#oh i suppose i should try to do the cake fake dating as well

[allsassnoclass]

i miss having lashton wips

[oceanbug]

when worlds collide

smau non!idol ningning x reader

15. double trouble.

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“Holy shit, Wonyoung’s coming; phones down." With Yunjin’s frantic words came even more frantic movement from the whole table. Everyone scurried to put their phones away so that it wouldn’t look like they were texting each other on purpose. That would be rude.

“Hey, babe~ How’s the food? Isn’t it delicious?” Wonyoung’s voice is always sweet, like honey; it felt like eating cotton candy with how light yet sweet she sounded. If you hadn’t known her, you’d be shocked to know that she hung out with a vicious dog like Ningning.

“It’s actually pretty good; we should come here more often!”

“Let’s call it a date then! And a hello to all you lovely ladies! Sorry for interrupting; I just needed to say hi to my baby.”

“Oh, it’s not trouble. It’s perfectly understandable to say hi to your girlfriend when you guys coincidentally meet up at the same restaurant. You’re never a bother, Wonyoung.” It was pretty weird that you all ended up at the same restaurant, but they did just open. It’s understandable for a bunch of college kids to go to the first place offering free food.

Wonyoung walked away, and everyone’s phones went right up again. Both tables were frantically texting, and the whole ambiance of the restaurant was awkward. Even strangers could pick up the tension. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to realize both tables were texting about each other. The glances at each other every 10 seconds gave it away.

Giselle was the first one to break the silence.

“Aw, you got some cake on you; let me wipe it off." She wiped off the frosting next to your lip and licked it off her finger. Everyone at your table stared at you two in awe and confusion.

“Y/n, what the fuck?” whispered a very confused Jimin.

“Just go with it, please.”

No one understood what was happening except you and Giselle, which is understandable since your plan was made in the study room yesterday.

_______________________________________________

17 hours prior, in the library’s study room.

“Why would she think Wonyoung would lie about that?”

You felt your jaw drop and your eyes widen. Is Giselle insinuating what you think she is?

“Well, if you don’t mind me asking, is the rumor true? Did you hook up with Yeonjun Giselle?” She could be lying to you, but you might as well ask. You were too curious about where this story was going to even care if she might be lying.

“No, I didn’t. I’d never cross Ning like that; we’re besties. Well, we were besties.”

“Then, why would Wonyoung lie about something like that?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out, and that’s where you come in. Wonyoung would never spill her secrets, and especially never to you. But if we were to keep her distracted enough, we could get some info from everyone else.”

“But why me? I’m sure Jimin or anyone else would be a better choice.”

“It’s simple; you’re the only one who can keep Ning distracted long enough for us to even get to Wonyoung. Everyone else is a breeze, but Ning’s tough; they’re glued against the hip.”

“Me?” In your mind, Ningning hated you.

“Haven’t you noticed? Ning’s tame around you. She does that for no one else. I don’t exactly know why, but she considers you human. Everyone else just happens to be a bunch of roaches that she’s ready to squash. Not you, though.”

“Ok, well, how would I even distract her?”

“That’s where I come along, my little kitten. Ning hates me enough for ‘stealing’ Yeonjun; imagine her fury when she sees the two of us together. Not just in a friendly way, but together.”

“It’ll be like you ’stole’ me from her, like you 'stole’ Yeonjun.”

“Bingo-bingo, my friend.”

“Ok, let’s do it. Let's fake a date.”

______________________________________

Present Day at ‘Le Dessert’ Cafe

The plan wasn’t supposed to take effect so fast, but I guess now’s a perfect opportunity. You couldn’t really tell your friends that you were fake dating; it had to be as believable as possible. It did make you blush a bit, which in some sense makes things more believable but also way more embarrassing.

You wanted nothing more than to turn around and see the look on Ningning's face, but you had to play it cool. That is, until a certain honey-voiced princess came skipping back to your table.

“Omg, I just had the best idea! We’re all friends, aren’t we? Why don’t we combine tables? Then I can be close to my baby. What do you say? You wouldn’t have any objections, would you?”

Fucking shit. No way is Wonyoung on to your plan already? She knows Ningning wants nothing more than to maul Aeri’s eyes out, and bringing Yeonjun to sit at the table with us? Even worse. What’s her plan? You could feel your heart beating faster and faster as the table stayed silent. It wasn’t until you felt another hand on top of yours that you calmed down. You turned to the source, and Giselle was giving you a reassuring nod. Right. Breathe. If this was part of Wony’s game, you could play better.

“We’d love that, Wonyoung! Hey Ningning, let’s pair tables.” You turned to her and gave her your biggest smile. Behind it was true fear as to what could come of this, but you had to look confident. You will make your plan work.

Ningning gave you a death stare but simply scoffed and began to move tables.

That’s it? After glaring daggers at you all day, she’s just going to move without a fight? Fine.

There was an awkward shuffling of tables, and everyone got settled into their slightly cramped seats. The tension in the room seems to have gotten even worse. Now, everyone is face-to-face; no one could hide behind their phones.

“So, this place is pretty cool, am I right, ladies?” Can this prick Yeonjun shut up?

“Yeah, pretty good food, I guess.” At least Yunjin was trying to converse; you could tell her, along with all your friends, had been incredibly confused about things. You wanted nothing more than to explain to them, but you couldn’t risk jeopardizing the plan.

The awkward silence was quick to return.

“I hear half of you knew each other in high school! What was that like?” You couldn’t fault Minji for asking such a painfully awkward question, but in her defense, she’s barley in the group chat enough to know. The body language of everyone who went to Spring Hill High became very tense. Everyone straightened their posture and avoided eye contact with each other. It was Giselle who finally broke the tension once again.

“I couldn’t tell you; I transferred out before senior year.”

“Sure, ‘transferred.’”

“What was that, Ning?”

“Nothing. Just that, I don’t consider getting shipped off to a rehabilitation center as ‘transferring’, but whatever.”

“Ok guys, can we just be civil?” You tried diffusing the situation, but all it got you was a death stare from Ningning.

“She asked a question; I’m giving more context to Aeri’s answer.”

“Ok. That’s fair.” That’s all you managed to get out; you didn’t want to argue. You knew you would be getting nowhere if you continued. 

“High school was pretty chill; my lovely lady and I here dated. I guess you can say fate brought us back together, right?” Yeonjun completely washed over any negative aspect of him and Ningning’s relationship and made it sound like they just drifted apart, then reconciled in college. The thing is, he couldn’t even bring himself to make eye contact with anyone else at the table other than Ningning. It was almost like he wanted her reassurance that they were in love, or more specifically, that she loved him. All he got in response was an eye-roll from Ningning and an “awe” from Wonyoung. It was a tough crowd for someone like him.

Trying to avoid Minji’s painfully awkward question, you took a bite of your cake, enjoying it. What was in this cake that made is so delicious? You couldn’t get enough!

“Oh no, you got more cake on you! Let me get it off.”

You prepared yourself to have cake wiped off your face again, except that’s not what happened.

The cake was off your lips but is now plastered on Giselle’s, or was until she licked it off. You sat up in shock. Giselle just kissed you. I guess couples do kiss, even fake ones, but could she have given you a warning? Before you could respond or even turn your face, a voice came blaring from the table.

“Ok, what the fuck was that?” It was Jimin.

“Oh, Y/N didn’t tell you? We decided last night we had a lot in common, so why not start dating? We look totally cute, don’t you think?”

The look on Jimin’s face quickly turned from confusion to hurt. Along with Ningning, who just stared at you,

“What happened to ‘You don’t know her, she doesn’t go here’” You forgot you texted Jimin that.

“What happened to ‘it didn’t mean anything when I hung out with Giselle’” You also forgot to text Ningning that. Ok. Double trouble. You have got to start reading your text more thoroughly before sending them.

“Look, I can explain." Before you even got another word out, Ningning had already begun spitting poison.

“What’s your fucking problem, Aeri? Huh? What problem do you have with me that you can't resist stealing from me? Are you that fucking obsessed with me? First you fucked my boyfriend four years ago; now you're crawling back for more? When will it end? You’re sad, pathetic, and lonely. Go fuck yourself.”

The room was silent. The restaurant was silent.

“Ningning-“ She was quick to cut you off again.

“And you. What’s your problem? I confided in you. I told you how I felt after I got cheated on. I thought you would understand, but it turns out you're just a mega-bitch like everyone else. Was anything you told me even true? If you’re already dating this tramp, did you ever really like Jimin? Or was that a lie just to get on my good side? Did you get your little friend Yujin to help you? You’re such a fucking freak for playing the long game. I bet you found it funny when I kissed Jimin at our graduation party, huh? Like it was all part of your plan? Let’s all laugh at Ningning! Well, not anymore. Fuck you. Goodbye.”

With that, Ningning stormed out; half-way through her meltdown, she had started crying. She was too focused on her words to even notice. Her group of friends were quick to follow along, except Yeonjun and Wonyoung, who remained at the table.

Before you even get to process what had just happened, round two was already brewing up.

“You... like me, Y/N? Is that what this is all about? Why’d you feel the need to lie? Did you not trust me enough to tell me? You decided to lie to me for our entire fucking friendship; are you serious? I told you that we could talk about anything; why couldn’t you talk to me about this?” Jimin was red in the face, slightly tearing up and choking on her words.

Speechless. That’s all you were. You couldn’t think of a response. Overwhelmed, you couldn't think of anything. Your throat began to close up more and more, feeling your body become heavier. You gave into the weight and collapsed onto the ground. Before your eyes fully close, all you hear is Sakura’s panicked voice:

“Is there peanut oil in this cake? Y/N’s has a peanut allergy! Fuck, I’ll get her epipen pen; call an ambulance!”

Everything faded into black.

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masterlist ~ next

(Synopsis) Y/N had never been the type to take life for granted. You grew up with the mindset that if you wanted something, you had to work for it; So getting paired up with the university’s “Rich Bitch” Ning Yi Zhuo for your midterm was the last thing you wanted. Are you willing to step into the world of fame for an A+?

taglist (open): @azraism ; @kimsgayness ; @sewiouslyz ; @winieter ; @llluvbluy ; @i06kkura ; @everydayiloveyves ; @edamboon

[hwangsies]

zephyr

(n) a gentle breeze

pairing: seo changbin x female reader (hwang hyunjin x female reader)

genre: rebound to fwb to dumbasses to lovers(?), college!au, undergroundrappers!3racha

warnings: angst: mentions of infidelity, heartbreak and abuse, seemingly unrequited love, they are both so dumb and prideful its annoying, fluff, bad attempt at comedy, minsung on the side, cursing, alcohol consumption, smut: protected piv, oral (f), studio sex, praise, mild degradation, hair pulling, mild spanking

wc: 10k

enjoy <3

-

September

"y/n?" you hear your roommates faint voice calling out your name.

You dont bother to answer because you know she's going to come into your room at any second now.

And you're right. "y/n??" Your door opens a few seconds later.

You groan in response, not looking up and instead staying in your little cocoon of blankets.

"no babygirl what are you doing?" you feel the bed shift under lias weight when she sits down.

"what does it look like i'm doing?" you grumble back, her hand gently rubbing over your arm.

"sulking, babe" she replies, dropping her purse to the ground.

"10 points for griffyndor" you sniffle as you scooch and sit up, pushing the blankets half off of you at which she sighs.

"wooyoung was not that good of a boyfriend for you to still be crying over him" lia presses her lips together concernedly.

She's right, you know it. It has almost been two months and you still feel like crying everytime someone mentions him.

"i know" you nod somewhat defeatedly "still, i was with him for almost a year and" you hiccup "he literally ripped my heart out and trampled on it"

"i know" lia nods understandingly "but i do think it would help if you went out again, even if its just for a night, you know just to be around people"

"it probably would but i just dont have the energy for it" you shrug your shoulders.

"i get it, girl, i really do" she pats your knee "both of my exes cheated on me, my only luck was that they were both awful at hiding it so i found out pretty quickly" she huffs.

You force out a chuckle, from what you heard from one of the girls that wooyoung cheated on you with, was that it started 3 months into your relationship.

"this the most humiliating thing ever, lia" you scoff "being with someone for so long, trusting them and telling them all your secrets and you think they are doing the same for you but then realizing that they were faking it all along to have multiple side chicks, and the fact that i was too oblivious to figure it out is the icing on the cake" you rub your forehead, feeling a migrane approach due to the sheer amount of crying you've been doing.

She seems to know what's happening and hands you the water bottle next to your bed "hydrate, sis"

So, you do. Taking four big gulps out of the water bottle.

Once you place the bottle next to you and tie your hair in a messy bun, you look at your roommate more thuroughly now that the tears are wiped away.

"you look pretty" you compliment her makeup and casual yet chic outfit "what'd you do tonight?"

Her contagious grin spreads over her face, eyes turning into little crescents.

"chris took me to the fair in town" lia grins before her face drops "I'm sorry, this is maybe not the time to ta-"

"No! It is, tell me about it" you interrupt her.

"O-okay" she nods hesitantly "well, i dont know if you've been keeping track but today was our fourth date and it was amazing" she gushes.

"I cant believe how much i like him, like, its crazy" she squeals a little, at which you giggle.

"so, fourth date huh? And he hasnt tried to get into your pants yet?" you quip.

"nope, i initiated our first kiss and other than that nothing" she whispers the last words before laughing.

"thats great" you smile, genuinely happy for her.

"Hmm yea" she sings as she gets up "i'll go to bed now too"

"Oh, hey, i have an idea" lia speaks up when standing in your doorway "chris has this performance thingy in two days, you should totally come!" she offers enthusiastically.

"he has a band?" you ask, partly to distract her from her offer.

"Hmm not really a band, they're a trio and there is this performance on saturday where a bunch of underground artists perform, i didnt fully listen if im honest" she giggles "but you should come with me!!" she jumps excitedly.

"i dont kno-"

"y/n pleasee? You'd do me a huge favor too because i dont know anyone there" lia pleads, clutchig her hands together.

"you know chris" you rebuttal.

"and what am i supposed to do when he's performing? stand around like an idiot? please y/n" she pouts.

"I dont really think this is my type of crowd..." you scratch your head.

"please please please" she jumps once more.

You sigh and tilt your head as you look at her sternly.

"one of his friends is single" she adds carefully.

"and cute" she sings "from what ive seen in pictures" she adds.

"lia" you groan.

"I'll do your laundry for two weeks if you come with me"

"you will?" Your head snaps towards her.

"yes i will! i promise, just come with me, please?"

A long sigh leaves your lips "okay"

-

The strong bass of the loud music rings in your chest as soon as you step foot into the club where “3racha” is supposed to be performing tonight.

Lia comes to a halt and you almost run into her because you were to busy checking out the venue and the other people around you.

“sorry” you mumble and hold onto her arm to avoid getting lost in the crowd.

She pulls out her phone and clicks on her and hers and chris’s chat, to figure out where to meet them, you assume.

“okay” lia puts her phone back into her jeans pocket and grabs your hand “they’re backstage, lets go”

“can we just go there?” you almost yell for her to understand what you’re saying.

“yea! Chris said he’ll make sure we’ll get in, come on” she tugs at your hand for you to walk faster.

You waddle behind her, barely dodging some drunk guys beer that goes flying before you arrive at the sign that says “artists only” and a black curtain behind it.

The guy standing infront of it raises a brow at the two of you before pointing at said sign “read ladies, no fans allowed”

“hey, they’re with me” a guy, you assume to be chris, taps on his shoulder and shows his artists badge, half of his body still covered by the curtain.

The bigger guy sighs and lets you through.

“thank you” lia lets go of your hand to loop her arms around chris’s neck once behind the curtain, they kiss and you look around.

Not because you are particularly uncomfortable, maybe still just a little bitter at happy couples.

You audibly clear your throat when they are still making out after a good ten seconds.

“oh-uhm” lia looks back at you after breaking the kiss “chris, this is y/n, y/n, chris” she giggles.

“hi y/n, nice to meet you” he gives you a quick hug and a smile full of dimples, finally understanding why your roommate is always swooning about him.

“hi” you smile back, somewhat forced.

“lets go to our dressingroom” chris suggests and leads the way.

Opening the door, he lets you and lia walk in first.

One guy is dancing around in the middle of the room, singing along to the current song that’s being played in the background with a water bottle as a pretend mic.

Another is one sitting on the small couch and laughing at him.

“oh, hi” the guy stops singing and quickly hides the bottle behind himself at which chris chuckles.

“guys, this is lia and y/n” chris points at the two of you before closing the door behind him.

“ooo the lia?” the waterbottle guy wiggles his eyebrows, at which you cant help but laugh as well, he isn’t very tall but looks lean.

“what is the lia supposed to mean?” lia laughs when chris comes up and slings an arm around her waist from behind her.

“I..well-I talk about you sometimes-“

“sometimes my ass” the guy sitting on the couch scoffs amusedly, your eyes shift to him.

He’s wearing a white baseball cap and a pretty tight fitted black Versace shirt, making his shoulders and arms look broad.

His hands clad in black half-gloves, he adjusts his cap before locking eyes with you and quickly looking down again.

“channie hyung must’ve forgotten his manners, I’m jisung” the waterbottle guy speaks up “and that’s changbin hyung” he points at the most intimidating-looking of the three of them, on the couch.

“channie?” lia squeals as she sits down with chris on the couch changbin is sitting on as well, jisung coming up to you.

“hey, you want something to drink?” he asks, pointing at the mini bar feigning cockiness  “we have a mini bar”

“woow” you chuckle, playing along “sure I’d love a drink”

“how come we’ve never met on campus before?” jisung asks after mixing you a vodka soda and sitting down on the second couch in the room.

“oh, you all go to uni here as well?” you ask surprisedly as you sit down next to him..

“yea” he grins “that’s how we all met” he points at lia and chris almost sitting on top of each other “and those two”

“oh I didn’t even know that” you take a sip, trying to loosen up “I guess I wasn’t listening when she was ranting on about him”

Jisung laughs and changbin joins the two of you as he sits down next to jisung.

“they just started calling each other bubs I feel like throwing up” changbin groans as he drinks from his beer.

You huff before jisung speaks again, looking from his friend back to you “he’s usually more romantic” he quips.

“I bet” you joke with him.

“yup” changbin locks eyes with you “that’s why I’m single, I’m just too romantic” he shakes his head sarcastically.

“ooh” you squint your eyes “emotional unavailability? love that in a man” you grin, at which his eyebrow quirks up amusedly.

“speaking of man, did minho hyung text you when he’d be here?” jisung asks his friend.

“yea he said he’ll be here in 5 and that you should finally buy a new phone” changbin answers, reading it from his phone at which jisung scoffs before turning to you.

“minho is my boyfriend” he explains “he’s hot” he grins at which you laugh “I bet”

“so, y/n, do you have a boyfriend?” jisung asks after taking a sip of his drink

“not anymore” you scoff, jisung inhales excitedly “guess what, changbin is single as well” he grins from ear to ear, comically looking back and forth between you two.

“oh, please dont start like lia” you chuckle, leaning forwards to lock eyes with changbin “no offense, but I only attract assholes”

He shakes his head, amusedly raising his brows “none taken” he grins at which you huff before a young woman comes into their dressing room to tell them they’re up next.

-

Back in the crowd, you and lia find a good place just as the lights dim and the music begins to play.

