except the name written at the top. Still, you can see at a general glance that more than half of his answers are correct; the logic of his organization is way too elegant and his writing’s too sure to be anything else. You whistle low, and his eyebrows shoot up.

“Something wrong?”

“Pretty much the opposite. How is it that you’re doing this without breaking a sweat?”

“Oh, well — it’s not…” He doesn’t even know how to brag. Yet another item in the perpetually growing list of things you find cute about Mark Lee. “I mean, anyone… can?”

“I must not be anyone then.” You meet his quizzical look with a wry smile. “Either you guys are leaps and bounds ahead, or I’m really not going to make it through this semester.”

Another silence passes, just for a fraction of a second — short enough to be passable to others, but long enough for you to wonder if your humor code isn’t up to par with the rest of the world’s — before Mark’s chuckling lowly. His large palm comes down, covering a majority of his answers in the process.

“You’re kidding. I’m sure you’re doing just fine.”

“Mark, look at this face.” You gesture to your evidently dumbfounded, blank expression. “Does this look like the face of someone that’s doing just fine?”

You’re pleased to hear another laugh from him; you don’t know if he really finds you funny or if he’s just the type to be easily amused. You don’t want to know, anyway; assuming is better than actually finding out.

“That bad, huh?” He slides the worksheet away again, like he’s afraid his correct answers are going to offend you into leaving the cafe. Instead, his hands start working on your order, grabbing a cup and scrawling the shorthand of the drink on one of the little boxes. “Ever think about getting a tutor, maybe? If you really feel like you’re drowning, that is.”

“A tutor? I guess that depends. Are you free on weeknights?”

The marker makes a soft screeching sound as he drags it down with too much force, ruining the penmanship of your name. Mark takes a moment to stare at the mistake on the plastic before he looks at you, pointing the rim of the cup towards himself. “Sorry — am I free—?”

“You said I should get a tutor, right?”

“I thought — no, sorry, I was thinking more like one of those department-assigned tutors you can ask the faculty for, or something.”

“Oh. Are you not one of them?” You sigh, albeit a little over dramatically. Thankfully, he doesn’t really cotton onto your acting, too caught up in befuddlement at the turn of the conversation. “That’s a bummer. I was kinda hoping that if I was going to ask for help, I’d get an actual genius. You know — someone like you?”

You can tell by Mark’s expression that he’s torn between denying your compliment again and responding to your actual question; he looks both relieved and miffed when the student behind you clears her throat.

“Sorry, but— you know that there’s a line, right?”

You both apologize, Mark’s much more sincere than your own, and you step aside. His gaze follows you for a moment before it snaps back to the next customer, his voice abandoning that bemused uncertainty it had taken up with you. You don’t really mind; as far as you’re concerned, any dent in his barista persona when he talks to you is a step in the right direction.

You hang around the pick-up area, receipt in hand, watching Mark clear the line before moving to the actual stations near the kitchen area. There’s a concentration on his face that you find all the more attractive; he has a habit of chewing on his bottom lip when he’s trying to focus on getting the drizzle just right inside the cup’s cylinder.

He tends to try his best at everything, you figure. Not an unattractive quality — not by a long shot.

Mark finishes your drink first; the milk’s still only seeping, cloudy, into the coffee when he brings it over. He doesn’t even have to call your queue number, opting to meet your eye — albeit slightly nervously — instead. You reach out to hold the cup, a calculated move that allows you to brush hands against his without him being able to pull back on instinct. He doesn’t, nor does he really seem to want to, but his jaw tightens as a flush creeps along the curve of his ears.

“You really won’t help me?”

Your question’s abrupt, almost a little demanding, even if your voice is sweet. You’re not above asking this much, anyway, even if you technically want him to make the first move. The redness sinks down to his earlobes.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t really say anything,” you tease. The cup’s on the counter now, so he can easily relinquish it to you at this point, but he still hesitates, only one hand slipping out from under the heat of your palm. He uses it to rub the back of his neck, chuckling softly, and you take this as a green light. “What time does your shift end?”

“Five-thirty. You sure you wouldn’t want someone better?”

You pull your cup slowly to yourself, and his hand, still lightly trapped by your own, follows for a few inches before he’s withdrawing, the counter between the two of you forcing the distance. A smile follows the shaking of your head, and you take a small sip of the drink before you respond simply.

“There’s no one better than you.”

Mark is a prompt kind of person; you learn this when, at five-thirty, he comes over to your table, tugging his apron off over his head. Of course, you might attribute that to his overall personality, but the fact that you spend the remaining two hours of his shift casting him glances from the left side of the coffee shop might have also been a contributing factor. The looks you give him aren’t even furtive; they’re deliberately long, so you never miss whenever he looks over to you from time to time.

He doesn’t hold eye contact for very long (he does it well enough when he’s talking to customers, but it’s not like you’re ordering another cold brew from across the room at that point), but you can read snippets of his thoughts through the fleeting gaze exchanges. He’s curious as to why you’re asking for help, now, of all times, when the semester’s more than halfway over. He’s surprised that you asked him, of all people, because he just can’t conceive of a world that isn’t within a television show where this kind of abrupt, overt request makes sense. He’s flattered that you even asked him out of the blue. He’s equal parts anxious and eager to know what’s meant to happen after his shift, once he starts fulfilling your request.

Most of all, he’s unsure if he’s reading you right — if what it feels like you’re doing is something he’s attaching too deep a meaning to. If he’s right in reading your signs.

You don’t really mind it; you like knowing that Mark somehow wears his heart on his sleeve, even if he tries to remain neutral for the sake of appearances. You also bask quietly in the fact that he’s looking at you twice as much as he ever has in the time you’ve loosely known each other. Still, his bubbling confusion and inquisitiveness seem to be interfering with the rest of his work, especially when you notice that he’s been wiping down the surface of a table two down from where you are for more than seven minutes.

In the hopes of easing whatever tension might be in his heart, you offer him a small smile, but that’s only met with his eyes immediately glazing over and inching a couple of centimeters above your forehead, where the story of Starbucks’ origins is drawn out in a faux-manga style. He pretends to find it interesting, as if he hasn’t seen it a million times from coming into this establishment day after day — you know it well enough, and you don’t even have to, considering you don’t work here — and you can’t do anything but hold back your laughter.

A small part of you says you should just give him the affirmative answer to his biggest question, but every other cell in your body says that it’s no fun if he doesn’t ascertain it for himself.

He has his school bag and textbook in tow when he approaches, taking the seat across from you. There’s a steely resolution on his face, like he’s been emotionally preparing himself for such a daunting task, but it eases up the moment you laugh lightly.

“You don’t have to act like I’m going to eat you.”

“I’m still not sure why you’re suddenly asking me to help you,” he admits. He’s also very honest, you note. Again, not an unattractive trait. “I’m not complaining. I just didn’t think you even had an opinion of me.”

“Why’s that?” You’re genuinely surprised. Mark drums his fingers on the front of his textbook, thoughtful — less for the sake of thinking what to say and more for the sake of considering how to say it. It’s clear he wants to avoid calling attention to the fact that before now, you two have had no reason to run the same track, let alone sit together and talk at a coffee shop, as if you’ve always been the best of friends.

“Genuinely just thought I was the guy who gave you your afternoon coffee every day,” he finally settles. Your eyes widen, and another laugh escapes you — a little louder this time, enough to call the attention of a couple of jumpy freshmen nearby.

“Well — let me put it this way.” You lean over slightly, cupping your chin in your palm. “Was I just the girl you made coffee for every day until now?”

There are clear cogs turning in his head; his eyes unfocus slightly as he thinks of the possibilities. His silence suddenly makes you somewhat nervous; your tone had been confident, and you’d only said that to prove a point, to push him in the right direction, but you realize that you hadn’t previously factored in the possibility that he might simply say yes — or, worse, say no just to avoid hurting your feelings.

You watch his lower lip curl in; he uses his tongue to smooth out the skin that’s slightly dried from work fatigue. You would much rather it peeked out, so you could imagine it against your own. His response is mumbled in a lower register, but you catch some key syllables — didn’t… not … stranger — pretty … you?

“Sorry?” You ask patiently, but the fact that he turns red and laughs again — something you realize is not only a trademark of his personality but also downright delicious of him to be doing — is all the answer you need to let the apprehension seep from your shoulders. “I didn’t catch that.”

Mark clears his throat. “No, I… didn’t think of you that way. I mean… you’re my classmate.”

“Sure,” your tone’s breezy, but the somewhat sloppy confirmation of interest in you makes your heart soar. He just needs more of a push. “And we’re basically friends, right?”

“Yeah.” His voice is unsure at first, like he can’t seem to wrap his head around the concept. You can tell that Mark’s notion of friendship is likely based on shared interests, of which you admittedly have none. Technically, if you were his friend, you’d spend less time just telling him the exact same order every single day and more time sitting around a table trying to learn how to play Magic: The Gathering with him. Still, he takes one long look at your grin and suddenly gains confidence in his next words, as if it somehow convinces him that the briefness of your old conversations had been a mutually agreed-upon thing and not the product of social distance between the two of you. “Yeah. We’re friends.”

“Right. Friends help friends, don’t they? I’d definitely feel more comfortable having a friend teach me than some stuffy upperclassman I don’t know.”

You see Mark’s lips move slightly, in such small movements you could have imagined it as breathing if you didn’t care too much (which you do). He mouths, to himself — friends help friends. For some reason, that boosts his conviction even further, and he nods.

“Makes sense. Well — for as long as you don’t mind me, then.”

“Mind? I asked you, so I should be saying that.”

“I’d never mind — I mean, of course I don’t mind.” He’s quick to correct himself, and you have to stop your own hand from reaching out to try to satisfy your curiosity, the desire to know just how hot his cheeks get when he blushes. “More than happy to help, actually.”

“And I’m more than happy to be here.” You beam at him, and he mirrors your smile. You don’t know what it is about the look on his face — the brightness in his eyes, or the slight lift of his eyebrows, maybe — but it gives you the impression that he might be feeling at least a fraction of what you are: the feeling of your heart lifting off a few inches from your rib cage. “Since we’re on the same page, I hope — should we get to it?”

From the moment that Mark opens his textbook to a chapter on inverted parabolas, he assumes a personality you feel you haven’t seen from him before. You realize that you really do know him in only two limited capacities — his classroom persona that seems to really only view himself and the material, focused on the board and the professor’s words (even up until the useless anecdotes) to absorb as much information as possible, and his more genial customer service form, always happy to assist in the trained, easygoing way you’ve come to meet so often.

Right now, he’s a blend of both, yet somehow neither all at once. He’s quick to catch the parabolas you draw, either wrongly or downright poorly. Despite initial hesitation, he always manages to say something; there’s already a pattern to how he does it, from his slightly awkward, “Ah, sorry, actually —” to the way his finger traces over what you’ve written, outlining the right curve. You find his interruptions so endearing that you start drawing them wrong purposefully — not enough for him to realize your schemes in their entirety, but enough to cast you a few amused glances, like he can’t imagine why you’d map out such an absurd graph. You get the feeling he wants to actually laugh at how ridiculous you’re acting, but he can’t tell if you’re seriously struggling or not, so he settles for a smile he thinks he does well in keeping to himself, but that you catch anyway. He’s patient, even when you have to rip out pages from the back of his notebook because of your ‘mistakes,’ like he’s still catering to your request for an extra pump of syrup for your coffee on sleepy days.

But there’s also that side to him that comes out when he suddenly remembers the distance between you that, before today, had felt unlikely to be closed. It peaks at odd moments, like when you’re borrowing his pen because yours is currently holding your slowly unraveling bun up, and your fingers brush against his. It surfaces abruptly when you lean in to watch what he’s drawing until he realizes how close you are, arm lightly grazing his, and his pen freezes, ink blotting on the paper for a second. It’s in those times that you can almost hear his brain churning out questions — like he’s wondering if you’re just oblivious or if you’re doing something on purpose that he can’t quite believe. Like he wants to ask you what’s on your mind, but he just doesn’t know how.

If he asked, you would reply without missing a beat. The answer, after all, is simple (him). But Mark never raises the question, only does something without fully acknowledging what he’s doing — the adjustment of his glasses on the bridge of his nose, the ruffling of his hair as though to shake off his thoughts, the clearing of his throat to normalize his tone before he explains something you’ve just asked about. There’s always that light tinge of pink to his face that makes him look even more endearing, and it fades and returns every so often for the better part of two hours.

By the time he rubs oncoming fatigue out of his eyes, the sun has already set; there are far fewer people around you at this time, and for as much as you like spending time with him and breathing in the scent of his shirt — always a tinge of Downy, barely cutting through the much more overpowering scent of espresso and sugar — your back has begun hurting from your front-heavy posture and determination to have your face as close as rationally possible to Mark’s. Still, you don’t miss out on the fact that the act of him cracking his neck to relieve tension makes your lips curl inward, trying to stifle an inappropriate noise in reaction to the view.

“I feel like I talked your ear off,” he pipes up, sounding a bit sheepish. “Sometimes it’s hard to know when to stop once you’ve gotten started. I’m just hoping I didn’t bore you to death.”

“Meanwhile, I’m here hoping you aren’t sick of my questions already.” You smile, closing your notebook and hanging the clip of your pen on the spiral. Your arms stretch up first, followed by your back, a light twist to relax your posture into normalcy again. Mark’s breathing falls quiet, like he’d been preparing to say something in response but had let it die in the back of his throat instead. You let your eyes drop, expecting to see him looking at you, as he mostly has been — on and off — since his shift ended, but his eyes are far lower than yours, the telltale redness now growing in evident splotches across his cheeks.

The hem of your shirt has ridden up; while there’s nothing outrageous about it, there’s a short expanse of skin that it reveals, for a brief moment. His eyes are slightly glossy, brow furrowed like he’s trying to find a solution to something he can’t fully understand. You’re not even sure about what he could really be looking at, or if there’s something he’s just thinking of that caught his attention while his eyes focused on a rather unfortunate spot. To test your theory, you suck in your stomach slightly alongside an inhale.

It should be objectively funny to watch Mark blink unevenly, left eye going first before his right tries to catch up, but you manage to stifle your laughter — poorly, though, because you end up coughing a little and breaking him out of his strange trance. You avert your eyes quickly enough for him to look vaguely relieved that you hadn’t caught him looking. So he thinks, at least.

“Anyway.” You feel bad that you have to tear his mind away from whatever faraway land it must be trying to burrow a hole in; the dazed expression on his face dims into hastily hidden embarrassment. You don’t want him to feel awkward, so you just busy yourself with packing up, making an unnecessary show of stuffing your notebook back into your bag as if it isn’t half-empty at this point. “I really appreciate you taking the time to help me.”

“Any time.” His first attempt is a little raspy, maybe from overuse of his voice today, so he clears his throat and tries again. A slow smile builds on your lips. “Any time, really. I’m glad that this is actually helping you; you pick things up surprisingly fast.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah. Give it a couple of weeks, and you’ll probably be ready to tackle it on your own again, I’m sure.”

He smiles reassuringly, but all you can think about is how that’s not good. You should pretend to be a little dumber next time, or this will end much too prematurely.

The next five minutes pass in silence; you don’t expect to be knee-deep in conversation anyway since, as much as you try to convince him, you aren’t actually anywhere close to being those kinds of friends yet. There’s an unspoken rule to the give and take of things, where he pauses for you to get an item off the table and push it into your bag before he does the same with his own belongings. Neither of you really intersect paths, save for the moment you both grab your phones and stand at the same time.

His jaw falls open like he’s preparing to say something, then shuts as if he’s better decided against it. You decide to take the initiative to say what you’re assuming he wants to. “Same time, same table?”

“Oh — uh, yeah, for sure.”

You want to ask him to walk out with you. You want to lace your fingers with his, tug him out, and kiss him under the green and white glow of the sign outside. You want to know if kissing his collarbone means you’ll taste a hint of coffee. You think about doing it all somehow, especially since he’s fighting back a slight smile at the promise of tomorrow.

But it just isn’t the right time.

Instead, you place a hand on his shoulder, giving it a light squeeze. The slow movement of his throat — yet another hard swallow — isn’t lost on you, and his eyes land on where the two of you connect. With a grateful smile, you bid him a soft goodbye, taking your leave first.

You don’t look back — at least, not until you’re fully in the cover of the darkness outside. On the gravel path, just out of reach of the lamplight, you chance one last glance back into the store. Mark is still rooted to the same spot, his backpack slung over one shoulder, staring at the table like he’s dissociating from what just happened — like he can’t believe the last couple of hours.

Your smile grows when you see his own, and his hand comes around to the back of his neck, rubbing it lightly like it gives him small comfort to let him know that it was real.

Baby steps, you remind yourself. You’ve already got one foot in the door, after all.

As the days trickle by, you fall into a more comfortable standing with Mark; there’s a routine to your meetings that seems to eliminate the initial and abrupt awkwardness of that first day. You come into that Starbucks at four, greet Mark, who doesn’t ever have to ask for your order, and spend the next hour and a half slowly sipping on it until the ice has thinned and watered down your drink substantially. In that time, you allow yourself to do whatever you want (as if you’ve ever done otherwise anyway), and what you usually want the most is a good view of him. You therefore use most of the minutes you have on hand to regard him from different angles — from the side when he’s frothing milk, upfront when he turns to leave cups on the pick-up counter, from the back when he’s clearing tables — interspersed with moments of checking your TikTok feed, clearing group chat messages, and sometimes re-curling your bangs with a portable iron from the school’s co-op center, a relatively new purchase you tote around these days. You do essentially anything in between to avoid acting too suspicious while he works.

Sometimes, you catch Mark’s eye too; the more your meetings increase in number over the course of a few weeks, the more deliberately he looks over at you, and the longer it lasts. You feel like you’ve made significant progress when your gazes lock and he smiles slightly, albeit a bit unsurely, instead of turning away like he used to. The other day, he’d even passed by while apologizing for how long you always waited for him — not that you ever minded, something you made a point to clarify with him before he walked away, carrying a couple of chairs from the back room with him to replace rickety ones.

That he’s able to transport them easily, as if he’s lugging a bag of apples from the grocery, does not escape your watchful eye.

What you like the most is that you start to learn more about him in a way that isn’t fueled only by your expectations and, therefore, limited by your imagination. You find out that he’s from a close-knit family with a rather cushy background, and this barista job is just for interest funding and experience, in that exact order. Most of his earnings are funneled into the things he collects, which apparently isn’t limited to comic books and special edition blu-rays with director’s cut but also a rather stupendous amount of PopMart blind box figurines. Apparently, he particularly likes the Skullpanda series even if he hasn’t completed it yet; your last session together had adjourned thirty minutes earlier than usual so that he could catch a pre-rush hour inner circle train to Hongdae, where the flagship store was set to open on that day. He’d promised to show you his pulls (as long as they weren’t embarrassing dupes). You learn that he likes to listen to loud music when he studies to stimulate his mind, and he has a playlist that’s just a jumble of songs from Punk Goes Pop volumes that makes him feel empowered for some absurd reason, like he’s going against the grain. You don’t really get it, but you do like that spiced-up rendition of Ariana Grande’s Problem that he let you listen to once.

Of course, there are things that you find out not through conversation but through continued, closer observation. You notice that he likes to put on chapstick even if his lips aren’t particularly dry, but he does worry on them often, most especially when he’s thinking hard about something. He has a habit of saying honestly… at the start of every other sentence, as if he’s concerned you won’t take his word on anything, even though he’s just talking about how unnaturally hot it was at noon despite it still being spring. He has long eyelashes that you’re equal parts attracted to and jealous of, and he bites the inside of his cheek whenever he wants to pep himself up after grueling shifts. He plays beats you’re not even sure he knows he’s creating against his knee with his fingers, so enthusiastic and consistent in this habit that you want to offer your thigh instead. His shoulders always go first before he laughs, and he does this thing where he raises his hand to cover his mouth at the start of it, which is a shame, because you’d do anything to keep seeing him smile like that — or, better yet, to be the reason for it.

Then there are those things you notice he tries to hide. He always turns his face halfway to the side when he blushes, something he seems to do without fail every time you smile at him. He has to temper the intensity of his grin when you take the time to compliment him on how cool his shirt is, or how nice his hair looks today, or how smart he is, like he doesn’t want you to know how good it makes him feel even if you want him to feel good about it, around you, because of you. Sometimes he denies it for the sake of responding, and his voice always lilts on the first syllable in his refusal to accept what you say, even though he knows you won’t take it for an answer.

And after a couple more careful experiments, you notice that Mark, out of the many things he’s interested in, seems to have a particular thing for your stomach.

You don’t know if it has anything to do with him not really seeing much of it in real life in his own time or if he just has his own kind of fixation on it, but you start to cotton on by the fourth time you meet. An hour of being hunched over a table that’s not at the greatest height in relation to your neck and torso has you stiff, and you’d leaned back in your chair, arms pulling to the air, hoping your spine might feel like realigning if you exerted enough tension pressure that way. Your shirt hadn’t ridden up this time, considering it had been tucked into your jeans, and it was because of this that you’d caught a flicker of something new in his face that you hadn’t seen before.

You could have sworn it looked like disappointment.

Of course, he hides it quickly, as he does with most of his emotional candor, but it’s enough to make you suspicious — enough to make you wonder if Mark is also just keeping something to himself. Or maybe you’re just projecting your own presently secretive nature onto him. Regardless, you think it’s odd that whenever you stand up or stretch, his eyes almost immediately fall to your midriff, like he wants to challenge your clothing into a staring contest before he thinks better of it.

You don’t mind, anyway. He can look as much as he likes. Maybe when the weather’s warmer, you’ll even cater to that interest and wear a crop top. Hopefully, that’ll be the push he needs to act on human instinct and ask you out or, like… bend you over. Maybe.

You’re often plagued with these kinds of thoughts in between the ones you try to keep as family-friendly as possible — now, more so than ever.

Sometimes, it’s easier, especially when you’re caught up in talks with him; despite the fact that he doesn’t seem like much of a conversationalist when it comes to generic matters, when either he or you are enthusiastic about a particular topic, he has a tendency to get carried away. There’s nothing impure about how his eyes light up when you remember to ask him about the movie he saw with his friends over the weekend or the way he hums old Nickelodeon cartoon theme songs under his breath whenever he’s looking for a page in the textbook. It’s more of a situation where you’ll observe something and immediately run with it despite it being an objectively normal action.

Like right now, as you’re watching him turn his pen between his fingers. Now, while he’s shaking his knee in mild impatience, as if he’s trying to will the answer to the worksheets you’ve both been trying to get through for the better part of the day faster. You’d made copies of the problems your professors had assigned and exchanged them under the premise of being able to practice more intensely.

However, whereas Mark is actually focused on solving, you’re just watching him out of the corner of your eye, wondering if he’s ever been told that his fingers are fuck-worthy on a singular, unique level or if it’d feel good for you to ride the thigh he’s currently moving, jeans and all. You consider the feeling of his warm palms on your bare waist as you do it, and you end up wondering if that’s what crosses his mind whenever he sneaks glances at you, too.

You’d know the answer to all those things if he’d fucking ask you out. Maybe you could do it after all. Maybe you should, instead of relying on slowly increasing the probability over such a long period of time. Maybe if you asked nicely, Mark might pull the shades down on the storefront windows and rail you against the glass.

You’re so lost in thought that it genuinely startles you when he plops his textbook over the worksheet, rattling your eraser dangerously close to the edge of the table. You’re still clutching your heart while he rubs his eyes a little too violently.

“Can’t,” he groans, and his neck gives into the weight of his head, allowing it to loll backward. “I feel like the numbers are just melting into each other. I swear, I thought I could read words out of them.”

“Maybe we were a little too ambitious with the double worksheet agenda,” you admit, even though you’ve barely gotten past half of yours and certainly haven’t touched a single item on his. “Should we call it a day for now?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, although he still takes the time to encircle his final answers before clapping his palms to his cheeks (an act that has your mind dangerously close to wandering off inappropriately again) to wake himself up. “Woah. I didn’t even notice how dark it is already. I’d say time flies when you’re having fun, but I’m not too sure about the ‘fun’ part of it…”

You trace his gaze towards the glass; the moon’s already out, surrounded by a smattering of low-light stars. You hadn’t realized how late it had gotten, probably because your mind had been on R-18 mode for most of the afternoon. Also, the days are getting generally shorter, but that fact doesn’t make you feel as embarrassed, at least.

“You got a ride?”

The question once again shocks you out of your small trance, and you turn back to him with wide eyes. “Well — no. Wait, I didn’t know you had a car. Why’d you take the subway, then?”

“Oh — no, sorry, I… don’t.” He looks suddenly sheepish, eyes dropping to the shiny surface of the table for a moment before they snap back up, as if he’s actually actively reminding himself to look at you. “I was wondering if you wanted me to — actually, more than that, are you going home already? Not that you need to stay; it’s not that important, but…”

You try to gloss over the fact that he had just been about to initiate another huge step in the right direction (i.e. offering to walk you home) by beaming at him, maybe a little too widely, if only to mask your disappointment at the sudden shift in conversation. “I have nothing waiting at home for me but a sandwich dinner and Singles Inferno, so hit me with whatever it is.”

“Oh, cool.” His lips turn up, and the corners shake, this show of happiness once again tamped down by his own inexplicable desire to maintain a safe distance. How are you supposed to tell him you’re desperate to bridge that gap without using those exact words? “I came from the flagship store yesterday — the one in Hongdae that I told you about?” He allows the smile to widen slightly when you nod in genuine understanding. “Got the last six boxes of the collection I’ve been trying to finish.”

You whistle appreciatively. “Can I ask you for a loan on my next phone bill? You know, once I’ve upgraded to something pricier.”

“Nah — just itching to complete the set,” he laughs. You wonder if he’s been doing that more often because he knows its crippling effect on you, though you doubt he’s that sly. Again, maybe you’re just projecting too much of your own motivations onto him. “This was probably about two months of saving up combined.”

“No new Iron Man issues to look out for, then?” Your voice is warm even though it takes on a teasing tone; Mark’s hand rubs the back of his neck, and his expression is a little sheepish, but you’re happy that the times he used to go completely quiet, opting only to blush at your attempts to act more familiar with him are pretty much gone now.

“Maybe next month.” You also like that he doesn’t really treat his hobbies as secrets, neither out of shame nor snobbishness. He explains these things to you the same way he does the topics you study — with an air of contentedness, like he’s happy someone listens to him without interrupting. On your end, you have no qualms with listening to his voice for hours, wondering when he’ll stop using it to greet you when you come through the door and when he’ll start saying your name in a way that makes you feel like you’re the only one he sees whenever you’re near. It’s a win-win situation (sort of). “I was actually debating between this collection and a really rare copy of Spi— well, never mind that. I just thought — since you were asking me a bit about blind boxes last time. You know, if you wanted to. With… me.”

As much as he’s become comfortable talking to you about things that don’t involve coffee orders and school, you can’t say that you aren’t doing your fair share of the work in connecting the dots; the demand for your efforts is exponentially higher in moments like this, when you think he’s trying to ask you something but can’t seem to find less-than-eager words to avoid what he thinks might spook you.

Luckily, he augments his fragments with action; reaching into his backpack — which you notice seems to be bulkier than usual — he starts extracting small brown boxes, all with the same design; it seems, for lack of better words, aesthetically gothic, and you reach out to pick one up, turning it over and examining the print on each side with vague interest. Mark starts laying them out on top of each other until there’s a small, somewhat unstable pyramid in front of him, then shifts his attention fully to you, just as you’re putting the box in your hand atop all the rest.

“I’d love to.” You beam as he does, and there’s a wondrous relief in his eyes that tells you he’s glad you manage to catch onto his words — or lack, thereof — surprisingly well. “For as long as you don’t blame me for any bad draws.”

“The contents have already been decided by my own hand — sort of,” he chuckles. “Point is, I would never do that to you. But I won’t lie; I kind of want to rely on your luck a little more.”

“What makes you think I’d have any of that running through my system?”

“Not sure — beginner’s luck, maybe? You just kind of look like one of those kinds of people to me — like… you’re just made of good things.”

You don’t know how to take this compliment; on the one hand, it’s easily one of the sweetest things Mark has ever said to you that doesn’t involve anything with actual sugar content. On the other, you know you’re not as lucky as he makes it sound, considering you’re still striking out on getting past the borderline of friendship with him. All you can do is smile, nodding and making to move closer to him by sliding into the next seat.

It’s hard to ignore the sight of him stiffening; something like surprise mingled with both fear and interest flashes strong across his face, but you don’t do anything to acknowledge the slight change in atmosphere, choosing to settle down comfortably and clap your hands. “So. What are the rules? What can I do, and what can’t I?”

“Uh.” His throat constricts at the right moment, the syllable getting caught and causing him to clear his throat. You know that this is the nearest you’ve ever been to him, the sleeve of your shirt tickling his arm. Upon closer, albeit brief inspection, you note that he’s also rather veiny. That doesn’t do your impurity any favors. “Not… really rules, or anything like that. Just — these are the ones I’ve been looking for. Not that you can really control it, but in case you were curious about that.”

You squint intently at the scaled-down images he points out. There’s one that looks like a penguin caught in an oil spill; another that seems to be in a polar bear costume, dozing; and — “What’s… halo? Halo…bios?”

“It just means marine life,” he answers quickly, like the thought means close to nothing to him to know something that obscure. Whoever said that smart is the new sexy wasn’t joking. “Like… all things that live in the ocean, that kind of thing.”

“And you know this because?”

He pauses, looking thoughtful. “I’m not sure. I guess I must have just learned it when I was curious about what it meant some time ago. Isn’t that how we all learn things?”

You shake your head incredulously, and he smiles a little apologetically. “You never cease to amaze me.” Your nail drums against the silhouette of one with a question mark on it. “What’s this supposed to be? Can you draw your own figurine, or something?”

“No.” He’s clearly amused, but his expression’s still patronizing enough for you to not feel too bad about saying something idiotic. “It’s a secret design — a money drainer, basically. You could buy a full set of this and still not get it. Some people will open hundreds without any luck, so it’s really rare.”

“You don’t want it?”

“I try not to get too caught up in the secret thing,” he admits. “Otherwise…”

“No rare print comic books for the rest of your life, basically?”

He taps his nose, and you both share another laugh. It’s nice, you think, to have come this far — to be someone Mark can share his interests and thoughts with. You may have been stretching the word to its limit when you first punched your way into his social life and called yourself his friend, but it feels more real now, more natural to think about and say. Even if he still sometimes seems to be hyperaware of the gap between the both of you, there’s no denying, at least, that it’s been significantly reduced, and this much is a testament to that.

“Well, leave it up to me. I’ll let all of this beginner’s luck rub off on you,” you announce with overflowing albeit unfounded confidence.

You both decide to open a box each at the same time; Mark suddenly panics and asks you not to unseal the foil bag right away without looking at the card inside first, earning him one slightly alarmed look followed by a burst of laughter at his pained expression when you pretend to rip open the packaging. Comparing pulls, you identify them using the set chart — your luck doesn’t seem to be operating at full capacity yet because you can only offer him the card of one that looks like a floppy pigeon, which he responds to with a slightly apologetic grimace before saying he’s already pulled that thrice in the past. He, on the other hand, is turning the card of the polar bear over in his palm, trying not to make you feel bad for your duplicate pull by slipping it under his textbook when your eyes land on it.

The second round isn’t much better; both of you manage to pull something he’s already added to his collection, and as you’re ripping the seal to your third box, he pauses and watches you. You think it’s because he’s concerned about the obvious shit luck you’ve had thus far and wants to snatch it from you before your negative energy transfigures whatever’s inside into something he doesn’t want, and you’re just about to offer the half-opened package to him before he pushes the one on his end to you.

“No way, Mark.” Your eyes are wide, a palm up to reject it. “If that turns out to be another dupe by my hand, I’m literally going to walk into oncoming traffic.”

He has to control his amusement at your words so that it doesn’t completely shake his voice into incoherence. “I picked all of these while I was there, so if anything, you’re only riding off my bad luck. Besides, this is your first time doing this. I want you to have fun.”

“But,” your voice is pained. “Your money.”

“It’s not a big deal. With how few I need to complete them, I was definitely bound to run into more repeats than new ones.” He taps the front of the textbook — or, at least, the part of it not buried under the figurines and sealing tapes yet. “Probability mathematics.”

“I thought we already ended the study part of the day,” you grumble but concede, putting aside the one you half-opened to tear the top of his. You’re careful when you shake out the foil packaging, making sure to place it upright on the table before extracting the card. Both of your faces fall — yours more than his — when you see it’s a repeat of the polar bear.

“Almost. It would’ve been a pretty lucky pull earlier, so it’s technically not bad,” he tries to reassure you, but you childishly feel like you’ve been the sole source of his disappointment thus far. “Try the last one.”

It’s irrational, but you’re suddenly anxious about it. For some reason, you’re worried that this will topple the carefully constructed ladder you’ve propped up against Mark’s tower of social defense. Even if he’s being genial about your rotten pulls, you don’t know how much of it is just resignation to dismay on his part.

You say a small prayer, then fully rip off the seal; you don’t even take out the packaged figuring anymore. You just shimmy the card out of the box, turning it over when you notice it’s upside down.

For a moment, your shoulders deflate. It’s closest to this pastel purple figurine in the middle of the line-up, its stupid puckered lips almost taunting you. He hadn’t even mentioned it as something he’s looking for, so you almost feel like this has come to a horrible full circle. But then he grabs the box, checks the list, and looks back at your card again. He looks shell-shocked, and you’re not sure if it’s the strong air conditioning directed towards the two of you or if it’s just his hands, but the image he’s holding is shivering slightly.

