#not enemies or lovers or it’s a slow burn but just friends?

[enhasparadise]

TOKYO ON EDGE. ˒˒ ﹙ niki! ﹚

╰┈⪼ moving to Japan wasn’t really on your plan through the year, but with your specialty being Japanese you had no choice but to accept. arriving in the middle of the year you found it strangely easy enough to integrate into your well-known class but over the days everything seemed to become boring and everything looked the same, the only thing that seemed to interest you was discovering the streets of Japan and the cultural differences with your native country. but, what you hadn't imagined was coming face to face with a car race, where one of the participants was one of your classmates, Nishimura Niki.

pairing ‎⸝⸝⸝ street racer!niki x student!reader 𓄷 iηcℓudᥱs 𓈓 older brother!jay, best friend!sunoo, best friend!haerin, bully!woonhak and heeseung.

genre﹙💬﹚⸝⸝⸝ serie, street racing au, enemies to lovers, kind of bully!niki, slow burn.

warnings ‎⸝⸝⸝ harsh talking, mention of violence and bullying, mention of drinking and smoking, cursing, mention of mental health, niki’s really dumb sometimes.

words count ‎⸝⸝⸝ 2681 words

taglist ‎ ⸝⸝⸝ @r1kification @cherryrikis @moonpri @who-tf-soddhi @heeswif3y @yangjungwonnie comment to be added to the taglist !!

rain’s note ‎⸝⸝⸝ screaming right now because I really love this chapter and how it’s start, also screaming because of the ending of this chapter since of what niki said. yes I’m fangirling over my own story, but anyways I really hope that you like how the story start and all that happened during this chapter.

all feedback and reblogs are welcome! ♡

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001. what kind of starter pack is this ?

You didn't know if it was simply the universe that was playing with you, or fate that had decided that, from one day to the next, after discovering your new school, you would meet this boy who spent his days talking to you. get on the nerves.

The most annoying part of the situation wasn't even the boy himself, but no matter where you were you heard each of the girls whispering his name as if he was a real living god.

Nishimura Niki.

No matter when you heard his name, you found yourself getting annoyed. Yet he hadn't done anything wrong, he was simply everything you despised deep down. That satisfied look and that smirk that almost never left his lips no matter where he was.

Since you had accidentally crossed his path, and his coffee had accidentally spilled on his uniform, he had spent the rest of his time ensuring that your days at school were nothing more than simple moments of torture or complete boredom, except that, even without his presence you were already annoyed and angry enough so knowing that he could arrive at any time made you completely mad with rage.

“y/n are you even listening to me?” Sunoo ended up saying.

“sorry Sunoo, I’m not really focused, it’s just.. all of this annoys me” you ended up responding as a sigh left your lips.

"y/n we'll never move forward with the presentation if you're not focused, and spending your time thinking about Niki won't help us."

“I don’t think about him!” you replied, offended that your best friend would think that before looking around you. "why does this idiot have to be so popular.. he's not even that amazing.."

Sunoo couldn't help but look at you without understanding what could be going on in your head. You now spent most of your days complaining about one of your classmates that you hated while, during your first days here, you both spent your days laughing and talking about topics that you are really interested.

Now it was almost like you spent your days complaining about Nishimura Niki and saying how much you hated him.

Simply, while you were both in the library working on your history paper which was due the next day, your best friend was ready to give up on everything because you weren't even concentrating while on your side you were ready to hit yourself with one of the books on the table if you once again came to wait for this name which was driving you completely crazy.

So, after taking a deep breath to focus again on the work you had to do, you turned back to Sunoo who was completely absorbed in reading his lips.

"And why shouldn't we be allowed to watch on the internet? Sunoo it would go ten times faster and you know it just as well as I do"

"Because, I know you and you'll end up spending the rest of the afternoon glued to your phone and I'll find myself having to do all the work on my own.." placing one of the books right in front of you, he showed you a passage that he found interesting, "I think we can also add that with everything we have just found, it will make a link with the other subjects that we must address later.." he replied wanting to get you back to work.

And it didn't take another sentence for your attention to return to the book, reading what he had told you.

Except that, at the same time, some girls who were passing behind you found themselves whispering a bunch of things that you hadn't heard until one of them said Niki's first name and, in a few moments, Only seconds later you found yourself looking around you.

The library was generally not a very busy place during school days, so obviously seeing more and more girls present was not particularly a good thing. Especially if it had anything to do with that student you hated so much.

But then, trying to concentrate on your work again so that your best friend wouldn't end up forcing you to finish everything by yourself, you sighed, realizing that you were possibly thinking too much simply because you were already quite agitated with what had happened that morning.

"Can we take a break Sunoo? I really can't concentrate it's horrible.." a sigh left your lips as you put your pen on the table and turned your head towards your best friend.

"If you want.." he started before taking his phone out of his pocket and realizing what time it was, "shit.. I have to go anyway.. Sunghoon is waiting for me so that We're going to join the others for our dance class."

Then, as soon as he finished his sentence, he closed the book in front of him, before getting up. "We'll finish this tonight, I'll call you as soon as I have time, and answer this time because otherwise we'll have more time to finish everything."

“Okay Sunoo.. go ahead I’ll take care of putting everything away” you replied before seeing him walk away and the last thing you saw was his blond hair as he closed the library door .

A sigh left your lips, your eyes closing for only a few seconds but opening them again you noticed Haerin in front of you then almost inevitably a smile appeared on your lips.

"Did he finally let you go? I thought I wouldn't be able to come see you all afternoon if he stayed with you.." she said directly with a slight laugh.

"Just assume that you have feelings for him and it will be a lot easier for both of you.." you had barely finished your sentence when you noticed your best friend's expression, and almost inevitably you started to to laugh. “Will you help me clean up? We can go to Starbucks afterwards if you want, it’s been a while since I’ve been there and I really want to go together.”

A smile appeared on your best friend's lips as she heard the word Starbucks and she immediately stood up while carrying several books in her hands to go straight to put them away.

Noticing how she reacted, a laugh left your lips once again and, taking the other part of the books, you yourself went through the shelves of the library to find the shelves where all the books came from.

Ten minutes later you finally left the library with Haerin following you. Except that, as soon as you left the library, your smile faded simply because you noticed a group of girls gathered in the same place, and you knew perfectly well what that meant. Niki was not far away.

“Oh my god do you think Niki is anywhere near?” Haerin asked, and as soon as her sentence was spoken, you remembered that she too, although she had feelings for your best friend, had a strange admiration with Nishimura Niki and you couldn't understand that.

“Please don’t say his name, it annoys me..” you replied as you placed your bag on your shoulder and began to walk to the end of the corridor to leave the room. 'establishment.

In spite of yourself, your gaze landed on this crowd of girls who looked like real kids, and you directly noticed Niki through the whole crowd. He wasn't doing anything in particular, he was just on his phone chatting with some boys in your class, and of course you wondered almost immediately what the girls saw in him. It was very obvious that he had absolutely nothing to do with them and that he simply preferred to ignore them, regardless of what she might say to him.

A sigh left your lips and you wanted to continue walking, but Haerin stopped you by grabbing your arm to make sure you didn't leave without her.

“Believe me, he’s an idiot, he doesn’t deserve your attention Haerin..” you told her, noticing that she reacted the same way as all the girls around him.

And almost as if he had heard what you had just said, Niki raised his head to look at you, and a few seconds later he put his phone away to walk towards you. What exactly was he looking for?

You didn't know him, but with everything you had heard you knew perfectly well that Niki didn't care at all about girls' feelings or just girls in general. Just you, he loved making your days difficult just by being near you. And unfortunately for you, today was likely to be even more complicated.

Haerin, noticing that he was approaching the two of you, couldn't help but laugh in the silliest way, but at no time did Niki's gaze fall on her, he was focused on you. And when he was at your side, he pushed Haerin to the side just to place his arm around your shoulder, which directly made you want to vomit and you almost immediately moved away from him.

“Don’t touch me, I don’t want a boy like you to touch me.”

“Oh come on y/n.. don’t you want to have fun with me? I know you like me deep down”

"Ew.. do you want me to vomit on your uniform or something? Considering the badboy starter pack that you are, I'm quite happy to hate you Niki.." you responded directly before releasing his arm from your shoulder and move away from him, visibly disgusted with how he was acting.

“A badboy starter pack? Can you give me a quick definition of what you mean by that?” He asked you and a laugh left your lips directly.

“I think you understand perfectly what I mean Niki, you’re stupid but not so stupid that you don’t understand..”

“Hey, he’s not stupid, shut up!” Shouted a girl who was around you, before other girls started saying any type of sentence to defend Niki. Except that no matter what she said, your view of Niki wasn't going to change, it was never going to change since Niki was just a miserable idiot.

"They're not wrong, I'm not stupid.." Niki defended himself as this most annoying smile appeared on her lips, and a sigh of annoyance left your lips at the same time.

"Oh of course niki.. you're the most annoying idiot I know in school.." you replied knowing that he wasn't going to leave you alone no matter what you said to him. "And to answer your question, they're the kind of bad boy starter pack, the ones who are really stupid, who react like real assholes and who of course don't mind hurting the girls who are interested in them simply to laugh about it behind..”

One of his eyebrows rose at your response before a laugh left his lips, finding what you had just said to him totally hilarious.

“Really y/n, it’s charming what you say about me” he responded so casually because none of your sentences hurt him.

