#next Friday CAN NOT COME FASTER | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

shy-writer-999 · 4 months ago

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1-800-LONELYCHEF (ii)

Summary: It's date night with Sanji. He meticulously prepared this for weeks and he's so nervous that he feels like he's going to faint. Afterwards, he's planning on asking you to come over. What will happen if you say yes? WC: 7.5k (read part 1 here!) CW: NSFW! Afab reader w/gendered pronouns (she/her/hers). Modern-ish AU; pwp; intercourse; oral (f. receiving); ejaculation inside. Minors do not interact!

It’s a Friday night. Months ago, you would have been gearing up for a long night at your job, being a phone sex operator. But you quit a while ago and your weekends look different now.

Like many Friday nights over the last year, you’re spending it with Sanji. But this time he’s actually there—materially present, in the flesh, smiling at you a couple feet away.

It’s a special night tonight. You’ve been seeing Sanji for around a month and a half, and tonight you’re at his restaurant, finally. You’ve fantasized about this for ages.

The darling chef across the table from you planned this carefully. He adjusted his schedule—instead of working tonight, he’s added an extra shift in next week, making up for the deficit.

He’s gone to great lengths to ensure that the crew in the kitchen is the best of the best, including that sous chef, who he strongly dislikes—but personal feelings aside, in Sanji’s kitchen there are only the most talented of chefs. He’s made sure of it.

He watched the ordering forms and produce vendors like hawks in the week leading up to this. You will only be eating the best quality ingredients, the freshest food, and nothing less.

Sanji is tense and he’s so nervous that he’s starting to feel sick. He’s running the logistics over in his head, trying to calculate if there’s anything he forgot, anything he missed, anything that could fall flat.

You can tell he’s overthinking, and it’s endearing. When his eyes aren’t darting around the restaurant, peeking into the semi-open kitchen and factoring all sorts of minuscule variables in your dining experience, he’s looking at you.

His gaze is warm, and when he’s around you, he’s sunshine personified. You can’t deny that he looks at you with such reverent adoration that it’s almost off-putting. But nothing he could do could actually put you off. You’re far too in love with him for that.

The restaurant is dark and the lights are warm. Slow jazz music plays at a low volume and the whole establishment smells exquisite.

There are tea lights on each table, with tiny flames that reflect in the gorgeous dark mahogany accents and mirrors on the walls. Next to each candle is a small vase filled with a couple flower stems—tonight, Sanji specifically asked the front of house staff to use your favorite flowers.

Across from you, the blonde man is dressed in what you now know is his signature outfit—black slacks with a button up; the sleeves are rolled up and a few buttons are undone. He looks effortlessly handsome and stylish. Your heart beats a bit faster when he catches your eyes.

How many dates has it been?

You’ve lost track at this point. Maybe you should be taking things slower with him, but you can’t hold yourself back when it comes to spending time with him.

One thing that you’ve been very intentional about, however, is intimacy (which is interesting, given your relationship history). After all, Sanji used to be one of your clients. You’ve had plenty of phone sex, but you haven’t gotten to the real thing yet.

You’re saving that for the right moment. Sure, you’ve made out with him a few times and you can’t deny that you both certainly get excited, but you’ve exercised self-restraint so far. You take this man very seriously. That seriousness entails caution.

The caution is only natural—not only do you feel like this man may be the love of your life, but he also wounded you deeply before. Building your trust, becoming accustomed to his affection and attention, and mending your heart has taken a little while. It’s an active process. But you’re comfortable now.

Soundlessly, Sanji breaks your train of thought. He reaches his hand across the circular table and places it palm-up in front of you.

You slide your hand onto his and he twists his wrist slightly—your fingers are entwined now. His thumb tickles as it draws a soft circle across your skin.

The flame from the tea light on the table reflects in his irises.

“My love?” He asks, rousing you from your stupor of thought. “What do you think?”

He gestures to the scenery around and you take a second to respond, soaking in the ambiance before giving him your verdict. He’s dying to know whether or not you’re impressed.

You haven’t told him yet, but you’ve been here before. Just once. A date took you here long ago, years before you started your old job, years before Sanji took up the position as head chef. The ambiance hasn’t changed much but it feels different now. For one, the man sitting across from you is simply radiating love. He’s devilishly handsome and chivalrous. He squeezes your hand gently.

“I like it,” you reply. “It’s just like you described. Very classy.”

He smiles. “I can’t wait for you to try the food.”

You’ve had Sanji’s cooking before, and it’s (simply put) the best food you’ve ever been served. Any time you go to his apartment, he cooks for you. But tonight, Sanji isn’t in the kitchen. This is a show of his skill in managing the kitchen, purveying ingredients, instructing his subordinates, and running the show, more than anything else.

“Tell me about the menu tonight,” you prompt him. You know he’s put an exorbitant amount of thought and energy into creating and testing what will be served tonight.

This restaurant is French. Sanji describes the prix fixe menu—he tends to link the dishes and flavors he constructs to very specific memories, emotions, or envisioned scenes. It’s impressive, and he shares each nugget of inspiration with you as the courses are served, per a promise he made weeks ago.

This experience is necessarily intimate—this is his passion, his art, the thing that he’s dedicated his life to.

It doesn’t escape him that you’re listening intently, appreciating the nuances of what he’s saying, and looking breathtaking while doing it.

The courses are small and painstakingly procured and presented. It’s interesting, looking at each dish and hearing the waitstaff explain what’s going on with each one, especially when the man in question—the artist and chef himself—is sitting in front of you. You can tell that the waiter is a bit nervous to serve him, but Sanji is kind and affable, putting them at ease immediately.

The first dish is a rocket salad with pears, pea blossoms, and a light vinaigrette.

“This recipe was actually passed down from my dad,” Sanji begins. “The story is kind of funny. Years ago, he was exploring some island and came across a tavern. They served something similar to this. He tried to get the recipe but ended up getting in a fist fight with the owner, so he just had to recreate it himself. He always complains that this salad isn’t as good as it should be, since it’s missing that ‘je ne sais quois’, but over the years he’s tweaked it. I stole it, obviously, and made some of my own adjustments.”

The dish is tangy, refreshing, and bright. It’s ridiculously good. Obviously.

You compliment him and, even though the room is dark, you can make out a pink flush across his cheeks. He lives for your praise.

Next, there’s a soup. Sanji explains how it came about.

“When I was growing up, Zeff had a bunch of leftovers that he was going to use for something else and I swiped them when he wasn’t looking. I threw them into a pot and… this is kind of the outcome. He was making some dish with leeks, so the scraps I stole were mostly leek trimmings. He was pissed when he realized I snagged them. The soup turned out awful the first few tries, like it was literally inedible, but I got it down to a science at some point. The trick is adding in some sage and the tiniest amount of white wine—it changes the balance of flavors completely.”

“How old were you?” You ask between flavorful spoonfuls.

You swear no one has given him any attention or love before, from the way he responds to your questions and praise. He looks genuinely shocked that you’ve asked him a such a thoughtful question. He’s never gotten used to the very sincere attention you treat him with, hasn’t reckoned with the fact that someone like you would be genuinely interested in him. You’ve known him (and treated him like this) since your first conversation, but it still takes him aback.

Sanji explains that he must have been 13 or 14 at the time, and he goes on to describe how upset his dad got with him over the whole fiasco. When Zeff finally tried the one of the more perfected, streamlined iterations of the leek soup, he said dropped the subject entirely. “That means that he liked it,” Sanji explains.

You’ve tried to piece together the man in front of you as long as you’ve known him—evidently, he wasn’t showered with praise as a child. The stories he’s told you, and his reaction to your compliments, make that clear. But he still has so much kindness in his heart, it’s absurd.

While Sanji tells you about the anecdotes and memories that prompted certain recipes, you notice that he’s figeting with the edge of his napkin with one hand. He’s nervous. It melts your heart a bit.

You lose track of the courses. Each is more scrumptious than the last, which shouldn’t be possible, but he’s a culinary genius so he’s pulled it off somehow. Afterwards, there’s a cheese course, a platter of dips, a carpaccio of some sort, a savory galette, another salad… the plates are small and never ending.

The last dish is, of course, dessert. It’s a tiramisu, scooped out of a huge serving dish, table-side.

The layers are defined, and it smells like cocoa. Sanji hesitates with this explanation. You wonder why.

“Tiramisu? How’d you come up with this one?” You smile at him, sensing his pause, and his heart flutters.

“Well,” he says, clearing his throat. “I heard my mom say that she liked it one day, offhand… So, I made it. I’ve been making it ever since.”

This is the first time he’s mentioned her in all your long months of talking. “Your mom?”

“Y-yeah, she uhh… She passed a long time ago when I was a little kid. She got really sick. She never got to try the tiramisu. But, ah, fuck, this sounds a bit cheesy, but whenever I make it, I make it for her.”

“Oh,” you respond, softly. “That’s very sweet, Sanji.”

He averts his eyes for a split-second, and you see that blush is taking over his whole face. Your heart is twisting at his story—how is this man real? He makes it for her? Fucking hell, he’s perfect.

Each story he’s told tonight has given you a look into his character, his childhood, memories, and impressions of the world. The tiramisu is perfect—it’s not too sweet and the flavors are balanced. The perfect way to end the perfect meal.

“Fuck, Sanji,” you say, furrowing your brows in an expression of incredulity. “It’s delicious. Like, one of the best things I’ve ever had.”

“Thanks, sweetheart. I made this batch myself.”

You can taste the love that it’s made with, really. This whole meal has been ridiculously good. You didn’t know food could be this good. It tastes even better because the handsome man across from you is showering you in compliments and the bill is completely taken care of.

“So, what did you think?” Sanji asks when the meal is over, reaching for your hand again. He’s smiling and a bit shy.

“It was amazing.” You respond simply, and he sees your lips curl up into that smile he so covets. “Thank you, Sanji. Seriously. For sharing everything with me. This was lovely.”

“It didn’t disappoint?” His eyes are brightening. You can see he’s starting to positively beam at your praise.

“It didn’t disappoint in the slightest. You’re so talented, it’s just, wow.”

When you leave the restaurant, you walk into the parking lot holding hands. You reflect in the third person for a second—how wild is this, to be with this man here, right now, hand in hand, with bashful smiles. Those familiar butterflies stir when he looks at you.

Like clockwork, Sanji invites you back to his place. You usually decline his invitation (which he presents without fail) because you don’t want to get too attached too fast, but… you’ve decided that sentiment is futile. You’re already attached. Very attached. There’s no point in deluding yourself any longer, really. You’re madly in love with each other and it’s no secret.

“Would you like to come back to mine for a drink, gorgeous?”

You take a second to study him. He does look fantastic, so put together and well-kept, and he’s been so sweet with you. You like him too much to decline.

“I’d love to.”

The ride back home is quiet—you’re comfortable enough with Sanji to sit in silence for periods of time. It’s peaceful, and it feels like you’ve known each other for years. He reaches a hand over and sets it on your thigh, giving you a soft squeeze.

Before you know it, you’re in Sanji’s apartment again. You’ve been here a handful of times. He’s made you dinners and lunches, you’ve watched shows together and cuddled on the couch. But tonight, you feel something in the air. Maybe tonight is the night that you go all the way with him, finally.

When you’re settled on the couch, he offers you a glass of wine or a cocktail. He caters to you like you’re royalty. An interesting irony.

“Would you like a pair of sweats and a hoodie, darling?” He asks after he’s fixed you your drink. You smile at him and respond in the affirmative—the stuffy, cute outfit you’ve been wearing is getting on your nerves, and it’s going to feel so much better to wear his clothes. It always does.

When you change into his clothes and return to the living room, Sanji’s face goes crimson again. He’s only seen you in his clothes a handful of times before and it makes him feel things. His heart and stomach are doing flips and his eyes are practically turning into hearts. He’s adorable.

“Would you like to watch something together, gorgeous? Maybe that show you were telling me about?” He asks as you both get comfy on the couch. Your bodies are pressed side-by-side.

“How about we just snuggle for a bit?” You propose, and he readily agrees.

“I could be persuaded to snuggle.” Sanji puts an arm around your waist and pulls you closer. “I can’t believe you spend time with me. I’m the luckiest man on earth.” He’s smiling and peppering your face with kisses.

“Sanjiiii,” you say, giggling. “Cut it out. It tickles.”

“I—don’t—ever—want—to—stop,” he kisses you somewhere between each word. Your cheeks, your neck, your hand, your forehead. Anywhere he can reach. “You’re stunning.”

His hand reaches for your chin and guides your lips to his. He’s preposterously suave. It’s like something out of a romance movie.

When he breaks the kiss, he says, “How did I land you? You’re just too beautifu—”

You cut him off by pressing your lips on his mid-word. You can tell he’s nervous and high-strung from dinner. But now that he’s impressed you like he wanted, he can calm down. He relaxes into your embrace after a second.

The kisses start soft, but they quickly increase in desperation. He wants you so bad that you can feel his yearning with each kiss. Ever the gentleman, he keeps his hands to his self, only placing one on your cheek and the other softly on your hip.

Maybe tonight is the night.

As you lock lips, you move his hand from where it rests on your hip downwards, so he’s touching your ass now through the sweatpants he lent you. Sanji timidly grabs a handful. He’s being gentle and shy, but you suspect that he’s in agony with desire.

This is a moment he’s dreamed about for around a year at this point. This night is about to be filled with moments that he’s been dreaming of.

You move his other hand from your cheek to your chest—his hands do as they please, petting and kneading you through the fabric of his clothes. After a few moments of Sanji’s hands getting their fill, they trail to your waist and he maneuvers you backwards, guiding you to lay on the couch while he perches over you.

You’re on your back now and he’s braced over you, with one hand next to your head and the other placed on your waist. He slides a knee between your legs, pressing it up between your legs, leaving it to rest there. Who knew this chef had it in him.

As you continue to lock lips, the pleasure from his knee grazing your core starts to make heat bloom between your legs.

You start to grind onto his knee slightly, and when your quiet sounds of pleasure seep out of your lips and into Sanji’s mouth, your hand finds his hard bulge. You caress him gently and pulls your lips from his.

“I want you, Sanji,” you murmur, and he pauses his wandering hands. He wants to ravage you totally, to have his way with you and make you reel in ecstasy, but he needs to check on you first.

“Wait, wait, my love, are you sure?” He whispers, softly placing a hand over yours, keeping it still. “Are you absolutely sure you want to go farther?”

“Mmmhmm,” you look at him with pleading eyes and he almost melts on the spot. “I’m sure, Sanji.”

“Then let’s get more comfortable,” he says. “Want to go to my room?”

You agree, and within moments you’re in Sanji’s bed under the covers. The bed is big and plushy, the sheets are soft, and the lighting is low and warm. He wastes no time pulling off his shirt and pants as he slides under the sheets.

You do the same, pulling off the clothes he so nicely lent you. You’re in your underwear now, and he’s in his, and he’s looking at you like you’re a piece of art. He’s wondering if he should pinch himself—is this a dream?

Not only does he get to spend time with you, the person he loves, but he also gets to see you and touch you? He’s thanking his lucky stars. If he knew many months ago that this would be his future, he wouldn’t have believed it.

Sanji pulls you to him and your chests are pressing together. He brings his lips to your neck and kisses a trail down to your collarbone.

“What did I ever do to get so lucky?” He asks again before he presses his lips on yours. His skin is warm, and his hands are rough. But the rest of him is soft—especially his hair, which your fingers weave their way through.

You throw a thigh over his hip and draw him closer. You realize that he’s hard, pressing on your core through the fabric of your underwear. While he kisses you he starts to slowly, barely rock his hips into you.

Sanji’s strong hands wander to grab rough handfuls of your ass. He uses his grip on your skin to press your body closer to his, and at the same time, he grinds harder into you. Heat is starting to build at the base of his spine—he can feel his lust slipping out. He’s about to lose his composure.

You suspected that Sanji would have some skills but he’s sinfully good in bed so far and you’re not even naked yet. Just the way he rolls his hips is mesmerizing. His kissing technique leaves nothing to be desired.

You have a feeling that he could do this for hours. But he’s not going to make any first moves here, no matter how crazed and desirous he feels. You’ve already talked about what this moment would look like, after all. Sanji told you a while ago that if and when you had sex for the first time, he wanted you to take the lead. He hates the idea of doing anything to you that makes you even the least bit uncomfortable or pressured.

Knowing this, you extricate yourself from him and remove your bra. He helps you shimmy out of your panties. Then you place your hands on him and drag your fingers downwards, conjuring a trail of goosebumps in their wake. Your fingertips pass over his broad chest, his toned and hard abs, and his dark happy trail. They reach the waistband of his boxers and slide underneath.

When your fingers touch his bare skin and wrap around his erection, his breath hitches and he goes completely still. All of his senses are focused on how soft your hand feels on his aching length and how leisurely you start to stroke him.

“Ah,” he lets out a sound that’s somewhere between a whine and a groan. “That f-feels so good, gorgeous.”

You hum in response and bring your other hand to the waistband of his underwear, pulling it down so his erection springs all the way out. Bringing both hands to his shaft now, you stroke him, slowly twisting your wrists.

His shaft is thick and long—the perfect size. You can tell it’s going to feel like a nice good stretch when he finally nestles himself inside you. If he’s not careful it might be a bit painful. He’s quite well endowed.

Minutes pass like seconds and precum starts to weep from his head, trickling down your fingers. He’s squirming slightly. Every twist of your wrists around his throbbing length elicits a delightful, lewd noise from him.

“Fuucck,” he whines softly, “if you keep it up I’m gonna—gonna cum.”

“Well, we wouldn’t want that yet, would we?” You offer him a coy smile and stop moving.

Sanji kisses you in short, passionate bursts. After a second, he makes a proposition.

“How about I go down on you?”

“Mmmm. I’ll allow it. I heard you’re quite talented.” You smile, referencing a conversation the pair of you had many months ago. Sanji cracks a grin, and you giggle.

“Let’s hope I wasn’t overselling myself, huh?”

You lay back on the pillows. Sanji gets on top of you, situating himself between your wide-spread legs—he starts to leave a trail of kisses from the hollow of your throat over your sternum and across your belly button. His lips keep moving lower—when he reaches the space where your thighs meet, he pulls one of your thighs up slightly. He holds it up effortlessly, kissing from behind your knee inwards and upwards towards your core. His lips stop right before they get to the place you crave them the most.

Sanji does the same with your other thigh, lifting it up and kissing the inside until he’s painfully close to your sensitive spots.

After teasing your thighs with kisses, Sanji finally touches you where you’ve been waiting for. He brings his fingers to your already sticky core. When his flesh meets yours, you gasp. He spreads you apart just barely, giving himself full access to your clit.

He wets his lips and places a soft, delicate kiss right on top of your sensitive bud of nerves. It’s a slow kiss, one that’s so gentle that it leaves you wanting more. When he goes in for a second kiss he uses a bit of tongue this time, just barely swirling the tip of his tongue in a circle. It sends a zap of pleasure through your body—your toes curl and you inhale sharply.

Sanji spends a few minutes doing this. He kisses your clit, alternating between using tongue and no tongue, and when your thighs spread wider and you begin to shake just the tiniest amount, he places a long lick from below your folds all the way upwards, ending with your clit. He dips his tongue in slightly, tasting you and relishing your scent, noises, and movements.

Your hands wander into his hair and he holds back a smile. He needs to focus on making you feel good. He knows he’s doing that right now, but he wants to make you feel even better. He’d love to hear you begging for more.

“S-sanji,” you murmur, your tone bathed in lust and oozing with need. You don’t say anything other than his name, but he knows what you mean.

His tongue and lips move lower—he presses his tongue into you slowly and it feels otherworldly. He brings it out and back in again, going as deep as he can. One of his hands rests on your thigh, pushing it down so he can have better access.

He relishes the weight of your fingers in his hair and your shallow, rapid breaths. This is heaven. He wishes he could freeze this moment and live in it forever.

As more arousal seeps out of you, Sanji pushes his ring finger into you slowly. He hooks it, delicately pressing you in all the right spots. While his finger explores, he keeps placing kisses on your clit. After a few moments, when you’ve adjusted to his finger, he presses another one into you.

Sanji’s cock is weeping against the covers as he eats you out and fingers you. His hips press into the sheets, humping against the fabric slightly. He can’t hold himself back.

His eyes snap upwards and meet yours. You’re staring down at him, gazing at where his pretty lips meet your flesh. When he looks up at you, he sees how glossy and half-lidded your eyes are. His heart patters and threatens to stop. He takes a mental screenshot.

Sanji’s fingers search for a certain spot inside of you—a spongy, gooey one. When he thinks he’s found it, he presses it slightly. Your thighs shake, your back arches off the sheets, and your toes curl again.

“Mmmppphhhh, Sanji, fuck,” you moan and he hums in response.

The slurping noises that he’s making are paired with muted squelching noises from where his tongue works on your heat and his fingers caress you inside. You’re almost at your limit.

He pulls his lips away and his fingers stop moving. “Do you want to cum, princess? Or do you want to wait?”

He’s so polite even when he’s feral. It’s heart melting.

Your brain is short circuiting. You do want to cum. You feel too good to ignore that crazy desire. But you also know that waiting and edging yourself a little bit would result in a better orgasm overall. But who’s to say that you can’t cum multiple times?

Sanji can see you check out mentally while you have this inner conversation with himself. A couple seconds pass. It’s hard to think straight while his fingers are inside of you, while his lips are poised so closely…

While you attempt to think it over, Sanji presses a kiss on your clit to get your attention. You whimper and respond, “I can’t make up my mind.” Your face looks tortured and it’s making his heart do flips.

“Just let me make you feel good,” he says, voice warm and comforting. You nod, closing your eyes, and he reaches under you to pull you even closer to his face.

Sanji draws his fingers out of you slowly and then presses his lips back to your entrance, probing his tongue against your hot arousal. Your hips buck inadvertently, and the movement presses his tongue deeper into you. Lost in pleasure already, you pull on his hair so hard that it hurts him (in the best way).

Sanji’s technique is mind blowing. You lose track of where his tongue and lips and fingers end and where your skin begins. All you know is that the space between your legs feels good, and hot, and sloppy, and buzzing, and throbbing, and Sanji’s there.

He can tell you’re close after a little while, can feel you writhing against his eager tongue as depraved sounds trickle out of you.

After fucking you with his tongue and playing with your clit, Sanji slides a finger into you to caress and pet your g-spot as he lavishes your clit with the rest of his attention. It’s mind-numbingly good and brings you to orgasm in seconds.

“S-s-sanji, I—fuck, fuck,” you whine at him and moan his name through your orgasm. The greedy slurping sounds that ring in the room are filthy and loud. While you cum you pull him (by his hair) as close as he can get to your core. Sanji licks you clean, savoring every last drop of the pleasure he coaxed out of you.

You’re in a daze, riding out the ripples of ecstasy from your orgasm as he moves upwards, climbing over you, to pull you into a tender kiss.