Suddenly you feel someone run into your side “woah I’m sorry” he quickly apologizes “this guy pushed me” he looks behind him.

“its alright” you nod, loud enough for him to hear.

Once they come outside, the crowd goes wild.

“jisungieee” the guy next to you all over sudden screams, you have to smile when looking at him.

“are you minho by any chance?” you ask him.

He nods aggressively “yea! do you know jisung?”

“I just met him backstage” you yell over the loud bass.

Minho laughs and nods before the bass drops and chris starts the first verse.

“he’s great right?” lia screams into your ear when the first chorus ends.

“yea” you nod, actually surprised at how good their music is, now understanding as to why the crowd loves them so much.

Changbin starts his verse and suddenly you feel somewhat entranced, his voice is rough and his bars are hard, definitely fitting his appearance but what entices you is the passion with which he appears to be performing.

Throughout their whole performance you cant take your eyes off him, the way his arms flex when he grips onto the microphone a little harder or the way his jugular sticks out when he growls into the microphone.

Not to mention the thighs you somehow didn’t notice in their dressing room, you watch them strain against his leather pants and feel even hotter suddenly.

Their last song ends and lia is quick to be in your ear about going backstage to chris again.

“oh you know chan hyung?” minho overhears and chimes in.

“yea she’s his date” you point at your overly excited roommate.

“changbin just texted and said they’re upstairs in the vip lounge, come with me” the brunette holds out his hand for you to take, which you do and grab lia with the other one.

“do you know where you’re going?” you ask minho after a minute of pressing yourself along sweaty dancing bodies.

“yea! they’re here a lot” he yells back “its right over there” he points to a flight of stairs where yet another bouncer is standing in front of.

“hey minho” the bouncer greats him with a fist bump “these girls are with you?” he points at lia and you.

“yea” he nods.

“trying something new, I see” he laughs atw hich you frown.

“oh, nono” minho chuckles uncomfortably “I’m still with jisung”

“ah-alright well, have fun” the bouncer moves after looking you all up and down, letting you walk up the stairs.

“wow, you’re famous” lia giggles at which minho huffs and shakes his head amusedly “yea, for being the only non-straight person they know”

“baby” you see jisung jump up from his seat in the spacious lounge as soon as you enter.

“hii” minho holds out his arms for him to run into, you cant stop yourself from smiling when you see jisung jump into his boyfriends arms.

“lia, y/n come over here” chris waves at the two of you.

“you were so good, baby” you hear minho praise jisung behind you as you walk over to the large round sitting booth where chan and changbin are sitting.

Lia slides into the booth and cuddles into chans side “you were awesome” she squeals as you sit down on the other end and grab a fresh glass from the middle of the round table, holding it next to changbins where he’s pouring cherry vodka into.

“can i get some?” you ask, he glances at you and smirks before silently filling your glass with a  double shots worth of the slightly rosy liquid.

“so, how did you like it?” he asks as he leans back, taking a swing of his drink.

“you guys were really good” you nod “to be honest I didn’t expect such high quality music”

He laughs, leaning his head back a little, his adams apple bopping with it.

You cant help but notice the sheer sheen of sweat that expands over his thick neck, obviously coming from their escapades on stage just now.

“what did you expect? a bunch of drunks playing wonderwall on the guitar for more drunks?” he grins, straight white teeth on display.

“hey, don’t come for wonderwall” you raise your hand jokingly at which he laughs.

“I wouldn’t dare” he raises his hands comically.

“hey” you whip your head around to see jisung and minho “scoot, please” jisung speaks again.

“oh-yea” you grab your drink and scoot further into the half circle-shaped booth.

“so what do you study?” changbin asks, his voice catches you off guard because you hadn’t calculated how close you’re sitting to him.

You turn to him to realise you’re close enough to smell his perfume and aftershave.

“uh- I- art” you answer shakily before taking a sip of your drink just to pull a face afterwards.

“jesus christ” you cough a little and hold your chest as changbin laughs.

“its stronger than you’d think” he grins “can you handle it?” he teases when your eyes get a little watery.

You stare at him for a second before playfully rolling your eyes “im good” 

His eyes trace over your face as you look around before he breaks the silence ”i can get you something else if you want” he offers.

“oh-uh no, I’m just being dramatic its fine” you chuckle.

“so...what do you study?” you change the topic.

“I’m majoring in music” he says, stretching out his arms over the backrest “all three of us are”

“oh, so you like, produce all your own stuff?” you ask, your eyes jumping to where his forearm touches your shoulder, that’s leaning against the backrest.

“yea, channie hyung composes the most, me and ji write a lot” he explains,

“thats really cool” you nod, looking over to the mentioned guy.

Changbin follows your eyes and huffs when the both of you see him and your roommate sucking face again.

After a few seconds they stop and giggle before standing up to go somewhere.

“where are they going?” you huff.

“I guess they want some alone time” he chuckles, lifting the arm close to you to take off the cap he’s still wearing.

You flinch when his forearm brushes your shoulder.

“are you scared of me?” he asks slowly, stopping his movements, cap still in hand.

“no- no” you shake your head, chuckling “I- its just been a while since I’ve gone out and I don’t know” you shrug “I feel a little lost”

“hm” changbin cocks his brow at your words, running one hand through his dark brown locks.

You divert your eyes from his bulging bicep back to his face quickly when he speaks again.

“any reason why?” he leans back again.

“oh, just a shitty ex and a shitty breakup” you shrug “I’m gonna spare you the details”

“aw, no please, tell me he had a small dick and everything, now im invested” he jokes.

You tsk at him and push his arm playfully, feigning annoyance.

“that still doesn’t answer my question as to why you jumped like that when my arm touched you” changbin raises his brows expectantly.

You open your mouth to speak but-

“we’ll go get some more to drink” minho interrupts you at which changbin nods.

“so?” he asks again, once minho and jisung leave.

“did that ex hit you? give me his address I’ll beat him up for you” changbin deadpans.

“no” you shake your head after taking another sip “he didn’t” you huff incredulously.

“its just- you look kinda scary” you blurt out finally.

His eyes widen before he falls into a boyish laughter, which you cant help but join.

“me?” he points at himself before laughing again, the image you had made up in your mind about him cracking.

“yea!” you raise your brows “when you look like this” you furrow your brows and lightly squint your eyes to mimic his resting bitch face.

“what the-” he splutters laughingly.

“stoop, don’t laugh” you hold onto his forearm, still giggling yourself.

He calms himself, subconsciously scooting closer to you in the now empty booth.

“maybe scary wasn’t the right word” you snicker, looking down.

“I think the word you were looking for was: sexy, hot or mysterious, maybe handsome-” he quips, grinning to himself when you start laughing again.

“no, no, I know what I meant” you joke back, just now noticing how close he is, his knee touching yours as his whole torso is turned to you.

“so none of my suggestions are accurate?” he cheekily raises one brow at which you scoff playfully.

“maybe one or two” you see his eyes jump to your lips.

The air suddenly feels thick around you with tension, changbins tongue darting out to wet his plump bottom lip while his eyes are still locked on yours.

You breathe in before the two of you lock eyes again "so…are you gonna kiss me, or just stare?"

He raises his brows at your sudden boost of confidence, grinning amusedly.

"what happened to me being scary?" he counters before urging you to swing one leg over his thighs with gentle hands.

You take a seat on his lap, straddling his thick thighs before looping your arms around his neck "i dont know, i think i'm into it" you quip.

His hands wander up your waist "well then i wont make you wait any longer" he grins, looking at your lips one last time before closing the gap inbetween you two.

You meet him in the middle, changbins grip on your waist tightens when his plush lips land on yours.

He pulls you closer to him, pushing his tongue past the seam of your lips.

You can taste the cherry vodka on his tongue but it riles you up even more, sucking at the wet muscle before his hands wander over the swell of your ass and each grab a handful of the flesh; your short skirt riding up when you subconsciously grind against his lap.

“be careful” he mumbles against your lips, gently tugging down the piece of fabric so you don’t expose yourself to bywalkers.

“where’s the fun in that?” you cock your head to the side teasingly.

Changbin scoffs and leans in again but you get interrupted by jisung.

“hey, we-oh” you whip your head around.

Jisungs frown turns into a grin “uh” he chuckles “we dont mean to interrupt but chan hyung texted minho and they’re going to your place” he points at you.

“ugh, seriously?” you mutter.

“I’m sleeping at minhos so, hyung you’ll have our place to yourself” he winks at changbin.

“so, we’re out too, have fun you guys” minho waves teasingly as jisung drags him away.

For a second you stare after them, until a gentle squeeze at your waist makes you turn around again.

“you could come over to my place if you don’t want to go to yours right now” he offers, eyes flickering to your lips when you bite at your lower one.

-

This is usually like not you, letting some guy you barely know take you home.

But here you are the next morning, looking up at the ceiling, changbins room flooded with daylight.

You sit up and look at the still unconscious changbin next to you. His blanket had fallen down and exposes his toned torso, barely covering his private parts.

A tingle forms in your lower abdomen when you think of what happened here a few hours ago.

But you pull yourself together and start looking around for your clothes.

You spot your bra on his desk and your skirt and shoes on the floor, gently shimmying out from underneath the blanket; you grab your skirt and slide it on without your panties, not being able to find them anywhere.

Right as you clasp your bra behind your back, changbins morning voice makes you flinch “you would’ve just snuck out?” he grumbles, rubbing his eyes as you look back at him.

“what? did you take me for a breakfast lover?” you quip as you slide into your shoes, looking around for your shirt.

“damn, that’s cold” he chuckles lowly, sitting up and watching you stride around his room.

“where did you put my shirt?” you ask, bending down to look under his desk.

“maybe you should worry about your panties first” he snickers, eyes glued to your core when you look back at him.

You kiss your teeth and straighten up quickly, having forgotten about your lack of underwear.

“not that that wasn’t a great view just now-“

“you’re not helping” you interrupt him, eyes lighting up when you spot your shirt in the hallway.

“why so serious all over sudden?” he grins “last night you were everything but tense”

You scoff as you pull your shirt over your head and stuff it into your skirt before grabbing your purse and phone.

“I have an exam in 2 days and I haven’t studied yet” you exhale.

“I could drive you home-“ he runs a hand through his messy hair.

“I’ll call a cab, uhm- thanks for last night” you hurriedly smile before walking out.

“bye” changbin calls after you, frowning and dropping back down onto his bed when he hears the door shut behind you “have a nice day I guess” he mumbles to himself.

 October

You cling your jacket closer to your body as you walk through the howling wind the seasonal change had brought with it.

When you arrive at lias faculty building you take out your phone to see if she texted you about when her lecture would be over.

lia : hey babe, chris took me to his place -received at 4:17 pm

You roll your eyes, typical you think.

you : are you serious? you begged me to walk home with you -sent at 4:25 pm

You see her the little blue bubble pop up, indicating that she’s writing a message.

lia : im sorry!! please don’t be mad, he surprised me :((( -received at 4:25 pm

You scoff and turn off your phone before slipping it in your coats pocket alongside your hands. Typical, you think, ever since that night at the club the two of them have become inseparable and lia cancelling on you had become a regular thing. You are happy for her but you also miss your friend.

“y/n?” a familiar voice calls after you right as you start to walk away, you freeze and turn around.

“yea?- oh” you swallow harshly when you see changbin walk your way.

“hey” he smiles brightly and you have to bite back a grin at the cute beanie he’s sporting alongside his slightly red nose due to the cold weather.

“hi” you smile timidly.

“you never texted” he tilts his head at which you nod.

“yea, sorry I actually never got your number” you look at the ground “uh- what are you doing here?”

“oh um im on my way to the studio” he points at a nearby building “that’s the music faculty”

“ah okay, well” you lock eyes “have fun then” you turn around again, ready to walk away.

“hey” he catches up with you “you wanna join me? check out some of our new stuff?” he burries his hands in the front pockets of his jeans.

“I don’t know, changbin I really don’t want to date right now-“ you start at which he chuckles.

“I didn’t ask you to marry me” he stops in his tracks, grinning when you do as well, locking eyes “come on, I just need an unbiased opinion on some new tracks” he tilts his head.

You inhale before looking around you “I could drive you home after? So you don’t have to walk through this weather?” he offers, raising his brows at which you purse your lips.

“alright” you give in, changbin smiles and extends his elbow for you to hold.

You simper and coyly hook your hand around his arm as the two of you start walking.

-

“this is awesome!” you point to his laptop a minute after he played the first song for you.

Changbin grins bashfully and leans back into his desk chair “you think?”

“yea, the hook is super catchy” you bob your head as his eyes fix on your profile “you’re really talented, changbin” you catch him blushing before putting on another song.

After a few other songs, he takes off his headphones when you take off yours.

“can I ask you something?” he asks, you glance at him.

“you just did” you quip at which he huffs, “sure” you nod.

“how much of that night do you remember?” he fiddles with one of the rings on his left hand.

“why?” you ask back.

“well, you seemed really upset the next morning so I got kind of scared that you didn’t actually want it and I kind of took advantage of you” he recalls the night the two of you spent together.

“oh, no. you didn’t take advantage of me, I wasn’t even  drunk and I would’ve told you if I had changed my mind or something. That was just the first time I ever spent the night at a guys house for a one night stand” you absently pick off some fuzzies from your jeans.

“plus I had just come out of a relationship so I was a little too emotional anyways” you chuckle.

“alright” changbin nods “just wanted to make sure” he smiles down at his hands “cause I remember all of it”

You whip your head, scoffing when you see him with a shit eating grin on his face.

“hm” you feign ignorance as you lean back “I don’t know, there wasn’t a lot to remember” you grin mischievously.

He laughs out loud, leaning forwards “no?”

You shake your head, pursing your lips comically “nah”

“cause I remember you shaking and screaming” he grins.

You shrug your shoulders “weird, must’ve faked it” you deadpan, fiddling with the headphones you’re still holding.

Changbins tongue prods on the inside of his cheek, huffing when he catches you grinning.

“right” he grins slumping into his seat a little further.

A thought flashes in your head when your gaze drops to his crotch and thick thighs, you swallow some spit in frustration as you feel your core getting hotter.

He was right, the night was amazing, maybe that was even part of the reason you stormed out the way you did.

You clench your thighs for some relief, anything really.

“want me to refresh your memory?” your eyes jump up to meet his, you open your mouth but nothing comes out; do you want him to?

Yes. Yes you do.

So, you get up and straddle him on his chair: his hands instantly gripping at your hips, pulling you closer.

“someones eager” he grins, pushing some of your hair behind your ear.

“shut up” you whisper before crashing your lips onto his.

Changbin groans when you tug at his hair, inviting you to slip your tongue in between his lips and grind your hips over his crotch.

He hisses before propping himself up on one armrest and holding your lower back with the other as he stands up; you squeal but he holds you before sitting you back down on the desk, next to his laptop.

“now who’s eager” you grin when his hands find the waistband of your leggings and tug them down with your panties in one.

He huffs as he bunches your leggings and panties around your ankles before slipping underneath the fabric barrier and inbetween your legs.

“by the looks of it..” he runs a finger through your wet folds “still you” he quips before pushing one finger in without warning.

You moan, you head dropping back onto the hard wooden surface.

“look at me” changbin orders as a second finger prods at your entrance, you whimper but prop yourself up on your elbows.

He curls the two fingers and pumps them almost violently, the palm of his hand smacking your clit with every pump.

“oh god-“ you yelp, your eyes scrunching together as your hips buck up.

“its changbin but god is fine too” he quips as he lowers his head, you curse at him, even though you have to laugh a little.

“you’re so annoy-ah!” you cry out because suddenly his tongue is lapping over your swollen clit, sucking on it forcefully when you claw one hand into his already messed up dark locks.

“fuck-bin- gonna cum” your hips stutter and you feel the pleasure that’s blooming in your tummy is getting ready to snap.

“mmh” he humms against you “cum then, baby” he moans, knowing full well what the added vibrations are doing to your body when your chest arches and your mouth drops open.

Your cries fill the studio as you clamp down on his fingers; he rides your through your high, holding down your hips with his unoccupied hand because you squirm with the euphoria that’s filling your veins.

“good girl” he mumbles, removing his fingers from you before bringing them up to your lips “now, suck them clean for me, yea?” he grins, lips and chin shiny with your cum.

-

“finally” you huff when arriving at 3rachas lounge in a club out of town; where they had just performed “this club is huge” you breathe, jisung scooting and changbin letting you squeeze past him to take a seat in between them as they chuckle.

Lia and chan already lost in their own world again as she drags him to the dancefloor, squealing when chan teasingly squeezes her sides as they disappear into the crowd.

“they are made for each other” minho sighs, sitting down and giving jisung the second beer from his hands.

“I know right” you lean back, breathing in.

“you’re still out of breath?” changbin laughs at you at which you hit his arm.

“stop it, oh my god” you feign annoyance “you know how exhausting it is to dodge beer bottles and not loose lia? she’s like a Chihuahua, I swear, you loose her once and its over” you chuckle, jisung and minho laughing too.

“you just don’t have any endurance, woman” changbin grins teasingly.

“that’s so not true” you laugh incredulously “what about two nights ago-“

“AH-“ jisung interrupts you, placing his hands over his ears “please spare us your sex stories, I hear enough of that when you’re over, babe”

You huff and changbins cheeks turn red.

“you guys are fucking?” minho asks, eyebrows raised as he takes a swing of his beer.

“good job keeping up, baby” jisung pats his boyfriends thigh teasingly at which he tsks at him.

“are you together or what?” minho props his elbow on the table to support his chin with his hand as he looks at the two of you expectantly.

“no, we’re not” you chuckle somewhat uncomfortably before looking over at changbin who just grins awkwardly.

“just here to be a good friend and keep the groupies away” you joke “right?” you nudge changbin with your elbow at which he nods swiftly, looking down again.

“yea, baby don’t be so old fashioned” jisung teases his boyfriend who just rolls his eyes playfully.

“speaking of groupies” minho mutters, spotting a group of girls just before they approach the lounge.

“hey jisungie, you wanna dance?” a pretty blonde girl bats her eyelashes as she leans down a bit to expose more of her cleavage, making jisung grin.

“baby, you’re gorgeous but I’m very gay” he nods apologetically, “Oh” she straightens up “really? You sure?”

You and changbin have to bite back a laugh when jisung nods again “very sure, thanks though, for coming”

She shrugs and looks at changbin “what about you? Wanna dance?”

“uh-“ changbin starts but you cut him off “he’s with me actually” you tilt your head.

“for real?” she stems her hands into her hips as she looks back at her posse, scoffing.

“yea” changbin loops his strong arm around your waist and pulls you closer to him “that’s my girl, so a little respect, please”

“aww” you coo dramatically as you play along, putting your hand on his jaw to turn his head towards you before you lock lips.

“whatever” you faintly hear the girls voice get quieter when changbin slips his tongue in between your lips.

“they’re gone” you hear minho but changbin pulls your legs to dangle over one of his thighs as he grips your waist.

“guys” jisungs voice only registers in the back of your head when changbin sucks at your bottom lip and you run your fingers through the hair on the back of his head.

“can I get you some more beers?” the waitresses voice pulls the both of you out of your trance as you break the kiss abruptly.

