#my baby sister is going to remember that when she was in fourth grade i showed up and i wanted to be there | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bahablastplz · 2 months

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All In | Chapter 7.5 (Changbin)

pairing: Lee Felix x f!reader (mafia au)

summary: You didn't know what you were getting yourself into when you started dating Yang Jungwon, notorious mafia boss. Your life gets flipped upside down when you're found beaten and bloody by SKZ, the rival mafia group, and you're quickly integrated into their lives. What will happen when you try to leave your old life behind and start anew?

chapter summary: Changbin knows what it's like to be weak but he has people he needs to protect. How did Changbin come to join SKZ?

warnings: please see series masterlist for all warnings

series masterlist ~~ series taglist ~~ main masterlist

“You’re weak,” he laughed at me.

When I was in fourth grade, I had gotten the shit beaten out of me when I stood up for my older sister. This guy in her grade was constantly berating her, picking on her, making her feel less than. One time too many she had come home crying and I decided enough was enough.

It didn’t go as planned, of course. He was two years older than me, and so I wasn’t able to stand up for her the way I had wanted to. I had gotten pulverized, more or less, but the relentless torment of my sister had stopped. Mission success?

The night I had gotten beaten up, my sister tended to my wounds in our family bathroom. “Stupid,” she had scolded as she wiped blood from my upper lip. “You should know better. I never want you to get hurt again.”

“Don’t tell Ma,” I had pleaded. Our mother would be sick out of her mind with worry if she saw me covered in blood and bruises.

Our mother was a headstrong, independent woman that had raised us well. Our father had taken off when I was just a baby and I was still too young to remember him, but his existence continued to sour the taste in our mouths to this very day. Since then, our mother had been a provider, working day and night in order to give us everything that we needed. She was overworked, anybody could see that much, but she wanted to make sure she gave her children a long and healthy life.

It was that night that I had vowed that I would become stronger. For her. For my sister. For our family. I would work hard and make sure that I would never get hurt again, but that I was strong and that I could protect my family.

I went out looking for work the very next day. Believe it or not, nobody really looks to hire you if you’re in the fourth grade. But try as I might, I went to every business in town and begged them to hire me. I was persistent, in fact.

“Why would we hire ya, kid?” one older man had spit at me. “With arms like yours, ya would only be a burden. You can’t lug around a potato if you tried.” I was ridiculed for even trying. But try as I might, day in and day out I would show up every morning begging for work, rain or shine.

One day, my luck had finally passed. I guess it was their busy season or something, because when I showed up to his shop at opening I was immediately thrust into work. It was all physical labor and sure, he was right about me not having the strength or stamina yet to truly be of help. But, I had the determination and perseverance. I never complained once, and though I was slower than some of his other workers, he gave me another chance the next day when I came back.

And so, that’s how I acquired my first job. And though my body wasn’t fully equipped for it yet, it certainly became equipped over time. Though I was small, my body started bulking up and giving me the strength to lift hundreds of pounds of materials each and every day.

By the time I reached high school age, I was working 60 hours a week and bringing home hundreds of dollars in cash. My Ma always made it a big thing when I tried to give her the money; I never kept any of it for myself. But I needed her to know I had it handled. If it were up to me, she would never have to work another day of her life and I would provide for us and we would live happily ever after.

It wasn’t long before I got greedy. People wanted me for my strength, after all. But once I found out that underground fighting was a thing… It was almost like I had forgotten about my vow years ago to never let Ma see me get hurt, to never have my sister have to patch me up again. I was leagues above the others, with my physique that I had spent years skillfully crafting. I never told my family the nature behind my new job, but all it entailed was me beating the crap out of other people. And people always bet on me, and they would always win of course. My technique was a little rusty at first but what I lacked in skill I more than made up for in strength. And when I wasn’t fighting and bringing home money, I was in the gym training.

It wasn’t enough. Just a little more. Once I was stronger, I’d be able to protect them.

Never mind the fact that I didn’t get to see much of my Ma or sister anymore, as I was always in the ring or in the gym. All that mattered was that I was powerful. That I had something to show for it.

One day when I showed up to the ring, there was a large crowd and a lot of murmurs that I had never heard before. A new opponent? Nobody had dared to challenge me in eons. But here he was… a man that had a few inches on me in height, but definitely not in raw strength. They called him Chan? I had never heard that name before, so he must be new.

One thing’s for sure, and that I was confident that this was a fight I could win.

“Changbin, right? Why don’t we turn this into a bet?” He had asked me.

I scoffed in his face. “Don’t make me laugh,” I told him. “You’re going to lose enough already, no? Do we really need to bring down your pride, your ego and whatever cash you have in your pocket? Let me do you a favor and spare you here and now.”

The man only grinned in return. I could tell he was cocky and that only pissed me off. My adrenaline was already ready to go.

“How about this. If I win, you’ll consider joining me and my team,” he had said.

“Your team… Yeah, sure buddy. Whatever you say. What about when I win?”

“If you win, Changbin, I’ll give you 10,000 dollars in cash.” My face blanched and my blood ran cold. He couldn’t be serious. He was that confident in himself?

“You’re on, man. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” We stepped into the ring and I cracked my jaw and knuckles in anticipation. I barely noticed the crowd getting larger and larger around us as we prepared.

The makeshift ref blew their whistle and counted us down. “3… 2… 1… Go!” And we were off. I was in my element, of course. Years of training would finally pay off, I thought to myself.

I barely had time to register how fast he was when the whistle blew. In half a second, he was across the ring and in front of my face. I blinked and saw a fist swinging for my face but had just enough time to duck, meeting his jaw with an uppercut. He took it like a champ, of course. Never had I seen someone that wasn’t instantly knocked out by the force of one of my uppercuts. I would usually save that for a finishing move, but today there was something on the line.

He stepped back, his hand cradling his jaw for a second as he took me in. He smiled at me. Usually by now, once my opponent is humbled they would make a last-ditch effort to swing and swing, getting messy in an attempt to stake their claim and win. I saw none of that with Chan. His eyes were sharp, calculating, and for a second I almost felt like prey.

“You’re strong,” he noted. “That’s why I want you.”

“You and everyone else,” I told him. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

I lunged forward, aiming for his stomach but I’m met with air. He dodged my blow? Stumbling forward, I wasn’t expecting to be swept off my feet. I didn’t even see him move! How could he have knocked me off balance that easily?

Squinting, I saw the flash of his shadow moving. He jumped, making to tackle me to the ground but I read him too quickly. I rolled to my side, noticing when he made contact with the ground instead of my frame. ‘Two can play that game,’ I had thought.

I’m on my feet in an instant, taking a defensive stance.

“You’re loyal to a fault,” he said. “A family man. You’re protective, a caregiver. You want to be able to provide.”

“How do you know all this?” I panted. I hadn’t had a fight in the ring this long in years.

“I make it my business to know things,” he provided unhelpfully. “The top fighter in the city? Definitely my business.” I rolled my eyes at that.

He moved forward and lunged with a right swing which I dodged with an arm. I reached to grab him but failed and instead was met with a blow right to my stomach that I had left unprotected. Holy shit. What muscle was this guy hiding? I coughed and sputtered and barely registered the sound of the crowd coming to a roar.

He lifted up his leg as if to kick me and I was thrown into yet another defensive attack, throwing my arms up. I instinctively swung back but he wasn’t there–he had used the momentum from his kick to crouch to the ground, springing up to land an uppercut straight to my nose. I heard a loud crack before everything went dark.

Chan later told me that I had been unconscious for about an hour. When I woke up, the crowd had dispersed and my coach was yelling at me about all the money I had lost him. Chan, in all his glory, had stayed until I was conscious again.

I groaned.

“So about my team,” he said, cracking a grin. “You want to be strong? You want to know how to protect your family, how to protect your mother and sister that you care so much about? There are things they need protecting from that you don’t even know about yet. They’ll be safe if you join SKZ, but if you don’t… bad things will happen to them. Let me tell you about it. Join me for a walk.”

─ ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ──── ♡ ─── ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ──

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grapejuicestyless · 5 months

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No One Wants To Die In The End.

Harry Styles x fem!reader

Summery: United through grief, Harry and Y/n have to navigate the same fates they witnessed as young children as understanding adults. After all, no one wants to die in the end, we can only hope death comes easy for us.

“Has anyone ever survived beyond the death rattle breathing?”

I hear my mother ask in a hushed tone, the nurse who came to send my grandma away giving her a tight lipped smile.

I sit on the bed pretending not to be able to hear them, pretending the sound of my grandma choking on her own saliva is normal and the staggering of her breathing between heavy wheezes isn’t concerning while I tell her all about what I learned in fourth grade.

She doesn’t remember me, not much anyway. Ever since the illness started taking pieces of her brain, I’ve been stuck in time. She only knows my name now, and my mom warned me on the way here today not to cry if she couldn’t even remember that. It was her illness forgetting, not my beloved grandma.

Mom says she loved me with all my heart, and that once the illness passes through her, she’ll remember me again fondly. I’ll get to tell her all about my life and growing up and she’ll understand what I’m talking about. She won’t give me the blank stare she does now while I hold her hand, and her skin won’t be so frail.

“We usually recommend getting everything in place by the end of the day. Gather her papers and say your goodbyes. We can’t guarantee anything with how much longer she’ll hold out for.” The nurse says, and though my mom doesn’t cry, I can see her skin hugging her throat constricting it and the soft fluttering of her wet eyelashes.

My mom pulled me away soon after, telling me to say goodbye. This time felt different though, even at age nine I knew that. So I told my grandma I’d be back, even if I wasn’t sure just because it always made her smile, and I promised to keep dancing around in my pajamas before breakfast like she loved.

That day at school, the one after I left my grandma with hundreds of promises to live freely and trust with my heart, I found my mother sat out on the front steps by our old white porch with her head in my hands.

“Hi mama. Can I go to Megans?” I had asked her cheerfully, excited about seeing my best friend, my neighbor and my sister.

Mom had this sad look in her eyes, one that told me to come close without her having to say it. And as I stood between her bent knees and felt her hands on my hips, I saw her shake her head.

“Y/n/n, grandma didn’t make it, baby.” She declared softly, and at the time I didn’t know how to process it, the idea of someone being gone forever. As mom told me how she had only left for a minute to go home and shower and came back to my grandma unresponsive in her sleep, I didn’t think about the fact that my grandma’s laugh would fade with the years, but rather how sad it was that she had to go alone. I prayed selfishly under my breath that I would have someone’s hand to hold when I went, that my rotting body would mean more than any shower ever could.

I didn’t tell mom this, my feelings on the death of grandma, the death of her mom, so I did what I knew how to do best, and I ran, begging softer this time to be able to go across the street just until dinner.

When I got there, I was greeted by Megan, and she looked sad. That’s how most people in my life seemed to look these past few hours, ever since the way my grandma breathed changed.

She pulled me into a hug and cried on my shoulder, promising to be there for me always, that it would get better. At the time I didn’t get it, why my best friend as a child would feel so much grief for a woman she barely knew, how she could feel so much more than I did, but grief hits differently in every person, I wished that someday I’d be able to process it openly instead of suppressing it somewhere I’d never find it. I wished that someday I’d learn how to cry.

Grandma didn’t get a funeral, they stuffed her ashes into a pretty vase with golden birds and her favorite flowers and held the wake early in the morning. Most of her friends I’d never met. It was a small service, a slow one. I spent most of my time playing hide and seek with my cousins and stealing the mints the funeral home left out for guests while my mother cried shaking each guests hand.

“How should we send out the letters?” My mom whispered to my father quietly, like it was something she didn’t want her children to know about.

“What’s the difference? Word spreads fast about people like him.”

People like him, that’s how my dad worded it. People like him, veterans who fought in a war they couldn’t even remember by the end of their lives and refused to replace the old wood paneling on their living room walls from the eighties.

My grandpa was the definition of people like him, he had lived enough lives to grow in white hairs by fourteen years old. Fighting alongside Elvis in the war and dancing with his dying wife in the afternoon.

I never met grandma, my dad said cancer took her before I was born, he says that’s why my name is the way it is, she picked it. But, I did meet grandpa.

He had white hair and a soft stomach from all the Swedish meatballs he made in his spare time. War does funny things like that to a man, make someone so against cooking love the simplicity of it, the safety of food consuming him.

I never really liked his Swedish meatballs, I didn’t like how he made them without sauce, when I was ten my world revolved around marinara sauce.

When I was twelve years old, I remember missing the softness of my grandpas stomach when he hugged me and the lingering smell of Swedish meatballs in his kitchen at dinner time. Which was weird because I never liked it before, but maybe my nose had changed while grandpa was changing in his own ways.

Cancer seemed to run in the family, something that was so small nobody ever suspected it was invading their bodies until the doctors became frantic to get it out.

My grandpa has bright white hair before his treatment, and small silver glasses perches on his swollen nose while he sat in his old brown chair and watched his grandkids school plays through the CD’s my parents would send him.

What a lonely life to live as he got older. The death of his wife and the absence of his grandchildren as they became less and less interested in family time and more focused on running outside freely with their friends.

I was so sidetracked I didn’t even know when grandpa died right away. Not until my father sat down on the coffee table in front of the couch where I laid with my mother rubbing his back slowly, a heavy look on his wrinkled face.

“Grandpa passed last night, Harry. He loved you very much.”

I didn’t cry as my father spoke, simply nodding before walking to my room to toy with my baseball cards and gameboy. I didn’t cry thinking about his passing, which confused me because I was twelve. I understood what death meant and how there was no one who had the power to reverse it, but I felt incapable of crying.

I went to school the next morning like my parents hadn’t told me the news, and my history teacher pulled me out into the hall during second period. He looked sad for me, his hands on my shoulders as he told me he would give me all the time I needed, not to try snd jump back into normalcy during such a tough time.

It made me feel embarrassed, which felt weird considering the context. I felt fine, completely indifferent to something I should have been breaking down over. But I guess grief is weird like that, and I wish I had the strength to be weak.

Grandpa had a big funeral, open casket with formal attire. He didn’t look like grandpa with all that makeup on him. I wanted to open his eyelids to see the colors in his eyes one last time. But that’s unacceptable to do, so I simply kneeled by the casket and prayed for him.

A big black limo took us from the boiling hot church to the graveyard where uniformed men loaded their guns and fired at the sky in honor of my grandpa. The smoke smelled like the low tide at the beach, and some people I’d never seen before sobbed a few rows behind me.

A lot of people showed up for grandpa, veterans from around the country and school friends from when he still had all his youth. Looking around at the crowd, I hoped I too would be able to make such a big impact on so many people. I selfishly prayed under my breath that one day I’d too have a large funeral. That people would care enough to come and cry for me because I would matter that much.

“When did you find out?” Harry asked softly, his large hand capturing mine in a paw-like grip over my knuckles.

I swallowed, wondering when I suspected it in comparison to when I finally got the guts to ask someone for help.

“I’ve known for a while, probably since I was nine. It runs in the family, you know? All these health issues that eat away at our brains?” I laughed, but neither of us found it funny, not when I ran my fingers through my hair to calm down and chunks cane out between my knuckles.

“I just thought I’d be gifted more time, thought biology would be kinder to my bones.”

Harry looks at me with a broken stare, one that hits me in the heart. We both tear up, but neither of us cry. We are our parents, we are the spitting image of them sitting us down to break the news. But at least they went peacefully, right? I know no peace, but still I don’t cry for myself, I feel too pathetic to even try.

“Did I do something wrong?” I ask, looking bitterly at the youthful green eyes in front of me, how his curly hair seems even more vibrant than nearly a decade ago. He ages backwards and I am already one foot out of the door.

Harry shakes his head.

“You did everything right.” He tells me, fingers pulling the hair from my hands to hide it behind his back.

“Then why do I feel like I have?”

“Nobody wants to die in the end, Y/n/n. It’s a game of chance, each day we live we gamble on how long we have left. Some people search for that end and others stumble on it accidentally, it’s just the chances.”

When he puts it like that, it makes me feel even worse, knowing how quickly I’ll be gone. How I’ve failed my future children I’ll never get to have, my husband who would have loved me I’m sure, and my poor old dog who waits by the food bowl only to find it empty each day I’m gone.

“I don’t like these chances.” I laugh with tears in my eyes, hands holding onto his as our forehead touch, my best friend holding me like no one ever has, not even Megan, who had long grownup into a woman I barely knew, a friend who drifted from me when we were thirteen and cried to her mother about how she missed me when she was sixteen.

Megan held me when my grandma died that day when I was nine, and I was confused as to why she was so sad, but with Harry holding me now, I understand it all better.

“I’m only twenty nine, Harry. At least my grandmothers dementia took away the intense pain of remembering what she was leaving behind.”

“And she lived not knowing who her daughter was for the rest of her life. She must have been so alone.”

I look down at my lap, my palms still pressed against his.

“I’d never forget you, even if my memory starts to go. I’ll never forget you because you’re too important to forget.” Harry smiles when I say that, pulling his hands away from mine to tap his chest quietly.

“And I’d never forget you, even when I’m old and crazy. I’ll keep photos of us on my walls and talk to them when I get bored.” He promised me, the dull light from the sun making the once lavish room feel less like a clean living room and more like a cold hospital.

As the months pass, my hair has been traded for one of Harry’s favorite hats. My shirts switched out for backless gowns with blue dots on the paper like material. My arms are not decorated with the same ink as Harry, but wires and tubes that come from the table beside my hospital bed.

I am twenty nine, but I must look about sixty now with how tired I am from simply trying to steal back the life that was ripped from me unfairly.

And as I fight to keep up with the beeping of the monitors hooked up beside me, I feel my throat rejecting my saliva and my sick coughs stuck behind my teeth.

I heat the same cracking sounds that my grandmother made when I was nine, and I feel relaxed knowing now that it doesn’t hurt to breathe this way, not right now anyway.

And in the silence I can hear an echo of my mother’s words from outside my door, her feminine voice exchanged for the deep one I’d grown rather fond of.

“Has anyone ever survived beyond the death rattle breathing?”

Harry asks in a hushed tone, the nurse different but her answer just the same.

“We usually recommend getting everything in place by the end of the day. Gather her papers and say your goodbyes. We can’t guarantee anything with how much longer she’ll hold out for.”

It’s happening again, the spirit leaving my bones to join everyone I’ve ever loved before, my father and my grandma. My mother and my old cousins. I only wished I didn’t have to leave Harry behind, I wished I could dance with him in our college dorms just one more time like we used to, and set fire to the box mac and cheese just one last time.

I remember everything about Harry, the nurse warning that my image of him might waver as my blood begins to slow under the skin. She tells him not to worry when my skin gets cold, it’s natural for people to cool down as their heart gives out.

Harry comes in and holds my hand, pretending the sound of my breathing doesn’t bother him and the sound of me choking on my own saliva is normal and the staggering of my breathing between heavy wheezes isn’t concerning while he swears to every single higher power he can think of that I’ll be okay.

And I believe him.

Because while he holds my hand in death, he’s fulfilled the one wish I prayed so hard for a a kid. The one selfish wish I made for myself in a time of need.

When I was nine, standing between my mothers legs with my nails between my teeth I prayed selfishly under my breath that I would have someone’s hand to hold when I went, that my rotting body would mean more than any shower ever could.

And here Harry was nearly two decades later, holding my hand and promising serenity in the afterlife.

What he doesn’t know is that I am one of the lucky ones. Even after my heart has stopped, I am given one last gift as an apology for such a short life. I am given an extra second of my brain living on, the soft cries of “I love you’s” from Harry the last thing I hear as my dying gasp is cut short from my death rattle breathing.

I have a small service, Harry and some college friends standing in line shaking the hands of the few guests who walk by to look at my body. My nephews and nieces play hide and seek with each other until the ceremony was over, mints stuffed deep in their pockets as they filed out of the funeral home like nothing had happened.