He’s prepared to leave it there—he doesn’t want to push anything further. He made you cum and that’s his dream come true. But even though you just came, you feel a burning, carnal desire for more. More of Sanji’s skin on yours, more of his hips moving, more of his soft hair in your hands, more everything.

“Sanji,” you mutter and his ears perk up. “Wanna do more.” It’s both a statement and a question.

“Are you sure, gorgeous?” He looks worried for a second. He doesn’t want to push you too far. But when he sees how strongly you nod your head yes, how blown out your pupils and lidded your eyes are in lust, he lets go of all apprehension.

“How about you sit up, pretty?” He asks, and you do as he says. Sanji sits up too, and he maneuvers you so you’re straddling him, chests pressed together. Your arms are thrown over his shoulders, you wrap your legs around him, and your lips come to meet his neck—he smells manly, musky, and faintly of cologne. His heart is beating so fast you can feel it in your chest.

Your head is still floating from your orgasm moments ago, but you have enough sense to lift up slightly, positioning yourself over his erection.

“Please, darling,” he whispers, feeling your hot breath on his neck.

While you place kisses on his neck, you sink down onto his length, slowly and cautiously. It’s a delicious feeling of being spread open—your body conforms to his girth and accommodates his (many) inches. The stretch feels amazing somehow, not painful like you were worried about.

When he’s fully inside of you the wiry ring of hair at the base of his shaft meets with your skin and he lets out a quiet groan.

“F-fuuhhhckkk.”

You sit like this for a second—his arms come to wrap around your waist and your walls throb around him. He’s trying to be patient, trying to fully appreciate this moment and etch each sensation in his mind. But his body is going into overdrive. His patience wears thin and disappears.

Sanji presses his hips upwards slightly, eliciting a gasp from you that makes his heart flutter. He does it again and the leaking tip of his shaft brushes that spongey spot inside of you just right.

“Ah, Sanji, fuck that feels good,” you whimper, speaking into the crook of his neck.

He does it again, harder this time. Each thrust of his hips conjures what feel like fireworks of pleasure. While your eyes are squeezed shut and your mouth hangs open in absent concentration, each press of his hips makes pretty colors erupt behind your eyes. Every burst of pleasure is red, white, purple, dazzlingly distracting.

His hands creep from your waist to your ass, then lower, to cup your thighs underneath and you’re reminded that this is a very real moment. He begins to slowly pull you up his length and press you back down, manipulating your movements on his shaft in a way that makes your eyes roll back in your head and your moans increase in desperation.

“Fuck, you’re—you’re perfect,” Sanji forces the words out between ragged breaths and grunts. “Perfect for me.”

Sanji is getting dangerously close to orgasm. He doesn’t know what to do—should he go slower now? Edge himself? Would you prefer he pulled out and took care of his own business?

As Sanji’s mind races for a second, you mutter something into his neck that makes him feel like his heart is going to stop.

“Inside.”

He pauses.

“What?”

“I said—ah—I said inside.”

Sanji gets the message. And while you’ve been explicit, he has to check. He’s just a gentleman through and through.

“Are you absolutely sure, beautiful?”

You nod again and lick a soft stripe up his neck. Sanji stifles a groan. His voice is hoarse, and his groans are punctuated by raspy breaths that go straight to your ear (and right between your legs).

When he starts to move again, Sanji finds a measured pace that shifts up a notch every few thrusts. The speed grows and he’s using all strength and concentration to make you feel as good as possible.

Your moans are so guttural that they almost sound like sobs. Each one goads on Sanji’s pace—and all the while, he’s actively conscious of the fact that he’s having sex with you, the person he loves, the person he’s loved for many months, the person he’s fantasized about being close with in every way.

If you could focus enough to get a good look at him you’d see that his cheeks are ruddy and his hair is plastered around the temples with sweat. He looks like a mess, and damn, it suits him.

In your daze, you’re approaching orgasm. You want him to cum, too, of course. You have an idea of something that might push him over the edge.

Your lips trail from his neck upwards, finding his earlobe. When you suck on it softly, Sanji pauses almost imperceptibly. He’s holding on for dear life. He’s close to orgasm, resisting it as much as he can so he can relish this moment for as long as physically possible.

But when you bite down on his earlobe, just enough to cause pain, Sanji crumbles. His thrusts turn haphazard and frantic. He loses himself in pleasure. Each gravelly moan that tumbles out of his mouth is followed by a whimper.

He cums when you bite down again. And while he cums, you whisper his name into his ear in the filthiest tone you can manage. It’s a tone that’s far more erotic than any you employed with him on the past. It’s a sincere one, one from the heart (and elsewhere), totally anchored in the reciprocal and yearning desire of the present moment.

Sanji comes apart and splits at the seams. As his arms encircle and pull you tighter, he rocks up one last time then, per your request, he orgasms inside of you. He moans your name through his orgasm, much like you did for him, and you know that he’s done this many times before. Your name is familiar and comfortable in his mouth.

The difference now is that (among other things) his words are met with a pair of ears other than his own. His moans are caused by your real warmth, flesh, and pleasure, too. It’s more intense than he could have imagined. He’s seeing stars. He buries his face in the crook of your neck while he orgasms, shuddering breaths while he embraces you so tight that it’s almost painful.

After many moments of labored, recovering breaths and soft nuzzles into each other’s skin, Sanji gingerly pulls out of you. He lifts you and sets you on your back on the bed. You’re coming back to reality slowly but surely. He props himself next to you and brings a hand to pet your hair.

“That was spectacular. You’re perfect, my love.”

“Nobody’s perfect,” you roll your eyes jokingly.

“Mmmm. Agree to disagree, gorgeous. C’mere.” Sanji kisses you softly once, cupping your face with both hands. When he pulls away, he seems to stiffen a bit. He offers a smile—did that look a little reserved, or are you overthinking things?—puts on his boxers, and goes to the bathroom to get you a towel.

The thought that just flitted through Sanji’s mind making him stiffen up isn’t a kind one. Frequently these sorts of thoughts weasel their way into his mind. This one just reminded him to not be 'too much'. Don’t be too overbearing. Don’t scare her away. Don’t suffocate her with your affection. What if she doesn’t want it? What if it’s too much for her?

Sanji reflects as he walks to grab you a towel. He’s been holding back his love for you for months. Ever since you first talked on the phone, he knew that he loved you. It has been many long months since then. And through all these long months, he’s tried to keep the visceral strength of his emotions at bay.

Now that Sanji knows you in real life, now that he’s started seeing you, now that the feelings are (supposedly) mutual, the love inside of him has only grown. But it hasn’t grown proportionately to what he allows to escape. In other words, as much as his love for you grows, he tries to reign it in for fear of being too much for you.

Sanji has been counting down the hours, minutes, and seconds until you’re comfortable enough with him for him to be fully himself. Because of his fear of scaring you away, he’s been trying to practice restraint. He’s been trying to present a version of himself that doesn’t seem too eager, too lovey-dovey and too obsessed. But every time he sees you, he feels like he’s going to burst at the seams.

As he walks through his apartment to grab you a towel, thoughts of self-doubt and caution assail his mind.

Could someone like you really love someone like him, a lonely, desperate loser who only works and smokes? It doesn't make any sense.

Will you get sick of him if he lets loose the strong feelings inside? If you get sick of him, he doesn't know how he'd cope with the heartbreak.

If he’s open with you, if he pets your hair like he wants to, holds your hand, stares longingly into your eyes and pulls you closer—if he does all of that and more, would it be too much for you? Will too much put you off, chase you away, or scare you?

Concern is written on his face plain as day, as much as he tries to hide it. You’ve noticed it a couple of times. On a few of the dates you’ve been on you've seen it peek through. And you saw it just now, when he stiffened up a bit.

You ponder for a moment on how to ease the tension you feel from him. How best can you offer this man some solace, in a sincere way that doesn’t have a trace of the artificial sugar through which you used to have to filter your words?

A couple seconds pass and you can hear Sanji padding softly back into his bedroom with a plush, white towel.

You take a second to admire his frame as he approaches the bed. He’s slender and toned. His hair is ruffled up and his cheeks are still rosy from the effort moments ago.

Your eyes sweep from his feet to his legs and thighs—they’re thick and hairy. Upwards more and you admire his pretty happy trail that snakes up his abdomen and thins out before it reaches his belly button.

Your eyes wander farther and you see his pecs—trimmed and defined—the same goes for his biceps, shoulders…

Sanji can tell you’re giving him a good look and he flushes crimson. The blush is enough to avert the negative thoughts mulling in his head.

As your eyes flick up to meet his, he smiles, but you can still make out some restraint—this faint tension from Sanji is a tension you can only surmise comes from his insecurity. You know him too well.

“Here you go, beautiful,” he says, rounding the bed to your side. He gets ready to kiss you again and help you get a bit tidier.

“Sanji,” your tone is different when you speak. It’s soft and firm at the same time. He pauses, heart stopping for a second.

Are you about to tell him you don’t want him? His mind races to the worst-case scenario.

“Yes?”

“Don’t forget that I’m head over heels for you, okay?” You reach out a hand to him. “You don’t have to hold anything back with me.”

He exhales and sits down on the bed next to you, sliding his fingers through yours.

“Fuck. Am I being that obvious?” He furrows his brow and lets out a nervous chuckle.

“Mmmm, only a little bit. Are you doing okay?”

He brings a hand to your cheek again. “I’m doing wonderfully. I’m just… I’m trying not to drown you in affection. I like you so much and I feel so strongly about you that I get a little worried about scaring you away.”

“Sanji.” You frown. It hurts to hear him say something like that. Maybe you haven’t been vocal enough with him about how you feel. “You’re not going to drown me in affection. I told you I’m head over heels for you. I mean it. I’m here for good and I love you.”

“You promise?” He squeezes your hand, and a smile takes over his lips.

“I promise. You're not going to scare me away. So no more holding back, okay?”

Sanji nods, relieved, and leans in for another kiss. He goes in with the intention of giving you a good one. But it turns into multiple.

His kisses feel different this time. Maybe they feel more honest. Softer. Sweeter. Something has changed.

When he pulls away from you, he keeps his face close. He’s so pretty up close like this—his eyes are stunning. His irises are a complicated color that you can’t quite place, his cheeks are flushed, and his hair is pushed back. His smile is charming and makes your stomach do flips.

“Now that I’m not holding back anymore,” he begins, “do you know how precious you are to me? How much I cherish you?”

“A lot?” You venture a guess, and your grin makes Sanji’s heart trip.

“A lot is an understatement. I can’t put it into words. I just want to shower you in affection, cook for you all day, and treat you like you deserve. I think about you a, uh, probably a concerning amount. I’m enamored.”

You thread you fingers through his hair again, pushing it back to expose his forehead some more, admiring those pretty cheekbones, and those swirly eyebrows.

“Well, I feel the same, Sanji. I’m glad you finally worked up the nerve to ask me out. You say that I’m perfect, but I think that’s you. Do you know how much I cherish you, Sanji?” You bring your entwined hands to your lips, kissing Sanji’s softly. "A lot. So don't ever hold back with me."

“Hearing that makes me happier than I can put into words, gorgeous.”

After exchanging more kisses and sickeningly sweet words, you put Sanji’s comfy clothes back on. You move to the living room again and he fixes you anything you please. You show him that show you love a lot, and he watches intently, laser-focused because he believes your taste in media (and other things) reflects some part of your character. As he watches, he wonders, what does she like best about this? What speaks to her about this?

His ardent admiration for you seeps out of him in a steady stream now. You soothed his heart and applied a salve of words and kisses. He’s happy to his core, with every fiber of his being, a pure sort of joy that he hasn’t felt in many, many years. He savors you as much as he possibly can and never stops counting his lucky stars, per say.

Maybe his lovesickness and insecurity will sneak up again on him. Most likely. He knows that next time that crushing wave comes for him—the wave of self-doubt and disgust—you’ll reassure him wholeheartedly. He won’t scare you away, he can’t, and he will never be too much for you.

< previous part | masterlist >

a/n: yay for more writing to laufey! i hope you liked this :) i feel very intense things about this man! :0 also this really is a labor of love it took me so long omfg.

#happy birthday sanji!#sanji smut #op sanji smut #op smut #op x reader #one piece x reader #one piece reader insert #sanji x reader #sanji x y/n #sanji x you

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prettygirl-gabi · 4 months ago

Text

Title: Stirred & Sweet

Pairing: Paige Bueckers x Reader

Rating: T (Teen)

Fandom: UConn Women’s Basketball

Word count: 3k+

Warning: Mild language, teasing from teammates, and an excessive amount of Dirty Shirleys.

Summary: being a bartender isn’t so bad after all

A/N: I got carried away and I didn’t want to do more than one part though… enjoy

🏷️: @yailtsv

There are slow nights at Ted’s, and then there are nights like this—where the place is packed shoulder to shoulder, the music is loud enough to shake the walls, and I’m pretty sure I’ll smell like grenadine for the next three days.

It’s my usual Friday night shift, and I’m behind the bar, flipping between orders faster than I can process them. But then, right in the middle of pouring a vodka soda, I hear a voice that’s unmistakable over the noise.

“Yo, can I get a Dirty Shirley?”

I don’t even have to look up. I already know.

Paige Bueckers.

Five-year UConn legend. Face of the program. Probably could get a drink for free just by flashing that stupidly perfect smile.

I glance up, and sure enough, she’s leaning against the bar, chin resting on her hand, watching me with that casual, slightly smug expression. Azzi, Ice, and the rest of the team are packed in behind her, laughing and teasing each other.

“Gotcha,” I say, grabbing a glass. “Coming right up.”

I make Dirty Shirleys all the time—it’s one of the easiest drinks in the book. But mine? Mine are the best. It’s not just about throwing Sprite, vodka, and grenadine into a cup. It’s about balance, ratios, the right kind of vodka, and just a little extra touch.

I slide the drink across the counter. “One Dirty Shirley, Bueckers. Hope it lives up to the hype.”

Paige takes a sip, and for a second, her expression is unreadable. Then, her eyes widen slightly, and she licks her lips like she’s trying to make sure she actually tasted what she thinks she did.

“Oh, hell no.” She looks at her teammates. “This is the best one I’ve had in five years.”

Azzi snorts. “You’ve had a lot of Dirty Shirleys, huh?”

“You don’t understand, Z.” Paige turns back to me. “How did you—what did you do?”

I grin, wiping my hands on a bar rag. “Trade secret.”

“No, for real. How are you this good at making drinks?”

I lean on the counter. “My dad owns a bar back home. He taught me everything. Ratios, ingredients, even flair bartending when I was like thirteen—don’t ask me why he thought that was a good idea. By the time I was seventeen, I could make drinks better than half the bartenders at his place.”

Paige shakes her head, impressed. “Damn. So I just got served a professional-level Dirty Shirley?”

“Something like that.” I smirk. “And now, the only way you’re getting one this good is if I make it myself.”

She raises a brow, a challenge in her eyes. “Bet.”

⸻

From that night on, Paige only orders Dirty Shirleys if I’m the one making them.

It turns into a thing.

She’ll walk into Ted’s, lock eyes with me across the bar, and hold up a finger—no words, just that stupidly charming smirk. And I already know. One Dirty Shirley, coming right up.

She hypes it up to the team, tells anyone who’ll listen that I make the best ones. She even gets a little dramatic about it sometimes.

“I refuse to drink a basic one now,” she tells me one night, sipping happily. “You’ve ruined them for me.”

“Oh no,” I deadpan. “Whatever will you do when I graduate?”

“Guess I’ll have to marry you, so you can make them for me forever.”

I choke on my laugh. “Paige.”

She just winks and takes another sip.

⸻

A few weeks later, it’s almost 2 AM when my phone buzzes.

I groan, rolling over, barely registering the name on my screen before answering.

“Paige,” I mumble. “Why are you calling me in the middle of the night?”

“Okay, don’t be mad,” she says, which means she’s about to say something ridiculous. “But I really want a Shirley Temple.”

I squint at my phone, confused. “Like… a non-alcoholic one?”

“Yes.”

I blink. “You called me at two in the morning for that?”

“You’re the only one who makes them right!” she whines. “Please? I’ll owe you forever.”

I sigh, already sitting up. “You better leave your door unlocked.”

⸻

When I get to her dorm, she’s waiting at the door, practically bouncing.

“You actually came,” she grins.

“You sounded desperate,” I tease, lifting the pitcher. “Figured it was my duty.”

She drags me inside, already pulling out cups. “You’re a lifesaver.”

We end up on the couch, sipping Shirley Temples and watching Friends. Somewhere between episodes, I stretch out, and Paige throws a blanket over both of us.

It’s late. Really late. But she’s warm next to me, and my eyes are getting heavier.

I wake up hours later to the sound of the TV playing softly, Paige’s head resting against my shoulder, and an almost-empty pitcher on the coffee table.

Not bad for a midnight call.

⸻

A week later, I’m back at work when Paige shows up again. But this time, she doesn’t ask for a Dirty Shirley.

“You’re trying something new tonight,” I tell her, already reaching for ingredients.

She looks skeptical. “You’re experimenting on me?”

“Yup.” I grin, setting up the glass. “I promise it’ll be good.”

She watches as I pour Seagram’s Ginger Ale, add two and a half shots of Don Julio, a shot of Tequila Silver, then grab an orange popsicle straight out of the freezer. I drop it in, stick and all, then drizzle in some strawberry syrup.

Paige raises a brow. “What the hell is this?”

“A masterpiece.” I slide it to her. “Try it.”

She takes a sip, then licks her lips slowly, processing the taste.

“Oh, that’s dangerous,” she murmurs.

“Told you.”

She takes another sip, eyes lighting up. “Okay, this is actually insane. What’s it called?”

I wipe down the counter. “I don’t know yet. You get to name it.”

She thinks for a second, then smirks. “Huskies Sunset.”

I laugh. “Why?”

“Because it looks like a sunset, and it’ll probably make you howl if you drink too much.”

I shake my head. “You’re ridiculous.”

“But you love it.” She grins, lifting her glass. “To Huskies Sunsets.”

And just like that, we’ve got a new favorite.

A few days later Paige send me a text

Paige: Yo, you working tonight?

Me: Yeah, why? You tryna bother me while I work again?

Paige: Maybe. Also… bring your best sales pitch.

I stare at my phone, confused, but before I can ask what she means, she sends another message.

Paige: Just trust me. You’ll thank me later.

I shake my head, pocket my phone, and head to Ted’s.

⸻

When I walk in, I immediately notice something weird.

My boss, Mike, is standing behind the bar—not working, just standing there, arms crossed, a deep-in-thought look on his face. And across from him, sitting on a stool like she owns the place, is Paige.

The moment she sees me, she waves. “Took you long enough.”

I set my bag down. “What’s going on?”

Mike looks at me, then at Paige, then back at me. “Your girl here has been talking my ear off about adding some drink to the menu.”

I blink. “Wait… what?”

Paige smirks. “Huskies Sunset. I told him it deserves a permanent spot.”

My jaw nearly drops. “Paige.”

She shrugs, all casual. “It’s a hit. I mean, I should know—I’ve had like five.”

Mike sighs, rubbing his temple. “Look, I’m not against it, but I don’t just put random drinks on the menu. It’s gotta sell.”

Paige leans forward. “It will sell. I promise you. Y/N makes the best drinks on campus, and this one is dangerous in the best way. People will eat it up.”

I can’t help but smile a little. She’s really going to bat for me.

Mike looks at me. “You got a name for this thing?”

I nod. “Huskies Sunset.”

He thinks for a moment, then sighs. “Fine. But it’s on a trial run. If it doesn’t sell, it’s out.”

Paige claps her hands. “Oh, it’ll sell. Just wait.”

⸻

Turns out, she wasn’t wrong.

The moment word gets out that there’s a Paige-approved drink on the menu, people start ordering it like crazy. It gets to a point where I can barely keep up—I’ve got orange popsicles flying, tequila pouring, and strawberry syrup everywhere.

And of course, the team eats it up.

Azzi is the first to tease me. “Wow, Paige gets one favorite bartender, and now she’s getting drinks added to the menu?”

Ice shakes her head. “Nah, this is next-level simp behavior.”

I roll my eyes. “She just likes the drink.”

Ayanna grins. “Just the drink? Y’all are literally always together.”

I scoff. “We are not.”

Paige, unbothered, sips her Huskies Sunset. “We kinda are.”

And that’s all it takes. The teasing gets worse.

Suddenly, everyone’s pointing out every little thing we do together—how we study at the same table in the library, how Paige randomly FaceTimes me while I’m at work, how we spend way too much time coming up with new drink ideas.

It doesn’t help that one night, she asks me to teach her how to bartend.

I try to play it cool, but the moment she steps behind the bar, sleeves rolled up, ready to learn? Yeah. I might be in trouble.

⸻

“Alright, Rookie,” I say, setting a bottle of tequila on the counter. “First lesson: pouring without spilling.”

Paige smirks. “Easy.”

It is not easy.

She tries to pour a shot, but the moment the liquid starts flowing, she panics, overcorrects, and half of it ends up on her hand.

I laugh. “Oh, yeah. Natural talent.”

She glares at me, shaking tequila off her fingers. “Okay, okay. Let me try again.”

She does better on the second attempt, actually filling the shot glass without a mess.

I nod approvingly. “Look at that. You’re learning.”

She grins. “Told you I could do it.”

I lean against the counter. “Alright, next test. Shaking a cocktail.”

I set up a simple drink and hand her the shaker. “Two hands, firm grip, shake hard but controlled.”

Paige takes it, mimicking my stance, and starts shaking. At first, she looks focused. But then, halfway through, the lid pops off.

Cue tequila flying everywhere.

I barely dodge it, while Paige gasps, looking at the mess.

“Oh, my God.” She stares at me. “Did I just—”

I burst out laughing. “You definitely just showered us in tequila.”

She winces. “Oops.”

I grab a rag, wiping my arms. “You’re lucky I like you.”

She smirks. “You like me?”

I freeze for half a second.

“…Shut up.”

⸻

The teasing from the team only gets worse after that.

Especially when they find out Paige has a new habit of calling me in the middle of the night.

KK: Ayo, why did I just hear that Y/N got up at 2 AM to bring Paige a Shirley Temple?

Ice: A Shirley. Temple. AT 2 IN THE MORNING?

Azzi: Just date already, my God.

Me: IT WAS JUST A DRINK.

Paige: I have high standards, what can I say?

Caroline adds a poll to the team’s group chat:

Will Y/N and Paige finally admit they’re basically together?

✔ Yes, they’re oblivious

✔ No, but they should be

✔ They’re already dating and just don’t know it yet

Paige just sends a single response.

Paige: Drink up, haters.

⸻

A few nights later, Paige shows up at the bar with an idea.

“So, we’ve got Huskies Sunset,” she says, sliding into her usual seat in front of me. “But we need something else. Something bigger.”

I raise a brow. “Bigger?”

She nods. “Like… a team drink.”

I pause, considering it. “A UConn team drink?”