“Oh shut up will you, you're such an annoying idiot, except girls never notice because of..” you looked at his face, a look of disgust appearing on your own face, “this what you look like.." then you ended up turning to all the girls around you, who were either looking at Niki in admiration or looking at you like they wanted to rip your head off for what you were saying about niki, then you came back to look at niki. “Seriously, are you lacking affection for all the girls to be so into you? Because it’s quite pitiful to be honest..”

The girls around you were almost going crazy over what you were saying but none of them seemed to come up to you, simply because Niki was right in front of them and they didn't want to in any way. that Niki sees them being violent.

“Oh but I'm not in need of attention, on the contrary..” Niki ended up responding in a very annoying way, “it's not my fault if the girls at school adore boys like me.. " the same smile was fixed on his face since the beginning of your conversation and it annoyed you greatly. “Too bad you’re not actually one of them.”

Hearing his last sentence you wanted to vomit because it seemed so pitiful and stupid. You just stared at him with a look of disgust on your face, unable to understand why Niki was bothering you like that when he could just be giving this attention to a girl who liked him more than you. . That is to say the only girl who hated him because of his troublemaker behavior and the way he annoyed you.

"Rather die than become one of your groupies who lick your coattails in the hope of getting attention that will never be given to me." you ended up answering, your hand gripping the strap of your bag so much you felt your blood boiling inside of you because he kept adding any sentence to see your reactions that he loved while you answered each time.

“Oh but I give them attention, there are just so many of them that I can't really give each of them attention for a day.”

"Yeah you're just a real idiot who plays with girls that's all"

“That’s what you think y/n”

“You make me want to vomit Niki… it’s surprising that I still haven’t vomited.”

“Oh stop y/n I know deep down you love me..”

"Shut up niki you really make me want to vomit you're so horrible and annoying.. then seeing how you act with girls it confirms that you're just an idiot badboy who has absolutely no interest in girls and who just spend their time breaking her hearts"

“I think the role of bad boy suits me well you know”

“So you confirm the fact that you are a bad boy and that you have the starter pack that I am with”

Niki looked at you blankly, almost as if you had just said the most incomprehensible thing imaginable. And around you you always heard the girls whispering or shouting all kinds of things about you.

“Being a bad boy doesn't give you a starter pack,” Niki ended up answering.

“Ah yes totally Niki, believe me you have a starter pack that fits the badboy label. Do you want me to make you a list?”

A laugh left his lips as he listened to you, before allowing you to continue speaking, knowing what you were going to say to confirm your words.

"So already, with what I've seen since I've been here you don't take authority seriously and you don't care what the teachers tell you, so that proves the first criterion of the bad boy, then in view of your hands you also spend your time fighting so that proves the second criterion." You paused in what you were saying just to look at him intently to notice every detail about him. "With your character and your behavior it's not surprising that you find yourself idolized by girls and then you don't even need.."

"In this case if I'm a badboy, that makes you a goodgirl, well if we stay in the cliché of course.." Niki ended up cutting you off, and as soon as you waited for his sentence you didn't know how you was supposed to get the information.

“And what does that mean Niki?” you ended up asking as your arms crossed over your chest.

“I think just as well as I do that you know perfectly well what that means y/n” he replied and you noticed that smile that annoyed you so much appear on his lips.

Something to which you hadn't responded simply because you knew that, deep down, Niki only did that to annoy you and he knew that it would work so obviously you didn't want to show him that he was right once. moreover.

“Seriously Niki shut up”

“Only if you confirm that you are the cliché of the good girl since I am, as you say, a bad boy with a starter pack to match..”

"Oh but you really are Niki stop lying to yourself.. you know you're just a bad boy playing it.."

“well I’m telling you that you’re a good girl, you just don’t notice it… but I’m going to prove to you that you are one”

[soobadnoonecanstopher]

Rat Bastard - Part 7

Pairing: You x Kyungsoo 

Rating: M (Mature)

Word Count: 8900

Warnings: There were too many beds, Enemies to Lovers, Slow Burn, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Idiots to Lovers

A/N: I wrote this in less than a day and none of it followed any of the plans I had for this story. This new laptop makes it too easy to write and it might end up adding extra chapters to this fic. Sorry and you’re welcome.

Tag: @ilovemyapopbaby

Links: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7

The silence that sat down atop both of your heads after that door closed tight, leaving you and him completely alone together for the first time in literally forever was about as loud as anything you’d ever experienced. 

Kyungsoo stood just inside of the drab entryway and you had been lingering closer to the hallway that would take you further into the shelter. You watched his face for a while, trying to gauge the mood he would be in to find himself trapped in here with you for at least one night, maybe two if things got wild at the hospital and Mr. Chen wasn’t able to get away as he promised. 

How would he feel about this? The relationship and you used that word strictly for lack of any other word to describe the you and the him, had been strained from the start, downright hostile at times, and only very recently kind of sort of settled into this civil agreement in which you did not antagonize him and he did not antagonize you -- much. 

It wasn’t a friendly relationship for he himself had told you quite brutally last night that he had no interest in being your friend, but lately, with the interactions that had grown just a little bit softer, the chat you’d had with him out on the patio as he made you ramen and teased you about your sexual optimism, the silly time passing game of stating a personal preference between two completely inconsequential things and you found, much to your surprise that you and he shared more than a few minor tastes in common; the fright you had been triggered into with the spiders in the movie and the genuine comfort you felt from him; it felt almost as if something somewhere might be changing. Were you, just as you had been with the threat from the fake spiders, simply imagining the entire thing? 

“Well, shit,” Kyungsoo whispered mostly to himself after the heavy door slammed shut and you looked up into his face to catch the smallest furrow of his brows and the frown of his lips. 

Was this a worst case scenario for him? Trapped alone with the girl he never wanted to be trapped with? Having gone out of his way all those months ago to ditch her on that stupid blind date and she just had to be pathetic enough to pick a fight with him about it, and then about anything and everything she could find to fight about and just when he thought he’d escaped that nightmare of a person she shows up here and not only is she forced upon him by the staff here but now he’s somehow charged with feeding her and entertaining her? You could see it in his face. He looked disappointed as evidenced by the furrow and the frown.

You pulled your arms up and crossed them over your chest, pulling your eyes down and away from that disappointed look you saw in his eyes and you made a deal with yourself then and there; you would not be a burden. You would keep as good a distance as this situation allowed and behave yourself as far as your temper or your tangled feelings for the man were concerned. You wouldn't let it show just how far down this pathetic rabbit hole you’d fallen of uninvited attraction and unrequited love. You’d treat him with disinterest, maybe casual civility that a shop worker would get, or that old man at the grocery store who made a friendly joke about the price of eggs and you provided the required perfunctory laugh at exactly the right pitch and tone to be deemed socially acceptable. That was what you would do, you would perform as expected by society in such a situation. 

It wasn’t his fault that you’d allowed this little crush to fester deep inside your stomach; and for a man who didn’t even desire friendship from you. It wasn’t the first time you’d let your heart run away with your mind. It didn’t have to happen with this man. 

You felt a slight burning in your stomach, just below your breastplate and you placed a palm over the space where you felt the pain. You knew enough about your body to recognize that you were just feeling the aftereffects from the panic from earlier. It always came as an upset stomach that burned and ached usually for hours after your heightened emotions had run their course. 

“What is it?” You hadn’t expected his attention but he must have seen your hand sink down hard just over the space at the top of your stomach. He must have noticed the look of discomfort on your face that you quickly blanked away with the drop of your hand. 

“Nothing,” you said flatly dropping the subject entirely before he had a chance to probe or suspect more of you and you lifted a hand to half shrug into the air, “umm… did you want to finish the movie or … maybe play another game?”

His lips parted and he closed them up, his eyes briefly leaving your face and glancing behind you into the dark hallway from where you both had come. 

When he didn’t answer you right away you inhaled to speak again, before you sounded like his own liability that he had to deal with, “you don’t have to do either, if you don’t want to. I don’t need you to entertain me or anything, I can figure something out for myself if you just want to be alone.”

You’d already spun on your heels, determined with your newfound resolve to be exactly as aloof and unaffected by anything he said or did as required by society to keep the peace; taking the first few steps away from him and turning back toward the dim light from the open kitchen door that you could barely make out as a direction in which you should travel.

“We could,” the first sounds of his voice stopped your steps and you turned your face in his direction, not committing to turning around the whole way, “play something, if you want.” 

“Not Monopoly again, I swear to God,” you said with a finger lifted into the air and you heard the soft chuckle that came from behind you. 

“Awww, my little Princess didn’t like the bitter taste of defeat?” You could hear the joking tone in his voice and weirdly that strong feeling of uncertainty you’d felt only moments earlier seemed to change with the teasing tone he used with you. Changed into what? You wouldn’t say, but it was only a slightly more comfortable feeling. There was a burning sensation just under the skin below your cheekbones and you thanked whatever god was responsible for putting you in this darkened hallway during this moment for the cover that would keep the blush from being noticed by him. You were imagining the softness you heard in that nickname. This man did not hold any affection for you. 

Inside the kitchen you returned to the familiar set up that you had left, only it felt wildly different. Gone was the soft comfy feeling of the mattresses on the floor, the pillows set up at your back and the fluffy down winner’s blanket sat in a tangled clump on the floor beside the bed that you both had occupied. The briefest of thoughts flittered by -- would you be able to smell him in it now? That clean, crisp fragrance he seemed to carry with him, would those microscopic molecules be wound into the spaces in between your one thousand threads ready to drift inside of your nose, bringing you back to the moment below the blanket when his fingers intertwined between your own and he held your hand, keeping you grounded and still connected to this world. The comfort he had given you then, but why? To keep you from embarrassing yourself or maybe him? You couldn't find the reasoning for it anywhere inside of you, but this wouldn't be the first time that man did something you couldn't understand. 