Being famous is weird, especially after a loved one has passed.

We send out prayers to the families of those affected, the media says, but how has the death of this person affected Harry? How has Y/n’s slipping away crushed him beyond belief? Will he dedicate his next album to her?

They don’t care about Y/n, they only care about how she makes a good headline for their companies, and it makes me sick to think about. How they profit off of my grief while I try to stop memorizing the sound of her broken sigh as she went.

I wonder if I was enough for her during her final days. If my touch was enough to cure her for just a brief second.

It’s no wonder I turned to move-on pills. Ones that lift me up and break me down further until I am face up on the bathroom floor we once shared, my eyes wide as I choke on my breathing and count how many times the lights multiply as I look up to the sky.

It’s not a shock that the headlines are out by the end of the day, the sirens enough to alert all of Hollywood of my dying dreams and my perfect execution.

My family stands in a line while they put my casket into the hearse, makeup on my face like they put on my grandpa, I can barely recognize myself as I watch the funeral service from another space.

And as they bury me under the ground, the media announces their grief and well wishes to all that attended and the millions watching from their televisions.

As a kid, I hoped I too would be able to make such a big impact on so many people. I selfishly prayed under my breath that one day I’d too have a large funeral. That people would care enough to come and cry for me because I would matter that much.

But now that it’s happening, I only care for one thing, I only asked for one thing in the letter I left behind. Lay me beside my best friend, so I can keep holding her hand through death, and we can laugh in the afterlife like we did when we were healthy, happy, and together.

#harry styles x reader #harry styles x y/n #harry styles x you #harry styles imagine #harry styles fluff #harry styles angst #yn x harry #harry x reader #harrystyles #harry styles #hslot harry #yn x harrystyles

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cloudycaffeinatedcryptid · 9 months

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What do you think each of the hacketteer's most cherished personal belonging is?

thank you for the ask, i love Making Up Things About My Blorbos hours. this really makes me think bc everyone bonds with such different things for random reasons. i've had a rock on my bookshelf for 7+ years bc a friend from a volunteer group found it for me & i like the way it looks. so it's always so different. still, i'll try

Jacob's for sure is some sort of lucky charm that he hangs from the rearview mirror of his truck, that he has one hundred percent belief in. i can't decide what it is - a horseshoe or rabbits foot or something else - but he thinks he's invincible with that thing

Kaitlyn will take it to her grave, but hers is her half of the tacky "best friends" necklace Jacob got for them when they were little, and no one will ever find out. she keeps it hidden but she still keeps her half, even tho she's sure Jacob didn't keep his (he did, it's buried in his sock drawer)

Nick, if you ask him, will say it's his pocketwatch - passed down through his father's side, it's a family heirloom, y'know? but he can't read analog clocks for shit & he has no idea what he's going to do with this watch. truthfully, it's a pair of limited edition Heelies signed by a local musician that he got when he was twelve. he's keeping those babies till the value skyrockets

Abi has her sketchbook, obviously, & probably many more that she's filled up over the years, but she has this cat mug with a chip in one ear that she's had for years & she loves with all her heart. comfort mug <3

Ryan loves his earbuds & probably has a lot of things he keeps for Reasons but i choose to believe his sister writes him letters every time he goes to camp & he keeps every single one of them tucked away in his room for when he needs them

Emma enjoys having all of her things. she loves stuff. she has lots of rings & earrings & bangles she thinks are cute, she has a box full of scrapbooking supplies, three different wax melters that she liked the designs of. but her favorite thing is a little music box she found at a flea market a long time ago, with a beat up little ballerina figure, that she keeps all her most sentimental items in. the love note with the strawberry-scented sticker she got in fourth grade. a gumball machine ring she got with her best friend in middle school. her first ever concert ticket

Dylan loves things. his necklace that he never lets us see, Schrodinger's baby teeth & old collar, weird or cool coins he finds while out. pretty much everything has emotional value to him. but he has a little wolf figurine that's scratched, beat up - he's owned it forever, barely remembers where he got it. but it sits right next his computer & he swears it keeps all his equipment running. he begs it for mercy whenever his computer starts to crash. he calls it His Royal Furriness, Lord Wolfington

#this was fun i love saying things #this was also really hard??#awoo i'd love to hear y'all's thoughts :)#i'm also a hoarder of things that make my brain happy so i keep a lot of random shit #the quarry #ask moth

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songforaname · 11 months

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not so much a secret, more just something i've been wondering and never got the opportunity to ask:

what's your connection with lizards?

i've remarked that it's something we have in common and in my case it's having one as a pet, but i've just never brought it up out of, idk, fear that since he's of a species often just grabbed from the wild (which he wasn't, he's one of the first of his kind to be born in captivity in the nordics) that you'd think less of me?

Short answer:

Longer answer:

i've never put too much thought into it, but the earliest i can trace anything back to is reading a children's science book about lizards whenever i went to visit my great-grandma over in canada as a kid.

i specifically remember about it having separate sections for lizards and salamders and how to care for them a return them to the wild after you've caught one.

naturally, living in a place which would be covered in snow for like a third of the year meant i'd never have the chance to do that, and a house full of cats and the occasional dog meant there wasn't any place for a lizard to be put in a tank either. (the fish i had would occasionally disappear from the tank they were in too. except for the goldfish i won at a carnival game, which is a whole different story)

but then at some point after my sister was born, my mom ended up getting us into making crafts out of beads and string. One of the projects in the book we had was a lizard. Guess what i made a lot?

then in like fourth or fifth grade, at the little christmas gift market my school would throw every year so kids could buy presents and get them wrapped, i had bought presents for almost everyone i knew except for my sister and by pure chance the doll bed i had bought for my sister also came with an Iggy the Iguana beanie baby for like $5 extra instead of the other tables there selling the beanie babies for like $15-$20 on their own.

That exact beanie baby has been in my posession since then and is the one i take pictures of whenever i go places and i've taken him cross-country several times. if we assume i got him the same year as his listed birthday is - August 12, 1997 - that would make him 26, and almost a year older than my brother.

At some point, other people in my family would grab me stuffed lizards for christmas or birthday presents because the Iggy pictures on facebook were the main way they would know what i was up to.

however, while typing this out, i remembered that as a really young kid, i had a Barney the Dinosaur doll i would have by my side at all times for years, even forcing my mom to end up getting more eyedrops than necessary when i needed them because i wouldn't take them unless barney had to take them too. And she couldn't fake it because i would watch her put them in. i don't know whatever happened to him.

i also was obsessed with the american godzilla movie at one point, and all kinds of dinosaurs as a kid, but none of those lasted as long or as fiercely as Barney or Iggy. so as far as i can tell, you can tempt me into anything with a brightly colored, fuzzy reptile of some sort.

or, for a probably more accurate answer, plucked from a tumblr post:

(i also don't actually know much about lizards.)

#askpost #lizardpost #other things i can be tempted me with include keychains and peppermints #answering this publicly so everyone knows about the lizard backstory

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kaylinalexanderbooks · 7 months

Note

Pawpaw: How do you name your characters?

Sugar Maple: What's the sweetest part of your story?

Hello! Thanks for the ask! (From this ask game)

Pawpaw: How do you name your characters?

Hm. Vibes? Generally speaking I use Behind the Name and its filters. Sometimes I go elsewhere or look up specific ethnic names. I sometimes go for meaning.

But sometimes, here is my process:

The Secret Portal

Lexi was dubbed "Alexia" in my fourth grade (age 10) creative writing project. I remember I went through an extremely elaborate process to naming her until I fell on that name. Unfortunately I don't remember how I did. In Draft Three (age 13) I tried out the nickname Lexi used by her sister and occasionally her friends, but in Draft Four I just called her Lexi and I preferred that for her (though her name is still Alexia).

Ash was originally named Aurora, but when starting Draft Four I had another OC in the project that later became SOTL named Aurora (she doesn't really exist anymore lol) and to avoid this I picked the first "A" name I thought of: Ashley. But I tried out Ash and realized I preferred it, so kept it consistent.

Gwen was the first G name I thought of, named because the friend she was originally based on wanted her name to start with that. Noelle came out of an inside joke. Rose was on a whim.

Maddie was Maddie because my sister chose the name. She also chose Kelsey. The names stuck, and I really like them.

Robbie I called Robert for a long time, choosing the name for an embarrassing reason (14 yo me was obsessed with Tony Stark) but the nickname fits him much better!!

Akash was chosen because I wanted less English names and selected Indian/Hindi on some baby name site. Obviously being an A name it was close to the top, but it meant "sky" and I laughed because I'd made him a flyer and I liked the name so kept it.

Carla was originally Carly and I don't remember how I picked the name or why I changed it. George was named after my grandfather. Why did I choose it for a young guy idk.

Ewan, Jazlyn, Wade, Parker, Tyler, and Sam were all chosen on a whim and I liked them so they stayed. Liam was originally named Seamus and I didn't like the name for him so I just looked up popular names in Canada and picked the one I liked. Niri was Stephen but I changed it for a similar reason: it wasn't working. Both characters have improved since I changed their name to something I was comfortable with.

Same is true for Hye-Jin and Gabriel, but the main reason I changed their names was they were Lucy and Luis - and with Liam and Lexi I hope you can understand why I didn't want so many four letters, two syllable L-names.

Jedi I picked because I found it on a baby name site. Carmen was on a whim.

Most other names were like that for TSP so I'll stop now. Basically the gist is most of them I picked on a whim, but then I changed the ones I didn't want by usually going to Behind the Name and filtering by ethnicity and looking for something I like.

School of the Legends

Much simpler to describe/harder to choose:

1) pick the name that they are in the fairy tale. Example: Jack (all Jacks)

2) pick a name that means the same as the name in the fairy tale but in another language. Example: Bai Xue (Snow White)

3) choose an ethnicity and look at all the meanings and pick one that's close to the character they represent. Example: Saira (Red Riding Hood, means "traveler")

4) pick a name with a good meaning tied to the character they represent. Example: Azraq (Little Boy Blue, means "blue")

Sugar Maple: What's the sweetest part of your story?

Any moment where it's 2+ characters (usually 2) doing something really sweet for the other (e.g., Kelsey giving Maddie an amigurumi tiger for no reason) or comforting the other (e.g., Gwen giving Akash a hug and a kiss on the forehead when he's crying).

TSP is made up of nothing but corny comedy, angst, and soft ass moments. It's honestly hard to pick a favorite, which is kind of lame lol. But these silly kids loving each other just gives me a lot of joy!

Thanks so much for the ask! Sorry this was a long read lol

TSP intro

TSP tag list (ask to be +/-): @thepeculiarbird @illarian-rambling @televisionjester

#the secret portal #tsp #teaspoon #writing ask game #behind the scenes #my wip #my ocs #oc ask game #this will be too many ocs to tag rip me #school of the legends #sotl #writing blog #writers on tumblr #writing community #writers of tumblr #writing on tumblr #writeblr #writeblr community

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weirdthoughtsandideas · 7 months

Text

People I've met irl with the same name as dcla characters (and how they were)

Nina: I have met LOTS of people named Nina, and they all have been very different. One of them is related to me and I love her ofc. But then there's also Nina from fourth grade who... well, we were on the swings at recess and I said "I wonder how they make cartoons like Phineas and Ferb, like how they animate them", and she stopped her tracks and said "Are you watching cartoons?!" in the most judgemental tone ever. She then jumped off the swings and walked away, not wanting to be associated with a fourth grader who was so cHiLdiSh she still watched cartoons. So, Nina from fourth grade, if you're out there: Fuck you :)

Maxi: Maxi is a very common name for people my age. Often a nickname of Maximillian (just like Maxi in Violetta's full name is Maximilliano). The Maxi's I've met have often been "one of the boys" and sometimes had a bit of a cocky attitude. One in particular also was famous for making really odd comments sometimes lol.

Helena: Often teachers or friends of my mom are named this. Been very different how they have been. One Helena was my english teacher in middle school and she was from America. She was also my drama teacher (in middle school I went to a school that had a performing arts program), but apparently she was not a fully fledged drama teacher but just "took a course in it for one class". And you could tell, because she just had no idea what we were doing. Once like a week before we performed was like "so I have an idea what you could do :)" and we were like "... we have a play already thanks"

Daisy: Now, the Daisy in Bia is a wonderful person. The Daisy I met irl......................... *traumatic flashbacks*

Simon: I've only met people who are named Simon without the accent over the o. They've all been like Simón in the show :)

Camila: I had a daycare teacher named Camila and I found her to be the funniest teacher. She was in charge of the younger kids, but she talked to us older kids a lot. I remember when my little brother was born and she every day was like "you need to show me your little brother!". And I was so excited when my mom came to pick me up and had my little brother with her (because she was on maternity leave), and as we were leaving, I saw Camila out in the yard and was like "CAMILA!!!! MY LITTLE BROTHER IS HERE!!" and she came out to greet us.

Leon: Every Leon I’ve met has been under 2 years old. I think that name is trending rn (googled: Yep, Leon was top 12 on the baby name list in Sweden 2022).

Lucas: In elementary school I had THREE people named Lucas/Lukas in my class. Extremely popular name in my generation. All of them were different. One of them left no impact on me at all, one of them was the most annoying boy ever, and one of them I had a crush on and ran around telling him I was going to kiss him. He also hit me with a stick in kindergarten and we went to the same daycare where I witnessed him spin around and fall down on a sharp rock, so his mom had to come pick him up and he needed to sew three stitches on his chin.

Alice: Yes, I’ve met several, but all of them are pronounced the english way. They’ve all been very kind people. One of them was a friend of my sisters and my sister said she was a bit odd, though. Although, I can’t judge for myself since I didn’t know her.

Ana: Well, maybe not spelled Ana, but Anna I’ve met hundreds of. Relatives, classmates, teachers, friends of my parents… no one is the same. Every Anna I’ve met has been nice except for one Anna in elementary school who I found so annoying, because she always acted like I was stupid, and gaslighted me. I’ve also had a teacher named Anna who was… we’re not gonna talk about her I am just wondering how she could be allowed to be around children tbh.

Emma: Emma is such a normal name that some Emma’s I’ve met have been nothing but kind, but other Emma’s have been hell’s children. I have nothing but love to say to some Emma’s and have the biggest grudge against other Emma’s.

Emilia: Yes, I met one Emilia. She was very nice and kind, although quite shy.

Amanda: Yep. One girl in my confirmation group who kissed me on the cheek because I offered her chocolate that I didn’t want. And one from my childhood who every time she was invited to birthday parties had to be accompanied by her mom as she had a tendency to get… out of control…

Diego: I’ve only met one Diego and he was literally 1 years old (people naming their kids Diego and Leon… they’re gonna grow up having the real life Violetta over here)

Tomas: Every Tomas I’ve met is either a middle aged man or a toddler, there’s been nothing in between. None of them have left a strong print on me lol

Monica: EVERY Monica I’ve met has either been a lunch lady or a teacher. They are always in school in some way. No one has been the same

Luna: Every Luna I’ve met has been friends of my sister and I never knew them much to say I have an impression. Like I’ve said hi to them at most.

Alex: Every Alex I’ve met is exactly like the Alex in the show. Literally if you’re named Alex (often short of Alexander), you’re destined to just act like that ig

Lara: The only Lara I’ve known was in the same ”art and design” class as me (this was kind of like regular arts class except it was an optional class you could take, like with drama, and you didn’t get graded so you could just sit there and draw or work on an artwork of your choice). I have to admit that I know nothing more than her name. Sometimes I wonder if she was also in my science, physics and biology group (we blended classes for those subjects). If she were I never talked to her. Honestly don't even know her face. Just know she exists because the teacher called her name.

Eric: Every Eric/Erik I've met has been the friend of a friend. I've never been close to an Eric but I've known his name because we have a mutual friend. Although, I recall once when I was like. 4? I was invited to a boy named Eric's birthday party, he went to the same daycare as me and he invited everyone in our daycare group. Remember nothing from his birthday except that it was out on some 4H farm and I ran around chasing a white balloon that was flying over the field. I don't even know if there was cake??? Every kid just ran around. But then again I was 4 so it's understandable I have such blurry memories.

I'm not sure if I've met anyone more that has the same name as a dcla character (maybe the same name as a small character that appeared in like an episode maybe).

#violetta #soy luna #disney bia

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steele-soulmate · 10 months

Text

Tattooed Wings, CHAPTER 527, Peter Steele & OFC, Soulmate AU

SUMMARY: Mary Claire Bradley meets her soulmate- literally- the famous Peter Steele of metal group Type O Negative. But will obstacles including trauma, stalkers, and toxic family members get in the way of their life?

WARNING: mentions of child rape (nothing graphic) PTSD, milk kink, soft smut, grinding, assault, fingering, hand jobs, blow jobs, 69, P in V sex, blood, noncon rape, violence, death, vandalism, graffiti, attempted kidnapping, break-ins, wild animal attacks, terrorist attack (sabotage) consensual impregnation, bareback, impregnation kink, creampies, terrorist attacks (shootings) hit and run pedestrian accident, precipitous labor, neonatal death, abandoned baby

WORDS: 1110

THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD- THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD- THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD- THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD- THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD- THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD- THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD

“Incoming!” my beefcake of an older husband chuckled, chest bare as he gave all three babies- Baby Tommy, little girl and Baby Eve- skin to skin, the three little human wearing only diapers and socks as they held each other’s hands.

Sure enough, an explosion in the door turned out to be Elizabeth and Katie, both girls clutching at their American Girl look alike dollies as they spilled into the bedroom before racing over to the bed and then crawling underneath the covers, popping out in between Peter and I.

“Little girl is here!” cheered Katie. “Yay yay!”

“Yay yay!” whooped Baby Tommy, rolling onto his back carefully and then sitting up to beam at his older sisters. “Yay yay!”

The kids were all giggling and seeking out all the cuddles as Isabelle poked her head into the doorway to give Peter and me updates on what trouble the girls had gotten up to.

“Hey,” she greeted us with a smile as she took a seat on the edge of the bed, welcoming Primrose as the skunklet crawled into her lap and curled up into a tight ball. “So the girls have a field trip coming up for their American history class. The teacher told me that the class will be going to the 9/11 memorial museum and he told me that he completely understands if you two decide that the girls shouldn’t go.”

“Mommy?” Katie meeped just then, cooing as Baby Eve reached out for her. “What happened on September eleventh?”

Peter and I both exchanged quick little glances.

“9/11 is a pivotal point in American history,” I started with a soft hum. “On September 11th, 2001, a group of nineteen men crashed two airplanes into the Twin Towers and one into the Pentagon outside of Washington DC. The hijackers also tried to crash a fourth plane into another building, possibly the White House or the U.S. capitol building, but the passengers fought back and the plane crashed into an empty field in Pennsylvania.”

The girl were silent as they processed all this new information.

“Mommy, what does pivotal means?” Katie frowned.

“Pivotal means significant or big,” I explained, brushing her sweet baby curls away from her face. “Your girls remember the unmentionable one’s fan club and all the chaos they created when they sabotaged daddy’s concerts? That is called terrorism, which is the use of violence to create fear and worry. That’s what the hijackers did.”

MEOW Mittens appeared out of seemingly nowhere, jumping up onto the bed and rubbing herself up against Elizabeth, purring loudly.

PUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUR

“Good kitty,” Elizabeth murmured in a shaky voice. “Mommy, where were you?”

“I would have been in the second grade with Mrs. Williams at Twin Peaks Elementary, I don’t really remember that day,” I answered honestly. “Mrs. Williams had the TV stand facing her desk and a bunch of the teachers and their aides were clustered around it, watching as the second tower was hit and then came down.”

“Daddy?” she turned her attention to Peter, hugging Elle tight to her chest.

“I was not in New York on that day; I was playing at a show in- I think- Georgia.” Peter’s eyes developed a misty haze as he remembered. “Your Auntie Patrica was there when the plans hit, but she got away before the towers came back down again. She died from cancer commonplaced from the tragedy.”