You look more closely at it, and something just doesn’t feel right. Color palette aside, there are notable differences — different colored lips, a more intricate ear design, and closed eyes. It’s…

“Dream eater,” Mark’s voice is hushed, almost reverent, and very, very close to your ear. “It’s the secret one. You’re… incredible.”

“What are you talking about,” your words are just as raspy; you’re not sure if you’re actually choked up with emotion or something — over a figurine, you have to remind yourself. “You picked all of this. I just ripped open the box.”

The hush that falls over the both of you feels very concrete, weighty on your shoulders. His fingers creep towards the foil packet — the only one he actually opens because there’s no way he’s not keeping it. The shiny purple head gleams under the fluorescent, the glitter around the star and moon designs catching the light as he turns it left to right, like he’s worried it’s a fake. You can tell why people want these things so much; there’s a thrill in you that lingers, makes you feel warm and alert. It’s anticipation, despair, excitement, and triumph all in one sitting.

You’re stroking the smooth curve of the design by the ears lightly when Mark speaks up again and says the most outrageous thing.

“I want you to have it.”

“What?” You actually have to pop your ear canal in front of him with your pinky to make sure he knows how ludicrous he sounds. “This is… you said it was crazy rare.”

“Yeah. And you pulled it, with your magic. That’s like… unimaginable luck. Even more than beginner’s luck.”

“Like I said, I literally just opened the box.”

“No — you have like… the golden touch.”

“Please,” you hiss, a genuine testiness to your voice. “Do not. I was just here for the ride — the experience, and all.”

“Seriously, take it.”

“Absolutely not—”

It’s a chaotic moment of him trying to hand you the figurine and you outright rejecting it, with both your palms working hard to push it back to him. Instead of nudging the plastic back, though, you end up placing the full force of your hands against his fingers.

There’s no actual spark when you touch, but your reactions make it feel like there might as well have been; you even lock eyes in startled unison, like you can’t believe that just happened, before you pull away quickly, Mark drawing the figuring back to his torso while looking away towards the counter, where a lowerclassman is wiping down the stains. You want to scream at your warped reflection in the window. You barely initiate contact with him, but you imagine that if you ever did, you would prefer to not be saying something as abjectly negative as absolutely not while doing so.

Your mind flails in an attempt to mitigate the issue and water down the embarrassment, and clearly he’s struggling to figure it out too, because he pipes up before you can piece your thoughts together.

“No, really.” His tone is a lot milder and, consequently, a lot more persuasive this way. “You should take it. I want you to.”

“It’s not mine. This is your thing — your hobby.”

“That’s why I’m giving it to you. I swear — I want you to keep it.”

“Why?”

He lapses into silence again, but his face is much redder than earlier. His mouth opens in an attempt to say something, but he just manages to uh his way back into a state of quiet, which gives you a chance to speak instead.

“We can… share it,” you suggest. “Shared custody…. ish.”

His eyebrow cocks involuntarily, and his jaw falls again, but all he does in actual response is nod — slowly at first, then with more sureness to the act.

“Yeah. We can share it. I’d… like that.”

You’re glad that the bulk of the awkwardness has fizzled out fairly easily, and when you think about it, this feels like a pretty good course of action; you like that it’s this little link between the two of you now — something you share that no one else can touch.

Mark, you notice, is smiling as well — more to himself than towards you, it seems. His thumb grazes across the face of the figurine, slow across the lips, and you’re once again falling into a pit of nonsense by wondering when he’d do that to you.

“Thanks for staying with me, _________,” he finally says, and your heart jolts and melts all at once. “And for… doing this. For chatting with me. And giving me your luck, and all that. Great way to end the day… with you.”

You say no problem, but you instantly regret it when you realize you could have just said it didn’t have to end just yet.

“__________? Hello? Come back down to Earth?”

“Shut up,” you sigh at the guy seated across you — Seo Youngho, an upperclassman, your Gender Studies classmate, and current project partner, waves in front of your face. You shoo his hand away, which only joins his other one as he throws them in defeat above his head. “Stop moving. Be quiet. Don’t talk.”

“That’s the same thing as shut up and be quiet. What’s up with you?” He demands. “Fifteen minutes ago, you were full of ideas. Now I feel like I’m talking to a wax figure.”

You’d been engrossed in your report for the last hour and a half, and the subject matter is admittedly something you enjoy — the role of gender in Twenty-First Century Korean marketing and advertisement, a title Youngho had taken more than ten minutes to type into the Google Docs header because he was pissed off at how the numbers looked like in the fonts he chose. He’s an enthusiastic classmate and someone you’ve come to be friendly with, not only because he’s genuinely approachable but also because he has fits of nosiness and talkativeness at the strangest moments, so a chunk of your relationship is mostly based on social terrorism on his part. You like him well enough most of the time — save for the last fifteen minutes of this hour.

Because Mark had just come in for his shift fifteen minutes ago, and suddenly Youngho is much too noisy for your taste, and his head is honestly way too big to the point that it gets in the way of your opportunities to see Mark behind the counter. You even resent him for choosing a booth instead of your usual table all of a sudden, because your view of the central barista’s area is much more limited from this angle, especially since the huge espresso machine is in the of your field of vision.

You’re also (currently and abruptly) mad at Youngho because you remember that he’s the reason you’ve had to skip out on a couple of sessions with Mark. Like, it technically isn’t his fault that you have a lot of research to do for the literature review section of the paper, nor is it his fault that this is your final requirement that comprises a whopping forty percent of your grade, but like… you’ll blame him anyway. So you’re much more irritable, and you’ve definitely been missing Mark’s presence. In fact, you kind of just want to shove Youngho’s balloon head away and call Mark over to sit with you, but you’re not that much of an animal to actually do that.

Probably.

There had been inquisitiveness across Mark’s face when he’d come in; his eyes had trailed to the table at which you usually sat, surprised to find two guys hunched over a single phone there instead of the usual you, waiting for him with your eyes bright and your smile wide. You’d like to think it’s because he’s gotten as used to seeing you as you’re used to waiting to see him — like he just expects you to be there.

You hadn’t really known how to call his attention to where you were, especially since Youngho was prattling very matter-of-factly about the academic journal he’d unearthed yesterday and how he thought it would be useful in reshaping the methodology of your paper (whatever). There was a moment in which you briefly considered ordering another cup of coffee just to get in line to talk to him, but your hands were already shaking from the venti you’d had to keep yourself from passing out in front of your partner.

So you’re more than relieved when, half an hour into his shift, Mark finally steps out from behind the huge machine, a mug of water for himself in hand, and turns away from the front of the store to drink it — only for your eyes to lock as he twists his torso in your general direction.

The mug stops just inches from his lips, but you could swear he smiles at you briefly when he recognizes you, so you return the favor. Youngho’s face contorts into abject befuddlement, turning around to see what you’re grinning at.

“Oh, you poor sap,” he snorts, finally letting the puzzle pieces fall into place.

“What?” You’re still distracted even if Mark has taken a gulp of water and is now attending to a gaggle of girls still in the throes of discussing what to order.

“What what? You gonna spend the rest of the day eyefucking Mark Lee from over here? At least let me get a different table.”

“Shut up,” you repeat sullenly, coming back down to his level and finally — albeit reluctantly — meeting his eye (just because Mark isn’t looking your way). “What were you saying about the sample size?”

“That it’s much too large to be feasible, a point we closed twenty fucking minutes ago,” he says pointedly. “Is it a thing for baristas or a thing for smart guys?”

“It’s a thing for Mark Lee,” you sigh, following Youngho’s suit and shutting your laptop close. You’re at least glad he’s not annoyed that you’re delaying work for a crush, or maybe he’s also just equally lazy at this point. “You ever look at someone and think you would give it all up for a chance to hit that?”

“No, because this isn’t a porn movie, and I’m clearly not the main character in whatever’s going on in there.” He jabs at your forehead; you swat his hand away again.

“Well, I would.”

He rolls his eyes. “So do it, dumbass.” He says this so simply, like he can’t imagine why you’d be holding yourself back, which is a valid thing to feel, except it’s not really any of his business.

“Can’t.”

“Because?”

“Because it doesn’t fit into my elegant master plan. Also because I want him to ask me out. I just want that victory.”

“Oh yeah, there it is.” Youngho leans over, wiggling his fingers at your ears like he’s greeting a next-door neighbor. “Hey, delusion. Good to see you. Do you even understand how crazy it is that you’re taking a Gender Studies class while waiting for your dick-in-shining-armor like a damsel in distress?”

“Asshole,” you grumble, violently opening your laptop monitor again. “Get back on Google Drive.”

Thankfully, Youngho complies, and the next two hours pass in relative silence and productivity, with you hammering out a vague references list that he promises to format in your stead so you can ‘spend more time dreaming about Mark Lee between your legs.’ You want to strangle him, but there are far too many people in the cafe for you to get away with it. Also, aforementioned Mark Lee would only be a witness to your criminal record, and while you think there’s something romantic in killing for love, or whatever, you’re not sure it’d make the best impression on him.

“Next week’s my birthday,” Youngho announces as he stands to tug on his jacket.

“Congratulations,” you say wryly, peeking over his bulletin board torso to see Mark tugging off his apron and picking up his school bag. Your heart hammers in your chest as he looks over at you briefly, and something like embarrassment passes over his face before he busies himself with neatly folding the fabric. “Go away.”

“Usually people look uncomfortable for not knowing and then start thinking about what gifts to get the celebrant, but I always felt you were kind of a revolutionary.” He snaps his fingers right in front of your eyes, and you look up at him, a little offended. “I’m having a get-together — and by get-together, I mean it’s gonna be a rager. You should come.”

“When?”

“Next Thursday.”

“Can’t,” you chew on your lip, wondering if Mark is leaving. His movements seem particularly slow, but you wonder if he’s just taking his sweet time because he has nothing better to do. Of course, he would have something better to do if Youngho stopped fucking obscuring you from him and vice versa. “Busy. School… whatever.” Not completely untrue. Most of what you do with Mark has to do with school.

“This moony-eyed thing is just not for you, I fear.”

“Are you going to be here all day?”

“Are you? Why don’t you just fucking ask him out, you lunatic?” You can’t imagine why he sounds so exasperated. It’s not like this is his problem — or his business, for that matter. “Maybe if you did, you could fuck him and move on with your life and be an actual contributor to society’s development.”

“Has anyone ever told you how nosy you are?”

“Constantly.” He brings his palms down on the table, the thud shaking you out of another oncoming stupor. “Think about it. Maybe it’ll make you stop making that stupid face.”

“You’ve got a stupid face,” you mumble, sulking as he pinches your cheek as a goodbye before heading out of the shop.

At least you finally get to see Mark in full, glorious view — and you get to watch him come closer, although his stride is somewhat cautious.

“Hey.” Even his voice sounds unsure — almost like the way he used to sound earlier in your friendship. “I didn’t want to interrupt you and… your friend?”

“Oh. Well, you wouldn’t have been interrupting,” you inform him, completely genuine. “He was spouting a lot of nonsense.”

“You guys seemed pretty close.”

“I guess it’s a proximity thing,” you sigh, and Mark raises his eyebrows slightly in question. “We’re partners.”

“Oh.” The way he draws out the syllable is slow. “That definitely makes sense.”

The silence stretches out between the two of you again, with Mark checking his shoelaces. You almost grab your head; it hadn’t occurred to you until now how damaging missing meetings with him would be to your friendship. You feel like you’re slowly being dragged back to square one, and you want to give him an explanation.

“He’s actually… I haven’t been able to see you because I’ve been working on something with him.” you offer, trying to answer a question he didn’t even ask. “Sorry about that. I swear I’ll be back on track tomorrow.”

“No, no — I completely understand.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Thank you… for telling me, though. I— uh, appreciate that.”

“I’d love to see you tomorrow, though.” You try injecting more pep into your voice. “I’ve really been behind on my algebra. I’ve definitely been drowning without you.”

“Oh, yeah.” A small smile graces his lips, but you can’t tell if the reluctance behind it is from fatigue or something that looks oddly like sadness. “I’m down for tomorrow. Same time, same table, right?”

“Yeah, for sure.”

“Cool. See you, _________.”

You watch him turn on his heel, walking to the front door, and something like fear mingled with desperation clutches your heart. Fuck the traditional route, you think. You don’t know what it is about how he’s acting now, but it’s making you feel like he’s slipping through your fingers. All that hard work — there’s no way you’re letting him go.

“Mark, wait.”

You’re at his side, fingers curled into the sleeve of his jacket before you can figure out exactly what you want to say. You feel as surprised as he looks at your sudden liveliness in action, and his gaze trails from your clenched fist to your face slowly, like he’s trying to memorize this whole position.

Your exhale’s shaky, but even still, you try not to sound overtly self-conscious when you ask, “Do you like Chinese food?”

Something in the furrowing of his brows tells you he can’t seem to see where this conversation is headed, and that slightly bothers him. “I like it well enough. Why?”

“There’s this really good dim sum buffet near my mom’s office. We tried it before — the Xiaolongbao is awesome.”

“Hey, that sounds pretty cool. I love Xiaolongbao. I’ll definitely have to check it out then.”

You want to tear your hair out. “How about — you know, checking it out with me? Tonight? You know… together. With me.” You already fucking said that.

You’ve never seen Mark blink this rapidly; he looks like he’s trying to crunch large numbers in his head. A small part of you actually worries that he’s malfunctioning, but just when you think he’s going to glitch out completely, he clears his throat. It bothers you how uncomfortable he looks. “Tonight? Oh man… it’s my cousin’s birthday tonight. I can’t… reschedule. Well, obviously. Maybe some other… time?”

Your ‘oh, yeah’ is small, and so is the ghost of Mark’s smile. You can’t help but feel like he’s pitying you a little, although he doesn’t seem like the type, but the thought of it alone makes you want to puke. He makes no motion to move, and you think he’s extending this awkward moment out on purpose until you realize you’re still hanging onto him and he has no way of telling you to let go nicely.

Fingers unfurling from his sleeve, you take a careful step back, but when he walks away, it feels like you’ve gone much, much further away.

The worst part is that you can’t even figure out why.

Luckily, the next few times you see Mark, you manage to rebuild a rather shaky bridge back to where you had been. You even manage to strong-arm him into sharing an apple fritter one afternoon, and you know it’s a bit sad to think about it a particular, untrue way, but you can’t help but pattern what you’re doing into some kind of pseudo-date. Pathetic isn’t a word you normally associate yourself with, but you’ve been borderline desperate for progress where there seems to be none, so you take small victories where you can get them.

Unfortunately, you haven’t been able to revisit your stupid dim sum plan; sometimes, he says he has somewhere important to be, but most of the time, it’s actually your fault. No — it’s Youngho’s fault, because he keeps bothering you to finish the project. You’re aware that he can’t do it himself, but since he’s informed of your current plight, he could at least stand to be more sympathetic.

And you hate the way Mark looks every time you splutter out that you have to take a rain check for that reason; it’s not even disappointment, or something, which would be much more understandable. It’s this mysterious kind of faraway look, where his eyes glaze over a bit and he seems suddenly very lost in thought — or completely dissociated. He never strays away from his normal response of “next time, then,” but that ‘next time’ fades into the weekend and into the start of next week, and you have to spend every other evening with an annoying Seo fucking Youngho on a Google Meets call instead of eating soup dumplings loveshot style with Mark Lee.

Thursday night rolls around, and the former performs the most irritating stunt yet: blowing up your phone with so many KakaoTalk messages that it almost buzzes off the table during your session with Mark. Luckily, he seems to have learned a thing or two from his comic books, catching it before it hits the floor.

“You sure you don’t want to answer it?” He asks, gingerly handing the phone to you like he’s afraid it’s going to explode from all the pinging.

“Without the shadow of a doubt,” you sigh, flipping the screen downwards. Buzz.

“It kind of seems important. Or, like… urgent.”

“He’ll live. Unfortunately.”

Mark falls silent, fiddling with the page he’s on. He’s neatly highlighted the formulas on the page with blue ink, and his finger keeps scratching at the slightly wet paper. Buzz.

“Didn’t you say you two were partners?”

“Yes. Also unfortunately.” Youngho is actually a great person, but you kind of hate how Mark’s paying more attention to his texts than to you right now. “What did you get for number ten?” Buzz.

“A hundred and twe— are you really just going to let it keep ringing like that? What if he’s… I don’t know. In trouble? Like, he needs you?”

You smack your phone on its back, hoping that the punishment reaches Youngho because he absolutely is in trouble — only with you. “He’s just making a racket because it’s his birthday and he probably wants a bunch of people to trash his parents’ house, or something.”

“Sounds like fun.” The dubious tone in Mark’s voice indicates that his idea of fun definitely isn’t that. Buzz.

“Not really, but I assume he’ll only pipe down if he manages to get his way.”

“He must really want you there.”

There it is again — that weird, distant expression that makes you feel like he’s trying to free himself from the tethers of the earth. You close your textbook in defeat; it wasn’t even like you got the answer to number ten correct anyway. Buzz.

“He just wants everyone there, I bet. But I probably should show up so he shuts up.”

“Oh — yeah, okay. We’ll call it a day, then?” He’s avoiding your eye as he starts packing his things, which is actually impressive because you have practically nothing but your book to keep in comparison to his pencils and protractor, so you just stare, willing him to look at you.

You want to know what’s going on in his head. You want to know what’s going on in his heart — what he thinks of you, why he seems warm one second then almost like a stranger the next. You want to know if he knows you like him and if him not doing anything even if he knows is a sign that he doesn’t like you back. You want to know if he’d let you kiss him, if he’d kiss you first, if you can meet not because of sweet cream cold brews or algebra but because you just want to be together.

You just don’t know how to ask. For as much as you like him, for as much as you want him, you haven’t figured out the most basic part of this — if you mean anything more than a two hour talk to him at all.

“Mark.” This feels awfully like the dim sum conversation, only somehow ten times more disastrous. “Come with me.”

“Sorry?” The appalled look on his face makes you squirm in your seat.

“I don’t really want to go, but maybe if we go together… we can just hang out a bit and leave once it’s boring… I think it’d be fun,” you explain lamely, deciding at the last second to drop the with you that had originally come with your sentiment.

“I don’t think your… partner will like someone uninvited showing up.”

“I’m inviting you.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how it works.”

“You’d be, like, my saving grace or something — my excuse to scram. We’ll say we came right from a study session; we only popped in halfway through for the sake of greeting him a happy birthday. Then we can just go. We can say — uh, we’ve got more work to do.” You’re practically begging him at this point, and you don’t even get why. You just don’t want him to leave looking the way he does — confused and a little detached. You want the Mark that had smiled at you while giving you your coffee — the one that had kindly pointed out an arithmetic mistake in the most gentle way possible. You want to open blind boxes with him, whine about your rotten luck, and part ways with his warmth still against your coat sleeve.

You don’t know what comes over you then, but you pluck up the courage and initiative to slip your hand in his. He stiffens a little, but you don’t care; your fingers squeeze his in urging.

Something in his expression breaks — cracks first, then falls away, before he’s nodding, still looking vaguely thoughtful.

“If you think it’ll help you, then… okay.”

The bus ride to Youngho’s neighborhood is uneventful because it’s quiet. You stand close to Mark at all times, but you barely touch, save for the times your knuckles accidentally brush his when you lurch forward slightly as the vehicle comes to a dangerously abrupt stop. He doesn’t ask anything about the party or the company that’ll populate it, which is just as well, because you don’t have a clue.

You know it’s the right house because the door’s wide open and there’s music coming from inside; you can’t make out much more than the deep bass pumping through the concrete, but you’re pretty sure it’s making your heart jump in your chest even more than it already is. There are quite a few people you vaguely recognize on the lawn, and even more that you absolutely don’t; a good number of them glance at you and Mark as you step through the threshold then look away, probably deciding you’re of no real consequence or harm to their moods.

Youngho’s easily spottable because of his massive height; he towers over the rest of his guests, and the red plastic cup in his hand calls even more attention because he’s lifted it over everyone else’s heads. You throw Mark an apologetic glance that he responds to with a short nod before you dive into the crowd alone, trying to weave your way to where you’d last seen Youngho.

“Bro, finally!” Youngho greets you, pretty much shouting over the music. “Where’s the gift? Did you leave it on the table?”

“Happy birthday, Youngho. Do you know how close you were to being blocked?”

“I see you brought mister espresso with you,” he ignores your comment completely, nodding to Mark. When you turn back to see him, you notice he’s squishing his arms closer to his sides, trying to minimize the space he takes up. “So what? Y’all get to hook up already?”

“No. I brought him here because we were in the middle of something and someone,” you stop, offering him a pointed look that’s also ignored. “Wouldn’t stop texting.”

“Cockblock,” the guy next to Youngho, who you now realize has been eavesdropping, singsongs. “Oh, sorry. You looked angry when you stomped through the crowd, so I wanted the juicy details. Name’s Jaehyun.”

You take the hand he offers you briefly, introducing yourself. When you say your name, realization dawns on his face, and he jabs his forefinger at you.

“Oh, dude. You’re that girl — the Starbucks Showstopper.”

“The what?”

“That’s what his friends call you.” He scratches his ear, seemingly racking his brain for more information. “I’m with Mark and a couple of his friends — Lee Donghyuck and Na Jaemin — in College Algebra.”

You completely gloss over the fact that you’ve finally found out the real government identity of the mysterious figure named ‘Hyuck.’ “They… talk about me?”

“From time to time. Not really. Once or twice. Donghyuck only calls you that because Mark apparently keeps blowing them off to hang out with you.”

“How do you know this?”

“I have ears. It’s not hard when they talk like no one’s around.”

You shush Youngho’s exclamation of and you’re saying I’m nosy?, your heart hammering hard in your ears, practically drowning out the music. “What… what else did they talk about?”

“Not sure. Something about not seeing you that often these days. Jaemin teasing Mark about getting dropped now that you don’t need his help anymore. Donghyuck piling on and saying you’ve got a boyfriend.”

“What?”

“Don’t shoot the messenger.” Jaehyun still inches away from you when your voice rises in pitch and decibel. Some people around you start, then move away as well, as if scared you’re going to incinerate them. “They were just teasing him that you probably ditched him after you started dating someone. Your partner in some project, or what.”

“Oh gross.” The realization hits you like a speeding truck. Youngho’s expression is affronted.

“First of all, you bitch. Second of all, as if I would date someone who didn’t even buy me a gift. Or want to come. Or yelled at me after coming. Wow — now that I think about it, you’re terrible, _________.”

“Oh, shit; that someone was you?” The only person that isn’t tense in this conversation is Jaehyun, who laughs point blank at Youngho’s sour face. “I think they were offering to put you into one of their Death Note notebooks. Sucks for you, hotshot.”

“What a smudge on my good name,” Youngho sighs mournfully. “On my special day, too.”

“I desperately need you two to be quiet for one second. I have to — where’s Mark?”

Even when you stand on your tiptoes, you’re not nearly as tall as the two of them; it’s Youngho, with his freakish height, who manages to spot Mark by the bowl of nachos, looking as though he’s trying to decide if they’re safe for consumption. You hardly excuse yourself; actually, all you say is a distracted “later” that dismisses Jaehyun’s cooing that something’s going down and you should clue him into all the mess later as a thank you. Your appreciation of his sudden and somewhat short-lived presence in your life is still up in the air.

Mark’s busy making a sour face at the sip of punch he’d just taken; he only straightens up when you’re right in front of him, putting his cup down next to the nachos. “Hey. Did you get to find… um…”

“That’s not important.” Your hand bunches the fabric of his jacket in a death grip, something he barely has time to register, let alone question, before you’re tugging him through the throng of people. You want somewhere quiet, somewhere private, and you initially consider the lawn, except you know it’s strewn with cups and has stragglers debating whether to go home or not. You can’t risk any of them being expert eavesdroppers like Jaehyun, so you make a beeline for the stairs instead.

“We’re not leaving yet?” He has to shout over the music, but there’s no resistance in his stride; he follows you up and waits patiently, although a little perplexed, as you check the doors on the second floor. Two are locked, one is a bathroom, and the other is a messy, musk aftershave-scented place you can only presume is Youngho’s room. Talking in front of a sink and a toilet doesn’t feel like it’ll be very productive, so you just drag Mark into the bedroom, kicking aside the crumpled shirt on the floor — which you could’ve sworn you’d seen Youngho wear for class yesterday. “_________, what’s going on?”

“Mark Lee,” you burst out, ignoring the fact that his eyes widen slightly at your tone. “What’s your fucking deal?”

You don’t think you’ve ever sworn in front of him before; that much is evident when he continues to gawk silently, unable to find words to respond to your question. Or maybe it’s just the volume and force with which you demand an answer. The problem is that you don’t even know what kind of reply you want. A small part of you nags that this is uncalled for, especially at this level, with you practically caging him into an unknown room. In fact, even now, you’re still embarrassed at your behavior, wondering if you’ve gone too far and stepped over a line between you.

But the source of all your frustrations is, in fact, that line — one so strangely drawn, clear at some points and almost invisible at others. Sometimes, he seems simply content with the barest minimum of friendship: talking to you, helping you, politely laughing at your (terrible) jokes. But there are also times he blushes too hard for it to not mean anything, times that he makes you feel like you could mean a little something more to him too.

Yet, from there, he wavers, stepping back so as not to get entangled in something you don’t understand — like when he grows distant every time you mention Youngho to him. You don’t understand why he would unless he echoed, even just a little, the longing in you. But you also don’t get why he stays and builds more walls around himself, like he’s determined to ignore all the other signs — like he doesn’t want to know if it’s really true and will just accept the assumption that it is. You hate not knowing where you stand with him, and while you could easily ask, you know you don’t want to.

And for a long time, you’ve convinced yourself that it’s because you want to see Mark step out of his comfort zone and initiate something, but the ugly truth is staring at you: it’s simply just that you can’t stand the idea of seeing him come to the conclusion that you can’t be anything more to him than someone he makes a sweet cream cold brew for every so often.

There’s a moment of tense silence between you two, where you’re just staring at each other — him, perplexed, and you, agitated — and the only sound that passes is the faint but unmistakable voice of Youngho going who has the cake cutting knife? from somewhere down below. You try not to get caught up in the fact that Mark still looks cute when he’s dumbfounded.

“Sorry?”

“What,” you repeat pointedly. “Is your deal? Why have you been acting so weirdly around me these days? I thought — I thought we were… getting closer. I thought… we…”

You’ve confirmed it now; you’re the epitome of cowardliness. You can’t even say I thought we liked each other — because you know that you do, but you still can’t honestly, assuredly tell if he does. Maybe you just read too deeply into the smallest things — smiles before he asks for your order, glances at you when he thinks you’re not looking, sharing the dream eater figurine — to fuel your own emotions without really checking the depth of his.

“I thought we were cool,” you reroute your words, and they come out flat and lame. “But just when I think you’re warming up to me, you suddenly pull away. Like… you’re afraid of me. Or you don’t like me. I don’t know.”

“It’s not — I don’t — I’m not afraid of you,” he stumbles over his words, and even in the darkness of this space, you see his face turn bright red, very quickly. His feet shuffle, not because he’s lost his balance but because he seems to want to get rid of a sudden restlessness. “I do like you. We are — we were getting — we’re close. We — we’re friends. You said that, and we are.”

“Is it only because I say we are that you agree?”

“What? No, I—” His hand passes over his face, slowing at the curve of his chin. “I really like being friends with you. I like being around you.”

“Then why do you act so weird these days? Like — you’ll be fine one moment, then you’ll back off, like you suddenly remembered you don’t want to be around me.”

“It’s not like that. I’m — I don’t get…” He takes a deep inhale, recalibrating himself for a moment before his voice comes out again, less strained this time. “I just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable around me.”

“How could I?” There’s something more than confusion coloring your voice; there’s hurt, too, and he looks as surprised as you feel at hearing it. “I wanted to be your friend. I was the one that asked you to hang out. I was the one who wanted you to talk to me, to help me, to go to a goddamn dim sum place with me. Why would I feel uncomfortable? Or are you just using this as some roundabout way to say you feel uncomfortable?”

Mark falls silent, and you don’t know why this speaks volumes all of a sudden. His eyes are trained to the tips of his sneakers, which are rising in soft bumps every few seconds; he’s curling his toes inside them. You feel like you’ve gotten the worst answer possible, and something grows cold in your chest.

“You feel uncomfortable around me.” You rehash, but it’s no longer a question. “You don’t know how to get rid of me.”

“No, it’s not that.”

“You think I’m only using you.”

“No.”

“Then what?” Your voice breaks, no longer out of anger, but a desperate sadness. The moment your eyes feel hot and prickly, you decide you want to end the conversation. It’s embarrassing, you think, for someone like Mark Lee — whom you like, who only ever sees you as a friend — to see you get choked up at a fucking birthday party at someone else’s house.

A beat later, you’re mumbling a half-hearted forget it, and you detest overdramatics, but you hate the idea of being in a room with someone who’ll never return your feelings even more right now; you push past him, already on the thought of calling a cab home instead of taking the bus so that no half-drunk businessmen coming from their company dinners see you crying.

But something warm wraps around your wrist, then closes over your hand, and you’re unable to move, Mark’s palm pressed against the back of yours. When you look back, you notice he’s still not looking at you, but his ears are practically on fire with how red they are, and you feel his fingers tighten slightly, tremble slightly against yours.

“It’s not that. I didn’t ever want you to think — I heard about you two. That you were dating someone. Seo Youngho.”

“What does that matter?” Your words come out a little more bitterly than you expect, and you have to remind yourself to reel it in. “That doesn’t explain your discomfort.”

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable,” he repeats, still evidently careful in choosing his words. “Because you wanted to be friends.”

“I don’t understand,” you state bluntly. In the back of your mind, you note that Mark’s grip keeps tightening and loosening, unsure of whether to keep holding on or let go. But there’s something else, too — the soft graze of skin against yours, his thumb gliding over your knuckles.

“That was all you said you wanted to be, right?” He waits for a response, but when you don’t give him one, he lets out a shaky breath and continues. “You kept saying — we were friends. You wanted us to be close like that. I just wanted to respect it, even if…”

“Respect what?”

“That you didn’t want… anything else.”

The music downstairs is a bit tamer now; you hear the door opening and closing every so often, signaling guests leaving here and there, but there are still enough footsteps downstairs for you to know that there’s a crowd Youngho hasn’t gotten rid of and therefore has to attend to. That much is good; you’d get slapped with a homicide charge if he came up here all of a sudden.

“You were jealous.”

Mark’s fingers pinch the bridge of his nose for a moment. “I tried to stop. I don’t have a lot of practice with — well, I didn’t know how to approach the situation. I thought I was still acting normally; I didn’t think… I didn’t want you to feel weird and stop hanging out with me just because… I couldn’t fix it.”

“Your friends are assholes,” you mumble, and he finally meets your eye, equal parts startled and amused. “We aren’t. Weren’t. We never were dating.”

“Even without that, I thought… it was a bit embarrassing. Liking someone like you — someone as pretty as you, as nice as you — I thought it would make you feel weird. Then you’d start avoiding me too. Or, worse, you’d keep doing it just because… you… felt bad for me.”

You don’t know what you find more ridiculous — that you hadn’t seen figured it out or that you could have avoided all of this if you’d just been a little more honest with him too. Mark’s hand starts loosening around yours, a little too much, and you turn your palm and grip his hand before he can escape. He stiffens again, just like earlier, but you now understand better why he does.

“I just wanted to keep hanging out with you as much as I could. I thought… It’d be fine, just spending time with you, and I’d be able to like you for a while, on my own, then…” He looks a little pained. “Then just let you go. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry you couldn’t let go?” You sigh softly, your palm guiding his until they connect, face to face, and you can finally lace your fingers into his. There’s no resistance, but his hand trembles slightly in yours still. “If there’s anything you should be apologizing for, it’s that you ever thought of doing it.”

Something clears in the air, lightens in his expression, and he chuckles, albeit a little shyly still. “It’s because I never thought someone like you would like someone like me.”

“I like you.” And it feels right to say it now, not at all out of the blue, never in fear of an answer he’s already given. “I like you when you smile at me every time you ask for my order. I like that you never get impatient when I’m getting my answers wrong. I like seeing you excited when you talk about a new series you’re looking forward to — something new you really want to collect. When you blush, when you laugh loudly, when you spin your pen in your hand — I like you in all those times.”

“Even when I’m jealous?”

“Especially when you are.” Your free hand comes up to cup his jaw, and you’re reminded of the fact that you’ve wanted to feel the strength of the angle under your palm for ages now. It’s not at all a disappointment, and your heart flutters irregularly in knowing you could’ve done this a long time ago, but it doesn’t matter because you’re doing it now, and fuck if Mark Lee doesn’t look good this close to you. “So be jealous — because now, you know you can be.”

Kissing him is better than you imagined, and you’ve imagined a little too much to be embarrassed at this point; there’s a heat to his lips that matches the one across his face, an upturn to them that makes you smile too. The setting’s not at all an expected one, but you’ll take it, not because it’s dark or because it’s private but because Mark’s in here with you, and you would have kissed him in a brightly lit football field full of people for as long as he’d let you.