The burning was back. You had an absentminded hand running over the spot on your belly and your feet carried you to the spot beside the fridge where the water bottles sat. You ‘d seen an electric kettle there and you busied yourself grabbing a mug and heating the water. Behind you, Kyungsoo was looking through the games again, trying to find something that he could no doubt destroy you with again. Your heart wasn’t in the fight this time, you felt too distracted. 

The water was heated and you poured some into a cup, finding that plain hot water always soothed your stomach the best and you returned to his side to peer over his shoulder holding your mug. 

He glanced over at you and down at the mug, making no comment about either, and then he held up a game. It was your game. It was the first game, a word game you’d picked to play with a nostalgic and hopeful glint in your eye. 

“We can play this one, if you want,” he said with a bit of a whisper as if you two weren’t the only ones in this entire building, “it’s still fun even with only two people.”

You nodded and took a seat near him but not close enough so he could cheat and look at your letters and he quietly set up the game, not once looking directly at your face for too long apart from the smallest of brushes with his eyes into yours as he handed you bits and pieces for the game. 

You settled into your seat and took a good long look at the letters you had to pick from, picking a few up and shuffling them to see if you could come up with something good and after a few moments you settled on something that was actually pretty decent, especially for the first round. The realization pulled a small smile to your face and you grabbed the letters to place them on the board. He’d already told you that you could go first and as you began placing your tiles on the board you looked up to find that he was watching you, of course he was; you were playing the first word. This word would determine what he could or couldn’t play from his letters. 

You played your word and did the math, giving yourself a nice start with 20 points and you wrote down the number on the pad of paper and looking up at him expectantly. You had expected him to be paying attention to the word, to be impressed by your intelligence. You had managed to spell that word on your very first go. You had expected him to feel thoroughly challenged by the force he had to reckon with. 

He sat there though, his eyes watching you but something about his mind seemed disconnected from the game. Your smile at your own move slipped just a little bit, falling flat because he hadn’t even looked at the word you played yet. He just sat there with his shoulders relaxed, his unshuffled letters sitting there in front of him, he didn't even have his fingers on them, rearranging and thinking as you would have expected. He just sat there -- it was odd. You lifted your chin and wiggled your head, lifting your eyebrows and you heard an inhale as he took a deep breath and exhaled as he slowly pushed the air through his lips and when he was empty his eyes closed up. He gave his head a little shake back and forth and finally, finally his eyes left your face. 

Finally he was looking down. 

“Oh you played that, hmm,” you heard him mumble and he was back. All at once, his fingers were touching lightly over his letters, picking some up, moving them, shoving some aside, actually thinking about the game in front of him instead of whatever in the world he had been so distracted by. 

You lifted your mug and took a sip, feeling the warmth of the hot water warm the inside of your stomach a little bit. The pain was still there even after another sip and you looked down at the mix of letters you had thinking of what word you might play next. You adjusted your posture some, lifting a hand to rub just below your breastplate again, wishing that knot would just go down and be done so you could win this game already. 

Kyungsoo had played his word, counted out his points, and wrote a sad little 16 under his name. You were already winning. The self-satisfied smile was back, it had replaced the wince on your face when you realized you already had your next word. You played it quickly and tallied up your numbers. 24 -- He really didn’t stand a chance. 

You heard the scrape of chair legs and the sound pulled your attention up to the man who was standing up and walking away from you toward the kitchen cabinets at the back wall. 

“It’s your turn, Kyungsoo,” you called toward his retreating back. 

“I know, I’m just getting something real quick,” he called without looking back at you and you heard him inside the fridge, heard him pulling something out and he was slicing something with a knife on a board. The kettle was going again and you heard a metal spoon hitting porcelain as he stirred something into a cup. 

He was back quickly with two mugs in his hand and when he returned to your side he’d place one of the mugs in front of you. 

The color of the water inside the cup was a pale yellow and you saw a single disc of sliced ginger floating on the surface. You could see the string and tab from a tea bag in his mug. 

“Honey and ginger,” he said as he busied himself with playing a word on the board game, “for your stomach,” he added as if you’d made an announcement at the start of your game that your stomach was hurting and he was just responding to that. 

You hadn’t said a single thing to him about it. In fact, you had thought you were doing a pretty good job hiding it from him. You hadn’t let him see you frown or groan or cry out in pain once. The worst you did was lightly massage the space where it hurt the most. 

You lifted his offering to your lips and took a sip expecting it to be too hot for you to drink comfortably and finding the temperature rather mild actually. You took another bigger sip and felt the soothing warmth slip into you. It was sweet with the honey he added and slightly spicy from the fresh ginger he’d added. It was delicious. You’d never tried this for your stomach aches before but it seemed to actually be helping. You took another sip and swallowed, finding that the burning lessened with each sip you took. 

Kyungsoo silently played a word and you watched his mouth moving as he added up his points and wrote down his score of 20. 

You smiled widely. He had just played the letter you needed to play your next word and with the orientation of the word you would be able to get the bonus points. You were already laying your letters out on the board and counting out your points before he’d even had a chance to replace the letters he’d used on the last word. 

“Oh come on, what? You gotta give me a chance to catch you,” he groaned in annoyance that didn’t really seem to sink too deep into him for him to really mean it. You could still see the smile on the edges of his mouth and in his eyes. You did a little victory wiggle in your seat, wrote down 50 points under your name, and even stuck your tongue out at him with a giggle. His eyes slipped down your face and his lips had been pulled into a smile, despite the fact that he was losing this game miserably. 

He pulled his head back a little bit and looked up into the air above his head. A quick glance at his pieces told you he still needed to replace letters and so you held up the bag with the open end toward him. He was still sulking about the heavy blow and you had to reach out to touch your fingertips over the back of his warm hand to get his attention. You gave the bag a little shake and you had his eyes in yours again as he reached into the bag, pulling out tiles and groaning at the letters the universe had decided to give him. 

“Ugh,” he was groaning with each new letter he pulled out. His eyes darted over the game board and occasionally slipped back up into yours, probably because you had been watching him for signs that he had something good to play. It didn’t seem like he did. 

“Blegh,” he made a disgusted sound,  complaining again. “What am I going to do? What do I do, what do I do?” he repeated to himself as he pondered his brand new fate as a loser of this game. 

In his hand, he held only two tiles and he hovered lightly over a space on the board. You giggled when he set them down. It was the saddest word you’d seen in a while. 

“You’re going to have to do better than that if you want to beat me, Kyungsoo,” you sing-songed playfully watching him spell out the word ‘SEE’ for only 5 points.

His hand moved and he spun his letters around, showing you very quickly the hand he had. You saw a slew of vowels, mostly the letter E and everyone’s least favorite burden a single solitary X. 

You were openly laughing at him now. His cheeks were pink and he was reaching into the bag to select his replacement letters and when he pulled them out he tossed them in disgust. They both landed flat on the table, face up with a clatter. He had thrown them there. You looked down to see two more Es and the sight threw you back into a noisy fit of laughter that seemed to be catching. You could hear him giggling beside you and he gripped the Es in his fingertips and tried to put them back into the bag. You snatched it up quickly and held the bag of letters out of his reach so he couldn't cheat and put them back in. 

“No no,” you gasped through the giggles, “Think of words with lots of Es like meet, umm, teeth, f-feet,” you said through a strained voice and you were laughing again at the look he shot you at the mention of the words that brought up a very recent sore memory for him. 

“Teeth and feet?” He said with his eyes wide, “You really brought that up again?” He exhaled through his teeth, his lips pulled wide in frustration. He was leaning now, reaching desperately past your game pieces to where you still kept the bag of letters out of his reach to keep him from cheating, even though you were pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to catch up with you even if he replaced all of his letters now. He had scooted his chair closer to you and you reached for his desperate hand, gripping around his fingers and pulling his hand down into your lap, holding it tightly there and leaning into him to help you gain some leverage against him. He was quite strong when he wanted to be but he seemed to be letting you hold him back like this. He definitely wasn’t putting his all into this struggle against you. Something was off with him. Kyungsoo had never held back on that chance to be terrible with you before. 

Instead, he had moved in too close to you and after the small playful struggle, you felt the warmth of him all over you. You had been giggling as he reached out with his other hand, reaching again for the bag of letters you held out of his reach and you felt the tips of his fingers wrap around your wrist and he pulled your arm down. It was a bit of a stalemate and you heard the soft laughter from him settle and go curiously still, when you opened your eyes you found his face in front of yours. You had his hand inside of yours down on your lap right over your thigh and he held your other hand with his fingers wrapped tightly around your wrist.  You hadn’t expected this level of closeness from him, the shock you felt radiating through your chest had taken the laughter out of your voice and left you stunned in a frozen silence instead. 

You suddenly felt hyper-aware of your own body. He was so close to you, that you wondered if he was able to hear how noisily your heart was pounding inside of your chest, or if he could hear the stuttered way your breathing moved in and out of your lungs. 

God, he was beautiful up close. His skin was clear and he had a scattering of tiny moles all over. The small freckle in his upper lip seemed to have a presence all of its own and you struggled to look away from him. Your eyes roamed over the length of his face. He had long since stopped laughing and he had even stopped reaching for the bag, stopped struggling against your hands and he was watching you with slow blinking wandering eyes over your face that seemed to settle again heavy and deep inside of your eyes. 