“Yeah! Something for game nights. Something we can all order and make a thing.”

I grin. “Alright, Challenge Accepted.”

We spend the next few nights messing with ideas, trying out flavors, and (accidentally) getting a little buzzed in the process. Paige is surprisingly good at taste-testing—she knows exactly what she likes, and she’s weirdly good at pairing flavors.

Finally, we land on something.

Blue curaçao for the Huskies’ blue, lemonade for a crisp, refreshing taste, a splash of Sprite for bubbles, and a frozen lemon slice on the rim.

The Husky Huddle.

When we debut it, the team goes crazy.

“Oh, this is dangerous,” Azzi says after her first sip.

Aubrey nods. “Yeah, we’re gonna need this before every away game.”

Ice grins. “Okay, but y’all see what’s happening, right?”

Ayanna smirks. “Oh, we see it.”

Paige looks at me, all innocent. “See what?”

Azzi shakes her head. “Y’all are literally co-owners of the Ted’s bar menu at this point.”

Ice grins. “More like co-owners of each other.”

Paige chokes on her drink. I roll my eyes.

“Y’all are so annoying.”

Azzi just raises her glass. “To Huskies Sunsets, Husky Huddles, and to Paige and Y/N finally admitting they’re a thing.”

Paige and I exchange glances, then both sigh.

We clink our glasses together.

“To Huskies Sunsets,” I say.

“To the best bartender at UConn,” Paige adds, smirking.

⸻

Six Months Later

By now, Paige is a staple at Ted’s.

She still only orders Huskies Sunsets when I’m working. Still calls me in the middle of the night for Shirley Temples. Still shows up unannounced to drag me out for “taste-testing” sessions.

The team hasn’t let up on the teasing. If anything, it’s gotten worse.

KK: So, what’s the hold-up? Y’all married yet?

Ice: I give it another month before Paige breaks and asks Y/N out.

Azzi: One month? You’re generous. I say two weeks.

I just roll my eyes every time. Paige and I—we’re just us. We exist in this weird, perfect space where we know we like each other, but neither of us says it out loud.

Until the night she makes me a drink.

⸻

It’s a slow night, one of those rare ones where I’m not drowning in orders. Paige is at the bar, as usual, twirling a straw between her fingers like she’s debating something.

Then, out of nowhere, she stands up.

“Okay, switch places with me.”

I blink. “Huh?”

She jerks her head toward the bar. “I wanna make you a drink.”

I scoff. “Paige, last time you were back here, you covered yourself in tequila.”

She grins. “Yeah, but I’ve learned. Trust me.”

I hesitate, then sigh, stepping aside. “Alright, Rookie. Show me what you got.”

She cracks her knuckles, looking way too serious for someone making a cocktail.

She starts with a base of passionfruit juice, a splash of lime, then adds two shots of rum. But then, she does something unexpected—she grabs a bottle of peach liqueur and pours just a little in, followed by a drizzle of honey.

I raise an eyebrow. “That’s… an interesting mix.”

Paige winks. “Trust the process.”

She shakes it (without spilling this time) and pours it into a glass over crushed ice. Then, to top it off, she adds a small mint leaf and slides it across the counter.

I pick it up, skeptical, and take a sip.

And damn.

It’s smooth, a little sweet, a little tart, with just the right kick.

I look up at her, surprised. “Paige. This is actually good.”

She smirks. “I know.”

I take another sip, then tilt my head. “What’s it called?”

She leans on the counter, looking at me with that lazy grin of hers.

“Date Night.”

My heart does a full-on somersault.

I set the drink down carefully. “Paige.”

She shrugs, trying (and failing) to look casual. “So, what do you think? Wanna make it official?”

I stare at her for a long second, then grin. “Well, I do like the drink.”

She laughs, shaking her head. “That’s all I get? After six months of pining?”

I take another sip. “Mmm… maybe you should take me out on a real date and find out.”

She leans in, eyes bright. “Deal.”

⸻

Four Years Later

If you had told me back then that one day I’d own my own bar, I probably would’ve laughed in your face.

But here I am, standing behind the counter of Sundown, my very own place in Dallas, with a fresh-cut lime in one hand and my phone buzzing on the counter.

I glance at the screen.

Paige: You at the bar?

Me: Where else would I be?

Paige: Cool. I’m ten minutes away.

I shake my head, smiling to myself.

Some things never change.

⸻

When Paige walks in, the place is packed. It’s a Friday night, and everyone’s here for happy hour, but the moment she steps inside, a few heads turn.

She’s in a hoodie and joggers, looking effortlessly cool, like she didn’t just drop 25 points on the Mercury last night.

She slides into her usual seat at the bar, grinning at me. “What’s up, Superstar?”

I snort. “You’re the only superstar here.”

She taps the counter. “Debatable. Now, hit me with the usual.”

I shake my head, already reaching for the ingredients. “Still not tired of Huskies Sunsets?”

She grins. “Never.”

I make her drink, sliding it over with a flourish. She takes a slow sip, eyes locked on me the whole time.

Then, she sets the glass down and leans in, voice softer. “So… you excited for tomorrow?”

Tomorrow.

Our engagement party.

I glance down at the ring on my finger—the one Paige had slipped on my hand last year after surprising me with a proposal at Ted’s.

(She had tried to be all smooth, but her hands were shaking so bad she almost dropped the ring in my drink.)

I smile. “Excited? Yeah. A little nervous? Also yeah.”

Paige tilts her head. “Nervous why?”

I gesture around. “I don’t know… this bar, this life—it’s everything I wanted. And now we’re about to start a whole new chapter.”

She reaches across the bar, taking my hand in hers. “And that scares you?”

I shake my head. “No. It just… feels big.”

Paige squeezes my hand. “Well, for the record, I think we’re gonna be just fine.”

I look at her—the same Paige who used to drag me out of bed for late-night Shirley Temples, who spent hours behind the bar learning to mix drinks just so we could have an excuse to hang out longer.

The same Paige who, after all these years, still only orders Huskies Sunsets if I’m the one making them.

I squeeze her hand back. “Yeah. I think so too.”

She grins. “Good. Now, gimme another drink. And make it something new.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Something new?”

She nods. “Yeah. Something fresh. Something that screams ‘future wife of a WNBA star.’”

I laugh, already reaching for a bottle. “Alright, challenge accepted.”

And as I start mixing, Paige just sits there, watching me with that soft, lazy grin—the one that says she’d spend forever right here if I let her.

Good thing forever is exactly what we have.

---

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-Thank You For Reading!🩵🩶

-prettygirl-gabi🎀✨️

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nyxxxatnite · 4 months ago

Note

Part 2 for poison??? Where he goes back to reader for another hook up but this time he needs to be close to her. Like legs wrapped around him and her hands in his hair while he practically latches himself onto you. Smut smut smut. He secretly really likes her but doesn’t want anyone to know yk keeping up with his asshole facade

antidote (poison pt2)

Plot: last time should have been the last time, just like he said. But when he comes crawling back, needier than ever you can’t help but come back pt.1

Pairings: asshole!Wally Clark x loner!fem!reader, alive!wally x alive!reader

warning(s): the obvious SMUT!, fluffy end, wally actually ends up being nice and in love? Characters are 18!!! Unprotected sex (WRAP IT), public sex!! Creampie!! Fucking POORLY written. NOT PROOFREAD

a/n: HI GUYS. okay so ik its been a minute 💀 im sorry i usually pump these out and get serious writers block but im TRYING. okay i also know you said to keep him an asshole but i NEEDED fluff!! Enjoy!

Finding yourself at the schools Friday night football game was NOT on your agenda, but you couldn’t help it. You felt drawn in and one of your newer friends BEGGED you to go with her so you did, reluctantly. The stands were PACKED with parents, siblings and other family members along with almost ALL of your classmates. Had football really been THIS popular?

you gave a low groan as you ducked and weaved through the crowd, trying not to get hit or bumped into. It wasn’t working out very well. Small sorry’s left your mouth as you finally wormed your way into your seat next to Julie, who was already teeming with energy.

“ i’m so excited. Monrovia has ALWAYS been a tougher team to beat, hopefully this year with Wally we can beat them. ”

At the mention of his name you tensed, you hadn’t seen or talked to him in what seemed like months (more so a week or two). A part of you, deep down ached for him, while the other part tried to keep you reasoned that he was the one that ended everything, he wanted nothing to do with you. And yet…somehow it felt like he still wanted you. None of the athletics (cheerleaders and football players) even stopped to say anything to you, or tease you about something so small. They just went on their merry way. Had he said something to them?

“ uh hello? Did you hear me? Wally’s looking at you! "

a small shake to your shoulders finally snapped you from your thoughts as your eyes moved to finally make eye contact with said football player. He was finally on the field after their introduction and was staring right at you from his huddle with his team. Once the both of you made eye contact he quickly looked away and popped his helmet on.

you shook your head, blinking yourself back to reality. What was his deal? The buzzers from the score board sounded, commencing the start of the first quarter of the game. The crowd around you buzzed to life in cheers as the boys got into formation after the coin toss, cementing that Monrovia would be starting with the ball. The first kick off was a strong one, sending the ball soaring to the back of the split river formation.

and like that the game set off into a very close, neck to neck game. One team would score and then the other would quickly swoop in and tie with their own touchdown. Everyone around you was on edge, Julie was screaming chants with the student section, making fun of the team and the other student section. You just sat quiet and cheered quietly when your team would score, trying not to burn in embarrassment. But slowly got into the energy of it all, starting to cheer in the last quarter of the game.

within the last few seconds of the game you shot up from your seat, cupping your hands around your mouth as you shouted.

“ GET THAT BALL TO THE END ZONE, WALLY! ”

His attention turned to you for only a second before something inside him amped up, making him sprint and dodge around the other team a bit faster. within the last second his feet finally landed in the end zone, signifying that they had scored the winning points and FINALLY got their hands on the win over Monrovia after years of losing. Loud screams and cheers erupted from the stands around you, the band immediately kicked in with their anthem as the team on the field flocked the quarter back in the end zone.

loud whoops and chants sounded from the boys as they hopped and shook with Wally in their arms, the other team standing dejectedly to the side, feeling the stab of loss from years of winning. You cheered loudly with your classmates, laughing happily as your friend latched onto you.

“ its like he HEARD you! You’re a fucking lucky charm! ”

she squealed happily and shook you, excitement bubbling from her as she darted off to some of her other friends to talk to them. Your attention finally turned back to the football team, seeing the ever happy Wally grinning and congratulating his teammates. His eyes then turned to you, a smirk playing at his lips as he sent you a wink. Butterflies seemed to spring from nowhere in your stomach at the motion, turning to look and see if he was sending it to anyone else, but no one else was paying any attention to the team. You looked back at him again and watched him mouth “stay after”, seeming to mean after the stadium cleared out.

After about an hour of waiting, almost everyone was cleared out of the stadium, lights beginning to shut off. You slowly started to lose hope he’d actually come talk to you, or even if he was still there. You carefully tossed your hood up as it started to drizzle, then pour. You sighed and turned, starting to walk toward the gates when a loud whistle echoed from the dressing rooms. Your head snapped to the source, seeing Wally walk out of the building. He was in his after game attire, hair in messy curls atop his head from the sweat and rain finally hitting his head.

you paused and crossed your arms, trying to keep up your “i hate you” mindset. But seeing him there after weeks made your knees feel like jello. What the fuck was going on in your head?! You tilted your head and watched as he got closer, making you step back

“ didn’t think you’d come to a game. But then i saw you in the stands, dressed in the schools colors with MY number of all numbers painted on your cheek. ”

you scoffed as he finally stopped before you, rolling your eyes as you looked away from him. She painted his number on your cheek? Did she know about you two hooking up or was this one of her dumb “he’s cute” things.

“ yeah, i didn’t paint this on, Julie did. Like hell id risk getting made fun of just to wear your number, Clark. "

He hissed in fake pain as you snapped at him, scrunching his face a bit to add to it. He chuckled and without a word tugged you close but your waist. You gasped in surprise as your chest collided with his, feeling the clothing start to get soaked from the heavy rain. What the hell was he doing?

“ you should wear it more often. Fuck all the time actually. Look..i was a fucking dumbass for pushing you away. Not being able to be near you drove me mad and made me realize some shit that i didn’t want to face. ”

your eyes widened as you realized he was about to confess his feelings. Were you even ready for that? Before he could even say another word you pushed yourself up and kissed him roughly, cupping the back of his head as you tried to keep him from saying anything. A small grunt sounded from the other as he immediately held onto your waist, keeping you close to his body.

the kiss started heated and just continued to stay that way, tongues meshing together in the middle as hands wondered each others bodys. And with hands wandering, came clothes starting to be removed. Were you about to fuck on the football field? You couldn’t really care less, you just needed him now. Moving yourself down onto the soaking grass, you felt him moved between your legs and carefully slip a hand between the two of you.

a small gasp leaves your mouth as he rubs at your clit for a moment, letting you get adjusted and wet enough for him to slip his fingers into your soaking center. Your eyes rolled back a bit from the stretch of his long fingers. Thank fuck for this lanky man, being blessed EVERYWHERE. small moans slipped from your lips as he pumped and curled his fingers in and out of you. Getting you nice and stretched was something he’s never done so it was a nice little change, it made your heart flutter in an odd way?

after a few minutes of prepping you he pulled his fingers out and used whatever wetness he had to lube himself just enough to carefully slip into your awaiting cunt, his eyes rolling back at the hug of your walls. Another gasp came from your throat as he slid inside of you, your hands clambering to grip onto his back to have some sort of tether to earth. He grunted and held still for a second, kissing along your neck and throat, arms winding around your middle to keep you close to him.

As much as your mind was SCREAMING at you to get the hell off the ground, you felt like you were in heaven. Especially when he started to finally fuck his cock in and out of your hot cunt. Moans and groans intertwined from the two of you as you fucked on the football field, rain poured around the two of you, drowning out your sounds so only the two of you could hear. You made an attempt to open your eyes, only to be met with Wally already looking at you. You whimpered softly and drew your eyebrows together, keeping eye contact as you moaned louder. Watching his face morph with pleasure at your sounds, feeling his cock twitch deep inside of you.

He carefully reached between the two of you, rubbing at your clit as he continued to pound into you. The knot in your stomach starting to tighten, feeling it start to verge on snapping. Your eyes rolled back a bit as it all began to be too much for you to even handle.

“ thats it baby, cum for me. Fuck, please cum. ”

he groaned out and placed his forehead to yours, feeling himself near his end as well. With a few final snaps into you, he was releasing everything he had into your awaiting cunt. And once you felt his load fill you, you threw your head back into the ground and cried out as you came not to far behind him. He kept his hips rocking, just to ride out your highs before slowly pulling out of you. He pushed himself up a bit and panted, looking at the absolute mess you were below him making him give a breathy chuckle.

“ we should probably hit the showers, babe. Were an absolute mess. ”

you slowly nodded your head, the after sex high still buzzing in your brain. You let him do what he needed, meaning letting him carry your naked form into the locker rooms to wash the both of you off. It was absolute silence as you stood under the water, somehow more awkward than the times before. Was it because of what he was going to say?

after washing off, you held the towel you were offered tight to your body. Finally registering that your clothes were out on the field still, ruined by the rain and the mud. But it was like Wally read your mind, carefully pulling out some extra clothes he had stuff away in his locker. You tugged on the sweat pants and the hoodie he offered you, humming softly at the warmth of them. He tugged on his own pair of sweats and a tank top, slowly turning to you as he shrugged on his letterman.

“ look…i..fuck. Okay so..i really like you. And i know saying that doesn’t really make up for how i treated you, but it just happened. I realized it when we fucked in the supply closet. And i understand if you don’t feel the same, i just really wanted to tell you. ”

you threw your hand up and covered his mouth to keep him from sputtering on anymore than he was, watching his cheeks and ears go red from embarrassment. You gave a soft giggle as you stared up at him, tilting your head a bit.

“ i like you too dumbass. As much as i hate that i fell for you, i did. ”

he visibly relaxed and moved your hand, tugging you closer as he carefully kissed you. This time keeping it gentle, full of passion. You could really get used to this sweet side Wally had hid away.

#milo manheim #milo manheim smut #wally clark x reader smut #wally clark smut #wally clark x reader #wally clark #school spirits

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skeltnwrites · 7 months ago

Text

The Shape of Family ‧₊˚❀༉

As a single dad, Steve’s world revolves around school drop-offs, bedtime rituals, and tee-ball practices—and he's struggling to keep up. But you're always there, happily lending a hand when he needs it most. / masterlist

part three - you help steve and penelope look for cinderella 11k

a/n - this actually took me ages oh my god. but to those asking about cinderella here you go! CW lost pet (happy ending i promise)

── .✦

The clock hanging in the hall clicks annoyingly loud. Tick, tick, tick, like a bad song stuck in your head. You watch the minute hand cross another line. It hasn’t been adjusted since the time changed last week. Similarly, the calendar below it has yet to be flipped.

It’s November now, but more importantly, it’s Friday. It’s quickly cementing itself as your favorite day of the week. Friday’s mean lunch in Steve’s office and trading weekend plans and hearing about the kind of mischief Penelope’s been up to at home.

But it’s a quarter past eight and Steve hasn’t arrived yet. He’s never been late, or even absent since you started volunteering. It’s odd, but everyone has their days you suppose. Still, a dull twinge blooms in your chest. Working without him might as well be a form of punishment.

Someone had shoved a vacuum in your hands while they try and figure out if he’s coming. It’s boring work, not the kind Steve would give you. And when he has to give you boring work, he at least makes it fun. Turns most things into games or competitions. Like last week, he bet you any candy from the vending machine that he could sort donations faster than you. You bought him a Reeses, of course, but if anyone asks, you let him win on purpose.

You hear Steve before you see him. He’s not loud, but his voice is distinct against any others. By now, you could pick him from a crowd by voice alone. You find him in the threshold between his supervisor's office and the hall. He lingers halfway out, toying with the door handle like he can’t decide if he should go inside.

“Ah, look who finally decided to show up,” you overhear. “Was about to send a search party for you, Harrington.” The man cackles at his own joke, tone devoid of any edge.

Steve laughs strangely. A laugh you aren’t sure you’ve ever heard from him before. He spills a string of apologies for his tardiness, but his boss waves him off and sends him to work.

When he backpedals out of the doorway, you chide, “Tsk. Tsk. You’re late, Harrington.”

Steve spooks easily. He hates to admit it but it makes him an easy target for office pranks which you do take full advantage of now that you’re friends. But you aren’t even trying to scare him this time.

He visibly tenses at your voice, eyes snapping to yours. They’re as intense as you’ve ever seen the lovely shade of brown, yet dulled with the toll of exhaustion. The next thing you notice is his hair. It’s combed back behind his ears and by the looks of it has no product.

“Hey,” he tries, stopping halfway to clear his throat.

As if his appearance isn’t alarming enough, the lack of a comeback is triple worrisome. You try– and fail– to contain your concern. “What happened?”

He deflates in one big sigh. Any attempt at a facade vanished. It’s impossible to lie to you when you look so concerned.

“I’m the worst dad ever,” he declares, skimming your arm as he sidesteps past you.

You catch up to his long stride with practiced eloquence. “Uh-oh. What’d you do?”

“Cinderella’s gone missing.”

“Missing?”

He nods.

“But she’s an outside cat, right? She’s probably, I dunno, chasing birds or slumped over a can of tuna at a neighbor's house.”

Steve bites the inside of his cheek. “It’s been four days. Four. She’s usually around at least once a day, if not, every other. I can’t even remember the last time–”

“Wait, wait. This makes you the worst dad, how exactly?”

He forces his key into the lock of his office door, jostling the handle in frustration. “Because Penelope’s begged me since forever to let her be an inside cat and I always say no. She wouldn’t have got lost if she was inside.”

You flick on the light and hum, understanding more than agreeing. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Steve, but I think you’re exaggerating.”

He plants his bag on the desk and unzips it. “This is serious. She loves that cat more than me, I swear.”

“Okay, first of all, not true. Second of all, this is serious and it sucks but it doesn’t make you a bad dad. You know that right?”

“Besides the point,” he passes you a heavy pile of paper. “Will you help me hang these up?”

You don’t answer because you don’t need to. He already knows you’ll say yes.

Black ink across the top page reads, “MISSING CAT”. There are two patchy images of Cinderella, one of which you’ve never seen and the other underexposed beyond recognition. Steve’s name, phone number, and address are listed at the bottom too. You flick through the stack, finding each version of Cinderella has been coated in a thick layer of brown crayon.

“Penelope insisted on coloring all of them so people know what color she is.”

Steve doesn’t have time for the pity party of a look you show him. If you cry, he’ll cry. And he’s cried enough in the last few days.

You accompany Steve to the bulletin board outside his office. Unspokenly, you accept the very important job of paper-passer while he’s in charge of the stapler.

“Thanks,” he says flatly, thumb catching on yours as he takes the page you’re holding out.

“Don’t worry, Steve. She’ll come home. Cats just like their space sometimes.” You aren’t totally sure if that’s true about cats, but it sounds like the right thing to say.

He mutters something under his breath. Not mean, just doubtful.

It’s unusual to be the one filling the conversation. Steve’s good at talking, a Chatty Cathy as he often calls Penelope. But you try your best to fill his shoes.

“How’s Penelope dealing with it?”

“Awfully.” He chuckles dryly. “She’s on strike for just about everything right now. Refused to go to sleep, refused to eat breakfast, refused to get in the car this morning.”

You nod and hand him another sheet.

“I’d bet by lunch I’ll have to go pick her up. She was hysterical at drop-off.”

“I’m sorry, Steve.” You have a funny urge to tack on something other than his name. Dummy or boss are typical but ill-fitting. And honey or sweetheart would probably cross a line, though, they’re nice to consider.

He sighs, kneading his eye sockets. “I’m sorry. I’m being… I know you’re trying to help.”

“You’re allowed to feel frustrated you know.”

“I know. You’re just– thanks.”

“I’m banning that word from our conversations. You say it too much,” you tease.

He gives you a look, neither happy nor sad. “Cause you’re always helping me, dummy.”

You grin, largely at the nickname.

Every board in the building is covered with posters and every person is notified of Cinderella’s disappearance in half the time it would normally take you and Steve. He’s not in any rush, just in his head. And after that, you dissolve into separate work, never far but still apart.

By noon Steve’s on his third cup of coffee. But no amount of caffeine or sugar will erase the heavy bags under his eyes. Finding Cinderella might be the only cure.

So there’s no debate in your mind when you offer, “I can come over and help look tonight?”

Steve holds a finger up, gaze trained on an address book with his phone clamped between his ear and shoulder. “Hi, Miss Crawford?” He pushes the bridge of his glasses further up his nose. It’s rare that he wears them in front of you. Cute, nonetheless. “Yes, it’s Steve,” he says.

There’s high-pitched rambling on the other end, not clear enough to discern anything other than an old-timey affection for Steve. You aren’t sure of the nature of Steve’s relationship with the woman, but he appears equally fond, even through the somber hues of his story.