You’d like to think he’s flushed for a reason other than shyness when you pull away, even if his laugh is quiet and breathy. In fact, when you murmur not enough, he’s the one that closes the gap this time, offering freely what you ask for with such little eloquence. The natural trepidation in his mouth relaxes, gives way to a curiosity that keeps you locked for so long that you forget you need to breathe, much more intent on finding out if Mark’s tongue tastes as good as you’ve imagined for so long.

It doesn’t; it tastes even better.

It’s still not enough, not by a long shot, but you have to resurface before you pass out like this, and even he looks a little dazed when you pull away — not in a bad way, with a grin on his face that you can only classify as endearingly goofy: slightly lopsided and a little shy, but with an unmistakable air of satisfaction.

“Months,” he mumbles, his lips still dangerously close to yours. Your eyebrows rise in questioning, and he laughs in that infectious way that makes you want to join in without even knowing what the punchline is. “I’ve been thinking of kissing you for months.”

And you do share the laughter this time, not out of amusement but of a happiness that spills without restraint. “But you’re suddenly holding back now?”

“Just letting myself bask in the moment, I guess. Letting it sink in so I remember everything.”

The two of you stand there quietly, still trying to fully parse the progression of events, and a small part of your mind registers that Mark’s thumb is still drawing circles on your skin. It’s also not enough — this touch, this closeness. You know now that he’s been thinking of you for months, and it reminds you that you spent that time dreaming of him too. And you remember you’ve always wanted to be even more familiar with him, and suddenly the desire is overwhelming; he’s right here, and you don’t ever want him out of your grasp again.

“Where are you going?” He’s only curious for the sake of it; there’s no alarm in the question because you keep your fingers tightly woven in his, tugging him along as you walk past him to the door. He’s still staring in wonder after the lock clicks shut. “What’s… happening now?”

“You waited months to kiss me, right?” He nods in response at your question. “I’ve been waiting just as long to have you too.”

His mouth falls open, but he doesn’t manage to say anything; his jaw tightens just as quickly when he feels your free hand trail down his chest, feather-light and asking for a green light. Your index finger stops just above his navel and draws back slowly, but not before you feel the shiver that runs down his torso.

“We don’t have to if you don’t want to,” you murmur, giving his hand a little squeeze. “But I just want you to know — I want to. I want you.”

A thoughtfulness settles on his face, and his eyes graze over yours, trying to read your seriousness. You don’t know how honest you look, but your words hold enough truth in them. A silence stretches over the next minute, but to you, it feels like an eternity, and you lose the test of patience somewhat, smiling softly at him.

“You don’t want to?”

“I—” His tongue peeks out, running over his bottom lip. “I do. It’s not that I don’t want to, but…”

“You seem worried.”

A hesitant nod. “I’ve never — well, no, I have, but not — with someone like you.”

“What’s someone like me?” You laugh airily.

“Someone pretty like you — I don’t know. Someone who seems to know exactly what they want. Someone who seems like… they could do better than me.”

“Mark.” You can’t keep the incredulity out of your voice. “I do know exactly what I want. I want you. The rest — I don’t care about. As long as it’s you, I want it.”

He cracks a smile, half of relief, half of disbelief. You don’t miss his hand coming up to press, warm, against your waist. “For real?”

Your fingers curl into the front of his shirt — an anchor to bring you closer, until the tips of your noses are brushing. “For real.”

The third time you kiss is slow, almost careful; there’s lingering worry in the line of his mouth that your lips try to ease until his slightly part under the movements of yours. You feel the tension leave his form in waves — first in his shoulders, then in his arms, until you’re able to press yourself closer and feel the slight give of his frame against your smaller one. He’s radiating an immense amount of body heat that’s pricking your skin and keeping you alert, and you’re hyperaware of the smallest things — the weak tremble in his mouth, the slight roughness of his teeth under your tongue, the ridges of his palate above it.

He tastes nothing like what he smells, you learn. Instead of the air of earthy coffee stuck to clean linen, you inhale a combination of spearmint and mild saltiness that’s made slightly sharper by the lingering splash of alcohol from his accidental sip of punch earlier. You decide then and there that this disparity is important to you; it makes you feel like you’re the only one who can have this experience — that everyone else can know his scent, but now, only you can know what Mark Lee tastes like.

You have to keep your wits about you to avoid this addictive stimulation of your senses; you let go of his hand only to lock your fingers around his neck, and there’s a show of trust in how he lets you lead him backwards, until his knees are hitting the edge of the unmade bed. The kiss breaks as he’s forced to settle on the mattress, and he looks up at you in what can only be described as a quiet kind of awe. He doesn’t complain when you place your hands, heavy, on his shoulders, using his sturdy form to keep you stable as you move to straddle his lap.

“I feel like,” his voice is hoarse as he speaks up. “We should have picked a different location. Someone… could walk in.”

“I locked the door,” you remind him, a light reassurance in your voice. He doesn’t say anything immediately, but it’s clear there are cogs turning in his head, and you think it’s unfair that he’s thinking way too hard about something else that isn’t you, right now, in this position. In a bid to rectify this, your face presses into the side of his neck, breathing in that familiar scent and leaving a light kiss on his skin right after. Your lips mark the moment he swallows hard at the contact. “Besides, would you really be that unhappy if someone did?”

His hands tighten against your waist, prompting you to leave another kiss against his collarbone. “What — what do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t like it if someone — say, Youngho — walked in to see me on your lap like this?”

The silence that follows your words is tense, and you can tell that Mark’s breathing has become shallower. Again, you can feel his throat constricting slightly, and you can’t help but laugh breathily as you nip at his skin, just under his Adam’s apple. He’s surprisingly easy to tease, you realize — quick to turn speechless and prone to hanging onto your words.

To say that you wouldn’t want to use that to your advantage would be a downright lie.

“Tell me,” you urge, your tone deceptively gentle. “You wouldn’t want him to see you kissing me like this? To see me wrapped around you, begging for more, saying your name over and over? You don’t want him to watch you take me — so he knows you’re the only one that can?”

A strangled groan punctuates your words, but it comes from him; his fingers dig hard into your side with barely constructed restraint. “What do you want from me, _________?”

“I want to know if kissing me was the only thing you wanted for months.”

You pull your head away, nudging his chin with the tip of your nose. Another groan escapes him, and his head tilts back slightly, almost like he’s praying. But when his gaze comes down to meet yours at your level again, you see a firm resolution in his eyes that stirs your heart — which takes off the moment he shakes his head, slowly but surely.

“Then,” you whisper. “What do you want from me?”

He doesn’t say so much as shows; he takes from you your breath, steals another kiss that’s now firmer and more openly demanding. Suddenly, his mouth can’t seem to stay still, trapping your lower lip in between his, drawing out your taste until it mixes with his against his teeth. You feel your head growing light again, and you’re pleasantly surprised that it’s suddenly become difficult to keep up with his lips, asking more from you without restraint. A hum of need sounds in the back of his throat, vaguely dissatisfied, and he’s telling you wordlessly that it isn’t enough right before he attaches his lips to the base of your neck, just above your collar. You think he’s just about to return the favor, but a laugh leaves you when you realize he’s taken it a step further, his teeth grazing your skin lightly, soft nips signaling how eager he is to sink his teeth in with only his slowly weakening self-control stopping him from doing it. Mark’s breathing is slightly labored when he pulls his lips away, warm breath fanning over your chest.

“It’s crazy — and stupid,” he croaks out, voice slightly raspy. “But I want it, and I don’t.”

“What do you mean?” Your fingers drag into his hair, combing it upward messily from his nape. He leans in for a quick kiss that’s somewhat misplaced, landing on the corner of your mouth instead of squarely atop it.

“I want them — him to see us. To see me with you, kissing you — fucking you, too. I want everyone to know we’re like this.”

You’ve never heard Mark say anything so forwardly before; a sweet, warm flush builds in your face, pleased at how comfortably he manages to say it — pleased that he’s saying it to you. “Then what’s the problem?”

“I don’t want him to see you.” There’s a bluntness to his words, but hiding behind them is an undertone of pleading — a serious request. “I don’t want him to see how pretty you look. I don’t want him to see you when you’re bare, or how you look when I’m inside you. I don’t want him to see—”

His voice wavers and dies, and you wonder if he’s embarrassed, but when you read his expression, you see an unyielding longing. A smile tugs at your lips, and your hand comes around to cup his chin, thumb extending upwards to drag his lower lip down.

“You don’t want him to see what’s only yours.”

He swallows hard again, but he doesn’t wait long to nod. Understanding passes between the both of you, silently but completely, and Mark presses his face to your throat, feeling the hum resonate as he places another long, firm kiss there.

“You’re mine,” he whispers, in a way that almost feels like he wants to convince himself of something impossible to believe. He doesn’t even wait for your affirmation, prefers to read it in the way you shiver lightly once his lips travel further down. His kisses trail past the collar of your shirt, and his hands are unabashed in how they seek skin, pushing the fabric upward so he can settle the palms of his hands, warm against your waist. Oddly, they don’t travel upwards; they only brush against the dip, down slightly over the upward rise of your hips, then upwards again, almost soothingly. It’s almost like he wants his mouth to meet them, but he stops halfway, sidetracked by the curve of your breasts.

He barely pulls away, only does for a moment, enough to meet your eyes.

“You’re only mine,” he repeats, his voice softer now. You realize he’s still waiting for some confirmation, and when you do, you’re quick to give it to him — quick to erase any doubt.

“I’m yours,” you affirm in the same tone, in the same careful volume. “Only yours, Mark.”

Whatever else he wanted to ask for, he knows you’ve given assent; that much is clear when he buries his face between your tits, inhaling your scent. You briefly wonder if he might feel just as intoxicated around you as you do around him, if your pleasant dizziness in being this close to him, in tasting and smelling him is something he experiences too, but you don’t get much time to dwell on it the moment you feel his lips part, a slight wetness seeping through the fabric. He’s kissing your chest, teeth grazing just above the cup of your bra, nipping without any real objective other than to feel the pad’s slight resistance to his mouth.

You almost miss what he says as he shifts his head, lips brushing over the curve of your breast — another breathless ‘mine’ that isn’t ever punctuated; his lips still stay parted, mouthing at the cloth, like he’s desperate to feel what’s underneath through it. There’s pressure where his tongue presses flush against the shape of your tit, tightness whenever he chooses to nip, attempting to take the flesh and all that’s between you and him between his teeth.

Not enough, you think, even when a whimper of need bubbles out of you; you want to be closer, your thighs pressing against the sides of his. You’re close in almost every way, but you still inch yourself further forward, enough to feel the taut hardness in his jeans. Your hips settle right there, letting fabric ride against fabric as you center yourself.

No sooner do you press yourself flush against him do you gasp; the light sting sends a jolt up your spine when his teeth close around your nipple through your bra, and when you look down at him, you see the corners of his mouth pulled up in evident satisfaction. He’s quick to atone, his tongue dragging your shirt slightly upwards in his attempt to soothe, and for some reason, the push of fabric and the barely-there feeling of motion leaves you tingling.

“Mark.” Your voice comes out in a whine, but in the haze you’re in, you don’t really have a clear idea of what you’re asking for. All you know is that you want more of him, and for as much as he’s already given you in kisses and words, you aren’t even halfway down the list of everything else you wish you could demand from him. You say the only thing that comes to mind — the only thing that really encompasses what you feel. “Mark, I want you. I want more of you.”

His hands on your waist are replaced by the significant tightness of his arms, locked around your torso; you don’t even have the time to take in your awe at the fact that he can easily carry you, turn you over until you’re on your back, until he’s already eased one knee between your legs.

The way he looks down at you is a mixture of hesitation and desire, but the former’s erased when you reach out for him, murmuring another ‘more’ so you can pull him in. With one palm pressed against the mattress, he lets his free hand graze against your side again, bolder in its movements, and his fingers trace a path up to your breast, squeezing the soft flesh through layers. Your back arches upwards in response, eager for more contact, for touch that’s almost there but not quite, and he smiles when you make a noise of frustration from his fingers tweaking the soft nub of your nipple.

“Mark, please—”

“Would you really let him see you like this?” His thumb’s still idly grazing over your breast, following the rise and fall of its curve. You swallow hard, trying to keep your voice level despite the growing want that threatens to break through it. “Would you really let him watch you… get fucked?”

You shake your head, and his brow furrows.

“I’d let him watch you fuck me,” you correct him, and the confusion in his face gives way to pure satisfaction the moment you make this nuance clear. “It has to be only you.”

His grip tightens briefly against your breast again, and he leans down, pressing a surprisingly chaste and brief kiss to your lips.

“Then I’ll unlock the door next time and give him a show.”

You don’t know if it’s what he says or what he does after — his hands bunching your shirt upward until the hem’s just below your neckline — that makes your breath hitch, but you decide it doesn’t matter when you realize you’d much rather be focusing on the journey his lips take, slick against your stomach as he presses languid kisses down to your navel. His fingers hook into the waistband of your jeans, the weight naturally pulling them down, and you see his muscles tighten for a moment as he stops himself from tugging them off completely.

Mark’s mouth is unparalleled in its attentiveness, seemingly intent on making sure he’s covered every inch of your stomach in warm kisses, but you only realize he’s somehow stalling when he starts the cycle again, his nails digging into the taut elastic of your jeans as though to remind himself to curb his desire.

You take the initiative instead, raising your hips slightly to signal your want, acutely aware of the fact that you brush lightly against his thigh when you do so. His eyes lift first, followed by the rest of his face, and he’s watching you quietly. You might have thought he was unsure of what to do all of a sudden again, but his knee pressing closer, an unmistakable pressure against you, is enough to tell you that he’s only curious to know what else you’ll do.

The second time you grind against his thigh, his hands catch your hips, keeping them aloft just long enough for him to tug the band of your jeans downward; he peels them off you with surprising ease, returning to the same position between your legs, hands still firm on your waist. With that done, he only has the thin garter of your panties left to curl his fingers into, bunching it into his fists when you roll your hips up one more time. You manage a shaky noise when you feel the stark difference — the roughness of the denim against you, the stick and drag of flimsy cloth. Mark lets out a low but unmistakable hiss.

“I can’t believe—” his idea is cut short by the movement of your hips again, and his grip tightens, knuckles pressing into your skin. “Can’t believe you’re here. I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

“What am I supposed to do,” you breathe out, the sound momentarily getting stuck in your throat. “So that you know it’s real?”

His fingers relax their hold, palms now pressed against your thighs; they travel between your hips and your knees, a soothing and thoughtful motion. “God — I don’t know. I just want — I just want you so badly. Like… I’m going to go crazy if I don’t have you now.”

You lean up, your weight resting on your elbow, and your other hand reaches out; Mark meets you halfway, bending just a little lower to press his cheek against your palm. There’s something intimate, something so giving about the way he turns his face to your fingers, pressing a fluttering kiss just under your thumb. The tips of your fingers trace the shape of his lips, even when they pucker again under your digits.

“Take me,” you murmur quietly. “Right now — from now on, every part of me is all for you.”

His exhale is shaky, but his fingers have a sureness to them; they slip under your thighs, cradling the backs of your knees, and lifting until they’re folded over your chest. You don’t even have the time to wonder if you should feel exposed all of a sudden; his breath warms the inside of your thigh as he presses his lips there — not a kiss, just a touch as he speaks.

“I want to taste you,” he mumbles, partly distracted with the act of inhaling the mild scent off of your skin. “Every inch of you — I want to know just how sweet you are.”

He lets his hold on your thighs relax, letting them fall apart; he busies his hands with your panties instead, hooking a finger into the strip of cloth just covering you. It’s clear you’re both aware that the fabric sticks light to your skin, poorly masking your wetness, and interest mingled with hunger flashes across his face as he pulls it aside.

“You’re so pretty,” he says, sounding like it’s a comment more for himself than anything else. His gaze flickers to you for a moment before it moves back to your pussy. “The prettiest fucking girl in the world.”

The pressure of his thumb between your folds causes you to forget what you wanted to say, and you know Mark had been nervous, but you realize that it doesn’t mean he’s supremely inexperienced by any means; there’s a quiet, understated confidence in the way he rubs slow, thorough circles, moving upward towards your clit. Your face, your neck, your whole torso feels flushed, but you power through the instinct to tilt your head back so that you can keep watching him — the minute changes in his expression, the slowly building strength in his touch.

“I want to taste you,” he repeats, looking up at you. “I want to know what you taste like when you cum against my mouth.”

You’re not sure if you’re gawking because you can hardly believe Mark Lee — your eternally blushing, mild mannered campus crush — had said all those words strung together into such a lewd sentence, but you’re sure as hell not going to deny him. Your hand travels down your torso, and he watches, curious at first, then awestruck when your index and forefinger settle against either side of your folds, pulling them apart in offering.

His eyes end up transfixed on your pussy again, observing how your fingers ease your folds further apart the more he massages his thumb against your slit. His mouth is slightly agape, intent on drinking in the sight, unaware that you’re trying to memorize this view of him too — Mark Lee, touching you, wanting you, eager to take you fully.

“I’ve always wanted to see what it’d look like with your face between my legs,” you say in a hushed tone, but he catches it anyway, briefly looking up at you again. “I’ve always wanted to know what your tongue would feel like against my pussy.”

Your index finger bumps against the tip of his thumb, and he stops its motions, allowing you to move his digit down until the pad of it hovers just in front of your tiny hole. You can see one cheek tucked between his teeth, bitten to muffle the groan you wish you’d heard louder.

“Won’t you show me?”

You think you hear him rasp out a ‘fuck yes’ before he bends down, pressing his half-open mouth against your pussy. The squeal of delight that leaves you is half-strangled as his thumb curls, hooking into your entrance. It starts a shallow, distracted motion, with his attention funneled much more clearly into keeping his tongue working. Flush against your slit, it drags up, and he releases a guttural noise at your taste, lips pursing slightly on the way back down — like he can’t stand not trapping every drop of wetness with his mouth.

The intensity of his tongue, the idle thrusting of his thumb — you’re not sure what you want to focus on more, and the result is you whimpering incoherently at the starkly contrasting combination of the two. Mark moves his mouth like he’s never tasted anything as good in his life; the sounds between your thighs are wet, sloppy — almost embarrassingly so — but you don’t have the presence of mind to dwell on that because Mark Lee is eating you out and that’s really all that you can think of.

The tip of his tongue suddenly flicks upwards; you keen, long and low, when it starts to circle your clit in that same intense, circular movement his thumb had gotten you used to. Your sensitivity skyrockets, and you’re completely unable to control the upward bucking of your hips, but Mark stays supremely unperturbed, his free arm winding under your thigh to keep the both of you steady. Your noises are growing embarrassingly loud, and you realize just how needy you’ve become when you vaguely notice that there’s a pattern in what you’re saying — his name, over and over again.

“Did you do that too?” He asks softly, his words slightly muffled against you. “Say my name, I mean — when you thought of me.”

“God, yes.” Your voice comes out strained, teetering on the edge of slurring. “So many times — every single fucking time.”

“Promise me something.” He lifts his head, and you see a fieriness in his gaze.

You nod — at this rate, whatever he’d ask you to do, you would without question. “Anything.”

His thumb presses in deeper, up to his knuckle and you reflexively tighten around his digit, but he keeps it anchored there, pushing down against your walls. He drinks in your gasp, the widening of your eyes, the way you chew on your lip with a singular kind of contentment on his face.

“Promise me — from now on, you’ll make sure I’m always there to hear it.”

The only kind of assent you’re able to make is a moan as he dives down again, mouth buried in your warmth, his nose pressed tight against your clit. His tongue moves in strong strokes, broad swipes that push your folds apart further, and his thumb, while not moving, increases in pressure to the point that you feel a heaviness adding to the growing pleasure. Your hands fly down, seeking some kind of sense and reason, and you thread your fingers into his hair, grip tightening as your climax builds in stride.

“Mark, I’m—” close, you want to say, embarrassingly so, but the moment he hears his name, his lips attach to your clit, and there’s suddenly so much more pressure as he sucks, almost like he’s desperate to draw out your orgasm. He chooses this of all time to start moving his thumb again, and this time, his movements are anything but slow and idle; they’re filled with the intent to drive you over the edge. “Fuck me, oh my god—”

“I want to,” he murmurs, pausing for just a moment to drag the tip of his tongue around the nub. “God, I want to. Let me see you cum first; let me taste how sweet you are.”

His thumb stops, buries deep into your pussy, and you’re not sure why this, of all things, is what pushes you beyond control; you’re only half-sure you say his name when your orgasm hits, the rest of your consciousness much too clouded by pleasure. He doesn’t stop, revels in the way you squirm under him as he hums low and keeps his tongue working against your clit. His licks become longer, more thorough as you come down from your high, your cries softening into whimpers as his tongue both attempts to clean you up and makes you messier in the process. His arm is still curled around your thigh, keeping you from inching away from him, even if instinct and stimulation are telling you to.

You’re barely lucid when you sit up, and Mark inches back, somewhat startled; you grab the front of his shirt, and the sight of his mouth, slick and glistening from your wetness, only makes you more curious to know what you taste like on him. You find out how tangy it is, how rich the two of you are together on his lips, and you’re able to fully appreciate the skill of the mouth that kisses you deeply, leaving traces of you against your tongue and teeth.

“Please — fuck me.” It’s the only thing you can say at this rate, only half-coherent and still trembling with desire, but Mark doesn’t seem to care that you’re stuttering over such a simple request. His thumb wipes traces of saliva off the corner of your mouth, kisses it clean for good measure, then straightens up, his hands working at his belt. You almost miss the fact that his hands are shaking slightly as he undoes the buckle and tugs it out from the loops.

You want to help — it’s the least you can do, after all, and your fingers push the button of his jeans out through the hole, his hands working in tandem to tug the zipper down. However, your movements falter when you hear a noise from just outside the room — the sound of the doorknob being jangled, the thud of a body gently hitting the door, as though worried it’s stuck. You glance up at Mark, ready to reassure him, but he either hadn’t heard or doesn’t care because he’s too busy stepping out from the pool of denim at his ankles, and you get completely sidetracked by the bulge straining against his boxers.

You almost ignore Youngho’s voice grumbling ‘Jesus Christ, now of all times? from behind the door, but you leverage it instead.

“Should we let him in?” You ask, tone innocent despite the evident deviousness in your words. It pays off, though; Mark’s cock twitches unmistakably under thin fabric, and he actually looks like he’s considering it. “You’re just about to fuck me, after all. Weren’t we going to — what did you say? Put on a show?”

He worries on his bottom lip, like he’s unsure if you’re serious, but in the end, he shakes his head, reaching out to smooth your hair away from your face and ushering you to lay back down. The lips that meet your forehead are gentle, almost apologetic.

“Not now,” he murmurs against your skin. “Right now, you’re all mine.”

You laugh lightly, nodding, and he chuckles too, but the sound of it slowly dies down when your finger hooks into the garter of his boxers. You can feel his breathing hitch as you tug it down, the elastic catching when it meets the shape of his cock, but you don’t make any move to free it just yet — for some reason, you want to see him do it.

“Show me.”

He complies without hesitation, one hand dragging the elastic down over his thighs, the other curling around the base of his length, and your face flushes as satisfaction works through your system at the bare sight of him.

Mark Lee is big — not monstrously so, but enough for you to make a pleased noise as your hand joins his, fingers barely wrapping around his girth. You give his shaft a gentle squeeze, and his exhale stutters, watching you stroke him, long and thorough in your movements. Your palm swipes over the tip, leaking precum, allowing it to slick up your hand enough to keep your movements smooth. You’re fixated on the tension in his lips, the throb of his cock against your palm, and the way his gaze never leaves your face, like a small, amazed part of him still can’t believe what you’re doing, even if you’re both half-naked already.

“I want to suck you off,” you plead, grip tightening slightly. He grits his teeth, stifling another groan, but he shakes his head clearly enough for you to slow your movements in mild surprise.

“Can’t — not now. I need to be in you so badly.” His breathing’s sharp and heavy, like he’s trying to keep himself in check. “You don’t even know — how long I’ve wanted to feel you.”

Your hold relaxes, and you let him maneuver you, his renewed hold on your hips dragging you closer to the edge of the bed. In this position, he can spread your thighs further, and you angle yourself optimally — enough for him to get a full view of your pussy, wet and still aching from your last orgasm.

“You don’t know how badly I’ve wanted to know how tight you are,” he continues, and there’s a faraway look in his eyes that makes you think he might be entrenched in fantasy. “How much I would have killed to see you — have you like this. I’m not gonna be able to wait anymore.”

His fingers dig into your sides, thumbs stroking your stomach in a weak pattern. The underside of his shaft presses against your folds, still half obscured by your panties, in a way that’s heavy enough to make you mewl, your hips reacting before your mind can, and he hisses softly as he feels his length glide along your slit before you relax your stance again.

“I can’t wait,” he reiterates, a breaking in his voice that sounds almost tortured. You don’t want him to either, want to see him buried to the hilt inside you, and you raise your hips again in need. “I want you so much it’s driving me crazy.”

“Then take me.”

And you’re not sure if it’s a demand or a plea, but he no longer stops himself; his hand fists his cock a few times, coating the slick of precum along his length before he lines the tip up with your entrance. His other hand’s flush against the inside of your thigh, a light pressure ensuring he always has enough space to fit himself between your legs — enough space to bottom out completely.

Mark’s considerate in his pace — maybe he knows he’s big, or maybe he’s just naturally careful, but he allows you the time to adjust to the stretch. Your nails almost puncture holes into the sheets, your grip so tight you wonder if it’s just to brace yourself or to hang onto the last threads of your sanity. He’s only halfway in, but you’re pushing fullness already, and he stops when his cock meets slight resistance, looking up at you in concern.

“You’re not—?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” you reassure him softly, and it’s true; the adjustment brings about slight discomfort, but it’s almost nothing to you — not compared to how much more you want. “Give me everything; I want all of you inside me.”

He pauses still, trying to read your expression for any lies, but when he can’t find any, he nods, his jaw tensing as he presses both palms against your thighs, keeping you open as much as possible to accommodate him. He doesn’t even stop when you whimper, feeling a tightening twitch in your pussy that also causes him to groan, until inch by inch, you’ve taken him, his hips flush against yours.

He doesn’t move — not yet, his eyes trained to where you’re connected like he’s once again unable to believe what he’s doing. You hear him mumble something to himself that you want to hear too; you squirm slightly, and he hisses through his teeth, looking up at you and finding the questioning in your face. He offers you a small smile, albeit somewhat strained.

“You’re tighter than I thought.”

“You’re bigger than I thought,” you hum, and neither of you is really to blame; the tight fit, the slight breathlessness it leaves you with, is perfect, you think — just what the both of you need. “Did you often think about fucking me?”

“Probably just as often as you’re making it sound like you thought about having me fuck you, I think.”

“Don’t get cocky,” you warn, but there’s no real heat in your voice.

“I won’t. But it makes me feel good — knowing you wanted me just as bad.”

“I still do.” Your gaze is lazy, a little hazy, even if you’re anticipating so much. Even just the feeling of Mark, throbbing inside you, is already slowly building the pleasure in your stomach again; you wonder if you could cum like this, given enough time, given enough patience. “I’m still waiting for you to fuck me. God, Mark— please.”

He chuckles good-naturedly, but even that’s drowned out by the long moan that leaves you once he draws his hips back; your body’s mildly shocked into a new adjustment, feeling a sudden emptiness that’s quickly mitigated by him filling you back up again. The pace is slow, almost torturous, although you know he isn’t doing it to get a rise out of you. He wants to ease you into speed, careful to help you adjust fully; his restraint in his movements is all the more evident on his face, in the furrowing of his brow and the determination in his gaze. Even with that, he can’t help what he says, so intent on controlling everything else he does that he lets his words spill out over your noises.

“Pretty,” he grunts out, and when your walls twitch around him, he accidentally thrusts sharper — just enough for you to whimper a little more loudly, and he has to reel his strength back again. “God, you’re beautiful. I should’ve told you sooner how much I wanted you. All those times I had to imagine you wrapped around me like this, wondering how much tighter you’d get once you came on my cock. All those times you drove me crazy while I was alone, when I could have been in you— I could have found out how good you felt. How pretty you’d look under me. And you’re still even prettier, even better than I ever dreamed.”

There’s an erratic melody of moans under his words, spilling from your mouth, and the fact that he riles himself up enough to increase his speed slightly doesn’t escape you. He’s a little less careful now, seemingly entranced by the view he gets, watching his shaft disappear into you only to come out glistening, and a part of you hates the idea of snapping out of his reverie, but the majority of your thoughts now lean towards wondering how much more you can get him to break free of his own self-imposed restrictions.

“I wanted to ask you so many times.” His eyes snap up, coming back into focus as he takes in the sight of you, flushed, hair tousled, gaze darkened. “Almost every day — I sat there, thinking about how all I could do was go home and fuck myself, frustrated you weren’t doing it for me. I should have taken you home with me right then and there — should have let you watch me touch myself thinking of you, should have let you touch me into cumming on your fingers.”

His breathing staggers as he leans in, eager to see you clearer, to hear your words, slowly becoming airier as they come out. For a moment, his gaze falls, torn between watching him move into you and meeting your eyes, but he ultimately chooses the latter once you speak up again, your tone even more hushed than before — like it’s meant to be a secret between just you and him.

“But there were times I wanted you even more than that, to the point that I almost felt like I couldn’t wait.” His eyes widen slightly, a few precious seconds of wondering if he understands what you mean, right before you confirm what he thinks. “I thought about making a move right then — I should have kissed you. I should have asked you.”

“Asked me what?” His voice is gruff with the effort to keep himself in check despite the fact that it’s clear to the both of you that it won’t last.

Your lazy smile’s illusionary; it hides the triumph swelling in your chest at knowing that he asked exactly what you hoped him to.

“I should have asked you to fuck me in front of everyone there.”

“God,” his eyes squeeze shut, his grip tightening. “Please. I can’t—”

“I should have bent over for you there, begged you to stretch me out right after our session,” you continue, bordering on merciless. “Mark, you don’t know — how badly I wanted to be on your lap, your cock in me, with everyone watching. How much I wanted you to fold me over that table, have people watch you pound me, have them listen to how good you make me feel. No one would ever even wonder; everyone would know I’m yours.”

You pause, allowing his eyes to fly open once again, and there’s a pleading in them that’s begging for release. Your eyes soften along with your voice, but you’re this far gone; you should at least see it through.

“And everyone would know you’re mine too.”

“Fuck,” he growls, and his hips stutter before new resolve fills him, his hips driving into you with the force of a strength you didn’t even know he had in him; your thighs tremble at the intensity, at the renewed impact, and feeling him drive his cock deeper into you has you crying out somewhere between a moan and a sob. “Fuck, _________. If I had known you’d thought about me like that — God.”

It’s your turn to shut your eyes for a while, allowing yourself to focus on his movements, breaching your tightness even faster now. You feel his hands skim up your sides again, fingers digging into the fabric of your bra and pulling them down until your bare tits are cupped in his hands. You shiver as his thumbs pass over your nipples, toying them into firm nubs.

“One day,” he hums out, his voice giving way to a slight hoarseness again. “I’ll do it. I’ll fuck you in front of him — in front of Youngho, in front of everyone. I’ll let them wonder how tight you are, how fucking warm you are, and I’ll let them leave knowing no one can know but me.”

It’ll never happen, you both know, but something about agreeing to something so absurd is what has your body almost shaking in longing, and it’s what causes him to press in deeper, folding your legs closer to your torso. Your hands do what little they can to help, keeping your thighs apart so as not to obstruct his view. You can tell it’s somehow not enough, not really all of what he wants when his brow furrows, and he shifts his weight, pushing into you at a new angle.

The stark difference has you gasping before you can control it. Immediately, Mark stops, and you’re already shaking your head before you even hear him say anything, presuming he’s paused out of concern. But before you can say you’re fine, his hushed voice cuts through the silence.

“Do that again.”

“What?”

“Do it again,” he mumbles, sounding distant. “Breathe in. Suck in your stomach.”

You’re not one to complain at such a simple request, albeit a little odd, so you comply, inhaling enough to tighten your torso. You’re surprised when you feel his cock twitch inside you, and you blow out the air alongside your question. “Mark, what are you—”

“I can see it,” he says in utter disbelief. “When you’re like this, I can — I can see my cock inside you. Just a bit.”

Your eyes follow his gaze, fixed just below your navel. From this angle, without any movement, you can’t see a thing, but you assume he’s not one to abandon fucking you so intently without good reason, so you press your palm against your stomach, just above your pelvis. Nothing really feels significantly out of place — up until the point when Mark draws his hips back again, and you feel the backward slide of his cock.

Your throat tightens, and you don’t really understand the feeling that spreads in you — a unique kind of arousal, knowing how deep he is inside you and how you’re taking all of him in despite the fit, because of the fit. Your hand falls away, allowing Mark’s to take its place, and he exerts just a little more pressure against your stomach in an attempt to get the most out of the experience when he thrusts back in. He groans, feeling the bulge push back up, and he quickly picks up the same pace, renewed in intensity so he can experience the rapid rise and fall he creates under his palm.

The faster he goes, the harder he presses, and you’re not sure if he knows it, but the onslaught of friction is what’s making you whine and squirm even more; you’re trapped, in the best way possible, in his hold, your hands back to clinging to the backs of your knees like a lifeline. Pressure from the outside builds on the slowly growing pressure inside, a knot in your pelvis that’s coiling so tightly you feel like you can’t breathe. If Mark notices how close you are, he doesn’t make it known; he’s busy feeling the outline of his cock against your stomach, and when he looks up at you again, his eyes are hazy.