You exhaled a breath you had been holding through your parted mouth and his eyes slipped down to look at your mouth when you moved. This was something. Something was happening here. Something that shouldn’t exist with the intense animosity he’s always felt for you. Something between you and something between him. You could feel it in the way your skin flushed, the blood in your body seemed to seek refuge in some place that wasn’t in your veins. You found it difficult to breathe with him so close and those eyes of his didn’t let up, they didn’t let you go, you felt so much more trapped here in his eyes than ever before. Your ears picked up on the smallest grunt of effort from somewhere in the back of his throat, then the smallest inhale of breath lifted his lungs, and finally, finally, he closed his eyes.

“I think I’ve lost this game,” he whispered through closed eyes with a sudden tight clench of his jaw. 

He was leaning. He was moving. You watched the sway of his balance and he moved closer to you, impossibly closer and the fingers he’d wrapped around your wrist released their hold, that hand was moving. You felt the first tiny touches of his fingertips as he moved his hand to touch your face lightly and achingly slowly along your jawline. You felt as if you could burst into flames at any second and judging by the heavy puffs of air that left his lungs, something similar was happening to him too. 

He leaned into you, close enough for a kiss but something stopped him. You felt and saw the lean though. He pulled back half a centimeter and it felt like he was at war with himself. 

You watched his face as he did it. His eyes, he kept them closed up as tightly as he could and the hard clench of his jaw did not let up. 

He was touching you though. His hand had moved and his thumb brushed lightly over your bottom lip and his fingertips dug in behind your ear. His other hand, the one that you held in your lap had moved too and you felt a squeeze from his fingers as he clenched tightly around your hand. 

Everything about him was tense. His jaw, his hands, his eyes squeezed shut tightly. 

This man was very purposefully attempting to regain control of himself and resist whatever it was he was feeling by being this close to you, by you touching him, and by him touching you. Your own self-control felt thready. How easily you could snap in two. How flimsy your resolve had grown around him. 

You’d long since dropped the bag of letters. You felt the need for the warmth of his soft skin under your fingertips. So you reached for his face, delighting in wonder at the smoothness your fingertips traveled over, even with the hard clench of his jaw he felt so warm and inviting and he was still so very close to you. He smelled so good, it was overwhelming. You wanted him. 

He was so very close; close enough for you to feel every quick burst of air that came from his nose against your lips, close enough for you to so easily lean your face into his and press your lips up against the softness of his mouth.

So you did it, you did it -- you leaned into him and you kissed him on the lips, relishing in the softness you felt when his lips gave into yours so, so easily, it seemed to come like second nature when you had actually worked up the nerve to do it. 

There were almost imperceivable changes in him when you did it; when you kissed him. The hard clench in his jaw let up with the soft grunt of surprise that came from the back of his throat and in his hands; the loosening of the tight grip he held you with on your face as he simply let go of you entirely for the first few seconds of this kiss from you. 

The next change was less subtle, you felt the careful way he caved to your lips. The tilt of his head paired with the parting of his jaw and he leaned into you further, pulling your soft bottom lip into his mouth then pulling you again, your upper lip. When he moved again you felt the tip of his wet tongue guide along your teeth and reach for yours with that same suction he had pulled against you which you gave to him, giving him what he wanted, feeling very much out of control now with greedy the way he sucked on your tongue. The kiss was too much in an instant. The undeniable attraction you felt for this man had taken every bit of rational thought and tossed it out the window, carrying them all away with the wind outside. 

His mouth and teeth and tongue nipped inside of your mouth, pulling at your lips and he was moving, peppering tiny kisses, bites, and nibbles along your jawline as he moved lower to taste the skin below your ear. 

You reached for him again, reaching a hand forward for his waist and lower, you’d lost your mind when you touched near his belt, slipping the tips of your fingertips in between the denim fabric and feeling along the elastic waistband of his underwear. Feeling the very clear bump of his arousal and the warmth of his skin there.

His hand flew up to stop you and you heard the soft groan that came from his chest against his will. You could feel your labored breathing taking your chest and heaving it up and you shook your head back and forth at the nerve he had to stop you. You wanted him, you wanted the sex. You were beginning to feel desperate for him. 

Kyungsoo leaned his forehead against yours and his hands now had a strong ironclad grip on your wandering hands. You felt the very slight movement of his face back and forth. 

No. 

He was telling you no. 

You had to take a genuine moment to absorb it. He was telling you no. You closed your eyes and inhaled a deep breath and you inhaled the no, the refusal, the rejection took its time coming at you slowly in a big old sluggish wave and your breathing was beginning to calm down now. 

“Kyungsoo?” You called out lightly, feeling just a bit upset and even more confused as to why he would have kissed you back so intensely if he didn’t want this. 

“I,” he opened his mouth and pulled his head back, “I don’t—” his words were broken, staggered, and fractured, “I couldn’t live with myself.”

“You don’t want me like that.” It wasn’t a question. You weren’t asking him a damn thing. It was a stark realization that you had simply misread his actions as affection. 

“I don’t mean that,” he began, his voice clearer and with slightly more urgency than the staggered speech from earlier, he inhaled and swallowed, licking his lips as his eyes searched over your face. 

“I don’t do that lightly,” he exhaled and furrowed his brows, narrowing his eyes and looking into your face again, “I’ve never slept with someone outside of a relationship. I don’t do it. This can’t happen. We aren’t going to have sex.” 

He had released his tight grip on your hands now that his reasoning was out and you sat there feeling just a little bit foolish for having jumped so quickly straight to sex. You felt the embarrassment hit you hard and you closed your eyes through it and shook your head, straightening your back and removing your hands from within his fingers and pulling them back toward you as you carefully busied yourself with straightening your shirt back out. This felt awful. You reached down for the mug with the now cold ginger honey water and you downed the remains quickly, hoping that some of that sweet honey might coat your insides and soothe your fractured ego while it was at it. 

You felt the softness of his hand land over yours when you put the mug back down and you looked down at it, his hand covering over yours. You could feel it then, he was asking you to look at him. You had been embarrassed by the rejection and had been busying yourself with literally anything that wasn’t him. He’d given you time to process it and to get yourself under control before calling your attention again with the softest and most gentle pull of just the warmth of his hand on yours. You signed deeply, willing all of that oxygen to fill your lungs and power your brain well, and after what felt like several inescapable seconds passed you looked up into his face. 

He was watching you, no words on his lips and a slow and steady blinking of his eyes.

You swallowed before you spoke, “I get it,” you said plainly, biting down on your lip once before you continued, “I understand. You don't sleep around. I sleep around. You and I aren’t the same.” 

His lips parted and his eyes rolled over his face once before they sank back down heavy inside of yours. He inhaled a breath, clearly ready to counter your words. You knew you were misinterpreting his meaning. It wasn't even as if he’d called you a slut or anything, but goddammit that recent discovery of his. Him having found your 20-pack of condoms in your bag; you couldn't help but compare them to the single 5-pack he brought which he probably never even had any intention of using in the first place when you had every intention of using some of those condoms on this retreat. You would be goddamned if you didn’t get laid at least once on this trip. It had been so long for you, that you needed something from someone that made you feel desired and attractive to another human being. 

“You know,” he was speaking, his eyes had drifted closed and he was having trouble getting the words out again. Maybe he was about to tell you he was on his way to pray for your forgiveness for being such a slut. 

“You already know how I feel about you,” he whispered and pulled his eyes open. 

You looked at his face for a moment before your eyes wandered over the space above his head; giving the smallest head shake as a reply. Not really. He hated you for one minute. He laughed at you and teased you another minute. He made you ramen and tasty honey tea to soothe your upset stomach and beat you mercilessly at Monopoly but his cold hard facade fell apart when you teased him back. He was a mystery to you, whenever you thought you had figured something out about him, he would pull out the rug from under you and swear that no matter how desperate you were for it he would specifically not ever sleep with you. You felt that same familiar pain in your stomach flare up again. You hissed through it and inhaled a small gasp, doing your best to keep your reaction under wraps. 

His eyes narrowed and he dropped his chin, “you must know,” he said again, “you already know.” 

You must have flinched somewhere in your face. Those knowing eyes of his caught it and his head ticked as his eyes moved over you again. 

“How could I know anything?” You were beginning to feel like you should go lie down. You even felt a tiny bit dizzy the more you stayed here just withstanding this. Maybe a warm shower would help. 

“Sara told you. You know everything.” he threw his head back and looked up at the ceiling above his head. He had a sort of exasperated expression on his face now and you tried to focus on this conversation but you’d already been through enough of it. 

What had Sara told you? She had been so excited about every little interaction between the two of you that her words had been too exaggerated and overly dramatic to be able to trust what she said. Your mind flew through her words to you about him. About him saying how pretty you were. So what if you were pretty. The man hated you. He hated you. Her words, were a distant memory now even though it had only been a couple of hours since she said them. 

‘The way he looks at you -- If I didn't know that he was desperately in love with you, I’d think he was trying to set you on fire with his eyes -- he was desperately in love with you -- he is desperately in love with you.’

It was impossible. Sara was wrong. This man did not love you. He couldn’t love someone like you. 