“Cancer?” Katie wrinkled her nose. “When did cancer come into play here?”

“When the towers came down, the particular mixture of building dust, smoke, and jet fuel at ground zero contained something called carcinogens, which is a substance the causes cancer,” Peter explained in a hollow voice.

“Katie, I can’t remember if you ever met her,” Peter sighed sadly.

“I don’t think I ever did,” she told him, cradling Baby Eve in her arms. “Was she a good egg?”

“She was, she really was.” Peter cooed at little girl and Baby Tommy spread out over the vast planes of his burly chest. “Patrica really was the best egg.”“The only kind of eggies that really matters,” I hummed as Baby Eve started fussing. I lifted up my shirt and Katie fitted her up against my breast. “Gramercy, mo stór.”“Bù kèqì,” she chirped happily. “Mommy, daddy, do you want for Lizz Lizz and me to go to the 9/11 Museum still? Or do you want us to take a mental health day?”

Peter and I both had a silent conversation using our eyes and facial motions.

“I don’t mind acting as a chaperones for the field trip,” Peter offered. “Would that make you feel better?”

“I guess…” Elizabeth muttered half heartingly. Katie just nodded her head eagerly, the two girls once more surprising me with how different for one another they really were. Elizabeth wore her heart on her sleeve and was easily emotional, while Katie was more hard shelled and didn’t really cry easily.

“Okay then,” Peter hummed before opening the paperwork and turned to me. “Do you have a pen that I can borrow, sweetheart?”

I reached over to my bedside table and grabbed a gel ink pen, which I handed over to him.

“Thanks,” he smiled before beginning to scratch away.

Gramercy, thank you, old French?

Mo stór, my dear, Irish Gaelic

Bù kèqì, you’re welcome, Chinese

TAGLISTS ARE OPEN/ ASK BOX IS OPEN/ REQUESTS ARE OPEN/ PLOT BUNNIES ARE WELCOMED

If you liked this, then please consider buying me a coffee HERE It only costs $3!!!

PETER STEELE TAGLIST

@rock-a-noodle

@ch3rry-c01a

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redhairedwolfwitch · 3 years

Text

Baby Shepherd - Part 4 - Jo Wilson x Shepherd!Sister!Reader

Summary: Jo is nervous about who to ask for their blessing so she can ask you to marry her. She also isn't quite sure how to even ask, but she's hoping they'll say yes.

Her eyes didn't leave your form until you had ran out of site, hurrying the trauma patient to get a CT scan. It was only when Amelia came into view that she chewed her lip, remembering a conversation you and she had had a few months after Nancy, Kathleen and your mother visited Seattle. It was the day after Liz had come to visit and a week after Addison had come to Seattle.

"I'm sorry you don't really get to meet Derek or Mark."

You were staring up at the ceiling as Jo rested her head on your shoulder, the blankets wrapped around the two of you.

"I met Doctor Shepherd... just not as your girlfriend, since we were just catching either other stealing looks back then. What was Mark Sloan like?" Jo whispered, sitting up slightly so she could listen more clearly.

"Mark, he called me his favourite Shepherd. Um, when I was seventeen, I wanted my mother's attention, so I started rebelling. In ways that left my grades clean, but I was always so lonely, since all my siblings were at college, or med school, or residency, fellowship blah, blah, blah. Mark came over, and he calls out 'where's my favourite Shepherd' and I ran inside. I'd been, um, smoking cigarettes, so I stank. But, Mark thought I'd just been cuddling with Amelia, since she was the only one who would, after I turned thirteen, y'know. He found the cigarettes in one of my jackets, well, it was Amelia's old one, but Mark had seen me wear it. The family had an intervention, but Amelia had been sober and she realised they weren't even the brand she would buy. He knew I was doing it for attention. He didn't yell like Derek did, Amelia tried to defend me as exploring or whatever, but the argument I had five siblings who were doctors or becoming doctors really took hold..." You explained, sniffling as tears brewed in your eyes and your nose got stuffy.

"What did he do?" Jo whispered, watching you stare at the ceiling with tears in your eyes.

"Amelia defended me, Derek yelled, Liz had this look on her face, this disappointed look... Kathleen and Nancy blamed Amelia... but Mark, Mark took me to the fun fair. I remember, crying my eyes out on the ferris wheel, because I wanted my mother to look at me. I risked my health, just because, even if she was the one yelling at me, I just wanted her to look at me. Mark, and Addison kept their eye on me after that, they'd spend time with me, stop the spiral. I was always the messy annoying baby of the family. But, Mark called me his favourite Shepherd, and I believed him." You chuckled, swiping away a stray tear before rolling over to rest your head on Jo's stomach gently.

"He was Derek's childhood best friend, so Mark was around my entire childhood. He was the... fourth person I told I liked girls, after Addison, Amelia and Derek. I remember him grinning and teasing me about whether I had a girlfriend or not. He would have loved you. Because I love you." You smiled, rolling over to press a kiss to Jo's sternum.

"I love you too." Jo hummed, her hand going to the back of your neck so she could pull you up to kiss you on the lips.

///

Jo was broke out of memory lane as Amelia came into view.

"Hey, uh, Amelia, Doctor Shepherd, I need, I need to talk to you." Jo stammered, her eyes widening when Amelia turned around to acknowledge Jo.

"Wilson, what's up? Do you need me for a consult or-"

"Y/n's, Y/n's great, isn't she? Like she's so great, and uh, she's really great and I love her and... I, yeah, she's, she's great." Jo rambled, panicking as Amelia gave Jo a confused look.

"Yeah... my baby sister is great, where are we going with this?" Amelia enquired, frowning as Jo stammered over her words.

"Okay, yeah, sure, whatever your question is, or whatever you're trying to tell me, okay? Just, go get some water before you talk to any patients, okay Wilson?" Amelia suggested as her pager went off, telling her she was needed for a consult in the pit.

"I want to marry your sister." Jo breathed, but Amelia was already heading away.

///

Pacing up and down, Jo stared at the contact name that she'd gotten after Amelia had added her to a group chat. A group chat that consisted of her, you, Amelia, Addison and Liz.

She'd added their numbers to her phone after you helped her figure out who was who. That meant she could call Liz to ask her, but after what happened with Amelia, she was terrified she'd make herself a fool over the phone too.

"Liz? Hi, it's, it's Jo. Y/n's okay, she's fine, she's at work, doing cardio things, y'know, um. I wanted to talk to you and ask you something." Jo bit her lip, still pacing up and down as she heard Liz on the other end of the line.

Liz raised an eyebrow as she listened to Jo stammer and fall over her words, almost guessing what was happening when Jo said she had something to ask.

"So, Y/n... um, she's amazing and I love her and I was wondering, I was wondering if-"

"Yes, Jo. You can have my blessing. Just try not to ramble when you actually propose to Baby Shep, okay?" Liz chuckled, hearing Jo gasp.

"How did you know I was asking for your blessing?"

"You wanted to ask me something, and you kept mentioning how you love Baby Shep, and how she's amazing, and that narrowed it down. Good luck, Jo. Oh, I better be invited to whatever you two do, wedding or run away to elope... I know the rest of the family would have a heart attack if you went with the second option though." Liz chuckled before hanging up the phone, leaving Jo to stand, flabbergasted at what just happened.

///

A yelp left Jo's mouth as you pulled her onto an on-call room, locking the door as Jo was pressed up against it.

"Aw, baby, did you miss me?" Jo smiled, teasing you as you hugged her tightly.

"Yes, now, shush, less talking, more kissing." You replied, moving your hands to Jo's waist as she got the hint and kissed you.

An audible gasp was heard as you began to remove your scrubs, smirking as Jo admired the lingerie you were wearing.

"Dammit!" Jo whined as her pager went off, followed by yours as you were both paged to the pit.

A whimper left Jo's lips as you tugged your scrubs back on, pecking her lips quickly before you smiled, "to be continued," hurrying out of the door to get down to the pit.

///

Pulling her bottom lip between her teeth, she withheld a sigh as she watched you run an EKG on a patient.

"Wilson, one request. Next time you try page my baby sister to an on-call room, please page my baby sister, and not me. Because I do not need to see more of you than I did when I walked in on you and my baby sister on the couch at her apartment." Amelia requested as she showed Jo her page from earlier.

"Oh crap... I guess it's a good job Y/n paged me to another on-call room at the same time, because that would have been awkward..." Jo rambled, leaving Amelia's face to fall into a laughing grimace.

"I did not need to know that, Wilson."

///

The back of your head hit the car roof with a thunk, a groan leaving your lips as Jo stopped what she was doing.

"Are you okay?" Jo looked up, noticing how your hand had gone from her shoulder to holding your head.

"I think the mood is officially ruined, can we continue this somewhere where I won't hit my head on the ceiling?" You asked, playfully swatting Jo as she smirked at what you said.

"Yeah, let's take this back to your apartment." She agreed, tugging her shirt back on and climbing into the front seats again.

"Do you know where my-"

"It's in my pocket, no worries." Jo replied, glancing in the rear view mirror as you tugged your shirt on.

///

"Wait, so why are we carpooling Maggie and Amelia instead of Meredith?" Jo enquired as you drove the car the next morning.

"Bailey got the flu, so Zola and Ellis got the flu, thus Meredith got the flu but Maggie and Amelia didn't. Mer usually does the carpool, but she's sick, so, Amelia called me whilst you were in the shower." You explained, tapping your fingers on the steering wheel as you pulled up to the house.

"Wait, that's why you didn't join me this morning?" Jo pouted, about to complain when the car door opened.

"Good morning!" Maggie smiled as she and Amelia climbed in the back.

"We are feverless and ready to go." Amelia announced, tugging her seatbelt on.

You were almost at the hospital when Maggie cleared her throat.

"Did someone lose a, a thong?" Maggie stuttered, holding up the object as Jo turned around to look, whilst you glanced in the rear view mirror, clenching your jaw as you avoided seeing Amelia's face.

"I'll just, take that..." Jo hesitated, grabbing the item whilst avoiding looking at Maggie and Amelia's faces.

She cleared her throat awkwardly as you stared directly ahead, dead inside.

"Well, have a good day!" The four of you got out of the car, you and Jo avoiding looking at Amelia and Maggie by speed-walking into the ED.

"Did that just happen?" Maggie voiced, shock on her face as Amelia stared at the ground.

"Oh, yes it did, just like how Wilson did a poor job at hiding all the hickeys..." Amelia replied, looking up as Maggie gawped.

"Oh my god. Your sister had them on her too."

"I really did not need to know that!" Amelia admitted, shivering slightly in disgust.

///

You'd spent most of shift avoiding looking at Maggie or Amelia, only talking to them when you were on a case together. Jo chewed her lip as she realised how awkward it was, only letting out a breath when you flopped next to her on the couch.

"You okay?" Jo whispered, reaching to stroke your cheek.

"Tired. Might just sleep through our day-off tomorrow." You admitted, yawning slightly as Jo chuckled.

"We really didn't do much sleeping last night, did we?" She teased, getting lightly whacked on the leg by you in response.

///

"Can't sleep?" You whispered, rolling over to face Jo as you realised she was staring up at the ceiling.

"Can I hold you?" Jo whispered back, rolling over onto her side so she could be the big spoon.

"Yeah..." You whispered, rolling over onto your side as Jo's fingers ran patterns into your exposed skin.

You were drifting into the embrace of sleep, and your girlfriend, when she spoke.

"Marry me?" Jo's voice was so quiet, you barely comprehended the words, turning your head to look at her in the darkness, shadows dancing around the room thanks to the mood lighting.

"What? What did you say?" You whispered, confusion laced in your tone as your heart raced.

Jo bit her lip before bringing a hand up to your cheek, her thumb running up and down your cheekbone before she realised you were smiling.

"Will you marry me?" Jo whispered, gasping slightly as you took her hand and kissed her palm, smiling before you shifted forwards to pull Jo into a kiss.

You'd never been more glad of the glow of the salt lamp and fairy lights in the room, or you wouldn't have been able to see what you were doing.

"Is that a yes-" Jo broke away from the kiss to ask, getting cut off as you kissed her nose.

"Yeah. It's a hell yes. I wanna marry you, Josephine Brooke Wilson." You replied, resting your head against the pillow as a bright smile broke across Jo's face.

Tags: @nnightskiess @emskisworld @afuckingshituniverse

#jo wilson x reader #jo wilson imagine #grey's anatomy x reader #amelia shepherd x reader #grey's anatomy imagine #amelia shepherd imagine #amelia shepherd x sister!reader #jo wilson #amelia shepherd #grey's anatomy #mark sloan #derek shepherd #liz shepherd #nancy shepherd #kathleen shepherd #addison montgomery #maggie pierce

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kj-1130 · 4 years

Text

Hiding

Main Masterlist

It was another camp that you had been invited to; your fourth one specifically.

You started warming up to the girls last time. Your quiet demeanor intrigued them so it was safe to say they were excited to begin getting to know you.

While it was a start, they didn't know many things about you. Only basic things like what grade you were in and what high school you went to, what your favorite color was, what your favorite song was, and things you liked to do outside of soccer. They had scraped the surface of your personality and you just knew they couldn’t wait to learn more.

You had gotten particularly close with Christen, both of you being the more responsible and relaxed of the bunch. And with her came Tobin, someone you enjoyed spending time with especially if you just wanted to chill and play video games all day.

Alex had become someone you had viewed as a sister, the two of you bonding over Charlie. She was always claiming that you loved her baby more than you loved her which wouldn’t be a total lie.

You woke up early causing you to be the first to breakfast for the day. You were soon greeted by Alyssa and Becky, who came down with a crossword and book. Tierna, who was your roommate, came down just as you were finishing up followed by basically everyone else.

You hopped up, threw away your trash and began to race to the elevator but was stopped by Alex, Christen, Tobin, and Krashlyn.

“Hey kiddo. What’s got you in a rush?” Tobin said slinging an arm over your shoulder.

“Umm, just remembered I forgot to submit an assignment last night. Gotta go. Bye!”

All of the women stared towards the direction where you just ran with furrowed eyebrows.

“That...was weird,” Christen states.

The other four mutter in agreement.

“We’ll have to check on her later,” Alex decides, the others liking the plan before heading up to breakfast.

In your room, you were definitely not working on an assignment.

As you were walking down to load the bus, you stared at your phone watching the three dots disappear only for a text to replace them.

miss you <3

A small smile grew on your face and you prepared to text back.

“What are cheesing about?”

You quickly tuck your phone in your pocket and lock eyes with Kelley.

“Nothing,” you squeak out before dashing towards the bus.

“Well that was odd.”

Camp ended last week. It was the last game of the first semester and the bleachers were packed. At your school, the girl’s soccer team was the most popular. The crowd was excited and you could see creative posters and confetti poppers everywhere. The janitors were going to love that.

As you were about to go on, you searched the bleachers and smiled as your eyes landed on one person. They waved and you followed suit with a dopey smile on your face. Before the two of you could interact any further, you were called to begin the game.

You and your team won—another victory for the school. The score ended up 5-1, which is good considering the last match had basically been a bust.

As everyone disbanded, you headed over to the bleachers and leaned on the railing as you watched her walk down.

“Hey champ.”

You rolled your eyes fondly and let a small smile spread over your face.

She grabbed your chin to pull you closer and left a lingering kiss on your lips.

Your eyes fluttered open as Nai watched with a grin.

“Hi,” you whispered.

“Hi.”

“Holy shit!”

Looking over to where the yell came from, your gaze found one Emily Sonnett, who was with the rest of the national team.

“Oh, fuck me,” you sighed.

“I can do that later.”

You looked at her blankly before she placed a kiss on your forehead.

“I’m kidding. Unless you want to,” she mutters quickly.

You gave her a mischievous look as she laughed, her head tossing back.

She gave a firm pat to your cheek and pushed your shoulder gentle.

“Go talk to them.”

You slowly dragged yourself over to the women and stood there awkwardly.

“Hi.”

Everyone was just staring between you and Nai as you rocked on your heels.

“Who is that?” Christen asked as she was the first to break out of shock.

“My… girlfriend.”

You looked at them with pursed lips as they continued to stare.

“Yes, Ash you owe me twenty bucks!”

Your head whipped towards the direction of the pink-haired women as you looked at her baffled.

“You bet on me?”

You watched as the goalkeeper begrudgingly handed over the money with a frown. She shrugged and looked at you.

“I mean, yeah. It was entertaining until I lost.”

You rolled your eyes and began to walk away.

“I’m leaving.”

“When can we meet her?”

“Never if I have anything to do with it!”

#uswnt #uswnt x reader #uswnt imagines #uswnt imagine #woso imagines #woso imagine

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everlarkficexchange · 3 years

Text

Like The Stars Hold The Moon

Written By : @katnissmellarkkkk

Prompt 59 : "Katniss dad is a victor, he won his hunger games and is a mentor. Peeta is reaped for the games and Katniss begs her dad to help him win the games. [submitted by anonymous]“

Hi! It feels like there’s so much I need to say here and I can’t remember any of it now! This is obviously–if you read the summary, which I assume you did and that’s why you’re here hahaha–an EFE prompt. It was submitted by an anonymous person, so I don’t know specifically if this is what you wanted but I really hope this is good enough that you’ll be fulfilled?

I don’t think there is much more to say? I hope everyone who reads this has a good day! I wrote plenty of this on Easter so I’d like to thank Jesus for rising again. And I feel like the prompt alone is a sufficient summary but just so you know, this heavily features Katniss, Peeta (obvi), Haymitch and Katniss’ father, Hunter (I named him, that’s not canon, I know).

This fic I likely going to be a three-shot with an opportunity for a sequel three-shot. Oh and also, thank you to the anon who sent the prompt!

Oh and this got really long, so I’m just going to submit the first part on here and then I’ll add a link at the bottom to continue reading on AO3. I’ve never done this before so I don’t know if I’m doing it right?

Okay, if you read all my talking, bye now!

Rated T for the canon violence.

At the reaping for the Forty-Seventh Hunger Games, Matty Knick drew out the names of a ”very special boy“ and ”a very special girl“ from the reaping bowls. She read them off in a bright voice and matched the sentiment with an out of place perky smile. The girl’s name was Heather Branch.

And the boy’s was Hunter Everdeen.

Of course, everyone knows the story of Hunter Everdeen.

Year of the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games.

"So Hunter,” Caesar Flickerman leans toward the victor, absolutely electrified, and says, “tell us, tell us. How excited are you for the games this year?”

The camera focuses in on gray eyes, the color of a storm cloud or a cleanly polished knife. Dangerous and hard and cunning.

Or protective and frightful and angry.

Or warm and loving and kind.

“I’m about as excited as I always am, Caesar,” he shoots back, not a trace of even so much as a smirk on his face. Not even so much as a lift from the corner of his mouth.

And still, the crowd of Capitol idiots burst out in laughter, as if they just heard the funniest joke in the world, as if this was Hunter’s desired response to the words.

As if the conversation wasn’t about teenagers—and some as young as twelve—killing other teenagers.

“And what about you, Haymitch?” Caesar asks next, segueing from one aggravated man to another.

“I’m looking forward to the free drinks,” Haymitch says while tipping back dark gold colored liquid into his mouth. Almost as an afterthought, he gestures wide and sloppy to the crowd, igniting cacophonous sounds from the population once more. “And of course, the social interaction with all you lovely people.”

No one in the audience recognizes the insult. No one understands the blatant sarcasm at their expense.

Here in District Twelve though, we do. As exemplified by Peeta’s laugh, vibrating against my back. “Shh,” I hush, laser focused on the enormous television screen before us.

“Daddy’s not speaking anymore,” Prim reminds me from the other room, where she’s currently flipping through a magazine our father sent.

“Well, be quiet before he does,” I snap, elbowing Peeta when he rolls his eyes now. “Stop it, I haven’t seen him in weeks,” I complain, fixing him with a fierce glare.