She offers no valuable insight as to Cinderella’s whereabouts but promises to keep an eye out, making her… strike seven. Steve’s determined to phone every person he knows and then every local in the phone book in the span of his thirty-minute lunch break. You joked about stealing his office neighbor’s phone to help, but Steve insisted you didn’t.

When he docks the receiver you repeat yourself.

“Sorry. You really don’t have to.”

“I know, but I can… If you want. It’s up to you.”

“I– okay,” he sighs. “Only if you really don’t mind. It would be really helpful honestly.”

“After work then?”

“Uhh, sure. I just have to pick up Penelope when I get off.”

“Sounds good.” You grin and stir your food idly with a fork. It eventually goes cold in your lap. You’re more preoccupied with what you’ll wear tonight and what to bring Penelope to cheer her up. Candy’s probably your best bet. You know she’s already run out of Skittles from Halloween.

Steve’s lips twitch happily as he dials another number.

That’s about the happiest you see him. The rest of the day is a blur, mostly busywork as Steve is consistently ushered away by someone for something not even in his job description. For the first time possibly ever, he leaves on time. And he doesn’t say goodbye. He’s clearly having an awful day so you pretend it doesn’t sting, but the walk to your car is painfully silent.

At home, you change quickly, pop something frozen in the microwave, and retrace your steps back to the car in record time. The drive to Steve’s is unfortunately not very long. It doesn’t give you much time to mull over every possible scenario like your brain desires. But you’ll survive.

It still feels unfamiliar, pulling into his driveway. Less so than the first time, but still. You notice things you hadn’t before. The long crack like lightning in the pavement, the tinkle of a wind chime against the breeze, and the stepping stone with a ‘P’ carved in it. Halloween was the last time you were here. A couple of weeks has never felt like such a lifetime. Steve’s been busy parenting and working late and all. You don’t blame him. Sometimes you wonder how he ever made time for you in the first place with his schedule.

On the front steps, Penelope plucks a weed and adds it to her bouquet. Her cheek is squished against the top of her knee and she’s curled over herself like a pillbug. Brown eyes flick up as you near. One blink, then two. The epitome of indifference.

“Hi, Penelope.”

“Hi,” she says. She sounds uncharacteristically small. And she is small, but her voice is anything but. You know her to be bold, unapologetic. But not today.

You squat, toe to toe with her little Mary Janes, and wave a pack of Skittles. “Look what I brought,” you sing.

The slightest lift of her frown before she restores the pout for good. “For me?”

“All for you.”

She takes the candy and tucks it under her arm.

“Wanna help me look for your dad?”

It’s not a bribe, though her presence does tend to balm your Steve-induced nerves. So you are a little disappointed when she shakes her head. But disappointment wanes into sympathy and sympathy to determination. Determination to help her find Cinderella as soon as possible.

You palm her shoulder as you stand. The front door is ajar, the breeze eating any warmth in the foyer. It’s eerily quiet inside.

“Steve?”

“One second!” he calls back, muffled from upstairs.

The entryway is messier than you remember it. Shoes in a jumbled heap behind the door, Steve’s unzipped backpack slumped against the baseboards, and winter gloves and hats knocked haphazardly onto the tile. You bend to pick up a knit beanie as Steve hurdles down the stairs.

He struggles to squeeze into a raincoat over the thick sweater he wore to work. “Hey,” he smiles softly, gaze sweeping across your clothes. “Thanks for coming.”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Do you want a heavier coat? Radio said it’s supposed to storm tonight.”

“Oh,” you peer down at your denim jacket. “I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

Steve tilts his head, passing you a bundle of crumpled pink cloth. “Give this to Penelope? I’ll grab you one.” He doesn’t allow you to argue before turning around, but he stops halfway up the stairs, leaning over the railing to say, “Tell her to grab her boots too.”

You find the boots in the pile by the door and bring them to Penelope outside. She stares at you helplessly with one shoe halfway on the wrong foot.

“Need help?”

“Yes please.”

You take her ankle and prop her foot against yours. It takes a few tries and lots of wiggling but you slide the boot on and lace the purple strings all the way up. The second round is easier but you still wonder whether kids shoes are supposed to be this difficult.

The door groans behind you and a warm hand cups your shoulder. “Did you eat?” Steve asks. “I can make you something before we go.”

You rise to face him. The sky’s overcast, muting his tan complexion, making him look even more spent than he had earlier. “I ate. But thank you,” you smile, hoping to encourage one back.

He doesn’t but he unfolds the coat he’s carrying, shaking the arms free so it’s easier for you to slip on. “See if this fits.”

It’s not your typical size, but the extra weight is nice. Traces of pine and juniper linger, like it’s been taken on a hike recently. And you’re instantly warmer, a comfort that extends beyond the garment alone.

“Nice,” he nods, taking it upon himself to even out the hood strings for you. His fingernail skips across the zipper teeth and for a second, you think he’ll zip it up too.

“Daddy, are we going now?”

Steve spins on his heel, shuffling for his keys at the door. “Yes, baby. What did we talk about?”

Penelope kicks a load of gravel into the grass. “Ummm, I dunno.”

“No running off. If I can’t see you, we go home. Capeesh?”

When he jogs down the steps to her side, she sighs. “Capeesh.”

“Ready?” He pats her head, “Got your detective hat on?”

She peers up then, a flush of fresh purpose, and nods.

“Alright, Detective. Let’s roll.”

Steve’s yard is embraced by dense woods on every side but the road. He leads you to the tree line where a trail has been carved smooth with frequent use. Bark stretches tall and needle branches weave a canopy of orange above.

“Katie said I need to think more like a cat.” Penelope cranes her head up, “Do you think Cinderella went in the trees?”

“Maybe,” Steve mumbles, focused on jamming his nail under the metal tab of a can of cat food.

“So maybe I should climb up to check?”

“Not these ones, babe. Too tall.”

“But what if she’s in one? Like, a really, really tall one.”

“I think she’d pick a shorter one so she could get down,” you supply. “It would probably hurt her nails going all the way up there too.”

She hums. You drift into a steady rhythm of whistling and calling Cinderella’s name. Penelope waves a toy ball with a little bell inside while you rattle the jar of treats.

Penelope orbits off course slowly and when she hops out of sight Steve calls, “What did I say Nell?”

“No running away!”

He shakes his head at you, “This kid’ll be the death of me, I swear.”

You grin, turning back to him when you spot Penelope. Steve has a lovely side profile. You try to memorize the shape without tripping over any twigs as you walk. “How was she at school?”

“Sad, they said. She cried at nap. Refused to sleep at all.”

You coo.

“But she ate all her lunch, so that’s good.”

You hum in agreement.

Penelope crouches to examine the inside of a log. Her pigtails flip as she tips her head upside down.

“Did you find something?” you ask.

Penelope pulls something dark out, a dopey smile rounding her cheeks. “A slug.”

Steve scrunches his nose but quickly slackens it in a poor attempt to conceal his disgust. Thankfully, you don’t have to be a good actor to fool a four-year-old. “Nice, honey.”

“I think he’s dead.”

“Why don’t you put him back? He’s probably hibernating.”

“Hiding? Why?”

“No, hi-ber-nat-ing. It’s when the animals go to sleep during the winter.”

She squints, “For the whole winter?”

“Yeah, think so.”

“How do they do that?”

“Umm, I don’t know.” Steve glances at you for help but you only shrug. “They just do.”

One of the joys of parenthood you’ve discovered through Penelope is the plethora of questions that you have absolutely no idea how to answer.

Penelope replants the slug in its home, making a point to clarify, “Cinderella wasn’t in there.”

The trail dips steadily downward, covered with a mess of broken branches, scattered pinecones, and crunchy leaves that crackle beneath your feet. Steve’s leading the way, rambling about something or other and you’d swear you’re listening if he asked. But truthfully, your eyes trace the fit of his jeans shamelessly. He has a nice ass, it’s hard not to notice!

Your foot snags on something hard– a root, a branch, you aren’t totally sure– and it all happens so fast. You yelp and pitch forward, knees and hands slamming into the dirt with the full force of your weight.

Steve whirls around and assesses the damage, quickly determines there are no injuries severe enough to warrant a hospital visit, and then he fucking cackles.

You scoff, burying your own amusement as Penelope mimics him. Some example Dad is setting. At least he offers to help you up, Penelope just watches your embarrassment unfold.

“Don’t laugh!” You yank his hand, harsh enough that he stumbles forward onto your toe. “Ow– Steve!”

“That’s what you get!” He hauls you up, grip faltering with each peel of laughter.

You twist around yourself, sweeping your backside. “Do I have leaves on my butt?”

He looks for as long as he deems appropriate which is not very long at all. “Just dirt and a ton of bugs.”

“Shut up,” you smack his bicep.

Penelope points, “That is not nice!”

“Yeah, keep your hands to yourself,” Steve teases.

You trap a retort behind clenched teeth and look to Penelope. “Sorry.”

“Uhh. You’re supposed to apologize to me.”

You skip past him to Penelope’s side. “I’m helping Penelope look right now. Maybe later.”

Steve knows you won’t see it but he hopes you feel him sticking up his middle finger.

Penelope trudges along, the corners of her mouth drawn tight in quiet sadness. She fills the silence before you find the words.

“Do you think she’ll come home?” she asks earnestly.

“I do, Pen. I think she’s probably just hiding.”

“Like hide and seek?”

“Yeah.”

She considers your words carefully. “But why?”

“I dunno. Cats are just silly like that.”

She smiles. “Like dinosaurs?”

You smile back. “Exactly.”

The trees taper off, merging with the cracked sidewalk lining a cul de sac. Penelope’s ponytails are swept off her shoulders as a car whizzes by.

You cuff her smaller fingers in your own just as Steve tells her to hold someone’s hand.

He stops at her other side, surveying the neighborhood. It’s the type you’d imagine families live in. Basketball hoops, sidewalk chalk, bikes thrown against the lawns.

“I’m gonna go talk to some neighbors. Will you hang some posters?” Steve asks you. “We should hurry. I think it’s going to rain soon.”

“Can I go?”

Steve’s eyes trail from Penelope back up to you curiously.

“Yeah, I’ve got her.” You squeeze her hand, reassuring yourself more than anyone.

“Okay. Penelope, be a good listener. Don’t go on the road by yourself. I’ll be just over there.” He points to a house with yellow siding and starts across the road.

You turn Penelope by the shoulders and unzip her bag, taking the stapler in one hand and the stack of paper in the other.

“Can you carry these?” you ask, thrusting the posters toward her.

You straighten out the stapler and pick a sheet off the top before she braces them against her chest. “You know, this reminds me of when we first met.”

“Because I helped you hang up stuff?”

“Mhmm.” You line the page up against a tree, nailing each corner to be sure it sticks.

Eventually, you're passed a different poster, a painting. It’s a charming tangle of shapes and a riot of brown and orange. At the top, "MISSING" is written with two backward S’s in a crooked slope.

“Did you paint this?”

“Yes, at school.”

“Wow. Did you write this too?”

“Yep. My teacher helped me.”

“Very good!” You tack it to a telephone pole and pivot to face her, brimming with pride.

She’s not nearly as happy as you are about it. Her lips thin as she stares at her work and she hesitates before asking,“Do you think we’re bad detectives?”

Your chest aches so sudden and fierce like you’ve been punched. You crouch, rubbing the soft fleece at her elbow. “No. No, honey. We aren’t bad detectives. Detective work just takes time. We have a lot of ground to cover.”

Her frown wobbles, lashes shining. “It’s taking so long,” she whines.

“I know, Pen. Cinderella didn’t leave us many clues, huh?” You swipe a tear before it reaches her mouth. You want to promise her that Cinderella will come home but your gut won’t let you. You don’t know if she really will. “Let’s go check on your Dad. See if the neighbors have seen her. Hmm?”

She nods and you give her your best loving squeeze.

Steve’s halfway up the steps of someone’s porch, mid-conversation with a young woman. Her frown deepens as you and Penelope approach, unlike the baby on her hip who smiles at you.

Steve glances over before continuing. “Well, please call, if you do happen to see her.”

“Absolutely. I hope you find her.”

“Thanks,” he waves, descending the stairs to stand beside you.

“No luck?” you ask, peering up at the clouds. They’re getting moodier by the minute and it’s started to sprinkle.

His hand settles around Penelope’s skull like a claw, he shakes her frown away but not easily. “Not yet. We’ll keep looking.”

Penelope walks a few feet ahead of you and Steve. Every few mailboxes you and Steve stick another poster up. Penelope doesn’t stop to wait, but she’s thorough in her searching, checking under cars and in drain pipes. Enough to even out the distance that grows each turn.

You’re faced away, unclogging the jam in the stapler when Penelope gasps.

“Nell! Wait!” Steve shouts as you turn. By then she’s already halfway up someone’s lawn.

Steve jogs after her and you jog after Steve. Penelope’s made it to the sideyard when you catch up, stretching onto tiptoes and squinting through a rotted hole in the fence.

“Penelope,” Steve sighs.

“I saw her Daddy! She jumped over the fence!”

“Are you sure?” His hand curls over the top of the fence but his eyes can’t reach.

“Yes, I promise! We have to go over!”

He scrapes through his hair, judging the wood planks. They’re at least a head taller than Steve, but there’s a thin lip dividing each in half. If he angles his foot right, he could use it to boost himself over.

He shakes his head. He might've hopped a fence or two as a teenager, but he's grown now. “We have to ask. It’s someone’s yard.”

Penelope wails, yanking his arm repeatedly. “No! Daddy! What if she’s gone? We have to hurry!”

“Just go,” you wave, already backing up toward the house. “I’ll go knock. See if they’re home.”

Steve winces at himself for what he’s about to do. But one glance at Penelope’s worried little face is all the courage he needs. He tests his grip, the sole of a shoe scraping wood for a scary second before catching on the trim. With one leg on either side, he pauses to look at Penelope. “Stay there,” he says, before leaping into the grass.

He scans the backyard. There’s a swing set, a raised garden bed, a kiddie pool, and lots and lots of toys. It reminds him of his own yard. Steve takes a handful of hesitant steps, gaze flicking across each window for any horrified faces. He’s thankful not to see any.

Then, a meow—faint, but unmistakable. His heart lurches, his head whipping up to the nearest tree even faster. His eyes comb through branch after branch, then again when he comes up empty. But a second meow and he’s never been more sure. He wedges his heel into a groove, hugging the trunk for balance. His nails dig uncomfortably into the bark as he pulls himself up.

And there! Right where he swears he looked, a strip of golden-orange fur, blending seamlessly with the leaves… Except, Cinderella isn’t orange, she’s brown. Steve’s shoe slips, sending his chin hard into a thick branch on his way to the ground. The cat hisses equally if not more upset than Steve about the situation. He groans, glaring at the tree as he picks himself up.

“Did you find her? Was it her?” Penelope yells, still peeping through the hole in the fence.

Steve waits until he vaults back over to answer. “No, princess. Not her.”

“Your chin,” you point out, but your words are eaten by Penelope’s shouting.

“It was her! I know it was! I saw!”

“It wasn’t, Nell. Promise. That cat was orange.”

“But it was! I saw her!” Penelope crumbles into hysterics, batting her fists against Steve’s thighs like they’re punching bags.

Steve scoops her up, clamping her arms between their chests.

“Daddy, we have to go back! I saw her!” Several gasps slice through her sentence and tears pour down her face in even streams.

Steve shushes her gently, fanning her hood across her head as it starts to rain. You follow him up to the road and then down the street. Penelope’s relentless, squirming and screaming in his ear. It’s the first of her temper tantrums you’ve seen in person, though you’ve heard plenty about them, and you caught the beginning of one once through the phone. Steve’s more composed than you thought possible, waiting patiently until her sobs have dwindled into teary hiccups to set her down.

“It’s not nice to hit. Even when we’re mad, you know that.”

She glares at him, more serious than you’ve ever seen.

“Are you ready to go home?”

Penelope’s face starts to wilt. She nearly cries again.

“It’s too rainy. We have to go home soon or we’ll get sick.”

“Five more minutes,” she begs.

“Okay.” He buttons her coat up to her chin. “Are you tired?”

She shakes her head, though her eyes say otherwise.

“Do you want me to carry you?”

Penelope thinks long and hard. It’s a trick question. Of course she wants to be carried but God forbid Steve finds out she’s tired.

He picks her up anyway. “You can still look from up here.”

Penelope hooks her chin over his shoulder, cheek tipping to kiss the pad of his jacket. So much worry and too many days of poor sleep etched into each flap of her lashes. She looks utterly exhausted. And she really tries to stay awake– she needs to find Cinderella– but she lost that battle before it even started. The hiss of rain and the warm swing of Steve’s embrace send her straight to dreamland.

Steve feels her arms slacken and slide down his back. He chances a glimpse at you to ask what he already knows but can’t. Not when you’re already watching Penelope with a type of love he believed was his alone to give.

Alarm pulses when he registers the weight of your stare has shifted to him. The same velvet endearment skips across every feature on your face. It’s lovely and adorable but it terrifies the hell out of Steve.

His cheeks burn and he smiles like a madman. He can’t help it. It sticks long after his eyes dart away.

You drift into a comfortable quiet. The spray of rain is like white noise, making even you drowsy. Maybe Steve could carry you back too. It’s an amusing idea, enough to make you grin to yourself. You’re glad he doesn’t notice. He couldn't torture that information out of you.

Halfway home, you hit a particularly steep incline in the forest, slick with the beginning sludge of mud.

“Here,” Steve calls, boosting Penelope higher up his chest before casting his arm at you.

You accept his hand, grateful for more reasons than one, and trace the wet shoeprints he leaves behind with your own. It’s a slow journey. Steve strains with the added weight on his front, but he doesn’t let go of you until you reach the top of the hill.

You cross the threshold back into Steve’s yard as a bout of thunder splits the sky above. Penelope shakes awake and peels herself off Steve. She blinks unhappily, cheeks stamped with red lines mirroring his coat folds.

“It’s okay,” he soothes, fixing her hood after it falls.

“Cinderella,” she whimpers.

“We’ll look again tomorrow.”

She sniffles, voice so frail, hollow with sleep. “No. I–”

Another wave of thunder startles her to panicked tears. Steve picks up the pace to the front door, shuffling through his pocket for the keys. He’s well-versed in unlocking the door one-handed– between groceries, backpacks, Penelope– he always has something to carry. But he’s thankful when you take the keys and do it for him.

You scoot inside last, joining the choir of shoe squealing on the tile.

Steve sets Penelope on the floor and kneels to unlace her boots. She wrestles with her coat zipper until Steve intervenes with much gentler hands.

“We looked really good while you were asleep,” you promise while shedding your own coat.

Her miserable expression doesn’t falter.

Steve smears her tear tracks one cheek at a time. “Stay for a bit? Until the storm passes.”

You bend to collect Penelope’s coat off the floor and hang it next to yours. “Okay,” you say when you realize his words were directed at you.

“I’m gonna give her a quick bath. Do you need anything? Water? Towel?”

“Oh, no. I’m good. Thanks.”

“Okay. We’ll be upstairs. Please, help yourself to whatever. Seriously.”

When Steve disappears from view, you mosey into the living room, searching for something to keep your hands busy. And it’s not hard to find. There’s a pile of laundry that looks like it’s been trampled through more than a few times. Clothes stretch from one end of the couch to the other. You push them into a pile and get comfortable, folding each item with more care than you would your own.

Four neat stacks later and Steve spots you from the stairs. “Please don’t do that,” he says.

You clear your smirk as he nears. “Do what?”

“You know what,” he snatches a sock from your grasp. It’s one of his, longer and duller than the others. “Sorry, I know it’s a mess.”

“You know I don’t care, Steve.”

He gazes down at you in pretend petulance. “Well, I do.” With a dramatic flick of his finger, he sends the sock sailing back into the hamper on the floor.

“If it makes you feel better, I have a pile of clothes covering half my bed right now.”

“Mmm. It doesn’t,” he decides. “But I came down because Penelope’s very kindly requested that you come read to her before she goes to bed. If you want to.”

“Of course I want to.” Your lips bend into a funny little line, happy and curious and doubtful all dressed in one. “She really asked for me?”

“Yeah,” he says in the same cadence he would duh. He offers his palm, drags you up easily. “Why’s that so hard to believe?”

“I dunno.” A toothy smile slips onto your face before you can stop it. But your lips close as soon as you stand, pressed closer to him than you expected to be.

“Sorry,” he chuckles, breaking away. “Come on.”

He seemed nervous– the way he laughed, how his hands retracted like he was burned– but maybe you’re overthinking it. You forget about the interaction by the time you reach Penelope’s room.

Several books are fanned around Penelope where she stands, like fallen petals from the stem of a flower. Her shelf has been mostly stripped. What isn’t on the floor has been scooped into a flimsy stack in her arms.

Steve knocks on the door frame, “Ready?”

Penelope turns and two books slide off the top of her tower. You can’t see her mouth but you can tell by her eyes that there’s a smile behind that copy of Goodnight Moon.

“You can pick three, missy,” he says.

“Five?”

“Four.”

“Four and a half?”

“Three.”

“No,” she giggles, definitely delirious. “Four.”

“Okay.” He kneels at her feet, reshelving unchosen books two or three at a time.

It’s not an easy decision, but Penelope decides on her four and promptly thrusts them into your hands. You follow her to bed where she packs herself against the wall, politely leaving the rest of the twin mattress for you.

“Wait!” she shouts when you open the first book, “The lights!”

“I’m working on it,” Steve grumbles, standing to flip the light switch by the door. The room is swallowed in black apart from the nightlight glowing to life across the room.

Penelope stretches across you to snatch something off her nightstand. A flashlight, you realize, as she clicks the switch. She trains the light on the page and beams at you with equal vibrance.

The first story is the shortest and the second not much longer, but the third takes time. Time you get to notice the heat of her breath as she yawns into your arm and time to appreciate the weight of her head limp against your shoulder.

You don’t have to look up to know Steve is still tidying. Every second counts when you’re a single parent. But you steal a glance in between each page anyway. Find him chucking clothes in the hamper and dumping an armload of stuffed animals onto the foot of the bed. They’ll be kicked to the floor by morning and yet he straightens them up anyhow.

He concludes his rounds by the final pages of the fourth book, taking a seat on the floor just in time to hear you whisper, “The end.”

Penelope bats her dark eyes up at you. She knows you’ll say yes before she even asks. “One more?”

“No,” Steve interjects. “No more tonight, babe.”

“Pleaseee!”

“No, you already hustled me into four. We usually only read two.”

“Pretty please!” she adds, puppy dog eyes bouncing from Steve to you.

Oh the cruelty. To defy Steve or disappoint Penelope. Both are terrible choices but only one of the pair currently has a heartbreaking little pout.

“I’ll read one more really really short book if you promise to go to sleep after?”

Her head bobs eagerly as she kicks the blankets off, springing to her feet.