Jisung laughs, shaking his head at the both of you before turning to the waitress “we’ll take a round of shots I think”

  November

 “fuck-harder” you gasp “..mhh binnie-shit” you moan while changbin pounds into you from behind, gripping your hip tighter with one of his hands; the other one migrating up your back to gather the legth of your hair, twisting them before he pulls at their root.

You groan when you feel your hair getting pulled back, neck stretching as he picks up his pace.

“like this? fuck you love this don’t you?” he breaths ragged, but you can hear the dirty smirk that lingers on his lips every time you have rough sex..

You moan out loudly when he releases your hair and pushes your torso down onto the mattress, your hand pulling at the sheets , needing something to grip and release the pleasure.

“fuck- answer me, slut” he grunts and delivers a harsh slap to your ass.

You cry out “yes-yes-fuck-love it” you desperately gasp as he leans down to you, earning a low chuckle which sends shivers down your back.

His lips latch onto your shoulder blade and start sucking on the skin until a purple mark blooms under his lips.

“fuck” you let out a strangled yell when the hand on your hip makes its way to your front and he started circling your clit with his fingers, the pace and firmness matching his thrusts.

You cry out for him as you clench furiously around his cock “that’s a good girl” he whispers, only letting go of your clit when you flinch in overstimulation.

“cum for me- fuck baby, cum for me and let the others know who’s fucking you this good” he rasps in your ear. Not 5 seconds later, your orgasm ripples through you and you would’ve collapsed completely if he wasn’t holding you up.

You’re still panting when both of his hands go back on your hips and push them down, laying you flat on the mattress before he picks up his pace again with his last left strength to reach his own high.

“shit- y/n“ he grunts when you tighten around him again and you feel him filling the condom with some drawn out groans and a sharp hiss.

After a few seconds of nothing but heavy breathing filling the room, he pulls out and falls next to you on his bed.

You wince at the soreness that’s already presenting itself when you turn around on your back, looking over to him; you watch as he ties a knot in the condom and throws it into the trash next to his desk.

“kobe!” he exclaims gleefully at his perfect throw before looking back at you to see if you saw.

“jesus christ why am I sleeping with you” you hold your hands over your face, hating the fact that it made you laugh.

He gasps, feigning to be offended “that’s not how you speak to the guy that just made you cum three times”

“you are so full of yourself, seo changbin” you shake your head amusedly as you sit up.

“wait, I’ll clean you up” changbin is quick to rise from his comfortable position to grab some tissues from his nightstand.

“come here” he mumbles, gently urging you to lie back down before carefully wiping your own cum off your inner thighs and mound.

You watch him as he gently moves to wipe the tissue over your puffy folds, your hips jumping a little when he accidentally passes your clit.

“sorry” he grins, pressing a kiss to your angled knee; at which you feel your heart lurch forward a bit.

Woah, wait.

You’ve been seeing changbin just for sex for almost two months now, you’ve even gone with him other performances and after parties to keep groupies away and be his arm candy and never has your heart done this.

Mayday. Abort mission.

“should be good for now” changbin shrugs, shooting you a sweet smile before turning away from you to also get rid of the tissues.

You use the opportunity to shuffle to the side of his bed and slip on your panties before grabbing your bra.

“hey, you wanna leave already?” changbin asks “I thought we could hang” he tucks his hand under his head as you look back at him, clipping your bra closed “watch a movie or something”

“sorry, I promised lia I’d help her clean the apartment today” you lie, surprisingly quick, before pulling your hoodie over your head.

“so you’re just gonna fuck me and leave again?” he jokes dramatically “I don’t even get cuddles?”

“shut up” you chuckle.

“am I nothing more to you than a pretty piece of meat?” he continues as you slip into your jeans, rolling your eyes playfully.

“a toy you use when you need stress relief??” he holds his chest dramatically.

You step into your shoes and raise your brows at him.

“are you complaining?” you ask playfully.

“nahh” he pulls his covers over his abs as he watches you grab your jacket from his desk chair.

"At least give me a 'gopdbye, thanks for the bomb dick, kiss" He grins when you scoff at him. So, you lean over him and press a quick peck to his lips; he whines playfully when you lean back up again, sitting up and catching your lips with his roughly once more.

“alright, see ya” you shrug."

And shit, your heart does it again. What are you doing?

You break the kiss and ruffle through his hair.

“ugh” he huffs annoyedly, fixing his hair “I hope you have trouble walking” he quips as you go for the door.

“I’ll text you if I don’t” you wink at him before closing his door, leaning against it from the outside and closing your eyes.

“fuck” you whisper to yourself before making your way through the guys apartment.

“don’t break his heart, y/n” minhos voie comes from behind as you twist the doorknob.

“huh?” you trun around to look at him, he’s wearing a shirt that you know to be jisungs so he must be staying over.

“I’ve known changbin for a while, he seems tough but he’s a softie deep down” he crosses his arms over his chest “he hurts easier than you think”

“we- we’re both not in this for anything serious” you stammer “what do you mean?”

“I see the way he looks at you, y/n” minho smiles softly “I’m not telling you how to live your life, just, be honest with him… and yourself for that matter” he quirks one brow up, smiling before disappearing around the corner.

 -

 You squint your eyes as you’re trying to make out the label of the cereal boxes in the upper shelves, looking back at your phone you check to see what brand lia had texted you about so you don’t accidentally buy the wrong thing.

“fuck” you mumble when you see her desired cereal at the top of the shelf, so you reach up but to no avail.

“y/n?” you lower your heels to the floor again before turning around to see…

“hyunjin?” you face drops in awe.

“hey!” the tall young man smiles widely, opening his arms and inviting you to a hug.

“wow, hi” you hug him back.

Damn, what happened to him? The last time you saw him was before he moved away in 10th grade.

You used to be good friends with him, or, well, the freakishly skinny and lanky highschool version of him you met in dance class.

By the feel of it, even through the trenchcoat he’s wearing, you can tell he’s bulked up quite a bit.

After letting go of him, you cant help but stare.

His acne had cleared up and his brown hair is chin length with the top parts pulled back into a little pony tail, leaving some face framing strands in the front.

“wow- you look-“ you blink a few times to make sure you’re not dreaming “…really good, hyunjin”

He smiles on the ground, his pretty plump lips parting to reveal beautiful pearly whites which used to be covered by braces.

“so do you” he grins.

“no- I mean you look… good-good” you splutter, laughing awkwardly “like what are you a model now or something?”

“actually, yea- part time” he chuckles.

“oh” you huff  “wow of course” you shake your head laughingly, blushing furiously when he doesn’t break eye contact.

“so- uhm” you gulp, making him grin even wider “what are you doing here?”

“I’m transferring here” he nods “better dance programme” he explains shortly.

“oh you still dance” you observe out loud “I haven’t danced in a while” you look down.

“you should come by after practice sometime” he offers “to catch up- or dance if you want” he giggles, a little dimple appearing on his left cheek.

“yea, I’d love that” you smile, nodding before he takes out his phone.

“put in your number, I’ll text you” he smiles softly when holding it out to you.

“mhm” you agree, saving your number in his phone and trying not to think about him staring at you the whole time.

“alright well” he checks his phone for the time, you guess “I gotta get going, only came here for this” he chuckles, holding up a carton of milk that you, weirdly enough, haven’t noticed until now.

“alright” you nod before he moves in for a hug again.

“bye” he smiles when loosening his arms again.

“bye” you mumble, staring at the back of his perfect head as he walks away.

You were about to pull out your phone and rant to lia about what just happened, when he stops in his tracks and turns around.

“almost forgot” he grins, reaching up and getting your cereal from the top shelf; winking when he places it in your hands, your body freezing.

“bye” he grins, walking away before you could thank him.

-

 You had taken hyunjin up on his offer and met him in the dance studio after class where he showed you some of his contemporary pieces before you made your way to the popular coffee shop on campus together.

“-no seriously the second piece was my favourite I think, but they were all amazing!” you smile up at him at which he shakes his head cutely.

“can you stop complimenting me, y/n I’m getting all nervous” he laughs softly.

“oh please” you quip “with your talent and looks I would think nothing could make you nervous” you roll your eyes playfully.

Hyunjin huffs, opening the coffee shops door for you “you can” he says softly as you walk past him, you turn around to him to see him blush a litte but diverting his eyes to the big menu above the counter.

Did he just flirt with you? No, you must be tripping.

You look around to see only two other people sitting in one of the booths together, the cold must keep most people home, you think before hyunjin gently pulls at your sleeve to get your attention.

“what do you want?” he asks, the barista looking at you expectantly.

“uhm- a hot chocolate please” you say, reaching in your purse to get your wallet.

“I’ll take the same” hyunjin smiles politely, giving the barista money.

“on me” he smiles down at you.

“oh, thank you” you smile sheepishly, letting go of your purse again.

Once your hot chocolates are ready, you sit down in one of the booths, hyunjin sliding in to sit across from you.

“I was back home last week before I came here, you’ll never guess who I met” hyunjin grins.

“who?” you ask curiously.

“tim” he grins.

“tim?” your eyes almost pop out of your head “as in my first boyfriend tim?” you laugh, holding your hand to your face incredulously.

“but he moved away as well?” you half ask.

“yea he said he was visiting his grandparents, but guess the best part” hyunjin bites his lip

“what?” you chuckle.

“he got a nose job” hyunjin bites back a laugh when you gasp surprisedly “really?”

“one word” hyunjin says “botched…”

“aw no, poor tim” you frown, looking down at your hot drink as memories from back in the day come back to you.

“he always used to put his hand up my shirt when hugging” you frown, making hyunjin laugh.

“it was 9th grade y/n what did you expect?” you scoff at his rethorical question.

“I don’t know, some basic manners maybe?” you counter playfully…slowly letting the conversation die down as you both take sips from your cocoa.

“how come we never dated?” he asks softly after aminute of silence, looking up at you.

“we were friends?” you chuckle awkwardly.

“come on” hyunjin sits back in his booth “you must’ve known I had the biggest crush on you”

“you did?” you almost launch forwards in your seat, making hyunjin laugh.

“well, I guess you didn’t know then” he giggles, hiding his face in his hands embarrassedly.

“anyways, I would’ve paid good money to be able to slip my hand up your shirt” he jokes, cheeks reddening when you laugh.

“I honestly liked you a lot back then” you say “if you would’ve said something we might’ve actually gone out” you shrug gently.

“damn, way to rub that in my face” hyunjin grins.

You hold his eye contact for a few seconds before you feel your blood rushing to your cheeks again, quickly lifting up your mug to take a sip and partly cover your face.

When you put your mug back down, hyunjin grins widely, mumbling a “cute” before slowly bringing his hand to your chin and gently swiping his thumb over your top lip where a foam mustache had formed.

You gulp when he swiftly sucks the foam off his thumb, your eyes darting from his eyes to his lips.

When he notices, he leans over, slowly as if scared to overwhelm you.

That’s when minhos words pop up in the back of your head.

“be honest with him, and yourself for that matter”

But you aren’t together, and hyunjin is great and you want to kiss him but you know it would be wrong.

However, before you know it his lips are on yours and you’re not doing anything to stop him.

They are soft and inviting and you let him swipe his tongue over the seam of your lips, but then the little doorbell rings and you hear lias voice, followed by a male one before they abruptly stop, making you pull away abruptly.

Oh.

There they are, lia, chan, jisung and changbin; looking at you.

“y/n” lia grins widely, approaching your table “aren’t you gonna introduce us?” she squeals, hyunjin clears his throat and sits back down.

The three guys hesitantly follow lia when-

“woah- hyunjin?” chan speaks up.

“chan-hyung?” hyunjin gets up from his place to receive a hug from the older one as your eyes divert to changbin who is looking at the ground.

You aren’t together. Then why do you feel so guilty and why does he look so disappointed.

“he’s cute, girl” jisung grinningly interrupts your daydreaming, nodding towards chan and hyunjin who are still talking.

You force out a smile.

“how do you two know each other?” lia asks curiously.

“he went to my highschool, the last few years” chan grins.

“what a coincidence” you mumble, almost ironically.

“I went to highschool with y/n too, the first couple years though, then I moved away” hyunjin explains “oh, im sorry, I’m hyunjin by the way” he turns to jisung and changbin.

“I’m jisung, this is changbin” jisung smiles, pointing at his grumpy friend.

“I’m lia” lia grins “his girlfriend and her best friend” she points at chan before snuggling up to you, giggling.

Jesus, woman where do you get the energy? Is what you want to ask but you just flash another forced smile, hoping this moment will pass quickly.

“where were you guys?” you change the topic, hoping changbin would maybe look at you if you spoke up.

“oh, I caught them all huddled up in the studio” lia grins “they probably haven’t been outside in a week again” she giggles.

“true” jisung quips.

“hey lets all sit down” hyunjin suggests.

“I’ll get a coffee” changbin mumbles, walking back to the counter.

You usher lia to make way for you to get out of the booth, following him.

“bin” you stand next to him as he looks up at the menu but he ignores you.

“you could at least acknowledge my presence, your highness” you quip annoyedly.

“what do you want me to say, y/n?” he mutters.

“I didn’t know this would happen with him or I would’ve told you” you say, looking back at the other four talking and laughing in the booth.

“we’re not together y/n, you’ve made that very clear; if you wanna kiss lord farquaad go ahead, I’m not stopping you” he looks over to the booth as well.

“jesus christ” you huff “why are you so defensive then?”

“hi” changbin greets the barista who just came from the back “I’ll have an iced coffee to go, please” he orders.

“the world doesn’t revolve around you y/n, maybe I’m having a bad day” he answers when the barista makes his way to the coffee machines, you feel a lump from in your throat.

“yea, well thanks for making mine bad as well” you turn on your heels to join the others, hyunjin sees you coming back and scooches to make some space for you next to him.

You smile and thank him quietly when he also gives you your mug.

“everything alright?” he asks quietly, as to not disturb the others conversation.

“yea, just had to ask him some stuff” you smile at which he smiles back, turning back to the others.

After a minute changbin approaches the booth with his iced coffee “hey, I’ll run back to the studio I gotta finish that track”

“ugh, changbin I just dragged you out of there, stay for a second” lia protests and jisung nods along.

“nah, gotta get it done tonight” he shakes his head.

“alight see you later” chan nods.

“nice to meet you, man” hyunjin says, nodding at him as well.

“yea” changbin answers tight-lipped before walking out.

 December

”I’m sorry, hyunjin” you frown “I’m just not ready for a relationship after what happened with my ex-“

“its alright y/n” his large hand encases yours “you don’t have to explain yourself to me”

You sigh in relief “I’m sorry I tried to rush things, it just, seemed to good to be true to find you here and everything” he says.

“but I’ll wait for you, if that’s what you want” he looks up at you.

“oh, jinnie you shouldn’t have to do that” you shake your head “I’m sure there are great girls out there who are emotionally ready to be with you”

“yea, but you’re the girl I want to be with” he says softly and your heart shatters into pieces because you’re not sure he’s the guy you want to be with.

-

You fight yourself through the crowd at 3rachas last performance of the year, at the same venue where you met them for the first time. Just like the time before, chan makes sure lia, hyunjin, minho and you are able to come backstage.

“I’m excited to see you perform, man” hyunjin grins at chan, patting his shoulder “your stuff was already dope back then…” they continue speaking as you enter their dressing room.

Jisung greets his boyfriend as you and lia sit down on the leather couch.

Changbin is standing in front of the mirror, fixing his hair before his eyes lock with yours through the mirror, but he just diverts them to chan who’s grabbing a beer for hyunjin and himself, you guess.

“did you have to invite him?” changbin semi-whispers to the older one, nodding at hyunjin, chan just frowns confusedly,making changbin shake his head and walk out.

You look at hyunjin who is talking to minho and jisung, and doesn’t seem to have heard changbin. So, you get up to follow him out but lia holds your wrist “y/n you cant keep running after him” she hisses.

“he cant keep treating me like im invisible, I just want to clear the air” you free your arm and walk out to see changbin almost at the end of the corridor, walking out of a heavy door which, you think leads outside.

After reaching the door you open it to find him outside, leaning against the brick wall of the building, looking down at his phone.

The cold air hits your skin and you shiver, only wearing a top and some jeans since its warm in the club.

Changbin notices you and looks up “what do you want, y/n?” he asks.

“that was real classy back there” you comment, holding your arms to your body to preserve some warmth. Changbin huffs, unfazed as he looks back at his phone “whatever, y/n”

“no, not whatever bin” you step closer to him “he asked me to date him” his head shoots up and you lock eyes, for a second they are soft in the way they look into yours but something changes and they turn mean when he speaks again.

“so? that’s a you proplem” he shrugs.

“its not a problem at all, he’s sweet and loving and cares about me but for some reason im standing here, hoping that you’ll give me a reason to not be with him” you feel your throat closing up with anger mixed with confusion when he starts chuckling.

“you’re not serious are you?” he squints and your heart drops, tears pooling at your lashline.

“of course not, I couldn’t expect someone as stubborn and- and comunicationally incompetent like you to understand anything about feelings” you turn on your heels when a teardrop rolls down your cheek.

A hand wraps itself around your wrist, making you turn back “I’ve wanted to be with you since that moment in the club where you kissed me infront of all these girls. It was always you who was stubborn y/n, you never wanted to spend anymore time with me other than fucking” he snaps at you, taking a breather to start another sentence but you cut him off.

“-then why didn’t you say anything?” you ask quietly and he looks down.

“because- fuck” he lets go of your wrist “I didn’t want to scare you away, you in my bed was better than no you at all. But then fucking prince charming appears out of no where and sweeps you off your feet-”

“but I don’t want prince charming I want you” you blurt out, tears now streaming down your face, making him take a step back as his eyes soften.

“then why didn’t you say anything?” a small smile tugs at his lips as he closes the distance between you, gently running his hands up your arms, feeling the goosebumps brought on by the cold.

You huff, looking down and watching one of your teardrops melting a tiny hole into the snow before looking back up “because I’m stubborn and comunicationally incompetent” you sniffle “and stupid apparently” 

A grin spreads over changbins face as his hands cradle your cheeks, wiping your tears away with his thumbs “so, you wanna be stubborn and stupid together?” he whispers, locking eyes with you.

You press your lips together, trying to keep yourself from sobbing even more as you nod.

He chuckles softly ”you can stop crying now, baby” at which you nod beathing in shakily but smiling when he pushes some hair out of your face.

“can you kiss me now please” you sniffle whiningly, huffing in a laugh when he pulls a face.

“i dont know babe, you’re a little snotty right now-” he jokes.

“shut up” you hit him, chuckling when he pulls you even closer by your waist and gently connects his lips with yours.

A soft wind blows through your hair and you loop your arms around his neck even tighter, deepening the kiss at which he moans, holding your waist tighter to his body.

The door creaks open and “are you guys finally together?” minhos voice makes you break the kiss.

“yea” you grin when jisung comes out after his boyfriend.

“nice” he grins, nodding at you.

“yea yea nice, beautiful love whatever, hyung we’re up, lets go” jisung rambles, laughing and running back inside when changbin pretends to hit him, minho shaking his head and following him.

“you’ll watch me yea?” your boyfriend grins at you, taking your hand and planting a kiss on the back of it.