“I know,” he murmurs agreeably, gently kissing my temple. “But he’ll be home in a few days.”

As if they could hear our exchange from inside the television box, Caesar turns his attention back to my father. “Hunter, how excited are you to get home to District Twelve?”

At that, his eyes genuinely light up with ferocity. “I’m counting the minutes,” he replies, but still manages to keep his tone cool. He adamantly refuses to give away his true emotion to even a single soul in the Capitol. It’s his way of withholding power from their greedy, glitter covered hands.

But I see the change in him. Prim, from her position against the doorframe, sees it. I’m positive my mother, who’s watching with our brother from the comfort of our house sees it as well.

Our father’s eyes are now alive again, the permanent frown his mouth resides in on every televised appearance loosens a bit, his brows aren’t knit so closely together any longer.

Caesar Flickerman sees the change too evidently.

“Look at those silver coins!” He bellows, gesturing for the cameras to put my father in a close up now. “They just lit up like the stars when talking about home. Tell me, Hunter Everdeen, how’s the family back in District Twelve?”

At that, my father makes a considerable effort to transform his entire expression into a mask of indifference. “They’re good,” he states evenly, his tone clipped. Making it blatant to even the airheaded Capitol citizens that he refuses to speak publicly about his family.

“Because you’re not property of the Capitol, baby,” he told me once, while on a walk in the woods. “You’re not anyone’s property.”

“What about you and mommy?”

“You’re our responsibility, but not our property.” He’d knelt down to my height, which happened to be the shortest in my second grade class. “Property implies ownership, Katniss. And no one owns you. No one owns you or your sister. Remember that for me. And never let yourself forget it.”

“You’re daughters are both old enough for the reaping, am I right?” Caesar presses further, and my sister and I automatically sigh. Knowing the response that’s bound to come.

“What’s wrong?” Peeta asks, as he still remains completely clueless. I shake my head instead of offering an explanation though, leaning further into his chest.

Peeta won’t understand. He was raised in town by merchants—the owners of the bakery, to be specific. He’s never understood the fierce protectiveness, the instantaneous fury, the irrational tunnel vision, that appears when a victor’s child is mentioned entering the games.

Peeta’s never even met my father. I’m not impatient by any stretch of the imagination to put the two of them in the same room, to watch my father chew my boyfriend up and devour him alive, to abide by his rules and regulations that will surely come with dating.

He doesn’t know Peeta and I have even so much as shaken hands. I’ve never so much as left him even the slightest hint. Not even when I’ve accompanied him to the bakery for the occasional trade with Peeta’s father, the baker himself.

Like both Prim and I predicted, our father is now on edge, his breathing uneven and his nostrils flaring. “Yes. Both my girls are of age,” he says after a long beat, his tone hard and jagged.

Caesar though is either oblivious or is extraordinarily practiced at appearing obtuse. “Well, wouldn’t it be something if either of them were chosen for the games? Am I right?” He directs his questions to the audience. “Don’t we all love a family story?” His words elicit cheers and hollers and a murderous glint in my father’s silver eyes. The camera only catches it for a moment’s time before quickly flitting away, towards the much more enjoyable image of the Captiolites chattering like chipmunks at the very idea.

And suddenly I feel Peeta’s arm tighten around me, the vision of me—the only person in the world he’s certain that he loves—being taken away from our home here in Twelve and tossed into an arena with kids twice her size, too much for even his naïve mind.

“Don’t we all believe in Mr. Everdeen,” the talk show host continues to push and I feel my typical annoyance with the odd man bleed into anger. “I mean, he brought home Mr. Abernathy here.” And with one single hand gesture from Caesar, the entire interview’s focus re-centers on Haymitch.

And unlike my father, he doesn’t even miss a beat before replying.

“Barely,” he mutters with a last swig of his drink, cleaning the glass. “And he was stingy with the gifts.”

Next to him, my father relaxes a bit. Haymitch always brings out a bit of levity in him, even on his worst days.

After all, in my father’s eyes, the paunchy drunk is a symbol of hope.

Haymitch is the only person my father’s ever brought him. He’s the only other living victor inside the confines of Twelve.

Not to mention his closest friend.

And my surrogate uncle, I note, a bit ironically. Haymitch and I have a far different relationship than he has with anyone else in my family but he’s always been there, has known me since the day I was born, often has dinner at our house, rain or shine, no matter how much he annoys my mother, and he’s an irreplaceable member of my family.

The audience is still riled up from Haymitch and howling with laughter—a bit too much, in my opinion—but my father can’t let the subject of his children go before adding one last sentiment.

“Don’t worry, Caesar. If either of my girls are reaped, trust me,” he states, louder and far more pronounced than anything else he’s said the entire interview. “They will be the victor. There’s not a tribute in the arena that would survive against my girl.”

For as long as I can remember, my father had taken me to the woods. He sometimes claims the first time he looked down at me in my mother’s arms, at a mere two days old, he saw a familiar hunger in my eyes.

Not a hunger for food. District Twelve is the smallest and the poorest in the country of Panem, but luckily, my family is one of the richest.

Unlike my schoolmates, I’ve never once had to worry about having enough to eat for lunch. My parents never worried that we’d starve to death or that Prim and I could be taken from their grasp by authorities. They never worried about supplying us with whatever we needed—they gave us more than we ever could have wanted—and they never had to fret that we’d be sent to the mines for work one day.

No, we were far too wealthy and far too famous for any of that.

But my parents had a far different batch of worries to keep them up at night. Not about food or finances or anything remotely common in Twelve.

No, they had to worry about cameras peaking into the privacy of our home and photos being taken without our knowledge and my face or Prim’s face being splashed across every magazine and newspaper in the country.

They worried about the almost insatiable thirst the Capitol seems to have for more family dynamics among the victors.

Especially after the recent back-to-back sibling victories led the hunger games to higher ratings and revenues in the Capitol.

When I was a child, my mother coached me to never go into town without my father by my side. Which sounds easy enough, until my father’s extensive vacations to the Capitol are taken into consideration. For as long as I can remember, my father would leave at random stretches of time, for weeks on end. To go play puppet for a population so dumb, so completely isolated from the rest of the country, that they took his anger for sarcasm. They took his bite as charm. They believed his glare was an act, was part of his appeal, when in reality my father had rebelled against performing for the last twenty-seven years.

When he was gone, our lives became strict. Bedtimes came earlier, curtains remained drawn day in and day out, our mother never wanted to sing or dance or even so much as smile with her husband gone.

But when he was home, sunshine peaked in our windows again. It danced on the floor and it swept us away with its gentle affection.

There was music and laughter and sweets and toys. He never returned from the Capitol empty-handed. He brought back expensive jewels for our mother, he built me and Prim a fancy treehouse in the backyard, put up a large, golden swing-set, went as far as purchasing as many cakes and breads as he could hold from the Mellark Bakery.

Peeta’s parents bakery.

Since I was two, further back than I can even retain, my father would take me out to the woods, would hold my hand and tell me old stories of District Twelve’s past, detail insane urban legends, teach me about plants and berries and trees and the direction of the wind.

And for as long as I can remember, I idolized him. He was so confident and so charismatic and so kind. For as long as I could remember, I wanted to be exactly like him when I grew up. It felt like an honor to me that I received far more his end of the gene line than my mother’s. She was regarded as a beauty in her youth, but he was one of the most magnificent people in the country. Having his coloring and the same silver eyes felt like a special gift, awarded every single time someone marveled at how similar we appear.

But my father was gone often and the unpredictable lengths of his stays in the large, foreign city was one of the only constants my family ever knew. So it really came as no surprise when my mother phoned the cabin only minutes after Caesar’s interview was over.

“I’ll get it,” Prim says flatly after a moment, throwing a sardonic glance at me and Peeta on the couch. Now in a much different entanglement than we had been while watching the talk-show.

“Thanks,” I murmur unintelligibly against Peeta’s mouth, before closing my eyes in pleasure.

“Don’t strain yourselves,” she can’t stop herself from tacking on the end.

“We’ll try not to while you’re still here,” Peeta murmurs cheekily, moving his lips downwards, towards my neck, right onto my pulse point. I let out a somewhat ridiculous squeak in response.

“Hello?” Prim says lightly into the receiver, already knowing it’s our mother. No one else calls this phone, inside this hidden cabin, located in the woods surrounding Twelve.

The woods in which officials fenced off years ago. The woods in which it’s illegal to enter. The woods in which my father has taken me to hunt for families less fortunate than ours since I was a small infant.

It’s not a typical cabin found in the outskirts of Twelve. No, ordinarily a cabin out here—a cabin anywhere in Panem, really—is nothing more than a broken down shack. There’s normally nothing other than an unsteady foundation, a freezing damp floor and an unlit fireplace.

But somewhere along the lines, in the years before I was born, my parents resurrected this place from the depths of despair and expanded it, rebuilt it, refurnished and redecorated and turned it into a vast, warm, safe second home for all of us to run away to when we felt the need.

Prim listens into the receiver for a long moment before she sighs deeply and beckons me. “Katniss, can you?”

Instantly, I break away from Peeta’s embrace, cupping his face and pulling him back from my collarbone.

“What’s wrong?” I ask as I scramble off the couch, my anxiety abruptly spiked. “Did something happen?” I search Prim’s eyes as I take the phone from her but, to my utter relief, all I find there is blatant, unmasked disappointment.

I already know what my mother is going to say before I put the phone to my ear. “Hi?”

“Hi, honey,” she murmurs, her voice both strained and higher than typical. Which indicates she’s trying to put up a front for us right now, when she’d rather be moping in bed. “Your father just called. Evidently Effie Trinket informed him he has more scheduled commitments to fulfill before he can come home.”

I deflate, already prepard, knowing this was coming. Isn’t it always coming inadvertently? My father has never been home when he was scheduled to be in my life. No matter the holiday, the birthday, the emergency or event, the Capitol demands that they comes first to him. Not even my birth could upstage his commitments. He wasn’t allowed to return home to Twelve, to meet his firstborn child, until his press events were done and over with.

It’s no wonder he refuses to put on show for those people.

“Okay,” I mumble after a moment, not even convinced my mother is even still there on the other end.

“It’ll be alright,” she says, as positively as she can. “He’ll be home as soon.”

“Yeah.” I try and fail miserably to match her tone. I inherited my father’s ability to act. Or inability, that is.

There’s the faint sound of crying in the background, and my heart aches a bit. “I’m sorry, honey, I have to go check on Archer,” she apologizes as a way of saying goodbye.

I make my way into the kitchen as soon as we hang up. Prim is standing by the counter, staring at the same magazine our father sent three weeks ago.

Peeta comes up behind me then, his hand rubbing my back in comforting circles. “Your father delayed again?”

I nod silently, as my eyes focused on my little sister now. She’s trying her best to hold back the upset that’s threatening to take over.

And without hesitation, my instincts to protect my family from anything and everything painful kick in. “Prim, it’s okay. It’s probably only going to be another week before he’s back,” I console, stepping closer to her small frame and touching her back.

It’s all the initiation she needs before spinning around into my arms and clinging onto me tight. “He’s never around,” she cries into my neck—I’m not much taller than her—as her shoulders shake with tears.

I feel Peeta’s eyes on me, measuring my reaction to Prim’s words. He’s heard me cry the same thing time and time again, he knows the familiarity of this scene better than anyone should.

“He tries his best, Prim,” I whisper thickly into her long, blonde hair. She’s fair and light, like our mother. Like a merchant or peacekeeper. Looking at my little sister, you’d never consider her to be the daughter of a man from the Seam.

But you’d easily believe that she was a girl raised in Victor’s Village and I suppose that’s what counts. Where we were raised and not where we could have been, if things had gone different.

“He’s never really going to be ours though,” she weeps and I don’t have words to comfort her now. Because she’s right.

Our father will always belong to the Capitol, first and foremost.

And not even his children can upstage that.

Prim leaves not long later, to head home to Victor’s Village and more than likely curl up with our mother for the night. They’ve both always been so alike, so much softer and more hopeful than me. I half expect every trip of our father’s to double in time, if not triple. After a lifetime of disappointments, I can’t help but prepare myself.

It’s not that they’re weak for believing. It’s that I have too much Hunter Everdeen in me. I have too much pessimism crawling inside my bones to ever fully trust that he’s really coming home until he’s already stepped off the train in Twelve.

Too many hours of my childhood were spent, wearing fancy stockings and warm, fur-lined coats, standing at the train station, only to welcome a load of cargo and no father in sight. Too many times were phone calls answered in tears. Too many night spent crying, clinging to my father’s hunting jacket, so disoriented by the hazardous schedule in which our lives were ran, waiting for my father to phone, waiting for him to walk through the front door, waiting for him to sneak up on us in the middle of the night or pull us from class on a school day.

That was the true constant in my life. Waiting for my father to finally come home, knowing every moment we shared was on borrowed time. Knowing that he’d never truly belong to us. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Waiting to hear my mother’s bedroom door slam and lock, waiting to hear Prim cry or Archer wail, waiting to see that defeated glint in my father’s slate gaze.

I close the cabin door behind my sister now, knowing with confidence that she’ll make it home alright, even with the sun currently setting in the faded blue sky.

Our father never took Prim hunting like he did me, never brought her out to the woods and taught her to shoot a bow and arrow, never showed her how to trap and kill an animal. But even still, the path from the cabin to our home in Victor’s Village is imprinted in our brains, like a birthmark or tattoo. We’d be able to find our way to and from, even if we were sleepwalking.

As would Peeta. Considering this is the place he spends the majority of his time.

Considering this cabin may as well be his permanent address.

And if it weren’t illegal, it very well might be, I think to myself wryly as I walk over to where he’s leaning against the doorframe now.

“Hello,” I greet again, hopping onto my tiptoes and kissing his lips lightly.

He grasps my hips, smiling against my mouth. “Don’t you have to get home too?” He hesitantly asks, his desire to keep me here bleeding through every caress of his fingers, as they trail underneath my loose shirt, sliding upwards and causing an electric current to ripple through the core of my body.

But I just shake my head at his inquiry, moving my mouth from his to kiss down the side of his face, underneath his jawline.

“Mmm,” he moans after a long moment, before suddenly putting a few more inches between us. “Are you sure your mother won’t miss you?”

Peeta’s always been considerate of my mother. Too considerate sometimes, if I do say so myself. Bordering on obsessive.

He is obsessed with keeping her approval, with never crossing any invisible line, with never even so much as mildly exasperating her.

I suppose it’s only natural though. She is the only parental figure he has in his life.

I’ve never been too enthusiastic to introduce him to my father and he’s never pushed the issue too far. Hunter Everdeen is a practical legend around Twelve—and beloved across the entirety of Panem—but he’s the reason, I’ve always privately felt, that I was isolated from all my classmates.

Sure, I’m already not the most friendly person to start with, in anyone’s book. As Haymitch never hesitates to tell me. But there was already very little chance of me making friends in school anyway. Being the victor of the Forty-Seventh Hunger Games’ child dropped the chances of play-dates or sleepovers drastically. My father trusts no one. Not with his children.

And I didn’t mind for the most part. I’m too like him to enjoy people much anyway. This whole notion was much harder on Prim, who adored her fellow classmates and easily endeared herself to them as well. But no matter how darling my little sister may be, nothing changed our father’s mind and when he was set on something, it was practically written in stone.

I can’t even imagine how Peeta must feel, having to live in fear for the entire last year of our little secret being exposed. I may be nervous about how my father will react, but Peeta has to be outright petrified.

“My mother will be fine,” I murmur, rolling my eyes as I lean back against the wall now. “She’s got Prim and Archie to keep her sane until my father’s home.”

Peeta chuckles at me, a mirthful smile in his eyes. “And you got me,” he teases, tapping my nose with his finger.

I giggle in a way I withheld until Prim left. I wasn’t about to give her ammunition to mock me later on. “All to myself,” I add, matching his expression now. “For unlimited hours of the day.”

“That’s my girl, looking on the bright side.”

I snort. “Yeah, that’s me.” I’m the exact opposite of an optimist. I prefer expecting the worse and setting expectations low. Maybe it’s a learned behavior but, at least that way, I’m not crushed like my mother when things don’t pan out the way I want.

Peeta mistakes the look on my face to be one of hidden disappointment. “You’re father will be home soon, sweetheart. They can’t keep him in the Capitol forever.”

“Can’t they?” I mumble, not expecting an answer. Before he can offer one—because Peeta is nothing if not a fixer—I quickly segue to a new topic. “Where do you think you’ll go when my father does come home?”

He just shrugs the question off though, completely unbothered. “Anywhere but home,” he says simply, his stunning blue eyes clear as the sky they remind me of.

“Anywhere but there,” I agree, my smile twisting into a grimace.

A year ago, when I was barely fifteen, President Snow—Panem’s true Gamemaker, my father always said—demanded every victor extend their stay in the Capitol, even after the games ended that year. He gave no outright reason and my father was cagey to speak on the subject, but in the end, the president’s word was law and there was no room for argument. President Snow can demand of us whatever he wishes.

It was a cold, dreary autumn that year, with early snowfall, which was the leading cause to the significant increase in accidents and injuries. My mother, the born healer, had more patients than she could handle, and even while training Prim as her assistant, she required my help. I was to head to town and purchase a list of herbs from the apothecary shop her parents still owned. The people who disowned her, who had little to no interest in her after she married a man from the Seam, victor or not. The people who never cared to meet their own grandchildren, to acknowledge our existence even as we passed right by their shop, in their plain sight.

I was dragging my feet the entire walk there, already with a sour taste in my mouth, when I heard the loudest wail my ears had every registered. When I heard sharp words being screamed out, when the sound of a boy sobbing filled the air.

And my instincts took over, my every sense focused on finding the hurt and helping them, altogether forgoing the trip for my mother’s herbs.

I followed the commotion to the bakery’s backdoor. Right through the open threshold, it was crystal clear, the baker’s wife—the witch, as many of the kids at school referred to her—had beaten her youngest son senselessly.

He’s in my year, I’d realized abruptly, staring with an agape mouth at his bloody face. His eye was swelling and his nose and lip were smeared scarlet and the only thing that crossed my mind at first, was I recognized him as the blonde boy with the colorful notebook, who could never meet my eyes and always wore long sleeves.

Of course, I snapped out of the daze after only a moment. The witch turned and caught sight of me, snapping that no Seam brat was going to get any free handouts from her and to scatter before she called the Peacekeepers.

Something about the unmasked prejudice against the Seam, a place where people in Twelve had next to nothing and were seen as lesser than the merchants, jolted me into action.

“Get your hand off him!” I’d demanded, using my entire body weight, just as my father taught me, to push the door open as she tried to close it in my face. “Let him go or I swear I’ll make you regret it.”

At that, I heard an ugly laugh and the door flew open again, my exerted force throwing it back into the wall.

“I’m serious, child,” she snaps, her blue eyes narrow and her mouth in a snide smirk. “I will call the Peacekeepers to remove you from my shop-”

I didn’t even let her finish. I wasn’t one to be messed with. Not when I just witnessed something awful firsthand, not when I had it in my power to do something.

I knew then I couldn’t bring my father home. He was owned by the president and the Capitol. To an extent, we all were. And I knew I couldn’t stop the games from happening or the possibility of my name being pulled from the reaping bowl. I couldn’t always make my mother come out of her room or even out of her bed, when her illness struck bad. And I couldn’t stop my siblings from crying for our father at night.

But I knew that day in the bakery, I had the power over Mrs. Mellark and I wasn’t going to let her get away with hurting her son anymore.

“Call them,” I dared, not an ounce of insecurity in my voice. “Cray is an old family friend.” He was actually indebted to my father, who’d kept the man’s secrets for too many years to count. But family friend rolled off the tongue more effectively.