Steve’s head flops against the sheets, hair like satin ribbons shining from root to end. You consider if it’s as soft as you assume and if you’ll ever have the chance to find out.

“Supposed to be on my side,” he whispers through a gooey grin.

“Am I?”

He tuts, craning up to find Penelope. “Don’t take all of those back out. I just cleaned them up.”

She exchanges the two in her hand for a thick chapter book.

“No ma’am,” Steve says as she turns. “Short one, ‘member?”

Penelope huffs and lugs herself back to the bookcase. She plucks a thinner paperback and uses Steve’s calf as a stool to launch herself back in bed. He doesn’t complain but he pinches her side in revenge.

The book mirrors the length of tonight’s first, yet it takes double the time for your own selfish reasons. You linger on each word, emphasize each sound, and savor every second. Penelope is nestled against your hip as you read the final sentence, sleepy and oblivious that you’ve turned the last page.

Steve pulls himself up to perch on the edge of the bed, mindful not to sit on anyone’s legs. He runs the back of his hand across her face, giving her nose an extra tap. Enough times and it’ll put her to sleep.

“Can you say thanks, Nell? And goodnight.”

She squirms away from his touch, pushing into your thigh. “I don’t wanna go to sleep.”

“Pen, remember our deal.” You squeeze her shoulder gently. “You promised, hmm?”

You swallow the urge to smile when she juts her lip out and frowns. The drama never ends with this one but you love it.

“Goodnight,” you whisper. Your hand glides over the shape of her arm beneath the blanket. “I had fun reading to you.”

She avoids your gaze, picking a loose string from her blanket. If she sees you grinning, she’ll end up grinning too. She can’t have that, she’s protesting. “Night.”

Steve shakes his head dismissively at you, grinning fondly himself. “I’ll be down in a second,” he explains.

You stand, slotting the book back in its home on the shelf and steal one last glimpse of them on your way out. A trail of nightlights guides you to the stairs like beacons. You end up in the kitchen, hands braced on the sink, eyes drifting around the backyard through the window.

There’s a patio with chairs and string lights. In the grass, a trampoline, a sandbox, and a toddler-sized picnic bench, all draped in purple moonlight and sparkling with rain. It’s easy to imagine life here. Birthday parties and cookouts and lazy Sunday afternoons.

The swish of sock against tile knocks you from the fantasy. You locate Steve’s reflection in the glass.

“You better not be doing my dishes.”

Your lips flex instinctually at his voice. “I thought about it.”

He leans back against the counter, hip a hand’s width from yours. Strips of hair sag across his forehead like a botched set of bangs. Your height difference and the angle only accentuate how silly he looks.

“What?” Steve smiles.

You huff through your own. “Nothin’.”

“Why are you laughing then?”

“I’m not. Just…” you reach for his face but the courage fades halfway. You wave obtusely instead. “This hair,” you finish.

He flattens the piece down, then another, combing more and more over his face like a real pair of bangs until the ends graze the ball of his nose. “What? You don’t like it?”

“Oh, it’s awful, Steve. Put it back.”

“I dunno. Thinking of changing it up anyway.”

You shake your head, peeling your eyes away from him. “Stupid.”

Stupidly gorgeous, you decide. He’s a mess, no doubt; rumpled and sweaty, and still, stupidly, impossibly gorgeous.

He rakes his hair back where it belongs, “You’re too good to me, you know.”

“You’re so dramatic.” Your gaze remains on the window but you watch Steve in your peripherals. “I’m the perfect amount of good to you.”

“Well, agree to disagree. But, thank you for coming over to help look. Really I–”

You face him fully then. “Steve, you don’t have to thank me.”

“No, I do. Really, you’re… you’re great and it’s been nice, you know, having help. Even just having company. It hasn't been easy making friends the last few years.”

Your brain stalls at his choice of words. You spout the first thing that comes to mind. “That’s what friends are for, right?” The words sting like acid on your tongue but you smile anyway. You’re pretty sure your heart just split itself in half on the way to the friend zone.

He hums, pushing off the counter toward the fridge. “Let me return the favor, please. I’ll make you whatever you want. Spaghetti, PB ‘n J, uhh, pre-packaged salad?”

“I’m good, Steve. I ate earlier. And you don’t need to return the favor.”

He sets a jar of jelly on the counter. “Your loss. Penelope says I make the best PB ‘n J’s.”

“Oh, I’m sure you do.”

You settle at the kitchen table and watch him work unapologetically. His focus is entirely on a one-sided debate about the perfect peanut butter-to-jelly ratio, leaving him oblivious to your ogling.

He plops down in the chair across from yours when he’s finished. “Sure you don’t want some? You can have half of mine.”

“Steve.”

“Okay,” he sings and takes a bite.

You watch the slow drip of water from the eaves. The rain has subsided enough that you could go, but neither of you suggest it. Your mind is elsewhere. Stuck on friends.

“Hello? Anybody home?” Steve chuckles when you blink back to reality. “Did you hear me? I was–”

The trill of the phone interrupts.

“I’m holding my thought. Don’t go anywhere.” Steve abandons his sandwich and crosses the room, pulling the phone from the counter. “Hello?... Uh-huh… Yes, yes.”

The sudden shift in his tone catches your attention. He sounds borderline ecstatic.

“Okay. I’ll be right over. Thank you!”

“Who was it?” you ask.

He snaps the receiver back into place. “A neighbor saw her just now.”

“Really?”

“Yes! Well, they’re pretty sure it’s her. It sounded like her, how they described. Are you able to stay here while I go check? I don’t wanna wake Penelope up.”

You don’t even think about it when you insist, “Of course. Go!”

“I’ll be right back. Thank you!” He squeezes your shoulder and jogs out of the kitchen. The sound of jangling keys fades with the closing of the front door and before you’ve processed it, you’re alone in Steve’s house.

It’s a strange thing, being in Steve’s house without Steve. You’re not technically alone, Penelope is still tucked in bed upstairs, of course. But the silence is thick, suffocating even. So you’re admittedly glad when you hear tiny footsteps from upstairs.

On the bottom step, Penelope freezes and her hand tightens around the railing, not expecting you to be there. “Where’s Daddy?” she mewls at you, bottom lip quivering against her words.

“It’s okay. He went out to look some more, that’s all.”

“I want Daddy,” she whines, breath hitching in between words.

“He’ll be right back, sweetheart. I promise.”

A sob wracks her chest, tears escaping as she scrunches her eyes. Sniffles cut through a mush of sounds, woven between them, she pleads, “When?”

“Oh, honey. Come here.” You hoist her up against your chest instinctually. It feels like the right thing to do, and it must be– her arms wind underneath yours like puzzle pieces. “Real soon,” you reassure.

You hope so anyway. Half for Penelope’s sake and half for yours. You’re afraid to overstep, to parent her in a way Steve wouldn’t approve of. You feel the echoes of his constant self-doubt in your own mind. But you’ll try your best until he returns.

Penelope’s not heavy, but it is the first time you’ve carried another human down a set of stairs. It’s a slow descent with lots of maneuvering and readjusting limbs so you can see the steps ahead but she doesn’t seem to mind. By the time you make it to the sectional, your arms burn. Still, you’d do it ten times over just so she doesn’t have to walk herself.

She sweeps her runny nose across your sleeve and her knee digs uncomfortably into your ribcage but you can’t find it in yourself to mind. She feels safe enough with you to do so. It’s a compliment more than anything. And the weight of her head against you is a type of soothing you don’t think you’ll ever get used to.

Your fingertips trace the shape of her shoulder blades through her nightgown. “Did you have a bad dream?” you whisper.

She draws similar lazy patterns on your arm, pausing to hum yes.

You hum back. “‘M sorry, Pen. Wanna talk about it? Might help.”

She shakes her head, the slightest movement against your collar.

“Okay, I got you. Don’t have to worry,” you whisper and pat her head. “I won’t let any more bad dreams get in here.”

Steve’s gone long enough to fuel your nerves and keep your mind buzzing, though your eyes beg for the sweet release of sleep. Penelope’s not helping, like a warm, weighted blanket on your chest. She’s barely awake herself when he arrives, but you’re surprised she’s awake at all. You aren’t sure what time it is but it’s definitely late.

Two clicks from the front door’s lock and a Steve-shaped shadow slides inside. He’s being particularly quiet, like when tries to sneak up on you at the rec center. Like a ninja, he always says.

Penelope’s head shoots up to peer over the couch. “Daddy?”

Steve stops in his tracks, but his head snaps in your direction. When his eyes confirm his ears he starts toward the couch, waiting until he can sit to coo, “Hey, baby. Hey.” A hand scoops a piece of hair behind her ear. “What are you doing up sleepyhead?”

Penelope splinters off of your chest but remains situated on your thighs. She offers several half-lidded blinks to Steve. “You didn’t find her?”

He melts like her eyes are made of sunbeams, reaching up to thumb sleep from under her lashes. “No, baby. Someone thought they did but it wasn’t her. I went to make sure.”

“Oh,” she says, not sad, just tired. Penelope slowly leans over to him like a bridge, wrapping her arms around his neck as he tows her into his lap.

He looks at you then. A long look. An expression you're having a hard time untangling. His eyes flutter back down when Penelope yawns. “Have to go to bed, okay?” he whispers into her crown, planting a kiss while he’s there.

“I wanna sleep in your room.”

“That’s fine but I’m not laying down yet. You still have to go to sleep.”

She nods against his chin.

“I’ll carry you up. Can you say goodnight?”

Penelope turns so you can see one side of her face, the other glued to Steve’s sweater.

“Goodnight,” you wave and smile softly.

She only shudders out a sigh but manners aren’t on Steve’s mind, especially when he knows you wouldn’t care about that. His knees crack as he stands, hiking her up higher before he heads upstairs.

You yank a blanket from the arm of the couch, missing the warmth Penelope lent you. It’s a risky move when you’re already fighting to keep your eyes open.

But Steve’s back before you have time to fall asleep. He’s trampling down the steps with a confidence that Penelope’s out for good this time. And he flops onto the couch with the same heaviness, sighing like you’ve never heard. Pure frustration. It’s understandable. But odd off his lips.

“You okay?” you ask, the same syrupy sweetness you’d used with Penelope.

He turns to face you and he looks awfully sad. The rainwater clinging to the ends of his hair doesn’t help. But he nods anyway because he’s Steve. “It was a stupid raccoon.”

“You’re kidding? They thought it was a cat?”

“I should’ve known,” he scrubs his face. “Practically senile that lady.”

“You’ll find her, Steve.”

He takes a deep breath and swallows. “I don’t know anymore. I’m really starting to think worst-case scenarios.”

You press your lips into a firm line. It’s a possibility you don’t want to consider. “Why don’t I go look a little longer? I’m off–”

“No, please,” he leans over to cradle the shell of your knee. “You’ve helped all night. I mean this in the nicest way possible, you look exhausted.”

“Way to treat a guest, Harrington,” you smirk, peeling his pointer finger off your leg to hook it under your own.

He squeezes your finger like a trigger, shifting focus between your hands and face. “Go home, rest, please.”

“You sure?”

“Hundred percent. Rain’s let up so the drive shouldn’t be too bad.”

“Promise you’ll get some rest too?”

He smiles despite the pang in his chest and the ache behind his eyes. You're the first to show him this kind of care in years. “I will. I promise.” He releases your finger, binding your pinky with his instead.

There’s something unreal about the way you smile back at him. Like you’ve entranced him with a spell. Steve believes in a lot of things– superpowers, demogorgans, parallel dimensions– but this is the first time he’s ever believed in pinky promise magic.

He shakes his head, “Come on.”

You take his hand, groaning in sync as he helps you up.

In the foyer, Steve unhooks the coat he’d lent you earlier. “Here.” And before you can contend, he adds, “Keep it. It’s an extra. I don’t need it.”

You let him guide your arms into the sleeves. And the same deliriousness possesses you to spring in for a hug after. “It’ll be okay, Steve,” you murmur, lips skimming the embroidered design across his chest.

He deflates for half a second before reciprocating. “I know,” he says. “Thank you.”

You wait until he softens to pull away and open the door.

The wind whips and howls blowing a wave of mist onto the other end of the porch. Steve scans the yard, then the road, both slick with rain. He asks himself if it’s a good enough reason to ask you to stay. But he decides it isn’t, not yet, at least.

“Call me when you get home?”

A wild smile splits your lips. “Okay,” you blink stupidly, too tired to care.

“Careful!” he shouts as you run to your car. Steve leans against the doorframe, loitering until your headlights flash his house and your car rolls out of the driveway.

It’s only sprinkling but streetlights are scarce near Steve’s place so you turn your high beams on, highlighting lawns on either side of the road. You drive slowly, inspecting one yard, then the one opposite, hopeful that Cinderella’s still out there.

There’s a stop sign at the end of Steve’s street. A landmark you know to make a left at. But you decide to go right. I wanted to take the scenic route, you’ll say if Steve asks. You drive that road and the one beside it and another beside that.

And it’s only a few turns away when you spot something sort of cat-shaped laid at the end of a driveway.

“Please do not be a raccoon,” you mumble, squinting as you inch the car closer. The longer you look the more it makes sense– two ears, a wavy tail, it’s definitely a cat. “No way.”

You put the car in park across from the house and study it. It bats its tail against the concrete, staring lazily back at your car. There’s just no way, not after all that looking. You find her after what, ten minutes of driving? It just can’t be her.

You push your door open gingerly, slipping onto the asphalt one foot at a time. The cat perks up, ears twitching with each crunch under your shoes. You slink over slowly, crouching into an uncomfortable crab walk when she stands. Brown coat, no collar, just as she’s been described to you. But it’s hard to say. You’ve only seen one picture of her and it was out of focus. There’s no way to really know it’s her.

Honking a few streets away slices the silence and your focus in one go. You flinch back a step which spooks the cat. She scampers up the driveway, weaving underneath a car to the other end of the yard.

You stick as low to the ground as you can while skipping after her. You’d guess you look ridiculous, but at least Steve isn’t here to see. The car blocks the view and you lose her by the time you reach the other side. But there’s a swirl of shrubbery, good for hiding probably. You blindly grapple for branches, blinking rapidly, slowly adjusting to the growing darkness the farther you move from your car’s headlights.

And then the porch light flickers on, spotlighting you digging through a random person’s bushes.

“Shit.” You freeze, hand choking a wreath of leaves, embarrassment flaring hot and red through your entire body. A minute passes, then two. Everything’s still. No cat, no angry homeowners, no police cars. You decide it’s safe. Must’ve been an automatic light. You hope, anyway.

Upon further inspection, the bushes are empty, and from what you can see the porch is too. There are a few trees but it’s difficult to make out any cats through the dark web of branches. A sudden gust of wind shakes a handful of leaves loose. Your eyes track them across the yard as they tumble back toward the driveway. And there’s the damn cat, sitting on the roof of the car like it was there the whole time.

“You better not set that alarm off, dude,” you grumble.

She narrows her eyes and growls as you draw closer. Cinderella is irritable– this makes sense. Or it’s a totally random feral cat who is about to claw your eyes out.

You’re within touching distance when you realize you have no plan. She very likely could claw your eyes out or give you rabies or something else awful. But you're in it now. You’re gonna get Penelope her cat back. So you shrug Steve’s coat off cautiously, eyes never leaving the cats. It’s raining again, you realize as it starts pelting your neck, trickling like ice down your shirt. But that’s the least of your worries right now.

“Nice kitty,” you whisper, unfolding the jacket.

She hisses as you lean in but before she can pounce or swipe you throw the jacket over her and scoop her off her feet. She goes stiff and growls low and throaty.

You speed walk to your car, toeing the cracked door open and maneuvering carefully into your seat. The jacket peels open as you shut the door. She sees an opportunity and takes it, nosing her way through the hole and under your elbow. There’s a shine of teeth as she bats your face, dragging a sharp set of claws against your cheek.

“No, no– shit! I swear if you don’t,” you argue, cramming her arms back in the fabric one at a time, tucking and tightening until she’s secure.

She huffs through her nose, glaring menacingly at you from her swaddle.

“Cinderella– if you’re even Cinderella– which you better be! You’re being a real jerk right now.”

She growls in response. Steve wasn’t lying about her attitude.

You shift the car into gear one-handed and forgo a seatbelt. It’s a short ride and you’ve maxed out your risk-taking meter for the night. While it really is a short drive, it goes dreadfully slow. You’re cold and wet and you feel like you are driving with a bomb strapped to your chest.

Getting out of the car is just as easy, as in not easy at all, as getting in. But you make it to Steve’s porch, surging the cat further up your chest so there are no last-minute getaways. You tap gently on the door with your toe, hoping not to disturb Penelope.

The instant the door opens, you squeeze by Steve and release the cat onto the floor. She scampers ahead a few feet before stopping to turn around. “Tell me this is the right cat and I didn’t just kidnap some other kid’s pet.”

He shoves the door closed. “Oh my God! Where the hell did you find her?”

You exhale with one big slump of your shoulders, all the worry bleeding away. “Like, five minutes down the road. Just hanging out in someone’s driveway.”

Steve gawks, crouching and coaxing her closer with an open palm.

She considers his invitation before striding into his touch.

He strokes her from head to tail and back. “I can’t believe you. I was about to make funeral arrangements.”

Cinderella chirps happily.

Steve twists to look up at you. For a second you think he might cry. Or kiss you.

He promptly stands and cups your jaw and your stomach tumbles because he might actually kiss you. But he aims your cheek against the light instead and whispers, “You’re bleeding.”

“Oh,” you tap around your cheek blindly, “It’s just a scratch.”

“Here. Come here.”

You follow him to the bathroom where he pulls a towel from the closet and drapes it around your shoulders like a shawl.

“You’re wet,” he says like you don’t already know.

You tug the fraying ends taut across your chest and watch him dig through the medicine cabinet. “If only someone let me borrow their coat.”

“If only,” he snickers, dumping the contents of the first aid kit in the sink. “I’m sorry Cinderella beat you up. She really has no manners.” He strips the plastic cover off a Barbie-themed bandaid and lines it up with your scratch, pressing, and smoothing it over your skin gingerly.

“How hideous do I look? Scale of one to ten.”

He shakes his head, smiling at you like an idiot. You make him smile like it’s your only job. And it sends his heart flying every time. He feels out of control around you. He hates feeling that way but somehow you make it easy.

“You could never be hideous.” Steve chuckles, still in disbelief. “You're amazing.”

Any cold lingering on your face evaporates. “Don’t go soft on me, Harrington,” you tease.

Maybe it’s the adrenaline buzz of chasing Cinderella or the high of successfully catching her, but you feel like you could do anything. Like you could say anything to him. Your eyes trickle down to his lips. He’s close enough to kiss. Every nerve in your body dares you to do it. You don’t think he’d reject you. Maybe he’d even meet you halfway.

A high-pitched scream severs the moment.

Steve jerks away, alarmed and then quickly amused. “Penelope,” he grins.

And right on cue, Penelope whizzes by the open door, squeals ricocheting down the hall. She chases Cinderella, who does not look happy to be chased, but Steve allows it.

“Daddy! Cinderella’s back! Look!” She clips her shoulder on the stair post before disappearing into the kitchen

He turns to you, beaming. He hopes you understand how amazing you are. He’d happily tell you again and again.

Penelope races out, heaving through a smile with the jar of treats. She sprays the entire contents of it across the floor. Steve can’t even be mad. In fact, it’s the happiest he’s been all week.

She lies down on her back, eyes skipping between you and Steve. “How did she get here?”

“I saw her on my way home. She was just a few streets away.”

“Wow. She’s really good at hide and seek,” Penelope decides.

Cinderella prances over, using Penelope’s belly as a personal vault. Penelope splays her hand out, patting and petting to her heart's content as Cinderella munches on the treats.

Steve squats, cupping a handful of them back into the jar.

“No, Daddy! It’s her prize.”

“Her prize will make her sick if she eats it all.”

“Okay. I guess.” She giggles as Cinderella pushes a treat with her paw.

Steve squeezes her knee where it wiggles, raising his eyebrows, “What do you say?”

Penelope turns to you with a wicked grin. She practically screams, “Thank you!”

“You're very welcome.”

Penelope pushes herself up and cocks her head. “Will you stay and play with us?”

It’s entirely innocent and equally adorable. You appreciate Steve for being the bad guy.

“Nuh-uh. You’re supposed to be in bed,” he reminds her.

She whines and shoots him a mean look. But it doesn’t last. Cinderella is back. That’s all she really cares about right now.

“You can play with Cinderella in the morning.” His eyes flicker between the two like they’re made of gold. “Maybe she’ll even sleep in your room.”

Penelope’s eyes and mouth widen into three little O’s. “Really!”

“Yes. She can stay inside from now on. But! You have to train her, be a good cat mom to her.”

“I will, I will,” she nods so relentlessly her head might pop off. “I promise I’ll be the bestest cat mom ever in the whole entire world!”

Steve chuckles, gaze dancing over to you. He looks at you like you’re made of gold too. That’s an intense realization.

“I should head home,” you say.

Steve nods, a flicker of hesitation crossing his face.

“Bye, Penelope! Bye, Cinderella!”

Penelope shackles Cinderella’s arm and forces her into a rigid wave. “Bye-bye!”

Steve follows you out to the front porch, snapping the door shut when Cinderella trots after him.

“Good luck keeping her inside.”

“Yeah,” he shakes his head, hand dropping from the door handle. “I’m sure she’ll escape by morning.”

Your gaze sweeps across the lawn. It’s only drizzling now, almost unnoticeably through the overcast veil of moonlight.

“Oh, here,” you tug one end of the towel until it slides off your neck.

Steve accepts it tentatively, “Maybe you should keep it. Case she gets out again.”

“Yeah, guess I’d need something to catch her with, huh?”

His teeth seem to glow in the moonlight when he smiles. He slings the towel back over your head and smooths it across your shoulders. “I know I’ve said this like a million times today,” he trails off, rubbing the fabric up and down your arms. “But I’m gonna say it again.” He looks up, dreadfully serious. Your eyes lock like magnets, like he’s specially polarized yours to stay tethered to his. “First of all, thank you for everything, seriously.”

“It’s no problem, Steve, really.”

“I know, I just,” his attention drifts away, tension seeping in through the silence. “I think you’re like the coolest person ever.”

You shake your head and shift your weight from one foot to the other, desperately trying to shake out the scary feeling in your gut.

A warm hand clasps yours. “I mean it. You’re so amazing and are just a super genuine person and– and I care a lot about you.”

Your pulse hammers so hard you wonder if he can hear it. The icy bite of rain clinging to your clothes turns hot. Hot enough to boil every drop of it off your skin.

“I dunno, it’s just really hard to make friends as a single parent. You’ve been so kind. And I really appreciate that.”

Your heart aches. Your eyes sting. That awful feeling triples. Friends, how could you forget?

He drops your hand, knotting his own fingers together instead. Watching you, waiting for a response.