Doh Kyungsoo had just rejected you for the third time now. The first when he stood you up on the date, leaving you to stew in the rejection, publicly calling you out amongst your best friends about it, basically ridiculing you again and again for your stupidity; how dare you really think someone like him could ever actually be interested in someone like you. The second rejection was shallower, the way he treated you when he found out you were here with him. You had the audacity to show up here and play pretend like you belonged here beside him; going so far as to reject even your offer of friendship, the lowest form of acquaintance and even that he didn't want. And now, reminding you of just how little he thought of you. 

He didn’t sleep with people he wasn’t in a relationship with. You’d offered yourself so easily to the man, practically begged for it but again, you received another rejection. 

Wasn't there a point in which you should give up on this? 

“I don't know anything, Kyungsoo. I don't even know you, remember? We never really even met each other.” You said it with such finality that his lips closed up and he pulled his head back. He seemed taken aback by the force with which you said those words to him. You stood up, done with this. There was only so much you could take. That surprised look on his face from earlier had flattened out and he was staring ahead of himself, not looking up at you. 

You stood there looking down at him for much longer than your pride should have allowed. Watching him staring ahead of himself with his silent lips and his bright red ears, his chest heaving up and down as if all of the emotions bubbling just below the surface of him could ever presume to break through that thick outer shell of a man who keeps everything inside when he should have just let it out. Goddammit Kyungsoo. But he wouldn’t move. He wouldn’t explain and he sure as hell wasn’t about to try any more than absolutely necessary with you. You’d been the one to put yourself out there again and again for this man. You felt let down. 

“I’m going to shower and lie down for a while.” 

You took the first steps to leave, to walk past him and you’d made it three whole steps toward the door when you felt the warmth and strength of his hand wrapped tightly around your wrist, pulling you back. He pulled you back roughly. You had been moving forward with such a momentum that the break in your stride caused you to stumble backward and you yelped out in surprise finding yourself pulled into him, pulled to where he still sat uselessly in that chair and the rough yank on your wrist sent you moving until you collided with a resisting barrier.

You stumbled on your feet and you bounced against him and the second you collided with him you felt the strength of his arms wrapping tightly around your waist. You felt the push of his firm chest hit against your thighs and in your belly you felt the point of his nose as he buried his entire face within your shirt, just below your ribs deep, within the softness of your belly. It tickled uncomfortably but you felt too stunned to do anything. You looked down in shock, seeing only the top of his head, his soft black hair fell into the fabric of your shirt and from his mouth somewhere you heard the softest moan that reverberated through your body. 

For lack of anywhere else to put them you rested your hands on his shoulders and you heard and felt him make another sound, a rough growl from his chest sounded out into your skin, buzzing into the skin of your stomach and his hands around your waist tightened to uncomfortable levels. He inhaled a deep breath from somewhere in the center of you and you found some semblance of some words to say. 

“Kyungsoo, what,” you began but his hot exhale warmed you on the exit and sent goosebumps cascading down your spine, taking whatever words you thought you could speak. After several breaths he lifted his face, propping his chin right against your skin to look up into your stunned and confused face. 

“What are you doing?” you managed. You felt too blindsided for more.

“Get to know me then,” he whispered up into the air and you wiggled against the tightness you felt in his arms matching the crazed look you saw in his eyes. He did not loosen them any, “get to know me, until you understand how I feel about you.” 

This didn’t feel real. It was impossible that this was happening. Was he serious? 

Your mind was spinning. You couldn’t reconcile the two versions of Doh Kyungsoo you were witnessing. The desperate way he clung to you told you one thing and yet, so much bad had already happened to tell you the complete opposite. This version clearly hadn't listened to a damn thing the other one had just told you. This one didn’t know about the no sex before commitment rule, the one that had his chance and squandered it, humiliating you in the process. But as tightly as you were wound here within his arms; you could feel your body responding to him all over again. You’d already been too affected by him before.

His eyes were looking up at you and you could just barely make out the tiny pout on his lips that was hiding within the fabric. 

Maybe he was drunk. Maybe that mug he had been sipping from had been full of whiskey instead of tea and this man was off his head right now. 

“What are you talking about?” 

He was moving with the question you hung into the air above his head. You could feel the slow way he moved his face, pressing himself against the softness of your belly again, breathing you in slowly and deeply as if every bit of sanity had simply left his body and this was a madman whose only purpose was to drive you as crazy as he was. 

“You know for someone who doesn’t want to fuck me, you are doing a terrible job of letting me leave this room.” 

Your own bluntness surprised you but you’d expected him to wake the hell up and release you so you could go take care of this problem he’d caused. 

“I never said I don’t want to fuck you.” He whispered it with his face hidden deep within the skin of your belly but the words echoed inside of you, hitting you hard with their heavy impact. 

The man was a menace. He’d just turned you down only to do this to you? You felt so turned on you almost couldn’t keep upright.  

You braced both of your hands on his shoulders and you pushed against him hard, pushing your hips backward too until he got the message and loosened his hold around you. The release allowed you to take a step back. His hands still lingered around you and you even felt one of his hot palms lying right over your ass, having slipped down from your waist he didn’t seem to be in too big of a hurry to take his wandering hands off of you. 

“Sorry, sorry,” his immediate apology told you that he knew exactly what sins he had committed against you, “I’m not in my right mind.”

You reached behind you and grabbed his hand off of your ass and brought it back around, dropping it down on his own lap. It landed with a flop in his lap and his eyes pulled deservedly down as he took on a much more sheepish expression in his face. You couldn’t tell if it was genuine. 

“You say one thing and do another, Doh Kyungsoo.”  

You felt ready to snap. “You say we won’t have sex, and that’s fine. I’m fine with that,” you said through wild eyes and even though you managed to get the words out, it felt like a lie. You weren’t fine with that. This hot piece of ass needed to figure himself out and in a hurry because you weren’t sure how much more of his torture you could take. 

“You seem fine with it,” you heard him mumble under his breath and your eyes widened as you lifted your eyebrows and looked at him. He lifted a hand and waved it lightly, “Sorry, continue.” 

“I was fine with it until you,” you lifted your arms and wrapped them around your body, doing a speed-run pantomime of him grabbing you around the waist, hugging you tightly and you even ran your fingers over the entire length of his face lightly, jumping back in pure frustration, “did all that to me, Kyungsoo. What the fuck?” 

The man who sat in front of you with his forearms crossed strategically over his lap ‘just so’ dared to smile at you. It was a tiny smile but you lifted a finger and pointed right at his face with a frustrated gasp. Again his smile, impossibly, widened.

“I am going to go take a shower. And I am going to lie down.” These words came out in a low growl. “I better not see you standing at that bathroom doorway.”

You’d spun on your heels for the second time to walk away from this man and you nearly screamed when you felt his hand reach for you again. This time he was standing up and you lifted your own hand in an 'I swear to god, give me a reason’ pose, enjoying how quickly he flinched away from you. 

“Wait, wait” he quickly spoke, not wanting to get smacked. You decided then and there that you weren’t above doing it. The memory of last night's tit punch was still fresh in your mind and you were feeling almost crazy enough to do it. 

“Just wait, goddammit,” he had the nerve to sound annoyed. He actually reached up and grabbed your raised hand and carefully brought it back down. “Come back later. Later tonight, give me like two hours maybe.” 

“What happens in two hours?” your eyes narrowed and your lips pouted just a little bit with the suggestive tilt of your head as your mind whirled through the possibilities. Did he just need two hours to decide that maybe you were worth a round or 20 of pressing your back into your mattress, or maybe his mattress? Hell, four mattresses were lying over there on the floor where the movies had been showing, you were not that picky. Literally this table here would suffice. Your face must have betrayed your filthy thoughts because he squeezed your hand and you heard a tiny laugh break free from him. 

He was laughing through his words, “Dinner. Just dinner with me. God, will you relax, please?”

His proposal sounded promising. Your eyebrows were lifted in curiosity without you even realizing it you eked out a tiny question for him.

“Like…a dinner date?” This sent a strange wave of panic through you. The tiny smile on his face and the little hum he made as a response sent butterflies flying. You felt at odds with the strange burst of nerves. The idea of having an actual date with this man was, well — you’d never once considered a re-do with him. Back then you’d been so offended, so humiliated, and so angry that the last thing you wanted was to give him a second chance. After a while, you’d even run out of any desire for him to explain himself for what he did back then. 

Perhaps a make-up for that botched blind date all those months ago that started all of this trouble was the kind of thing your heart craved deep down inside. You suddenly felt nervous. Sex was one thing but a date with him? Sex was just physical but starting this over again, a date with Kyungsoo felt too vulnerable. Why was that so much scarier to you? 

What if he didn’t show up? 

Wait, he was trapped here and he was the one doing the cooking. Plus if he didn't show up, you knew where you could find him. You’d beat down the door and kick his ass as long as he was hiding away in one of the rooms here that didn't have any spiders. 

His eyebrows lifted and the smile he was wearing on his lips was gone. 

“You don’t want to?” He asked the question and left his lips hanging open. You could see on his face that despite the false bravado he wore when he proposed the date, to begin with, he also was feeling a lot of the same nerves about it that you felt. His focus on your face was flighty, not quite able to commit to solid eye contact with you with this heavy question handing in the air like this. 

“Okay,” you finally answered in a whisper and you closed up your mouth and nodded your head up and down twice. 

Kyungsoo’s eyes watched your face and you caught him mirroring the same head nod. “Okay,” he also whispered. 

You nodded again and he was quiet as he looked at you, eventually looking away from you and looking around the kitchen space with a small exhale of air through his mouth. He didn’t move, but what was even worse was that you also did not move. You weren’t sure how to do it.