“Head Peacekeeper is now making friends in the Seam?” She spat in disbelief. “No wonder this district is so rundown.”

She laughed humorlessly, but my focus was pulled towards the boy. He was covering the left side of his face, as if it hurt too badly to release. As if he was trying to stop his eye from swelling, stop his nose from gushing blood. As if he could hold his now split lip together with nothing more than the palm of his hand.

The sight hurt my heart to see. It burned a fire inside of me that only a true injustice could set alight.

“My father is Hunter Everdeen,” I snapped in the woman’s direction, not even basking in satisfaction when her face drained of all color. The idea that a scrappy little girl with olive skin and dark hair was the child of the most powerful man in all of Twelve struck a cord inside even the witch. “Still wanna make that call?”

The woman’s face was caught between anger and shock when I glanced at her again. And I hated her for it. I hated her and every single person in this district who hurt their kids, who took out their grievances on them, who made them cower and quiver in fear. Who raised them to be afraid of those they loved in a world already so awful.

I know I live a privileged life but, deep in my bones, I know even if things were different, my parents wouldn’t have laid a hand on us. Even if we were so poor I had to take tesserae, even if we were starving to the point of no return, even if we were practically homeless in the Seam, my parents would never hurt us.

“Leave,” the witch spoke then, but her voice was void of all emotion.

“Not without him,” I refused, my eyes planted on the wounded boy in front of me. The boy who was doing everything to avoid looking me in the eye, too busy covering his battered face.

I heard a sound caught between a groan and a shriek, before a cutting board was tossed across the room. “Just go!” She shouted at her son, causing him to flinch severely. “Just go with her!”

On her order, which sounded more distraught than angry, the boy had stormed out the back door and into the chilly evening air, still covering his face desperately, still looking utterly ashamed.

But he waited for me to catch up with him. He waited for me to guide him away from that awful woman he was forced to call his mother.

He didn’t flinch when I touched his arm nor when I took his hand. And when I led him away from the town and towards the village, he followed me without complaint.

Actually, he followed me without a single word.

I realized this just as my house came into view. “You never told me your name?” I whispered, looking up at him gently.

He had tears leaking from his eyes that he was doing his best to ignore, the bleeding on the left side of his face had barely even lightened up, his eye was swelling bigger and bigger, and yet, he chuckled a little at the question. “I’ve been in your class since kindergarten, Katniss.”

I felt my cheeks burn pink, even under the darkening sky. “I know.” But I still peered up at him, curiously waiting for him to tell me.

“It’s Peeta,” he finally answered, maybe a bit satirical.

“Peeta Mellark,” I suddenly recognized.

“Mhmm. Figured you’d pick up the last name.”

“Why’s that?”

“It’s printed across the bakery in huge letters?”

“Oh.” He chuckled at my ignorance, causing my blush to deepen.

And I realized immediately how much I liked the sound of his laugh. How I liked being the reason for the sound.

My stomach did a complete flip at the notion and my ears abruptly felt hot, but I tried to push all this away, needing to get him to my mother.

“Wait,” he halted before I could even reached the front door. “Is your mother in there?”

I shot him a confused look. “Yeah, of course? Who else-”

I didn’t even get a chance to finish though. “I really don’t want anyone else to know about this,” he pleads, his eyes looking as frightened as they did with the witch.

“Peeta-” I start, opening my mouth argue, to convince him to go into the house and let my mother treat his injuries. To let me get him help.

But one look inside his desolated, defeated, terrified eyes and I couldn’t make myself do it. I couldn’t put him through any more than he’d already gone through. Not when he’d eventually have to go face the witch again at home.

“Okay,” I whispered, and I felt him squeeze the hand I didn’t realize I was still clutching. “Let me take you somewhere else. And I’ll try to fix you up myself.”

I wasn’t a healer like my mother and Prim. I was a hunter, just like my father, just like his very name, through and through. But I had witnessed enough of what my mother did—my father had forced me to witness enough of what she did, in case I ever needed the knowledge—and I was confident I had the expertise to help him.

My decision was validated by the relief in Peeta’s eyes, by the visible exhale he expelled from inside. He was ashamed, I realized, of his abuse. He was embarrassed to let anyone know what was happening behind closed doors.

I guided him by the hand outside the village, through the Seam—a place in which he’d never been before—and to the fence line.

“Isn’t it electrified?” He asked, his grip on my palm tightening. I liked the sensation for some reason. I liked the way his big hand felt wrapped around my small one. I liked how he wanted to hold onto me in the darkness.

“Nope,” I say, and let out a proud giggle. Or maybe a nervous one. Whenever I think back to this night, I can never tell.

“How do you know?” His blonde eyebrows knit together, still afraid in a way I’d never had to be. My father had taught me everything there was to know about the woods from a young age.

“Listen,” I urge softly, leaning my ear towards the fence.

He cranes forward too, waiting for the buzz of electricity to fill his ears. Only, just as I knew, it never does. Because it never has. The fence’s electricity was shut off long before we were even born.

I watched as his face registered the silence, as he realized and trusted I was right. And I beamed at him, before showing him the way my father slips beyond the fence and guiding him through the trees, towards the cabin, buried deep inside the woods.

It took an hour to find, not because of the blackened sky, but because Peeta’s face hurt so badly that his gait was slowed. But I remained patient, even though that was never my strong suit either. I waited for him to pick up the pace, to be ready to move, to find our way through the tall green trees. I pulled all the branches I could see out of his path, used the moon as our flashlight and didn’t complain once when he stumbled along the way.

By the time we got to the cabin, it had to be past Archer’s bedtime. My mother would be worried sick for me, but I soothed myself that she had plenty on her plate. I’m her firstborn. The child she understands the least, the one who’s like her husband in body and soul. I knew I was probably near the bottom of her worry list.

The very first thing I did when we entered the cabin was order Peeta to sit down in the dining room. I gathered my mother’s first aid kit from the bathroom, wet a rag in cool water and I got to work cleaning the blood from his face.

“This has to be gross for you,” he murmurs after a long stretch of silence. His eyes betrayed how self-conscious he must have felt.

Trying to alleviate his anxiety, I pretended to shrug it off. “My mother cleans wounds all the time. At our kitchen table, no less.”

Peeta made a noise that indicated he didn’t buy my act of ease. “I heard at school that you run from the sick and injured.”

I raised my eyebrows at the comment. No one at school talked about me. No one knew me well enough to. People stopped trying to get close to any of Hunter Everdeen’s kids years ago.

The longer I stared at Peeta in disbelief, the more he seemed to lose confidence in his statement. “Maybe I didn't hear it,” he finally amended. I brought the damp cloth back up to his face again as a reward, tenderly wiping away the blood, before using the clean side to set against his swelling lid, hoping to offer some pain reduction there as well. “Maybe I saw it,” he added sheepishly.

I furrowed my brows, even more perplexed by the elaboration. “Saw it?”

“When Leaf Barker tripped and broke his knee in Physical Education last year? You were almost green when you bolted out of the gymnasium.”

His words conjured up a vague image. Still though, something about this felt odd to me.

“How do you remember that better than I do?”

At that, Peeta shrugged. “I guess, I notice you sometimes?”

“What do you mean, sometimes?” I pressed, none of his words suddenly making a bit of sense.

“Why did you stick up for me tonight?” He abruptly segued, his expression shifting into something of defense, like he’s trying to deflect.

But I’m not one to be deterred. “I wasn’t going to stand there and watch your mother hurt you,” I stated, my voice remaining firm. “Why?”

He continued to walk around my question. “Is tonight the first night you ever noticed me?”

I pulled my hand and the damp cloth away from his wounded face, reaching in the kit to grab a white cream I’d seen my mother and Prim both use on swelling before. “Yes,” I finally replied, because I don’t know what else to say. That I saw him glance at me sometimes and then watched as his eyes flit away? That I noticed how he doodled in math class, because he found the subject boring? That I’d seen him lift a sack easily over his shoulder at the bakery and watched him beat almost every upperclassmen at wrestling, even while three years their junior?

None of that seems even remotely relevant to mention.

“When was the first time you noticed me?” I shot back, still being careful to apply the cream with only the lightest pressure to his battered eye.

“Kindergarten,” he instantly blurted out, his tone simple and bold.

I stared at him in disbelief for a long moment before chuckling, catching the joke. “Funny.”

“I’m serious,” he refuted, peaking his good eye open, the sky meeting a silver dollar as our gaze locked. And I see that he is serious somehow.

“What?”

“The first day of kindergarten,” he continued, after a long beat of me just staring him. His confidence had wavered once again and he was looking a bit regretful that he’d put this out in the open. “You were wearing a red velvet dress and brown stockings. Your hair was in two braids instead of one and your ribbons matched your dress. The teacher asked during music assembly who knew The Valley Song and your hand shot right up. She put you on a stool and you sang it, clear as day, for everyone to hear. Even the birds outside stopped to listen. And from that moment on… I was a goner.”

I just continued to look at him in disbelief, unable to put the pieces of what he’s said together. Finally, I whispered, “you’re telling the truth?”

“I’ve had a crush on you for forever,” he admitted, his singularly open eye giving away his nerves at the admission. “And I know you probably don’t feel the same way. I know you didn’t even know my name until tonight but I just wanted to say, in case we never have the chance to speak again-”

“Stop,” I cut him off, my mind already about to explode. “Stop, um…” I refused to look at him as I spoke, furiously staring down at my lap. “I need more time to… process this.”

He had a crush on me since the first day of kindergarten? He’d heard me sing and from that day forward he held a hidden candle for me?

And he never once worked up the courage to talk to me?

Dozens of moments suddenly race through my mind.

Cerulean blue eyes finding me in a crowd countless times and then pulling away as soon as I meet them. The time I wanted to play a stupid game at recess and a stocky blonde boy volunteered to be team captain, and then picked me first. The stunning drawing I found in my locker last year on Sweetheart’s Day, that I was convinced was put there by mistake, though it bore a striking resemblance to the doodles on Peeta’s notebook.

And before I could stop it, I felt myself begin to shake with nerves.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” he apologized, seeing my frightened reaction. “I didn’t mean to scare you, I just… I didn’t know if I’d ever get the opportunity to tell you again-”

“Shhh,” I hushed, picking up the damp cloth once more. “Let me take care of your face. And then…” I hesitated again, unsure what to say in this situation. I had exactly zero experiences to compare this to. “Tomorrow we can talk more.”

Peeta nodded amicably, staying silent for the reminder of my ministrations. I felt a terrible pang of guilt for not responding the way he’d probably hoped, but there was still a part of me too stunned to even fully register the confession.

I was an outcast. I’d never fit in with the kids at school, neither town or Seam. I don’t look like the merchants and I’m too rich for the Seam folk. I would have been alone all the time at school if it weren’t for Madge Undersee, the mayor’s daughter who sat with me at lunch and partnered with me in class.

How could anyone have even noticed me to be anything other than strange? I barely spoke, even in classes where I knew all the answers. And I hardly participated in games or gossip. I had a father who insisted most days on picking me up himself from school, not allowing me to walk home alone like the other kids.

But the look in Peeta’s eyes was earnest. He wasn’t playing some elaborate trick on me, he wasn’t trying to coerce me into confessing something as well so he could humiliate me. He was being genuine in every way I could tell. And I had my father’s senses.

The same senses that helped him win his hunger games.

A new thought struck me out of the blue. Peeta seemed too kind and too considerate to have a mother who beat him like this. He doesn’t fit the profile of the kids in the community home, brought there by even less abuse than I witnessed firsthand tonight.

The insane urge to get to know him more, to learn more about this complete stranger who I went out on an impulsive limb for suddenly surges through my brain.

It wouldn’t be a good idea, I told myself. He’s a merchant and I’m the daughter of a victor. Two titles that seem not far apart in theory but are miles away from the other in practice. And I’m not experienced with people the way he is. I don’t know how to make friends or how to maintain them. I don’t know what he expects from me but it’s surely more than I know how to give. I don’t know what to say in a situation like this. Haymitch always tells me I’m as romantic as dirt.

But is that what I want to be? I asked myself as I finished fixing Peeta up. Do I want to be romantic? Do I want to be that girl who holds her boyfriend’s hand in the town square and kisses him under the moonlight? Do I want to put an embroidered ribbon in my hair and wear an expensive dress from the Capitol to go to the Sweetheart’s Dance? Do I want to sneak in through my bedroom window at the crack of dawn so my father won’t know I’ve been out all night?

If I could learn to be romantic, would I want to be?

And naturally, the answer I’ve always known automatically seeps through my brain. No. I’m not like my mother and Prim. I’m practical by nature, rather than fanciful. I’ve never truly obsessed about falling in love or fawned over even the most incredible looking men on the television.

But something held me back now. Something inside me said that answer, the truth I’d always known, is suddenly not entirely accurate anymore.

Because I find that I did want those things I just described. I did want to have someone to hold, someone to laugh with, someone who conjured up that same flip in my stomach as Peeta did earlier when he laughed.

I wanted the same kind of love my parents had. The kind of love that brought them both to life, despite the horrible circumstances they’d both separately endured. I wanted the kind of love that they showed me was possible, even in a world as bleak and as inhumane as Panem felt at times.

I only realized how long I’d been silent, contemplating my inner desires, when Peeta offered a minuscule smile and stood up slowly to leave.

I opened my mouth to speak but when his eyes met mine, every thought in my head was magically wiped away. I had nothing to say, nothing that could be of any sort of consequence, that could mean anything in comparison to his confession.

“I should head back to town,” he murmured, trying to appear nonchalant. “Face my mother. Hope she’s in a better mood now-”

But I couldn’t stand the idea of him returning to the witch, the idea of going to school tomorrow and acting like his words weren’t still spinning around my brain, the idea of even sleeping soundly tonight.

“Peeta,” I called just as he was about to reach the front door. “Wait!”

He turned towards me, looking puzzled by my outburst. “What’s wrong?”

And I don’t know what came over me. I still can’t place what made me—a girl who had never been decisive a day in her life—fling myself across the room and smash my lips onto his.

He didn’t respond at first. I caught him too completely by surprise. His lips hung there, frozen, as mine pushed against his, with too much force and an overload of desperation.

But I felt an incredible stirring in my chest, an odd sensation that felt akin to a giggle amplified.

And when he finally recovered from the shock of it all, his hands both came to rest on either side of my hips, his mouth began to move against mine, his knees bent to reach my height with more success, and the stirring turned to a fiery spark. I know he felt it too, as the kiss was swiftly disturbed by his wide grin.

“Don’t go back home tonight,” I gasped out, looking up at him, wide-eyed and breathless.

His gaze melted as he took me in, he head bobbing in agreement without even needing to consider my request.

“Okay,” he’d whispered with a dazed smile, his blue eyes impossibly wild and sleepy at the same time.

His expression, his spirit somehow, was contagious, and I found myself somewhere stuck between a laugh and a blush when I replied.

“Okay.”

After that night, Peeta rarely went back home. I had called my mother and let her know I was staying at the cabin, but intentionally eluded telling her that the baker’s son was joining me. We’d spent the entire night talking in front of the fire, making each other laugh. The bashfulness I felt from my unexpected kiss stayed in my gut, causing me to bubble up with embarrassed laughter every so often.

But instead of that making things awkward, it cut the tension pretty smoothly. It was only months later did Peeta confess he’d felt just as nervous and just as shy about spending time with me. He was charismatic, I realize even that first night. Ironically funny. He was nice, in a way I rarely have found anyone to be. And, the more time went on, the more my desire grew to stay close to him. The more often I was around him, the more painfully I missed him when we were apart.

It was only a matter of time until my mother found out—not least of all, because my siblings accidentally caught us kissing in back of the school, a month to the day we first spoke.

I always imagined she’d be strict on me, the firstborn, when it came to dating. Especially in the world we lived in. Especially with my father’s position. I truly thought she’d forbid a relationship until I was of age. Maybe I was wrong about her. Or maybe she just saw how I looked at Peeta and understood that I wasn’t just being careless or rebellious. That whatever magnetic connection I felt towards Peeta wasn’t just an ordinary school-aged fling.

To my surprise as well, my mother seemed to take on a very similar stance to me when it came to Peeta and my father. Keeping the news of this entanglement from her husband’s ears was almost her idea.

“What are you thinking about?” Peeta asks me now, bringing me back to the present moment. His fingers tickle my neck as they brush my hair back behind my ear, touching one of the satin green ribbons weaved throughout my loose braids.

“You,” I reply coyly, shooting him a sly glance as I slip past him to head back towards the kitchen.

“Me?” He calls in mock disbelief. He trails up behind me, catching me by the waist and swinging me into his arms without warning.

“Peeta!” I exclaim, automatically wrapping myself around him as I try to steady my balance midair.

“What, baby?”

“Put me down, baby,” I mock, pressing my nose to his now, rubbing them together.

“I like holding you though,” he whispers, like he’s confessing some huge secret.

“Until your arms gets tired-”

“That was one time, Katniss.”

“I’m just reminding you,” I say with an air of superiority. “You don’t always appreciate holding me.”

At that, his demeanor falls a little. “I do when I realize I won’t be seeing you much in a few days.”

I feel my heart sink now too. As excited as I am at the prospect of my father coming home, after weeks apart, I always have to be a little more careful upon his first days back.

He always likes to spend time at the cabin and go for long walks in the woods upon his return. Spend more time in nature than the indoors, stay far away from people outside our family, sleep under the stars by the lake. The Capitol is apparently luxurious, but in my father’s own words, it is void of any true or natural beauty. Everything is artificial, man-made, concocted and orchestrated. There’s nothing that compares in his mind—or mine either—to a cool breeze on a sunny day spent in the meadow where the dandelions grow tall.

“But I’ll still see you in school?” I say, though my voice comes out as more of a plea. Peeta doesn’t always like to attend school these days, not when he knows his parents can easily track him down there.

His father, the baker himself, took the ambiguous loss of his youngest—his favorite—son particularly hard. It was only a matter of weeks after I intercepted his mother beating him that Peeta definitively decided to sever ties with majority of his family.

I’d like to say he made the choice all on his own but that’d be a lie. I watched as the physical bruises on his skin healed, as he began to peel back emotional layer upon layer to me, as he slowly told me what really had been going on in the Mellark’s family home. And I can’t say that I was impartial to his decision to cut the connection to a mother with a bruising fist and a father who closed his eyes and let it happen.

“Delly’s parents usually make me go to school so…” He shrugs it off, like it’s of no consequence, his arms hoisting me higher against his chest.

But I feel a sudden wave of gratitude towards the Cartwrights. They may be a little too jolly for my liking and their daughter, Delly, maybe can’t take a hint to save her life, but at least they always watch out for Peeta’s well-being. At least they cover for him when his mother come sniffing around and they feed him what they can afford and force him to attend class, where I’ll be able to see him.

“Good,” I murmur, at peace now. My father will be home soon and Peeta will be safely tucked away with his best friend.

I lean down and kiss his nose sweetly, reveling in the tender moment. His lips follow my lead and begin to plant themselves across my chin, underneath my jaw, causing me to squirm and squeal at the sensation.

“So,” he murmurs against my throat. “We have the entire place to ourselves, for the whole night, huh?”

His audacious smile elicits my own. “At least.” My father’s delays usually mean a minimum of two days.

Within a minute, Peeta has me on my back, against the softly quilted bed of my upstairs room. He takes his time helping me out of my clothes before I hurriedly shove his off, impatient and hungry.

He, of course, finds time to crack a joke. “Good thing Archie is too young to come here unchaperoned. Or else we’d never get the chance to do this.”

I roll my eyes and shove his mouth off my collarbone, utterly disgusted now. “Talking about my baby brother is one sure way to turn me off, Peeta.”

Archer, my three-old-brother, was an unexpected surprise, to put it lightly. My parents were done with two girls. My father joked him and my mother were both already set with one clone each, but alas, the year of the Seventieth Hunger Games was a year full of shocks.