You smile, brittle but convincing enough that he smiles back. “Well, that’s really sweet. I’m happy to help. And, for the record, I think you’re super cool too.” You punch his shoulder playfully. Because that’s what friends do.

“Phew, that’s a relief. Was starting to think you were getting sick of us.”

You smile genuinely then. You don’t think it’s possible to ever get sick of them. “Ehh, I’m still warming up to Cinderella but Penelope’s my favorite, no offense.”

“No, she’s pretty cool.” He nods, pausing to think. “You can come over tomorrow– if you aren’t busy. If you want to. We’ll probably go buy some cat stuff. I dunno, it’s cool if you can’t.”

“I’d love to, Steve.”

He laughs in soft little layers. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

“See you then.”

“See ya.”

You spin on your heel, scurrying down the porch steps faster than you probably should. Forget the rain, Steve’s what you're running from. His laugh and his dopey smile and his overly kind words. You’re too young to die of a heart attack, but surely your heart won’t last much more of this.

When you tug the handle of your car door, he yells, “Don’t forget to call me!”

You bite your lip to stop yourself from smiling and flash him a thumbs-up before getting in. He’s such an idiot. Probably waking his neighbors up yelling like that. It’s probably unhealthy, the amount of emotions you’ve just experienced in the span of a few minutes.

But already all you can think about is tomorrow. It seems like lightyears away, but you’d wait lightyears for Steve– even for just friends Steve– silly as it sounds.

#steve harrington x reader #steve harrington fluff #steve harrington x you #steve harrington #steve harrington angst #stranger things #stranger things fic #tsof #skeltnwrites #the shape of family #dad steve harrington

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wavesmp3 · 1 year ago

Text

young & stupid

yoon jeonghan x reader (gender neutral)

you think yoon jeonghan is crazy when he asks if you'll pretend to date him, but luckily for him you're just young and dumb enough to agree.

genre: university + fake dating au word count: 14k warnings: alcohol, profanity, some explicit content, mentions of sex, and a very american writer who says soccer instead of football a/n: posted an unfinished version of this like 4 years ago and randomly decided one day a couple weeks ago to finish it. this is the most indulgent fic i have ever written. pls enjoy my birthday gift to myself lolol

Music bursts from every corner of the run-down frat house, chasing after you no matter where you run to escape it. Bodies endlessly spill in from the patio and front entrance, a never ending revolving door of college kids just like yourself looking for some kind of release after a long week of… well, college. But unlike most times you’ve paid a visit to Soonyoung’s frat house on a Friday night, tonight you’ve already decided that you are not going to be having fun at this party.

Soonyoung begged you to come, bribing your appearance with a promise to study with you for the next math quiz. Of course the first thing he does after walking into the house with you is ditch you. But even that, you deal with. You find some friends among the crowd, acquaint yourself with some beer, and almost start to have fun egging on a brewing dance battle. But all that ends the second you turn a corner too fast and are met with a full cup of bright red jungle juice all over your white shirt.

So now, upstairs in a bathroom Soonyoung let you in to, desperately trying to wash out the stains, you make a stubborn decision to not make another appearance at a frat party for the rest of the semester which you’re positive you’ll break by the time midterms are up.

But for now, helplessly staring at your reflection in the dirty mirror, you arrive to the conclusion that this damn jungle juice stain is not coming out. You exit the bathroom into the adjoining room and start grabbing your stuff to walk home.

“Who the fuck are you?” You jump at the voice that’s joined you in the room. You hadn’t even noticed anyone entering. You stare at the figure, mouth open. “How’d you get into my room?”

“Oh my gosh, so sorry,” you apologize in a hurried voice, packing your things up impossibly faster. “Soonyoung let me in. It was just supposed to be a quick thing–Wait no, that makes it sound like we were hooking up. Which we definitely were not. I can promise you that much, lol, not Soonyoung. But no, I just needed the bathroom. Cause this dude and his jungle juice, and…” you look down at your shirt. “Anyways, I was about to go home. I didn’t even–”

“Okay, wait, slow down.” The guy cuts you off. “You know Soonyoung.”

You nod. “Uh, yeah, we’re friends.”

He steps closer, narrowing his eyes at you, and for a moment you think the guy looks a little bit familiar. “And you’re not a stalker?”

This time you squint, jutting your head forward. “A stalker?” He stares at you unwavering. You scoff. “Um. No. Of course not.”

“Oh, okay, good.” He exhales, his previous demeanor falling entirely. “Well, in that case, let me help.” He walks towards one of the dressers, pulling the drawer open to rummage through it.

“No. That’s okay. You don’t have to–”

“Let me. Plus,” he gestures towards the general direction of your shirt without looking up from the drawer, “that can’t be comfortable. And it definitely isn’t flattering.”

You’re too stunned to say anything back. You’re not sure how you’d respond anyways to what you think counts as an insult from the dude who’s also helping you. You study him instead. You’ve definitely seen him around before, but you’re not entirely sure where or when because you probably would’ve remembered someone as attractive as him. He’s tall, soft-faced with longer hair that cuts off right under his ears, and damn is he attractive. In an obvious—in your face, weak in the knees, god this man is beautiful—kind of way. Not that you notice.

“Here.” He throws a tshirt your way, and you catch it between your arms. You both stare at each for a long moment, until he jumps on his heels a little as if he’s suddenly remembered something. “My bad, I’ll turn around.”

You stare unamused at his backside. He really doesn’t think you’re going to change with him in the room does he?

And almost as if he’s reading your mind, he says: “Don’t worry, I won’t peek.” He looks over his shoulder with a crooked, mischievous smile. “I mean unless you want me to.” Your stomach throws itself out the window.

You scoff. “I’ll just change in the bathroom.” You fully expect the guy to be gone by the time you exit the bathroom, but instead he’s still there, sitting at the edge of the bed on his phone.

You clear your throat. “Thanks for the shirt.”

“Oh, yeah,” he looks up from his phone and takes you in. You swear his mouth twitches into a half smile. “It’s no big deal.

You let out an awkward half laugh, half sigh. “So, I’ll get this shirt back to you somehow. Thanks again.”

He nods, still staring at the air around your body with that sickeningly charming half smile. You turn for the door.

“Wait!” You pause, facing the boy again who is now standing up, arm stretched out towards you. He drops it at once like it was never supposed to be there. “Are you going back to the party?”

You actually laugh at that. “God, no. I’m going home.”

“Oh.” He tilts his head, and then opens and closes his mouth as if the words keep getting lost in the back of his throat. You try not to think too hard about how endearing the action is. “I can give you a ride if you want.”

You shake your head quickly. “No, that’s alright. I don’t live that far.” You live on the opposite side of campus.

He grabs a set of keys off his desk. “Let me. I wanna get out of this party too. But sadly,” he motions to the room you’re both standing in, then leans towards you a little, “I live here.”

And you know you should refuse. You know there is nothing sensical about letting this stranger, whose name you don’t even know, take you home. But there’s something about his smile and the tufts of hair falling over his forehead, something about the way he gave you his shirt that makes you say yes against your better judgment.

It turns out, leaving the party with the mysteriously nice guy, who’s conveniently hot (again, not that you’re looking), is much harder than it looks. The only plus side to getting bombarded with people wanting to talk to him, is that you learn his name: Jeonghan. And it hits you then, of course you’ve seen him around before. Well, maybe not him, but you’ve definitely seen his picture. His face is plastered over all of the university’s promotional material. Half the school has a crush on Jeonghan, the star soccer player. Unfortunately for you and your apparently impossible wish to go home, it also appears that half the school is at this party and fueled with liquid confidence.

“Hey Jeonghan,” one person in particular slurs, appearing in front of you and him magically. Yeah, you think, if I were him I’d want to get out of this party too. Then as if the stranger has come to their senses, they jump back and clasp their hands over their mouth. A blush paints itself all over their face. “So sorry. I must’ve tripped or something…” they laugh awkwardly. Jeonghan does too. You look over at him and find that he looks incredibly uncomfortable.

“It’s fine,” he tells them, holding his hands up, “I gotta go. See you around though.” And Jeonghan’s turning on his heel ready to dash for the door.

“Wait a second!” The person calls, grabbing Jeonghan’s arm before he can slip out of the house. He turns back around begrudgingly. “I was uh I was sort of wondering if you’d like to maybe go out or something—“

You watch them ask out Jeonghan on a date, and well, it’s sort of cute. The stranger clearly harbors a massive crush on Jeonghan. They’re not being rude or pushy, and honestly, even after accounting for the alcohol, they’re more confident and bold than you’d be. You find yourself wanting to congratulate them. But then, with another look at Jeonghan’s face, you feel a burst of pity. You know that look. Jeonghan is going to turn them down.

“I, uh, I’m really flattered but I…” Jeonghan stutters through his words, shooting you a glance asking for help. You just shrug. Suddenly his smirk reappears. He grabs your hand, pulling you to his slide and lifting your joined hands up like a trophy. “I’m actually with them.”

Your teeth clench immediately to keep your mouth from falling open. You stare at Jeonghan, eyes screaming.

“Oh sorry,” the person looks between the two of you, “I didn’t know.”

You stare at Jeonghan, waiting for him to say something and failing to find any words for yourself. But instead of continuing his lie verbally, he decides to act it out even further, bringing your hands up to his lips and pressing the faintest kiss to your knuckle.

That fucker.

“Yeah,” you sigh, grasping at straws for something to say that sounds convincing with your one free hand. “It’s new.” You squeeze Jeonghan’s hand hard enough to know it has to have hurt and promptly drag him out of the house.

Once you’re in his car, safe from all his suitors. You round on him. “You couldn’t have just said no?”

“That was their third time asking me out.”

“And?”

“Turning down people is hard.” He whines, pushing the keys in the car and starting the ignition. “It was just easier to say we’re dating. Plus, you’re in my shirt so it already looks like we just had sex.”

“Or,” you gasp, exasperated, “it looks like I got jungle juice on my shirt, and you just gave me one to wear!”

He gives you a look. “Now, who would believe that?”

You have the sudden desire to dissolve into the seat.

“Anyways,” he says, putting the car in reverse, “where to?”

“East campus. The Austin Complex.”

He makes a triumphant noise while stopping at a red light. “It appears I’m not the only one that’s been telling lies tonight. Not that far you said.”

You gape at him. “My lie is not comparable to yours.”

“Actually I think it is.” He taps a finger to his chin. “In fact, I think it even makes us equal.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

He holds out his pinky as a peace offering. “I’m not moving until you agree.”

“Jeonghan, the light’s green.”

He glances at the green traffic light and proceeds to turn his hazards on in the middle of the fucking road all while keeping his pinky in the exact same spot.

“Are you crazy?”

“Most people don’t think so.”

“People will honk.”

“It’s 1 am.”

You say his name. He says yours. The light turns yellow, and you feel a rush of warmth.

“Fine.” You huff, joining your pinky with his. “We’re equal.”

He passes the light just as it turns red.

—

You haven’t seen Jeonghan since the entire incident. In truth, you’ve been so busy studying for your math quiz with Soonyoung that you almost hadn’t even thought about that night again. Emphasis on almost. However, when you get your score back the following week, the hours you spent studying appear to have been wasted. You slump into a bench outside the lecture hall, holding another barely passing grade to your chest.

And in the midst of your public wallowing, you feel a flick to your forehead.

You yelp and snap your eyes open to Jeonghan who stands before you snickering. “What was that for?”

“Payback.”

You say holding out your pinky as a reminder. “I thought we were even.” He shrugs, sporting a smirk that makes your stomach churn. It should be illegal for someone to look that good with a smirk.

“Excuse me?”

Fuck. Did you say that outloud?

“Nothing.” You quickly mutter, shaking your head. He invites himself to sit down next to you.

“Anyway, what’s wrong with you?”

You groan at the reminder. “Multi.”

“Multivariable calculus?” He asks to which you nod. “Who do you have?”

“Lubinsky.”

Defying all laws of reason and physics, Jeonghan perks up a bit. “Oh, I loved him.”

“His quizzes are impossible.”

“Yeah, but he’s funny.”

You scrunch your noise. “When did you even take multi? Aren’t you a business major?”

He tilts his head at you. “How do you know my major?” You might’ve asked Soonyoung about Jeonghan during one of your study sessions, but you definitely weren’t about to admit that now. Luckily for you, he continues without an answer. “I switched majors last year.”

“Then you must know how much I despise sketching in three axes.” You complain, throwing your head back against the wall.

“Just wait until you get to finding extrema.” Jeonghan hums. You want to shove your head through the damn wall just from the sound of it.

“May my grade rest in peace in that case,” you mutter, fishing through your bag. “Here’s your shirt back.”

He takes it. “So people kind of think we’re dating after the party.”

You can’t help it. You laugh at the look on his face. “Yeah, what did you expect when you said we were together?” He doesn’t say anything. “Don’t worry. I’ll clear the air.”

He furrows his brows at you. “What? No. That’s not what I mean. I…” he hesitates, scratching an area behind his neck. “Well, this past week has been surprisingly calm for me. Not a ton of confessions.” (“Oh, poor Jeonghan,” you murmur.) He looks at you hopefully, “So, I was thinking we keep up the charade.”

You make a noise. “Like fake dating?”

“Yes.”

“Haha, very funny.”

“No, seriously.” He says earnestly. You don’t say anything for a moment just staring at him flabbergasted. He softens, giving you a very soft, “please,” paired with big, brown, pleading eyes.

Goddamn it–those eyes.

You turn your body towards him. “What do I get out of it?”

“I’ll tutor you.” He says, pointing to your quiz grade. You flip the paper upside down. “I got an A in multi.”

“No one makes an A with Lubinsky.”

“Which is exactly why you want me as your tutor.”

You think about it for a moment longer, and, well…

Fake dating Yoon Jeonghan can’t be the worst thing in the world.

—

As you find out during your first session, Jeonghan is not what you’d call a ‘chill’ tutor. You’re both sitting in a far corner of the library, notes splayed out all over the table.

“Do it again.”

“Jeonghan please, we’ve been finding directional derivatives and unit normal vectors for so long now. Let’s take a break.”

He points to your worksheet. “One more.”

“That’s what you said last time.”

“I thought you wanted an A.”

“You know, a C isn’t sounding so bad right now.”

“Just do it.”

You groan and set up another integral.

To your complete and utter shock, you’re able to solve the problem all on your own. No clarifying questions to Jeonghan. No flipping through your lecture notes. Just you and the answer.

Jeonghan checks it over, eyes darting between your notebook and his laptop. He pauses for a minute, finger lingering by your boxed, final answer, before very quietly saying, “look at that.” He looks up to you, eyes widened and lips pursed together in a pleasant surprise.

You can barely contain yourself. “It’s right?”

“Well,” he draws out the word, sitting back in his chair and erasing his previous expression. “You still rounded wrong at this step—“

You throw your pencil down. “I’M RIGHT!”

Which unsurprisingly earns you a couple dirty looks from others.

He snickers at your excitement, offering you silent applause at the achievement.

“So can we take a break now?”

He looks at you for a long moment. You stare at him back, shaking your shoulders as if that would convince him of a break. He smiles. “Okay, fine, but only for ten minutes.”

You end up taking it on the roof of the library building, eating an assortment of snacks that you bought from the vending machine and Jeonghan brought from home.

“So, tell me,” you start, grabbing a chip from the bag, “the confessions can’t really be that bad, can they?”

“How do you mean?”

“I mean,” you sit up in your chair, stretching out your back, “enough for you to spend your Thursday afternoon doing all this?”

“Ah.” He exhales, sitting down further in his seat and popping a grape in his mouth. “Well, I like to teach.”

“And what about the whole fake dating ruse?”

He shrugs. “It’s easier than being the asshole that says no.”

You lean forward, squinting at him. “I don’t believe that.”

He cocks his head. “No?”

You shake yours. “No.”

“What about you then?” He asks, crossing his arms over his chest. “How come I know nothing about you?”

“How come you haven’t asked?”

He swipes his tongue over his lips briefly, sizing your question up. Quietly, he says, “Touche.” Then leads forward in his seat and asks if you have an ex.

You steal a grape. “Not an official one.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that there was this guy before university, and we were…” you push the grape in your mouth, letting the burst of it give you time to find the right words. They never come. “We were something,” you settle on, “but he just ended up being more trouble than he was worth. Ask Soonyoung. He’s always hated the guy’s guts.”

“I can’t imagine Soonyoung hating anyone.” Jeonghan muses, pushing the tupperware of grapes towards you.

“Yeah, well, Soonyoung hated people who treated others like they were disposable.”

“So why’d you date him then?”

For a moment, you’re taken aback by the question. Replaying the words over and over in your mind looking for a hint of mockery or judgment. You don’t find any. Instead, you find his brows knitted together, and his lips pushed to the side of this mouth. The question is genuine. A wholehearted curiosity that feels so misplaced coming from the guy who has suitors falling at his feet at least once a day. It’s an innocent kind of curiosity that isn’t trying to pry; it’s only trying to understand. And that thought, the very idea that Jeonghan might actually be trying to get to know you, makes your entire body inexplicably shiver.

The curiosity in his voice bends over and touches yours. “What? You’ve never been young and stupid before?”

He shakes his head. “I was so focused on school and soccer when I was younger. I feel like I never gave myself the chance to just do dumb things, date shitty people, etc. etc.”

Gravely, you say. “It’s really not that exciting.”

He laughs. “I know.” His voice dips. “I just wish I had figured that out myself.”

Jeonghan doesn’t meet your eyes when he says it, but he makes this face, this sad-eyed, forced smile face that makes him look so suddenly vulnerable. Like you could tap his shoulder and watch him unravel from head to toe. You feel a rush of pity in the middle of your chest, a quiet urge to reach over and give him all the teenage regrets he never got to have. Instead, you lean towards him and say, “You’re still young. You can still do dumb things. Date shitty people.”

His eyes flit up to you. You notice what a beautiful shade of brown they are. How big they are. How sincerely sad they look. (And you know, somewhere, in a very far corner of your mind, that those eyes will be the ultimate death of you.)

“Well, I don’t know about that last part.” He starts, rubbing his hands against his jeans. “Technically, I’m dating you.”

You place your palm on your chest. “And I swear to be the shittiest fake partner you’ll ever have.”

He smiles. The sun emerges from behind a cloud. And his eyes–you swear to god–they glimmer.

—

You and Jeonghan’s first outing as an official fake couple is back at the frat house. To your surprise Jeonghan stays by your side the entire time. He takes you around the house, gets you a drink, and introduces you to his friends, but you’re quick to shoot down any shock because what else would a fake boyfriend be doing at a party. Although it’s not as easy to calm down the beating of your heart when Jeonghan’s hand finds its way into yours at some point in the night. By the time the party is in full swing, people bursting from every open door and window in the house, you’re already a little tipsy.

You’re getting a refill for your nearly done drink when another girl appears in front of Jeonghan. From the way she’s twirling her hair between her fingers and leaning into one hip, you can tell that, at least from her end, it’s more than just a friendly conversation. But even that doesn’t really explain what makes you act the way you do. Maybe it’s the alcohol, you reason. Or maybe the fact that Jeonghan’s popularity is just as contagious as the rest of him. Or maybe, just maybe, it’s that you’ve gotten a little too invested in this whole fake dating act. Either way, you swallow reason with the last of your drink, strut up to the both of them, and latch yourself to Jeonghan’s side, letting your arm wrap around his. You give the girl a snotty ‘sorry, he’s taken’ before dragging Jeonghan away, giggling into your palm with no intention to return. When you look back at Jeonghan, you find him looking quite amused as well.

“That was good!” He tells you by the time you’re both in the hallway. “But you know what would really seal the deal?”

You’re excited. Fake dating is fun. “What?”

“If we kissed?”

“Oh, please.” Your eyes do a drunken loop de loop. “I’m gonna go get my refill.”

“No, seriously.” He says with a look you can’t quite comprehend. “Look. She’s still watching.”

You look beyond his shoulder and sure enough, the girl is still watching you and him in the hallway. And she looks pissed. Maybe Jeonghan wasn’t that far off with the stalker accusation.

“You see what I have to deal with. Just one kiss. We probably won’t even have to do it again after this.”

“Probably?” You echo.

“Well, yeah, I can’t make any promises.” He shrugs except that you barely hear the words because you’re too focused on taking a tiny step back each time he takes a tiny step towards you. Eventually, the charade ends. Your heel and head meet the wall. His knee meets yours.

You’re painfully aware of your own breathing when you say, “When I said to be young and stupid this is not what I meant.”

He giggles in your face. You can smell the vodka on his breath. Is he drunk? Are you?

“Who’s going to believe we’re dating if we never kiss?”

And well, you can’t really argue with that logic. “Fine, but keep it short.”

He cocks his head to the side. “Do I look like the kind of guy to keep a kiss short?” You snort at that, and when he takes yet another step closer to you, your hands instinctively fly up against his chest. He tangles his fingers between yours and pulls your hands down, resting his forehead against yours. “Hey,” he says except that he’s so close it’s more like he exhales the word and inhales you, “can I kiss you now?”

He lets go of your hands, as if he’s making sure you know you have an out. Your eyes flit up to his, only to find that he’s watching your lips.

“Oh, fuck it,” is what you say before you fist his shirt and pull him in so that his lips meet yours.

And the moment you do all of your previous precautions are thrown out the window because—dang how long has it been since you’ve kissed someone?

Somewhere along the kiss, you lose yourself in the sensation of it, tugging on Jeonghan’s shirt. He wraps his arms around your waist, pulling you in until your bodies are flush against each other. And when he slips his tongue into your mouth you tell yourself you allow it to happen because you’re tipsy or touch starved or both. Although none of those excuses explain why your arms snake around his neck and why your entire body turns to jelly when he moans in your mouth.

“Hey lovebirds,” you hear Soonyoung yell from somewhere thousands and thousands lightyears away, somewhere so far away you barely hear it, “get a room.” You both pull away from the kiss, faces only moving a tiny bit apart. Neither of you try to remove yourselves from the other's arms. He smiles, wide enough that his cheek brushes up against your nose, and it makes you forget where you are. Your ears betray you. You let yourself think he’s talking about the kiss and not the charade when he says, “Thanks for that.”

You throw caution to the window, laughing freely against his face. “Asshole. You knew I wouldn’t say no.”

He steps back, pulling away from your embrace. “Yeah,” he mutters, looking back to the main room, “that should do it.” You follow his eyes to see the girl from earlier whispering to a friend while sneaking glances at you two. You’re reminded of the whole reason you and Jeonghan were kissing in the first place.

He points to your cup. “Shot?”

You laugh—or well at least you try to—but it gets caught in your throat and distorted into a small cough. You swallow. “Yes.”

—

Thankfully, things aren’t awkward between you and Jeonghan after the party, although there’s no real reason for there to be other than the fact that you agreed to fake date him without really thinking about what else it would implicate. In fact, things are sort of easy with Jeonghan. He finds you around campus more often, and you find him too, walking each other to class and grabbing coffee when you both have a spare moment. In the midst of getting a fake boyfriend, you also get a new friend. With Jeonghan’s help, you actually start understanding math enough to complete the homework without having to flip back to the textbook every question. And it’s not too long after the party that you’re planning your next outing as a couple.