“I would fuck you every single day, every single hour if I could feel this every time,” he whispers in a way that’s almost reverent. “Let me — I want to keep seeing you like this. I want to feel how deep I am inside you, too. Let me fuck you all the time.”

You nod, and your first attempt to say something is just another choked sob. When you do manage to get something out, it’s broken in tearful stutters. “M-Mark, I’m s— I’m so close… I’m — fuck—”

“Do it.” It’s not a harsh command but an urging made on short breath; through your misty vision, you see tension in Mark’s face and shoulders, like he’s bracing himself for something too. You barely register the ping in the back of your mind, too focused on the way he’s pressing his palm harder on your stomach, the way his hips quicken their pace — he’s close too. “Let me feel you — want to feel you cum all over my cock.”

You inhale, not to speak but to let out a loud whimper; your teeth dig into your lower lip as you try to stifle the moans that threaten to follow, but in the end, you whine out his name. Your thighs threaten to close, trembling as you finally reach your climax, an impossible explosion of pleasure, and you have to squeeze your eyes shut so that you don’t get dizzy from the stars that burst around your vision.

“Fuck.” Mark’s voice is strained, his one hand still firm against your stomach, the other sliding against the inside of your thigh. “You get even tighter — you feel even better when you cum.”

“Mark,” you hiccup, unable to do anything but flutter around him as he pistons harder into you. You don’t even know what you’re asking for when you say ‘please,’ but he somehow seems to, and you trust that your body’s saying something you can’t fully detect in this state, with your mind floating in the aftermath of ecstasy.

“I know,” his tone is soothing in contrast to the intensity of his thrusts. “I’ve got you. Just a little more — where do you want—?”

You blink slowly, his words sinking in at too leisurely a pace; his hips stutter dangerously before you’re able to respond. You barely even do that, your hand gently brushing over the one against your stomach, but he catches onto the meaning quickly enough.

You’ve never heard your name said in such a beautiful way; hearing him moaning it lowly is enough to make you whine again, and that noise is drawn out when he shifts and slips out of you fully. Your brain’s fuzzy, but your senses are at least sharp enough to drink in the perfect sight of him cumming — the way he leans his head back, jaw taut and eyes shut, as he pumps his cock and the heat of his release against your skin, pooling against your stomach once he finally cums. You see a shiver run through him, and then he’s still for a while in this position, the both of you basking in the afterglow of your highs.

You’re still weak and sensitive when Mark finally comes back down, a lucidity you don’t have right now coming back into his gaze. All you can do is smile when he leans in, catching your lips in another kiss — one that’s surprisingly soft and slow in comparison to everything else, but still leaves you breathless when he pulls away.

“Let me clean you up,” he murmurs, and you hum in agreement, your body limp as you watch him move off the bed and pull a handful of tissues from a box on the desk on the opposite wall. Even his hands are gentle when he scoops you up, shifting you until your head can lean against the pillows. They carry a scent you’re not used to, and your nose scrunches, rejecting the change, but that’s quickly overpowered by Mark’s familiar coffee-and-linen one when he presses next to you, careful as he wipes his cum off your stomach and thoroughly cleans between your thighs. From somewhere down below, you still hear hushed voices, and the front door slams shut again. People are still in the middle of leaving, but you know Youngho will likely run out of guests soon, and this makes you feel like the timing’s suddenly become urgent.

“I want to date you properly,” you start, slightly slurred but unmistakably blunt. Mark’s gaze snaps to yours, slightly amused, as he balls the tissues up in his fist. “You never asked me, so I’m asking you.”

He looks perplexed. “I just never thought you wanted me to, so I didn’t try.”

You reach up, locking your fingers into his hair and using your grip to pull him down. Your kiss is a little demanding, with a tinge of excess frustration, and he pulls away laughing lightly.

“Do you still think I don’t want you to?”

Mark hums thoughtfully. “I think you made a lot of things clear tonight. On my end, I was happy enough to be near you.” He smiles down at you, and in the faint light, you can see the flush slowly return to his cheeks. “Having you like this — dating you… there’s no way I’d say no.”

Your shoulders relax, satisfied with his answer, and you beam up at him — an act he easily returns, breathtaking and endearing all at once.

Moments later, you feel his arm wind around your waist; he allows you to lean into his side, his other hand crossing over his lap to stroke your thigh. His face turns, pressing a kiss to your hair, and you feel his lips move, hear the quick rush of a whisper. You tilt your head, eyes slightly wide in questioning. “What was that?”

He shakes his head at first, trying to pass it off as nothing. But when it’s clear your curiosity won’t abate, he chuckles softly, his hand gently cupping your chin so that you can only look at him. His thumb strokes your bottom lip gently, as if trying to coax the same words out of your mouth before he murmurs them to you one more time — and this time, he sounds fully convinced of them.

“You’re all mine.”

[seiwas]

grow on me like a dog loved fondly: prologue | kamo choso

wc: 1.0k

summary: your regular to the flower shop is more than what he seems. 

contains: written with f!reader in mind but can be read as gn!, animal shelter employee choso x flower shop owner reader, implied that reader is shorter than choso, flowers, small talk.

a/n: the promised choso drabble! depending on how this is received, i intend for this to be the prologue to a longer choso fic i have in mind!

You have a regular on the weekends. 

Business in the flower shop tends to be slow during winter, with less occasions having the need for flowers and even less buds blooming during the season. 

But even with the expected decline in customers, Saturdays always guarantee one—

The bells attached to the store doors jingle, allowing in a gust of cool air that tickles your cheeks from where you’re crouched down. The peonies in your hands were delivered just yesterday, the ends of the stems needing a slight trim to keep them fresh for longer. 

You turn, standing up to face your visitor. A purple scarf is wrapped high around his neck, with white fleece running down the length of his arms—a sort of undershirt to the short-sleeved uniform worn atop it. The outfit is familiar enough, but what truly distinguishes him are the two spiky pigtails on the sides of his head. 

There are a few things you’ve managed to pick up from four-line exchanges with your regular (six if you’re lucky): 1) he works at the animal shelter a few streets away, 2) the flowers he buys are for the front desk, a weekly replacement he deems necessary to keep the place looking alive, and 3) who he is, his name—

—‘Choso’, if the tag on his uniform says anything. 

The tag that is now, also, just a hand’s reach away from you. 

You look up, pocketing your plant nippers. The peonies dangle between your fingers. 

“W-welcome!” you stutter, focusing on the thin metal chain running across his nose. 

It’s new, an addition that intrigues you more about the man in front of you. 

The look he gives you is lazy, gaze deadpan, almost empty. Anyone else might find it snobbish and off-putting, but you’ve gotten used to it—an almost magenta puffiness that surrounds his eyes, bags of fatigue that usually hang underneath. 

He continues to stare, unmoving. 

Considering all your previous interactions, you’ve realized, he isn’t scary or rude or anything of that sort—he’s just awkward. 

A bit quiet and unbothered, maybe, but still just awkward. You don’t think he’s ever started an interaction with you first. 

“Is there any flower in particular that you’re looking for?” you ask, motioning around your store. 

The selection is limited this season—a few camellias and clusters of Japanese primrose with an abundance of peonies and daffodils. 

His head turns as he glances around the store, pigtails bobbing slightly with each movement. When he faces you again, he shrugs, voice deep and firm as he asks, “Do you have any recommendations?” 

It’s an odd feeling, borderline awkward and nervous; you have no idea why your mind is blanking. 

“Um,” you clear your throat, tucking the peonies between your fingers into your apron pocket, “daffodils are bright and friendly, good for entryways and front desks, I think.” 

He eyes the daffodils to your right, buckets of stems holding yellow and white. The store stays quiet for what feels like a good minute before he nods, agreeing to your suggestion. 

“The usual?” two clusters, wrapped in newspaper. 

Your question echoes throughout the shop, lingering while you pick at which daffodils look best. 

“Yes, but two of them.” he answers in monotone, before adding on, a soft hesitancy, “Please.” 

You smile to yourself, picking more daffodils for another bunch. 

Both of you make your way to the cashier, another bout of silence surrounding you as you crumple newspaper and pull at tape. He always watches, you notice, his focus set on your practiced handling of stems and leaves. 

You look up momentarily, seeing that he keeps his head down, “The pigtails are cool.” 

He doesn’t say anything, and for a while you’re afraid you might have offended him, but he responds, voice low; it’s soft, gentle in a way you never expected it to be. 

“Thank you.” you catch him shifting his weight from your periphery, hands digging deeper into his pockets, “The dogs think they’re chew toys when I wear it this way.” 

You most certainly were not expecting that, either. 

This is the most initiative he’s taken to add onto the conversation.

You grin, chuckling under your breath, “That must be fun.” 

It’s faint, but you think you hear him laugh a little. 

When the flowers are completely wrapped, you set them aside, making your way behind the cash register. You punch in the cost, ready to bill him before he speaks again. 

“Actually, would you happen to do deliveries?” he seems shy asking it, barely looking you in the eye. 

“Yes!” You nod, grabbing a pen and paper to hand over to him, “Just write down your contact details, the address you want it delivered to, and when you’d like it to be delivered.” 

Another thing you’ve realized, is that despite appearances and what he seems to be, Choso handles objects gently; the pen and paper you’d just given him were taken lightly from your fingertips. Even the strokes of his penmanship are slow, the tip of the pen barely creating an indent on the small sheet. 

“Will you be having both of these delivered?” you ask, holding up the bundles of daffodils. 

“Just one.” he answers promptly, before adding on again, “Thank you.” 

And you know you shouldn’t ask, shouldn’t be so nosy, but—

“What’s the occasion?”—

Flowers are rarely in demand during the winter season. 

—“If you don’t mind me asking,” you follow-up quickly. 

The immediate quiet makes you think you might have gotten too comfortable again, made him feel weird about your questions—but he answers.

“My brothers,” he finishes the final curves of his writing, “they’re coming to visit.” 

The piece of paper is handed to you, and you hum, acknowledging his response. You go over his details, reciting it to him to double-check. But when you land on his address, your eyes go wide, a little ‘oh!’ slipping out. 

He furrows his brows, confused. 

You definitely, most certainly did not expect this. 

“Sorry,” you shake your head, your cheeks heating up in embarrassment, “Just—“ you chuckle, “I think we might be neighbors.” 

thank you notes: @twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat for sending me lil prompts that somehow birthed into this!! + @yemmuishomeforthementallyunwell for feeding the choso brainrot 🥹 + @mysugu @soumies for being my angels, lights of my life!! listening to me ramble abt this and helping me pick music, hash out plot, pick title, everything! ily

comments, tags, and reblogs are greatly appreciated ♡

[rboooks]

DC x DP Fic idea: The Royal Consort

Wesley Weston runs a blog after getting over his desire to expose Danny's secret- primarily due to no one believing him- and no one pays attention to it since almost all of Casper high school has one too.

The difference between the hundreds of other blogs is that one of his pictures of Phantom is clear. A perfectly uncorrected image of the famous ghost, whereas nearly all other pictures are blurry due to ghosts disrupting cameras. Even Wes isn't sure how he managed to capture him so well.

Another difference between his blog and others is that one of his followers happens to be John Constantine, who followed the kid a long time ago due to the fanfiction of the Bats and found them hilarious.

John opens his phone app, expecting a new chapter to the Bruce Wayne/Superman fic, and spits out his tea upon seeing the High King of the Dead casually in the human world. Horrified that the King has not been appropriately welcomed- which could lead to a war that the humans would never win- he calls an emergency Justice League and Justice League Dark meeting.

It didn't help that they had allowed a county to pass the anti-ecto laws, which ruined any attempt to appease the Ghost King once the news broke to the public. The League still worried about a declaration of war even after they demolished the laws and the United Nations had the States apologize on humans' behalf.

They quickly discover High King Phantom has been visiting Earth for almost three years. Before his coronation, Phantom had not been outside the Infinite Realms very often though he has appeared throughout history. Cave drawings date back thousands of years before the first ancient Egyptians, but he's visits are few and short.

Life would naturally send him back to the Realms because he had too much power and ectoplasm. After taking the throne, his powers only grew, which meant someone had to summon him as the only way for him to stay on Earth longer than an hour.

Now as King, he appeared only within the small town of Amity Park daily. Why?

John sighs. "He has an anchor. Someone is tying him to this plane. Like the helmet for Nabu, which allows Doctor Fate to exist here without being launched back to the Infinite Releams, Phantom has bonded himself. And I know who that is"

He pulls up a class photo on Weston's blog and points to a boy wearing a particular necklace.

"Danny Fenton is wearing the official Royal Consort of the Infinite Realms symbol and has been since he was fourteen. Phantom's husband may be our only hope to salvage the terrible mess the USA's bloody GIW placed the rest of us in."

Danny loved the necklace he found in Pariah Dark's old haunt. He inherited Pariah's haunt and everything inside once he was crowned and hasn't taken it off since. He didn't think it would be an issue. It's not like it would out his secret to his parents or anyone else since it was in Ghost Speech. Even he didn't know what it said.

Then one morning he comes down for breakfast only to have the most important members of the Justice League sitting in his living room waiting to greet him.

Desperate to keep his halfa status a secret, Danny must convince the entire world watching him, that he's just a human who scandalously eloped at age fourteen with one of the strongest beings in the mulitverse.

Jack's horrified "We were shooting my son-in-law this whole time" became a meme that has trended for months.

( Part 2 )

[fyorina]

ᡣ𐭩 I LAUGH LIKE ME AGAIN (SHE LAUGHS LIKE YOU)

FEATURING: dazai osamu

SUMMARY: four years apart and the ultimate question is about to be answered: do you and dazai really still know each other, or are you clinging to a fantasy of the past? you decide to put it to the test with a game of wits and questions when dazai gets back to your apartment—but as the game drags on, dazai starts to wonder if maybe he was wrong. worse, if maybe he would prefer to be wrong.

(wordcount: 14.5k; ņsfw; fem!reader; port mafia executive!reader, jealous!dazai, possessive!dazai, smoking & drinking, unprotected sex, switch!dazai, switch!reader, undertones of angst (happy ending). lmk if anything is missing, im rushing to get this out!)

AUTHOR'S NOTES: guys here it IS - sorry it's late, but TRUST it's worth it. i'm so proud of this fic, genuinely one of the things im most proud of writing. this is technically a part 2 to he's my collar but can be read as a standalone

It takes far too long for Dazai to make it out of the Port Mafia headquarters, with both Akutagawa and Chuuya prowling about like the dogs they are. He wonders if you tipped either of them off—Chuuya, in particular—because the slug had been looking around like he was searching for someone. He thinks you’re entirely wretched for it, knowing that if he got caught, he’d be trapped in that damp and filthy torture chamber until he managed to finagle his way out, and he plans to make it known to you just how entirely displeased he is by the situation. 

The path to your apartment is achingly familiar, and the giddiness in his chest is something he hasn’t felt since the day he left. He knows that he should probably be more careful—he’s still in Port Mafia territory, your apartment spans the top floor of the easternmost building of the five towers—but he also knows that you’re the only one with direct access to the cameras in this building so he’s more reckless than he would’ve otherwise been. 

The floors tick up agonizingly slowly, Dazai swears that there must be something wrong with the elevator because it’s never taken this long before to get up to your place. His fingers thrum against his thigh, and his foot taps the ground impatiently. He paces from corner to corner within the small space like a caged animal. He thinks that maybe he should be taking advantage of the time alone, come up with some better excuses as to why he didn’t say anything to you before he left.

“I wouldn’t have left,” isn’t going to cut it. As true as it might be, it’s not the full truth, and Dazai knows you’ll be able to sniff it out in a matter of a few seconds with a clear head. He’s not walking into a cheerful reunion between old lovers, he’s walking into what’s about to be a stressful game of chess against a strategist whom Dazai has always considered a near-equal, a battle of wits against a woman whose whole life has revolved around political warfare. If he wants to keep his dignity intact and his secrets safe, he’s going to have to be incredibly cautious with what he says to you and even with how he reacts to what you say to him.

Still, he can’t help the giddiness. The excitement. He’s missed you. He’s missed you so much that it hurts. He’d thought that over time, the longing for you would go away, but it never did. If anything, it got worse because, over time, the pictures of you started to lack the soothing feeling they used to bring to the aching in his chest. Over time, he started to forget the sound of your voice and the sound of your laugh.

He’d known that you’d been sent away on foreign business not long after his last call to you, but he didn’t think Mori would actually keep you abroad for three whole years. He’d been hoping, maybe, that he could stumble into you one day. Or maybe just watch from afar, get close enough to hear the sound of your voice again. He’s been grossly denied of you for too long, and he knows that it’s of his own doing but that only makes it worse.

When the elevator dings, announcing his arrival on your floor, Dazai is sorely unprepared for the conversation about to take place. He steps into your penthouse, eyes drifting around the familiar vast space.

Like your office, not much has changed since the last time he was here. Your coffee table is still set down a few centimeters too close to the couch in the living room—the same couch he had his first kiss on with you when the two of you were sixteen and drunk on champagne celebrating a successful mission. You still hang your black jacket over a chair instead of properly on a hanger, it’s why it always has a crease on the back—he’d noticed it when you left your office, and he can’t help but smile slightly at the confirmation as his eyes linger on where it’s draped over one of your kitchen chairs. 

You tried to convince him that you’ve changed in the years the two of you have been apart, but Dazai doesn’t think you’ve changed much at all.

You’re leaning against the windows, looking down on the city—he knows you must’ve heard the elevator, but you haven’t bothered to look his way yet. There’s an indecipherable expression on your face and a glass of wine in your hand. You’re still dressed in your suit and Dazai notices there’s a glass of whiskey on the rocks untouched on the kitchen table. He shrugs off his trench coat and drapes it over yours, hoping that the scent of you seeps into it because he’s gone too long without it.

His fingers curl around the glass of whiskey you’d left out for him, and for a moment, he swears that he’s eighteen again. He’s making his way to your penthouse after a long mission with Chuuya, you’re expecting him—you always are—and he can never push away the fondness that squeezes his chest when he finds you lounging back on your couch, flipping through channels to find something to watch, a glass of his favorite whiskey set down on the coffee table next to where your feet are propped up as you wait for him to show up.

He wonders if you even care to remember what his favorite is. He wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t.

He makes his way out of the kitchen and back into the living room, and he’s reminded that he’s not eighteen and you’re not waiting for him to show up after a mission because you finally look at him, and his breath catches in his throat.

He thinks you look a bit older now than you did four years ago—to be expected, of course—and there’s a coldness to your eyes that hadn’t been there before. Impossibly, he thinks that you’re somehow even more beautiful than you were when he last saw you, and he realizes again, throat tightening, that even after three years of no contact with you, he’s just as in love with you now as he was the day he left.

He knew it back then before he left, even if he never said it. When he was eighteen and could only feel any inkling of pleasure when he was with you; it wasn’t like he’d never tried to have sex with other people, he’d whore himself out for information at any given chance and slept around frequently after you started dating a civilian to distract himself from the bitter jealousy he felt, but he’d never known how good it was supposed to feel until he slept with you for the first time. When he was seventeen and could only ever feel comfortable in your presence, seeking you out at any given chance when he couldn’t handle being around people anymore; he’d curl up in your office with your orange blanket, napping as you did work, knowing that you’d keep people away from him. He thinks he might’ve even known when he was sixteen when the two of you first met on the streets of the Kanagawa prefecture.

He wonders if you even believed him when he said it earlier—he doubts it, you don’t seem too keen to believe anything he says, and he doesn’t blame you for it. 

But whether you believe it or not, it’s yours—that rotted heart of his, shriveled and shabby, riddled with holes and decay, half-eaten by maggots and worms it might be, but it’s still yours. He thinks that it was meant to be yours since the moment he was born, and it’ll be yours even after the two of you are long dead. He doesn’t know how he’s meant to go without you again—he doesn’t think he can. He knows that despite the tentative ceasefire, the Port Mafia and the Agency are still enemies, but he knows in his heart that he won’t be able to leave you again. Even just the sight of you has condemned him completely. 

Then you speak, and at once, his entire world falls apart.

“I’m leaving again in the morning,” you finally say, tone flat and eyes sharp and shrewd as you look over him. He reminds himself that this is not a reunion, that he needs to get his head on straight if he wants to make it out of your apartment in one piece, but it’s hard. “I was only brought back to smooth things over with the government after the whole fiasco with Fitzgerald and his American cronies. I’ll be leaving for Russia in the morning to meet with Tolstoy and Nabakov. Hopefully, gain some intel on Fyodor Dostoevsky’s plans before the man makes another move on the city.”

He… did not anticipate that you’d be leaving again so soon. Something cold and sharp latches to his heart, like jagged nails ripping it apart. He makes sure it doesn’t show on his face.

“Be careful,” he tells you quietly. “Dostoevsky… he’s not someone to underestimate. Just-Just be careful.”

You raise your eyebrows, unimpressed, “I’ve worked with Dostoevsky before. I don’t need you to warn me about him.” 

Your voice is cool. Sharp. Dazai sighs, knowing that anything he might’ve said to you earlier in the night is lost to you, and he doesn’t know if he’ll have it in him to bare his heart again, only for you to scorn it. He’s not meeting with you as he knows you—as his closest friend, as his lover; he’s meeting with you as the Port Mafia executive. Not the version of you that treats with allies, wining and dining them with glittering eyes and playful smiles as you use your ability to ensure they never turn on the Port Mafia; the version of you that sits at the round table with enemies, with a quick mind and calculating eyes as you decide whether or not they’re worthy of being absorbed into the Port Mafia or if Double Black will be sent out to eradicate them. 

“I told you everything I had to say back at the office,” Dazai tries, and he wonders if you’ll let him get away with it—he doubts it, but it’s worth a shot, and it will at least stall for a few moments as he tries to forcibly turn the cogs in his mind to figure out the best way of appeasing you. “I missed you. I… couldn’t say goodbye to you, not if I was to leave. I…”

I love you.

He doesn’t say it; he thinks he was only able to push it out earlier in the night in the heat of the moment, the orgasm-induced haze fogging his brain enough to let it slip out in desperation to make you give him a chance. And it worked because you gave him a second chance when you invited him back to your apartment, but Dazai doesn’t know how to make the most of the opportunity. He thinks he’s a fool for not preparing for this before getting here.

You click your tongue sharply, lip curling up in something close to disgust, and Dazai is glad he didn’t speak his ‘I love you’ because he thinks he might’ve actually cried if that was your reaction to him saying it.

“The only things you told me earlier in the night were half-truths and sweet talk. I didn’t invite you back to my apartment to hear you beg for another chance, Dazai,” you say coolly, and Dazai desperately misses the sound of his given name on your tongue. The corner of your lip curves up into a half-smirk, eyes suddenly glittering beneath the dim lighting of your penthouse as you add, “Although, I wouldn’t be opposed to it after we talk.”

He thinks the fact that you’re already considering an after might be a good sign. He can feel his cheeks flush a bit at your words, but instead of letting himself get rattled, he takes a step forward, well into your personal space, as he dips his face down so close to yours that his lips nearly brush yours as he speaks.

“I’d beg pretty for you,” he whispers, letting his voice drop an octave as his gaze tracks down to your lips. “I’d even get on my knees.”

Unfortunately, you are entirely unbothered by the proposition. “We’ll see, I suppose,” you say, and then raise your eyebrows, signaling for him to take a step back.

He does, and he feels distinctly put out and rejected by your reaction, but he sighs and asks, “What did you invite me here for then?” 

He very much does not like the way your eyes glitter now—shrewd this time, more amused, dangerous, as if you know the two of you are about to tread down territory that he’s going to be unfamiliar with. You nod for him to follow you into the kitchen, taking a seat at the head of the table and motioning for him to sit opposite you.

He does.

“We can play a game,” you finally concede. Dazai settles back against his chair, fingers still tapping rhythmically against his glass of whiskey, a terrible habit that Dazai has accrued whenever he feels cornered. Not a frequent occurrence, but damning when it is. Your eyes linger on them, and he knows you’ve pinpointed the tell. He forces himself to stop, but from the way your lips curl up, he can tell it doesn’t matter. “Ten questions each. Yes or no answers only.”

Dazai notices that you pointedly leave out any rule about the honesty of each answer—intentional, surely, so he probes.

“How do we determine the winner?” Dazai asks. He finally takes a sip of the fine whiskey you’d poured for him, and his question from earlier is answered. His favorite. There’s a warm feeling in his chest at the realization that you’ve remembered it even after all of these years.

Your lips curve up into a sharper and wider smile, teeth glimmering like knives beneath the soft lighting of your kitchen. The glass of wine in your hands is suddenly more reminiscent of a gun being pointed at him than your choice of alcohol, and he feels as if he’s already made some egregious mistake in your eyes.

“After we give our answer, the other has to decide whether or not it was truthful. In the end, we’ll both see how many the other got right. A test to see how well we still know each other,” is all you say in response. You’re mocking him and his insistence that the two of you are still the same, but Dazai intends to prove himself right. You tilt your head to the side and then say, “The prize is to be determined by the winner. I’ll ask the first question.”

Dazai winks, a lecherous comment already on his tongue about the prize, but the withering look you give him is more than enough to make it die before he can let it loose. He pointedly takes another sip of his drink and sinks in his seat.

He thinks that this should be an easy win. You’re quite the adept liar, but you’ve always had a glaring tell. Well, he amends, it’s glaring to him, at least. Not many others would be observant enough to catch it, and even if they were, only someone with an abundance of experience with you would be able to put it together. His gaze flickers up to meet yours, wondering if your lashes flutter right before you tell a lie. It’s such a simple and subtle tell, so casual that it took Dazai a year and a half to put together, but it was hard to miss once he did.

You hum to yourself as you give off the appearance of thinking about a question, but Dazai knows you better than anyone, and he’s certain that you already have all ten prepared, so he rolls his eyes at the faux show of uncertainty. 

“We both know you know what you want to ask,” he finally says. “Do us both a favor and quit with the theatrics.”

Your lip quirks up in amusement. “And here I was being gracious giving you more time to formulate whatever lies you’ll try to get away with,” you drawl, and Dazai nearly flinches.

“You know me so well,” Dazai sighs to hide how disconcerted he really is. “The question?”

You stare at him for a moment, and your lips curl up into a deceptively soft smile that almost throws Dazai off because, god, he’s missed you. And he knows you’re looking at him like this just for this specific reason because you’re a despicable bitch who knows that he’s always been easily unsettled when people show any semblance of affection toward him, but he can’t help the way he falters.

He tries to brace himself for whatever invasive question you’re about to ask regarding his reasons for leaving. Tries to prepare himself to lie cleanly because he’s sure you’re as aware of his tells as he is of yours. 

Then you ask: 

“Did you defect because of something Oda asked of you?”

Jesus. Right for the throat. You really don’t pull punches. 

Dazai’s throat tightens at the mention of his old friend, but he’s able to keep his expression clear of the sudden pain that your question brings on. You’re watching him carefully for reactions, gaze hawklike as you study his face, and Dazai is not about to let you pinpoint any more of his tells so early in the game.

He figures that this is an easy question; you already know the answer but want to hear the confirmation from his lips, so he decides to tell the truth.

“Yes.”

“The truth,” you say, an indecipherable expression on your face. He wonders if you want to ask what Odasaku asked of him, but that’s not part of the game and Dazai has no intention of answering that.

Be on the side that saves people. If both are the same to you, become a good man.

You might laugh in his face—Dazai Osamu, the Demon Prodigy, a good man? The idea is blasphemous, and he thinks it might actually hurt him if you scoff or laugh in response to hearing that, so he keeps his mouth shut and doesn’t give away more than he has to, hoping that you don’t just straight up ask him.

You open your lips to speak, and Dazai braces himself for the prying question, but instead, you only probe, “First question?”

He wonders if your whole first question and the implications of it was just a means of trying to throw him off because now he’s fumbling trying to remember what he wanted to ask you before you hit him with it. He wouldn’t put it past you to play dirty like that—bringing up his dead friend and his last request just to unsettle him to give you the edge.

“Did we meet during my underground years after I defected?” he finally asks, and yeah, he knows the answer to this question. The missing half of his ear and waking up in the old safe house he used to hide out at with you is more than enough evidence for him to come to a definite conclusion, but he wants to hear it from you.

“Yes.”

Dazai inhales sharply and then murmurs, “That’s the truth.” And then, more loudly and far more affronted, he accuses, “I can’t believe you shot half of my ear off.”

He expects you to toss him a wink and a sharp grin, unrepentant and even finding amusement in his offense, but instead, your expression falters for the first time since he’s arrived. Something strange crosses your face; for whatever reason, his words leave you conflicted and Dazai suddenly feels even more nervous than he already was because now he can’t help but wonder what he might’ve said to you in his drunken state. 

He supposes that’ll have to be another question, but first, he’s going to have to figure out how to phrase it to get a yes or no answer first, without being vague enough for it to be a waste of a question or easy for you to misconstrue.

You hum after a few moments, taking a pointed sip of your wine. Dazai watches curiously—you’re bothered still, you’re not even trying to hide it. He knows you have better control over your facial expressions than this, so he thinks maybe it’s a ploy to get him to start spiraling down a path of useless questions. Put off by his sudden inability to discern your schemes, a part of him wonders if maybe you were right because the him of four years ago would’ve seen right through you right now.

“I’m afraid it had to be done,” you sigh with faux regret, but he can tell from the way the smile on your lips doesn’t reach your eyes that you’re not into the banter. “Were you able to fulfill Oda’s request?” 

Fuck. This time Dazai can’t withhold the grimace that spreads across his face. He tries to keep his voice light with a deflecting comment, “My, bella, you’re really hitting with the deep questions tonight, aren’t you?”

You raise your eyebrows, tilting your head to the side as you wait for an answer, not giving him any room to formulate a response to your question. He finally sighs and shakes his head, taking a long sip of his whiskey. He wishes he had a pack of cigarettes on him, suddenly desperately longing for the pleasant burn of the smoke against his throat; he needs the buzz badly right now.

As if you could read his mind, you shift in your seat a bit and stuff your hand into the pocket of your slacks. It takes a few seconds but you fish out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, sliding them across the table over to him. If he wasn’t already so in his head over the question you asked, he’d make a quip over the fact that you still know him so well despite your insistence otherwise, but he only pulls out a cigarette and lights it, looking curiously down at the familiar brand.

“Since when did you start smoking these?” he asks quietly, eyes fluttering shut as he tilts his head back and takes a long drag of it. He exhales slowly and then adds, “Thought you liked the other ones, in the green box.”

“Teal,” you correct, and then frown a bit. “... Switched after you left.”

Dazai’s eyes flutter back open as his gaze focuses on you, wondering if the implication you left up in the air is something he can take at face value or if it’s just another way of trying to get him to lower his guard. But from the way you suddenly don’t meet his eyes, Dazai thinks you might be being honest: you switched because they reminded you of him.

Dazai’s chest suddenly feels heavy again.

“... No,” he finally responds to your second question. “Not yet, at least.”

“... Truth,” you say, and Dazai’s lips curl into a wry smile.

“Unfortunately.” The word slips out before he can stop it.

Your gaze flickers back up to him, curious, but Dazai doesn’t give you the chance to dwell on his comment, asking his next question: “Did I… admit anything to you that night that I wouldn’t have said while sober?”

His fingers tap rhythmically against his glass of whiskey, half-empty now; he’s anxious to hear your response.

“You did,” you confirm.

Dazai grimaces because that’s another truth, and that is not good. But just like how he doesn’t offer any context for his answers, you don’t either. He doesn’t know what he might’ve admitted or how you might’ve taken it—he’s going to have to waste another question on this topic.

“Truth,” he murmurs.

You hum and then ask, “Do you still blame yourself for what happened to him?”

“Come on,” Dazai complains sharply, tossing you a dirty look now. His jaw is tight. He wonders if you keep asking about Oda as some sort of sick revenge for him leaving, ripping open wounds that never properly healed so you can dig your fingers into them and twist around. You don’t look bothered by his outburst, waiting patiently for a response. He lets out an angry sigh, looking away and taking another long drink from his glass and another drag of his cigarette. 

He voices his first lie, “No.”

You let out a puff of air, rising to your feet and making your way over to the opposite counter, you grab the bottle of whiskey and bring it back over to him, topping off his now-empty glass before pointedly holding out your hand. He passes the cigarette over to you, tilting his head back to watch you bring it to your lips—a part of him longs to lean forward, to slide his hand behind your neck and cradle your head as he brings his lips to yours, inhaling the smoke as you exhale it, dizzy off the proximity to you, high off the buzz of the nicotine, just like the two of you would do when before he left.

He refrains, if only barely.

You exhale the smoke, a small cloud billowing around you—Dazai mourns the waste—and then you pass the cigarette back over to him. Your fingers brush his as you do, and a spark shoots through his arm at the touch.

“A lie,” you finally say, looking down at him with a frown. “You shouldn’t blame yourself. There was nothing you could’ve done to save him.”

“You don’t know that,” Dazai says tightly, averting his gaze from you as you make your way back over to your seat across from him. “If I’d been faster-”

“If Mori wants someone dead, then they’ll die,” you interrupt him, a grimace on your face as you look down at your wine glass. “Trust me, Dazai, there was no saving Oda Sakunosuke.”

Dazai pauses instead of snapping again, catching the expression on your face. Haunted, as if you’re speaking from experience. He tilts his head to the side and then asks quietly, “Are you talking about your ex-partner? Itou?”