Oh. Oh no. Oh no this was awkward. Did you just say goodbye and walk away? Did you give him, like, a high five or maybe lean into him for a hug, God that would be terrible, Imagine? A hug, thanks buddy, thanks pal, thanks for letting me make out with you, sorry to freak you out when I got too into it and touched your boner because apparently that is a no-touchy zone, I did not get the memo about the boner. Should you lean in and give him a kiss on the cheek? How did you leave this situation with at least one-fourth of your dignity, an acceptable amount for someone with your history of humiliating yourself, still intact? 

The kiss on the cheek might be okay, right? His cheeks were soft and his skin was smooth. You took the smallest step into him and you leaned in for it, but oh god, he was moving already. You leaned at the exact same moment that he spun around on his feet and began to walk away from you toward the doorway that led toward the bunk beds, which would have been completely fine except for the fact that he had seen you beginning to lean into him right before he moved. He had seen you move, he had seen you lean, but his feet had already stepped, his body had already begun the exit process and what resulted was a terrible, awful, awkward time in which he stopped walking abruptly and turned back around to face you, halfway toward the doorway, stuck somewhere in the middle of this kitchen with him again facing you and neither of you wanting to explain to each other with words why the journey to the exit had been halted so abruptly. 

“No,” you shook your head back and forth. His face was pink again. “No, just go. You already ruined it.” 

“What were you going to do?” 

“Doesn't matter. It’s over.” You sidestepped him and moved quickly through the space, placing your handle on the kitchen door and pulling it open. You hurled yourself into the darkness of the hallway, feeling just a tiny bit of irritation at the realization that you could still hear the sound of his footsteps very clearly. He hadn’t stayed behind in that kitchen but he seemed to be following you down the hallway toward the room with your bunks. 

“You were leaning, what were you leaning for?” 

“Why are you following me? I have things to do. Alone, Kyungsoo.” You emphasized the last bit while looking directly into his eyes and he was fighting his smile a little but he didn’t seem to stop following you until you reached the door to the bunks and stopped to look at him with your hand on the door handle. 

“I just need to get my bag. Then you can have the place to yourself.” He was already pushing past you, rushing through the room toward the bed in the back and he was grabbing a black duffel that he slung over his shoulder and he made quick work of the distance with his quick walking reaching the space in the doorway that you still occupied in no time. 

When he was back at your side you moved inside the room to give him room for his exit but before he disappeared through the doorway you caught an abrupt shift in his balance. When he was close enough he leaned into you and pressed his soft lips against your cheek, lingering against your skin for one second too long before he pulled back again and looked into your eyes. Admittedly, you hadn’t expected that at all and you had closed your eyes halfway through the lingering part and you had to act quickly to open your eyes up in time so as not to miss the smoldering look part. 

“Now, wouldn’t that have been awkward to do back in the kitchen when I was going to come all the way over here the whole time?” 

You’d opened your mouth and inhaled a breath to respond to him. You would have lied and told him that you weren’t going to kiss him in the kitchen, or that he was imagining things again, or maybe you would lie and say you took it back and you didn’t want to have sex with him ever. He had already disappeared and the heavy door slammed shut before you had a chance to think of a clever comeback. 

Links: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7

[flores-desyatov]

🩷🤍💚

[garrettwrites]

I'm am so fucking tired of people not understanding tropes. No, it's not an enemies to lovers if the characters just kinda dislike each other. No, it's not enemies to lovers if the characters merely view each other as annoying. No, it's not enemies to lovers just because A is an asshole to B. Stop tagging your crappy book as enemies to lovers when it isn't I am so tired of getting excited for shit I think I'll enjoy only to be slapped with "lol they're in love 40 pages into this enemies business" shut up shut up shut up

[spideysatan]

life is great when you're not a HUGE bitch that is mad with life and love and whimsy and you can simply enjoy different love stories without comparing them

[raccoonfallsharder]

Chapter 15/25+ Window Across the Galaxy (new 10/5 ♡)

girl falls first; raccoon falls harder.

She can feel that her eyes are huge, and locked on his. “Mornin’,” he grumbles muzzily, and then eyes her more closely. “What?” “Nothing,” she says quickly. “I - good morning.” He’s looking at her suspiciously. “Why’s your face all red?” Christ.  Because Jolie is who she is, she doesn’t answer. She just holds his gaze for a long, half-terrified moment like she’s a fucking deer in headlights - then closes her eyes, shaking her head like the motion can somehow dislodge the blush from her cheeks or the heat from her abdomen.

Chapter XV. Galaxy-Breaking Shit. in which more comfort is shared, and life is good. Briefly.

clonky chapter with a mix of angst and fluff and the slow burn heating up a bit.

General summary/notes + links to recently preceding chapters behind the cut. let me know via comment, message, or ask if you'd like to be added or removed from my fanfic/headcanon taglist ♡

General Summary~

Rocket is captured by a Ravager crew hoping to get rich off the excessively large bounty on his head. Throwing a wrench in everyone’s plans is the Terran girl they hired to do some freelance assessing on a recent haul of goods they’ve seized from a Xandaran luxury liner. Oops.

let me be real with you: this fic is really about wish-fulfillment. not just the eventual smut (but that too). mostly i just want someone to be nice to my best raccoon

Chapter I. A Delicacy. in which our reluctant heroes meet atop a crate of Sovereign porn in the bowels of a Ravager ship. Chapter II. Monster For A Pet. in which one hero wrestles with his inner Groot, and the other is quite possibly a moron. Chapter III. A Kindness.in which Rocket gets in his own damn way: not for the first time, and certainly not for the last. Chapter IV. Got There First.in which our heroes obtain an arsenal and street food. Chapter V. Things No-One Has Said Before. in which one hero refuses to babysit and the other refuses to leave. Chapter VI. Two and a Half Billion Units. in which we lean into the “they were roommates” trope. Jolie has misgivings, while Rocket has fantasies - about getting rich, of course. Chapter VII. I'm Here.in which we visit Knowhere. Chapter VIII. The Care & Feeding of Human Pets. in which our heroes practice breathing and we lean into a new trope: “there was (technically) one bed.” Chapter IX. Scrapmetal and a Dream. in which we redefine homemaking. Chapter X. Thin Fucking Ice.in which our heroes get fucked. Not in the good way. Chapter XI. Let It Be.in which Xandar is saved and good lives are lost. Chapter XII. So Much It Hurts. in which we try not to fuck up the vibes. Chapter XIII. Don’t Wait.in which a lost sister is found and Drax grapples with the concept of sarcasm. Chapter XIV. Exactly Like a Flower. in which comfort is shared. Chapter XV: Galaxy-Breaking Shit. in which more comfort is shared, and life is good. Briefly. Coming Soon: Chapter XVII. Run. in which Rocket falls victim to his superstitions.

slight AU starting pre-GOTG volume 1 (but will hit most of the same major plot points). slooowww burn + eventual smut with a lot of pining in the middle. kinda enemies-to-lovers? (but only one of these idiots thinks they're enemies). elements of hurt/comfort because rocket is the saddest-angriest boy. rating will go up and tags will be added to as needed.

@evolvingchaoswitch♡@wren-phoenix♡@pretty-chips♡ @suicidalshitstick

[literallymikewheeler]

i will never EVER get the hype about enemies to lovers.. like im so sorry but i dont want my whole relationship w someone to be us screaming insults at each other and just completely degrading one another and then going and making out. like??? i feel like i would enjoy the trope a lot more if it was some rare, unpopular trope but IT. IS. SO. OVERUSED. can we PLS give it a break???

on an unrelated note, i am OBSESSED with friends to lovers + slow burn. specifically, if the friends to lovers is childhood best friends and it is a queer love story. im so sorry but that trope just does it better

[waldensblog]

Writer: Character A and Character B meet. Instantly they are attracted to each other and get together. There is a misunderstanding, but it’s all okay, they get back together quickly and it’s all happily ever after!

Me: 

Writer: Character A and Character B meet. There is an attraction, but they do not get together. They yearn, they pine, they perish, circling one another... finally, they get past these obstacles and they are together, hooray! But alas, tragedy strikes! They are now enemies... 

Me: 

[spokentothewoods]

Maybe I'm bad at using AO3 but how are you guys always doing something on it ? I have like 4 fics I'll sometimes go back and read and then reread for a few days after but then I get burnt out on them and don't use AO3 for like a month

[misspermitted]

Sometimes it’s just you and that dirty cup in the corner of your room that has been there for 3 weeks and you gives you daily anxiety but you still won’t clean. It’s about the chemistry. The will they won’t they. The mutual pining but oh no I can’t give in. Stolen glances across the room. Oh the torture. Even when my eyes are off you I’m thinking of you.

[werdlewrites]

Season of The Witch (Steve Harrington x OC?)

Chapter Two: Death

masterlist-about-patreon-ao3

UPDATED 7/21/24

Summary: “Can I help you with something? Are you lost?” There’s finally some recognition, a twist of discomfort as he can sense the tension building between them already. He opens his mouth to retort but she beats him to it. “Did that orange ball smack your big head so hard you forgot where you were?” “Alright, alright,” he says rather quickly, annoyed at just how pleased she was with herself. “I come in peace,” he says with both hands held out, palms towards her in good faith. “Yeah, I’m sure." Warnings: Smoking, anti Steve (for now), witchery, panic/anxiety attack Word Count: 3707

Time was stretching on forever. Leaving Autumn lingering in an unknown void, a trance. Watching as the water slowly eased its way down into the soil of her ninth, or tenth, plant of the morning. She would study it closely, making a guess if it was either too much or too little, and moving forward after that. It was slow, tedious, and sometimes therapeutic, but not when you’ve struggled for another night of sleep. 