A few months before the games that year, the coal mines—the industry Twelve is known for—exploded. Right in the middle of the afternoon, as everyone was obliviously going about their day.

It was a close call for many and one more reason my father is beloved around these parts. If he hadn’t been at the right place, at the right time, if he hadn’t volunteered to go with Prim and her class on a field trip down to the mines that day, there was a chance that no one would have noticed the gas leak.

It was too late to do anything by the time my father pointed it out, but his warning and the fact that people in Twelve take his word very seriously, managed to save the lives the inevitable explosion would have otherwise cost.

Through the outpouring of gratitude, and the overwhelming media coverage my whole family was abruptly bombarded with, my parents made the decision to pull me and Prim from school for a while, to hole up in the remodeled cabin, where no one could find us because of its illegal location.

I’ve never ask and I don't ever want to know when my parents conceived Archer. But about nine months after the vacation from the world, my mother gave birth to a little boy who looked identical to me and my father.

“Sorry,” Peeta whispers with a chuckle, collapsing beside me. “I’ll make it up to you.”

He moves to kiss my stomach, to trace circles on my hips like he always does. But I shake my head, a different request—or more like it, demand—on my mind.

“Tell me the story of how you first fell in love with me?”

Peeta rolls his eyes. Very dramatically. “You mean a year ago?”

“I mean in kindergarten,” I say with a smirk and then let out a shriek of surprise when he pounces on me, his lips attacking my neck.

“Aren’t you tired of that story yet?” He asks, his voice edging on exasperated.

“You never tire of a classic.” I give him a pout, knowing he never refuses me anything when I pull that trick.

I’m right, as per usual. “Fine,” he relents, but his eyes tell me that he enjoys telling this tale more than he leads on. “Come here.” He holds open his arms and waits for me to crawl into them, to settle against his chest.

I lay there for a long moment, my pointer finger running up and down the center of his bicep, as my ear rests against his heartbeat, patiently waiting for him to begin.

“It was the very first day of school. You were wearing a red, velvet dress…”

Read the rest on AO3

#katnissmellarkkkk #prompt 59 #Springtime edition 2021 #submission

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ratmonky · 4 years

Text

The Wolf Within A Puppy

word count: 5.9k

warnings: gaslighting, noncon, violence, fingering, oral

AO3 link

A wolf was meant to be wild, untamed, and carefree. It was simply impossible to tame an animal born into the wild, it had already had a taste of freedom, and forcing it to be in a cage in shackles wouldn’t work but if the wolf was put in a cage, it would do anything until it was free. Even if it meant pretending to be a dog.

Humans were like animals.

They followed their instincts to live their life, that was what created them had intended. Humans were supposed to be following unwritten rules instead of the written ones, just like animals.

Animals lived without guilt, pain, or worry.

You wished you could live freely like animals.

~~~

Your teacher had told you specifically not to leave the campus, you lacked cursed energy and fighting spirit to be able to face any curse without the help of your younger classmen.

Yet, you desperately wanted to prove them wrong, you were more than your healing powers, you weren’t just a damsel in distress, you were the person who was going to save others. You were the main character.

Being able to sense cursed spells and energy from far away gave you the advantage of sniffing out low-level curses and exorcising them with the cursed tools you had stolen from the school.

Unless you did all of this, you wouldn’t be a sorcerer, being a sorcerer meant fighting curses and exorcising them, if you didn’t do any of that, it would be meaningless. Your existence was meaningless.

Today was supposed to be like any other day, you were following the low leveled curse energies to exorcise them and try to build your own cursed energy. Although Gojo had told you that you were a special case and didn’t have any, you refused to believe him and wanted to prove him wrong.

“It was coming from here,” you chirped, tightening your grip around the dagger’s handle. You stood in front of the sewer gate, some cursed energy was leaking out from inside, something that could be a grade four or even maybe just a fly head.

If you were lucky, it could be a third-level curse and you would have the chance to practice fighting with a higher grade curse than you’re used to.

Kneeling down, you crawled inside the sewers to find and exorcise the curse. Using your phone’s flashlight, you navigated your way through the larger gates and pipes. The foul smell was disturbing but you managed to ignore it with your willpower only.

You walked for minutes, trying to find the curse but failed. The energy had withdrawn itself, perhaps it actually was a fly head and it had run away for its life.

With a click of your tongue, you kicked a small pebble and it hit the water.

This was useless, you were useless. Why did you come here anyway? There was no way you could succeed at anything yet you kept trying as if that was going to do something.

Your eyes were glossy with tears, you were a failure. You hated this feeling, you hated the jujutsu school and your younger classmen. You knew they were looking down at you, even though you knew they cared about you, they were babying you. You were nothing, absolutely nothing compared to them.

Even thinking about becoming a fourth-grade sorcerer was an insult to your teacher. He had told you that you didn’t possess anything. You were just lucky to be born with the awareness of the curses and the ability to heal others.

You wouldn’t last a minute fighting with a cursed spirit.

No, no, no.

You had exorcised many spirits and curses with the help of the cursed tools. You were capable of certain things, you were being harsh on yourself, come on now…

Your hands went to your hair and you ruffled it with a groan. Maybe, if you told Gojo about the things you had done until now, he could give you a chance. You could train with others and maybe even possess an ounce of cursed energy.

Yes, Gojo would understand. You could return the cursed dagger and ask for Maki’s help to build your stamina, you could learn to use larger weapons. Maybe then you could become a worthy opponent to your lower classmen.

It was time to head back, you knew what to do.

“Ah, I wasn’t expecting any visitors!”

From the corner of your eye, you saw it. You were about to turn around and run out of the sewers but your body refused to move. Your mouth opened in pure terror but you couldn’t scream out of pure shock.

The cursed energy you had thought to be faint was overflowing your senses, your head hurt, your eyes felt like they were about to pop out of your head.

This couldn’t be happening.

Whatever it was, you knew it was something that was about to kill you.

You had to run. If you didn’t run, you were going to die.

This was a special grade cursed spirit. It could even talk.

Run.

Quick, legs, move!

Your legs refused to register what your brain was telling them, although all of your instincts were screaming for you to run, you stood exactly where you were, paralyzed from head to toe.

“Hmm, weird, I thought you sorcerers were a lot more… livid but you’re just like a statue.”

Footsteps came closer, you felt its hand on your shoulder and a whimper left your lips as it walked around you until it was facing you.

It happened in the blink of an eye. You tightened your grip on the dagger and lifted it, ready to stab the cursed spirit.

“Are you sure you wanna do that?” it chirped in a sing-song tone, then cocked its head to the side and smiled.

You dropped your dagger, fear coursed through your entire body before you felt your lips tremble.

“I don’t sense any cursed energy from you, how come you were confident enough to come after me?”

You bit your lip in frustration until you tasted the bitter copper. Nobody knew you were here, you had thought you would be able to handle this by yourself.

You didn’t have any cursed energy or special abilities, you were just a healer. You were nothing, you were nothing against this cursed spirit.

It must have noticed your despair because it had a nightmarish smile on its face, its skin snagging on its stitches as the skin crinkled around the corners of its mouth.

“I haven’t met you before,” it said, grabbing a chunk of your hair and pulling it back until your head lifted from the ground to meet its gaze. “Are you one of the new first years?”

“I’m a third-year,” you replied, your hand weakly grasped on its wrist. It was futile though, you were weak. You wouldn’t be able to fight. “Please let me go, I won’t tell anyone.”

It laughed as if you told it the funniest joke it had ever heard.

“My name’s Mahito, what about you, little lost puppy?” He ignored your cries.

You sniffled, your throat ached and clenched as if you had been screaming nonstop. Your body hurt from fear. “Please, I won’t tell anyone about your presence to anyone, please… just let me go. I- I don’t… I don’t wanna die-” By the time you finished your meaningless sentence, you were sobbing uncontrollably.

Mahito pulled your hair back and forced you to look at his mocking face. “I-I-I won’t k-k-kill you.” His eyes squinted, his cursed energy had lessened but you were still drowning in it. “I’ll maybe even let you go,” he said, pausing a moment longer to watch your face muscles relax and listen to you stuttering empty promises and gratitude. “I’ll let you go after I’ve made an example out of you.”

“No- Please!” An audible whimper left your lips, your tears were streaming down your cheeks. You couldn’t see straight, you could only make out the blurry outline of Mahito and his eerie smile. “I’ll do anything, please…”

He raised a brow at your promise.

His fingers loosened their grip on your hair and he instead carded his fingers through your hair slowly, like petting a scared animal.

His free hand landed on your shoulder before sliding down your spine and to the small of your back, he placed his hand steadily and pulled you towards him to close the gap between the two of you.

“Humans try so hard to leave an imprint of their lives. Are you one of them?” he asked curiously, “Is that why you became a sorcerer? Do you want to be remembered by others even after you die?”

You stayed quiet.

“When you die, nobody will remember you. From the moment you stepped inside here, I knew how insignificant your soul was. It��s not vibrant nor has any specialties. If I were to kill you, nobody would know, right? Your only legacy would be a framed picture of you... if you let others take your picture at some point that is.”

His words were like razor-sharp blades. It hurt you even more because he was right.

“It’s boring when you don’t fight or react, you know.” He twirled a strand of your hair between his fingers. Leaving your hair alone, he took your bag from you, unzipping and turning it upside down to empty it out. Once he was done, he threw your bag into the sewer water. “You’re supposed to fight with tooth and nails, or was it… fighting with all your might… is that what they say? Whatever, you understand what I'm trying to say, right?”

You nodded without paying any real attention to his words or what laid beneath them. You were only desperately trying to get this over with. If he was going to kill you, so be it.

This was your fault for coming here.

Mahito crouched to look closer at the items on the concrete, there were makeup, a hand mirror, books, pens, and a small good luck charm you had gotten when you had first started the jujutsu school.

A bittersweet memory invaded your mind, how excited you were about entering the school and how hard you had been trying to improve. But that excitement died quickly as you watched Gojo search for more students, hoping to gather around powerful sorcerers with a promising future.

You remembered the jealousy you felt of others. The way they all treated you like fragile porcelain, ready to break at any given time. The way they always looked at you with pity.

“(name) should never leave alone, it’s dangerous.”

“Making (name) participate in the sister school event is cruel, she can’t protect herself.”

If you were to die here, you would never be able to prove them wrong. If you exorcised this spirit right here, you would be free from the shackles of the expectations and opinions of others.

Mahito smirked at the way your eyes sparkled with determination. He put the sketchbook with your name on it down to instead watch you crouch and reach your hand to retrieve the dagger you had dropped with a smile.

It happened all too quickly, you were about to grab the dagger but found yourself tackled to the concrete. You let out a pained yelp as Mahito’s entire weight pressed on your back.

“What a magnificent fighting spirit!” he barked, pressing your cheek down onto the concrete and laughing hysterically.

You struggled to breathe but you kept squirming. Ready to fight this cursed spirit with everything you got.

His hand reached for your face and you jerked away from his hand, “Don’t touch me!” you screamed, your eyes finally meeting his, they were sparkling with vicious intent.

You shrieked upon seeing his stitched-up face up close, he was hideous. Him being this close to you made you panic even more. “Stay away from me!” Your body automatically tried twisting around from where you were trapped under his weight.

You started to scream as you struggled in his hold. It was barely evening, someone would hear your screams for help.

Mahito grabbed a chunk of your hair and pulled your head back before abruptly smashing your face into the concrete with tremendous strength.

The moment your face hit the cold concrete your nerves struck your entire body. The pain quickly hit you and your head bounced off from the ground like a ball, only to crash to the ground with a loud thud once again. You hit your head hard, the second impact left you dumbfounded, you could taste copper in your mouth. Your hand went to your mouth, only to discover the wetness… You looked at your hand in horror, you were bleeding.

The fear came rushing back.

Mahito looked down at you with a sinister smile, he was entertained by your pain. A low chuckle coming from him made you scream for help again.

It was no use though. On your way here, you hadn’t seen a single soul out in the streets. You were left to his mercy, you could only hope he didn’t kill you.

You were completely vulnerable and defenseless. All you could do was scream for help or beg for this merciless cursed spirit to stop. You had no idea what he wanted but if he actually wanted to hurt you, there was nothing you could do to stop him, especially not when you were bleeding and were in unbearable pain.

“You have no idea,” He suddenly said, startling you out of your frantic thoughts. “How much I'm going to enjoy this.”

He shrugged out of his shirt, the clothing fell next to your head and you found yourself sobbing in horror, “Please, please don’t hurt me,” your voice echoed in the sewers.

Nobody was going to save you.

You kept holding onto that small hint of hope that someone would come running into the sewers any second now, you were desperately trying to deny the realness of the situation.

“Calm down, puppy,” he spoke softly, you suddenly realized that he was crouched next to you now. You tried to see him through your tears, -God when did you start crying again?

You tried to move, crawl away from him. “Please,” you said, “I don’t wanna die.”

He laughed lowly and grabbed you by your ankle, pulling you towards him, “They all get talkative before their fate.” Mahito grabbed a chunk of your hair again and turned you to face him. “Ah, how pretty.” He pouted his lips, “You look gorgeous with all the blood coming out from you.”

He paused, noticing how your wounds were closing.

“You can heal yourself?” He laughed to himself, amazed by your ability. “You get more interesting each passing second!”

You still tried to hold onto that brim of hope that someone would come to save you.

You inhaled as much air as you could to start screaming again but the cold metal against your cheek forced you to keep quiet.

“Now, keep still,” he pressed the dagger down to your cheek, “I’m gonna make this quick.”

Terrified, you watched him move between your legs.

With a sudden rush of adrenaline being released into your body, you blindly kicked at him but fail miserably as he violently pounded your head to the concrete twice with a laugh at your attempt of kicking him.

The first blow stabbed a sharp pain into the side of your face, your vision went blank for a brief moment and you bit your tongue in the process.

The second hit on the concrete made you whimper helplessly.

Your hands fell to your sides in defeat.

When Mahito let his grip on your head loosen, you couldn’t move anymore, you laid on the concrete entirely motionless, blood emerged from the large cut on your temple and your nose. “Wait,” he smiled and lifted the skirt of your uniform, peeking under the fabric with a giggle. “Is that all the fight you had in you?”

He had noticed how you were still saving energy instead of healing yourself. He knew what your useless plan was.

Your eyes watered and you felt even more warm liquid gushing out from your nose and mouth. Your skin warmed and throbbed as you writhed in pain, gritting your teeth while the taste of copper spread in your mouth.

Your cheek laid flat on the cold concrete, your skin must have been burning hot because it relieved some of your pain you had on your face.

He placed the dagger next to your head, it was so close yet so far away.

“Don’t you think it’s funny how some humans follow the rules blindly until they take their last breath?” Mahito placed his hands on your thighs, spreading your legs and pulling you towards his hips. “I think it’s interesting, I wonder if their last thoughts before dying are about how they should’ve done something exciting in their miserable lives?”

You squirmed in an attempt to push yourself up or away from him but he effectively had pinned you down, using a single hand on the small of your back.

“Do you have any regrets? Were you a goody two shoes in your life? You came here to exorcise me, right? You wanted to be praised, didn’t you?” He pressed his chest on your back, nosing some of your hair out of the way to whisper into your ear. He kept sluggishly pressing his stomach against your back until you felt his lips brush against your earlobe. His warm breath tickled the side of your face. “Aren’t you the type of person who would be too stuck up to hang out with their friends and study instead?”

You mumbled.

“Hmm?”

Silence.

Mahito pouted his lips. You were getting boring. “What can I say to get to you, huh?”

He started thinking, the makeup stuff you had earlier meant you had to be the organized type, he had seen a keychain and a sketchbook with your name on it but it was nothing useful. But… your books about improvement could mean that you felt you weren’t enough at some academic level and then there was this good luck charm that had gotten you in a feisty mood…

Hmm.

An imaginary lightbulb popped over his head.

“Ahh, I see.” He took a staggering whiff of your hair. “Your life is already miserable enough.”

Your breath hitched, giving Mahito the reaction he had been looking for.

“I think,” he breathed, his lips were brushing against the shell of your ear. “It's finally time you and I had some fun, hmm?”

Your pulse went absolutely berserk with the threat of his words, the dark promise that loomed within his words.

“W-wait-”

Mahito flipped you over like a sack of potatoes. Once again, you were facing him. You stared at his patchwork of a face, loudly gulping at the disgusting sight. Before you could even comprehend what he was doing, you felt his cold hands go under your skirt.

With wide eyes, you struggled with renewed vigor as you tried to close your legs shut. But he was so much stronger than you. He only chuckled as you made a useless effort to stop him.

You were left to his mercy, once you realized that, you looked away from him.

“Ahh,” he smirked as he lifted the skirt of your uniform, “Such a naughty girl, you’re wearing these to school?” You felt his fingers gently feeling the fabric of your panties.

You squirmed uncomfortably on the cold concrete, knowing that he was staring down at your clothed cunt. You refused to give in to him, refusing to grant him the satisfaction of getting a reaction out of you.

He snickered and the sound of the clinking of his belt buckle startled you enough to yelp. You quickly closed your eyes.

“Eyes on me, (name),” he uttered as one of his hands kneaded the soft flesh of your thigh.

Your eyes widened at your name. How did he-

“You should enjoy doing bad things, (name),” he said. “Listen to your soul, be free as the shape of your soul.”

Mahito’s hand squeezed your cheeks together until your lips puckered and he leaned to press his lips against yours. At the same time, you felt a fabric being pulled down, it took a staggeringly long moment before you realized it was your panties.

“If you keep living your life to please others, you won’t be able to please yourself.”

A loud sore tore out of you and disappeared into Mahito’s mouth as he let his tongue loll out before licking your lips. His saliva left a wet feeling and the breeze from the sewers chilled your skin.

“How cute.”

Mahito lifted your legs and you laid there completely motionless as he palmed his cock through his boxers. You looked away from him, refusing to watch him violate your body.

Although you weren’t watching him, you could feel his fingers moving along your folds. He lifted his hand and held it between your faces, smiling widely. “You’re sopping wet, (name).”

He forced his digits into your mouth, swirling them until you cleaned his fingers with your tongue. He watched you with an amusing smile.

Finally satisfied, he took his fingers out from your mouth and slipped them inside your slick heat.

You jolted and a noise closer to a moan came out from your mouth.

Mahito’s thumb rested on your clit, rubbing sluggish circles over the muscle as his digits went in and out of you.

“Don’t close your legs,” he said, curling his fingers inside your pussy and started making a scissoring motion.

You squirmed, one of your hands found his shoulder and you held onto him to ignore your legs shaking in pleasure.

“Ahh, I can feel it throbbing,” Mahito chuckled, “You’re sucking my fingers in, (name), how naughty.”

“I’m not,” you whined, lifting your hips subconsciously to feel more of his fingers. His fingers reached much deeper inside your pussy than your own fingers ever could.

“Really?” he hummed, he leaned over to your face until his lips brushed against yours. “But you’re moving your hips so cutely.”

When you opened your mouth to deny he took the momentary opportunity to shove his tongue down your throat. His lips moved roughly against your unresponsive ones. He frowned into the kiss and pulled himself away from your face.

His fingers scooped your juices and left the warmth of your pussy. Mahito lifted his fingers up to his lips and he opened his mouth. You watched as he placed his fingers on his tongue before closing his mouth agonizingly slowly with a smile. His lips curled upwards, you heard him moan while licking his own fingers clean.

Funny enough, his voice made more juices leak out from your pussy.

“What a sweet taste,” he said, gazing down at you and licking his lips. “Makes me wonder if it’d taste more vibrant from the source.” Mahito moved between your legs.

Your cheeks flushed red, “Wait, it’s-”

He used his thumbs to spread your folds and chuckled at the sight of wet strands connecting your folds together breaking out slowly. “You’re going to be a good little puppy, right?”

You let out a hot breath, nodding rapidly.

He lapped at your pussy menacingly slowly, savoring your taste greedily.

Your legs shook around his head, your hands immediately went to his hair, gripping tightly while Mahito’s tongue moved between your folds. Lifting your hips up, you pulled his hair when he laid his tongue flat against your clit.

His hands that were spreading your folds slid to your inner thighs and he pinned them down. He pressed his lips on your clit, sluggishly lapping at the muscle and sucking it in his mouth gently.

Your fingers in his hair pushed him towards your cunt, begging for more. You turned your face away as you bit back a moan. Then your eyes landed on the dagger, something was clinging to the back of your mind, you heard your own voice screaming at you to get yourself together but they all disappeared when Mahito inserted his digits inside of you.

His fingers thrust inside, his lips sucked on your clit while his tongue lapped at the muscle one last time before he pulled himself back, leaving you needy.

“Just as I thought, it tastes much better straight from the source.”

He licked his fingers without breaking eye contact.

“You’ve become so much more obedient, (name).” Mahito crawled on top of you, your hands in his hair slid down to his neck, and rested there. “You’re a good little obedient puppy, aren’t you?”

A dreamingly sick smile spread across your face, nodding approvingly.

He matched your smile, amazed by your reaction.

Mahito leaned in for a kiss and this time you kissed him back, you tasted yourself in his mouth. Using your hands, you pulled him closer. His shoulders lowered and rose slightly as he tugged down his pants along with his underwear. He kicked his pants off from his ankles and only a couple of seconds later you felt him drag the tip of his cock between your folds.

He pulled back from the kiss and the second your eyes met his, he shoved the entire length of his cock inside of you. You tensed and yelped as he watched you with dark amusement while his cock stretched your tight virgin walls.

You opened your mouth in a silent scream, his girth was too much, he was filling you up with no gaps. The gummy flesh of your walls pulsated around him, warm blood trickled from the length of his cock and pooled under your bodies, on the concrete.

“You probably didn’t know but our souls are one, only for this moment, (name)!” He cackled, his voice filled with mischief. “Isn’t it great?”

“Yes,” you hissed as he moved. His hips slammed into yours with a disgustingly wet sound.

“Can you feel it?” he asked, pulling back and thrusting in your pussy, growling lowly. “Can you feel how free your soul is?”

You could feel it.

You felt all of your guilts and worries wash away each time he thrust inside.

“This is how animals feel,” he groaned audibly, your walls were squeezing the girth of his cock from tip to the base. You were such a perfect match, you were made for him, your cunt fit him like a glove. This was the only purpose of your existence. “Animals are always free, (name).”

You kept nodding even though his words seemed to go over your head, you were only focused at the firm length moving inside you.

“Do you know why?” he hit a significant spot that made your walls clench around his cock. “It’s because animals don’t know sin, (name).”

He was right.

“I’m taking your innocence, doesn’t that make you happy?”

“Yes!”

He laughed, placing his hands to the back of your knees and pushing them towards your chest. He mercilessly humped your pussy which made you scream in pleasure. His cock was reaching so far deep in this position, it was hitting all the good spots now. You couldn’t help but curl your toes and move your hips to feel more of his cock.

“I won’t allow you to show this face to others.” His grip behind your knees softened, he held you more gently before leaning onto you to whisper his next words, “I’m the only one who can make you feel this free. Don’t forget that.”

You nodded, placing a hand on your stomach and you felt his cock grow bigger inside of you. Your hand pressed against the bulge that had formed from what was moving inside you.

The bulging on your stomach made your eyes roll to the back of your head.

He laughed lowly, you were quite amusing. He snapped his hips forward, you moaned louder this time. Your voice echoed along with his laughter in the sewers.

“Mahito,” you begged, the waves of pleasure from his cock hitting your sweet spot made your voice tremble, “E-enough, please-”

He watched you with his half-lidded eyes intently, ignoring your words as your legs started to shake with each brutal thrust, you were close. He started pulling out from you until only the tip was in your entrance and slamming inside you with his entire length. His pace was like an animal in heat, his balls slapped against your ass each time he thrust inside.

Mahito quickened his pace, his large cock stretched out your virgin walls until they took the shape of his cock. He pushed your legs to your chest and buried his cock even deeper inside of you.

“You’re mine.”

You nodded frantically, his thrusts were punishing. Eventually, your pussy started spasming around his twitching cock. Unable to resist your virgin walls clamping on him any longer, Mahito spilled his thick and hot seed inside your womb.

He growled loudly and continued fucking his cum deep inside of your pussy until the squelching sounds of his cum mixed with yours gushing out from your abused hole started echoing in the sewers.

It was like music to his ears, he was humming to himself, rocking back and forward.

Your body relaxed and fell back on the concrete after he pulled his dick out from you. His cum spilled out from your slick heat and down to the cold concrete to mix with your blood from earlier.

You heard Mahito getting dressed but you were unable to move, your body was exhausted. Your wounds had healed themselves, but the thin layer of dried blood was making your skin itchy.

The last thing you were aware of was the soft tune of your cell phone and it grew more distant as you drifted into slumber, feeling free.