If Dazai remembers correctly, he died on a mission when you were seventeen. You never told him the circumstances, and he never asked, but it was the first and only time you ever broke down in front of him.

The corner of your lips tightens, “Is that your next question?”

Dazai barely withholds a frustrated sigh. 

“No,” he says quietly, and then asks, “Did I tell you why I couldn’t say goodbye? The real reason?”

He holds his breath now as he waits for your response. One way or another, this question is a double blade: if he did tell you why, then he’s at another disadvantage because he’s going to feel distinctly bare and vulnerable; if he didn’t tell you, he just admitted that he lied back at your office, at least partially. 

After what feels like an eternity, you finally say, “Yes.”

The truth. Dazai wonders when you’re going to utter your first lie, if you will, or if you’re trying to make some sort of point by being honest with him. He voices his answer and then waits impatiently for your next question as his mind races.

He desperately wants to know how you responded to him back then. Would you have come with him had he come to you before he left? Or would you have chosen the Port Mafia? He wonders if he should ask, make it one of his remaining seven questions, but he doesn’t know if he has the guts to hear your answer, so maybe he’ll just change the subject.

“Are you enjoying yourself at the Agency?”

For the life of him, Dazai cannot figure out your angle. First, the prying questions about Oda and now asking about the Agency. He doesn’t know what he expected at the start of the game—you’ve always been unpredictable, but even more so now. He’s never had such a hard time reading you or your intentions before.

He starts to feel even more doubtful, wondering if you were right.

Maybe he doesn’t know you as well as he thinks he does anymore.

But this is an easy question, so he says the truth with little hesitation, “I am.”

Dazai swears the corners of your lips curl up into a soft smile, but it’s gone so quickly that he might’ve imagined it.

“Good,” you say quietly. “I’m glad.”

Dazai’s lips part, a warm feeling spreads through his chest at the honesty in your tone. Desperately, he wants to know what’s going on—where’s the rage and the betrayal he expected from you? The hate? Why do you seem… okay with all of this?

Irrationally, he starts to wonder if everything from the office was just a heat-of-the-moment conversation. If now that you’ve had time to sit on your thoughts, you’ve realized… realized what? That you’ve moved on from him? That you don’t care what he does anymore? That you’ve accepted that he’s no longer a part of your life? The warmth in his chest disappears, edged away by a sudden coldness and desperation because he thinks he’d rather die than go back to a life without you.

Even more irrationally, he remembers the comment you made back at the office, the admission that you’ve slept around since he left. Oh god, what if you really have moved on?

He knows his next question.

“The people you slept with—were they all one-night stands?”

He doesn’t want to know the answer unless it’s a yes.

You raise your eyebrows at the abrupt shift in his line of questioning, and then, to his absolute horror, you say, truthfully, “No.”

“What do you mean no?” he asks angrily—he thinks if he was a bird, he’d be puffing his chest out in irritation. He feels antsy suddenly, he needs to move around. He starts tapping his foot against the floor, his fingers against the glass. And again, he thinks you’re a despicable bitch because you only look amused at his question as if he’s not beside himself with righteous fury.

“It’s not your turn,” is all you respond with, and Dazai has a distinct urge to throttle you. Then you ask, “Do you feel like you belong there?”

He halts.

His fingers freeze from where they’re tapping against the glass, his foot freezes mid-motion. His lips part as he’s confronted with the very question that he’s been struggling with for two years now. He wants to yes, if only to maybe be a little spiteful, to rub in your face that he’s somewhere good and he’s somewhere where he belongs, and it’s not somewhere with you. A cruel dig to get back for the aching in his chest at the thought of you being with other people, but he knows that you’ll catch the lie, and more importantly, he doesn’t want to hurt you like that.

Maybe he has grown a bit because the Dazai of four years ago nearly killed your civilian boyfriend when he found out that you were dating someone besides him and then promptly made a show of sleeping around to try to get back at you.

So, instead, he says quite honestly, “I don’t know.”

You tilt your head to the side. “Not a yes or no answer, but I suppose it works. How curious.”

He hates your cryptic comments. Pointedly, he side-eyes you as he takes another long drag of his cigarette. Already, it’s nearly down to the nub, so he puts it out on your table, ignoring the distasteful look you give him, and then reaches for another to light as he asks: “Were you in a relationship with any of them?” 

You roll your eyes at his prying, and he cannot hide the abject horror that crosses his face when you say, “Yes.”

“That better be a lie,” he complains, and when you look at him as if to ask if that’s really his guess, he makes a show of pushing out his bottom lip and looking away as he says: “I cannot believe you dated other people. Cheater.”

“We were never even dating, Daz-”

“Yes, we were,” Dazai protests instantly, entirely aghast at your words. “We absolutely were. What does that even mean? Of course, we were dating. Everybody knew it. Ask anybody. Ane-san knew. Gin-chan knew. Chuuya knew. Even Mori knew. We were so dating, you-”

“You never officially asked me to be your girlfriend, which is, unfortunately, the most fundamental step of dating,” you interrupt him, and Dazai stares at you in disbelief.

“I bought you flowers, we fucked exclusively,” Dazai complains, aggrieved. “We were definitely dating, and you definitely cheated on me because we never broke up.”

“If we were dating,” you emphasize the if very pointedly, and Dazai is distinctly put out by it, “then we broke up the day you left without saying goodbye.”

Dazai withers. He has no witty comment to return fire with, so instead, he just takes another sip of his whiskey, grateful for the combined buzz of the alcohol and the nicotine to distract him from the overwhelming guilt he feels whenever you bring up how he left you.

“Do you feel like you belong more with the Agency than you did with the Port Mafia?” 

Your next question is an amendment to your previous on, and it leaves Dazai just as lost.

He wants to belong with the Agency. He does. Desperately. He wants more than anything to feel as at home and comfortable in the light as he does in the dark. He doesn’t want to question his place among them anymore, he doesn’t want to wonder if he sticks out like a sore thumb. He wants to enter the office and feel like he doesn’t have to pretend to be someone he’s not, just so he can keep his place with them. He doesn’t want to have to fear at every corner that he’s going to revert to old habits, and they’ll see him for the monster that he is: a monster that should have never left the dark crevices that he crawled out from, a monster with blood so black that it strikes fear in even the most terrible mafiosos.

“No,” he admits the insecurity that’s plagued him to the one person he feels comfortable enough with to voice it aloud. He can’t bring himself to look up at you, wondering if the admission will give you some sort of sick satisfaction, if you’ll be happy that he’s not finding a place he can be comfortable in without you. Instead, he decides to rush to ask his next question: “The one you were in a relationship with, did you love him?”

He thinks that the question came across as far more timid than he meant it to be, and his eyes slide shut as he waits for your answer.

“There were multiple I had relationships with—” Dazai scoffs, of course, there were multiple. “—...but no, I did not.”

He lets out a soft puff of air, shoulders slumping a bit in relief. But his fingers are still tense around his glass, waiting for whatever question you’re going to ask next that’s going to dig deep into open wounds, stripping him of all of his masks and armor to force him to lay himself entirely bare in front of you.

“Did you really blow up Chuuya’s car before you left?”

His eyes fly open at the sudden change of pace in your questions, noting the smirk curling at the corner of your lips and the amusement glinting in your eyes. He accepts the olive branch quickly as he gives you a sharp smile and asks: “What do you think?” 

Your hand flies to your mouth to muffle a laugh, and the smile on Dazai’s lips becomes a bit softer as he watches you desperately try to get yourself under control. “You’re insane, you know that?” you finally say, still trying to bite back giggles. “He was so mad. Raged about it for weeks.”

Another question pops into Dazai’s head at the mention of Chuuya, and before he can consider whether or not he actually wants to know the answer to it, he asks: “Speaking of Chuuya, was he one of your trysts while I was gone?”

Suddenly, you are not laughing, and suddenly, Dazai regrets speaking.

“No,” he says, shaking his head. “Do not tell me-”

“He was,” you confirm.

Dazai’s glass of whiskey is empty. 

He grabs the bottle and drinks right from it, miserable.

“I think I would’ve rather been stabbed through the heart,” Dazai says mournfully, and though he keeps a faux-light tone with you, his throat feels like it’s swollen, and he feels a bit sick to his stomach.

He’s always been jealous of the bond you have with Chuuya. Absurdly jealous, even. You clicked with him quickly—you clicked with both of them quickly, and maybe it was a matter of the three of you being the youngest of the Port Mafia’s uppermost echelon, but Dazai doesn’t want to attribute it solely to that—but the way you clicked with Chuuya was different from how you clicked with Dazai. Two people so completely human locked away in the dark, clinging to one another to maintain some sense of normalcy; your and his casual humanity made Dazai’s lack of it irrefutable and glaring.

Regardless of the why, he never liked how close you were with Chuuya. 

Even before you were dating him—because you were dating him—a part of him had always felt sidelined whenever the three of you hung out together. Not because of either of your wrongdoings but just because it was hard for him to keep up with the two of you. He always felt a bit lost trying to, unable to follow along when the two of you would start laughing at jokes that he didn’t understand even when you explained them to him, when you would share glances with one another that spoke whole conversations he wasn’t privy to. The two of you got along in ways that Dazai would never be able to get along with anyone because there’s just something fundamentally wrong with him at his core. Chuuya, for all of his talk and fear regarding the question of his humanity, has always been so unfailingly human in ways that Dazai, to this day, cannot fathom to understand.

After you started dating him—because you were dating him—it only got worse because he’d see you with Chuuya and wonder if you were better off with someone like him instead. Dazai doesn’t know how to treat you right, clearly. He can’t even treat himself right; and Chuuya has always been the epitome of a gentleman, loathe Dazai is to admit it—Ane-san drilled that into the other boy where Mori only taught Dazai how to be cruel and unforgiving. The line between love and obsession has always been a terribly blurry one for him, and you have always wavered on either side of it—and Dazai, unfortunately, does not love healthily and obsesses so entirely that it would have most people running for the hills. 

For better or for worse, you’re not most people.

In his spiral of insecurity, he doesn’t catch the way your brows furrow as you put together some puzzle pieces. “Dazai,” you say suddenly, drawing him from his thoughts abruptly. There’s an accusatory look in your eyes that he really does not like. “Were you the one that booby-trapped my fucking apartment?”

Dazai snorts.

“You bastard,” you snap at him, and Dazai can’t help but bite the palm of his hand as a means of trying to stifle his laughter. “Mori thought it was a goddamn assassination attempt. He kept me under watch for weeks because of you. I couldn’t leave the towers without half of the Black Lizards with me.”

“Sorry,” he coos, not sorry at all. Dazai, because he clearly doesn’t know when to learn his lesson, then he promptly asks, “Am I better fuck than Chuuya?”

“Jesus Christ, Dazai, get off the topic of Chuuya and my sex life, it’s clearly only upsetting you,” you snap at him instead of answering the question. Dazai wants to argue and retain some dignity; he’s not upset, but then his entire world is shattered by your next words: “I am not answering this question.”

Dazai blanches. He can feel the blood drain from his face. He’d thought this was an easy question to make him feel a bit better. What do you mean you won’t answer? Does that mean Chuuya-

No. Dazai refuses to believe it.

 “No way,” he says, shaking his head. “He’s not a better fuck than me. You can’t possibly-”

“He’s not,” you finally say, and Dazai audibly lets out a sigh of relief. “But if you ever mention anything along the likes of that to him, you will never fuck me again, Dazai Osamu. Do you understand?”

Dazai is too relieved to even argue. “Yeah.”

“No more questions about my sex life,” you say firmly, and Dazai doesn’t respond, but he does agree internally because he doesn’t think his heart can handle any more scares like that. Your eyes sharpen again, and Dazai braces himself. “Were you the one to tell Mori I lied about being sick so I could skip out on the ball Mishima hosted when we were seventeen?”

Dazai’s eyes narrow right back at you and rather than answering, he shoots one of his own questions at you: “Were you the one to tell Mori I had his contact in my phone as ‘ignore’?”

You take his lack of an answer as an affirmative, correctly so. Dazai has no regrets about ratting you out to Mori because he was not about to attend Mishima’s event without you on his arm. He’d rather die. 

“You bastard, do you know the lengths I went to fake being sick? I wanted one night to relax without people breathing down my neck.”

“If I had to go, you had to go,” Dazai retorts petulantly. “I was not about to suffer with only Chuuya as company. You had no reason to tell Mori about the contact name besides to be petty. I fought with Chuuya for weeks because I thought he was the one to do it.”

You choke on a laugh. “Chuuya was so mad, he had no idea what you were talking about.”

“He tied me to a pole and swung me around for three hours,” Dazai complains, but there’s a smile on his lips as you burst into laughter, unable to stifle the giggles that spill from your lips.

“I know,” you wheeze, “I got it on video. We watch it sometimes when we’re bored and can’t find a movie.”

Dazai gapes, and you laugh harder, but for the first time in four years, Dazai finally feels… at home, he feels comfortable in his own skin again. He’s back in your penthouse, he’s drinking his favorite whiskey and smoking his favorite brand of cigarettes, you’re sitting at the kitchen table with him and laughing your head off at his expense, and for a moment, Dazai feels as if nothing has changed: he feels like himself again, eighteen and entirely enamored by the sight and sound of you, and you feel like you again, all of the doubt that had begun to rise to his chest as the two of you played the questions game long gone.

He falls in love with you all over again. Harder this time. Faster. He thinks he’ll fall in love with you again and again every day for the rest of your lives, each time more than the last, no matter how impossible it might seem.

He thinks maybe it’s not that he feels like he belongs with the Port Mafia more than the Agency. He thinks that it’s you. You’re the one he feels at home with. You’re the one he’s comfortable enough to be himself with. You’re the one he belongs with, always has, and always will.

After a few moments, you finally manage to get yourself under control, still giggling a bit as you look back up at him. Your smile is softer now, eyes gentle, more genuine than the smile you gave him before asking the first question. Dazai’s breath catches because when was the last time you looked at him like this—the last time anyone has looked at him like this? A warm feeling spreads through his chest; Dazai thinks he would stay in this moment forever if given the opportunity.

“Are you happy?” you ask quietly

Dazai blinks, startled, and an odd feeling spreads through his chest once your question registers. His lips part to answer, but no words leave them; he draws back as if he’s been slapped, a bit flustered and confused because that’s the furthest thing from what he expected you to ask. He wonders if you’d asked the last three questions to lull him into a false sense of security.

“I-” he starts to say but cuts himself off. “What kind of question is that?” 

He tries to deflect instead of properly answering, frowning, but you only raise your eyebrows, pointedly keeping your lips sealed to let him know that you expect an answer. He shakes his head and then sighs, bouncing the question in his head a few times before going for a cop-out: “When I’m with you? Always.”

You’re not pleased by his decision, frowning as you look away from him—he knows that’s not what you asked, not really, but you should have been clearer with your question if you wanted him to give you the answer you expected. But he doesn’t like the sudden disappointment on your face, it leaves his skin itchy and his chest longing for the soft look to return.

So he sits there, ruminating on the question. Is he happy? He should be, right? He’s saving people. He’s on the way to fulfilling Odasaku’s final request. He has a whole group of people whom he can rely on without having to fear being taken advantage of or betrayed at every corner. He’s happy.

But is he trying to convince himself of it? Why is he still trying to kill himself if he’s happy? Why is there a part of him that feels lonely no matter how surrounded he is by people? Why is it that when he’s at his lowest points, the only two people he wishes he could be with are you and Chuuya? Why does he ache for the days he’d spend dragging the two of you around Yokohama, causing trouble for Mori—the closest he’s ever felt to enjoying life?

“I don’t know,” he finally amends his answer, looking down at the bottle in front of him and the cinders of the cigarette dangling between his fingers. He lifts it to his lips again, taking one last drag of it as he tries to figure out what his last question should be.

There’s only one pressing question he has left, but he hesitates, unsure if he really wants to know your answer.

He forces it out anyway.

“Would you… would you have come with me back then?” His voice is quieter than he intended, cracks over ‘me’, and to your credit, you don’t react to the question, expression as eerily still as it was before, as if you’re considering your words.

A yes or no. It shouldn’t take this long for you to answer. Each second that passes feels like an eternity, and Dazai suddenly feels anxious, he doesn’t know why he asked this question because if the answer is no—if it’s no, then…

Finally, you let you a soft sigh, taking a sip of your wine as if to prolong his agony.

Your lashes flutter before you speak.

You lie for the first time that night.

“Yes.”

Dazai’s voice sounds far away as he says, “That’s a lie.”

“I guess you were right,” you say softly, but you sound so distant, like you’re on the opposite side of a long, empty tunnel and not sitting right in front of him. “We do still know each other decently well; you got them all right.”

Dazai doesn’t care. In fact, he would have gladly conceded a loss in this game, and he would’ve gladly admitted that maybe the two of you don’t know each other as well as you used to if it meant that he got the last question wrong because then he would’ve just given you a coy expression and asked if you’d let him get to know this new version of you too. You would’ve said yes, and he would’ve made quite the pleasurable night out of it for the two of you. Instead, he had to insist that nothing has changed, and now he has to come to terms with the fact that he was right and he had known you well enough back then to know not to ask you to leave with him because you would have chosen the Mafia over him. 

He’s so lost in his thoughts that he doesn’t even notice you approaching him until you’re leaning on the table next to him, index and middle finger coming beneath his chin to tilt his face up toward you. He looks up at you through his lashes, eyes searching your face, but he only finds another blank slate that he can’t read. His breath hitches when your hand slides from his chin to cup his cheek, and he can’t help the way that he leans into your touch, eyes fluttering shut.

“I would choose you over so many things, Osamu.” You speak his given name for the first time in years, but he can hardly find any comfort in it because he knows he’s not going to like what you’re about to say. Your fingers card through the tips of his hair, brushing the dark locks behind his ear as your thumb sweeps over his cheekbone. “But not over the Port Mafia. Just like how you didn’t choose to stay for me.”

“It’s not the same,” he says, voice hoarse. “It’s-”

“It is,” you interrupt, voice deceptively gentle, and he thinks you’re entirely unfair because he can hardly focus with your touch distracting him. He’s missed it so much—he’s gone four years without it, without any type of touch that wasn’t him getting his shit kicked in by Kunikida or an enemy. “You didn’t choose to stay for me. I wouldn’t have chosen to leave for you.”

“Why?” Dazai asks tightly, and he hates that when his jaw tenses, you smooth your fingers over it, and he unclenches it immediately.

There’s a sadder look in your eye now as you give him a small smile. “You know why.”

Of course, he knows why. He feels the hatred deep in his gut as his mind draws back to Mori. Because that’s who the issue is. It’s not the Port Mafia. It’s not your friendship with Kouyou. It’s not even your friendship with Chuuya that’s the issue. It’s Mori and your undying loyalty to him. No matter how much you claim to despise him, bashing him every chance you get, sneering at him whenever he tries to treat you like his daughter, Dazai knows that when it comes down to it, you’ll always choose him. You’d throw yourself on a sword if he asked it of you, and not for the first time, Dazai wants to spit in the man’s face for making you feel as if you’re eternally indebted to him for rescuing you from that warzone so many years ago; for making you feel as if you’re nothing without the Mafia, nothing without him.

“You don’t owe him anything,” Dazai says tightly. “You have to know that by now—you don’t owe him anything.”

“I don’t want to have this conversation, Dazai,” you sigh, sounding tired. Your hand drops from his face, and Dazai longs for your touch again instantly. His fingers twitch from where they’re resting on his lap; he only barely stops himself from reaching out for you. You try to smile as you change the subject, but it hardly meets your eyes, “It’s a tie then. No prize for either of us, hm?”

Dazai is not so inclined to switch the subject. He wants to press on this now that he has the chance; he doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to rip you out from beneath Mori’s thumb, but he needs to at least try… but you’re leaving again in the morning, and Dazai also does not want to ruin this night with you. He doesn’t know when he’ll get another.

So, instead, he matches your half-assed smile as he looks up at you and says, “I didn’t say you got them all right. You only said that I got them all right.”

You raise your eyebrows. “Did I get any wrong?” you ask, amused.

No.

“Yes.”

“Liar,” you say, but there’s a fond lilt to your tone as you let out another puff of air, the smile on your face finally reaching your eyes as you look down at him. The soft lighting of your kitchen casts a pretty glow over your face, your smile is so entrancing that Dazai thinks he could stare at it forever.

“You’re so beautiful,” he breathes out, the words slipping from his lips before he can stop them. “I’ve missed you so much.”

He’s sure he must look like a fool right now, entirely enamored by the sight of you, unable to even fathom drawing his gaze away. He wonders if you’ll protest again, call him a liar, and shift away from him.

You don’t.

The smile on your lips falls, and a wrecked expression crosses your face as your eyes search his. Your lips part to speak, and he waits with bated breath for whatever you’re about to say—he thinks that if you deny him again right now, it might completely shatter all of the walls he’d so carefully built to protect himself.

“I’ve missed you too,” you whisper as if you’re scared to speak the words out loud—and how can he blame you when the last time you dared to speak them, he hung up on you, never hearing from him again until tonight.

God, the guilt he feels whenever he thinks of you returns with a vengeance, so intense that Dazai starts to feel sick to his stomach. He can’t handle it, so he does the only thing he knows how to do to distract himself from it.

His movements are clumsy as he pushes himself up to his feet, nearly tripping over the leg of his chair, and his fingers feel clunky as he lifts them up to cup your cheeks. For a second, he fears that you might move away from him, but you don’t, so he leans in to press his lips against yours.

There’s no tenderness to his kiss. Dazai kisses you like he wants to consume you, lips sliding messily against yours, blunt nails indent crescents into your cheeks as he holds you close. Usually, he would be embarrassed by his blatant desperation and lack of finesse—he’s never been a sloppy kisser, when the two of you were younger, you would always let out pleased hums into his mouth, lashes fluttering as he worked his lips carefully against yours, tongue sliding against your own as he traces his name on it. 

All of his finely honed skill is thrown out the window now as he kisses you like a man who has been starved for years. He has been starved for years—the quick fuck in your office did nothing to quell the longing he’s felt for you the past four years. He could kiss you for hours. Days, even, and it still won’t be enough. Nothing short of an eternity with you would be enough to make up for the four years he’s been deprived of you.

He lets out a low groan into your mouth as you nip at his bottom lip, hands sliding from your face down to your hips. He’d take you here. Right now. But he remembers the last time he tried to fuck you on your kitchen table, it ended with him choking on the barrel of your gun as you yelled at him for being gross (“I eat on this table, you heathen!”) and he’s not particularly in the mood to set off your temper now that he finally has you in his arms again, so it’s with much restraint that he grabs you by the hips to walk you back into your bedroom.

He can hardly concentrate as your fingers twist the hair at the nape of his neck, soft moans slipping from his lips, muffled against your mouth. It’s only sheer instinct and muscle memory that has him making his way from the kitchen and down the hall. He can’t bring himself to separate his lips from yours for even a second. And he’s a mess because he’s not coherent enough to force himself to breathe properly through his nose, so his lungs are burning and his head feels a bit light, but he doesn’t care so long as it means he can keep kissing you.

Turn left, turn right, second door from the end of the hall. 

His fingers fumble for the knob of your bedroom door, pushing it open a bit too hard, considering the way he hears it slam against the wall and how you tug his hair hard in retaliation. He doesn’t care, moans a bit louder even when your nails scrape his stinging scalp, and you let out a derisive noise against his lips before biting down hard enough to draw blood.

The taste of iron makes a slow smile curl at his lips, walking you back toward the bed, and it’s only when your knees hit the edge that you finally pull away from him. “If you broke my door, you’re fixing it, Osamu.”

Dazai’s smile is lecherous. “I’m gonna break something alright,” he croons, relishing in the way you immediately roll your eyes at him. It’s all so familiar—he can almost pretend that he never left, that nothing has changed since the two of you were eighteen, dumb, reckless, and in love.

Before he can press you back against the bed, he feels your fingers drop from around his neck to his waistband, curling around his belt loops. In an instant, you’ve twisted the both of you around, and suddenly, it’s the back of Dazai’s knees pressed against the edge of the bed as you push him down onto the mattress. He hits the sheets with an ‘oof’ and a hazy smile, surrounded by the scent of you, drowning in the sight of you. He thinks he might be in heaven. 

You shift on top of him, straddling his waist; Dazai’s hands instantly come to rest on your thighs, sliding up the sides to grab your ass and pull you more firmly onto him. He groans when he feels you grind down against his cock, and god, he’s already hard just from kissing you. He hears you snort above him, but Dazai doesn’t even have it in him to be embarrassed.

His lips part in a silent moan as you lean down to ghost kisses along his jaw, hands sliding up his chest. He feels you wrap your fingers around his bolo tie and tug it, you let out a sharp noise of distaste against his skin before murmuring: “I hate this ugly thing.”

He lets out a huff of laughter that quickly breaks off into a moan when your lips trail to the spot behind his ear that always makes him writhe. His fingers bite into your hips, pushing you down on him as he rocks his hips up into you—shit, he might be able to cum just from this. His cock is straining painfully against his beige pants, twitching as he grinds up against your clothed cunt. He thinks maybe if he fucks his hips upward a few more times, he might be able to push himself over the edge, but as desperate as he is to chase his release, he refuses to cum anywhere but inside of you.

Plus, he thinks he’ll be shamed to hell and back if he finishes in his pants with you hardly touching him. 

“Then strip me out of it,” he gasps, lashes fluttering as your teeth graze his pulse point right above the edge of his bandages. Fuck, he’d give anything for you to bite down—riddle him with marks he can’t cover so he can flaunt them off to everyone who looks at him. Dazai knows that there are countless men and women out there who’d die to be able to be called yours, he wants them to know he’s the only one who can take that honor. “What’re you waiting for?” 

You hum and then sit back on his hips—he bites his bottom lip raw as you unintentionally put even more pressure on his cock. He’s half dazed out, not realizing that your grip tightened on his bolo tie until you straight up yank it off of him, snapping the string around his neck.

“No!” he complains, watching with wide eyes and parted lips as you fling the now-broken bolo tie off to the side of your room. “Noooo, why’d you do that? I’m going to have to order a new one.”

“Boo-hoo,” you say dryly, hardly paying attention to him as your fingers curl around the hem of his vest, pulling it up over his head, snorting when he lets out a puff of irritation as his nose gets caught around the collar. 

“This is so unsexy,” he protests, rubbing his nose. “Shouldn’t you be more gentle?” 

“Stop wearing so many layers of clothes,” you retort, but Dazai is placated when you lean back down to kiss the corner of his lips, lashes fluttering as his eyes slide shut. He lets out a pleased hum as you kiss down his jaw, nimble fingers unbuttoning his final layer of clothing. He wishes he wore an undershirt just to watch you huff in annoyance. His breath catches as you nip at his skin and then murmur, “This better?” 

“Yeah,” he breathes out, voice wavering as you get down to the last button of his shirt, sliding it off of his shoulders and easing him out of it. His body shudders as your hands slide over the bandages wrapped around his abdomen. Fuck, it’s been so long since anyone’s touched him beneath his clothes, even with the bandages still acting as a layer between the two of you, his nerves are on end, sensitive to everywhere your fingers touch.

He wonders if you’ll pull off the bandages—it’s a line that the two of you only crossed once back then, and although the idea of it has him brimming with anxiety, he longs for the feeling of your skin flush to his.

He almost feels a bit embarrassed when you sit back again to admire him as if there’s not a scar-ridden body hidden beneath the bandages. You look at him like he’s beautiful, like he’s not a monster disguised as a man, like he’s human. Dazai has always felt distinctly seen beneath your stare like you can see through all of the masks he wears and see him for him, and that has not changed over the past four years.

He’s missed the comfort of it. He has. It used to unnerve him back then, thinking someone could see him so clearly when he tried so hard and so carefully to hide himself beneath layers of impenetrable masks, but after going four years alone, with no one for him to turn to, no one he could look at and have them just know what he’s thinking… 

Yosano once mentioned offhandedly that to be loved is to be seen, and Dazai thinks the only time he’s ever been seen—truly seen, down to his core, deep in his soul—is when he’s with you.

It was a very lonely four years without you.

“I thought about you every day,” Dazai tells you softly, the grip on your hips easing up as he looks up at you. “Made a list of places I wanted to bring you and then burned it because I never thought I’d get the chance to be with you again. Stared at old pictures of you all the time, couldn’t sleep without thinking about memories with you. Drank your favorite wine just so I could pretend I was tasting it off your lips.”

You bring your hand up to cup his cheek, and Dazai leans into your touch, eyes fluttering shut again. He kisses your palm, humming softly when your thumb runs along his bottom lip.

“There wasn’t a single day I went without you crossing my mind,” you admit quietly and Dazai’s breath hitches as he stares up at you, dark eyes wide and lips parted. He thinks he should say something, anything really, but it’s a lost cause. You don’t seem to mind, luckily, because you only lean down to brush your lips against his again.

This kiss is softer than the last, lips trembling against yours as your tongue dances along his inner lip. He thinks his cheeks might feel wet but he doesn’t dare acknowledge it; you don’t either, only using your thumbs to brush away the tears as they spill over his cheeks.

“Are you really leaving again in the morning?” he finally asks, and he hates that his voice cracks over the words.

You hum in agreement, still hovering over him, still running your thumbs along his cheekbone. His lashes droop shut, but he forces them back open as you speak. “I am. Bright and early. Flight leaves at six.”

His gaze flickers to the left, over to where your alarm clock is set up on your nightstand. 

12:35

He looks back at you, eyes swimming with desperation.

You give him a soft, wry smile. “We should make the most of the night then, hm?”

He doesn’t waste any time on that.

His grip on your hip tightens, and in one swift motion, he flips the two of you around, elbows resting on the mattress on either side of your head as he hovers above you. Your eyes glitter as you give him a coy smile, and again, Dazai falls in love.

Then, he ruins the moment.

“Tell me how you fucked Chuuya.”

Your smile drops. “Osamu, what the fuck?”

“Tell me,” he pouts, nudging his nose against your cheek and peppering soft kisses on your cheek and down your neck. His knees drop to the bed on either side of your hips, holding up his weight as he reaches down to unbutton your slacks, sliding them off your body. A smile flickers onto his lips as his fingers graze your panties—drenched, finally, evidence that he’s not the only one so affected by this. “Tell me. Were you on top? Did he take you from behind? Was he rough? No, it’s Chuuya-”

“If you care so much about how Chuuya fucks, Osamu, how about you go fuck him yourself?” you interrupt him.

Dazai gags.

“Don’t ever say that again,” he says and then returns to his mission, fumbling with his own pants now as he tries to yank them and his briefs off, unable to hold back the relieved sigh when he finally frees his cock, unceremoniously tossing them to the floor. “Tell me.” 

“Why do you care so much, hm?” you ask, reaching up to brush his hair out of his eyes. “I told you that you were better.”

You’re only trying to deflect from the question and he almost lets you succeed, partially placated, but he stays strong, leveling an unrelenting stare onto you as he waits for your answer. You sigh heavily, and he knows he’s won.

“Not rough,” you say as if Dazai hasn’t already come to that conclusion. Chuuya’s had a crush on you since the three of you were sixteen. Dazai assumed he had grown out of it, but evidently, he was wrong, considering he took the opportunity to sleep with Dazai’s girlfriend—because you were his girlfriend—the moment Dazai was out of the picture. What a little snake. Dazai needs to vandalize his apartment again. Maybe set up a few more bombs. He’s only drawn back from his mental spiral when you start talking again: “He took the lead. Wanted to see my face the whole time, make sure I was okay.”

“How gentlemanly of him,” Dazai says—he’s not bitter. He’s not.

“It was,” you agree, too genuinely.

Dazai squints at you hard. 

“Don’t look at me like that,” you say. “You asked.”

“You don’t need to sound so wistful.”

“Oh, shut the fuck up, Osamu, I’m not wistful.”

“How-”

“Are we going to talk about Nakahara Chuuya all night, or are you going to fuck me?” you interrupt immediately, looking increasingly incensed. Dazai only raises his chin at you pointedly—you’re the one that slept with Chuuya. “Time is dwindling, Osamu.”

Okay. 

Dazai’s gaze flickers back to the clock and then back down to you, withering a bit under your irritated stare. He sighs and leans back over you to kiss the corner of your lips, fingers curling around the hem of your panties to slide them off your legs.

“You’re so beautiful,” he murmurs against your skin, his kisses linger against your skin now as he drags his lips down to your jaw. “The thought of him being with you…”

It makes Dazai want to do terrible things. The part of him that he locked up deep within rattles at the bars of its cage, furious and bloodthirsty. The trigger finger he’s been so careful to tame twitches with a desire he hasn’t felt in four years. The thought of anyone being with you makes Dazai sick to his stomach—Dazai is the only one who should get to see you like this, be with you like this—but the thought of Chuuya being with you is so much worse.

“You’re all I’ve ever wanted, Osamu,” you tell him quietly, fingers intertwining with his hair as he nips at your neck. “No matter how much I slept around, nothing was ever able to fill the hole losing you left. Not even Chuuya.”

Dazai exhales, shaky—the guilt returns, and so does the doubt because what right does he have sitting here being petty about what you did while he was gone when he was the one who left you behind without so much as a word? His eyes flutter shut, he spares a few more chaste kisses across your throat before lifting his face back to yours, kissing you gently.

“Let me make up for lost time then,” he says softly.