Autumn had awoken before the sun had even kissed the sky of Hawkins, unsettled and uncomfortable in her own bed. She only tossed and turned through most of the night, and in the moments of peace she did find, she was only met with hushed conversations in the furthest reaches of her mind. Voices, not of anyone she knew, and certainly not of her own. 

This hadn’t been the first time they’d called out to her as she laid her head down to rest. It was one of many curses, or gifts, as her father would call them. Autumn would call them neither, only pieces of herself that she has struggled to cope with throughout her life. From imaginary friends when she was only a child to actively experiencing moments she couldn’t recognize or place. She had thought she was spiraling into madness, and so did everyone else—safe for her father, who helped her find the way. He was encouraging, full of guidance and support, as he purchased any book she asked for to better herself and her understanding of just what was happening. With age came acceptance; acceptance created hatred from others.

The girl didn’t have much. People feared her without much knowledge, pitied her, or simply thought she was the odd one out.

Autumn had her plants, a father who cared in his own way, Jonathan, and a dream to get the fuck out of Hawkins. To a place where people welcomed her if it even existed.

She downs the last of her coffee, staring in silence at the now-empty mug in debate over a second cup. The sun has yet to make an appearance, and the lack of sleep is weighing heavily on the girl. A looming cloud filled with heavy rain drenching Autumn until her feet sink deep into the earth, unable to move onward. Each step drains life from her—a fight. 

The only peace she holds onto is knowing that it’s Friday, the final day of torment before a weekend with the Byers. Autumn leaves the mug behind, opting for a hot shower to further push her into the morning and away from a tempting nap before the alarm sounds. She can still hear the voices calling, but only as a memory that she doesn’t wish to return to.

There was the usual onslaught of unnecessary comments the moment her feet touched down at the high school. Maybe it was the lack of sleep—maybe it was something in the air that day—but her patience was wearing thin the moment someone gave her an odd look. The wire was only twisting tighter and tighter in her gut with every passing remark and glance, and within seconds, a cigarette had found its way to her lips, panicked fingers running along the wheel until it finally provided a flame. It sends a rush of relief and nicotine through her body—a destructive distraction. 

As her lungs filled, those momentary worries seemed not so worrisome. Her tense shoulders had now fallen, and her frame leaned up against the brick wall of the school building, ignoring the murmurs as they passed right by and through the doors. Her knee was bouncing wildly, still lingering in the effects of anxiety, until she forced it out straight with a final drag of her cigarette, crushing the end of it into the wall before making her way inside. It’s as busy as ever. No one seemed to be in a real rush to get to class early, all lingering as if they hadn’t seen each other the day before. Friday did, in a small way, feel like a piece of the weekend.

There was one part of her Friday she did not anticipate, though. He was leaning against her locker, waiting with an almost impatient look on his face as his eyes flicked through the crowd in search of her. King Steve Harrington is the star of the basketball and swim team. Cocky as all hell, Nancy Wheeler’s special something, and Autumn’s very long, lost friend. 

He was so lost that she couldn’t remember the last time she enjoyed his company, and yet somehow, he was at her locker. Honey-colored eyes lock on her within seconds, and he gives her a small, awkward wave. As the distance between them lessened, her heart rate only seemed to go up, already missing that poisonous friend she had left outdoors to calm her aching nerves.

“You’re in my way, Harrington.” 

His smile doesn’t falter, but he does inch away from her space, just enough so she can open the metal door with great unease. She takes her time, pretending to look through her books or her bag, as she can feel those same eyes burning a hole through the shield meant to deter him. A bagged lunch is tossed inside, along with other items she didn’t require for the first half of the day, before she closes it, looking unimpressed and irritated to see that the boy hasn’t moved at all. “Can I help you with something? Are you lost?” 

There’s finally some recognition. A twist of discomfort, as he can sense the tension building between them already. He opens his mouth to retort, but she beats him to it. “Did that orange ball smack your big head so hard you forgot where you were?” 

“Alright, alright,” he says rather quickly, annoyed at just how pleased she was with herself. “I come in peace.” Both hands are offered out, palms towards her in good faith. But she doesn’t quite buy it.

“Yeah, I’m sure. Tommy around the corner? Just waiting t’throw some pig's blood on me?” 

Steve seems taken aback by her comment, brows knitted together in pure confusion before hands fall to his hips, cocked to the side. “What? Why-no! That’s disgusting. There’s no—there's no blood here.” 

“Great. Then I suppose I can spare the world from my rage just one more day,” she teases, though her fake smile easily falls flat, still wondering why after all of this time Steve would bother to come to her one-on-one. She had only seen him from afar as they drifted apart—as he found new crowds to surround himself with. They influenced him in ways that changed her view of him forever, watching as he became someone she could no longer recognize. And while Steve never attacked her directly, he never stopped it. That alone spoke volumes.

Steve pinches at the bridge of his nose, feeling unfocused, and he is desperate to get back on track, while she seems determined to keep him off of it. “Look, I came because... I wanted t’ask for a favor,” he finally admits with a sigh. It’s enough to leave a brow raised in curiosity. “I was wondering if you could do, y’know, a reading.” 

“Readings aren’t ‘favors’, Steve. That costs,” she holds up her hand, rubbing her thumb along her fingertips, the sign for ‘cash’ and he instantly rolls his eyes, shoulders slumped. 

“Okay, well, I can pay. Can we do one today? During lunch?” 

In their time apart, she had never imagined herself here, agreeing to Steve Harrington and his request. But, here she was. Nodding along to his plan to meet up at the bleachers midday. He seemed breathless, a little too eager for her liking as he jogged away from her, all the while she looked at him like any other customer.

Autumn had nearly slept through her classes. The beginning always seemed to start so well, and by the end, she was heavy-lidded, leaning into her palm so hard that she swore she could have torn her own face off. At one point, she was gone. The voice of the teacher had faded out, replaced with sweet nothingness—at least that’s what it seemed. For a moment, all behind closed eyes was black. A sweet relief, though brief, as something unsettling creeps in. 

The sound of misery—desperate pleas from a soft and pained voice just at her back. So close, it almost feels too real. The agony is squeezing at her chest as frantic breath ghosts along the shell of her ear. She’s almost grateful as a kick to her ankle rips her back into reality. 

The light rushed in with wide, dazed eyes, searching for the source of the voice. It was almost blinding, her eyes blinking away the blurred vision to focus back on her teacher and then on Jonathan. He sits with a smug look on his face, hiding behind a hand as a smile creeps in. Though her glare fails to waiver, amusement turns to worry, mouthing, “Are you okay?” 

It’s the last thing she needs. Having someone stress over her without the ability to pull her from the fire. Autumn wears a forced smirk, her middle finger rising just under her folded arms to say, "Fuck you.” 

He’s quick to shift focus downward, scoffing in amusement with the roll of his eyes. With his mind set at ease, he returns to the lesson, and she slumps further into her seat—attention forward but mind elsewhere.

Friday was no weekend. Not this time.

When lunch had come around, Autumn was happily laid out on the bleachers. Soaking up what little sun was available to them that day as the clouds roamed high above, consuming the sky. The air was chilled, comforting her aching muscles from the long night before. The air was still and quiet enough to offer her comfort as her eyes slipped shut, finding peace away from all of the noise inside the cafeteria. 

With her lunch devoured on sight and the beast within now tamed, she was able to drift into a state of calm. A mistake on her part was letting time pass by carelessly. Ignorant to just how long her eyes would remain closed for. She could have spent the day out there, her mind full of fragility as she gave in to the long, sleepless night. She’d catch a cold and land under a stern stare from the principal and her father for unintentionally skipping class. She puts blind faith in Harrington, hoping he will do good on his word and pull her from the edge just before she fades out.

“There, I did it,” the child states happily. In her palm, she holds what she believes to be a delicate piece of art. Something she’s worked hard for, following every instruction, no matter how frustrating. 

She marvels at the simple design, making notes on where to add more polka dots on the folded-up sheet of paper. Her eyes wander, finding her friend oblivious to her finished project as he smoothes out the creases of his own paper game. In comparison, hers seems like a wadded-up ball. Uneven folds and words show where they shouldn’t have been. She doesn’t question it at first, simply casting looks back and forth until he finally finishes. 

His sweet eyes are prideful, a blissful smile shining as he holds it up for her to see. Then, it all seems to shift. Victory is long gone, and he’s locked in a trance over her attempt. Without warning, a laugh slips through. “What did you do?” 

The girl at his side holds an empty stare, unsure if she should be laughing along with him or hurt by his comment. “I did what you said,” she replied plainly, her brows knitting together as his amusement grew. 

“Give me that.” He trades their pieces, and she watches as he works in silence. Her paper is unfolded to lay flat against the small desk, his smile stretching as he reads over the options given. “Make more friends" lies right next to “Get a dog,” and he can’t fight the tug at his heart. Sparing a look her way, he watches as she pulls at his tabs, a look of irritation at just how good he was at designing them. “You’re cheating.” 

Young eyes flick up to stare at the boy, easing the fold back down to hide the message. “Sorry.” Her voice is low, barely audible, and she seems almost ashamed. 