“from the front row, baby”

-

a/n: omg im finally done wth this took me so long yall, i started writing this sin september (which is why the fic starts in september as well lol) sorry about the winterly feelings i’m pushing onto you in the end but last week it literally snowed where i live so i was like uh?!?!?!? okay lets write some snowy shit, global warming ftw i guess....anyways i hope u liked it pls leave some feedback and/or ur favourite part ig lol i would appreciate it alot <33 (not proofred yet oopsie)

---

taglist: @kpopscape​ @oopsie-whats-this​ @zhaqifa​ @synnocence​ @changlix-mp4​ + some besties who always inspire me wether they know it or not😭 @bangtantaegi @hanflix @bruh-changbin @hyunyin @yyxgin @hyunsluvv @unstableskzstan @violethhj @missskzbiased @cartierbin @dom--minnie

[yutahoes]

Thunder

main characters: childhood enemies!? Yuta Nakamoto and Y/N other characters: brother! Lee Taeyong word count: 2.2k words genre: fluff summary: You hated Yuta Nakamoto all your life.  warnings: crotch kicking, Yuta is shirtless in one part, Y/N is in a diet, Y/N is scared of thunder, Yuta teasing Y/N about her chest, cursing inspired by the anime ‘Ouran Highschool Host Club’ 

Czennies’ Anime Boy Birthday Project - Day 2

You hated Nakamoto Yuta all your life. 

No, scratch that, you loathed him. 

It stemmed from when the two of you first met. He, 'accidentally' he claimed, ripped the head of your favorite Barbie doll. While you, intentionally you knew, kicked him in the crotch. It wasn't a big deal. You always see girls do that in TV but your dad had to ground you for doing that which is totally unfair. Yuta still gets to play with your brother, Taeyong, while you're inside the room when it was clearly his fault. 

And that started the cat and dog attitude you had towards each other. 

It doesn't help that your family is close to theirs. So when your family went to Japan for a vacation, the Nakamoto family welcomed you to their beach house. It was a pretty house, you thought, with an exclusive beach behind. 

This will be the best vacation. 

"Yuta!" his mom called which made you frown. Oh yeah, the devil is here. "Where is that boy? He should be helping you with your luggage, Y/N." You gave her a smile, dragging your suitcase in hand. Everything is going on smoothly, you don't want to see him just yet. "Yuta!" she called once again. 

"Yup?" He asked and you clearly heard the footsteps accompanied by that annoying voice. Your jaw almost fell in surprise. Yuta's hair is damp as if he just came from a swim. His bare skin lightly tanned. "Oh, hi auntie and uncle." He greeted your parents before walking past you. When did he get taller than you? He gave Taeyong a brotherly hug which made you pout. 

Your dad laughed. "When did you get so masculine, Yuta?"

"Had to charm the girls in town," Yuta whispered which made you frown once again. A ladies’ man. Why aren’t you surprised?  You felt someone tugged the suitcase in your hand and turned to see Yuta smiling at you. "You're still ugly as ever." he whispered, which made you throw a punch at him. Yuta only laughed. When did his arms become muscular?  

"When will the two of you ever change?" Your mom asked, followed by the others laughing. 

-----

"Yuta, why don't you tour Y/N and Taeyong in town this afternoon?" his dad asked while they're eating lunch. He nodded then lightly glanced at you who were eating small portions of your food. His attention was disturbed when your dad asked some questions about his college education and his recent hobbies which he answered eloquently. 

Taeyong took his dad's car keys to drive to town, Yuta in the passenger seat and you in the backseat. "Y/N," your brother called. "Stop thinking about your ex-boyfriend. This was supposed to be a vacation." You glared at your brother through the rearview mirror. 

"Ex-boyfriend?" Yuta asked. "Someone actually had a crush on you?" 

You gave him a fake smile before rolling your eyes, crossing an arm against your chest while huffing. "Can we get something to eat? I want some matcha cake and macaroons." 

"Are you pregnant?" You only kicked Taeyong's chair in annoyance. 

The market in town isn't that crowded even if it's afternoon. Maybe because the weather is too dry to stroll. Taeyong said that he'll just go to the comfort room, leaving the two of you looking for souvenirs. You already bought a lot of stationery yet your brother didn't come back. "Do you think he ditched us?" Yuta asked while you’re paying for the things you bought. 

"Probably." You answered with a shrug. "We can get a cab back home, can't we?" The guy nodded before opening the door for you. 

You were just enjoying the market, not caring about Yuta. Luckily, your parents had given you money to spend. Maybe you'll buy small gifts for your friends back home. Your attention was on some bracelets when Yuta told you to come with him. Although hesitant, you just went with him. 

The pastry shop looks so pretty with its pastel shades. The pictures in the menu look so delectable that you're quickly hungry. "Order a lot, you didn't eat properly earlier," Yuta claimed, looking at the menu. "Are you on a diet or something?" 

You glared. "Yeah, yeah. My ex broke up with me saying I'm fat so I'm trying to lose weight." 

"Then you're dating the wrong guy. It's your body, he shouldn't care." He turned the menu to look at the cake selections. "Eat lots and be a cute piggy instead." You stepped on his foot which made him glare at you. 

When the waitress came, she smiled at Yuta and he flirted back. You rolled your eyes, such a ladies' man. You ordered a chocolate cake and he ordered matcha, claiming that you wanted that in the car. Well, Yuta isn't that bad. But he's annoying. 

The clouds turned darker that surprised you. It was alright earlier, why is it so gloomy now? "Do you think it will rain?" Yuta nodded, there's a high possibility. "I hope it isn't a thunderstorm." You whispered. 

You walked around one last time, buying things that you might need at home when you bumped into someone familiar. He was Yuta's friend, you remembered, the one who talked to you in the playground when Yuta refused to let you join him and his friends back then. "Y/N," he greeted and you smiled, calling for his name. "Long time no see. You've grown up." It really has been a long time since you saw him. "Are you here for vacation?" 

You nodded and made little chats with each other. When he excused himself to leave, you turned to find out that Yuta is gone. 

Fuck! Where is he? 

When you glanced at your phone, the battery was dead. Another fuck! 

The raindrops fell on your skin that made you hiss. Third fuck! 

How are you going home now? 

------

Of all the people to meet, why does it have to be that guy? Yuta knew that he had a huge crush on you and seeing how you smiled at him, you probably had a crush on that guy as well. He just went inside the store and bought some macaroons that you kept on asking for since earlier. 

When he returned to where he last saw you, you're nowhere to be seen. Maybe you went with that stupid guy. He was about to call you when he realized he didn't have your number. You're with that guy, right? He'll bring you home safely. 

The raindrops fell. Maybe he'll just stay under a shed and wait until the rain stops. But as the minutes passed, it grew heavier. 

The sky was so dark and little rumbles could be heard. A flash of lightning can be seen followed by large raindrops falling on the pavement as thunder came rolling in. A thunderstorm. He might stay here for a long time. 

Yuta was tapping his foot along the music in his headphones when his phone rang, indicating a new number. When he took the call, it was Taeyong's voice. "Where are you and Y/N? I'll come…" 

"I'm not with Y/N." 

"What?" he asked, shouting through the phone. Yuta explained that he left you with a friend but it was his mom who answered on the phone that his friend came and you were not with him. "Yuta, my sister is scared of thunder. She can't move at all when she hears thunder. Please…" Yuta doesn't need to hear the continuation, he knew he had to find you. 

He kept on running under the pouring rain, asking people he passed if they saw the girl he kept on describing. He kept on looking inside shops opened to see if you were inside. The sky is getting darker, it's almost nighttime. He needed to find you, quick. 

A flash of light came followed by rumbles of thunder that startled him. If he's surprised like this, how would you feel? Maybe you're too scared now. Where could you be? He stopped in front of the town chapel, a puddle of water can be seen by the entrance. 

Yuta ran the steps of the chapel, opening the door widely. "Y/N!" he called. "Are you here?"  A bolt of huge lightning illuminated the place, followed by a loud rumble of thunder but he heard the small whimpers coming from the altar steps. 

He stood there, watching you under the table. Eyes closed, both hands on your ear, shaking, soaking wet. Another thunder and you jolted in surprise, crying louder while calling for your dad. 

He pulled the linen above the table, wrapping it on you which made you look at him. He put the headphone on your ear as you gaze at him with tear-stained eyes. "I'm sorry, Y/N." he whispered before you wrap your arms around him, relieved that someone is here. That he is here. You flinched when the lightning struck, loud thunder echoed through the walls of the small chapel that made you clench tightly on Yuta's shirt. "I'm here now, Y/N. I won't leave you." 

----

You woke up with the sound of chirping birds outside, the sunlight hitting your face that made you groan. When you turned to the side, away from the sunlight, you felt something warm. Surprised, you opened one eye and saw Yuta's bare torso lying next to you. "Yah!" you shouted, immediately checking your clothes under the blanket then pulling it up to cover your clothed body. 

The guy rubbed his eyes, "What? It's still so fucking early." 

"Why are you sleeping in my bed?" 

He stared at you dead in the eyes. "This is my room." He stated as a matter of fact and you glance around the unfamiliar room full of L'arc En Ciel and Ultraman posters. "And you were the one who didn't let go of me last night." He claimed while lying on his bed again, groaning.  

The happenings that night came to you. When his dad and Taeyong came to pick you up in the chapel, you kept clinging on Yuta under the warm blanket in the backseat of the car. After showering, you cried in his arms in fright. Maybe, you slept like that.

God, it's so embarrassing. Why are you like this? "Nothing happened, right?" 

Yuta chuckled before pulling the blanket to cover himself. "I won't ever touch your non-existent breasts." This guy, really. You lightly kicked him off the bed, startled that instead of his thigh, you felt something hard by your foot. 

Then he disappeared from the bed. 

He stood up from falling on the floor, glaring at you. "Why do you keep kicking me there? Will you be responsible if I can't have a child?" What? "If something happens…" You heard the door open behind you, "Will you marry me?" 

A gasp can be heard followed by your mom's voice shouting, "Honey, Yuta already proposed." What? You glanced at the doorway, his mom was there with a wide smile on her face. "Oh my God, you two. We've been waiting for this for so long." 

"No, it's not…" But the door closed before you could finish your sentence. You were about to go out the door when Yuta raced you to it. He closed the door, trapping you between his body and the door. "Yuta, our parents will…" 

"Let them misunderstand," he whispered that made you look at him. "Be responsible for me. I have the biggest crush on you since we first met." 

"You broke my Barbie the first time we met." 

"Because you spend more time on that toy than playing with me." he revolted. "You only look at me when I tease you so I kept doing that." He stepped forward, removing the distance between the two of you. " Please take a chance on me, Y/N. I'll hug you during thunderstorms. I'll let you eat all your favorite food. Just please, take a chance on me." 

There's nothing wrong with taking a chance with Yuta. Both your families are friends. Your mom seemed so excited at the idea of the two of you together. And his mom already said that they've been waiting for this for so long. He's handsome, has a nice body, has a nice smile, and did you mention that he has such a nice body? You nodded and he flashed his million-dollar smile, hugging you. "Wow, you really have small breasts." You lightly pushed him, kicking him in the crotch. 

"You're really unbelievable."

Yuta crouched on the floor, repeatedly punching his lower back. "That's the third time. You'll really be responsible for me." He stood up but you opened the door and ran outside, him chasing after you. 

Your parents were both looking as you got out of the house and into the beach sand outside. He hugged you from the back, lightly raising you. "Caught you." Then proceed to throw you in the water. 

"They look really cute together." Yuta's mom commented that made the older men nod. 

"Nice job, Taeyong." your dad claimed, tapping your brother's shoulder.

The younger of the five chuckled while watching you and Yuta playing tag on the water. "I just hope they won't be too lovey-dovey." 

[kravkalackin]

It was a fool proof plan, if Lup did say so herself. She was really quite proud of it, and her mastery of the art of the grift in general. 

The fancy restaurant was extremely crowded, and also much more expensive than either her or Barry could really afford. Considering all that, there was really no reason for them to have made a reservation on valentine’s day, especially considering they weren’t even dating. 

No reason to, except Lup wanted to treat herself. And also Barry. And also lord it over her brother that she got to eat here before he did. So she came up with a plan, and valentine’s day was the best time to play it out for maximum effect. 

It was a genius twist on an old classic really. Simple, but just unexpected enough that no one would see through it. Her and Barry were going to enjoy their dinner, acting as a sickeningly in love couple for all to see, highlighted by the valentine’s day atmosphere. 

As soon as dinner started to wind down, Barry was going to propose. Most grifts would leave it at that, but this kind of place wouldn’t offer a free meal for a proposal, not on valentine’s day of all days. The most they could get was probably a free desert. No, they needed to go bigger. 

Barry was going to propose, and all Lup had to do was turn him down. Awkwardly grab her stuff and shuffle off, leaving him all sad and dejected. 

And them bam! Free steak and shrimp and wine. They would still leave a tip for the waiter, but otherwise Barry would meet her outside and it would be hilarious. 

Lup had just about finished up her meal now, and damn it was nearly worth the ridiculous price tag. She was laughing over something Barry had said, and really the easiest part of all this was the whole pretending to be in love with him thing, mostly because she really didn’t have to pretend. 

She saw his eyes flicker to hers, and then off again. She didn’t look, but she guessed the waiter was starting to head over. She stopped laughing, giving him a quick, subtle nod. With a nervous smile, he stood up. They had already been holding hands across the table, and he didn’t let go now. 

“Lup,” he started, and it was adorable how red his face already was. She knew he didn’t enjoy being the center of attention, so she would have to find some way to make this up to him later. 

“Lup, we’ve been together for a long time now. Ever since you came into my life I’ve had to wonder every day how I could have possibly gotten so lucky to even know you. Getting to actually share my life with you? I’d say it’s a dream, but there isn’t a dream out there that could live up to you,” he continued, and she could feel her face starting to heat up now as well. She hadn’t been expecting a speech. 

Probably a smart move. Garner up even more sympathy. 

“How someone like me could possibly be worthy of someone as intelligent and loving and beautiful as you, I’ll never know, but that day in eighth grade when you called me a nerd and made me help you and your brother catch the class mice you accidentally let loose was legitimately the best day of my life. I wouldn’t be the person I am today without you, and I don’t ever want to let go.” 

“Shit,” Lup whispered under her breath, having to blink rapidly as her eyes started to get all moist. She didn’t expect him to be so good at this, why was he so good at this? 

“I love you Lup, with all of my heart,” he said, finally getting down on one knee now. With the hand that wasn’t holding hers, he pulled out a small ring box, having to finally let go to actually open it. 

“So I need to know. Lup, will you marry me?” 

“Yes.” 

Barry’s eyes widened, genuine surprise on his face instead of the fake devastation that was supposed to be there. It took Lup’s brain a moment to catch up with her words, and when it did she nearly slapped her hands over her mouth. 

“O-oh? Awesome,” Barry said, clearly trying to recover from her going incredibly off script. When he reached over Lup let him slide the ring onto her finger. 

And well, there was nothing left to do but fucking lean into it, so when he stood back up Lup pulled him into a kiss. The restaurant broke into cheers around them, and when they finally pulled apart Barry looked like a tomato. 

“Might I be the first to say congratulations,” their waiter said, and Lup forced herself to grin up at him over the wishing for death she was doing inside. Well, the wishing for death mixed in with the absolute euphoria of finally getting to kiss Barry. 

“Thank you,” she managed, watching as he put down what she could only assume was a free heart shaped chocolate cake with vanilla ice-cream. 

And also the check.

“Uh, Lup?” Barry asked after a moment, seeming to have finally gotten the ability to form words back again. Instead of responding Lup quickly reached over, flipping the check before she could actually see any of the numbers. 

“If I don’t see the numbers they can’t hurt me,” she said in a rush, and Barry was looking at her somewhere between befuddled and endeared. 

“I don’t- I don’t think that’s how it works,” he said, and Lup shook her head. Taking a spoon, she started shoving cake and ice cream into her mouth. If she was going to pay for this, she was going to enjoy all of it. 

“Nope, totally how it works,” she said. Barry chuckled at that, starting to eat some of the dessert as well. 

“Fair enough,” he said, and it was quiet for a moment. 

“I’ll... pay you back for this,” Lup whispered quietly. Barry waved her off, and she could see that he was eating more of the ice cream than he should. Considering the night though, she couldn’t blame him. 

“Don’t worry about it,” he insisted, but they both knew that wasn’t going to happen. After a moment she could see his eyes glance towards her hand, which was still wearing that engagement ring. “Hey do we... do we need to talk about uh, anything? After this?” he whispered, and Lup kind of wanted to die. 

But she also really wanted to kiss him again.

“Maybe. Can we make out again first?” she said, and despite the shade of red of his face Barry quickly nodded. 

“Definitely,” he said. 

“Cool,” she said, and yeah, there was going to be a lot they needed to talk about, but also really not that much. 

They had already pretty much said everything. 

[blessednereid]

Pity the Living

Daniel Sharman x Reader Series

A/N: The Much Requested, and By Requested, I mean @rogershoe wanted me to write this, MY DANIEL SHARMAN FANFICTION!!!!!! The character that Y/N plays is based on my OC for FTWD and is not an actual character in FTWD. Basic Premise of the setting for this chapter is that they're in high-school/ secondary school. But for the majority of the story(minus flashbacks) it's set in 2016/17 when s3 of FTWD was filmed.

Story Summary: When (Y/N) (L/N) reunites with a high-school friend on the set of the job she's been working on for the past 2-3 years, not only is she excited to work with the guy who inspired her to go into acting, but to hear about what he's done since she's seen him. But the more they talk, the more she realizes, this reunion is not going the way she had planned.

CW: Cursing? brief mention of alcohol, anxiety, mentions of food, fake dagger, fake blood, bets,

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Career Day

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

Most of the students around you were chorusing to the tune of your school anthem, but not you. You had heard the melody and sung it almost a million times. Whether you were exaggerating or not, not even you knew. Instead, you were whispering and laughing with one of your best friends, Daniel Sharman.

You met Daniel when you first came to the school. You didn't know many people. You didn't even know yourself in this place. It was a completely foreign experience, but he stuck by your side and showed you around.

Since then, you had made friends, joined the swim team, learned your way around the school without ending up in the boys' restrooms instead of the girls' ones. Despite not needing Daniel to show you around anymore, he still provided plenty of comedic support and pick-me-ups and was a great mate all around.

Your teacher had just finished introducing all the parents who were presenting at career day. The assignment being after the presentations were finished, you were supposed to think about what you wanted to be in the future. You had no idea what you wanted to be. But of course… Daniel did.

"An actor."

"An actor?" he nodded. "Like Macbeth?"

"No, Macbeth is a character. An actor is a person who plays the character."

"Why an actor?"

"Dunno. Just seems right."

You frowned. "Huh, that's nice. Knowing what you want to be."

"You could always try acting. It's worth a shot."

"Hah, if I ever tried acting, it would probably be when I'm old, senile, and look like Betty White."

"Oh, come on. You're a great actress!"

"What's that supposed to mean, Sharman?" you gasped.

"Just that you tell fibs and stories as if they were the truth. That's all acting is."

"I DO NOT!"

"How did you convince your mum that your dog jumped onto the table and ate the cake without making any noise last weekend, then?" You opened your mouth to speak before closing it.

"Cat got your tongue?" he teased.

"Shut up, Sharman."

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

L/N Residence

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

You and Daniel were both swimming in the pool in your backyard when Daniel asked you the question.

"Did you think about it?"