He doesn’t hesitate now, one hand dropping down to your thigh, lifting it to wrap around his waist as he presses his hips into you. His breath shudders when his cock slips against your folds, a low moan spilling from his lips. He has to reach down to angle himself properly, tip pressing against your tight hole.

The fingers of his free hands are shaky as he lifts them to cup your cheek. “Look at me,” he says, heat spreading through his abdomen when he realizes you already can hardly hold your eyes open, quick breaths escaping your lips as you try to keep yourself from cumming already. “Look at me, I want to see you.”

Your eyes flutter open, lidded and heavy as you look up at him, and Dazai thinks that maybe he could cum just from the expression on your face alone, inhaling sharply as his thumb drags across your bottom lip. He thinks maybe he should try to get ahold of himself, fearing that if he pushes inside of you now, he might cum on the spot, but his cock is aching so badly that Dazai thinks he might die if he doesn’t feel your heat around him immediately.

It takes all of his strength to keep his eyes from sliding shut as he pushes inside of you, desperate to see the way your face twists and your breath catches. Your lips tremble, chest rising and falling rapidly, he can feel your thighs tightening around his waist, and Dazai groans when your heels dig into his lower back, forcing his hips flush to you, burying his cock deep in your cunt. He chokes, grip on your thigh bruising; his abdomen tightens, and his head feels light.

No way, he thinks, gritting his teeth as he tries to hold back the waves of pleasure threatening to tear through him. He hears you let out a huff of laughter beneath him, and Dazai would shut you up with a sharp thrust of your hips, but he’s still desperately trying to regain control over himself, so he thinks that’s maybe not the best idea.

His forehead drops to rest on the pillow next to your head, lips brushing your ear as he lets out a low moan. He can’t even savor the way you let out a full-body shudder, fingers coming up to toy with the hair at the nape of his neck. Fuck, you’re so tight—Dazai can feel your walls tightening around him, spasming, his breath is shaky, and he tries to distract himself by pressing his lips to your skin, mouthing messily at your skin, sucking and nipping and counting to ten as he tries to settle down.

But it’s hard with the soft sighs you’re letting out, the way your fingers catch on his tousled hair, tugging enough to make his scalp sting. His head is so fogged that he can hardly think straight—god, he’s missed this, he hasn’t had the comfort of letting himself go like this in… since he left, really. His mind is always turning, plotting out ten, twenty, thirty steps in advance in fear of making a mistake, slipping up and letting the rest of the Agency see him for what he is, slipping up and their lives being the price just like with Odasaku. It’s only with you that’s ever comfortable enough to finally let the cogs in his brain slow and shatter, lose himself in carnal pleasures, lose himself in you; it’s been four years since he’s last had a reprieve from his own brain.

But he only lets himself slip halfway—tonight isn’t going to be about him, it’s about you. He has four years to make up for and he intends on getting a good start on it tonight.

He pants quietly as he lifts his head enough to bite your earlobe, tugging it gently before pressing his lips to your temple. “I’ve missed this,” he admits, voice raspy and clogged thick with emotion. “I’ve-”

He can hardly get the words out, and his breath catches when your hands slide from behind his head to cup his cheeks, forcing him to look at you. He thinks he must look wrecked—he can already feel the sweat beading on his forehead, and he knows his eyes are probably glazed over. You still look stunning, a soft expression on your face as you look up at him as if he’s not buried to the hilt inside of you. 

Unfair, he thinks mournfully. 

“What're you still holding onto, hm?” you ask, and Dazai only barely registers your words, sinking into your touch as you brush matted hair out of his eyes. He can finally bring himself to roll his hips—experimental, slow, trying to make sure he can actually move before trying to fuck you. Then you sigh softly, and he’s too out of it to try to make out the expression on your face as you say: “You work yourself so hard… always have. I’ve got you, you can let go, Dazai. C’mon.”

“No,” he hums, but his voice is strained, evidence of his struggle. “Tonight’s about my favorite girl.”

“Favorite?” you tease, lifting your shoulders off the bed to ghost a kiss against his lips that nearly has his hips stuttering—the conversation so reminiscent of one that the two of you had at seventeen it almost makes him smile.

“Only,” he amends quietly, kissing your nose, then the corner of your lips, and then nipping your jawline.

Just when he thinks he’s good to actually start picking up the pace, intent on fucking the thoughts out of you until you forget about your stupid flight in the morning, he catches a suspicious expression on your face, one that has his eyes narrowing.

“What?” he asks dubiously; your eyes are glittering in a way that he knows from experience is dangerous. 

You don’t say anything, just look pointedly at your thighs, then up to his shoulders. Dazai tilts his head to the side, recognizing what you want, and after a moment’s hesitation, he slides your legs up above his shoulders, folding them to your chest, eyes nearly rolling back at the new angle. Fuck, his hips do stutter this time, breath hitching. He has to readjust again, mentally focus on not cumming on the spot, and then-

And then you say: “He had my legs like this.”

A trick. 

Dazai knows it. 

You’re trying to make him let go of the thin thread of self-control he still has. To give in. To let all of the gears in his brain finally fall apart for the first time in four years.

He knows it.

He falls for it anyway.

Dazai’s jaw tightens, gaze snapping down to you only to catch a goading look in your eyes, a sly smile on your lips that Dazai has every intention of fucking right off your face. He inhales sharply, one hand sliding up your body to grab your chin, blunt nails digging a bit too deeply into your cheeks.

“Yeah?” he says, voice rough. 

Your lashes flutter and lips part as Dazai pointedly jerks his hips up. Your breath catches over a moan, and Dazai knows that this new angle is affecting you just as much as it is him.

“Mhm,” you agree, and just like that, the thin thread snaps.

He snaps his hips into you so hard that your bedframe bangs loudly against the wall behind it, quickly setting a steady pace, nice and deep, quick enough that you can’t even get a breath of air to your lungs before Dazai is fucking it right out of you. Already, he’s so fucked out that his mind is in shambles, one hand settling on your hip to hold you in place as he thrusts his hips into you, hitting that sweet spot with each stroke while his other hand, still cupping your face, slides down to your neck.

He doesn’t squeeze—wouldn’t dare to cut off the pretty noises spilling from your lips, moans of his names, choked gasps and cries between each rock of his hips—but the fact that you trust him, him, enough to have his fingers wrapped around your throat is always a quick way make him topple over the edge.

His eyes dart down to your chest, realizing, very unfortunately, that you haven’t taken off your button-up yet. He nearly bites down on his tongue in frustration as his hand comes down to your chest, careful to keep the pace of his hips as he hooks his fingers around the first button just to yank down, popping off half of the buttons of your expensive dress shirt and haphazardly pulling it off of you to toss it to the side before fumbling with the clip of your bra.

“Osamu,” you hiss, and Dazai revels in the way your voice wavers with each thrust, biting back moans. “That’s the second-”

You don’t get to finish your sentence. Dazai tosses your bra over with your discarded shirt and dips his head down to wrap his lips around your nipple, tongue swirling around the sensitive bud before rolling it between his teeth, and you’re gone—Dazai lets out a muffled groan around you as your back arches up into him, crying out his name, walls tightening around him as you cum on his cock.

“Oh-f-hah-fuck,” Dazai gasps as he rests his head on your collarbone, grip on your waist tightening. 

He has to physically force himself to lift his head, bracing his forearm on the mattress next to your head, desperate to see the way your eyes roll back, he can already feel himself teetering over the edge—the lewd sound of skin-on-skin, the sloppiness of his cock driving in and out of your cunt, he can feel your cum dripping down his cock, smeared on his pelvis.

His hand slides behind your head, lifting it from where you have it pressed against the mattress. Beautiful—the only thought that can run through his hazy brain is of you and how perfect you are, lips swollen and bitten raw, parted as pitched moans escape them, tears spilling from the corner of your eyes as he fucks you through your orgasm and right into a second. He’s the only one that should ever get to see you like this, with your clever brain fucked right and dumb, body writhing against the bed as you cling to him.

He leans down again, trailing sloppy kisses against your neck, gasping as he starts to feel his high approaching.

“No one makes you feel like this,” he says, or maybe he begs, he’s not sure if he’s making a statement or pleading for you to tell him it’s the truth. “Tell me. T-shit-tell me.”

“No one,” you sob over another moan, and Dazai can feel your pussy fluttering around him—he wonders if he’s already fucked you into a third. Usually, it takes longer. “No one, Osamu, you’re the only one.”

And that’s the only thing he needed to hear to give him that final push. His steady pace shifts into a more erratic one, sloppy and desperate, as he chases a high that’s just out of reach. His moans are muffled against your skin, teeth scraping your collarbone, mind a jumbled mess of thoughts of you. He feels your fingers trembling as you lift them to his cheeks, pulling his face up to press your lips against his, and that’s all it takes: he lets out a wanton moan against your mouth, pressing your legs further into your chest as his hips still against your ass, finishing deep inside of you.

Spots dance in his vision, head buzzing and ears ringing; he swears his orgasm lasts an eternity, body shaking and shuddering above you, letting out breathy moans into your mouth. He can feel his cum dribbling out of you, pooling onto the sheets beneath the two of you, so much of it that you can’t even keep it all in you. 

He doesn’t let his lips leave yours once—the kisses are messy and sloppy, devoid of all of the finesse that the two of you usually have, teeth nearly clashing, tongues sliding against each other’s. 

It’s only when his vision finally starts to clear and his head feels less on the verge of passing out does Dazai finally trails kisses from your lips to your jaw and down your neck before he finally collapses on top of you, mind entirely gone, like he’s floating on clouds. He pants as he tries to catch his breath, eyes lidded as he absently trails kisses along your chest and collarbone. He thinks the world could be ending around the two of you, and Dazai wouldn’t even have the capacity to notice. For the first time in four years, he really, truly allows his brain to rest.

He doesn’t know how much time passes, eyes drooping shut as he lets himself be enveloped by your arms, drowning in the comfort of your scent.

He doesn’t want to know. He’s scared to look at the clock and check.

“Tonight was supposed to be about you,” Dazai finally complains, burying his face in your chest as he pouts.

You only let out a soft laugh above him. “We have the rest of our lives for that… You deserved a break, Osamu.”

The rest of our lives.

Dazai’s throat tightens, vision blurring a bit at the thought—he can only barely bring himself to respond, and the words that slip out are not what he means to say: “I never thought I’d get to be with you like this again,” he admits, voice hoarse. “I never thought-”

“I know,” you interrupt, voice quiet, a bit shaky. “... I know.”

Of course, you know.

He can’t bring himself to say anything else, so he doesn’t, sinking into your arms and allowing himself the comfort he’s deprived himself of for so long. He almost starts to drift off—and god, he can’t remember the last time he’s dozed off willingly, only able to sleep after drinking copious amounts of alcohol or taking an even more copious number of sleeping pills. It’s not until you speak again does he stir back awake from the brink of sleep.

“What did he ask of you? Oda, I mean,” you finally ask, fingers brushing through his dark hair, lulling him further to sleep.

Dazai thinks that you’re cruel, asking him while his mind is still fogged from the exhaustion following his high, and he’s still half asleep in your arms, trying to regain his bearings. The words slip out before he can think twice, forgetting his fear of you laughing at the idea of him trying to be a better man.

“He asked me to be on the side that saves people… if both are the same to me, he wanted me to be a good man.”

The words dawn on him too late; he can hardly bring himself to look up at you, scared that he’s going to find an amused expression on your face or a derisive sneer. He wouldn’t blame you, he’s thought the same about himself ever since he left the Port Mafia, doubt and self-loathing riddling him with every step he takes in the light. He waits for the scoff, he waits for the laugh, he waits for-

“... I think he would be proud of who you’ve become, Osamu. I think you’ve fulfilled his request.”

Dazai does look up at you now, feeling particularly vulnerable, still scared that he might find a mocking expression on your face but he doesn’t. Only an uncharacteristically soft expression is painted on your face as you look up at the ceiling, a genuine one—a small smile and a look in your eyes that makes his heart feel warm. You don’t notice him looking until he lets slip out:

“I’ve missed you so much,” he whispers. 

(I love you, he means)

“I’ve missed you too,” you say back quietly.

(I love you too)

[irndad]

in every other life- s.r.

a/n: my soul is in this mf fic. there's a lil sexual tension lol! this is a behemoth of pining. so much fucking pining. this guy needs you like air wtf!! ALSO the poem is from a book, the lover's dictionary by david levithan. summary: the love of spencer's life is also his best friend, and she goes on a few dates. he does not handle it well, internally. ft. metaphysics by our dear genius boy. wc: 3.3k (holy shit)

While he recognizes that no direct injustice has actually been done to him, he can’t help but feel that it’s so unfair. 

Because Spencer had never actually wanted much of anyone, actually. He was too much of a child through his entire education, and he’d found anyone that he’d even consider had almost instantly had dismissed him. He’d grown used to a life where companionship wasn’t a desire that crossed his mind. 

But he wanted her. 

His lovely friend, his coworker, who was the kind of lovely that it feels unfair you’d ever have to take your eyes off of. She’s the best person he’s ever met, the sort of wonderful you read about but never convince yourself you’ll ever see. He knows the shape of her, has her form memorized from watching, waiting for her to step into the office every day.  

It was only a matter of time until he wasn’t the only one with his eye on her. 

She’s actually absurdly easy to want. There’s nights where they watch something, often what he picked, Doctor Who or some other science fiction which would be great if he could focus on anything but her. Her warm disposition ruminating his too-small apartment with a kind of light that follows his every movement. He’d adore her even if she wasn’t, but it’s impossible to ignore how beautiful she is- the kind of pretty that you hardly expect to see in real life. 

“Hey you,” her so-sweet voice is what breaks him out of his daydreaming, and he looks up at her lovely face smiling down at him. Fondness seeps through her tone, and it’s everything he can do not to preen that her first thought at seeing him is one of pleasure. 

“Hey back,” he says, greeting her with a warm grin of his own. “How was your weekend?”

It’s a calculated question. 

She had canceled their weekly movie night. He’d tried not to look too disappointed, like the idea of her next to him on his couch, of her nimble fingers raking through his unkempt hair while something nice, but far less wonderful than his company played in the background wasn’t all that was keeping him going. These days, and he knows it’s likely delusion, that she sometimes seems to gaze back at him with a similar sort of desperation, hooded eyes and tenderness. 

It’s a liminal space, those nights. How can people be two things at once? You cannot be both in love and not. In the low-light of his place, under his blanket- it’s like Schrodinger’s experiment. She can’t love him like a friend and more at the same time- it resists the laws of physics. She is his best friend, a fact he knows as sure as gravity and the elements, and believing anymore than that- it’s asserting an impossibility. 

When they’re alone together, though. It seems like the impossible exists. 

But she’d canceled it, something she hadn’t done for the months they’d been engaging in their little tradition. So there had to be a reason. She sits next to him, her desk next to his. 

She looks a little disheveled, only in an adorable way- but a little like she’s been busy, like her flow is disrupted.

“It was good! I finally went out with that guy Penelope’s been begging me to let her set me up with.”

It’s all that he can do not to freeze up. 

Penelope has been trying to get her to go out with her friend Ben, which Spencer thinks is a stupid name, by the way, and secretly he’d been so, so pleased when she had brushed off the invite. It’s a dangerous thing, hope. He tries not to have too much of it, tries to savor the thought of her, of more for moments of particular vulnerability. It’s treacherous, to want her the way he does. He knows he can’t let himself feel it all the way. 

And logistically- romance is not a reason for a valid reason for him to be panicking the way he is, but all he can think about is the physics. Two opposite things cannot be true at the same time. 

“You know, studies suggest that even now, the majority of couples are meeting in person or through friends over any other medium.” 

It hurts to say. She’s part of a couple, one half a whole that he doesn’t complete. 

“Seriously? I’d have thought it’d changed by now. I guess it’s safer to date someone you know.”

She’d date someone she knew? Is that what she prefers? 

“How did it go?” He hears Emily ask, and this conversation is already the bane of his existence.

“Guys, it really wasn’t a big deal! We got dinner, it was just a little thing.”

Spencer isn’t experienced in dating, but he does know that dinner is a serious date. Coffee is a smaller thing, but dinner-

Dinner means she got pretty for him. Probably picked out a dress for the evening, spent time on a carefully manicured look. Spent hours of her precious, rare, time on him. 

It’s not fair how much he fucking hates this guy. 

“Dinner is not nothing!” Penelope squeals, and he would love to share in her excitement, except it kind of feels like a piece of his heart is being shredded. 

“Dinner means coming up to my place, have coffee, oh look who doesn’t have her hair done-“

Please kill me, he thinks. Please. 

“Oh, that definitely did not happen.”

Thank god. 

Except he can’t miss her flush, how her expression shifts- and he has the sickening feeling he’d be hearing that guy’s name again. 

When they all settle around the table, her doe eyes focused on gruesome images that were the exact antithesis of her spirit, he couldn’t help but feel that even if it hurt, there was finality. 

The cat was out of the box. Two things cannot be true at once, and so only one is- she does not love him, at least not the way he does. 

Ben, is not in fact, going away. 

If he had more willpower or self-preservation, Spencer would keep his distance from her, but the truth of it is that as much as he wants to be the person she turns to, her smile is most of why he can stand his job anymore. 

It’s a Tuesday, and everyone is grumbling about being pulled in early in the morning, but he’s just happy to have a reason to leave the house.

“Spence!” He hears her excited voice carry, the pretty sound picking his ears up at once. “I got you coffee. It’s hazelnut, and it’s like, 90% sugar. You’re gonna love it.”

She beams at him, and he takes it in his hands. Their hands brush, and he tries so hard not to notice how soft her hands are. Her name is on the cup, and an unconsenting fantasy of her name meaning that he’s hers creeps into his mind before he can bat it away.  

But her cup says Ben. 

“Thanks,” he says her name, tries to sound measured and friendly. “Coffee date?”

She preens, and god, if this guy doesn’t get how lucky he is it might be thing thing that actually sends him over the edge after all these years.

“Just a quick thing, we were just in the same place and he bought me a coffee, I’d already gotten yours.”

If there’s two roles he can fill and he doesn’t get to pick, if he’s stuck with friends, he’s gonna be great at it, and he’s gonna be grateful. Because knowing her is a grace in itself, the kind of thing you should could yourself so lucky to have. 

“He sounds like a great guy,” he hears himself say, “I’m glad you’re doing this.”

It’s the right thing to say. He’s sure of it. The thing he’s not sure of is why the smile she offers him doesn’t reach her eyes. 

The next time he notices the cracks in their relationship, it’s when they’re out. She’d suggested this bookstore-cafe kind of thing, and he’d jumped at the thought, all of his favorite things in one afternoon. He’d felt foolish spending so much time picking out his outfit out, wearing the blazer she’d once complimented-he’d actually stuttered so hard in thanks that Morgan laughed for a full minute when she left the room- but she always looked beautiful, and he knows he sometimes pales in comparison. 

“Oh, I love this one!” She thumbs over the spine of a thin book of poetry. She’s wearing a forest green sweater that hugs her frame, and a bracelet hangs on her delicate wrist. He loves looking at her, though he tries to conceal it. His goal of being a supportive friend includes trying not to make it that known how gone for her he is. 

“I don’t read too much poetry,” he admits, “But I’m sure you have excellent taste.” 

Her keen eyes skim through the pages intently, clearly seeking out a specific passage before stopping, gaze alight with recognition. 

Her tone is molasses-sweet when she begins reading, and his heart skips a beat.

“When I say be my lover,” her voice hitches, reverent of the quote and he is reverent of her, “ I don’t mean ‘let’s have an affair. I don’t mean Sleep with me. I don’t mean Be my secret. I want us to go back to that root. I want you to be the one who loves me. I want to be the one who loves you.”

It feels impossible to look away from her, doe eyes practically sparkling in the low light of the shop, and there it is. His heart’s in his throat. Of all the things you could have told Spencer he’d experience, hearing her lovely voice wrap around the words be my lover in hushed tone, in sacred sweetness, would never ever be one he’d guess. 

He’s not sure how he feels about the multiverse theory, but right now, he can feel all the versions of himself pressing right up against him. Can see into lives he doesn’t get to live, lifetimes where his love isn’t a buried, worn-out tattered thing to keep his ever-frigid chest warm. Versions of himself that in this very moment can smile back at her, warm and open and kind, and kiss her perfect smile. 

Because he would be her lover. He would come home to her, spend the rest of his life building a home that she could fit  into. It’d be easy, actually. She’s easy to imagine- nights of laughing in a shared kitchen, evenings where her company is a fine wine, sipped at leisure with the comfort of knowing it’s never going to slip from your grasp. 

“I like that,” he says, voice too vulnerable for his own good, eyes unable to tear from the eye contact. “I really like that.” 

In the root of it, he already is her lover. He is the one who loves her. She’s just not his. 

It comes to a head on a Friday. It’s a few weeks from he book shop, and the air feels heavier between them now. The last handful of Fridays he’s sat with the ghost of what used to be their plans, empty time lingering where in its’ place used to be her company. 

He doesn’t know if she’s been with Ben. He tries not to think about it. 

The sound of her voice lingers in his mind, sweet and bitter in his mind like old lemon candy, the kind his mother would save for special occasions. He’d spend any amount of money he had to hear her lovely voice say those words to him out of the context of a poem. 

At work, they seem almost normal. Like one of them wasn’t desperately in love with the other; like a genius and his lovely, incredibly empathetic, kind best friend. In the field, their actions flow together seamlessly. She is always the first to listen and to understand (and god, isn’t it intoxicating to have someone meet you in understanding) and there is nothing to suspect is off.

But there’s still a cloud lingering. The poem- the soft melody of her voice curling around the words, the request of it all, the way she had sounded so wanting- and then, there’s Ben. 

She doesn’t mention Ben to him, of course, but Penelope does. Penelope, all bows and bright colors and cheeriness keeps bringing the absolute worst news to Spencer with a smile on her face. 

He’s taking her out for drinks! Oh, he’s reading her favorite book, do you know what it is?

This anger isn’t an emotion that he’s familiar with. A roar of possessiveness, the bite of it not tempered at all by rationality. Has he touched her?

It seems almost a tradition at this point when she shakes him out of his jealous storm of thought.

“Spence?” she muses, “You alright?” They’re alone at his desk, everyone having fled for their own evening and weekend plans. This was one of the Fridays that she had agreed to spend with him, and he wonders if he’ll be able to handle the scent of her shampoo so close after such a lapse of the sensation. Will all of his judgement go where he can’t follow?

“Yeah,” he says, tucking his papers into his bag, “I’m excited for tonight.”

His place is actually a short walk from the office. He’d been embarrassed to show her the place at first. It’s all function over fashion, and a bit cramped, but she’d looked at as though it was made of something more, something good. She didn’t even tease him. It had actually been her idea, to start these movie nights. 

Ironic, really. 

The walk was pleasant, the weather a little frigid but still nice, and she looks beautiful under the setting sun. It’s incredible to him, how her lashes catch the light and make her irises look like polished stained glass. His favorite color. Through the looking glass of another life, he sees a version of himself that gathers her up in his arms. In this daydream, she grants him one of her smiles that seems to carry its’ own light, and leans into his body like it’s the only thing that keeps her steady. It’s so clear. On the other side of the veil, he kisses her reddening nose, and keeps her warm himself. 

In the here and now, Her coat is long, and hangs low by her ankles. It’s an elegant thing, like the woman who wears it, and Spencer would be grateful for a lifetime of just looking.They stop in front of his door, some invisible force stopping him from entering. 

She sheds the coat inside his home. It smells like the candle she got him for his birthday, a reminder of her grace. He’s saved a bottle of wine for them, a sweet thing for the sweetest thing he’s known. 

“I’m sorry,” she speaks the warmth of the beverage on her tongue, and it should feel abrupt but it doesn’t.

“What for?” He can’t imagine what she would have to apologize for. 

“I know things have been…off between us,” she says carefully, considering the phrasing of each word. He watches her with a reverence, his hazel eye brimming with affection with nowhere to go. “You’ve been so great through it.”

Her legs are thrown across his own, and she’s dangerously close to sitting in his lap, but not exactly. He’s missed having her this close, the last time she’d been in his orbit was before she’d had reason to be gone. She smells floral. He fights With limited filtering through his already treacherous mind he thinks, He can’t take this from me. I still get her like this. 

“I’m not entirely sure what it is.” 

She slowly shuts her eyes, go for a moment to somewhere he can’t follow. Her cheeks are rosy from the cold. 

“This whole Ben thing.”

“Oh.”

Logically, it always had to come back to this. Someone else had the good fortune to know her like this, to be the person she reads poetry to in deep meaning to. 

He’s been stealing moments from someone who’s not his to take them from. 

“I don’t even know how I wanted you to react.” she murmurs, staring at the rim of her glass. 

“I just want you to be happy” His voice is something low, grit in the sound of it. His hand rests on her thigh. There’s warmth blanketing the room and he wants to kiss her. He wants to kiss her all the time. 

She laughs, but it’s not her normal laugh. It’s tinny and a little bitter. He pushes his luck, and reaches out to brush the side of her face, moving the hair but still holding her face. Her breath smells like strawberry wine and temptation. 

It feels different tonight. Low light and tension that could be sliced with wire. Every part of her is in reach, and something in the air makes all of this talk of relativity, of physics, moot. 

Like maybe he’s not in the only world they don’t end up together. 

Her face is warm and soft under his touch and he loves the sight of her. He’s never touched her like this. Every point of contact feels electric, addicting. 

“What is it? The Ben thing?” He doesn’t know what he’s expecting to hear. What he wants, is for her to tell him that it doesn’t matter anymore, that she picks him-

“I only went out with him the once.”

“What?”

“I told Penelope I was still going because it made her happy and she said I couldn’t keep going to your apartment and reading you poetry and call that romance.”

Romance? 

Wasn’t it romance, though? 

Her eyes widen in something akin to horror. 

“Shit, Spence- I’m sorry, that is so fucked of me to say-“

“You,” he tries to say calmly, “aren’t going out with Ben.”

She blinks. 

“No?”

He has spent so much time living in other lives, existing in the minds of versions of himself he wasn’t lucky enough to be. Drinking coffee imagine a life colored in her presence, falling asleep yearning for the presence of something lighter than what he has to carry. 

He can’t exist in two places. That was the entire basis of the experiment. 

He moves his other hand to hold hers, and somehow she’s shifted to being on top of him, and he looks up at her with unwavering desire. 

Spencer isn’t good at wanting people, but it comes naturally with her. Less of an action and more an urge, a course of motion to which he is at the mercy of. This is what leads him to close the gap between them, and kiss her. It’s 

Her delicate fingers run through his hair, and she can’t be close enough, please, and he could spend the rest of his life kissing her, actually. He probably will spend the rest of his life thinking about the soft sigh he pulls out of her. 

“I want it to be me,” he manages to say through shallow breath, still so close that his lips brush hers every other word, “I want to be the one you pick. I want it to be me.” His hazel eyes seem to shift in the moment, swirling with emotion. 

She brushes a lock of his overgrown hair out of his face. He normally shaves when he sees her, but he’d been so busy that he’d forgotten, and felt embarrassed of it now. That is, until she runs her index finger along the edge of his jawline.

It’s then she leans down and kisses him again, pliant and good, his hands around her waist. He breathes a prayer into her mouth, one that hopes that she never ever comes to her senses about him. 

“Spence,” she says, her voice golden silk, a kindness.  “There was never anyone else to pick.” 

[tzuberry]

(cute) things zerobaseone maknae line do as your boyfriend ૮ ◞ ﻌ ◟ ა

pairing shen quanrui (ricky), kim gyuvin, park gunwook, han yujin + gn reader⠀⠀⠀details fluff, established relationship, bulletpoint

cw none ⠀⠀⠀wc 410, 418, 505, 462 (1,795 overall)⠀⠀⠀reading time 12 minutes

note HELLOOOO i havent posted a fic since july 15th and that was my first fic ever on this account omg... thank u for all the notes on my other post LIKE i didnt expect so much + thank you for 90 followers!! also i might start writing for tiot and evnne if i have time 🫡 likes are reblogs are appreciated if u can 💟

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ricky 리키

lets you play with his hair

i think ricky is honestly extremely particular with his hair, and especially who gets to touch it

his hair isn’t very visibly damaged despite getting it dyed frequently / basically not having black hair since he was probably fifteen years old (and he’s nineteen now, so that says something) so he has to take good care of it not to have it fried off

there were stories about him during bopeul where they said they always saw him fully ready with perfectly styled hair whenever he left his room, too

like i’m not even kidding he has to care for his hair a whole lot or by now he could’ve been bald i’m sorry

when his friends—mainly gyuvin—try to play with his hair or comb their fingers through it, ricky allows it but is not that pleased because he put effort into styling his hair and doesn’t want it to get messed up

gyuvin jokingly whines a little, but is over it after a few seconds

when ricky started dating you, although he thoroughly knew you and almost all of your habits and mannerisms, he didn’t think you would be into playing with his hair

you’re hanging out, watching a movie at your apartment while your head is rested on his shoulder when he feels your fingers suddenly brush through the strands of his hair

he turns to look at you, partly shocked but also just wondering what you’re planning on doing to his hair

you shrug your shoulders, keeping your eyes on the tv and not minding him one bit

“what are you doing?” he asks, a little amused

he expects you to reply playfully, to exchange banter or something like that

but instead, you say, “your hair is really soft, you know,” as you proceed to curl a portion with your finger acting as the curling iron

ricky quite literally folded that day... now he lets you do whatever you want with his hair

you can braid it, curl it, whatever

he doesn’t mind as long as it’s you, even if he spent nearly an hour fixing it this morning

you’re in a cafe talking to gyuvin and gunwook, sitting at the other side of the table when you lift your arm to twirl ricky’s hair, him not remotely flinching at the contact

gyuvin is pleasantly surprised to witness this sight

“you don’t let me do that,” he sulks, aimed at ricky

your boyfriend scoffs. “you’re not [name].”

gyuvin 규빈

always texts you + makes sure you’ve eaten

okay i think i’ve seen a lot of people say this already idk but i think it’s soooo true

gyuvin texts you excessively

like. about anything

there was one instance when his little brother had a crush on a girl, and gyuvin literally went to you for help and his brother didn’t even have an inkling of what was happening

gyuvin (DO NOT REPLY): [NAME] MY LITTLE BROTHER... is... growing up :(

gyuvin (DO NOT REPLY): he used to be so small i could put him in my pocket and now

yn: what happened???

gyuvin (DO NOT REPLY): he LIKES A GIRL. who told him it was okay to get a girlfriend? at his toddler age??

yn: gyuvin i love you but we started dating when We were his age

and then he continued to ask you for advice on how to help his brother get the girl he liked

there’s more instances of him oversharing his brother’s life with you, but that ends there

he also buys you snacks all the time

even if you don’t want it. even if you verbally, very clearly, straightforwardly tell him you’re not the tiniest bit hungry

he’s basically your mother oml

he makes those little snack baggies for you to take

before you both graduated, gyuvin would bring you lunch. it didn’t just stop at snacks

he would ask his mom to help him cook for you

and he’d make it all cute and stuff like shaping the rice to be your favorite character

he’d pack it to school and give it to you in the morning. omg

mixing those two things together, you get “have you eaten yet” texts all the time

it’s two pm, and you were so stuck while helping a friend that you regrettably forgot to eat lunch. ‘it’s okay,’ you assure yourself, ‘i had a late breakfast’

gyuvin texts you, asking the usual “have you eaten lunch????” and you lie and say yes

and then your phone rings and you know you can’t avoid it anymore because he can see through your voice when you lie

from the speaker of your phone, gyuvin’s voice is unbelievably attractive—but you choose to ignore that fact for now

“[name],” he deadpans. “be honest. have you eaten?”

choosing to accept defeat, you exhale deeply. “no.”

gyuvin suddenly hangs up and only a text is left on your screen

gyuvin (DO NOT REPLY): i’m coming over in. like 30 minutes i have to ask my mom to help me cook

gunwook 건욱

teaches you how to dance

gunwook is SO good at dancing it’s so crazy

i love watching him on stage because he’s the best performer ever. like he seems to genuinely enjoy it and i hope he never loses that love for dancing / singing / rapping

you on the other hand..... you could be good at dancing too, just definitely not as good as gunwook

so whenever your scheduled dates are interrupted by his extracurriculars at school, you decide to tag along with him, if the members of his clubs don’t mind (which they usually don’t)

one of his extracurriculars is the dance team

and most of the time, when your preplanned dates are cancelled because of an extracurricular he has lined up for him, it is almost always dance

so you end up following him to the practice room, silently watching him in the corner so as to not obstruct their view of the mirror by sitting directly in front of them

his eyes light up with the flame of passion you adore so much, and you’re so content that even if your date is cancelled because of this, you’re not annoyed and you still get to indirectly spend some time with him by spectating him as he does what he likes

in the short breaks that he gets, he takes the opportunity to sit beside you on the floor and ask about your day

when the practice session ends, he asks if it’s okay with you if he stays to polish up the routine, to which you say yes and offer to stay with him because everyone else has started to leave

after a while, he grows tired and plops down next to you

gunwook chuckles. “i’m sorry for cancelling our date and making you stay with me.”

“it’s alright, i like watching you dance.” you smile

he abruptly stiffens up, irises reflecting the light, making his eyes glow excitedly. “do i dance well? what do you think?”

you giggle. “you dance very well. a lot better than i can, for sure.”