“N-no, it’s okay, really. You’re just supposed t’go by your gut,” he reassures gently before his focus moves back to her own, where he begins to fold it evenly with care. “I guess it’s about fate, or whatever.” Her spine straightens and her fingers slip inside the pockets, practicing the game by herself while he works. 

“You like dogs?” She shrugs in response, her expression confirming that curiosity. “What kind?” Another weak shrug. 

“Don't know. All dogs, I think.” 

“Maybe you’ll get one for Christmas,” he suggests with a toothy grin, though faltering ever so slightly as the enthusiasm isn’t returned. If anything, he swears her eyes shift into something more somber.

“Hey!”

Alarms are sounding off in her head at the sudden disruption. Her body comes to life with shock as chilled air sweeps in to burn her resting lungs. There’s no more peace, only the sound of his voice booming across the field, calling out her name. 

Through one cracked-open eye, Autumn swore she could see him waving for her attention as he ran the rest of the way. She’s not sure if she’s pleased by just how timely he was or if there’s disappointment that she couldn’t steal away another moment of quiet. 

"Sorry, sorry,” he stammers, clearly breathless, with his hands resting lazily on his hips. “I got held up. Y’know, girl stuff.” 

Autumn remains unamused, eyeing him with remnants of the person he used to be. Running out to sit on these very bleachers to hide their cigarettes or the place they met a few yards away to put an end to the tattered friendship. For a moment, she wonders what it all would have been like. “Yeah, girl stuff. D’you want this reading or not?” 

A rush of excitement seems to move through him, a spark as his eyes light up, and maybe even a hint of a smile. Maybe there was a piece of him that didn’t think she would still be willing to help. “Y-yeah! One second,” he says in a panicked voice, scrambling towards the other end of the bleachers to begin his climb up to her. The chilled metal stings his skin, shaking out his hands by the time he is up at her level, sitting just across from her with eyes glued to her bag as she rummages through it. “How can you sit out here?” 

Autumn pauses in her search, blowing hair from her face and shaking it away to meet his curious gaze. “I’m sorry. D’you want t’go inside? I can do magic there." 

“No!” The boy yells, a little unexpected for both of them, as the air immediately becomes painfully silent afterward, heavy with discomfort, though she could only smile. “O-out here is...fine.” 

Autumn waits another moment. She waits for him to settle and be sure of his choices before she pulls out a Tarot deck from her bag, setting it between the pair. “Can’t be caught fraternizing with the witch,” she chuckles. “Alright, here’s how this works. I do cash up front; no refunds. Your destiny is your own, blah blah. All of that bullshit. D’you have any questions?”

 Steve seems unsettled, though he gives a quick shake of his head to let her begin. The boy leans in with his elbows resting on denim-clad knees, chewing at his lips as his nerves build into something he is unable to ignore. “D’you want a palm reading or one from the cards?” 

That seemed to pique some interest, with his eyes beaming up at her in confusion through fallen locks of hair. “What?” 

“A palm reading is three bucks. Five from the cards and ten for a large spread.” 

It was then that he sat back, a clear look of annoyance in his expression as he glared at her, pure disbelief in her words. “I heard you did Heather’s for cheaper.” 

“Yeah, I like Heather.” 

The comment leaves him stunned, blinking with a dumbfounded look in his eyes, and together they sit in silence, almost as if he is waiting for her to change her reply. To make a joke of it all. Autumn remains calm and steady, leaving Steve to surrender and bitch about the pricing as he digs through his wallet, practically tossing the five-dollar bill at her, just to end the awkward moment only he seemed to be suffering from. “What d’you want t’know?”

Steve had come here with a goal in mind, but getting him to actually confess it had his palms sweating as he rubbed them together. There was hesitancy, a sudden skip in his chest that left him breathless for only a moment. “I-I want t’know about me and Nance.” 

And no matter his look of pain and discomfort, Autumn was smiling from ear to ear, hands already gently shuffling the cards once pulled from their tin. “Feeling a little insecure, are we?”

“What? No,” he bites back, though it’s shrugged off by the receiver. 

“And what is it you want t’know?” 

“Uh,” his thumbs are fiddling together, fighting for the right words—she pretends not to notice as she continues to shuffle, not in preparation but mostly to calm her nerves. “Will I-” Autumn shuts his question down before it truly begins, waving her hand between the two in disagreement. 

“No, no. ‘Will I’ questions lock you into 'yes' or 'no'. Ask ‘How’ or ‘What’.” 

Steve whispers an “Oh,” with eyes fluttering elsewhere, rethinking the question to something more suitable. “What does my future with Nancy look like?” 

Boring. It's what most of them want these days. Anything in regards to love with their current partner or from their ex, or if they will ever find the missing piece to their ever-growing puzzle of life. On occasion, some would seek more benefits towards more personal goals. Colleges, larger-than-life sports teams, or simply if they made it anywhere at all. Of course, Autumn could never say, "Looks like you'll win the lottery." But her readings were enough to provide hope or crush dreams right on the spot. Whatever the outcome, she was a few bucks richer. And no matter the history between the two, Steve would be no different. The cards favored and pitied no one. 

Her eyes are closed, focusing the dull and expected question into the deck that she sorts through with quick hands, cards flying with ease. Slow and steady breaths fill her chest, unaware of the curious gaze moving between her and the cards. Uncertain if he should do or say anything and how it all really works, he sits in silence until further instructed. But when she pauses, looking stone-faced and serious, he can't fight the audible gulp before the cards are spread out along the icy, rigid seat. Autumn is determined, wasting no time before pulling a single card and laying it face up before Steve. He’s uncertain of it all, but he isn’t blind, and the words paired with imagery are enough to have his fingers anxiously dig into his jeans.

Death.

"Pfft," the girl let out an airy chuckle, hiding behind her present, joyous smile while the boy was wide-eyed with panic. It’s one of her favorite cards in the deck, one that causes mayhem as the client seeks to understand it—just like now. 

“What? What is that?” It sounded like a question, but his tone was forceful, demanding, seeking acknowledgment immediately, and growing more aggravated the more she laughed. “Hello? What the fuck is that? Why does that say ‘Death’?” 

“Calm down, Harrington." 

“No, I don’t like that. You pulled way too quick.” 

Autumn reels back at the comment, an obvious look of offense on her face, and for a moment she is too stunned to reply back. Mouth hung agape, biting back all of the things she had wanted to say since the start of freshman year. “This is how I do things. I go by feeling and gut instinct. Besides, Death isn’t all that bad.”

Steve looked as though his old friend had just grown a second head—bizarre and confusing. How is that even possible? “Uh-huh? D’you want to elaborate on that for me? That big orange ball, y’know. It really smacked me around.” He teases, his large hands creating a sphere around his head as he rattles himself around within it dramatically.

“Death is the ending of a cycle. A beginning, a change—metamorphosis. D’you know-?” 

“Yeah, I know what metamorphosis is.” He spits out, defensive. 

“But when reversed, there are... new meanings. Fear of change, never moving forward, and so on.” 

"Yeah, but y-you laid it upright,” Steve says quietly, his finger firmly pressed down on the card, drawing her attention back to the symbol between the two. 

Without further hesitation, she lets out a loud, “Dun, dun, dun.” Out of the two of them, only she finds it amusing, while Steve is merely rolling his eyes with hands running along his thighs from anxiety. 

“Come on, that’s not funny. I want another pull." 

The laughter stops, and she’s bent forward, her open palm exposed for his cash to fall into her grasp. “D’you have another five for a full spread?” 

“N-no, but I can pay you next week.” 

With that, Death along with her many other cards, are swiped up and neatly laid in their place, protected from whatever harm may come to them. “Cash up front. Don’t sweat it, Harrington. You two just got together, yeah?” He nods wordlessly, everything he wants to say caught in his throat. “Change is coming. Growth for the two of you.” 

"Is that good or bad?” Autumn shrugs, the tin now resting safely in the depths of her bag before it’s swung over her shoulder. 

“That’s up to the two of you.”

[danistartt]

Y/N being besties with Colin??

are you psychic

[housewifebuck]

Has anyone else on the planet besides me watched Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan. Get in my dms

[poohsources]

🐝  *  ―  𝑺𝑯𝑰𝑷𝑷𝑰𝑵𝑮 𝑺𝑯𝑬𝑬𝑻.

send 🚢 or ( 'SHIP' ) if you ever considered shipping our characters romantically and want me to fill out the following form for our muses. bold all that definitely applies, italicize what could potentially apply. feel free to add more if you think certain options are missing or you just want to add more.

do i ship our characters together?: yes | no | not yet but maybe soon

would i like to ship with you?: yes | maybe, i'm willing to try | no

type of relationship i could see: childhood or high school sweethearts | exes | engaged | married | long-term relationship | crushes | unrequited love | fling | long distance | online relationship | just dating | new relationship | toxic lovers | friends with benefits

tropes i'd enjoy writing for them: friends to lovers | enemies to lovers | exes to lovers | fake relationship / dating | forbidden love | grumpy and sunshine | star-crossed lovers | surprise pregnancy | second chance | soulmates | amnesia / mistaken identity | forced proximity | secret relationship | slow burn relationship

would i rather plot first or jump right in and see where it goes?: develop their relationship first | jump right in | something in between ( what specifically? )

what now?: let's plot something | send me shippy memes | i'll send you shippy memes | write me a random starter | i'll write you a random starter

anything else i want you to know about me / my character / my shipping habits: ( put whatever you want here )