Still floating, you asked, "About what?"

"Acting."

You laughed incredulously. "You were serious?"

"Of course I was." He swam closer to you and pulled your leg down, making you flop around and splash water.

"WHAT THE HELL!"

"Was just trying to get your attention," he remarked innocently.

You coughed. "You had it."

"Picture this," he waved you off. "Us, on the red carpet-"

"Who's red carpet?"

"Does it matter? We'll be each other's dates anyways."

"Why is that?" you asked.

"Because we're best friends."

"What if one of us has a boyfriend or girlfriend?"

He shrugged. "Ok, whatever. We're on the red carpet separately. It's both of ours red carpet-"

"So, does that mean we're in a movie together?"

"Yes, Y/N," he muttered exasperatedly.

"But that's impossible?"

"Why do you say that?"

You leaned closer to his ear. "BECAUSE I'M NOT BECOMING AN ACTOR."

He jumped away from you, proceeding to splash you with water.

"Mark my words. I know talent when I see it."

You sighed. "Could this just be you not wanting to be lonely in the acting world?"

He jutted his lip and spoke in a whiny voice. "Maybe…"

You laughed before splashing a giant wave of water at him. While he still had water in his eyes, you dove under and pulled him down.

He flailed around before his head popped up, and he calmed down.

"WHAT THE HELL!"

"PAYBACK, SHARMAN!"

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Announcement

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

The intercom gave a heavy buzz, and static-y noises ran amok over the building before a voice actually came through the speakers.

"Hello, Teachers, Students, and Faculty. Welcome back to school. We hope that you all enjoyed your holidays and got the rest you needed to pay attention in class today," the last part was passive. Your principal gave more announcements for clubs and sports around the school, such as upcoming games or reminders for students to buy the school yearbook.

You were nodding along interested, or looking for interest really when something caught your best friend's attention.

"The school will also be hosting its first-ever play, Romeo and Juliet. Interested people should report to the music room before the end of the week to receive information."

You saw Daniel's eyes widen only moments before he spoke up. "Hey," he waved at you. "You should audition!"

"Daniel, are you insane?"

He chuckled, "No, but I think you'd like it."

You tried arguing, but he wasn't taking no for an answer. "You're the one who said you didn't know what you wanted to do after you graduated. Doing this cannot hurt."

"Yeah, it can't hurt until I trip on my costumes and break my neck!"

"That rarely ever happens," he said exasperatedly. "Ok, how about this? You audition, and if you end up getting a role and actually doing the play, I'll give you fifty pounds."

You squinted. "Do you even have fifty pounds to give me?"

"Do you even have to ask," he feigned shock in the accusation? You gave a sour face before he truthfully answered. "Fine, I don't have it now. But I will by the time the play comes around."

"What do I get just for auditioning?"

"I'll convince my mum to make that cake you like."

"Fine."

"BUT!" he exclaimed. "You have to audition for Juliet."

"You're kidding?"

He laughed. "No, I'm not. You have to audition for Juliet."

"I hate you," you mumbled before sighing a whispered 'fine.'

He gave a toothy smile. "Then we have a deal."

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Auditions

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

You reluctantly walked onto the stage, Daniel's widening grin so visible in the audience. He said that he only put his name on the audition sheet so he could watch the auditions. He would've already been gone by the time it was his turn.

"Hello, My name is Y/n L/n, and I am auditioning for Juliet," your lips pressing into a straight line after saying the sentence.

You stammered through your first few lines. "Sh-Shall I speak ill of him— that is my husband?" You said with a laugh.

"Ah," you paused and clicked your tongue. "Poor my lord, what tongue shall smooth thy name… When I, thy three-hours wife, have mangled it?"

You said your following line in an accusatory manner. "But wherefore, villain... didst thou kill my cousin?" you said, though your voice squealed trying to pronounce 'didst.' "That villain cousin would have killed my husband."

"Back, foolish tears, back to your native spring!" Your voice rose and fell several octaves. "Your tributary drops belong to woe, Which you, mistaking, offer up to joy." Fake tears spring to your eyes, your voice cracked, and you began slowly falling against an invisible wall.

You looked down at your paper for what to say next. "My husband lives, that Tybalt would have slain; And Tybalt's dead, that would have slain my husband. All this is comfort; wherefore weep I then?" You wiped your cheeks dramatically.

"Some word there was, worser than Tybalt's death, That murd'red me. I would forget it fain;" your lips quivered, and you sucked in deep, heaving breaths before speaking your line.

"But O, it presses to my memory. Like damnèd guilty deeds to sinners' minds! 'Tybalt is dead, and Romeo--banishèd!" You shouted.

You stood back up in a startling jump, and with a proud smile, you said triumphantly, "And Scene!"

The directors and some students in the audience, especially Daniel, gave a round of applause before the director dismissed you.

You took the steps to the stage and sat next to Daniel as the director called the next student to audition.

"You were amazing! The director might as well have given you the role right then and there."

You laughed, "Hang on, charmer. There were a bunch of Juliet's who literally said that entire thing so… fluently. I stammered through the whole thing."

"But you showed more emotion than anyone else. You only had a week to prepare. The actual show will be like child's play."

"They want people who can memorize and recite. The emotion can be added later, but it's worth nothing if they forget their lines."

"There is such a thing called improvising for a reason," he reassured.

"Who in their right, bloody minds wants to improvise Shakespeare?"

He turned his head and chuckled before waving a five-pound note in front of your face. "Here, I got to go before they call me, but you earned this at least."

"Five pounds for being forced to audition for a stupid play so you can prove a point? Wow, you must really fancy me, huh, Sharman?" you said sarcastically.

"Goodbye, L/n," he whispered before sneaking out the back door of the auditorium.

"Alright, next up. Daniel Sharman!" The director shouted your friend's name a few more times before giving up.

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Headmasters Office

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

A week after your audition, you were called to the headmasters' office. Thus is the cause of the curious looks from your classmates. Oohs and Aahs flooded your ears as you grabbed your bag and headed out the door to the front of the school.

When you got to the front of the building and went into the headmasters' office, you saw the Theatre director, Ms Parker, standing behind the desk. "Headmaster Leo allowed me to use his office to do this. Isn't that cool?"

Ms Parker was one of the younger teachers in school. She was twenty-four, and this was her first year teaching after receiving her bachelor's degree in education and a master's degree in music production. A fact she could astoundingly ramble about for fifteen minutes. As proven at the auditions.

"I didn't want to call you to the theatre room. That would be too predictable, correct?" You'd come to realize she was a very eccentric woman. "I have called you in here to inform you that you have been selected to perform in this year's play of Romeo and Juliet."

A wave of shock coursed through your body, and you were sure it reflected on your face. "Are you sure?"

"Darling, I'm positive!- your audition was totally spectacular! So brilliant-in fact- that I am completely sure in my choice to make you our female lead- Juliet!"

"What!" Your eyes widened into a blank stare. Your thoughts were running rampant in your mind. You thought that performing on the stage would be a breeze when you weren't the lead.

"Ms Parker, I didn't actually want the part of Juliet! It's just that my friend dared me to audition for Juliet! Is there no way I can get a smaller part? I'm no Juliet. The show would be ruined," you rambled.

The directors' facial expressions softened, "Darling, you are the only choice. None of the other people who auditioned can even compare to the amount of passion you produced in that audition. I am determined to have you as our Juliet."

You whimpered out an "Ok." Professors had a strange way of convincing you to do extra credit assignments or things that aren't necessary.

"We have a chemistry read for you and a few of our other choices for Romeo after school today. Do you need to contact a parent to let them know where you'll be?"

"Uh, yes, please."

After you made your call, you walked back to your classroom with shaky hands. The class period was almost over, but you had to tell Daniel that you had gotten a part in the show. Not just any part- THE PART!

You shuffled into the classroom reluctantly. All eyes were on you as every student had assumed you'd been in trouble. Either suspended, expelled, or told your parents were going to have a sit-down with the headmaster.

You took your seat next to Daniel before taking out a piece of paper and writing out a note, encompassing the words, "I got the part!"

You slid the sheet discreetly onto his desk. When he read it, his eyes widened, and he quietly moved his hands toward yours, beckoning for a high five.

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

First Rehearsal

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

After the chemistry read, the role of Romeo was given to a kid named James Mercer-Allen got the part. Though it was more because the directors were starting to become tired.

The next day was the first rehearsal. Swimming season was last semester, so there was no clash in schedules with the play.

"Alright, this rehearsal is to get acquainted with the stage, your fellow actors, and directors," she insisted. "Now, let's introduce ourselves. Can our Romeo please stand up?"

James stood up and gave a brief introduction. You were called on next. You stated your name, "I was on the swim team last semester, and I'm in my thirteenth year. I hope I can do this role justice."

More students stood up to introduce themselves. The entire process took more than thirty minutes.

The next thing to happen was that the rest of the students were called to recite lines for various roles. The only parts that had been cast preliminarily were Romeo and Juliet.

You and James had sat on the wooden stools unless there was a scene going on that needed Romeo and/or Juliet.

By the end of the first rehearsal, the majority of the speaking roles were cast. You went home exhausted but not expecting the conversation that waited for you.

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

The Talk

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

"We're moving?" you shouted at your parents from your seat across from them in the sitting room. "What do you mean we're moving."

"Honey, your dad got a job in the states, so we have to move," your mother argued.

"But what about school? No school will take me in the middle of the year, and it's my last year of secondary school. I don't want to spend the rest of my last year knowing nobody."

Your dad, the man of the hour, spoke up. "Dear, we're moving at the end of the year. After school ends."

"But- What about Uni?"

"You said you were taking a sabbatical year!"

"Yes, so I could intern in London!"

"Can't you intern in California?" Your mother whined.

"We're going to California? It's the furthest state?"

Your dad attempted to reassure you but failed. "Darling, it won't be that bad. Maybe you'll like it there more than you like it here!"

"I could never like anywhere more than I like it here!"

You agreed to go to your room and spent the rest of the day there. Later on, after you finished moping, you ringed up your closest friends to tell them you were moving. You did that until you were so tired you fell asleep on the phone with Sarah before you even called Daniel.

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Confrontation

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

"Why am I hearing from everyone besides you that you're moving?" Daniel appeared out of thin air behind you, and the accusation was an assault on your conscience.

You could lie and tell him that you wanted to reveal that to him in person, or you could just tell him the truth- say you fell asleep. Mix-and-Match? You ended up just telling the truth. "I fell asleep when I was making some of my other calls. I was going to tell you, I swear!"

"Why didn't you call me first. I'm your best friend?"

"That's why! It was too hard. I kept putting it off and putting it off and putting it off because I didn't want to tell you, I don't want it to be true, and telling you of all people would make it feel real."

"Why can't you stay for Uni?"

"I already told my parents I was taking a gap year. I didn't apply to any colleges."

"Crap!" he sighed. "Ok, well, we're going to have to make the most of it. And! You're getting a going away party!"

"Daniel, I don't need-"

"No debate! You are getting a going away party!"

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Opening Night

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

Four months later, after all the rehearsals and memorizations of lines. After much running around the entire film department, it was finally opening night, and your nerves were shot.

You were scrambling all morning to find everything you needed. All your costumes were at the school, but you still needed to bring your black leotard, skin-coloured tights, and wear your hair in an up-do style.

You decided to do your skincare routine, but your panic got the best of you, and you forgot what every single product was used for.

Daniel came over and helped you get ready but found you practically hyperventilating.

Your parents drove you both to the theatre, and when Ms Parker told you that Daniel couldn't be backstage, you promptly told her that he was your emotional support. After much arguing, she finally let him backstage.

Around an hour before showtime, the director told Daniel that he had to go wait in the audience if he already bought his ticket or that he had to go do it now.

Before he left, he gave you a pep-talk. "Hey, so one time, I was in this play, and the idea was that I was expelled, and there was a piece of paper I had to give my 'mother,' but I lost it. So we had to improvise, but I couldn't find the paper, and I felt horrible. So just know, even if you forget your lines, you must improvise, and remember, it still probably won't compare to the embarrassment I felt that day. So you can laugh at my humiliation. "

You chuckled, "I will. Ok, go before you get in trouble."

"Ok, me, our parents and all your friends will be in the front row. I've already reserved the entire row. I brought a whole bag of jackets just for that reason!"

"You can't do that," you said in between cackles.

"For you, I'll do anything," he grinned.

A few hours later and the show was almost done. "What's here? A cup, closed in my true love's hand? Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end," you wept.

"O, churl! Drunk all and left no friendly drop to help me after? I will kiss thy lips; Haply some poison yet doth hang on them, to die with thine restorative." You leaned over James and let your hair fall to the side of your head to cover your face. You pulled back without actually kissing James.

"Thy lips are warm."

A whispery voice came from offstage, "Which way?" The cue for you to take the poison, which was actually cranberry juice.

"Yea, noise? Then I'll be brief. O happy dagger!" You grabbed the dagger and brought it near your chest. "This is thy sheath;" you drew the fake knife back three inches from your chest and stabbed it to where the bag of more cranberry juice was and punctured the bag. 'Blood' soaked through your dress. "There rust, and let me die." You fell dramatically onto the altar and waited for the scene to end as the crowd cheered.

After the show, you dashed into the crowd where your friends and family waited for you. Ovations and Applauses were passed, lauded boxes of chocolates and gorgeous roses were given.

When you got to Daniel, he practically tackled you with a hug. "I actually thought you died for a split second. The blood looked so real."

"Daniel, most people don't bleed that fast, do they?"

"I don't know but fear kicked in, and I couldn't make sense of anything."

You grinned and almost went to your parents before Daniel grabbed your arm. "You don't have a date to the Leavers ball, do you?"

"No, I don't. Why?"

He sighed. "Well, I was thinking that you could go with me. I don't have a date either."

You squinted, thinking there was some ulterior motive behind his actions. "Ok, I'll go with you if you give me the money you owe me before then."

"It's right here," he smiled.

Your face scrunched up, but you reluctantly agreed. You only had a month of school left, and you might as well spend it having fun with your friends.

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

The Leavers Ball and the Getaway Party

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

You were dressed in a light blue, pleated, Mikado prom dress that cut off at mid-thigh. You had black wedges on your feet and a black pearl-beaded bracelet on your arm.

You were wearing a half-up, half-down style that framed your face and a silver necklace with a circle-shaped diamond.

You were sitting in the parlour when Daniel rang the doorbell. He was ten minutes late.

"Sorry," he said when your dad answered it. "I know I'm late. I was picking up Kat and James."

Kat and James were your and Daniel's respective friends who'd started last year after you and Daniel introduced them.

"Hi," you popped out of the shadows. "Alright, Mom, Dad, we're late, so we're just going to get goi-"

"Wait! I have to take pictures! Go get Kat and James."

"No, Mom. No pictures!"

"It's only right. I just want a few. We can take it outside."

You sighed but reluctantly caved into your mother's will.

The four of you took pictures outside of Daniel's Jeep Wrangler. You took ones with silly faces, just girls, just boys, and ones with all four of you before your parents allowed you to leave.

You were forty minutes late, and the ball was already in full swing by the time you got there.

You got on the dance floor immediately because one of your favourite songs was playing, but the DJ switched the song as soon as you found a decent spot. It was a slow song. You chuckled, and Daniel put his hands on your waist.

"Well, this is awkward."

A few minutes later, Daniel posed an interesting question.

"Did you know that I had a crush on you when you first came to school?"

"Uh, you stammered. "No, I didn't know that."

"Yeah, I did. It was short, though. Surface-level."

"Oh," you said. "Should I take offence to that?"

"What?" His eyes widened in realization with what he said. "No, that's not what I meant. You have an amazing personality. I just meant that… I just meant I like you more as a friend than to ruin that with any of those feelings."

"Oh, ok. You wouldn't have, though."

"I wouldn't?"

"No, everyone needs an ego boost every once in a while."

"Haha!"

"And besides, I've had feelings for you at one point too. But it was very cliche, so I tried to shake it as hard as I could."

"Oh?" He raised his eyebrows. "And did you?"

"Like I said, as hard as I could. If it's still there somewhere, it's buried very deep, so much so that I was embarrassed."

"Embarrassed to like me?"

"I mean embarrassed to try and make my life seem like some movie."

"Oh, well, if you did, it would've just made you that much better as an actress. Speaking of that, would you consider acting in the least?"

"Maybe, now that I'm leaving, it's basically the last thing I have to connect me to you."

"No," he said, pointing to your bracelet. "You have that."

You had forgotten that it was Daniel who gave it to you, but the realization brought a smile to your face. "Oh yeah, I'll never take it off."

Later on, long before the ball ended, you saw many of your friends leaving.

"Hey, are you ready to go?" Daniel approached you.

"Where is everyone going?"

He wriggled his eyebrows. "Afterparty!"

"But it's not over?"

"Quit being a party popper and just come with us, L/N!"

You gave in, something you did a lot, and you all started driving. When you got there, you realized you were at Daniel's house.

"The afterparty is at your house?" you asked.

"Well…" James answered.

Kat joined in. "It's really an afterparty!"

"This is your going away party!" Daniel finished.

"But I'm not going away for another month."

"Well, now you have an entire month for people to give you gifts and stuff, and you don't have to worry about the party!" He reasoned.

"But why did it have to be after the Leavers ball?"

"Because you're already in a dress, and it has to be a surprise! Surprise!" Kat exclaimed.

"Alright, fine!"

The entire night you partied and danced, and though you didn't drink alcohol, plentiful amounts of pop and mocktails were passed around. The music was a delight to your ears with all your favourite songs. There were chips and pizza with all your favourite toppings.

"This party is awesome!"

Daniel grinned. "Well, I am an amazing party planner if I do say so myself."

☆◦ 。＼｜／。◦☆

Airport

☆◦ 。／｜＼。◦☆

Daniel's parents drove your family to the airport. Your parents had sold the car. Your dad would return in a week to close a deal on the house. Everything was official, and now you were leaving.

You got out of the car, and the tears forcefully began to fall.

"I'm really gonna miss you, jerk," you said disdainfully to Daniel.

He chuckled. "I'm going to miss you more."

"Impossible!"

He wiped the fallen tear from your eye, and for a moment, you could see every single multi-coloured speck in his eyes and noticed how sometimes they looked blue, and at others, they looked grey or green.

You noticed the curvature of his smile and the chisel of his jawline.You saw the hurt in his eyes that said, 'why do you have to go? You're killing me,' and wanted to never move from that position.

He continued to rub the tears that fell onto your cheek, and the sad moment was as sheltered as it could be. You felt safe with him, in his arms, just looking at his face and being reminded of how he comforted you in a place that felt as familiar as Oz felt to Dorothy.

"What am I gonna do without you?" you whispered.

"Get at least one acting job, get an assistant and an agent, I'll do the same thing, and then either one of us has our assistants reach out to our agents, so we get back in touch in case we ever lose touch."

He sounded so grave that you couldn't help but laugh. "That's assuming I do become an actress, Daniel."

"You're right," he whined. "But don't forget me."

"I promise."

And you tried to keep that promise. Throughout your first year, you interned at UCLA, working in the lab. You then applied to go to school there, and you still tried to keep Daniel in your mind. Maintaining a social life on campus combined with schoolwork already wasn't easy. However, you still wouldn't let yourself forget your best friend.