—

The stands of the field are absolutely packed with people. You had no idea soccer games rallied this much interest at your school.

“We’re playing a top ranked school apparently,” Soonyoung reads off a sign as you both make your way towards the student section. Luckily, he knows as little about the sport as you do. “So, why exactly did you agree to fake date Jeonghan?”

“He’s tutoring me in multi.” You explain to him, scanning the stands. While walking over to the game, you had told Soonyoung about the whole act, confirming what he already started to suspect when you first suggested going to the soccer game together. (“Drunken makeout I get.” Soonyoung had said. “But going to his games seemed like a stretch.” You shoved him off the sidewalk.)

“At least you’re getting something out of it.” He snorts. “Who are we looking for?”

You show him the text from Jeonghan, telling you to sit with his friend. “Do you know him?”

Soonyoung looks into the crowd. “Him?” He asks, pointing to a guy waving you and him over. You inhale sharply, waving back. “So if it’s fake, why is Jeonghan having you meet his friends?” Soonyoung asks as you head over.

“He has his reasons.” You offer, having asked a similar question yourself. You reach the stand where his friend is seated, crossing past the others in the row and gently apologizing as you bump into dozens of knees.

“Hi, I’m Joshua.” Jeonghan’s friend introduces himself as you and Soonyoung take your seats. You return the greeting, introducing yourself to him. Looking around the student section, you notice everyone else dressed in school merchandise. “Was I supposed to wear school colors for this?”

Soonyoung gives you a long look. Then just laughs in your face.

“Asshole.” You grumble quietly. “Could’ve said something.”

Joshua laughs as well, although much less in-your-face than Soonyoung’s. “I’m surprised Jeonghan didn’t give you like a jersey to wear or something.”

You had meant the asshole in question to be Soonyoung, not Jeonghan, but you don’t really have the heart to correct him. Instead, while waiting for the game to start, you ask, “How do you know Jeonghan?”

“Oh, we met freshman year. We both rushed the frat together, but I dropped after one semester.” Soonyoung pops in then, telling Joshua about when he rushed, and the two boys talk about other people they both mutually know. As one does.

They run out of people after a person named Jihoon. Joshua turns back to you. “How did you and Jeonghan meet? I haven’t even gotten the full story yet.”

“We met through Soonyoung, technically, I guess. At the house during a party. Soonyoung let me into his bathroom.”

Joshua nods, and with a playful lilt adds, “not a stalker, are you?”

You click your tongue against the roof of your mouth and turn back to Soonyoung on the other side of you. “I hope you know I’m never beating the stalker allegations because of you.”

Soonyoung smiles smugly at you.

“No, I’m kidding,” Joshua says through a laugh hidden behind his palm. “I just know how paranoid Jeonghan is about that stuff now.”

The wording pokes at a corner of your mind. “Now?”

Joshua nods, solemnly almost. “He actually had one last year. Didn’t end up being anything seriously endangering luckily. But he barely left his dorm for the rest of the semester after all was said and done.”

You think back to your conversation with Jeonghan on the roof of the library. You feel a familiar pang of pity bloom in your chest. He never got to just be young. Outloud, you hear yourself saying, “stupid.”

Joshua leans towards you. “What?”

You wave it off, and the crowd erupts into cheer. Everybody starts standing up, yelling and jumping and whooping. You hesitate for too long obviously. Soonyoung pulls you up by your arm. You see the team rush the field and the crowd gets impossibly louder. You look for Jeonghan among the players scanning each of them until you find him towards the left side of the field, warming up or something. You’re not really sure. Either way, you hear yourself start cheering when you find him, hands cupping around your mouth. The game starts soon enough with Joshua explaining to you and Soonyoung which position Jeonghan plays and what the hell is happening each time a player receives a card. After the first 15 minutes, you actually get a pretty good understanding of the whole thing.

The first half comes to a close with the opposing team up by one goal and Jeonghan’s team looking exhausted and dispirited.

“Hey, I gotta head out.” Soonyoung tells you once everything has settled down for halftime. “Still have to finish that chem lab due tonight.”

You grimace at the reminder of the report. “Good luck. It took me 5 hours.”

He gives you a miserable thumbs up. Then, turns his attention to Joshua. “It was nice to meet you.”

Joshua returns the sentiment. “I’ll see you at Tim’s once you’re done with the report though, right?”

Soonyoung’s lips turn to a fine line. “I, well, it’s a funny story but uh…”

“He’s banned from Tim’s.” You finish for him.

Joshua does not hide his shock. Soonyoung just shrugs and walks off. Joshua turns to you, exasperated. “But it’s the only bar in town.”

You inhale, “And Soonyoung is the type to get impulsively banned from it for the rest of college.” The answer doesn’t seem to do much of anything for Joshua’s profound confusion. “What’s at Tim’s tonight?”

“Oh, the team always goes there after games. They normally invite some friends too. Whoever can make it out basically.” You nod at his explanation, watching as people leave the stands then return, holding steaming, paper cartons of food. God, that smells good. You crane your neck to see. Are those corn dogs? “Did Jeonghan not tell you about it?”

“What?” He pulls you out of a trance of your own. “Oh, yeah, yeah. I think he mentioned it. I probably just forgot.”

Joshua chuckles politely. “So are you coming?”

Oh crap. “Uh, well…” A million lies run through your mind, chasing past one another, zigzagging in your brain. You have homework. You have other plans. You and Jeonghan aren’t even actually dating. Well—a million lies and one truth you guess. Either way, they all fizzle to nothing. Jeonghan didn’t tell you about the tradition at Tim’s. He probably doesn’t even want you there. So what the hell are you supposed to tell his best friend?

Luckily, you never have to figure that out. Fanfare erupts through the crowd, the announcer sounds throughout the entire field. “Oh the game’s restarting,” you mutter. Joshua is either genuinely disinterested in your response or just polite enough to not ask about it again. You have a crummy feeling it’s the latter.

The second half of the game is much more intense than the first. Your school’s team comes out blazing, scoring a goal in the first ten minutes in an insane effort led by the player with a 7 on his back. And the crowd, you included, absolutely lose their shit. You’re jumping up and down on the stands, screaming at the top of your lungs, voice lost among the rest. The team rushes to the right corner of the field closest to the student section, colliding in hugs and jumps and screaming maybe even louder than the hundreds of you in the stands. You watch Jeonghan in the celebration, hair matted down with sweat, mouth ajar in a soundless cheer, embracing a teammate before ditching him to literally jump on top of another. Your yells turn to laughs. And before you know it, the game is back on, all players racing across the field in a mad dash. The ball goes flying. Penalty cards flying to nearly every player at least once. The entire student section is at the edge of their seats. Time seems to fly by with unified chants filling your ears and throat. There’s only 10 minutes left. The game is still in a tie, and you really don’t feel like sitting here for the extra time. Then, someone starts singing the school’s fight song. Eventually, the whole section is singing it. You included. It ignites something in the team.

The opposing team has the ball, dribbling it across the field and passing it back and forth. Out of nowhere, one of your school’s players appears right next to the opponent with the ball. He kicks the ball out from under the other player, taking him and the rest of the stands by surprise. The ball rolls from under his knees to another of your school’s players. Jeonghan’s teammate is in action immediately, sprinting away with the ball to the opposite side of the field, feet flying faster than your mind can even comprehend. And just as one of the opposing team’s members closes in on him, he punts the ball in the air and it flies and flies and flies. Your heart lurches. There’s no mistaking it–the ball is aimed for Jeonghan. 7 minutes left. Jeonghan receives the ball perfectly, immediately racing away with it towards the goal. An opponent chases after him, forcing him to head nearer and nearer to the touchlines. It all happens so fast. The other player kicks his feet out to steal the ball. Jeonghan crosses the ball over to another teammate. The teammate receives it with his head. He dribbles it forward for half a second and then shoots. Time nearly stops when he does. The goalie throws their entire body to block the ball, and every present body watches, stupefied, as the ball blows right past the goalie’s head and lands squarely within the goal.

And if you thought the previous goal’s celebration was loud, this one’s is deafening. The entire stadium roars in pride. Your school won. Jeonghan won. And you can’t stop fucking smiling.

—

Joshua convinces you to wait for Jeonghan and the rest of the team at Tim’s with him. You do. For matters of fake dating but also because you could really use a beer. Conversation with Joshua is fun and light. By the time you’re both on your second round, his politeness dims to tease you for your drink of choice. You see now why he’s one of Jeonghan’s closest friends.

There’s commotion towards the entrance. You turn your heads towards it and watch Jeonghan’s team rumble through the tiny door, yelling at god knows what and rushing to the bar.

Joshua stands to go say hi. You follow him, walking slightly behind. Jeonghan finds you before you both find him. He tackles Joshua first, hugging him from the side, and literally ‘whooping’ into his ear. Joshua smacks at his face at first, but eventually joins him in the repeated ‘whooping’ jumping up and down in celebration. Then Jeonghan sees you. The whooping fades. He stares.

You swallow.

“Yah!” He exclaims, releasing Joshua and pointing a finger at your shirt. “I thought I told you to wear the jersey I gave you.”

Your face drops. Whatever happened to ‘hi’, ‘hello’, ‘how are you’?

Joshua says something about the bathroom and walks to the back of the bar.

You shake your head at the remaining boy. “It’s a little bit concerning how good you are at lying, you know.”

“Well, we can’t have people suspecting us.” He retorts, stepping closer to you as someone passes behind him.

“Is it okay that I’m here?” You ask, quiet enough for no one else to hear, face scrunching. “I didn’t know what to say to Joshua earlier, but I can definitely make up a lie if you want to just–”

“Are you kidding?” He grabs you by the shoulders, shaking you back and forth. “I want you here! We have to celebrate. This was the biggest game of the season, and we won it!” Then, with that same crooked smile you noticed upon first meeting, he adds, “Plus, you’re not very good at lying.”

You scoff. “Even now, you have the capacity for assholery.”

His eyebrows zip together. “I don’t think that’s a word.”

“It could be.”

Someone pats Jeonghan on the back, handing him a drink. Jeonghan asks what it is. The other person tells him to just drink it. Jeonghan does so begrudgingly. You recognize the person to be player number 7.

“Hi, I’m Seungcheol,” number 7 says to you, holding out his hand. You shake it, introducing yourself and congratulating him on the game.

“Hey, is assholery a word?” Jeonghan asks his teammate, watching your face contort through a thousand different variations of annoyance and disbelief.

Seungcheol looks between the two of you. “Uh, no. Don’t think so.”

“Ha!” Jeonghan wags a finger in your face. “You owe me a drink.”

You narrow your eyes at him, but you head towards the bar with Jeonghan anyways, where you find Joshua again ordering the three of you a round of shots. “No, no,” he insists, when you try to tell him that you’re already buying drinks, “I owe Jeonghan a drink anyways.”

And as you find out throughout the course of the night, apparently every other patron at Tim’s owes Jeonghan a drink. You lose count of how many times you’ve heard him say so after your third beer. Joshua makes his exit soon after that and conveniently right before the team starts singing the fight song again. You start dreaming of bed when a guy you recognize as number 3 gets on a chair and starts leading the crowd.

Your phone buzzes.

Soonyoung [1:23 AM]: finished the report :0

Soonyoung [1:23 AM]: finally

Soonyoung [1:24 AM]: how’s tim’s

You [1:24 AM]: did you know they had a karaoke machine?

Soonyoung [1:25 AM]: do you not remember how i got banned in the first place

You [1:25 AM]: sore subject mb

You [1:27 AM]: damn how’d you finish the report so fast

You [1:27 AM]: you only started it after the game right

Soonyoung [1:28 AM]: u know me xD

An odd feeling settles in your stomach as they start the last stanza of the fight song. You shove your phone in your pocket and ask for the check.

By 2 am, the celebration is finally winding down, and the entire team is collectively too drunk to stand. “Come on, Jeonghan,” you pull him away as he says goodbye to his friends for the millionth time. “Let’s go home.”

He finally relents, turning away from his friends and throwing both his arms over your shoulders, hugging you from the back. “Let’s go to yours.”

“Mine? Why?”

“It’s closer.” Then after a moment, he bumps his chin against your shoulder and adds, “Plus, I wanna see your room.”

“Fine,” you huff and start walking. Jeonghan releases himself from your back, electing to walk on his own until you realize he’s too much of a wanderer to be unattached, drifting off to the edge of the sidewalk or in the wrong direction every chance he gets. He asks you to carry him. You settle for holding his hand. The two of you walk quietly back to your dorm. That is until Jeonghan starts humming the fight song again. You snap. “Is that the only song you guys know tonight?”

He stops humming and apologizes. You don’t say anything back. Then, very quietly, sounding so infuriatingly innocent, he says, “I didn’t mean to get this drunk.”

You’re an asshole. “No. It’s okay. You’re okay. I’m just a little… upset right now.”

He burps. “Because of me?”

The look on his face when he says it pulls a laugh from between your lips. “No. Not because of you.” You make a right onto your street, dragging Jeonghan along as he tries to take a left. “Anyway, I thought student athletes weren’t supposed to drink.”

“No, we’re not supposed to get caught drinking.” Jeonghan holds out his hand in front of him, as if to say ‘stop’ to something invisible to you. “Very different.”

“Ah, I see.”

“Either way, I don’t drink that much.”

You scoff, stopping in front of the door to your building. “What do you mean? You drank last weekend.”

He shakes his head. “That was a special occasion.”

“And the occasion was…?”

He looks you dead in the eye.

“You make me nervous.”

Then, he turns around and vomits into the bushes behind him.

Once you get him to your apartment and in your bathroom, you leave him to vomit out the alcohol. Returning after the retching sounds recede and you’ve changed into pjs. He’s seated on the floor beside the toilet, eyes closed and head resting against the wall. You sit on the other side. Thank god, you cleaned this bathroom yesterday. “How do you feel?” You ask him.

He inhales. “Much better now that I…” He gestures to the toilet.

“Here.” You hand him a glass of water.

He opens his eyes and takes it, drinking from it slowly. “Sorry I got so drunk.”

“You already apologized 30 times on the way up here.” You remind him.

“But I’m really sorry.”

“And I really don’t mind.”

He considers that for a long moment. “You sure?”

You lean forward. “I’m sure. More water?”

He shakes his head, wordlessly eyeing your pajama pants. You look down at your snoopy pants. You hadn’t thought too hard about your choice of bottoms when you changed. “Cute.” He mutters, smiling at them.

You mumble back a ‘thanks’.

“So, what’d you think of the game?”

You tell him honestly how much fun you had watching them play, giving him every reaction you had to every move made and all your unfiltered opinions on the refs. He listens intently, filling you in on all the thoughts that ran through his head while they were playing and every conversation that happened on the sidelines.

“Thanks for coming.” He tells you once you’ve both exhausted all opinions relating to the game itself. “And for meeting Joshua and coming out to Tim’s afterwards and then getting me out of Tim’s too.”

“Jeonghan, it’s really not that big of a deal. And Joshua was a lot of fun to hang out with.”

“Hey, don’t get too attached.” He warns. “I’m the one you’re fake dating.”

“Trust me, I know.”

“So, then, as your fake boyfriend,” he gulps down the last of the water, “are you going to tell me what you were so upset about?”

You exhale, flexing your fingers. “It’s stupid.”

“And here I was thinking we had made a pact to be young and dumb.” You run your tongue over your top row of teeth, holding back a smile. “So, what happened?”

“I just got this text from Soonyoung that he finished this one assignment. And, I don’t know, I just felt so ridiculous because it took me so much longer than him to do.”

“Which assignment? The chem lab?”

You don’t remember telling Jeonghan about it. “Uh, yeah. How did you–”

“Man, who cares if it took you longer? I know Soonyoung, and I know you, and I bet yours is a million times better than his. No offense to Soonyoung, but I’m pretty sure he’d agree anyways.”

“Okay, you’re drunk.”

“That may be true, but it has nothing to do with the fact that you’re brilliant.”

Something about the way he says it, how steady his voice is maybe or the way he refuses to look away, forces you to see how much he believes it. But even that, doesn’t do much to change what you think.

“What are you talking about? I wouldn’t even be passing multi if it weren’t for you.” Your voice cracks as you say the words, making it all come out sounding much sadder than you had intended it to. You hope he doesn’t notice.

“That’s really not true.” You can’t even trust yourself to respond to him. He pouts. “Are you upset again?”

“A little.”

“I’m sorry. Let’s drop it.”

“Gladly.” Then, after a moment, you laugh at how silly it all is.

“First fight of the relationship.” He gives you your second half smile of the night. “I think we should hug it out.”

Your body reacts to the words before you do. “I disagree–”

“Did you just cringe?”

“–you smell like vomit.”

“Well, do you have clothes for me?”

“No, but I have a couch.”

He holds his index finger up. “I’ll take it.”

—

(When you wake up the next morning, Jeonghan’s gone. You open your phone and find 2 more apologies and 3 more thank you’s from him.

You try to ignore the twinge of disappointment.)

—

When the third weekend of fake dating rolls around, you admittedly are a bit tired of going to parties and getting drunk. So when Jeonghan asks what the plans are, you suggest he say that he’s taking you out on a date instead.

As such, you’ve spent nearly the entire day in bed. You’re heating up some water on the stove to make ramen when you get a text from Jeonghan saying he’s five minutes away. You stare at the text. The fuck does that mean?

Unsurprisingly, it ends up meaning that he was literally five minutes away. You open the door when he knocks and stare at him standing in the doorway.

“What are you wearing?” Is the first thing he says. You look down at your outfit. “You should’ve told me this was going to be a sweats kind of date before I put real clothes on.”

“Date?”

“Don’t look so surprised, it was your idea.” Jeonghan reminds you, strutting into your kitchen.

“No, no.” You say, returning to your boiling water. “My idea was to tell people we’re going on a date. Like as a cover.”

“Oh.” He falls down onto your couch. “Well I’m here so get dressed there’s this new ramen place I wanna try.”

You sigh, turning the stovetop off before trudging to your room to change.

The ‘date’ ends up being quite nice. You discuss a study plan to prepare for your math midterm over a much yummier bowl of ramen than you had planned on consuming today. Afterwards, you walk the streets of downtown, only intending to window shop. However, now, standing in a small boutique, Jeonghan tries to convince you to buy matching necklaces.

“Come on, they’re so cute.”

“We don’t need matching necklaces, Jeonghan.”

“A real couple would definitely have matching necklaces.”

“Good thing we’re not one.”

“Fine then. Guess I’ll just stop tutoring you in math too. You know Lubinsky’s midterms are almost as hard as his finals, right?”

You grab two of the necklaces and turn to the cashier. “How much?” You swear you hear Jeonghan whoop from behind you.

—

“Hey,” Jeonghan whispers, “we’re here.” You open your eyes slowly, not even registering that you fell asleep on the ride back to campus after the date-but-not-date. “You drool when you sleep by the way.”

And that wakes you up. You wipe whatever drool is left on your mouth, muttering a small and embarrassed ‘shut up’.

“What are you doing for the rest of your day?” He asks as you gather your things from his car.

“Absolutely nothing. Today’s the last day to rot before midterm prep starts.” You tell him, looking for your wallet. “What about you?”

“Avoiding a mixer at the house tonight.” He reaches into the center console and hands you the leather slip.

You take the wallet gratefully. “Wanna join me? We can make some tea. Watch a movie.”

He puts the car in park. “I know just what we should watch.”

And that’s how you end up on your couch with Jeonghan, two emptied mugs sitting on the coffee table, blanket draped over your legs, and the worst movie you’ve seen to date playing in the background.

“Wow, this movie sucks ass.”

“This,” Jeonghan gestures passionately to the screen, “is cinema.” You clasp your hands together as if in prayer. He takes a double take at the motion. “What are you doing?”

“I’m thanking god that your major is business and not film.” He immediately smacks apart your hands. “Don’t lie.” You say gasping for air between laughs. “This movie is objectively not good.”

His tongue peeks out between his lips, you practically see the smiling begging to emerge on his face. “Okay, so it might not be all that it was hyped up to be, but–”

“Ha!” You point a finger in his face. “I knew you hated it.” He slumps into the couch, pulling the blanket up to his chin. “Do you want more tea?” You ask. He soundlessly nods, refusing to move his eyes from the tv screen.

You stand to make some, grabbing both mugs from the table. “So, do you not have a roommate?” Jeonghan questions, as you pour water from the kettle into the mugs.

You look to the second, empty room of your apartment style dorm. “Actually, no. There was supposed to be someone there, but they moved or dropped out at the start of the year and the school never filled the room.”

“Ah.” Jeonghan clicks, nodding as if finally putting together the last piece of a puzzle “So, that’s why you’re so friendless.”

You return to the couch with full mugs. “I am not friendless.” He makes a face. “Really. I have friends.”

“Other than Soonyoung?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, name them.” You kick him under the blanket. “Fine. You have friends.” (“I have friends.”) “But how come you never talk about hanging out with them?”

You exhale slowly, sinking further into the couch. “I just didn’t do too well in school last semester, so I promised myself I would focus on classes this time around. And, I don’t know, I guess I just got so caught up in that and haven’t really been making the time or effort for hangouts.”

He tilts his head. “You know, I feel like there’s a world where you can do well in school while also maintaining your friendships. I mean we see each other regularly.”

“That’s because half of the time we’re studying.”

He gives you a look. “You know what I mean.”

You sigh, considering his point. Maybe at one point you would have thought the same. Last semester you even tried to have it all–the friends, the social life, the grades. But in the end, you dropped the ball. You can’t afford to make those same mistakes. “I just don’t think that world exists for me.”

He finally looks away from the tv and gives his full attention to you. His eyes seem to linger on every turn in your face. Quietly, he says, “So that’s what it is.” He doesn’t offer an explanation immediately. Instead, his chest deflates in one long exhale, and you smother the voice in your head that’s begging you to ask for one. And there’s this conviction in his voice, this breathtaking finality, when he says, “When are you going to believe me when I say that you’re one of the smartest people I know?” that scares the living shit out of you.

He looks at you again, and you swear to god, his eyes fall right through your frame. You swallow. “What about you?”

His eyebrows raise. “What about me?”

“Who are your friends? How do you spend all your time apart from classes, soccer, the frat, tutoring me and–oh my god, nevermind, new question. Do you even sleep?”

He takes a sip from the tea. “Don’t forget the business honor society. I’ll be the treasurer next fall.”

You squint at him. “Why?”

And like it’s the simplest, most obvious thing in the world he says, “oh, well, they asked.”

Suddenly, you’re reminded of all the times you’ve seen him get asked out on dates followed by every time he’s failed to say no. “Jeonghan,” you turn to him, setting down your mug. (“oh, this is serious, okay.”) You ignore him. “Can you not say no to people?”