~~~

The next time you opened your eyes, you were staring at the morning sky. The soft sound of trees shaking and birds chirping filled your ears.

You sat up abruptly and looked around in confusion. You were under a bridge, your bag was under your head, your cell phone by your side and you were clutching onto your dagger.

Hastily, you took out your hand mirror from your bag and checked your face. You didn’t look anything out of the ordinary other than your clumped lashes. Your hair was matted from laying on the concrete.

Suddenly, your hand went under your skirt but you couldn’t feel any difference.

What had happened?

Had that happened?

You stood up, clutching your bag and putting the dagger inside. The walk back to the city wasn’t too long as you checked the missed calls on your phone and the worrying amount of messages you had gotten from your lower classmen along with your teachers.

You weren’t sure what had happened. You remembered everything so faintly, each memory was a blur.

Unable to let them suffer like this, you replied to each text by saying that you were back at your own apartment because of a family issue.

The lower classmen believed you but Gojo had texted you to come back to the campus as soon as possible, saying that he would lend an ear and whenever you needed a shoulder to cry on, you had to trust him, he clearly was worried. Yet your mind was a whirlwind of different thoughts, you ignored him.

Back at your apartment, you kicked off your shoes and threw your bag onto the couch before crashing on the couch yourself.

There was something deeply wrong, the stench that lingered on your uniform was unbearable.

So, you stripped yourself from the uniform and filled the bathtub. While your clothes were washing in the machine, you soaked in the bath, letting your muscles relax.

The apartment was empty and quiet, which disturbed you deeply solely because you were forced to be alone with your thoughts until you found the courage to go back to the campus.

You got scolded for leaving without notice and they found out you had stolen a cursed tool. Although you tried to explain how you were using it to improve yourself, you still got detention.

In the end, Gojo didn’t react the way you thought. He didn’t let you practice with others or tried to find a way to build up your cursed energy.

Days passed, you found yourself back in the shadow of everyone else.

Today, you found yourself under the same bridge you woke up a week ago. The night sky was beautiful, the stars sparkled brightly. None of it helped ease your nerves, your stomach churned and the feeling of uneasiness surrounded you.

You hadn’t brought anything with you. Your phone, bag, and good luck charm were back at the campus, in your room.

Not sure what to do, you simply stood there, staring.

The large gate was inviting, the darkness promised to swallow you whole and the stench… was welcoming.

Hesitantly, you took a step forward and then another until you disappeared into the dark sewers.

You walked for hours. Each right you took led to dead ends and each left you took led you back outside. It was like you were going in circles.

Perhaps, you thought, you had imagined that whole thing.

You pressed a hand between your thighs at the memory, your legs were trembling. The trembling turned into violent shaking and your legs gave up from under you.

Planting your hand on the cold concrete, you tried pushing yourself to get back up on your feet but it was futile.

Your eyes were glossy with tears, you couldn’t comprehend why you were crying.

“Ahh,” a familiar voice cooed. “The obedient little puppy came back to its owner.”

Almost immediately you lifted your head. Tears streamed down your face as you stood up and stared at Mahito welcoming you with open arms.

Your lips parted, conflicted if they should curl up to a smile or down to a frown. The feeling that surrounded you wasn’t something you could explain with words.

You rushed to him and crashed into Mahito’s arms and lips. You were fiercely moving your lips against his, your desperation made him laugh into the kiss.

When he finally decided to kiss you back, you were trembling from head to toe, holding onto Mahito. The kiss was wet and tasted salty from your tears but none of you paid any mind.

“(name).” Mahito broke the kiss to wipe away your tears with his thumbs. “Why did you come back?”

He looked amused, not confused enough to ask you that question but that same question was something you had to ask yourself.

“Mahito,” you sobbed, clutching on his shirt, your lower lip wouldn’t stop trembling as you were unable to answer his question.

Were you only obsessed with the idea to live freely without sins or did you want something more than that?

“Nevermind.” Mahito pressed a gentle kiss against your forehead, leaving his lips there for a moment. After you stopped crying, he led you deeper inside the sewers until the darkness consumed the two of you. Your heart was shuddering in your chest, you couldn’t believe how much power he held over you.

It was just Mahito had said, animals lived without guilt, pain, or worry because animals didn’t know sin.

But that statement didn’t matter, you weren’t an animal.

You were a human and your sins would follow you to your death.

And he was a cursed spirit, he didn’t know any sin.

Oh… it was him who was the animal.

A wolf couldn’t be tamed, you remembered. You weren’t the wolf. You were a domestic wolf tasting the sweet freedom for the first time. No… you were only a puppy.

A small puppy following after the big bad wolf.

#i know the story doesn’t make any sense #i simply blacked out writing it lmao #you’ll probably see me change the title over and over again cuz i am very indecisive #i’m going back to being d3ad #mahito x reader

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thewidowsghost · 3 years

Text

Daughter of the Sea - Chapter 1

So, I started this on my Wattpad, and if figured I'd just put it on here! Just tell me if you want me to add you to the taglist!

Percy's POV

My name is Percy Jackson.

I am twelve years old. I'm a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York, and my sister, (Y/n), taking online schooling at home.

Am I a troubled kid?

Yeah. You could say that.

I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan—twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know—it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.

Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.

I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.

See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course, I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that...Well, you get the idea.

On this trip, I was determined to be good.

All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.

Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.

Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwiches that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.

"I'm going to kill her," I mumble.

Grover tries to calm me down. "I'm okay. I like peanut butter -" He dodges another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." I start to get up, but Grover pulls me back to my seat.

"You're already on probation," he reminds me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Mr. Brunner leads the museum tour.

He rides up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blows my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.

He gathers us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and starts telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.

One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."

Mr. Brunner keeps talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickers something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turn around and say, "Will you shut up?"

It comes out louder than I meant it to.

The whole group laughs. Mr. Brunner stops his story. "Mr. Jackson," he says, "did you have a comment?"

My face is totally red, I think. I answer, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner points to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I look at the carving, and feel a flush of relief, because I actually recognize it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

"Yes," Mr. Brunner says, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because..."

"Well..." I rack my brain to remember. (Y/n) would have known the answer. She was nuts for this kind of stuff. "Kronos was the king god, and —"

"God?" Mr. Brunner asks.

"Titan," I correct myself. "And...he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"

"Eeew!" says one of the girls behind me.

"—and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continue, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbles to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner says, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover mutters.

"Shut up," Nancy hisses, her face even brighter red than her hair.

At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.

I think about his question, and shrug. "I don't know, sir."

"I see." Mr. Brunner looks disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

The class drifts off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.

Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."

I knew that was coming.

I tell Grover to keep going; then I turn toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?" Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go—intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything. "You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner tells me.

"About the Titans?"

'"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."

"Oh."

"What you learn from me," he says, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."

I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!" and challenged us, swordpoint against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C– in my life. No—he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.

I mumble something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner takes one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.

He tells me to go outside and eat my lunch.

The class gathers on the front steps of the museum, where we can watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm is brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figure maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.

Nobody else seems to notice, though. Some of the guys are pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit is trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds isn't seeing a thing.

Grover and I sit on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school—the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean—I'm not a genius, not like (Y/n). She seems to know everything."

Grover doesn't say anything for a while. Then, when I think he is going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he asks, "Can I have your apple?"

I don't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.

I watch the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and think about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sit. I hadn't seen her or my sister since Christmas. I want so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. Mom and (Y/n) would hug me and be glad to see me, but Mom would be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I couldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.

Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized café table.

I am about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appears in front of me with her ugly friends—I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists—and dumps her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.

"Oops." She grins at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles are orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

I try to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I am so mad my mind went blank. A wave roars in my ears.

I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy is sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see—"

"—the water—"

"—like it grabbed her—"

I don't know what they were talking about. All I know is that I was in trouble again.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds is sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turns on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey—"

"I know," I grumble. "A month erasing workbooks." That wasn't the right thing to say.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds says.

"Wait!" Grover yelps. "It was me. I pushed her."

I stare at him, stunned. I can't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.

She glares at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she says.

"But—"

"You—will—stay—here."

Grover looks at me desperately.

"It's okay, man," I tell him. "Thanks for trying."

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barks at me. "Now."

Nancy Bobofit smirks. I give her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. Then I turn to face Mrs. Dodds, but she isn't there. She is standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

How'd she get there so fast?

I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.

I wasn't so sure. I go after Mrs. Dodds.

Halfway up the steps, I glance back at Grover. He is looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner is absorbed in his novel.

I look back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She is now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.

Okay, I think. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.

But apparently, that wasn't the plan.

I follow her deeper into the museum. When I finally catch up to her, we are back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery is empty.

Mrs. Dodds stands with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She is making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze as if she wanted to pulverize it...

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she says.

I do the safe thing. I reply, "Yes, ma'am."

She tugs on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"

The look in her eyes is beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me. I say, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."

Thunder shakes the building.

"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

I didn't know what she's talking about.

All I can think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.

"Well?" she demands.

"Ma'am, I don't..."

"Your time is up," she hisses.

Then the weirdest thing happens. Her eyes begin to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretch, turning into talons. Her jacket melts into large, leathery wings. She isn't human. She is a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.

Then things got even stranger.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheels his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouts and tosses the pen through the air.

Mrs. Dodds lunges at me.

With a yelp, I dodge and feel talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatch the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hits my hand, it isn;t a pen anymore. It is a sword—Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always uses on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds spins towards me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees are jelly. My hands are shaking so bad I almost drop the sword.

She snarl, "Die, honey!" And she flies straight at me.

Absolute terror runs through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swing the sword.

The metal blade hits her shoulder and passes clean through her body as if she was made of water. Hisss!

Mrs. Dodds was a sandcastle in a power fan. She explodes into yellow powder, vaporizing on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes are still watching me.

I'm alone.

There is a ballpoint pen in my hand.

Mr. Brunner isn't there. Nobody is there but me.

My hands are still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.

Had I imagined the whole thing?

I walk back outside.

It had started to rain.

Grover is sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit is still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she sees me, she says, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."

I answer, "Who?"

"Our teacher. Duh!"

I blink. We don't have a teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I ask Nancy what she is talking about.

She just rolls her eyes and turns away.

I ask Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

"Who?" he asks, but he pauses first and he wouldn't look at me, so I figure he was messing with me.

"Not funny, man," I tell him. "This is serious."

Thunder booms overhead.

I see Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book as if he'd never moved.

I go over to him.

He looks up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."

I had Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.

"Sir," I ask, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stares blankly at me, "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowns and sits forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"

Word Count: 3159 words

So yeah, this is the first chapter of this book.

Not much (Y/n) yet, but we'll get there.

Love y'all! Kaitlynn ❤️😍

#percy jackson x sister reader #sally jackson x daugther reader #demigod reader #fem reader #reader insert #percy jackson and the heroes of olympus #percy jackson and the lightning thief reader insert #percy jackson and the battle of the labyrinth #percy jackson and the titans curse #percy jackson and the lightning thief #percy jackson and the greek gods #percy jackson and the sea of monsters #percy jackson and the olympians #percy jackson and the olympians reader insert

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auroracalisto · 4 years

Text

as fate will have it

request: Can I please request a Sweet Pea x sweet/innocent!fem!reader when soulmates meet, something important to themselves appears on their soulmate’s wrist as a tattoo. So since being a Serpent is so important to Sweet Pea, a Serpent tattoo appears on Y/n’s wrist, and since being loving is so important to Y/n, a heart would appear on Sweet Pea’s wrist. It would be especially cute if Y/n found out that she’s actually FP’s daughter/Jughead’s year younger sister (but was raised by her adoptive parents in the Northside and maybe FP didn’t know that he had another daughter because her birth mom never told him she was pregnant) because she has “Serpent blood” so it’s like it was fate. Oooo also, I don’t know if this would be good to add to the plot, but it would also be interesting if Y/n’s adoptive parents told her she had to pick between them or FP & Jug, so an it’s us or them type of thing. Y/n picks FP, her birth dad, and her newfound older brother, Jughead, so she would go to live with them in the trailer. — @kpopgirlbtssvt

summary: request covers this

word count: 2.4k words

warnings: rude parents? adoption (idk if that’s something to trigger, but just to be safe). being kicked out of home. it’s also very possible that it’s ooc sweet pea BUT it’s fineeee

author’s notes: i wanted to clarify that it’s been like two years since i last saw the first season riverdale, so some things could be a little off. the show is wack but i love the characters. i also might have somewhat gone off from what the request was, and if i went off too much, just let me know and i will write something else!

Your friend quickly took her seat beside you, smiling. "Did you hear?"

"Hear what?" you looked up from your book, slipping a piece of paper in between the old pages.

She let out a soft giggle. "Well, uh, I know you don't really care, but everyone else is busy—"

"—is that why you're talking to me?"

"Oh my god, no," she blushed. "No, sorry, that came out totally insensitive, didn't it? I just... okay, well, they're closing down the southside."

Your eyes widened a bit. "What?"

"Yeah. They're gonna consolidate the schools. So everyone from the southside will be coming up here. They're supposed to start coming in today. You should try to see if anyone is your soulmate," she grinned.

"Yeah, okay, but you've already found your soulmate," you sighed softly, standing up. You had hardly touched your lunch at all. From your book and the mention of your soulmate, you didn't want to touch it. You wanted to meet your soulmate. Oh, you wanted to love them like they deserved to be loved. But here you were, finding it hard to believe that you had a soulmate.

Your friend just smiled. "You know I love you, right?"

You rose an eyebrow but you soon returned the smile. "Yeah, yeah. I know."

She just smiled before she rushed off, gods only know where.

You stuffed your book back into your backpack, carrying your tray to empty it. You needed to stop by your locker before your next class.

Walking out of the cafeteria, you started towards your lockers. New faces filled the hallway the farther you walked. You could feel the anxiety start creeping into your veins, but not because of the southside—you had began to wonder if you would find your soulmate from the people who transferred.

You sighed softly to yourself as you came to your locker—and you had even been prepared to get into it when you saw a man leaning up against it. He was tall, his hair was dark, and he had gorgeous brown eyes. He was talking to a short girl with streaked hair and another guy with equally dark hair.

You cleared your throat to get the tall guy's attention and your blush only darkened as he looked over at you.

"Would you mind moving? You're on top of my locker..."

He stared at you for a moment before he nodded, pushing himself off from the locker. But before he could move too far, a searing pain took over his wrist. Just as quickly as it had came, it disappeared. He quickly looked down at his wrist, only to realize that the same exact thing had happened to you. And now, you were staring down at a serpent tattoo on your wrist, whereas a heart took its place on his own.

The girl with streaks in her hair was smiling. "Uuhhhh," she grabbed a hold of the other boy. "Have fun," she quickly said, before leading him away.

You blushed and looked up at the man. "Uh—"

"—a northsider?" he asked, but he couldn't help his smile from forming. He was about to tease you, but he couldn't help his happiness. He finally found his soulmate. "Do you know how much hell I'm gonna get for this?"