It wasn't until you entered your senior year and you were about to graduate that he started to wane in your memories. The things you did together became obsolete as new friends and memories replaced the old. The things he taught you were thrown out to make space for the new lessons you learned each day.

Even when you did become an actress, you never really remembered why you decided to. You remembered that your friend pushed you to do that play, but it was almost ten years ago, and for the life of you, you couldn't remember his name.

But you did do it, first as an extra, then a body double, and then you started getting l roles on smaller shows. But your big break was getting a quasi-lead role on the spin-off of a big television show, The Walking Dead. For two years, you enjoyed going to conventions and playing the complex character, Valeria Bishop, and you thought you had it all figured out.

But life has a funny way of coming full circle and throwing you a curveball that knows you off course and changes your life.

[thefanficmonster]

You Call It A Mess, We Call It Baking

Corpse Husband x Reader (Female)

Warnings: Swearing

Genre: Tons of fluff

Summary: A friendly argument via Discord leads to a baking session. Said baking session leads to a kitchen looking like it was the victim of a tornado. The lesson here is: don’t leave Corpse and Y/N in the kitchen together.

Requested by Anon, thank you so much for your request, hope I captured what you wanted well and I hope you enjoy reading it.

Corpse’s POV

I’ve been sitting in a Discord call with Y/N for about three years now, keeping her company as she’s editing some footage Sean sent her earlier. In the meantime, I’m reviewing the recently submitted stories by my viewers, reading some lines I find funny or downright terrifying to her.

“When I went in the kitchen to check on the cake, it was already out of the oven, a sticky note next to it on the counter that read: ‘smells nice’. My blood ran cold.“ I read the eerie sentence that is suggesting one of my most frightening scenarios - a stalker getting inside your house. I get chills just imagining what was probably going on in the sender’s head when they saw that.

“Jeez, it’s been so long since I’ve cooked something other than omelet.“ I hear Y/N reply absentmindedly, completely neglecting the fear factor of what’s going on in the story.

“Good job missing the point.” I chuckle, my eyes continuing to scan the email until my brain actually comprehends what she said, “Wait, you mean to tell me you have baked anything ever?! No offense, Y/N, but I was honestly doubting your ability to make an omelet as well. In all the years we’ve been friends I can’t remember you ever not saying ‘I hade takeout’ when I asked you what you had for dinner.” 

The scoff that comes through my headphones is the most adorable thing ever. She’s one to easily take a joke and never get offended by anything, but I know how heated she can get with her sarcasm. If I’m being honest, I’m always here for it. 

“There are many things you don’t know about me, Corpsy. A girl’s gotta have some aces up her sleeve.“ I can just imagine the narrowing of here eyes and the tilting of her head as she says that. She has a very specific way of expressing her thoughts. When we first met I accidentally made the comparison to one of those children’s books that have pictures, stories and small buttons for audio. That comparison has stuck with me and I look back at it very often. To fully catch her point, you don’t just listen to her. No, no, no. You focus on every change in her face and body. The way she looks away during certain parts of her speech, the way her voice plays with several different tones at once. Her posture while speaking. Just like those books - you don’t just listen to the audio, you look at the pictures and read the text.

“Well you know how much I like playing poker, why don’t you come over and throw those aces down.“ The last thing you should ever give Y/N is a challenge. She won’t only homerun it, but will never let you forget it either. When we met she was a girl with self esteem in the negatives, so seeing her brag about her achievements to me always brings me joy.

The details I’ve listed are pretty in-depth, aren’t they? That’s because I don’t want to let anything slip when it comes to her. This realization hit me early in our friendship and it was only like two years in that I finally connected the dots - this investment in her of mine was not simple nor platonic. Come to think of it, I reckon it never was.

“No way, I’m not changing out of my pajamas just to come to your house.” She laughs, once again making me picture her full body reaction to her statement.

I smirk, knowing I’m about to bring out my main weapon, “Oh come on, I’ve seen you in pajamas countless times. You can just admit you don’t wanna embarrass yourself. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.”

I can sense her fuming even though she’s like two miles away. “I’ll be there in 15.”

She hangs up before getting the chance to hear me lose control of the laughter I’ve been suppressing. 

Man, I love this girl.

Y/N’s POV 

“It’s on.“ I say as soon as the door in front of me swings open to reveal the smug smirking face of my bestfriend. The foundation of my tough, unbothered act is shaken up by the outburst of butterflies in my stomach which occurs every time I see him. I can never look at this man and not turn at least a little red in the cheeks. 

It’s been long since I self-diagnosed with the malicious ‘falling for someone who would never reciprocate my feelings’ illness. I’ve been living with it for a while. What medication do I take? Dating other guys. One bad relationship after another, scolding myself that every one of them has been a desperate attempt to get him to change his gaze on me from ‘best friend’ to something more. Hell, I don’t even know how to define that ‘something more’. I once even tried to admit my feelings, but I was so vague and so incoherent that I didn’t understand myself, so how was he supposed to grasp my downright sad excuse of a confession. 

“No ‘hello’, no nothing?“ He moves aside to let me in. I walk right past him with a sassy flip of my hair to mask the nervousness of being aware that his eyes were on me, “Rude.“ He murmured with an obvious smile in his tone.

He looks as cute as ever, black sweatpants and a black tee, hair messy as though he has just rolled out of bed. I can say with the upmost certainty that he’s the only one who can pull of that hairstyle.

I hide mine as I throw on the apron that’s hanging by his fridge, ready to take over his kitchen and put those aces of mine to use. I can’t help but furrow my brows when I see him enter the kitchen behind me and lean against the counter. That’s when I notice the counter is lined with all the ingredients I’ll need for the cake I had in mind. 

“OK, what do we do first?“ he claps his hands together, straightening his posture as he gives me a expectant look.

It takes all my brain cells to prevent me from freezing up completely. I’m not usually like this, mind you, I’m a lot better at keeping what’s going on inside my head camouflaged. I don’t know what’s happening to me, but I don’t have much time to dwell on that. If I do, he’ll pick up on it right away.

“Um, we are not gonna do anything. I will be here baking, and you will remain outside the kitchen until I’m done. If you need something, ask and I’ll bring it to you. I can’t have you sabotaging my project, impostor.” I narrow my eyes at him like he’s the most dangerous of threats. And he is, for my mental sanity.

He fakes a hurt expression, clearly fighting to the best of his ability to hide how much he’s enjoying messing with me. “We’ve known each other for five years, Y/N. Don’t you trust me?”

I lean over the counter to where we’re about two feet apart and whisper, “Not. Even. A. Little. Bit.”

He smiles, “You’re just trying to get away with making this cake by watching a YouTube tutorial. Admit it, you can’t even crack an egg properly.” His eyes are now as narrowed as mine as we stare each other down at a proximity that’s rapidly raising my body temperature and heartbeat. It’s not fair. I’m a mess around him so he automatically has the upper hand.

As expected, I give in, “You better not mess around though.”

After I force him to give me several different oaths, we start. I’m working on the batter, he’s working on the frosting. We decided to decorate it with crimson and dark purple frosting. We’re both really pick about the color shades so he’s currently struggling to get the crimson perfect. 

“Let’s make it a layer cake.“ He suggests out of the blue, “Two layers, nothing crazy.“

I think it over for a moment or two before shrugging, “OK, but then you better grab a bowl and help me with the second layer. You know how to make the batter, right?”

He confirms that he does and walks out of my line of sight. I hear him open the fridge as I whisk the eggs I have cracked with the sugar. 

“You want something to drink?“ He asks while rummaging through the fridge.

I decline, try to focus on the recipe that I have somehow memorized to the smallest of details. As I’m reciting the it silently to make sure I didn’t skip any steps with the batter, I feel something cold run down my back causing me to scream.

“What the fuck was that?!“ I turn around and glare at him just as the ice cube slips out from under my hoodie and falls to the floor. The fucker’s laughing whole heartedly, not giving a damn that he just gave me a mini heart attack. Mainly cause I thought it was a roach or something, and he know I hate bugs.

“You do realize how boiling red you are, right? You look like a lobster. I thought you needed something to cool you down.“

Instead of being annoyed, I do a full 180 and decide to play his game, “Yeah, I know...” I trail off, reaching my hand back towards the bowl of flour. Grabbing a a handful of the white powder I throw it at him before he can even catch on. Needless, to say, his outfit and hair aren’t so black anymore. “Ah, I knew your hair would look good with snowflakes in it, but you can never be too sure.”

“This means war, Y/N.” His smile is borderline malicious, getting me excited for what’s to come. 

Him and I have always had these so called wars, but never like you’d imagine. We are silent, strategic, subtle. Neither of us knows when the other will attack until it’s too late. That’s why instead of going for a counter-attack right away, he heads to complete his mission of making the batter for the second layer.

All is quiet except the noises of the utensils clinking together every now and then. I keep a close watch on him out of the corner of my eye and I notice no sus behavior. That is until I see him take a spoonful of his batter and eat it. I whirl around at the speed of a gust of wind, eyes wide, “Do you want to fuck up your guts.” He ignores me as he takes another spoonful, bringing it close to his mouth. This time, I grab onto his arm causing the contents of the spoon to spill on my hoodie.

I roll my eyes, unbothered by the brown stain that by some miracle missed the apron and fell on my grey hoodie, “Don’t. Eat. The. Batter. Copy?“

“Paste.“ He nods, smirking with pride as he puts the spoon aside.

I sigh and return to my side of the kitchen, focusing on the next task: poring the batter into the circular baking tray which he, for some reason, has two of. He repeats the task soon after me and we put the two trays in the oven. I help him with the frosting, getting the shades close enough to what we had in mind. 

After about five minutes of the crusts baking, a wonderful smell spreads throughout the kitchen. At this point, all we have to do is wait for the oven to signal that our cinnamon crust is ready to be taken out, wait for it to cool down and then frost the cake.

“It smells really good.“ He comments, turning his head to look at me.

I’m sitting atop the kitchen counter and Corpse is standing next to me. This is the only time him and I are at approximately the same height. The realization brings a thought to my mind, one that makes me feel like an evil mastermind.

“Hey, remember earlier when you said I couldn’t crack an egg properly?“ He hums affirmatively, “Well...“

The carton of eggs is within arm’s reach. I grab an egg, chip it off the side of the counter and crack it apart above his head, its contents coating his hair. “How’s that for a proper egg crack?” I ask victoriously.

He lets out a surprised sound, something between a gasp and a laugh. Shaking his head to get the yoke to fall down, he says amusedly: “I don’t know...you tell me.”

Too late for me to do anything. There’s milk all over me.

The malicious smile on his face is replicated on mine and now it’s really on. However, as we reach for the items meant to be out weapons, the oven dings.

Frosting the cake goes about as well as you expect: there’s more frosting on us than the cake itself.

“Let’s make amends, please. I’m so not looking forward to taking three showers tonight.“ I say, raising a white napkin and waving it around.

“Fair enough.“ He shrugs and we shake hands.

As I’m about to pull my hand back, he holds onto it, making me look up at him. Our eyes lock and I suddenly regain that same shakiness and vulnerability I always have around him. It never leaves me, I just manage to ignore it. The sound of my panic is muffled by the sound of my heart thumping the loudest it has ever. 

Expectedly, he is the bold one who makes the first and final move. The move to end one era of us and start another. His lips touch mine and all fades. It’s just him and I. The friends who were never just friends. The cowards who suck at dealing with emotions. The fearful little kids that are afraid of rejection because we both mean so much to each other, to the point of suffering to prevent the possibility of losing one another.

We embrace who we are, finally admitting that friends is not what we are meant to remain forever.

The kiss might’ve been brief, but the meaning it carries makes it the most valuable moment of my life. One I’ll cherish forever. Something in his eyes tells me he will too. That’s all I need. That’s all we need. No words are necessary.

Suddenly, our bubble bursts as a result of his ringing phone. He lets go of one of my hands and takes his phone from the counter.

“It’s Dave”, he smiles, picking up the call and turning to get me in the camera frame. “Hey Dave, look who’s here with me.“

I wave at the camera and at the baffled face of Dave. “Hi!”

“What, in the name of God, is that mess?“ He raises both his eyebrows as his eyes scan us and the kitchen behind us.

“You call it a mess, we call it baking.“ Corpse and I look at each other and smile, blushing as red as the streak in Dave’s hair.

“Am I missing something here? Did I call at a bad time?“ He asks, still struggling to rationalize what he is seeing.

“Yeah, you actually did. I’ll call you back.“ Corpse dead-ass hangs up on him, putting his phone away before turning to me, “We have more important matters at the moment.“

He kisses me again, this time more confidently. His arms wrap around me and prep me up on the counter, insinuating that this kiss won’t be as short as the last.

[twst-bs]

TWST Vice Dorm Leaders and a Stressed-out MC

I couldn't leave out the Vice Dorm Leaders! I'm just used to working in chunks of seven because of my Obey Me! writing. I'll do a piece for all of the other characters as well!

Note: I wrote most of these to be ambiguous, but Ortho's in meant to be read as platonic. I just wanted to give the little dude some love.

-----

Trey: "Do you not like it?"

They only just barely managed to catch their fork before it clattered against the plate. With everything going through their head at a mile a minute, they had completely forgotten what they were supposed to be doing.

“No! I mean, yes, I like it!” they stumbled over their words, pasting a hopefully-convincing grin on their face.

“Really?” Trey fixed them with a knowing look and they felt themselves wither beneath it. “Because you only took one bite before staring off into middle distance.”

“Oh,” their grin turned sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“Something on your mind?” he asked, taking a seat on the stool across from them. “You’re awfully quiet.”

Damn it, they had really hoped Trey wouldn’t figure them out. Or at least take more than ten minutes.

The pressure had been mounting lately. Trying to stay on top of impossible classes, watching over Grimm, the ever-looming problem of them not being able to go back to their own world and the moral dilemma of if they even wanted to go back...they had a lot of things on their mind, and they didn’t even know where to start.

This was supposed to be a light-hearted little night in. Trey had found a new recipe he wanted to try out, and they were always willing to be the taste-tester. But, of course, good old anxiety had decided to drop in and ruin the fun, and the cute date night had turned south before it had even really begun.

“Hey, easy,” Trey’s voice cut through the fog that was slowly descending over their brain. “I know that face. Will talking about it help or hurt?”

“...I don’t know,” they mumbled, setting their fork down. “I’m sorry, Trey, I -”

“Nope.” he reached across the kitchen island and gently slipped his hand beneath theirs. They squeezed it back, letting him run his thumb over their knuckles as they tried to fight down the panic that threatened to burst from within. “No apologies are necessary. Take your time.”

“But I ruined our date,” they sighed, shoulders slumping. “Just because I couldn’t get out of my own head for a few hours.”

“Riddle couldn’t get out of his own head for almost two decades, and I’m still friends with him.” Trey chuckled. “Your mental well-being is more important than a silly date night. You can talk to me about anything, any time, anywhere, and I won’t be angry with you, promise.”

“...Can I still have the cake?”

“Yes, you can still have the cake.”

Ruggie: It had been another long night.

Sleepless nights were a pretty common occurrence for the Ramshackle Prefect, unfortunately. Even if they were dead tired at the end of the day, they often tossed and turned the whole night, managing maybe a few hours of sleep at best. Which often led to days like this.

They could barely keep their eyes open, even as they walked to their next class. They were on autopilot, going through their daily motions. The books in their bag felt like they might as well be boulders, and the thought of climbing the stairs made them want to cry. Their legs felt like lead.

“Gotcha!”

They definitely didn’t scream when a pair of lithe arms wrapped around their middle. No way, you have no proof.

“Sheesh, herbivore, you’re loud.” Ruggie snickered, hooking his chin over their shoulder. “You could wake the dead like that. Is that how you wake up the ghosts in your dorm?”

“Ruggie, you scared the hell out of me!”

“Your fault for not payin’ attention!” He gave them a fond squeeze around the middle before letting them go. “I’ve been walkin’ behind you since you left your class. You wouldn’t survive a day in the Savannah, walkin’ around with your head in the clouds like that.”

“Why didn’t you say anything, instead of stalking me like a creep?”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Ruggie cackled. However, his snarky grin dropped from his face when he got a good look at them. “Hey, you aren’t lookin’ so good.”

“Didn’t sleep very well,” they shrugged, readjusting the strap on their bag so it wasn’t digging into their shoulder. Ruggie scowled, eyes narrowing.

“Again?”

They stuck their tongue out at him. “It’s not like I do it on purpose.”

The hyena stared at them for a little bit longer before sighing. “I guess it can’t be helped. Come on.” he grabbed their wrist, tugging them in the opposite direction of their next class.

“Hey, where are we going?”

“Back to Ramshackle,” Ruggie said lightly.

“Oh, but you scold Leona when he skips?” they poked him in the side with their free hand, and he squirmed away.

“Leona doesn’t need three afternoon naps,” the hyena sniggered. “You look like you could use a coma.”

Jade: “Thank you again for helping out.”

Their arms felt like jelly. Their legs were about ready to fall off. Their face hurt from having to put on a fake smile for the past few hours.

“No problem!” they said brightly. The fake smile could last a few more minutes. “I guess Floyd can’t give you guys more notice when he decides to skip his shift, huh?”

“No, Floyd does what he wants, when he wants.” Jade chuckled lightly, wiping his hands on the towel draped over his arm. Friday nights at the lounge were always busy, so of course that was when Floyd decided he didn’t want to work. Mostro Lounge didn’t have that many options, so Jade had called and asked them if they would mind helping out.

Honestly, they should have said no. They were tired, they had a lot of homework to do, and they honestly just needed a night to themselves for once. But, the thought of letting someone down triggered a deep and primal fear in them, and before they even really knew what they were doing, they had agreed. And here they were.

“...would you like?”

They had to stop themselves from physically shaking themselves out of their trance. “What? I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you.”

Jade raised an eyebrow, but politely decided not to comment. “One of the rules at the Lounge is that those who work that day get a free meal after their shift. I asked what you would like.”

“Oh! Um, I’m fine, really, I wouldn’t want to -” their stomach chose that moment to disagree, grumbling loudly in protest of not being fed. How long had it been since lunch? Had they even eaten lunch?

“Both I and your stomach insist, it seems.” Jade pulled out his waiter’s pad. “You’ve earned a meal for your hard work.”

“But -”

“You aren’t troubling anyone.” Jade cut in, seemingly more in tune with their thoughts than they were. “And I wouldn’t have been angry with you if you had turned down my request for help.”

“How did you -”

“Now, what would you like to eat?”

The two of them stood at an impasse for a moment.

“...the tomato basil bisque and grilled cheese sounded good.”

Jamil: “You’re going to chop your fingers off.”

They almost hit the ceiling when Jamil’s hand covered their own. They hadn’t even realized their hands had been shaking until his warm palm steadied theirs.Gently, carefully, he brought the knife down onto the vegetables they were chopping in a nice, clean cut.

“You don’t have to help if you aren’t feeling well.” Jamil took the knife from their hands, setting it down on the cutting board. Kalim had spontaneously announced another one of Scarabia’s famous parties, and of course that left most of the prep work to Jamil. Although Kalim was at least handling the decorations this time. Baby steps.

When they heard the news a few days prior, they had offered to help, and Jamil had practically deflated with relief. Every time Kalim held a party at the dorm, Jamil felt like a zombie for at least the next day and a half. They had personally seen him take a basketball to the face because he had been so tired. Although that might have been Floyd messing with him.