“mhm, yeah?” he grins widely, and you know what he’s going to do

gunwook jumps up on his feet, extending his hand out to you to help you get up

“you just need a little help.” he nods proudly. “you’re lucky i’m your boyfriend.”

you take his hand, and he leads you to the center of the room and he starts to dance with you ballroom style (???) like the waltz and stuff

he guides your arms over his shoulder to circle his neck, and his hands rest on your waist and then he starts counting, “4... 3... 2... 1... like this,” as he takes a singular step in different directions, encouraging you to mirror his movements

you almost trip, but you tightly cling on to his shoulders before you can fall

gunwook laughs. “enough dancing for today?”

“yes, please,” you agree, letting your body fall forwards into a hug with him

“alright. if you’re not that tired, are you still up for that date?”

yujin 유진

(tries to) initiate / enjoys physical touch

yujin doesn’t seem like his love language is physical touch.... i know gyuvin does it a lot to him and he kinda pretends to not like it but it’s so endearing and i sooo believe he deep down loves it

it’s the same with you, but he’s the one intiating it

he never thought he liked skinship all that much, because he would even jokingly say it pestered him a little at times when gyuvin would dote on him

but when it came to you, and when you first started dating, he was itching to hold your hand

it was so new to him because he never craved for anyone’s physical affection before

all his older friends like gyuvin and gunwook would always just.... initiate skinship for him and he thought he didn’t like it but

suddenly you come along, and you don’t even try to hold his hand

he thought couples were supposed to hold hands?? and hug??

but you’re not budging and it’s so frustrating

while walking you home from school like usual, as you tell him about your day, he tries to gather the courage to intertwine your hands

it doesn’t work, and he’s left with cold hands as he stares at you enter your front door

“next time,” he whispers to no one but the wind

next time comes and still... he’s too nervous to hold your hand

the distance between your palms is less than four inches, and all he has to do is take the leap—besides, nothing could go that wrong. you like him and he likes you

he purposely bumps the back of his hand with yours, but doesn’t actually take your hand in his

he awkwardly rubs his nape, unsure of what to do now

your brows knit together, as you’re now aware of yujin’s weird behavior

“yujin?” you tug on his uniform sleeve. “is something wrong?”

“no! nothing’s wrong,” he quickly denies, “don’t worry about it.”

“okay... can i see your hand, though?” you request, and it successfully confuses him because why do you want to see his hand?

he obliges, giving it to you palm up when you lace your fingers with his

“i’ve noticed you trying to hold my hand since last week,” you say, giggling. “i was waiting for you to do it, but i guess you’re too shy.”

“i’m not that shy,” yujin defends, looking down at your interlocked hands... ‘this is a good feeling,’ he thinks

you nod passively. “it’s fine. it’s one of the reasons why i like you.” you swing both your hands back and forth in the space between you

yujin doesn’t try to retort, only relishing the feeling of your hand in his

skinship isn’t so bad... maybe he could get used to this.

[kittenintheden]

Ethics Review

Dave Matthews voice: I DID IT

Tav (reader) and Astarion pay his old office at the Courts a visit in the middle of the night for funsies and things get spicy.

aka it's the switchy bitchy magistrate roleplay fic

Rating: E Word Count: 5.2k Pairing: Astarion/reader (Tav) Content: 18+, light BDSM elements, sexual roleplay, bitches be switches, dirty talk, spanking, orgasm denial, light edgeplay, oral sex, PIV sex (AFAB reader, not gendered)

AO3 Link

It’s late, but then, it’s always late when you’re out with Astarion these days. By necessity, mostly, but also because it’s the best time for the pair of you to get up to your more unsavory plans without catching the watchful eye of the newly-reformed Fist.

“Where are you taking me?” you laugh as you follow him through a series of dark alleys. “This better not end with me having to send for Gale to get your hand out of another magicked jar.”

“Never going to let me live that down, are you?” He looks over his shoulder and gives you an affectionate smirk.

“Not ever.”

Astarion peers around the corner of a brown brick building, checking that the coast is clear. To you, he says, “You’re lucky I’m such a kind and forgiving soul.”

“Ah, yes,” you agree, wrapping your arms around him from behind and nuzzling his neck. “Two of your most obvious and accurate qualities.”

He chuckles. “We’re almost there. Come on.”

A labyrinthine dozen alleyways later, you’re deposited in an open square, quiet and still. The cobblestones are dark with recent rain, sending their petrichor scent into the air. As you follow Astarion out into the space, you realize where you are. It’s the Courthouse District of the Lower City, where people are tried and held for petty crimes that aren’t suitable for Wyrm’s Rock.

You huff a laugh through your nose and look over at your partner with a raised eyebrow. “Did you need to tell me something? Have a court date you forgot to mention?”

“Hush,” he playfully scolds you, holding a finger up to his lips. “Let me think a moment.”

He peers up at a particular building on the square and furrows his brow, closing his eyes and moving his hands through the air. You fold your arms and watch as he moves his fingers like he’s following a path only he can see, turning corners and raising level by level. At last, he opens his eyes, and points at window on the third floor, two in from the corner.

“That one,” he says.

“That one what?” you prompt.

He grins devilishly. “That…” he points again. “... is my old office. I thought we might pay it a visit.”

“To what end?” you laugh.

“What can I say, I’m feeling a touch nostalgic these days.” He keeps his eye on the window and beckons you to follow closer to the building. “Something about my old haunts is calling to me.”

Behind where he can’t see, you pay him an affectionate smile. In the last year or so since the fall of the Nether Brain, you’ve seen the city rebuilt and gone on your fair share of adventures and quests, always searching for some way to give Astarion back the sunlight you promised him. No luck yet, but there have been promising leads here and there. It’s not a lost cause. Not yet.

The last few months in particular have seen certain changes in your lover. The terror and fear he carried for so long clung to him like a shadow, and ever so slowly it’s beginning to lift. His laugh is more present than before, more real. The intimate moments you share are filled with trust and care, even as you get more comfortable pushing a few boundaries here and there.

Most of all, he’s been remembering. Not everything. There are parts of his past forever lost to him, written over by more years of torment than he ever had of life. But there’ve been flashes every now and again of who he used to be. Some of them he likes, some he loathes. He doesn’t always talk about it, but you know being able to pick up a piece once in a while has meant a great deal to him.

So you follow along with whatever little game he has planned.

He walks along the building, scanning the brick for footholds. Just as he puts his hand on a storm drain and tenses to leap, you halt him with a gentle hand on his shoulder. When he looks back at you, you flick your eyes up toward the window.

“Three up, two in from then end?” you ask.

He nods.

“Allow me, love.”

You hold up your hand and cobalt magic pools in your palm, forming into a sphere. You send it up above you, the arcane eye floating until it finds the correct window before it slips inside. You blink, your own eyes glowing blue as you use your magic to scan the room. It’s certainly an office of some sort.

Astarion takes your hand when you hold it out for him and instantly you’re transported inside the office thanks to a handy little dimensional door spell you picked up on one of your many adventures. You wave away the arcane eye and give Astarion a wink.

He smirks and shakes his head at you. “Take all of the fun out of the thing, why don’t you,” he says through his smile. “Suppose I’ll have to make do with checking that the place isn’t alarmed. Alas.”

The place is, indeed, alarmed. Astarion manages to disarm two common magic wires and one trickier sending stone scattered throughout the room. You reach out through the Weave for any other whispers of magic. Some artifacts and lightly magical office supplies. Nothing worrisome.

Once you’re both satisfied that you won’t end up immediately arrested, Astarion moves to the center of the room, hands clasped behind his back. You’re quiet as he scans the walls, turning in a slow circle as he takes everything in. His fangs flash as he gives a quiet laugh.

“The layout is different, and the color,” he says. “But yes, this is the place.” He furrows his brow slightly and holds out his hands, eyes on the floor. “I… worked here. Me. A magistrate.” His eyes find you and his smile widens. “It was a lie for so much longer than it was a reality. But it was a reality, once upon a time.”

“I’m surprised,” you say, folding your arms and nonchalantly stepping closer. “The way you spoke and dressed when we first met, I thought you must’ve been an Upper City fancy defending-the-powerful type.”

Astarion clicks his tongue at you. “Now, don’t be judgmental. That’s my job.” He waves a hand through the air. “I was quite young in my career, but I was working my way up. All the way to the third floor, thank you.”

You come in to wrap your arms around his waist and lean your head on his shoulder. “I’m proud of you. Genuinely.”

He spreads his fingers over your forearm, pressing his lips to your hair. “Thank you. That’s always nice to hear.” He clears his throat and removes your arms, backing away from you with a toss of his head. “But don’t be too proud. I wasn’t exactly a… what’s the term? Model citizen.”

Astarion begins to walk around the small table with four chairs set in the center of the room.

“Oh?” you say, walking around the other side to mirror him. “Were you terribly corrupt?”

He pauses and tilts his head, shrugging. “‘Terribly’ is such a strong word, isn’t it? Lets just say I may have been known to, ah… sway the odds in my favor.”

You stop and look across the table at him. “What do magistrates even do, exactly? What did you do, specifically?”

“An absolutely stupid amount of paperwork, as I recall,” he says. “At least, I certainly remember hating every scrap that came across the desk. Meting out appropriate punishment for any minor and petty crime you can think of, most of them horrifically boring. But…” He leans over the table and holds up a finger. “... sometimes I got to conduct interviews to determine if crime was worthy of Wyrm’s Rock, and I was very good at getting the verdict I wanted.”

You rather like seeing this side of Astarion. Honest pride, confidence, and authority. The tip of your tongue runs along your bottom lip as you take in your love leaning over that table, dappled in moonlight. Gods, he’s beautiful.

“And how did you do that?” You pop your hip and raise your thumb to your mouth, teasing your lip as you peer up at him through your eyelashes. “Exactly?”

Astarion notices the shift in your demeanor immediately, his own eyes going half-lidded as they track the path of your hand to your mouth. His grin goes predatory and he leans back so he can come around the table to you and pull out the chair.

“Please, darling,” he says, nodding for you to sit. “Let’s talk, you and I.”

You pay him a sultry smile and sink into the chair, which he pushes in under you. Then he walks back around to the other side with his spine straight, hands folded behind his back.

A new game begins.

Astarion rolls out his shoulders as if he’s shedding a coat. When he turns to look at you, he does so down the length of his nose, his hard gaze making it clear that he thinks you beneath him.

You shiver as a thrill runs down your back and attempt to hide it.

He shakes his head above you, tutting. You’ve disappointed him.

Instinctively, you shrink into your chair slightly as he leans forward and places the tips of his fingers against the table in front of him, continuing to lower his face until it’s a mere foot from yours.

“A pathetic display back there,” he says, voice dripping with condescension. “Your associates have hung you out to dry. You do know that…” He tilts his head. “... don’t you?”

You swallow the lump in your throat and drop your eyes. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“Silly little patsy,” he chides as he straightens to glare down at you again. “Such stars in your eyes for friends who would sooner see you burn than stick their necks out for you.”

“I’m not telling you anything,” you say, raising your eyes to him in defiance even as you let a waver of nerves shake your voice.

“What must it be like to be so tragically misguided?” he sneers. It’s like an echo of a man you once knew. One you met on a sunny beach amid burning wreckage.

You blink up at him, eyes going soft. “I can’t betray them.”

“Betray them,” he breathes, huffing a mirthless laugh as he leans one hand onto a nearby chair. “My dear, they are in the next room, and the room after that, giving you up as we speak. No loyalty among thieves, I fear.”

“No,” you gasp. “They wouldn’t.”

Astarion holds a finger up to his lips, shushing you. “I think you know better than that. But fine, have it your way. Don’t give them up to save your own hide. Let me sweeten the pot.”

He turns his body so he can side-sit on the table and put his first knuckle under your chin, lifting it so he can inspect you. The corner of his mouth ticks up. “Gold to line your pockets, perhaps?”

Though you try to stop it, your body betrays you as a bright blush blooms across your nose and cheeks. Astarion’s pupils dilate above you.

“Or something else entirely?” he whispers, tilting his mouth closer to yours. “I’d much sooner send those two cads to Wyrm’s Rock in your place. Help me, and maybe you and I could have a bit of…” His eyes trail down your jaw, your neck, your collarbone, and beyond before he looks back into your eyes. “... fun in celebration.”

“Why would you do that for me?” you whisper back.

He shrugs. “What can I say? I rather like you. Plus, I might get a little kickback in the form of a promotion for bringing in two thorns in the Fist’s side, but that’s neither here nor there.” He rolls his eyes and pays you a flirtatious smile on the last bit.

And that… is your opening.

Your expression grows serious and you note the moment that Astarion’s eyebrows give the briefest twitch of concern.

"You've overplayed your hand, Magistrate Ancunín," you say.

Astarion draws his hand back and gives you a perplexed look. “Have I?”

You smile, then. Calm and dangerous. "I've been sent by the Board of Ethics, you see."

Astarion is thrown by this turn, but he recovers quickly, offering a simpering smile. "Oh? Oh, dear. Seems I've been caught with my pants down."

You stand, holding his eye. "Indeed. Best go place your hands on the desk where I can see them."

With a flourish, he holds his hands up for you to see. No funny business, none at all. He goes to the desk and spreads his palms flat against the polished wood. He must feel the heat of your skin as you come close, only inches away. Inspecting. Considering.

You lean in close to his ear. "Say our word if you'd like me to stop, Ancunín," you whisper.

"Stop what?" he asks.

In answer, you grab his hips and pull them flush against your own with enough force that he gasps from it, genuinely surprised. In his ear again, you whisper, "Teaching you a lesson."

You release him and move to his side. He turns his head to look at you and you can see the openmouthed surprise in his face, but it’s more than that. Surprised, yes, but also open. Interested. Very turned on. You know this look.

This is Astarion’s “oh, we’re doing that thing I like?” look. It’s a good look on him.

You tap a finger on his nearest hand. “Keep these exactly where they are. I must warn you that you face serious repercussions for witness tampering. I have some questions. Answer them to my satisfaction, and I may consider…” Your gaze trails down to the front of his trousers, which are straining. When you meet his eye again, you add, “... reinstatement.”

Astarion tilts his chin down so he can give you a heated look. “Then by all means,” he says, lips parted. “Ask.”

“Hm,” you hum as you trail your fingers over the desk as you walk around to the other side. You mimic his stance with your hands on the table, though yours is one of authority while his is one of awaiting judgment. He tilts his head at you in question, gaze hot. You match it.

“Let’s start with an easy one.” You tilt your head toward the wall without breaking eye contact. “That placard hanging there. What is it?”

He looks and then huffs through his nose. “It’s an oath.”

You tilt your head the other way. “And what does it say?”

Astarion smirks. “‘As an officer of the Court, I will strive to conduct myself at all times with integrity, dignity, and honor.’”

“That’s right,” you say, nodding. “Now tell me, Ancunín… do you feel you’ve conducted yourself in accordance with that oath?”

“Of course,” he answers without hesitation, flashing you a winning smile. “I offered you the utmost dignity and honor, did I not?”

An idea occurs to you and you imagine he catches the twinkle in your eye as you raise one of your hands to click your fingers, a glowing web of pale blue stretching to cage you both inside. Astarion frowns up at it. The moment he realizes what you’ve done, he gives you a look that’s half-exasperated and half-devious.

“What’s this?” he says, playing along.

“A little insurance policy. To ensure your adherence to honesty.” You reach to the collar of your shirt and undo one button. Then another.

Then another.

Astarion struggles to keep his eyes on your face, but when you lean back down onto the table, he can’t help but sneak a peek.

You toy with another button. “Why don’t you tell me what you think about dignity now?”

Astarion bites the corner of his lip to keep his expression serious. He keeps his eyes trained on your chest and seems to carefully consider his words before he says, “I maintain that I respect the dignity of your tits.”

That’s not what he meant to say. He blinks. His eyes flick up to yours. “Your position,” he amends.

His eyes flick back down. “Your position and your tits.”

“Ah,” you say. “Yes, I thought that might be the case. That you might be… what do they say? Dipping your wick in the law office wax.”

You stand and come back around to his side, maintaining your spell as you do. Astarion tracks you all the way back around.

“I’d like you to be as honest with me as you can be,” you say softly. “Not that you’ve much choice. So, in that case, here’s some extra… motivation.”

You’re behind him now and you hear his sharp intake of breath when he feels your palms spread over either side of his hips before moving around to the ties at the front of his trousers. You loosen them just enough to give you space.

Astarion’s knuckles are going white where he presses his fingers against the desk.

Your fingers are soft and warm against his lower abdomen as they dip below his waistband, then inside his underthings. You find what you seek and grip it firmly, fisting the length of him. He bites back a groan and flexes his hands against the wood as you draw him out into the open air. 

“You do keep it cool in here,” you whisper into his ear. You keep your touch light as you tease his cock, just enough to make him want but not nearly enough to satiate the need. “Why is that?”

Astarion swallows and looks at you out of the corner of his eye. “A little discomfort loosens the tongue, I find.” He struggles to keep the breathiness out of his voice and very nearly succeeds. 

Nearly. 

Your smile is wicked. “I see. Well.”

You rest his hardened length against the varnished wood of the desk. It’s cool on his touch-warmed skin and he whines lightly as you leave him there to walk around to his other side, fingertips drawing a trail across his broad back and shoulders.

“In that case, we’ll be leaving that…” You glance down at his cock, then back at his face. “… out in the cold until you’ve answered my questions to my satisfaction. Understood?”

He takes a deep breath through his nose and meets your eye. “Completely.”

“Good.” You move one of his misplaced curls back into place. “If I’m satisfied, I just might let you warm it up again. We shall see.”

“Indeed we shall,” he says, voice dropping deeper, and you can sense the challenge there. You smile as you turn away from him.

“Let’s try again,” you say. “Do you make a habit of lying to your interviewees in hopes of manipulating a confession?”

“Is ‘lying’ the word we want to use?” he says with a lilt.

“Yes.” You turn back to look at him.

He clears his throat, chewing his tongue to hide another smile before he looks away. He thinks a moment, then says, “I occasionally massage my message to pave the way for a more fruitful discussion in my favor, yes. Only in the interest of this office and my personal satisfaction.” He smirks at you, clearly pleased with himself.

You shake your head. “My, my. And just when I thought we were getting somewhere. Perhaps you need a reminder that I hold your immediate future in my hands?”

When you move back in and loosen his trousers still further to shove down his hips and below his arse, he wriggles to help. He seems to think he’s won this phase of the game. Adorable.

Rather than give him any relief, you reach out to the desk and pick up a wooden ruler, thin and flexible. Astarion opens his mouth, presumably to ask what you’re doing, but doesn’t get the chance as you use the flat of the ruler to give him a quick smack on his bare arse. 

He cries out in surprise and looks around at you. You raise an eyebrow at him and give him the opportunity to call his out. Instead, you watch his eyes darken. He’s still in. Which is good, because gods above if you aren’t beginning to make a mess of your underwear already.

“Do you understand your situation?” you ask.

“Maybe you ought to remind me again,” he rumbles.

You do, leaving another slap on his pale skin. A shiver travels up his back from the base of his spine all the way up.

“I understand,” he says.

“Very good,” you say. “Do you manipulate the outcomes of your interviews?”

“Sometimes, yes,” he says quietly, peering up at you from under his brows.

“Thank you for your honesty. With bribery?”

He nods.

You bend forward so you’re eye-to-eye. “And do you frequently offer favors of a sexual nature?”

Astarion’s gaze drops to your mouth and he blinks heavily. “That’s only for when I see someone I like,” he says.

There’s another slap to his arse, quick as reflex, and he gives a small, broken “a-ah” as he drops his head. He spoke the truth, your spell ensures that, but you want him to be more specific. You look down to see he’s subtly grinding himself against the desk, his cock beginning to weep pre-fluid as you watch.

You place the ruler against his back to hold him in place. “None of that,” you say. “Not until you clarify. Why me?”

He groans in frustration. “Because I like you. Because I’m attracted to you. Because I want to be inside you and fuck and fuck and fuck until we’re both hoarse from crying our ecstasy.”

Well. The pair of underwear you’re wearing are officially done for, you fear.

“What a wicked tongue you have,” you breathe, not quite able to keep up your aura of authority. You swallow and add, “Perhaps I’ll consider letting you off with a warning if we can figure out a better use for it.”

Astarion goes to his knees so quickly it makes your head spin. You don’t hesitate to take care of the bindings on your own trousers and he’s eager to help, shoving your clothing to the floor. You’re trying to remove a boot when he presses his face into the crux of your legs and runs his tongue along the seam of you so hotly that you nearly fall over. You lean down and give him another half-hearted smack. All it does is elicit a groan against your most sensitive of places.

With some struggle, you manage to remove the boot, kick your trousers and underthings off of one leg, and hop up to sit on the desk, Astarion follows you along, refusing to let you leave him now that he’s on you. His mouth works against you on its own, tongue lapping firmly at the edges of your cunt, flushing you and making you swell. He hasn’t even touched your clit yet and you know you’re already slick with desire.

You’re so momentarily distracted that you almost miss where his hands have gone.

Chest heaving, you weakly wave to dismiss your Zone of Truth and call up your mage hand, sending it down where you can’t reach to grab the wrist of the hand Astarion’s using to pump his cock while he licks at you.

“I don’t think so,” you gasp. “Still on… probation.”

You’re losing the thread and you’re perfectly okay with it.

Astarion growls in response and comes up higher on his knees, wrapping his arms around your lower back and pulling you tight against his face. His tongue finally finds your center and he rolls it against your entrance, plying the place just inside that makes you go flush with arousal, your clit swelling further. Then he finally pays it attention with a light draw followed by firm circles, teasing until you feel sparkles of arcane energy tingling at your fingertips and zaps of pleasure shoot through your core.

He holds you so tight to him that there’s no escape from the assault of pleasure he’s waging on your body. All too soon, you’re whimpering as you approach your peak.

And Astarion simply stops. He leaves you there, right before the edge, and you cry out in dismay and frustration. Before you realize what’s happening, he’s on his feet and pulling you onto yours, spinning you around until your hips are pressed to the edge of the dark wood. You can feel his rock hard length against the cleft of your arse, feel the wetness at the tip of him against your lower back.

“You’ve overplayed your hand this time, I think,” he pants into your ear. “Let your guard down. What member of the Board of Ethics accepts bribes?”

When you try to wriggle free, you feel his fingers at your wrists. He takes your hands and spreads them on the desk as you’d done to him, bending you over. His hips draw back and then return and you feel his hardness drag over your folds from behind, teasing but not quite putting pressure on your clit.

His breathing is heavy, but through it, he manages, “This time, you tell me the truth. Why did you meet with me?”

“To catch you out,” you gasp. “Your behavior has been… unethical.”

“Is it unethical to recognize when someone wants your cock?” he whispers, sending a tingle over your shoulders. “Is it against my oath to offer?”

“That’s not… I didn’t…”

The head of his cock nudges your clit and you both hiss through your teeth. He pulls back until he catches at your entrance, pushing in just barely. Just enough to begin to feel him, but nowhere near enough of him. Instinctively you arch your back harder, trying to take more, but he won’t let you.

“Beg me,” he growls in your ear. “Beg me for my cock. Tell me it’s why you came here.”

Your very last thread of remaining restraint is pulled to its absolute limit, but it doesn’t break quite yet. “I came here on orders to uncover a magistrate with loose morals,” you manage.

Astarion reaches a hand up to the hair at the back of your head, grabs a handful, and gently pulls to bend your head back. Directly into your ear, he whispers, “You’ve found him. Now beg for it.”

In the quiver of his voice, you can hear that he’s the one begging you.

So you give in.

“I came here for you,” you whisper back. “Please, let me. Let me take your cock.”

His breath shudders out of him. “Take it you shall.”

Astarion thrusts his hips forward, burying himself in you, and you hardly have time to so much as gasp before he sets a punishing rhythm, one arm around your waist to hold you in place and the other one still tangled up in your hair. You arch deeply, giving him as much access as you can, and he pounds into you relentlessly. On the outskirts of your awareness, you feel bruises beginning to form on your hipbones from where they repeatedly hit the desk.

You don’t care one whit.

He keeps you bent over the desk, your palms spread to keep you both upright as he fucks you hard, his moans trapped behind his clenched teeth. As you fly full speed back to your edge, he removes the hand from your head and absently places it over your mouth to muffle your own escalating cries.

The coil of your climax tightens and Astarion begins to mutter a steady mantra of “yes, yes, yes, gods, yes” beside your ear. He presses himself all the way to the hilt and rocks, the base of him stretching you just right and his balls pressed firm to your clit and there, oh there, it’s right-

You scream behind Astarion’s palm as you come, the delicious tension boiling and spilling over as contractions roll through you, pleasure washing over your body with every heartbeat. You nearly blank out for a second and when you blink back down, your lover continues to pump into you as he chases his own end.

With a shaking hand, you call up your mage hand from where it shimmers nearby and press it to his chest, pushing back with soft pressure.

“No,” Astarion whines, attempting one or two more thrusts before you back him up. “No, please, please, I didn’t finish, I-”

You turn, bottomless and eyes full of fuck and revenge, and add your own hands to the mix, all three pushing him back until he hits the deposition table, going flat on his back. You crawl up over him and straddle him, up on your knees just out of reach.

You look down upon him, beautiful and fucked out in the moonlight. “Do you regret any of it?” you say.

“I’m regretting a lot of my decisions at the moment,” he snarks. His lips part as he breathes.

With a smile, you roll your hips just enough to catch the head of his cock back at your opening. “Do you regret any of it?” you repeat.

He pants, looking up at you. Then he reaches up to grip the front of your shirt and pull you down over him in a searing kiss. When you break, he whispers, “No. Not a moment. It brought me to you.”

You roll back, sinking down onto him. He gasps and throws his arms around you, helping you get back into rhythm, and he’s so close that it’s barely any time at all before he arches his back clear up off the table and groans as he spills inside of you, the relief painted across every inch of his face. He comes for nearly a minute, twitching and humming beneath you until he finally relaxes into a boneless heap.

When he next opens his eyes, you lean down and catch him in another kiss.

The pair of you have barely redressed and cast a few prestidigitation cantrips as a courtesy before there’s a sound somewhere down the hall. Footsteps. Coming closer.

“Shit,” Astarion whispers, startled. He grabs your hand and spins you both into a dim corner of the room before you both cast Invisibility. Just in the nick of time, it appears, because there’s a jangle of keys and then a harried-looking halfling comes bustling into the room, dark bags under their eyes.

They grumble to themselves for a moment, going to a box to sort through files. They don’t find what they’re looking for and move on to the desk. Once there, they open a drawer, then wrinkle their nose.

“Bleeding hells, it smells like sex in here,” they grumble. “Gonna tell Jackobson that Cole has been using his office again. Teach that arsehole for making me come fetch the file he forgot.”

The halfling pulls a file from the drawer, slams it, and exits the room.

Neither of you move for the rest of the minute your invisibility lasts. As soon as the cloaking spell fades, you both collapse to the floor in quiet giggles. You kiss Astarion through your laughter, again and again.

It’s nice to see this side of him.

[studioghibelli]

moonlight sonata- a joel miller x reader

summary: entranced by your enigmatic history professor, you can't help but feel like he's hiding something from you. is it really that crazy to think that joel miller might actually be.... a vampire?

warnings: no use of y/n, teacher x student relationship, vampire!joel, professor!joel, student!reader, no outbreak!au, hefty age gap, a self-indulgent vampire fic i'm not even gonna lie, and of course smut (biting, desk fucking, pussy eating, period sex, fingering, finger sucking, some dirty talk, unprotected sex, creampie, etc.)

The rocky shore line raged alongside the whistling storm, brazen waves slapping and slamming against the rocky coast with each crack of lightning. The stone covered castle far off the outskirts of the small, hidden university was mostly shrouded in the darkness of night, except the flickering of a candle light at the highest window.

With each tick tock of the clock, the rain continued its journey on through the evening, painting the green grass with its wet dew. You cursed yourself for making an appointment with your history professor on this day of all days, annoyed that the weather decided to act up on this particular Wednesday, as if the storm hadn't been brewing for days on end.

As you walked along the cobblestone path, the moon slowly clawing up the canvas of the sky, your mind wandered to thoughts of him.

Joel Miller. Dr. Joel Miller. Professor Joel Miller. He didn't mind what he was called, as long as they got the "Joel" part right.

He was an enigmatic as he was handsome: charming, intuitive, mysterious, quiet. Every time you thought you were getting over him, he did something to draw you right back in. The flash of a smile sent directly to you during a test, a gentle brush of his fingers across your shoulder, a comment made on a well-written paper of yours- he knew just what to do to keep you tight on the line of his fishing hook. Whether he knew what he was doing, well... that was another question entirely.

You had asked to meet him after his office hours because of a particularly jarring comment he left on one of your papers.

Your research on Medieval Romanian folklore demonstrates commendable dedication and insight into the complexities of nocturnal life and the myths associated with it. However, I urge you to exercise caution in your interpretations, as some observations may lead you down paths best left unexplored. Remember, curiosity can be both a blessing and a curse.

Since you read what he wrote, you haven't been able to get it out of your head.

Weeks of research on Romanian folklore, specifically that of vampires, had left you questioning and guessing a multitude of previously learned lessons. You felt crazy, waking up in the dead of night because you felt eyes on you, the lingering kiss of a pair of sharp teeth ghosting against the soft skin of your neck. And, even more crazy -admittedly- you found yourself studying Professor Miller even more closely after his comment.

He only held his classes in the evening, his office hours were far later than any other professor, and you could always see his office light flickering on throughout the night, a beacon of hope you could look out to from your dormitory, when you were jerked awake by nightmares of monsters sucking your blood dry, their sharp fangs biting in to your supple flesh as though you were their first meal in centuries.

And yet, despite the pieces of evidence you had collected over the past few semesters, you still felt like you were on the brink of insanity for even thinking about believing such a preposterous myth. Especially one that involved Joel Miller, your favorite professor.

Despite this, you longed to talk to him about that cryptic message he wrote, so you swallowed your doubts and fears and garnered up enough courage to meet up with him.

By the time you reached the thick wooden door of his office, you could barely breathe, soaked to the bone as your clothes clung to your skin, droplets of rain clinging to your skin like smears of oil paint on a canvas.

You didn't have to knock for the iron hinges of the door to swing open with a loud creak.

"Professor!" Your surprise rocked through you, eyes widening as he caught you right on time.

"Hello. I knew you were on your way up." He looked down at you, his burly build towering over your own, and beckoned you inside.

Dr. Miller's office was cold, so cold that your skin raised with goosebumps as you slowly made your way inside. The wallpaper was old and floral, ripping at the edges of the corners of the walls, and the gothic architecture of the ceiling was tall and made of stone, providing even more of a chill in the already frigid room.

His desk was dark and made of solid mahogany, an absinthe lamp standing proud in the corner, as various candles flickered throughout. Rows of books lined the shelves, all of them old and leather bound, filling the office with the musky and comforting smell of aged paper.

It felt homely, yet it was freezing. The dichotomy of those two feelings left you rather stumped.

Joel made his way to his chair, his tight black pants and loose, long sleeved white shirt bellowing beneath the cranked A/C.

Perhaps you were just wet with rain, but you couldn't stop shivering.

"D-Do you run hot, or something?" You finally managed to stutter out, your arms hugging tight around your body as you sat across from him.

The Professor grinned ever so slightly, grabbing a black coat that hung on his tall coat rack, moving to hand it to you. When he got close, his nostrils flared ever so slightly. You watched his knuckles turn white against the collar of the jacket, and you heard him slowly take in a deep breath.

Slowly you looked up, his pupils blown wide with some archaic sort of desire, darkening with every breath he took in. It was as though he was breathing you in. Your thighs clenched tightly as his hand dropped to your shoulder.

Joel looked down at you, blinking slowly, as though he were coming back down to reality from an existential crisis or nerve racking nightmare. A shudder ran down the teachers spine, before he quickly dropped the material in your lap and rushed back to his chair, quickly becoming composed and poised as though nothing else had happened.

What was that about?

Dr. Miller peered at you from across the desk, smoothing out a paper that lay before him. The air was thick with an awkward sort of palpability, and you were scared if you tried to speak, nothing would come out of your mouth, your tongue dry like cotton.

"You said you wanted to meet with me?" He finally asked, his words slow and deep, that familiar Southern drawl clinging to each syllable in a smooth, honeyed sort of way.

"Y-.... yes." Clearing your throat, you somehow managed to sit up straighter, bringing the fleece coat tight upon your shoulders. "My paper."

"The one about vampiric Romanian myths, I assume. What about it?"

"I..." You paused once more, your mouth hanging open at the sheer insanity of what you wished to say next. "I think we should stop calling them myths, Professor."

Your professor chuckled a lovely, warming chuckle, a hand gently running down his stubble covered cheek. "Is that so?" His voice dropped an octave, and you saw his pupils grow dark once more.

With furrowed eyebrows, you began to speak once more. "I researched this extensively, you see. These... these sources, from the 15th century, they're accompanied by various art pieces, debates... I-I even read papal court cases involving humanoid creatures that only hunt at night. All of that-all of it is just a myth? Something doesn't add up to me."

"When studying history, it's important to note that not everything is.... as it seems." He flashed you a smile, and you caught glimpse of an incisor that looked longer than usual, sharper that normal, more imposing than most.

A wave of courage rushed over you at the sight. "Just with history?" Your voice was a whisper, but for the first time that night, it did not waver.

He stood, slowly making his way towards you. Your spine straightened as he pressed against you from behind the chair, his hands slowly falling to your shoulders. His palms were warm, heating the skin of your shoulders, your mind soon forgetting the cold memory of the rain.