Your blush only darkened. "I—I, well," you breathed out, but your own smile spread across your face. "That's exciting. I still need to get in my locker." You were buzzing with happiness. The boy moved out of the way and you quickly got into it, looking up at him. He was far taller than you. You couldn't help the grin that showed up.

"I'm Sweet Pea," he said.

You blushed. "That's cute." He rose his eyebrows. "I mean—" you let out an awkward laugh. "My name is [Your name]."

"It's nice to meet you, [Your name]," he blushed a bit. He just smiled. He would have said more, but his name was shouted from across the hallway. He looked at you and bit his lip, before he suddenly grabbed your arm, taking a permanent marker from your locker. He wrote down his number before he looked up at you and grinned. "Text me, okay?"

You blushed and nodded, before you watched him leave.

[]

That night, you were too excited to tell your parents about your day. You finally found your soulmate. And he was totally attractive. And worth your love. You had decided this just moments after he grabbed your arm to write his number down. It felt like the stars were aligned, just for you. Perhaps that's what it felt like when you found your soulmate—like nothing could go wrong.

But as you walked in to your home, dropping your backpack to the floor, it was dead silent. You walked into the dining room, seeing your parents sitting there with a couple of papers laying out. Your mother was close to tears, but your father seemed angry. He cleared his throat as he saw you.

"[Your name]. Sit."

You did as you were told, beginning to frown. You looked at your mom. "What's going on?"

"[Your name]. Remember how we told you we had adopted you?"

You looked at your dad and nodded. "Of course. But that doesn't matter... because you're both my parents. What's this about?"

"Your mother."

You quickly looked at her, frowning.

"Your mother fabricated a couple of papers. She wanted a baby so badly that she would lie about who you belonged to just so she could have you."

"What?"

"You belong to FP," your dad said, staring down your mother. You always knew that your father didn't like southsiders, but this was odd.

"I don't belong to anyone, dad—"

"—don't," he said, frowning at you. "Your mother decided that it was okay to adopt the child of a gang leader. She put us in danger. Your sister. Your grandparents."

"What—they've never hurt anyone," you frowned at the man. "Why would she have endangered them if they swear against violence like that—"

"—you'd be surprised," he snorted through his nose. He clenched his jaws before he handed you the papers. Before you could grab them, he just dropped them in front of you. You picked one up, seeing your real birth certificate. Your birth mother was listed, and then so was your birth father. Your father was right—FP Jones was listed as your birth father.

Your face paled and you looked up at him. "What is this? What are you trying to tell me?"

"Choose."

"Excuse me?"

"Choose. The Jones. Or us."

You looked over at your mother in disbelief. "What happens if I choose you?"

"We will forbid you from talking with the Jones."

You blinked a couple of times, confusion washing over you. "But if they're my biological family, I'd like to know them—"

"—if that's the case," your father frowned, "just go and live with them."

You stared at him, feeling your heart beat rushing in your ears. You quickly got to your feet. Your mother wasn't defending you. Your father was kicking you out. It only took a few moments for you to decide that you would leave. You quickly rushed to the front door, grabbing your bag. But not before you had grabbed the papers your father had sat in front of you. The proof was in the ink—literally.

You pulled your backpack onto your back, looking down at the papers as you pulled out your phone.

It had been literal years since you last talked to Jughead Jones. You had his contact, still. At least, the one he had whenever the two of you were friends in your seventh grade year. You began to hope that the stars were aligned for you once more as you clicked on the contact and listened to it ringing. By the fourth ring, you were prepared to turn your phone off, but you almost gasped as you heard Jughead's voice.

"Shh," you heard Jughead, before he said hello.

"Jughead? Uh, it's [Your name]—"

"—yeah, I have your contact."

"Right," you blushed. "I, uh," you cleared your throat. "Do you mind if I swing by your house? I need to talk to your dad."

You didn't mention the fact that you had just been kicked out of your home. That could come at a later point in time.

Jughead blinked a couple of times and he leaned back in his seat. "Yeah, of course. When will you be here?"

"In about an hour," you said.

"Alright. See you then?"

With that, he hung up. He looked over at Sweet Pea, Fangs, and Toni.

"Who was that?" Sweet Pea asked.

"[Your name]."

[]

You hadn't anticipated the walk to Jughead's house, but you still remembered the way. It had taken you the full hour to get there from your house. But you were there. As you walked up to the trailer, you noticed two motorcycles parked by Jughead's dad's truck. You walked up the stairs and knocked on the door. You probably looked a mess—from the walk and from the cold air, you were sure you were as red as the red lipstick you always had stuffed in the bottom of your book bag.

The door began to open and you quickly greeted Jughead, only stopping short when you realized Sweet Pea had answered.

He smiled at you. "Hi."

You began to blush and you smiled. "Hi..."

He moved out of the way and let you inside. FP was in the living room, and he looked over at you, confused.

"What has it been?" he asked, beginning to smile. "Three years?"

"Four, sir," you weakly smiled.

FP took notice and he tilted his head. Sweet Pea frowned and led you over to sit down. He looked at the papers in your hands as he sat on the edge of the armchair you sat on. His eyes widened and he quickly looked over at Jughead and his father.

"I... I wanted to tell you about this. I don't... do you remember a Julie Harding?"

FP blinked harshly before he nodded. "Yes."

You took in a deep breath as you looked down at the papers. "She's my birth mother."

Jughead looked at you with a frown. "You were adopted?"

You nodded towards him and handed FP your papers. He took one look at the birth certificate and he looked up at you in disbelief. "Are you serious?"

You weakly smiled, once more. "They kicked me out when they realized you were my birth dad."

Sweet Pea's jaw was locked as he looked at you.

FP frowned. "Well. You're always welcome here. I... I can't believe this," he said. His frown soon formed into a smile. "I have another daughter," he breathed out.

Jughead looked at the papers for a moment. "We're siblings?"

"I guess so," you began to smile as well.

Sweet Pea watched you for a moment. You were always filled with smiles. You were always happy, even in moments like this. It astounded him, but he knew that he needed that in his life. He knew that the stars were truly aligned in just the right way.

He suddenly took a hold of your hand and you laced your fingers with his, blushing. Sure, your parents hurt you. But you took one look around the trailer and you realized that these people were the ones that you could truly make a family out of.

[]

Two months down the road, you were still asking Sweet Pea to move out of the way so you could get into your locker. But instead of him staring at you the entire time, he would just kiss your cheek or your forehead, or even your lips, and move to stand on the other side. Which side truly depended on his mood, just like where he kissed you.

Every time you would see Jughead, he would greet you with a smile and a short conversation, but when the two of you were with your new friends, you were truly yourself. You found comfort in the serpents. You found comfort in your biological family, and with your soulmate, Sweet Pea.

Sweet Pea stood by your locker, his arms crossed over his chest as he saw you walk down the hall. He couldn't help his frown from turning into a smile. Before you could ask him to move, he leaned forward to kiss your cheek. He quickly took your books and stuffed them in your already opened locker—Toni had memorized your combination and he asked her to unlock it for him.

He took your hand. "Come on. I have a surprise for you."

You rose an eyebrow but you laced his fingers with his. You tried to protest when you realized that he was about to lead you out of the school, but you stopped yourself. FP wouldn't berate you for skipping a couple of classes.

Sweet Pea brought you over to his motorcycle and her turned to look at you, smiling. "Wear this," he said, handing you his helmet.

You just blushed and did as you were told before you got onto the back of the sleek bike. You wrapped your arms around his torso and he put on his helmet before he started his motorcycle and took off. He drove fast, but not dangerously. In a matter of minutes, the two of you were back at FP's trailer. Sweet Pea helped you off and took a hold of both of your hands.

"What—"

"I don't have anything to show you. I just... know that your birthday is coming up soon and I wanted to celebrate alone while we can."

You blushed and gently shoved his shoulder.

"Not that," he laughed. "Get your mind out of the gutter. Nah, I wanted to have a movie marathon with you, but if that's what you want—"

"—movie marathon," you blushed, taking a hold of his hand once more. He smiled and led you into the trailer.

He stopped in the doorway to look at you, just taking in your beauty. He leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to your lips.

"Did I ever tell you how thankful I am that you're my soulmate?" he asked.

You just blushed and shook your head as he let out a soft laugh and hugged onto you.

Your soulmate acted tough in public—but around you and in private, he was a softy. Your heart melted every time you saw him, and actions like this only strengthened your love for the man. You wrapped your arms around his neck and smiled.

"I love you, Sweet Pea."

His eyes widened as he heard the words, but his smile never left him.

"I love you, too, [Your name]."

#sweet pea x reader #sweet pea #x reader #reader insert #gender neutral reader?#riverdale #riverdale x reader #one-shot #fp jones #jughead jones #y/n jones #soulmate #soulmate au

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yutahoes · 4 years

Text

Sakura

(Part Two)

One - Two

genre : Chaptered, Fluff

pairing : childhood friends: soccer player! Nakamoto Yuta x single mom! Reader (Y/N)

word count : 2.3k words

You’ll always be his Sakura.

taglist : @ailoveyuta @loona-4-eva @aiforyuu @2-3-t-i @cosmiclatte28 @url-lindo-sexy @nuoyipeach @aaasteroidsky @readers-posts @delightfultacobread @bby-kji9 @a-bts-world @mel-yjh @yeolsechanhun @yutazen01

It was the summer before his third grade when his dad announced that they will be moving to Seoul because of a business opportunity. The then eight-year-old Yuta hated that he had to leave his friends just because he can't stay in Japan. He hated that he had to transfer schools and learn a new language. Why do they have to move to another country? Why not move to another city instead?

When the teacher introduced him to the class of third graders, he just glared at his Korean classmates who were looking at him in wonder. He doesn't want to be friends with them. He doesn't want to talk. He doesn't want to learn a new language. He's Japanese, why would he speak Korean? The teacher told him - or at least that was what he understood - to sit on a vacant chair at the back of the class. His classmates were staring at him. He's the new guy, it's normal. But he hated the attention.

It was lunch when he decided to eat on the school's rooftop. He wasn't surprised that it was locked but a girl was drawing on the door of the rooftop. Isn't she in his class? The girl seated in front of him? A crayon drawing of stick figures made him curious, what is that?

A certain symbol caught his attention, a straight line with a beak-like image and wings at the end held by a stickman he believed is a girl because of the triangular picture below her body. "Sakura?" He asked and the girl jolted in surprise, quickly hiding what she was doing. "Cardcaptor Sakura?"

The girl was wide-eyed, looked at her drawing then at him. He noticed how her eyes twinkle at that even if the area isn't well-lit. Or is it because she just cried? "You're that Japanese guy." She said in Korean and he only caught the words 'Japanese' and 'guy' so she's probably referring to him. "Do you know Cardcaptor Sakura?" He only nodded. It is a hit in Japan, everyone knows Sakura. "I like Cardcaptor Sakura!" She exclaimed with a bright smile.

That was the first time he saw that girl who loves Sakura. The first classmate who talked to him as if they spoke the same language. He remembered handing her a comic of her favorite cartoons the next day and she introduced herself as Y/N, even asking him along the lines of 'Can you teach me Japanese?' and 'Do you want to be friends with me?'

His initial plan of not knowing Korean or not talking to people backfired. He wanted to have a real conversation with this Sakura girl. His first Korean friend.

Yuta would remember teaching her hiragana every lunchtime, on their own place by the door of the rooftop and she would teach him hangul in exchange. Before class, she would tell him stories about what happened to Sakura from the episode yesterday as if he didn't watch the same show. After class, they would spend some time in the playground waiting for her mom to pick her up.

She was also the person who encouraged him to try out for the soccer team. Unlike in Japan, soccer isn't a required PE in Korea so his classmates were amazed that he knew how to play soccer, even defeating some older kids. "Yuta, sugoi!" She exclaimed that made him smile, a real genuine smile he never showed to everyone. "You're handsome when you smile. You should smile more often." It was her who made him smile more. Just because he wanted her to call him handsome once again.

In fourth grade, the two were so close that she spent time in their home and him on hers. Sometimes she would even sleep at their place when her mom has to stay all night in the hospital. He found out that she doesn't have a dad, he left them when she's just a baby and that she would always cry in her sleep looking for her dad. Kids weren't very welcoming with the idea of a broken family either and he would often see her crying on the stairs to the rooftop.

And now, she's the one who has children. A mom. He never imagined that he will see her as a mom in the future. He wondered if she still cries for her dad. He wonders if she still knew how to speak or write Japanese. He wonders if she could call him 'handsome' again.

Yuta promised that he wouldn't stay that long in Korea, he wanted to leave as soon as the wedding was over and he had every reason why. But Mark Lee, his secretary, thinks that he needs to stay for a couple more days and think of it as a vacation before the big soccer leagues happen.

"Your alma mater is inviting you to teach the soccer club," Mark noted as he stared at the email by the administration of his former elementary school. The place where he honed his soccer playing skills.

The place where he met her.

The younger guy was surprised when the soccer player agreed to the said invitation. Even forcing him to do it today before he changes his mind. Luckily, he doesn't have any schedules that day.

The school changed a lot. Well, it's been years since he last visited the place. A lot of buildings surrounded the soccer field and he watched how elementary kids played. They look so small or is it because he's used to watching the adults play? The principal greeted him and introduced him to the soccer coach who looked so cocky. But instead of heading to the soccer field, he asked the principal if he could look upstairs.

His feet dragged him to the staircase to the rooftop. Their meeting place. The door changed color, erasing her drawing that they maintained for years. From the stick figures to an actual 2D drawing of Sakura and Syaoran.

He wished he could just erase his memory of her as well. The same way as the drawings are erased.

It was free period when he went down to the classrooms and saw little kids in the school's hallway. Are they this small? "It's because you don't have a dad." He heard a child say and saw that it's a huge kid, probably a third-grader, in his jersey. "The soccer team doesn't accept kids who don't have dads." Well, elementary didn't change.

When his gaze caught the smaller boy he's talking to, a sudden feeling of recognition hit him. Jae. Y/N's son. "My dad lives abroad." He nodded, he's correct about that.

"Dads should watch your soccer games." The older kid claimed, making Yuta shake his head. Are children’s behavior like this? Well, he really should refrain from making one of his own. "Accept it, Jae. You can never be good for the soccer team."

"Yah!" Someone shouted from the side. "Stop bullying my brother." Yuta smiled as he watched the mini version of the girl occupying his mind shout at the bigger kids who were hurting her brother. She's totally different from her. "Did your dad teach you that?"

The bigger kid only glared when the soccer coach called for him, and he quickly called him 'daddy'. So that is where his confidence came from. His gaze returned to the siblings, Jae was holding his sister's arm saying sorry that she had to get angry. Yuta smiled, that's their mom's attitude. Always apologetic. How can these two be a spitting image of her? Truly, they're her children.

"Yuta Nakamoto," Jae called before he could flee the place. He greeted the young boy then smiled at the girl who was looking at him in curiosity. "I told you he's eomma's friend, noona. He knows my name." Yuta chuckled at that. He just met his youngest fanboy.

The younger girl pulled her brother behind her that surprised Yuta. "Eomma said not to talk to strangers." The older smirked. She's really different from her mom.

"Should we call your mom? Can you give me her number?" The girl shook her head and Yuta nodded, already texting Taeyong. He responded with her number and Yuta quickly called the said phone number, "Hi Y/N. It's Yuta." Both kids were staring at him, "I'm here in Jae's school. Can I bring them to the mall?"

"Ahjusshi, can I see if it's my mom?" The girl asked and Yuta handed his phone to her. "Eomma?" The girl stared at him in wonder as she heard her mom's voice. "Then can we go with this ahjusshi?" She glared at him for a moment then nodded as if she’s talking to her mom. “She wants to talk to you.”

“Yuta, you don’t have to do this if you’re busy.” But he wanted to. He wanted to spend time with them and learn about her as a mom. “Just message me where you are. I’ll pick them up.” He agreed. If only he could spend time with her as well.

It was Jae who’s most excited when they reached the mall. The older girl stayed a few feet away from the two of them. Maybe she’s not interested. But really, she’s a tough nut to crack. He discovered that Jae wanted to play soccer but his mom doesn’t want him to, saying that he’s too young to play. So Yuta brought him to a shop where they sell sports shoes. “I’ll go talk to your mom. But for now, wear these soccer shoes,” he claimed while tying the younger boy’s shoelaces that made him beam. Jae hugged Yuta, thanking him for the shoes. “You’re welcome, bud.”

Yuta realized that he didn’t know the older girl’s name. What was it? Did Y/N mention her name? To be safe, he just asked Jae about it. “Cherry,” he called then walked to where she was, staring at the skating shoes. “Do you want one?” She shook her head mumbling that their mom would get mad. “Besides, it’s not snowing.” He nodded.

“We can go ice skating...”

“You’re not my dad.” That made Yuta stop. Of course, he’s not. “Stop acting that you care about me or Jae. You’re just like the other guys.” Other guys? “You’ll leave me and Jae. You’ll leave eomma.” She’s a difficult nut to crack.

Yet she’s so different when she’s next to her brother. The cold eyes were changed into warmness when her brother asked if they could play in the ball pit. She looked like a child, smiling at the younger as they bounced at the trampoline. She looks exactly like her. How can two children, both from the same parents, have so different personalities?

He was just watching them, texting Y/N where he is, checking from time to time the two kids playing with the others in the ball pit area. "Hey," Y/N called, sitting beside Yuta on the mall bench. She smiled seeing the two playing. "Did they tire you?"

Yuta laughed. "It's fine. They're cool." There was silence, a comfortable silence. It's awkward to see her now. A lot of things changed. "Jae has the same personality as you, that's cute." She giggled. "Cherry looks like you."

Y/N nodded. "I'm glad she talks to you."

"It was hard, honestly." He confessed and again, she giggled. That sound. He missed her laugh. "I think she wants to go figure skating." That surprised Y/N. "And Jae wants to play soccer."

"He's too young. He'll get hurt with the bigger kids." Yuta was about to revolt at that. "I remembered when you played with the bigger kids back in eighth grade." That was one of his worst plays ever. Until now, he can feel how hurt he is.

She confessed that she doesn't know anything about sports that's why she's a little worried about sending her kids to the sports clinic that made him smile. She's such a mom. "I'll train Jae," Yuta announced that made her look at him. "I have to stay in Spain for two months for the league then I'll come back and teach Jae soccer." He explained. "I'll help Cherry too."

"Yuta, you don't have to."

"I want to." He held her hand. "Please."

"Why are you holding hands?" Cherry asked that made Yuta let go of his hold on her.

The older just gave her daughter a glare that made Yuta laugh. They look alike, the resemblance is too uncanny if you see them now yet they’re so different. “Eomma!” Jae called, reaching out to hug his mom. “I had fun today.” And she smiled at him. “Yuta samchon is so cool.”

“He bought you shoes?” She asked, checking the new kicks on her son’s feet. Jae claimed that he also bought Cherry one that made the older girl glare at Yuta. “Did you say thank you?” Both nodded.

Yuta smiled at them. They do look like a happy family. “I’ll get going. I’ll see you when I get back from Spain.” Y/N nodded. Yuta asked for a hug and Jae was the only one who’s ecstatic to hug him. Cherry rolled her eyes that made the older guy laugh. As expected. “Come on, Y/N, a hug.” He said, hands extended for the older girl.

The girl giggled before giving him a tight hug. His hand rested on her back then the other on the back of her head, caressing her hair. “You’re doing a great job being a mom, Sakura.”

She laughed before muttering the words, “I’m proud of you, Syaoran.”

Watching the three of them head to a different way opposite him, he wished he would have another chance to bond with them. He would love to be with them. Maybe having children isn’t too bad.

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

Three

#yuta fluff #yuta nakamoto fluff #yuta nakamoto #Yuta #chaptered

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