But, of course, when they woke up the day of the party, something had felt off. Nothing in particular had caused them to feel strange, but it could have been a bunch of little things. Regardless of the cause, it was a day best spent alone, dealing with the random anxiety. But, they had made a promise, and even though they wanted to back out, said anxiety also wouldn’t let them for fear of inconveniencing someone even a little bit.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” they grinned, shaking their wrist out. “Just spent a bit too long working on Trein’s homework. I’m pretty sure you get better grades if you write long paragraphs.”

“The trick is to make them long and unnecessarily fancy,” Jamil’s lips quirked upwards as he hip-checked them out of the way. “And don’t think you can distract me.”

“Damn it.”

Jamil shook his head. “Don’t push yourself so hard.”

“Pot meet kettle, Jamil.”

“I’m serious.” he leveled them with a steely look that had them feeling like a child getting scolded. “Honestly, with all of the stuff you do for everyone, I’m surprised you haven’t cracked yet.”

“...Me too, honestly.”

“See? Give yourself a break every once in a while.”

“Only if you do, too, Mr. I-Don’t-Need-Any-Help.”

His stern look softened until he was smiling fondly at them, warmth in his eyes. “Deal.”

Rook: “Non, non, this is unacceptable.”

They had heard Rook’s footsteps as he approached, which meant he wanted them to notice him. Otherwise he would have been completely silent.

Hand still on the spine of the book they were attempting to ease out of the tightly-packed library shelves, they turned to look at him. “What’s unacceptable?”

“The hunch to your shoulders, mon bijou.” the hunter swept dramatically into the light. “The sallowness of your skin. The shadows beneath your eyes!”

“Rook…”

“You look very tired, my dear.” Rook dropped his usual flamboyant act, approaching them with concern shining in his eyes. “Are you alright?”

“Just…” after a moment, they turned to him and rapped their knuckles lightly against their head. “A lot going on up here, you know?”

“I do,” Rook nodded. “You have many things to be worrying about, don’t you?.”

He stepped forward, grasping both of their hands in his. They were trembling lightly, since when had that started?

“You know I pride myself in being a protector of all things beautiful,” Rook gave their hands a squeeze. “And seeing your beautiful heart burdened so...it is my duty to ease it’s weight. So please, if there is anything I can do to help, tell me.”

Ortho: “Sorry for bothering you like this, Ortho.”

The little robot-boy smiled. “It’s no problem! I’m glad to help! Something as simple as a body scan is no trouble.”

The two of them were sat in the Ignihyde lounge. It was late enough that most of the dorm members had holed themselves up in their rooms - Ignihyde wasn’t known for its social butterflies, after all. But Ortho had still been up and about when the Ramshackle Prefect came knocking.

The infirmary closed around 5pm, although there was a nurse on-call for emergencies. So when something was wrong with a student, but not necessarily life threatening, they went to NRC’s resident robot. Ortho could scan for most problems in seconds, and more than once the nurses had asked to borrow him.

The little scanner on his chest opened up. The blue light swept over the Prefect’s body for a few seconds before Ortho beeped and the light disappeared.

“Heart rate: 102. No physical cause detected.” he reported. “It looks like you’re a little bit stressed.”

“...Yeah, that tracks.” they sighed. “I guess there’s nothing you can do for general anxiety, huh?”

“I don’t think so.” Ortho shrugged, looking sad. “I’m sorry, I wish I could help more.”

“It’s okay!” the Prefect smiled. “You did help! I was worried I was sick or something.”

Ortho still didn’t look satisfied. “But...ah!” he hit his fist against his palm. They could practically see the lightbulb go off in his head. Actually, they were a little surprised Idia had not installed that feature yet. “There is one thing I can do.”

“What’s that?”

The Prefect made a soft “oof” sound as Ortho darted forward and wrapped his arms around them. He was a little cold, being made of metal, but the thought was there.

“Internet research says that sometimes a hug can make people feel better. Does it work? I hope it works.”

They felt like they were going to cry. Or explode. Or both. “Yeah, I think it works.”

Lilia: “You don’t need to look so stressed, you know.”

Lilia laughed when the Ramshackle Prefect jumped, fangs poking out. “You’ve wound yourself so tightly, I wonder if you’ll break.”

To be fair, the Diasomnia lounge could be quite intimidating. It often took first years a few solid months to be comfortable in it. So Lilia wasn’t surprised that the human was ill at ease sitting there as Lilia served the two of them tea.

“That old story about being trapped in the Fae world if you eat their food isn’t true, you know.” Lilia sat down on the couch opposite of them, taking a sip of his tea. “At least, not that I’m aware of.”

The human squirmed slightly, and Lilia sighed. “Go on, drink. This is the type of tea I used to give to Malleus when he couldn’t sleep.”

The image of a baby Malleus being soothed by Lilia was so ridiculously cute that it brought a smile to their face. Lilia hummed happily in response.

“There’s the smile I was looking for.” he set his cup down. “Now, what brings you here so late? Nightmares again?”

“...Yeah…” they sighed, the tension in their body falling away like someone had cut the strings of a marionette. “I just wish they would stop so I could sleep.”

“Do you want to talk about them?” Lilia asked.

“It’s the same one, it’s always the same one.” they groaned, reaching for the tea cup. It smelled of chamomile and lavender, a perfect sleeping concoction. “I’m being chased, but I can’t tell by what, and every time I turn a corner the thing gets closer, and - and -”

“Hush, don’t work yourself up.” he moved from his spot on the couch to sit next to them. “Take a drink, there’s a good child.”

They took a sip of tea, focusing on the feeling of warmth down their throat as a way to ground themselves to the present. “I’m sorry.”

“You needn’t apologize,” Lilia murmured, reaching up to pet their hair. “Drink your tea, now, and I’ll make sure you get some sleep.”

[libraryofloveletters]

Could I request a fake dating with Hotch where you’re upset bc you’re nervous about going to a friends wedding bc you know your semi recent ex will be there so Hotch comes with you as your plus one. But obv you both like each other and you never acted on it before and get together for real at the end?

Cover For Me

Aaron Hotchner x Reader 

Warnings: fem!reader, cursing 

Category: fluff 

Word Count: 1.5k

Author’s Note: I wrote this at like 4am oops, hope you like it sweets! 

----

The pretty yellow envelope sat on your desk. You knew exactly what was in it, an invitation to your friend’s wedding. You didn’t want to go but she insisted on you being there. Your ex was going to be there and although you ended things on good terms, you weren't ready to see them just yet.

Everyone had left for the night, it was just you and Hotch at the office. He was headed out when you went to throw the envelope out. “Are you okay l/n? You were done with your work hours ago. Why are you still here?” he seemed genuinely concerned. 

“Just throwing out some stuff” you smiled at him 

“That’s a bright envelope” he chuckled, glancing down at the envelope in your hand. 

“Yeah just an invite, but I'm not going.” you told him 

“Where aren't you going?” he asked you 

“My friend’s wedding. She wants me to bring a plus one but everyone’s busy. Spence’s going to see his mom, JJ and Will have a party, Emily has her annual ‘sin to win’ weekend and Penelope’s going with her and Derek’s going out with some girl he met. As for Rossi, everyone’s just gonna think he’s my sugar daddy and I’m not in the mood for their judgement” You explained to him your lack of a date

He chuckled, “Maybe I could go with you? If you don’t mind of course and well, if you’re even going” 

You were shocked he offered to go with you, you knew he spent his weekends with Jack. “Are you sure? I don’t want to make you cancel your plans to go to some wedding with me.” you looked at him, he smiled. “I didn’t have any plans, Jack’s with his grandparents this weekend. What time should I pick you up?” 

“Is 3 alright?” 

“3 is perfect. I’ll see you tomorrow” he gave your arm a little squeeze before heading out leaving you in the office by yourself. 

----

It was now 2:57 and you were waiting for Aaron to come pick you up. You’d be lying if you said you weren’t nervous. Your boss offered to be your date and also because your ex is going to be there, with their new partner. 

You took a look in the mirror, adjusting the front of your dress. It was a black silk dress Emily had convinced you to buy a while ago. It was floor length and backless, it fit your body like it was made just for you. It had red embroidery going down one side, from the shoulder to right above your hip. 

The doorbell rang, you took a deep breath in before opening the door. Aaron was wearing all over black, the two two buttons on his shirt undone. There was no denying that he looked handsome.

“You look beautiful” He smiled at you.

You chuckled “Hello to you too Mr. Hotchner” 

A red tint spread across his cheeks, he smiled “Hi y/n” 

“You don’t look so bad yourself” you leaned against the door.

There had always been this unspoken level of attractiveness between the two of you. You opened the door wider for him to step in, “give me two minutes to find my shoes and I'll be ready” he nodded and shut the door behind him as you walked over to your closet. You pulled out a pair of black heels and slipped them on before walking back to Aaron. Even with your heels on, he still towered over you by a few inches. 

“Ready ?” he asked you, looking you up and down. “Yeah, I'm ready”

---- 

The service was beautiful, your friend was the ideal image of a blushing bride. Everyone was at the reception and Aaron had stepped away to take a phone call, leaving you with the chance to get yourself a drink. 

“Uh, a rum and coke please” the bartender nodded as you leaned against the counter. Your ex made their way over, you looked away praying that they wouldn’t come talk to you. 

“Y/n! It’s so good to see you” They smiled at you 

fuck fuck fuck, this is what you wanted to avoid. 

“Hey! Good to see you too” you gave them a fake smile. Where the hell was Hotch when you needed him. You glanced around hoping you’d see Hotch and excuse yourself but he was nowhere to be seen. 

“How have you been ? Oh! Have you met Sam? They’re my partner” 

“Mhm nice to meet you Sam” you gave the two of them a fake smile. Aaron had seen your ex once or twice from pictures so he knew who was talking to you when he walked back over to you. 

You felt his arm wrap around your waist, his hand on your hip rubbing it softly. “Hey baby, I'm sorry it was work” He gave you a kiss on the cheek. 

You smiled at him “It’s alright. Oh, this is (ex’s name) my ex” Aaron looked at them and nodded, not saying anything. 

Your ex stood there trying to make a conversation with you but Aaron kept whispering in your ear. It wasn’t anything important, just stupid little dad jokes which made you giggle every time. Your favourite song came on, your ex glanced at you. 

“Dance with me sweets? I know this is your favourite” Aaron asked you. You were surprised he knew your favourite song. “Of course I'll dance with you” The two of you walked to the dance floor hand in hand leaving your ex behind. 

Aaron’s hand rested on your hip and the other was holding your hand. The two of you swayed to the beat, not a care in the world. It felt as if the two of you were the only people in the room, in the world. The world and everything in it melted away as the two of you spun around the dance floor. 

Before you knew it, the song was over and the two of you were still standing there, holding onto each other. 

---- 

He drove you back home, still playing the part of the boyfriend. He opened the door for you, holding your hand and helping you out of the car. You smiled at him as he walked you to the front door. 

“Do you want some coffee or something? I have cake in the fridge” you look at him, back against the door waiting for his answer. 

“Coffee sounds good” 

You unlocked the door and walked in, he followed you in and shut the door. You pulled off your heels and left them by the door before heading to the kitchen. When Aaron got to the kitchen, his jacket was off and his sleeves were rolled up. 

You could feel the butterflies in your stomach, something about him had always made you want to be close to him. Tonight didn't help your feelings at all, everything felt so normal, so domestic. 

Your coffee maker beeped, snapping you out of your dream world. Aaron was filling water into the machine, “sorry, I was supposed to do that” you said to him. “It’s alright, you zoned out for a second there. Are you okay?” he asked, leaning against your counter. You hopped up onto the counter beside him and he turned to face you. 

“Tonight was nice” you whispered, barely loud enough for him to hear 

“It was, I had a good time” he said back 

You fidgeted with your fingers, his hand rested on top of yours. “y/n, what’s on your mind?” he asked you, he shifted closer towards you. You shook your head, “I’m fine, why do you ask?”

“I know you, you only fidget with your fingers when something’s on your mind or if you’re upset.” he admitted to you. You took a breath in, depending if you should tell him how you really felt. You knew either way, he’d figure it out eventually but you wanted to tell him, you should tell him. 

“I didn’t thank you for being my date tonight” you looked down at your lap, he smiled. “You don't have to thank me, y/n. I’m glad I could go with you” 

You rested a hand on his cheek, unsure how he’d react. His head leaned towards your hand, nuzzling his cheek into your palm. 

“I like you Aaron” you whispered, looking up at him. You could feel him smile against your palm, he turned his head to press a little kiss in your palm. 

“I like you too. Honestly, I thought I was over my feelings but tonight showed me that I wasn’t” he told you, stepping forward to stand between your legs. His hands cupped your cheeks as he leaned forward, you leaned closer as you felt his lips touch yours. The kiss was gentle, but passionate.

There was 4 years of chemistry in that one kiss. 4 years of small touches, over the shoulder glances, pining, lust and want poured into this kiss. This was magical and for the second time that night, you felt as if the whole world melted away. 

[maladaptive---daydreamer]

Fake it till you make it

You were never really one to receive post from home. Your parents would send you a letter every once in a while, sometimes a small care package towards the end of term, but they would come in black lidded boxes tied together with red silk ribbon. This was the precise reason why you were so confused when a school post owl dropped a crushed brown box in front of you and flew back to the owlery.

“What the hell is that?” Your best friend, Draco, asked, voice laced with disgust.

“I have no idea” you replied, cautiously picking the box up looking for a clue as to who the sender was.

“Well open it, don't leave us in suspense, Y/N” Daphne urged.

You ripped the brown parchment off the box to be greeted with a cake box from a bakery in Hogsmeade. You lifted the crumpled box lid off to reveal a small square carrot cake. It had been decorated with white icing, and a note had been piped on with orange icing.

“Go out with me?” Daphne read. “Oh my, you’re getting asked out! Does it say who the sender was?”

Draco looked at you suddenly interested in this delivery.

“No it doesn’t, and I’m glad it doesn't because I definitely don’t want to go out with the owner of this cake.” You replied, pushing the box away from you and returning to your breakfast.

“You don't mind if I take that do you, Y/N?” Crabbe asked, licking his lips.

“Go ahead, Crabbe.” You pushed the box towards them and both him and Goyle reached for the cake.

“Acting as though you’ve never seen a cake in your lives, you disgust me the pair of you” Draco sneered. He picked up the parchment the cake was wrapped in with two fingers and began to stare at it.

“What are you doing?” You asked, looking up from the page of the Daily Prophet you were reading

“I’m checking to see who sent it.”

“I already did that, there was no name on it.”

“You might have missed it”

“I can read, Malfoy”

“Well there doesn't seem to be a name on here, a shame really, I would have enjoyed watching you turn him down and embarrass him in front of the whole school”

“Who said I would have turned him down?”

“You did, just now,”

“I only said that because its an anonymously sent cake, it could have been poisoned for all I know. Had I known who the cake was from I would have reacted differently”

Draco looked confused for a second before getting up, announcing he was going to make his way to potions. You and Daphne did the same a few minutes later and met up with him again in the queue outside the classroom. You had potions with the Ravenclaws, which according to the sorting hat was its next choice for you, but it believed you’d be better suited in Slytherin. It meant that you managed to get along well with some of the Ravenclaw students. Before long, Slughorn called you all in and you took your usual seat at the back, taking up a four-seat bench with you, Daphne, Draco and Blaise. Today's lesson was about sleeping potions, Slughorn announced he would be pairing you up rather than you working with the person you sat alongside. He began reading off a list, pairing Daphne with your friend, Alicia, Draco with Marcus Belby and you with Terry Boot.

You reluctantly got up and moved to a station near the front of the room.

“Morning, Y/N” Terry greeted, oddly giddy for a Tuesday morning

“Morning, Terry” you replied, giving him a small smile. You read through the instructions in your textbook and began to chop up your ingredients.

“Anything interesting happen this morning?” He asked, looking up from the valerian root he was chopping.

“I did get a weird package at breakfast.”

“Oh, you did?”

“Yeah, someone tried to ask me out, bit stupid though they didn't leave their name”

“I did! it was on the inside of the lid”

“Pardon?”

“Erm yeah sorry about that. What I meant to say is that I sent it.”

“Oh, right, well” You were honestly speechless, you had maybe spoken to Terry once, apologising for Draco’s remark about his mother.

“It's just you’re so beautiful and smart, and you’re nice”

“Terry I’m flattered but I’m just not interested”

“You think I’m ugly don’t you?”

“No- I”

“Don’t lie to me Y/N”

“No I swear, it's just” Your mind raced at a million miles an hour to try and come up with a passable lie. “It's just that I’m actually going out with someone already. We just haven't told anyone, you know how-”

“Who?” He cut you off, his face twisting with anger.

“I don't see how that’s any of your business” The sheer cheek of him was enough to make you angry as well,

“Well, then you’re lying, if it were true you’d say who. You do think I’m ugly”

“It’s,” You paused, blurting out the first name that came into your mind. “Its Draco”. You were already kicking yourself for spluttering his name out. Any Slytherin boy would have done fine, but you just had to say his name.

“Oh, right. Makes sense, you two are inseparable,”

An awkward silence had fallen over you and he barely spoke another word the whole lesson. Slughorn had administered each pairs sleeping potion on a cornish pixie, the pair who managed to keep their pixie asleep for long enough was due to receive a prize the next lesson. You returned to your seat at the back and grabbed your things.

“What’s wrong with you?” Draco asked, pulling the back of your robe

“Huh? what-”

“You look ill, do you need me to walk you to the hospital wing?”

“Walk the long way with me to defence against the dark arts?”

He nodded and the two of you left, splitting off from Daphne and Blaise.

You walked in silence for a bit

“Are you going to tell me what the matter is?” He stopped and faced you for a second

“I found out who sent me the cake” You admitted, continuing to walk

“And?”

“It was Terry Boot.”

Draco started to laugh.  “You’re lying”

“I swear but this isn't even the worst part” You were beginning to explain but he wouldn't stop laughing. “Draco, I’m serious! stop laughing there's more!”

He calmed down after a few seconds and you continued.

“I tried rejecting him nicely, but he just didn't take it. So I lied and told him I’m going out with someone”

“Oh? whos the unlucky bugger?”

You slapped his arm. “It's you”

“Me?” He looked genuinely shocked.

“I’m sorry it was the first name that came into my mind. But I just wanted to give you a heads up because he’ll probably tell his friends and the whole school will probably find out! Ugh I’m sorry Draco”

“Sorry for what?”

“Well that everyone’s going to think we're together”

“They could think of worse things, Y/N. Plus I don't care what they have to say about me,”

“you're not angry?”

“Of course not, people thought we were going out anyway.”

“Thank you, Draco, seriously”

“You know, we might as well make it believable, just until he moves on, something tells me Boot isn't going to let this drop.”

“What do you mean believable?”

“Like act like we’re a couple. Hold hands, you know all of that”

“But what about all your admirers”

“I could care less about them, your happiness and safety matters more than the opinions of the mediocre witches and wizards in this school”

You felt your heart swell a bit, you honestly didn't expect Draco to prioritise you like this. “So we should just fake it until he gets a girlfriend?”

“Exactly, just follow my lead”

You two ended up being a minute late to your lesson. He took your hand in his and the two of you walked in after everyone had taken their seats.