"What are you implying?" You looked over to him, your eyes tracing over the golden skin of his hands, rough and calloused by the hand of time. This is the skin of a killer bella.

"Are you..." You took in a defeated sigh, shutting your eyes tightly. "Are you a vampire?" You couldn't believe how stupid you felt, how stupid all of this seemed once you spoke it out loud.

He laughed, and you felt him shifting to match your height, one knee resting on the wooden planks of the floor. "What do you think?" Joel whispered, his nose gently brushing against the skin of your neck.

You took in a sharp breath of air, leaning back against him, slowly turning to face him. "Dr. Miller...."

"What?"

"You're... you're very close to me."

"Do you want me to move? I can."

You shook your head slowly. "No. Don't." And you meant it.

A mischievous smirk fell over his plush lips, and you felt a finger gently tracing down your arm. "That's what I thought. I can see you, you know. The way you act around me, how you beam when I praise you, how you deflate when I walk away from you. I'm not stupid, darlin'. I know what you want, and I can give it to you."

"And what do I want, Professor?"

You could feel the arrogance radiating off of him. "Me." That one word was so infuriatingly attractive, his confidence only making him more desirable, more tempting.

You took in a sharp breath of air, your head falling into his shoulder. You felt his eyes searing in to your jugular, the smooth, taut skin of your neck on display for his chocolate hued eyes.

"How do you know that?"

"I can smell it. Your arousal. Your desire. Your need. All for me. I can make you feel pleasure like no one else can." His words were hot against your skin, and you felt his lips brushing against it with each word he spoke.

If you wanted to lie, you knew you would be unable to, now caught in his words like an animal in a trap. You swallowed thickly, nodding. "Yes." Was all you could say, your tongue dry once more. "But not tonight. I'm-"

"Bleeding?" Joel finished for you, and you were shook by the realization that if anyone in the world would care about that, it certainly wouldn't be him.

"How did you know?"

"I can smell it." You could practically hear the watering of his mouth, the desire which clung to the surface of his syllables. "Surely that wouldn't deter me, if what you've discovered is true. No?"

"No."

"Then let me taste you, let me have you."

"I'm yours." You whispered quietly, eyelids shutting as his mouth attached to your neck, deep kisses pressing in to your exposed flesh, searing hot with the promise of arousal.

"Oh, you always have been, haven't you?" Joel's fingers gently tangled around your tresses of hair, his tongue licking a thick strip across your throat.

"You never answered my question." You whispered out your thoughts as you felt his the sharpness of his teeth.

"I know. But you never answered mine."

"What-.... what question?"

"What do you think I am?"

"You know what I think."

"Do you have proof to back that up?" Dr. Miller's voice was getting cocky now, each word laced with more arrogance than the last.

"I've never seen you in the daylight. Never... never seen you eat or drink anything. You lurk in your office, in the shadows of the classroom. You're not like the other professor's, who are always out and about in the mornings, chattering and drinking coffee." You shut your eyes tightly, your tongue sweeping across your lower lip.

"Say it." He pleaded, words dark and cloudy with desire. "Say what I am."

"You're a vampire."

"You're right."

A shaky breath escaped you, and you slowly opened your eyes to see his mouth slightly open, the sharpness of his fangs exposed to your vision. You turned to face him head on, his sharp features illuminated by the flickering golden flame of the surrounding candles.

He looked so handsome in this light, the shadows that danced across his face only making him more imposing, more alluring. The Professors umber eyes were glued to your features, and you felt a calloused finger trace along the line of your soft jaw, his touch warm and gentle. You shivered at the feeling.

"Will you bite me?"

"Bite... you?"

"Please."

Joel ran his middle finger across your lower lip, a stray strand of hair pushed behind your ear by his slow movements. A sad sort of smile fell over his face. "That's not a good idea."

"Why not?"

He stared at you long and hard, as though he were weighing infinite possibilities within his mind. "If I start, I won't ever want to stop. I'll just keep coming back to you for more and more, it will be an infinite loop. Not to mention what.... well, what will happen to you."

"To me?"

"Eternity is a very long time." His voice turned solemn for a moment, and you nodded in silent understanding.

"How old are you?"

"Very old."

A soft giggle escaped you, and your hands moved to cup his scruffy cheeks. "I always thought vampires were Romanian. Or, Byron-like and British. Like Keanu Reeves."

He chuckled smoothly, shaking his head slowly at your guess. "Not this one. I'm a cowboy, through and through. Always have been, always will be."

A laugh escaped you before you could stop it, and you leaned towards him. "Can this cowboy kiss me?"

"This cowboy'll do whatever you want him to do."

Your eyes fluttered shut as Joel pressed his mouth to yours, a searing kiss burning through your body like an pyre ignited with flames. You moaned at the pleasure that filled your chest, his hands slowly moving to the hem of your damp shirt, fingers pressing into the soft skin of your belly as your kiss deepened. You hooked your leg around the professors waist, pulling him closer until his chest was flush against yours.

"I want more." You moaned out breathlessly, arms hooking around his neck as you pulled away.

"Then I'll give you more."

In one fell swoop he picked you up and placed you on his desk, his sheer strength causing you to yelp in surprise. Joel kissed you as though he would never kissed another, hungrily and passionately, working the buttons of his shirt. When he was done, he stripped you of your own, only pulling away to look upon your naked form.

"You're beautiful. Perfect. Look at you." His eyes drunk in every inch of your exposed chest, and he slowly grabbed the waistline of your jeans, tugging them off of you in one brief movement of his arms.

"You're beautiful." You mumbled, planting your hands on his thick biceps, feeling the strain of his muscles against your touch.

He smirked slightly, yet you caught a glimpse of it, and before you knew it he was down on his knees, his face buried between your thighs. You felt his teeth gently bite into your thighs, not hard enough to break any skin, but enough for you to feel it. You shivered at the pleasure, your fingers tangling into his hair.

You laid back across the desk, legs hooked over his shoulders, as his lips wrapped around your swelling clit, tongue tracing circles over your sensitive button.

You groaned out at the contact, tugging at his curls, trying to bring him even closer to the slick heat of your pussy.

"You're the most delicious thing I've ever tasted."

All you could do was moan out at his comment, allowing him to drink you all in with every lap of his tongue, every movement of his soft lips.

"I could stay down here for eternity." Joel grumbled, sucking in your clit, applying just the right amount of pressure to leave you begging for me.

"Do what you must." You responded through a breathless laugh, shocks of pleasure jolting through your core.

His tongue swept through your folds, collecting your arousal and your blood, the metallic taste of your tang filling his senses with pleasure he never thought was possible. Joel ate your pussy like a starved man. Which, in truth, he really was.

His fingers slowly moved to the entrance of your contracting pussy, and he eased his digits in to the knuckle, hitting against that spot that made you coo with relief. As he slowly began a rhythm with his movements, Joel returned to your clit, making sure it wasn't feeling left out. He sucked and licked, lapped and groaned, your cunt the only thing in the world that he cared about in that moment.

Before you could even think of what was going on, you felt your orgasm brewing within you, and that coil was only growing tighter by the minute. Dr. Miller continued fingering you, adding in a second finger as his tongue traced shapes into your bud, your blood dripping on his chin as he took you all in.

"I'm going to- I'm... Oh, fuck. Professor!" Your orgasm rocked you like a hurricane, waves and waves of tepid bliss filling your mind until his tongue on your skin and his fingers deep inside you were the only thing you could ever remember.

He only pulled away once he licked every drop of your cum and blood up, wiping away the excess with the back of his hand. Joel looked at you darkly, eyes meeting yours, and you noticed the bulge pressing into his trousers.

"Fill me." You whispered, opening your arms to welcome him back to your embrace.

"Oh, I will."

Joel moved to your arms, his hands working at his zipper until he was completely naked in front of you. You traced your palm down the softness of his belly until you had wrapped your own hand around his cock, stiff and aching with the thought of being buried deep inside of you. You guided his leaking mushroom tip to the entrance of your cunt, slowly looking up at him.

"Take me."

"As you wish." He whispered, his head falling to the crook of your neck as he pushed in to you, hands moving to your waist.

He stretched you perfectly, each ridge and vein introducing you to new pleasures you had never felt before. Joel knew how to make you shiver, how to make you moan, and he had never heard anything as beautiful as the sound of his name falling off your pretty lips.

"You feel so fuckin' good. So fuckin' tight for me, so wet." His teeth grazed against the flesh of your collarbone, and you felt his kisses pressing up and in to your neck. He bit down on your skin, much harder than the last time, his incisors tracing perfect lines on the suppleness of your throat.

Your fingers moved to his hair as you cried out his name, cheek falling into the side of his head as he pumped deep in to you. "Fuck me." You begged out breathlessly, his hips against yours growing harder and meaner with each movement.

"You're mine." His words were a growl, his words calming and deep in your ear, his heavy pants with each thrust causing you to whimper.

"I'm yours."

"Good fuckin' girl. Takin' me in." He raised his fingers to your mouth, gently pushing past your lips. "Suck."

You sucked your own orgasm off his flesh, moaning at the taste as he pulled away to watch, his pelvis hitting against yours as he fucked your pussy. A smirk flitted at the corners of his mouth.

"Look so pretty with your mouth stuffed."

You moaned out at the praise, pulling away with a gentle pop.

Joel reached down, easily finding your clit. "Gonna make you cum on my cock. One more time for me. Okay?"

"Okay." You complied happily, laying back on the desk once more as he towered over you, chest coming in to contact with your own as he rubbed and fucked, skilled beyond any sort of measure you had ever experienced before.

"That's my girl. My pretty girl. My strong, smart, clever girl." His words were hot against your throat as he bit you again, not hard enough to draw blood, but hard enough to make himself known.

He had so much power like that, with his teeth right against your flesh. He had your life in his hands, and yet he had no desire to take it. No desire you suck you down to the bone, no desire to curse you with the eternal fate he himself had been left with. Oh, yes. Eternity does sound so romantic to those who have no concept of it, doesn't it? But Joel Miller knew. He knew what forever could do to a man. He knew how lonely it could be.

You were right under his grasp, right there. He could take everything away from you in one bite, with one movement of his teeth. And yet he didn't.

Somehow, knowing this, knowing what he could do to you, only made you want him more. The trust that was there, the respect that lingered with each feeling of his fangs against you, only made you fall harder, deeper, longer.

Your stomach tightened with another climax as you fell back down to reality, and Joel pulled away to look at you, his nose pressing in to your own as your eyes met.

"I'm going to cum again." You whispered, throwing your hands around his shoulders.

"Cum for me then, darlin'. Cum on this dick."

Hearing his voice, deep and smooth and sexy and raw, caused you to come undone, your voice giving out as you cried out silently, pleasure flooding you as your pussy tightened around his cock. Joel followed suit, burying his face in your shoulder as his own orgasm shot through, his seed spilling deep within you, painting your walls white.

His weight pressed down against you as he pulled you closer, allowing your climaxes to calm down before kissed you, his lips rough and cracked against your own.

"Perhaps I should start leaving more comments on your papers." He joked as he pulled away, gently moving to help you dress, your shirt almost dry from the rains previous assault.

"Or I could just keep coming back. Over and over again."

"I would like that." Joel said earnestly, pulling his pants on over his legs.

"I would, too." You smiled up at him, slowly getting off the edge of his desk. "Do you, uh, have any plans tonight?"

"Besides lurking in the shadows and hunting pale virgins? No, not really." Dr. Miller's voice was dry and sarcastic, yet a hint of charming care was evident.

You laughed softly at his joke, looking up at him. "Would you want to do something with me?"

"Like what? I can't exactly take you out to dinner."

Joel relished in the bright smile that stretched across your face. "We could always go for a walk? The rain has stopped."

He peered out the window, the silver light of the moon flooding in through the sheer curtains. "Then it's a date."

"Yes. A date."

And as you two walked, hand in hand through the dense forest of autumn, and as the distant waves of the ocean crashed in and out of ear shot, you wondered what could possibly be so bad about eternity if it were spent with him. Perhaps you could get used to these late night walks. Perhaps you would yearn for them for the rest of your life, however long that may be.

[that-nerd-who-writes-fanfiction]

Headcanon that Merlin listens to Arthur and the knight’s rambling because he just really enjoys listening to them talk

I’ve had this headcanon for a while and I’ve written about it a few times but never anything I liked enough to post. But I got reminded about it again so I thought I’d share here.

If anyone writes this, please just tag me here or on Ao3 and give credit. Thanks :))

Merlin realises pretty early on in Camelot that nobles are never forthcoming with information or talking.

He also learns that Arthur loves to ramble about his special interests or hyper-fixations, despite it being trained out of him from an early age.

ADHD Arthur has me in a chokehold most days and I really really hate Uther despite the source of angst.

Anyway, Merlin will act like he doesn’t know anything about hunting or swords even after he’s had a few months in Camelot and he’ll ask Arthur more and more questions till he starts rambling.

And Merlin loves it. He loves listening and getting a chance to relax and not be the constant ball of energy in the relationship. He gets Arthur talking about longbows or developments in battle strategy throughout history while they’re on rides or walking through the halls, or he asks about breaking the horses for riding, Camelot’s history, pretty much anything.

Arthur just thinks Merlin is genuinely curious about these things, but he realises Merlin hates hunting, he shouldn’t care about bow weight or arrows. And he can’t handle a sword to save his life so why would he be interested in why the discovery of counterbalance is important?

It’s not till he looks over during one of his rants and sees Merlin completely at ease that he realises Merlin just likes listening. Arthur pauses and Merlin frowns to ask why he stopped. Arthur isn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth when it comes to Merlin and he knows better than to try and understand him. So he rolls his eyes, says something about making sure he was actually listening, to which Merlin reassures him he’s listening by repeating the last few things Arthur’s said, with his own understanding to show he’s interested, before telling Arthur to keep talking.

It spreads around the knights eventually and Merlin becomes the guy who listens to people. Leon, in particular, will spend time talking to Merlin about things he finds interesting because he’s never had anyone to listen to him before. Gwaine knows why Leon and Arthur are so happy to talk to Merlin because he experienced it too when Merlin said he wasn’t sick of having Gwaine around and talking ‘too much’ after his first time in Camelot.

He also gets a few skills along the way, he can pick a perfect sword for Arthur’s birthday present, learns a lot about the Druids from Percival and a lot of other things from the knights.

And the fics I wrote for this were entirely an excuse for me to ramble about why the capes in BBC Merlin were stupid and inaccurate, and the various other historical inaccuracies in the show, but that’s another thing.

[libraryleopard]

The other day one of my friends was like “Where on earth do you hear about all the books you read?” and I’m honestly trying to think about that because I don’t really pay attention to Booktube, Booktok, Book Twitter, or Bookstagram, only occasionally dip back into book blogging, and mostly use Goodreads as a place to track books I want to read or have read rather than searching for recommendations, so I’m trying to make a list of the places I hear about books from besides a few trusted social media mutuals.

Tor.com is one major place I hear about science fiction and fantasy books–they do deal announcements, cover reveals, lists of new releases, and reviews, as well as columns reviewing backlist work. I really like “The Book Queered Me,” for instance, which is people looking back on books that were important to their understand of identity. 

The Book Smugglers isn’t really that active anymore, but they reviewed science fiction and fantasy media, as well as publishing essays and short fiction and I read them religiously for a long time.

Book Riot I read occasionally and they publish bookish news and essays. I forgot I was subscribed to their LGBTQ+ book newsletter for a while and went through the emails I’d been sent earlier this week and that particular newsletter is nice because it highlights a couple books and does a round-up of recent news about queer books.

Austraddle’s book section, especially the Rainbow Reading column, does reviews, interviews, and news related to queer books, mostly queer women. It’s helpful for non-SFF stuff because I’m usually very up-to-date on news in the science fiction and fantasy world but they cover poetry, nonfiction, romance, etc.

We Need Diverse Books is a great resources, of course, and I really like the interviews they do with authors of recent releases.

LGBTQ Reads is an invaluable resource for queer literature–new release highlights, author interviews, lists of books by representation or age/genre if you’re looking for something specific.

Electric Literature is where I hear about more adult lit fic/nonfiction stuff, they also have a column called Novel Gazing in which people write about books that have impacted them and I find that really interesting. They also publish poetry and short fiction but I haven’t read much of that.

The Lesbrary does reviews of books about lesbian and bisexual women, as well as round-ups of new releases. Good resource for keeping up with sapphic books.

Rich in Color reads and reviews diverse YA books and is a good place to keep up with books by authors of color.

[cloudypariah]

How to perpetrate and sabotage your own kidnapping: A guide for dummies.

- The creation of the board (and its subsequent discovery)

Summary: Step One: host a brainstorming session with your teammates on how best to kidnap your future abductee. Step Two: have said abductee show up half an hour into the session and begin correcting your entire plan. Step Three: realise at the beginning of their impromptu presentation the target has absolutely no idea that they’re the target. Step Four: fail anyway.

Pairing: Dark!Poly!Task Force 141 x fem!Reader

Word count: 1.8k

Content tags: Dark content - Discussions around kidnapping, tense situations. If this is not your cup of tea, please go and find something different might better suited your palate. This is an 18+ fic meaning minors do not interact with this work. No one has permission from me to repost, copy or translate my work. No one has my permission to put my work into any AI source.

Notes: This is my first foray into the COD fandom and will be the first part in a dark comedy series. Please let me know what you think. Not proofread very well, sorry for any mistakes! Thanks for the motivation @live-love-be-unique !

Link to Task Force 141 masterlist / Link to COD masterlist

Captain John Price likes to think he knows his men well enough to trust them when his back is turned. Now that itself doesn’t necessarily mean knowing each and every one of their dirty secrets - he definitely wouldn’t come out smelling like fresh daisies if any number of his were revealed - but it does mean that he has the awareness to recognise that they all share one particular secret.

He sees it in the way Lieutenant Riley’s body language shifts when you give him his medical forms to look over, your consideration at offering him the option to disclose only certain personal information making the reserved soldier relax just enough to offer you a low thanks, accompanied with a stare that stretches on for a few moments longer than considered socially polite.

It’s also so amazingly obvious with Sergeant MacTavish. John’s surprised everyone else misses the way Soap’s smile takes a little longer to fade after departing for yet another mission, your swift congratulations on completing yet another physiotherapy appointment - “ Keep it up the good work big guy” - leaving the Scotsman floating on cloud nine damn near until the plane lands.

And how could he forget Sergeant Garrick? The man’s quick to change his tune and focus up, but the captain has observed Kyle absentmindedly rubbing his shoulder, thumb gingerly stroking the spot where your palm was only moments before, your figure long gone as you retreat down the corridor to where you came from.

No, Jonathan Price doesn’t miss a thing about his men. And it only takes two weeks and a long chat in the corner booth of the bar one quiet night - sans you or Laswell - before somehow his place becomes the meeting point for an unusual, though not unwelcome, topic - you.

More specifically, how to keep you.

The wooden shit box of a sports bar was where the first two facts were confirmed amongst them: 1. Every single one of the 141 men wanted you for themselves, but they weren’t above sharing. 2. You weren’t worth killing each other over, not when there was a much easier solution staring them in the face.

John’s house became the go-to place to discuss fact number three - They needed a plan.

It was Gaz who initially suggested the whiteboard after numerous interjections from Ghost and John; from everything to how to keep this from Laswell, to deciding which of your usual hangouts would provide them with the best opportunity to commence your “relocation”, to how to delicately but firmly explain said "relocation" to you once it was complete. Kyle loves his brothers in arms and never regrets a moment where his life is on the line if it means saving any one of them, but his patience began to wear thin when Soap got bored and started using goddamn paper planes instead of words to get his point across. At that Price finally relented and bought the damn thing.

Now, John was expecting you to pop by his place on Wednesday night to drop some papers off. A perfect opportunity, were it not for the fact that the gentlemen were still disagreeing on where to relocate you. However, it’ll allow you to grow more comfortable with him while he has some alone time with you, your presence like a balm on a wound - soothing and necessary (at least to him).

He had been looking forward to seeing you… tomorrow. So when you turn up not just on the doorstep but in the middle of the bloody hallway in his own bloody home halfway through the 141 “guys night”, his secondary action of shitting bricks quickly overrides his primary instinct to eliminate the threat.

He’s on his way back from the bathroom when he sees you standing, familiar folders firm in your grasp - fucking hell, is that his spare key too? - and a sour expression on your pretty face.

Your eyes narrow further when you spot him, striding over with fury rolling off you in small waves. “Captain Price, I know you did not leave these dossiers on my desk just before the end of my work day with a note stating they all need to be completed by the end of the work day.”

John’s senses are briefly overwhelmed by you being so close to him, the sight of you angry having a different effect on him than what you had originally intended. He’s never seen it before, and his hand twitches when you’re less than a foot away - fluctuating adrenaline or the desire to reach out and hold you, he’s not sure which is more prevalent. 

He always forgets to not be so obvious around you, but it isn’t as though you usually notice. (He’s not sure if the thought should make him feel sad or grateful.)

The sounds of his men arguing in the background, merely the next room over, are enough to bring reality crashing down hard.

His voice is deliberately loud and stalwart when replies. “You can’t be here.”

“Tough shit. Your lads night can wait.” You lean past him to the origin of what your gut was telling you was the sounds of the remaining 141 members quarreling. It’s easy to slip past Captain Price once your mind is set, the push of files against his chest preventing him from reacting for a few seconds - all the time you need to move down the hallway to where everyone else is bound to be.

John is quick to rush behind you, the arguing noises having swiftly changed to near cartoon-like crashes just moments before you enter the room. 

Ghost has migrated to the corner of the sitting area, standing as stiff as a fucking nutcracker, a mountain of crumpled notes and paper planes spilling out from between his arms. (His mask is still on thank god because it’ll hide exactly how caught out he feels, and if there’s one thing Simon Riley cannot stand it’s feeling like a kid with his hand caught in the cookie jar). His eyes instinctually watch your every move, waiting for your reaction.

Both of your gazes drift to the other side of the room, with neither of you failing to notice how the couch cushions are strewn widely across the space, (with one being stuck on top of a bookshelf for some odd reason) to find not one, but two soldiers gecko’d to the standing whiteboard.

Their demolitions expert is currently splayed out on the left side of the board and desperately grabbing the top of its metal frame, his stomach pressed into the cold porcelain and a left leg hitched up in a poor attempt to conceal the incriminating writing.

Price’s protégé is in a similar state. Dear Gaz has his back against the right side, with his arms outstretched to - much like Johnny - cover as much of their group planning as possible, a coloured marker clasped in each fist.

Two deers in headlights.

The sight of his task force is enough to bring back flashbacks of his original conversation with Kate about bringing these men together because Jesus H. Christ, what the fuck was he thinking?

There are a few moments when nobody moves or dares to breathe…

… except for you, of course.

You waste no time walking over to the two youngest members of the 141 as you attempt to shove them off the board. “Move,” you demand, palms pushing firmly against their sides. “I want to know what’s so important to everyone.” When they refuse, you do your best to stare at them, pleading with a pleasantly soft, “Please.”

Yeah, they both do what you say with ease when they hear that, giving you enough space to take in the somewhat smudged scribbles.

You miss the signal John gives Simon, the Ghost moving closer to your position as John quietly locks the door, and when your attention is drawn back to the board after the other two move you also miss all of the knowing looks shared behind your back. This was very far from ideal, but how can they recover from this?

They hope you understand that whatever comes next, they didn’t plan for it to start this way.

Kyle and John call your name but you ignore them, still processing the information written in front of you.

Johnny flexes his hands, preparing for the worst as you step back and say, “This is… bullshit.”

Every single member stops. That was not the reaction they were expecting.

Turning to face the group, you scoff. “I’m not even kidding. Firstly, you’re using guys' night to work, which is horrible for your mental and emotional health. And you should all know better.”

Four sets of brows furrow in united confusion. You don’t let that deter you from continuing, your arms gesturing haphazardly at the whiteboard. “Secondly, this is hands-down one of the worst brainstorms I have ever seen. This is not cohesive in the fucking slightest. Garrick, mark me.”

Kyle chokes on his spit, his brain short-circuiting before he sees your fingers wiggling at one of the markers he’s holding. The sergeant promptly gives it to you.

Your free hand takes turns pointing at everyone else in the room, a verbal command of, “sit down” directed at each man also. Dumbly and cautiously they all do. Ghost places himself at the end of the couch nearest the entrance, John strategically chooses a spot between yourself and the kitchen, and Soap and Gaz sit closest to you, where the two of them can hear you muttering under your breath as you draw what appears to be a massive cloud shape in the middle of the board.

Once completed, you fill your shape in with the word ‘TARGET’ and slam your free hand against the board. No one flinches, but if one were to look closely there would be some eyes widening in response. Johnny swears he sees one of your eyelids twitch.

“So,” you call out, “what do we know about the target?”

There are not only wide eyes looking at you, there are full glances exchanged between your audience.

“Seeing as you had the nerve to not invite me in your little meeting while keeping me on overtime” - Kyle and John squirm at that, and your finger makes a little circle - “we are going to be working on this project together. With all due respect, I’m not asking.”

Surely not…

And it’s when Captain John Price reviews the writing left over from the others that he realises Kyle and Johnny did one thing right during their clusterfuck of a coverup.

They managed to erase your name.

… you have absolutely no idea you are the target.

 A piece of writing far in the coroner catches your attention, and your shoulders slump. “The target likes knitting and ‘The Karate Kid’. In another life we would have been the best of friends.” A dramatic sigh leaves you, “Oh well, at least I’ll be able to give you some insight into the mindset of this individual. Any questions?”

Four hands shoot up.

Rubbing your hands together with glee, a maniac smile grows on your face. “Excellent.”

[janitorhutcherson]

bedtime with mike and abby ( mike schmidt x reader)

hi guys! this is my first ever lil fic/imagine/blurb here!! if y'all like this, I'll keep it up. I'm also new to tumblr, so please please be patient with me. in the future i'd love to do requests.

also if someone wants to help me with formatting/be friends, just shoot me a msg :p

this is just a quick lil imagine/blurb. I've seen so many smutty fics and i wanted to spice it up w/ some fluff. just sleepy time on mike's night off! on w the fic :p

*edit* this isn’t revised!! i threw something together last min and posted cause i felt like writing lol. don’t mind the typos

word count: 1,633

warnings: none! just fluff, angst if u squint!!

summary: nighttime with mike and abby on his day off!

Most of the time, you, your boyfriend Mike, and his little sister Abby were on entirely different schedules. Mike worked nights at a shitty gas station job for the time being after his job at Freddy's was... well.. no more for obvious reasons. Even though he swore off the night shift, this was necessary until he could find something better. Jobs were sparse at the moment, and Mike's history didn't exactly make him a star candidate.

A typical night would consist of you making the three of you dinner, slowly forcing Abby to venture out when it came to her taste buds. Recently, she'd taken a liking to tacos. You and Mike would make a joint effort to get her ready for bed earlier together, as Mike was more particular about being there for her since the incident. She'd get a bath, get into her jammies, and the two of you would tuck her in with a bedtime story. You'd both kiss her little forehead goodnight, then kiss your boyfriend on his lips before sending him off.

Most nights, you tossed and turned in your sleep, unable to rest properly without Mike by your side. A painfully dull feeling would rest in your stomach, the lack of his warmth beside you agonizing. You'd spend all night waiting for 6am to roll around as you felt the bed dip on his side, barely stirring you from your sleep. You'd have thirty minutes until your alarm went off, thirty minutes to wrap yourself up into him before you once again went on your separate ways... living your separate lives until you could have your few hours of union later on.

But tonight, you were lucky. Mike had gotten the next few days off. His job was being extra kind as they actually recognized the hard work Mike put in, something he wasn't used to. They'd told him someone would take over for a bit, to enjoy himself, to rest. It may have been a low-paying, trashy, borderline dangerous job, but his boss was nice, and the customers were certainly safer to deal with than those at the pizzeria.

You called out sick from work, not wanting to miss a single second with your little trio. You'd both even made the decision to pull Abby out of school for the day, spending it building forts, watching movies, and eating ice cream. The three of you even went out rollerskating, Mike awkwardly tumbling every few seconds on the rink as Abby would bust out laughing at him. The three of you were now sat around on the couch, Mike smooshed into the far side of the armrest as your entire body lay on his, Abby's head resting in your lap as she sleepily blinked her eyes. She'd already had her bath, brushed her teeth, and all three of you were in your pajamas.

"So, everyone have a good day?" Mike asked, turning his head to the two of you with a small but sleepy smile.

"Mhm," Abby hummed quietly, slowly nodding her head against your lap. It was clear that she was moments from passing out, and once Abby was out, she was impossible to get up without a fight.

"Okay, I think it's time for bed," you giggled, slowly lifting your own head up from Mike's shoulder. Mike nodded in agreement, a laugh of his own escaping his lips.

You both slowly pulled Abby up, getting her up on her feet, her half asleep state making her delirious as she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, staring back at the two of you in confusion.

"C'mon, Abs, it's time for bed," Mike muttered, standing up. He grabbed your hand, pulling you up with him. You stood as well, following Mike as he led Abby to her room. She crawled up into her bed, her little body tucking under her blankets as the two of you sat on both sides of her.

"Want a bedtime story?" Mike asked, raising his eyebrows as he leaned down to press a small kiss to Abby's forehead. Abby's lips parted to answer, but before she could, her eyes were closed and she was out. A sincere and quiet chuckle escaped underneath Mike's breath, his eyes full of love for his sister as her stared down at her. You couldn't help but stare, the edges of your mouth turning up into a sleepy smile of your own. He was so majestic, his messy but soft brown curls were laying in every which way on his head. Even though he was much more rested than usual, his eyes were still somewhat sunken in, but to you, that just made him more attractive. His scruff was messy, unshaven, but it managed to highlight his jawline. The sparkle that remained in his eyes, even through it all, after everything that he'd been through, warmed you to your core, your love for him overwhelming.

"What?" Mike asked quietly with a smile still plastered on his lips, his eyes now locked on yours. A blush crossed your cheeks as you realize you’d been caught, your eyebrows raising.

“Nothin’,” you hummed, shaking your head. “Just admiring you.” Your hand reached out to his as the two of you went to your own bedroom, the only light now lighting up your house being the moonlight and street lamps peeking through the blinds. You both crawled into bed, pulling the blankets over your bodies.

There was nothing but silence other than the sound of the fan in your room, the hum almost hypnotic as you wrapped yourself up in his arms. Your head rest against his chest as he instantly tugged you closer, his back flat on the bed as his hand cradled your side. His thumb drew small figure eights on your shoulder. Your body felt fuzzy, a type of relaxation you hadn’t felt at night in a while. Mike made you feel safe. On nights where you two were able to just snuggle up, nothing could buzz in your mind. Anxious thoughts disappeared, even the ones that seemed to be a constant in the back of your brain. There was nothing but a warmness in your mind and a beam of love in your heart.

“Hey, baby?” You heard Mike ask softly, his voice cracking from his sleepiness. You were broken from your train of thought by this, looking up at the man with the sleepy eyes. “Hm?” You hummed in response, your eyes fluttering, but he couldn’t see due to the lack of light. Mike sat up, pulling you up with him as he grabbed your hands, both of your faces now lit up by the light peeking through the cracks in your curtain.

“I- I know we don’t get nights like these much, and I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m never home, I’m sorry you have to do so much for you and Abby alone. I’m sorry I dragged you into that mess with Freddy’s, got you involved in so much of this,” he said, his voice seeping with sadness and regret. His eyes held an even softer emotion than they did earlier, one that felt like a knife to your chest. “Most importantly, I’m sorry I can’t be the boyfriend I should be. I mean, we should be spending our nights out at clubs, going out on special dates and vacations, and I hate that I’m unable to give you that,” he sniffled, a tear now falling down his eye.

You leaned forward, a frown on your lips as your eyebrows furrowed, your eyes locked on his as you placed your hand on his cheek, wiping away the tear with your thumb as you shook your head. Mike’s own two much larger hands were now placed on both of your cheeks as he continued. “But listen, Y/N, I love you, more than I have ever loved anyone, okay? I- I’m not good at this shit, I know I’m not. I’m clumsy and I’m bad at emotions. I don’t always know what I want or what I need, but I know I don’t only want you, but I need you. You came into my life and you brightened it where it was the darkest. You brought happiness back, you made me understand what joy was again, what it was like to feel.. complete. You saved me, but..” he trailed off again, full on tears falling down his cheeks now. “Most importantly, you saved Abby, made her feel whole again too, gave her somethin’ like a mother, something I couldn’t give her,” he said, his voice breaking at the end. Before he could say another word, you wrapped around arms around him, pulling him into a massive bear hug. He buried his head into the crook of your neck, your mind not even focused on the salty tears and the snotty nose that was leaned up against your shoulder. Your hands rubbing his back as you kissed the top of his head.

“Oh, baby..” you whispered softly, squeezing him like if you let go he’d disappear. “You know I love you so much too…” you finished, pulling his face up by his chin, pressing a soft, gentle but electric kiss to his lips. The two of you then settled back into bed, curling up in each other’s arms as he played with your hair, occasionally leaning down to press a gentle kiss to your lips, small sniffles still leaving his nose from the emotional moment. He was right, it was rare you got moments like these together, but when you did, you cherished them. It took about thirty minutes of sweet nothings and cuddles before the two of you drifted off, in your own little dream worlds filled with many nights like these.