He blows a raspberry. “I can say no. Ask me something.”

“Uhhhh,” you rack your brain, “how about–let’s go to the beach next weekend.”

The closest beach is 5 hours away, and yet he has the audacity to say, “Wait, that sounds like fun though.”

“I thought you hated the ocean.”

“Yeah, but maybe it’d be fun with you.”

You shake your head, muttering how impossible he is. The end credits of the movie finally plays.

“I should head out.” Jeonghan says, removing himself from under the blanket. You nod, grabbing the mugs of tea and bringing them to the kitchen. He follows you to the door. You both exchange the usual ‘this was fun’, ‘let’s do it again’, ‘I’ll see you later’ that ends every hangout you’ve had in college. But then, unlike every other person you’ve held the door open for as they leave, after Jeonghan says his final goodbye, he gives you a peck on the lips.

Did that just happen?

Your fingers touch against your lips. Oh my god, it did.

He blinks. “Sorry. I, uh, I don’t know why I just,” he points to your lips, swallowing, “lol. We’re always pretending and then now. And you. Okay, well, anyways, I’ll leave.”

He turns and doesn’t look back. You hear a ‘bye’ sound from the hallway.

And it’s only by the time he’s probably halfway home that it hits: You’ve never seen Jeonghan flustered like that.

—

The first day of midterm prep is brutal. You spend the entire night in the library, studying for hours on end. And once an hour, on the dot it seems, you hear Jeonghan’s voice in your head. There’s a world where you can do well in school while also maintaining your friendships. That very night you text your friends, asking if they want to join you in one of the library study rooms you have booked every evening this week. They do, excited to hear from you again and for the gentle encouragement to get a head start on studying. You hate to admit that Jeonghan was right, but goddammit he was. You have a blast with your friends. You had barely even realized how long you’d gone without seeing them and how much you missed them. By the time your Thursday afternoon tutoring with Jeonghan comes back around, you’re still on track with the study plan you created over ramen, and you have exciting news for him.

“A birthday party?” Jeonghan says, voice carefully devoid of the disdain you must know he feels.

“Yeah, they heard through whoever that we’re dating, and now they all want you to come.”

“But a birthday party?” He repeats. This time not trying to hide anything.

“Oh come on. I went to the game for you.”

“Yeah, but the game was fun.”

“This will be fun too!” You say in what you hope is an encouraging way.

“Fine. But promise you won’t ditch me for your friends.”

“You’re so dramatic.” You mutter. “But yes, I promise.”

That Friday night Jeonghan meets you at your apartment and the two of you head over to the party together.

Halfway down the hallway to your friend’s apartment, Jeonghan suddenly halts. “Shit, should I have brought something?”

“Like what?”

“A gift? Wine? I don’t know.”

“Jeonghan, it’s a party. Don’t overthink it.” You tell him, opening the door to your friend’s apartment.

You step into her entryway and immediately feel like you’ve been transported into another world. The lights are all off save for some LED lights wrapped around the living room ceiling. An assortment of stacked red solo cups, yak-worthy bottles of vodka, and seltzers take over all available kitchen counter space. Some old pop song from an artist you know your friend loves plays loudly from the tv, reverberating through every pair of ears shoved into this tiny apartment. You inhale. The air reeks distinctly of college. You love it.

“Oh my god, there’s even people on the balcony.” Jeonghan whispers in your ears. You pivot your head around to look at him. He looks back at you, unassuming. “What?”

This entire scene is one you’re quite familiar with, having spent many nights just like this in previous semesters. But as you watch Jeonghan gape at the amount of people fitted into the kitchen alone, you figure he might not be as acquainted with this. “Yoon Jeonghan, is this your first apartment party?”

He cocks his head to the side. “Is it not yours?”

But before you can tell him all about the life you used to live before him, your friends find you attacking you with hugs and introducing themselves to Jeonghan.

Jenny, the birthday girl in question, sloppily points at both of you and says, “I’ve been drinking since noon. You need to catch up.”

After a minute of half-hearted protest, you oblige, heading over to the kitchen area. You grab two cups, handing Jeonghan one. “There’s soda over there if you’re not drinking tonight,” you tell him, pointing to the area beside the sink where a line of mixers await.

He looks over at the bottles, then looks back at you. “Are you drinking?”

“Yes!” Your friend Daniel yells from over the music. You just shrug, reaching for one of the handles. “I guess so.”

Jeonghan inhales sharply, holding out his cup for you to pour. “I’ll have what you’re having then.”

You hesitate, open bottle hovering over the lip of his cup. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. Why?”

You frown. “I was thinking about what you said after the game about how you don’t drink that much, and I don’t want you to drink just because I am. I can not drink too.”

He pushes his cup up. “What was it you said earlier? It’s a party. Don’t overthink it.”

Then he gives you that crooked half smile that you’ve come to know so well. You pour him a drink and pour yourself one too. You turn back to your friends, holding up your cup for a cheers.

“Wait, wait, what are we cheersing to?” Daniel asks, grabbing his cup from behind him and holding it up, tapping on Jenny’s shoulder for her to do the same.

It’s Jeonghan who answers. Looking straight at you, he holds his cup up high and says, “To friends.”

You bring the drink up to your lips smiling, watching him watching you. All four of you down your drinks. The drink is absolutely terrible, burning a path down your throat all the way down. Jeonghan hands you another cup, whispering ‘it’s coke’ with an equally pained expression on his face. You take it gratefully.

“God,” Jenny says, placing a hand on her chest while watching the exchange between you and Jeonghan, “they’re like an old married couple already. How have we missed all this?”

“I know.” Daniel says, shaking his head. “I can still barely believe it.”

You glare at him. “Hey, what’s so hard to believe?”

They both ignore you, turning their attention to Jeonghan instead.

“So, we’ve heard all the boring–how you guys met, first date–sort of stuff, but we want to know the juicy details–”

“Jenny, don’t you have other guests to attend to or–”

“Yeah,” Daniel joins in, “like what’s your favorite thing about them?”

You turn to Jeonghan immediately. “You don’t have to answer that.”

“My favorite part,” Jeonghan starts, ignoring your plea to not humor them and tapping a finger on his chin in thought. He must find it after a moment, pausing the tapping and stealing a glance your way. “Probably how much fun I have with them.” He says to your friends. “I feel like we’re always laughing together or just having a good time. I’ve never been able to talk to someone as easily as I do with them. Like you know how when you get towards the end of a really good book, and you just can’t put it down, pushing everything else to the side to keep reading. Hanging out with them is like that.” Turning back to look at you, he adds, “I never want it to end.”

You hold his gaze while Jenny and Daniel erupt into a series of awes and exclamations. Deep in your gut, you know that you should be focusing on the kind smile on his face or the sudden rapidity in your heartbeat, but instead, more cruelly, you wonder how much of that was a lie he made up to appease the role of your fake boyfriend.

You turn to pour yourself another drink. He holds his cup out as well. You pour for two.

“You okay?” He asks, pouring some fruit punch into both your cups as well.

You nod. You have no reason to be upset. So taking a sip of the drink, you decide you’re not. “Yeah, I’m good.”

“We should play a game,” he says, taking a sniff of your jointly made concoction.

“Oh?”

“Yeah, like…” He looks around the apartment. “We have to drink every time we see someone kissing.”

“What kind of rule is that?”

“No. It’ll be fun.” He says, scanning the apartment again. He sucks in air between his teeth. “Damn, I thought there’d be more kissing than this for some reason.”

You laugh at his cluelessness, and then lean in to kiss his cheek. “There.” You say, clinking your cup against his. “Now, we can drink.”

He taps a finger to the tip of his nose twice, then points it at you, before taking two large gulps of his drink.

The game actually does a good job of getting you and Jeonghan drunk once Jenny catches wind if it and starts giving out birthday kisses to whoever will take one. After a while, you make the executive decision that you need a break and escape to the bathroom to piss. When you exit back into the hallway off the living room, Jeonghan is there, leaning against the opposite wall, waiting for you. He hands you your cup back. “Your friends are terrible, terrible enablers,” he says, motioning for you to drink up while taking a drink himself. You whimper, leaning against the wall beside him and readmitting the dreaded liquid to your body.

“So,” you bump your shoulder against his, “are you having fun?”

He shifts his entire body to face you, shoulder resting against the wall, back turned to the entire party. He puts his face right in front of yours, narrows his eyes at you playfully, and says, “did you even listen to what I said?”

You put a hand on his shoulder. Just to have something between his body and yours. “What?”

He grins cheekily, letting out a puff of air that smells like cherry. “I always have fun with you.”

You laugh. Then in a voice sober you would be embarrassed of, you say, “And you never want it to end?”

He sticks his tongue out just barely, laughing into your neck. “And I never want it to end.”

You kiss him.

You don’t stop to think about what it might mean tomorrow or even in the next hour. You don’t stop to think about the fact that you’re too drunk to be initiating kisses or the possibility that he is. You don’t stop to think about anything, other than how much you love the sound of his laugh and how badly you want to feel his lips on yours again.

The kiss starts slowly, a shy orchestration of lips and breath. Your nose bumps against his, and he pulls away. He looks at you with those damn eyes, like it’s the first time all over again. And for some reason you can’t explain you bitterly think that it was always going to end like this.

He cups his free hand against your cheek and pulls you back in. Your lips meet in an open-mouthed kiss that has nothing slow and shy about it. No. It’s sloppy, hurried, and hungry. It’s tongue and teeth, crashing and colliding over and over again. It’s your body against his, every rise of your chest battling against his You wrap your free hand against his torso, pulling him impossibly closer. His hand moves from where it was holding your face to travel over the back of your head and your neck, sliding halfway down your back before pulling forward to run from your waist down to your hip. It lingers there for a moment before continuing further to grip the back of your thigh, pulling your knee up the side of his leg and holding it there against his hip.

A commotion sounds from the living room. “Oh shit.” You say breathlessly, pulling away from him. “I think she’s going to pop the champagne.”

“Okay.” He breathes, before kissing you again. You laugh in his mouth, whispering his name and pushing a hand against his chest. Finally, he lets go of your leg. You lead him back to the rest of the party where everyone is crowding around the balcony entrance. You and Jeonghan stand in the living room, watching from the window as Jenny struggles to pop the cork. She gets it after a moment, yelping at the sudden burst and spraying it over the edge of the balcony. Once the champagne dies down enough to not be overflowing, she brings the bottle to her lips and chugs. Everyone counts.

1! Jeonghan steps closer to you, wrapping his arms around your torso and hugging you from the back. You have to remind yourself to catch your breath.

2! He rests his chin on your shoulder. Without even thinking about it, you rest your head against his. His voice is a warm breath on your neck.

3! You recall what he said to your friends at the start of the party and again to you right before the kiss. Did he mean it? Does he really not want this to end?

4! Your eyes glance over at his. He looks happy. He looks like he’s finally given himself the chance to be young and stupid, which from the start, is all you ever wanted for him. So then why does it make you feel so suddenly grief-stricken?

5! “Why didn’t you tell Joshua about us?” You ask him quietly, voice drowned out by the counting for everyone other than him.

6! He angles his chin towards you. “What do you mean? He knows we’re dating.”

7! “No, I mean why didn’t you tell him that it’s fake.”

8! He stands up straight. Fuck the counting. You turn to look at him. “He’s your best friend, isn’t he?”

9! He looks at you carefully. “Did you tell Soonyoung that it’s all been fake?”

10! You haven’t even answered him yet, but somehow, he already knows what you’re going to say.

11! “Yes.” And even alcohol couldn’t have hidden the distinct look of betrayal painted all over his face.

12! He looks down into his cup and chuckles darkly. “Why did we just kiss?”

13! You swallow. Shit. “Someone was looking at you, like–well, you know what like.”

14! He doesn’t say anything. You recount his words back to him. “Sealing the deal, remember.”

15! His eyes bore into yours. How could you have been so stupid?

16! Please, you want to beg, say something.

17! He shakes his head, smiling emptily. “Tell your friends it was nice to meet them.”

18! He doesn’t wait to hear if you have anything left to say. He turns, and you watch him disappear from the party.

The rest of the numbers blur in your head.

—

(That night you had called Soonyoung, sobbing over the phone, feeling more drunk then, in your apartment than you had at any other point that night.

“What’s wrong?” Alarm was flush in his voice. “What happened? Are you okay?”

The only thing Soonyoung could even make out was a very sad, very quiet, “I ruined it.”)

—

You haven’t talked to Jeonghan since Jenny’s party. He hasn’t texted you either. Staring at your upcoming midterm on Thursday and the extra study session with Jeonghan scheduled for Wednesday, you feel, quite lamely, mocked by your own calendar. But more than anything, you’re mad that he’s left you to study all alone the week of your midterm. You’re mad that you’re so busy replaying that night in your head, you can barely pay attention to the practice tests. You’re mad that, right now, sitting at the spot you guys always sat at in the library, you don’t have him. And you’re terrified of the creeping thought that you never really did.

By the time the midterm does come around, you’re exhausted. Not from studying or lack of sleep, but just from the sheer willpower it’s taken all week to not think about Jeonghan. You feel oddly calm going into the exam, the usual anxious chatter of students around you and rattling of chairs and pencils, not freaking you out as much as it normally would. You take the midterm, one question at a time, just as Jeonghan instructed you to do with every homework and every quiz. And then, 40 minutes in, you finish. Astonishingly, you even have enough time left to check over your work. So you do, fixing minor rounding and calculation errors, until you’re faced again with a completed exam and 15 minutes left.

You get to do something you haven’t done since high school: you turn it in early.

—

You spend the rest of that day in between your bed and your couch, struggling even more now than before to ignore thoughts of Jeonghan and your last conversation with him. For the past several weeks, Thursday afternoons were monopolized by Jeonghan, but today, watching the sun set outside your window, you’ve spent it all alone. The finality of what happened last weekend finally hits you: you might never speak to Jeonghan again. You really did ruin it. Suddenly, the urge to weep overcomes you. You turn on the tv instead, looking for a movie to watch. And of course it must be fate's petty joke on you that the first movie that pops up is the one you watched with Jeonghan after your date. You groan into your pillow before switching to something else.

By the time the movie is almost over and the sun has fully set, your phone rings. You had been checking it obsessively earlier and had therefore set it a bit farther away from where you were sitting. But at the sound of the ring, you’re ashamed to admit that you literally leapt for it. Your mind reads the caller id and is instantly flooded with an odd mix of relief and anxiety. Jeonghan is calling. Holy shit, Jeonghan is calling.

Your voice is shaky when you answer. “Hello?”

“Hey, this is Jeonghan’s partner right?” Your mouth parts at the voice that most definitely does not belong to Jeonghan. Who is this man? Why does he have Jeonghan’s phone? Why does it hurt your heart so much when he calls you Jeonghan’s partner? You must sit in your shock for too long because the mystery caller speaks again, sounding somewhat annoyed. “This is Seungcheol from the team. This is who I think it is, right? Because your number was saved as ‘my cutie’ with like a million heart emojis, so if not, this is about to get really awkward.” You have no idea how to respond to that. Finally, Seungcheol says your name. “This is you, right?”

You inhale sharply. “Yeah, uhm, sorry yes. Is everything alright? Aren’t you guys at practice right now?”

“Yeah, well we’re about to end, but here’s the thing…” Seungcheol then explains how terribly Jeonghan’s been playing this week, overly aggressive, missing every pass, fucking up every cross. And today, halfway through practice he hurt his shoulder and the coach sat him out entirely, forcing him to sit on the sidelines and just watch. Safe to say, this did not go over well with him, and he’s been laying down on the bench head buried in his arms, snapping at everyone who approaches him ever since. Seungcheol had to use a fake emergency bathroom break as a chance to run away to the locker room and make this call. “Do you know what’s going on with him?”

Of course you know, and it’s all your fault. You really did ruin everything with one kiss. “I–”

“Fuck, I’m running out of time. Never mind that.” Seungcheol says, cutting you off. “Can you just come down and be here, when we get off practice? Jeonghan drove over so you both can take his car back, but I think he just really needs someone here with him today.”

You wince. “Seungcheol, actually, I–”

“No, no, please. You don’t understand. I think I saw him crying on the bench. He needs you. Come.” Then after a slight hesitation he adds, “If you can. Please.”

You don’t even know what to say, but it doesn’t matter because just then the call ends. You stare at your phone, considering the options. Stay here and wallow. Or go, and try to salvage everything you’ve broken. And while you are a very accomplished wallower, you know which one you have to do. You drag your feet all the way over to your room to change.

You pace outside the field waiting for them, running through every possible scenario in your head. It does nothing, only worsening the condition of your already ailing heart. You drop down onto the curb, holding your head in your hands. Maybe he won’t even see you like this. You can’t tell if you prefer or hate that possibility.

Something bumps into your back. You look up and find Jeonghan staring down at you. You stand up so quickly your head starts to spin. Looking at him, you realize that this is the longest you’ve gone without seeing or talking to each other since meeting. You hated every second of it. But you think you might hate the look on his face right now more.

“What are you doing here?” He asks, words devoid of all the little quirks that make him him.

“Seungcheol called me.”

His face twitches. “Why?”

“He said that you–” you halt, selfishly wondering if it’s too late to abandon this ship. “How’s your shoulder?”

He looks at it, rolling it out once. He shrugs. “It’s fine now.”

You nod.

He then surprises you by asking: “How was your midterm?” Your eyes widen, searching his face for… you’re not even sure what. You don’t find it anyways.

You shift your weight uncomfortably. “It went well actually.”

He nods.

“Do you want a ride back?

He scoffs quietly. You flinch. “Can you even drive?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“How would you get back to yours?”

“I don’t know. Walk. Or maybe a bus. Or I could even–”

He doesn’t even let you finish. Voice raising when he asks again, “Why are you here?”

The words come out before you can stop them, tone matching his. “Because I’m sorry!”

“For what?”

“For kissing you!” He drops his duffle bag on the floor. “I don’t know!”

He parts his lips, inhaling as if to speak, but then he looks straight in your eyes and loses every word he might’ve wanted to say. He picks up his duffle and walks over to his car. “Jeonghan, please say something. I miss you, and I hate this. I just want to at least talk about what happened before we never speak again.”

He shoves his bag into the backseat and slams the door shut. He points to the car. “You coming?”

“Where?”

“I’ll drop you home.”

You don’t even know why you let him, but you do, sliding in the passenger seat and waiting until the car is started and moving to say something.

Or at least, that was the plan. But then you lose all the nerves you built up on your walk over and keep quiet the entire drive back to your place. It’s only when he stops in front of yours, ignition shutting off, that they build back enough for you to say, “Jeonghan, I–”

“I’m not mad because of the kiss.” He finally says, voice much softer than before. His eyes stay trained on the dashboard. “The kiss was…” He chokes on the word while the tiniest of smiles breaks like light after a storm on his face. “The kiss was perfect.” Your stomach momentarily turns into a gymnast. “I’m not even mad at all. I’m just,” You lean in after the words, as if waiting to catch them in your hands. He shakes his head once and then turns to look at you fully. “I’m upset because you think this has all been fake when, if I’m being brutally honest, I haven’t been faking anything since that first party.”

Oh.

Holy fucking shit.

He chuckles darkly, hitting his head lightly against the steering wheel. “Now, I know what it feels like to be on the opposite end of this.”

You can’t help yourself. “How is it?”

He groans. “It’s like a thousand stomach aches throughout your entire body.”

You want to take him out of his misery, but, “I don’t know what to say.”

“Don’t say anything.”

“I don’t think–”

“No, I’m serious.” He mutters. He looks pained. “Remember when you said that I can’t say no to people? This is it. I’m saying no.” He smiles at you, but you know his eyes too well and you know when there’s nothing in them. His breath catches. “I’m really happy about your midterm. I always knew you didn’t need me.”

He looks away after that, turning the car back on, an obvious signal for you to get out. Selfishly, you don’t. You take two more seconds to stare at his face, his eyes, his hair, his hands. Then you unbuckle your seatbelt and step out of the car.

He doesn’t wait long before he drives away.

You walk back up to your dorm in a stupor of sorts. You unlock the door, step through the kitchen, walk like a zombie to your room, and stare at yourself in the mirror. Your eyes travel over your whole frame, and for some reason they fall to rest at your neck. More specifically, your necklace.

You’re out of the door, running before you even know it. Breathlessly, turning onto the road that leads to the opposite side of campus. 30 minutes away. This of course turns out to be a terrible, terrible idea. You do not run. But you get there eventually. Speed walking up to the door of Jeonghan’s frat house and knocking vigorously.

Soonyoung happens to be the one that opens it. “Oh, hey! How was your–Why can’t you breathe?”

You ignore him. “Is Jeonghan here?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think he’s back from practice yet. Why? What happened? Did you guys make up yet?”

“No, but, Soonyoung, I’ve been so stupid. This whole time I kept gabbing on and on, but I was blind. It was him. It was always–”

You hear a familiar voice say your name. Not just familiar. Your favorite voice. You turn to face him.

And you can’t help it, you grin.

You’re distantly aware of Soonyoung closing the door behind you.

“How did you get here?”

“I ran.” He makes a face. “Well, partly.”

“I told you to–”

“I know what you said.”

“Fine.” He sighs. “I didn’t–well, not like this, but listen. It’s okay if you don’t care–”

“But the thing is Jeonghan,” you say, the sentences and words you had prepared on the way over blurring together all in a rush to get out of your head and into his, “I do. There was no one looking at you at Jenny’s party. I kissed you because I wanted to. Because I wanted it. I hate sports. Really, ask Soonyoung, but I went and watched your game and had fun because you asked me to and because I don’t have the capacity to actually say no to your face. I thought I hated that smirk you do, but really I just hate how flustered it makes me feel. And I’m sorry that I took the whole young and stupid thing too close to heart, but,” you pull the matching necklace out from under your shirt. “If I didn’t care, would I still be wearing this? Would I be able to stand here and tell you and I haven’t taken it off since we bought it? And that that date was the best date I’ve ever been on.” You let go of the necklace, inhaling sharply. “I care, Jeonghan.” Then, as if it needs to be clarified, you add, “about you.”

You stare at him, waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

He turns around, takes two steps away from you, and then immediately plops his ass on the ground. You hear a whimper. “I thought I was going to lose you.” You approach him slowly, like a cat you’re trying like hell not to scare. You kneel down on the pavement beside him. He wipes his tears. “Don’t laugh.” He cries, already sensing the one bubbling in your throat. You shake your head as a swear not to. Which you break a second after the fact, turning your head to the side, desperately trying to hide it behind your hand. “Bully!” He exclaims.

“No. No.” You say, composing yourself and turning back to him. His tears are wiped, but a pout remains on his face. You cup your hands against his cheeks. “It’s just really cute.”

“It’s embarrassing.” He huffs.

You shake your head. “I love it.” Then you kiss him. It’s a slow and sweet kiss. You relish in it. There’s no rush anymore. No deadline. He isn’t going anywhere. Neither are you. You have all the time in the world with him.

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