“Mr Malfoy, Miss Y/L/N, you are late to my lesson” Snape stated.

The whole class turned and looked at you, noting your hand clearly being held by Draco

“Sorry professor, we accidentally walked the long way from potions” Draco explained, swinging your hands.

“Two points from Slytherin, take your seats.” The two of you sat down.

“You and Draco?” Daphne hissed, knowing how long you had been crushing on him.

“Mind your business, Greengrass” Draco replied, sitting back in his chair putting his arm around the back of your seat.

“I'll explain later,” You promised, not wanting to piss off Snape, by talking in his lesson, any more than you already had.

For the rest of the day, you were ogled at like some caged animal in a zoo. Students from every year glanced and immediately dissolved into whispers with their friends. Word clearly travels fast around Hogwarts. You walked out of your last lesson with Daphne, getting ready to head to the Slytherin common room before dinner.

“You better be getting ready to explain this whole thing to me.” She said, pulling you away from the other students

“Yes, as soon as we get to our dorm-”

“Mind if I steal my girlfriend from you, Daphne?” Draco interrupted, appearing from what seemed to be nowhere.

“Yes I do actually,” She replied, pulling you further from Draco.

“Too bad, I’ll be taking her anyway”

“I swear I’ll tell you daph-” You explained apologetically, pulling your arm from her grasp.

Daphne stomped her foot like a toddler and turned to walk to the Slytherin common room. You, on the other hand, were stood with Draco, getting, even more, stares because the two of you were finally stood together, giving feeding truth into the rumour that was swirling around the school. He put his arm lazily around your shoulders and the two of you began your stroll to a more quiet part of the castle.

“I know you want to tell Daphne everything, but do you think that's wise?” He asked quietly

“Yes, she's my best friend, why wouldn't I?”

“I thought I was, I’m hurt”

“You are, you mug, but she is too”

“You know what a big mouth Daphne has, not to mention you know what she’s like once shes had a bit to drink, she might let it slip.”

You pondered what Draco had said. It was no secret that Daphne Greengrass liked to gossip, but it was also no secret that she couldn't handle her alcohol, spilling some of her families darkest secrets after a few shots. Not to mention had she slipped out that you lied about dating Draco it would be embarrassing for not only you but him.

“Ugh I hate that you’re right”

“When am I not?”

“But what am I supposed to tell her when she asks? She knows when I’m lying”

“Well we did spend basically the entire summer together, we’ll just say it happened then.”

“This is all so stressful! Why couldn't I have thought of another excuse? If I knew this was going to be the outcome, I would have agreed with him and said I found him ugly,” You dropped your head onto his chest. He wrapped both of his arms around you, swaying side to side.

“I know, love, but its too late to go back now”

You and Draco had been in this exact moment before in your friendship, only this time it felt different. You felt like you were more than two best friends consoling one another, it was almost as if you were just two teenagers in love. Only for a short while before reality came crashing down on you, it was all just fake.

The two of you went back to the common room to drop your school bags and robes before making your way to the hall for dinner. Despite it being late, there was still a large proportion of students sat down to eat. You took a deep breath as Draco’s hold on your hand tightened and the two of you walked in. Every single pair of eyes in the room were trained on you, it felt like an eternity before you finally got to your seats on the Slytherin table.

“Finally, you have no excuse not to explain yourself to me now, Y/N” Daphne scoffed.

“Don’t get your knickers in a twist, Greengrass. Were going out, that's it, what more do you want?” Draco retorted.

“Id like to know when, how, where. All of the details, Malfoy”

“Well we started going out in the holidays-” You began to explain before she cut you off.

“Pardon, the summer? As in 6 months ago? You have been hiding your relationship from me, your best friend for 6 whole months?” Daphne’s voice began to rise.

“Daphne-”

“Watch how you talk to my girlfriend, Greengrass, otherwise you'll find you can't speak another word.” Draco practically snarled at her, he looked as though he was about to rip her head off.

“I wanted to tell you, Daph I really did, I just wanted to keep it between Draco and I for a while, just in case it didn't work out, so it wouldn't be awkward.” You explained calmly.

“Hm, I guess that's a valid reason, you’re forgiven for now. But from here on out, I want to know everything. Did you at least find out who that ghastly cake was from?”

“Terry Boot”

She almost choked on her rice. You filled her goblet with some water and slid it to her.

“He confessed to me in potions, I tried to say I wasn't interested but he basically forced me to admit that I had a boyfriend”

“You poor thing,”

She had quickly forgotten and moved onto the next piece of Hogwarts gossip that took her fancy. Draco was engrossed with his own conversations and it hit you, your new reality was Draco Malfoy’s girlfriend, that was until Terry Boot managed to get his own one. It was something you had wanted since the second year, you felt as though you should have been over the moon, one of your most wild fantasies was playing out right in front of you, but you weren't. It wasn't going to last, you were sure he didn't even like you that way, he was just being the kind but overprotective Draco you had got to know over the past few years.

Once you had filled yourselves up with dinner, you and your friends made your way back to the common room, Draco's hand found yours and he held it as you walked down to the dungeons. Once you had got to the common room, Blaise forced a group of fourth years off the sofa in front of the fire and pulled out his deck of exploding snap, which you all played as a group. The warmth of the fire coupled with the comfort of the sofa made you want to curl up and fall asleep, you could feel your eyelids drooping as you tried and failed to suppress a yawn.

“Tired, love?” He asked, tilting his head.

“A little bit, I think I’ll head up to sleep in a bit” You responded, another small yawn passing your lips.

He nodded and simply pulled you into his side, your head falling on his chest and his arm around you resting on your hip

“God, you two are disgusting” Pansy grumbled as she walked past, taking note of you and Draco in your loved-up state.

“We all know you're just jealous you’re not in Y/N’s place” Crabbe laughed.

“Shut up Crabbe,” She snapped, trying to hit him around the back of his head but failing.

Your whole group laughed as she stomped away. You only managed to last another hour before you really were going to fall asleep, though you were reluctant to move from your position, you got up and announced you'd be heading to bed.

“I think I’ll join you.” Daphne yawned, getting up and stretching.

You made a move to leave but were pulled back by Draco.

“Gonna leave without saying goodnight were you?” He smiled

You laughed, “of course not, goodnight, Draco”

He kissed the back of your hand, sending a jolt of electricity from where his lips touched right to your brain, “goodnight, princess”

You smiled and headed up to bed, feeling as though you were floating on cloud 9.

Over the next few days, you had fallen into a routine, he’d wait at the bottom of the stairs from your dormitory for you to come down every morning, as soon as he saw you, he’d chirp a “good morning, love” before walking you to breakfast. He would walk you to and from every lesson that you didn’t have with him, he even went as far as waiting outside the girl's bathroom for you so he could walk with you back to the library. You had to admit it, Draco Malfoy was the best fake boyfriend.

One cold Wednesday afternoon, you were in the middle of a potions lesson, Slughorn was going on and on about the properties of belladonna, he even hinted it would come up in your exam, but all you could focus on was the contractions of your uterus. The first two days of your period were the worst, horrific cramps, bloating, tender boobs and hot flushes. Madam Pomfrey was aware of how debilitating your period was and would always send owls to your teachers informing them you would be absent from lessons, you didn't even care that Snape would find out about your period, all you wanted was to lie in bed. You tried your hardest to ride out the pain for the next 40 minutes of the lesson before you could go to the hospital wing and get something for the pain.

“Just ask Slughorn to leave early,” Daphne whispered.

“This is going to be on the exam, I can't just leave now”

“Y/N, you are literally dying, I’ll give you my notes, just please go to the hospital wing”

“I’ll be fine,”

You took a deep breath and shrugged your robe off you in an attempt to cool down. Draco slide you a note

‘Everything okay?’

‘Yeah, just my period, nothing to worry about :)’

‘Are you sure? I know how bad they get’

‘I’ll be fine, focus on the lesson!’

‘How can I focus when you’re in pain’

‘Oh shut up, I’ll be fine, I’m a big girl’

Draco read your last message and slid the sheet of parchment into his textbook. Another jolt of pain ran across your abdomen, causing you to squeeze your belly in pain. Draco’s arm shot up almost instantaneously.

“Professor, Y/N isn't feeling well, may I escort her to the hospital wing?”

“Of course m’boy”

You glared at Draco before collecting your things. and trying to discreetly leave the classroom without disrupting the lesson further.

“Do feel better Y/L/N” Slughorn called from the front of the room.

“Thank you, professor” you mumbled, feeling slightly embarrassed.

“Here give me your bag,” He said, going to grab your bag off your shoulder.

“I’m on my period, Draco, not dying”

He held out his hand anyway and you handed him your bag. He knew you hated being touched too much, it made you feel hotter, so he linked his pinky with yours.

“The corridors are empty, you don't need to hold my hand,” you stated, looking around

“I don't need to but I like to, your hands are soft” You saw him blush slightly as he said it. You simply smiled as the two of you walked into the hospital wing.

“Ah, miss Y/L/N, I’ve been expecting a visit from you” Madam Pomfrey went into her store cupboard and produced a violet potion and measured a dose. “You know the drill, come back tomorrow after breakfast and I’ll give you more, I’ll send an owl to your teachers, what’s your next lesson?”

“We have transfiguration” Draco answered for you while you finished downing your medicine.

“Right, well I’ll tell Professor McGonagall you'll both be absent from the lesson, be sure to catch up with the missing work Mr Malfoy”

You thanked Madam Pomfrey before returning to the Slytherin dormitory. The boys had managed to disable the charm that prevented them from coming up into the girls' dorms, so Draco followed you up.

“Draco, honestly I’m fine.” You signed, dropping onto your bed

“You don’t look fine,” He crossed his arms and looked down at you.

“I just need to get into some comfy clothes and lie down and I’ll be fine, I even have chocolate in my trunk.” You crouched down and opened your trunk and fished out your slab of Honeydukes chocolate. surprised to find that you only had 6 squares left.

“That’s hardly enough, wait here.”

“Dra-”

He turned and went down the stairs, leaving you alone. You changed out of your skirt and into some comfy trousers and were about to unbutton your blouse when Draco returned with a full slab of Honeydukes chocolate and his old quidditch jumper.

“I remember you saying how soft this was, I don't need it anymore, you're free to keep it,” He said sheepishly

“Thank you, Draco, seriously” He smiled at you and just stood there, looking at you. “Erm, I need to change,”

He slowly turned around and you unbuttoned your blouse and unhooked your bra throwing it on your bed before putting the jumper on.

“I’m done,”

He turned around, his eyes immediately landing on your black lace bra on your bed, you followed his gaze and quickly snatched the bra and stuffed it back in your trunk.

“I had you pegged for a cotton bra girl myself,” He smirked

“If you think that's scandalous, you should see what I wear on the bottom” you replied, winking. You got under your covers and began to open the chocolate, Draco sat awkwardly at the foot of your bed.

“Why are you sitting like that?”

“I’ve never been in your dormitory before,”

“It's literally the same as yours, come, sit” You moved a bit to the side and he came and sat next to you, stretching his legs out. At this point it was a reflex, his arms wrapped themselves around you as you buried yourself into him.

“Draco,”

“Hmmm”

“Thank you,”

“You’ve said that already”

“I mean it, honestly,”

“Anything for you, princess”. You two fell into a comfortable silence as you lay on his chest, being lulled to sleep by his chest rising and falling.

You were awoken by a loud squeal, you blinked and slowly opened your eyes.

“You two are just the cutest!” Daphne shouted.

You looked around confused for a moment until you saw what was in Daphne’s hand. She handed you a small bouquet of roses with a note attached that read:

I didn't have the heart to wake you, I’ll bring you dinner if you're not up to coming down, I hope you feel better, love - D x

You smiled as you conjured up a small vase filled with water. It was time to admit it, you were deeply, truly and utterly in love with Draco Malfoy

A Hogsmeade trip had been planned for that weekend, at first, you were planning on skipping it, but after some convincing, you decided you’d go. You decided to replenish your potions store, as well as getting some more quills and ink. Draco treated you to some sweets from Honeydukes, before you and your group headed into the three broomsticks to grab a butterbeer before you returned to the castle. You sat in a booth with Blaise, Daphne, Goyle and Pansy, choosing to squeeze yourself right in the corner. Blaise got up to order the drinks returning a few moments later with six butterbeers in his hands. The six of you fell into a discussion about the quidditch tournament, the boys getting heated over Ravenclaw’s win over Slytherin in their last match. After a while Daphne excused herself to go to the bathroom, only to run back a few moments later.

“You will not guess who I just saw snogging Hannah Abbott in the women’s toilet” Daphne yelled, sitting back in her seat at the end of the table.

You all looked at her, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“Terry fucking Boot!”

The whole group looked at you and Draco. At that moment you felt a million different emotions, recently it had felt like you weren't faking anymore, you had tricked yourself into thinking that it was all real, forgetting about your deal with Draco. But you knew that this revelation meant it was all over, you and Draco would fake an amicable break-up and remain to be best friends and the thought of that killed you.

“Well, at least now he won't get hexed for looking at my girlfriend” Draco joked.

You smiled and took a sip of your butterbeer. Once you had all finished your drinks, you returned to the castle and settled in your spot in the common room. You were sat with Draco but all you could think about was how this little bubble you were in was going to burst soon. You practically zoned out, your eyes losing focus as you stared at the fire.

“Are you quite alright? You look as though you’ve been stunned” Daphne asked, looking confused.

“Mmm I don’t feel too good, I don't think being out in the cold was a good idea” you mumbled, blinking slowly.

Daphne came and felt your forehead.

“You do feel a bit warm, why don’t you go lie down for a while”

You agreed and went up to lie in your bed for a while. You ended up skipping dinner too, you played up your symptoms to Daphne and she left you alone out of fear that she’d catch whatever you had. You didn’t end up getting out of bed until the next morning, barely having the energy to brush your teeth before you trudged to the great hall for breakfast in your pyjamas. Draco saw you come in and his eyes lit up, he was worried after Daphne told him you were sick. As soon as you sat down he began to pile food into your plate.

“Whoa calm down, I’ll barely be able to eat half of that” You pushed his hand back to the bowl of baked beans prompting him to drop the spoon back into the bowl.

“You haven’t eaten since yesterday, you must be starving, love”

You shook your head reaching for a cereal bowl instead. He looked at you concern filling his face. He kept glancing over at you while you ate, making note of your unusual silence. Once he had noticed you stopped eating your cereal squeezed your hand under the table, you pulled your hand away and acted as though you were scratching an itch on the side of your neck.

“Y/N why don’t we take a visit to madam Pomfrey, just to make sure you’re okay”

“I’m fine Draco, it’s probably just a cold”

“Draco’s right, you should make sure it’s nothing contagious or something” Daphne agreed

“Fine, let’s go then” You dusted your pyjamas off and got up, defeated.

You followed Draco out of the great hall. He began walking the opposite direction to the hospital wing and pulled you into a deserted part of the corridor.

“Are you okay?” He asked immediately, his tall frame towering over you.

“I’m just tired Draco, that’s all”

“You can’t lie to me, I’m your best friend”

“I’m not lying, I’m just tired, I haven’t been sleeping well the past few days”

“Has someone said something? Threatened you? I swear if I get my hands on them”

“No ones done anything. You don’t need to keep the overprotective boyfriend act up anymore, we’re alone and Terry has a girlfriend now”

“Act?” His face had fallen and he turned to look away

“Draco?”

“You really thought it was all an act?”

“Was it not? You said it yourself, we were faking it until he got a girlfriend so that he wouldn’t try and make a move on me”

“How can you be one of the smartest witches in our house but be so dense at the same time. “

“Excuse me,”

“It wasn't an act for me”

Your heart stopped.

“What?” you honestly couldn’t believe what you were hearing

“It wasn't an act for me. I didn't do all that just because I wanted Boot to back off, I did it cause I’ve fancied you for a while” Draco began pacing, as he explained himself

“but-”

“You said you would have gone out with the sender of that cake if it wasn't anonymously sent. I don't know why, but it didn’t sit right with me. I didn't like the fact that you were willing to go out with someone that wasn't me.”

“So you waited for me to find out who did send it, so you could propose this crazy idea?”

“I didn’t expect you to find out, hell I didn't even know I was going to say it, but once you agreed to go along with it, I felt like maybe you’d see that us being more than just best friends wasn't that bad, and maybe you'd be willing to give me a chance.”

“Can I let you in on a little secret?”

He stopped and looked down at you and nodded,

“I've fancied you since second year”

He smiled and grabbed both your hands

“And since we’ve been fake going out, I’m pretty sure I’m in love with you now,”

“Say that again”

“I’m in love with you Draco,”

“Say it again,” he said, placing his hands on your cheeks and staring into your eyes with adoration.

You laughed “I love you”

“I love you so much more, princess. Way more than I can even explain”

You beamed up at him, you felt like you could honestly explode at this point. all those years of crushing on him and wishing you could tell him how you felt, and here you were.

“I'm going to kiss you” He whispered

“I think it's about time you did”

He moved slowly before giving you a sweet but passionate kiss. His lips were softer than you thought they'd be.

“At least now we don't need to worry about telling our friends,” You joked, resting your forehead against his.

He laughed and kissed you again. Something you know you would never get tired of. As cliche as it seemed, you did it, your best friend was now your boyfriend. It was just you and Draco, safe in your perfect bubble.

[all-my-love-for-harry]

Make the day better.

summary: Y/N's son turns five and Harry doesn't know what to give him.

word count: 2.5k

Based on these requests:

"could you do artemis first bday with harry or christmas??"

and

"Love your writing. I have a request please, celebrating a birthday, could be Y/N, Harry or Artemis birthday"

and

"Can you do a blurb in the single mom series where Artemis is watching videos on YouTube but he sees harry in his 1d days and watches those vids and Artemis really likes and thinks one of the 1d boys are cool and stuff so harry does stuff to make Artemis happy, like maybe call that member or something? Sorry if it's trash I don't mind if you just throw it in the bin😂"

and

“I have an idea! For my shy little boy, could you do something about the moment that makes Harry realize he wants to keep y/n and Artemis forever and decides he’s going to marry her and hopefully adopt the little boy one day? Love your writing!!”

you can find more of my shy little boy here

a/n: saw these pictures and immediately thought about our little family. enjoy!

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞𓆝 𓆟 𓆞𓆝 𓆟 𓆞

December, 2018.

Artemis has discovered something new.

He has discovered old videos from Harry from when he was in the band. At first, he was confused as to why Harry wasn’t alone in the videos he watched like in the ones he was used to see. So Artemis did what always did when he was confused: ask.

Conveniently, Harry was invited to dinner at their house, and the first thing Artemis did when he crossed the door, was tell him. “Harry, I saw you on the TV!”

“You did? Did I look good?” He asked cheekily, sitting next to him on the sofa.

“Watch!” He turned on the television and pointed to it.

Harry chuckled when he saw his young self in the Best Song Ever music video along with the rest of his former band mates. “That’s you!” He said excitedly, clapping with his small hands.

“Yeah, buddy. I was in a band before.” Harry was happy Artemis seemed interested.

“What’s his name?” He asked, pointing one of the guys.

“The blonde one?” Harry questioned, receiving a nod from the small boy beside him. “That’s Niall.”

“He’s so cool.” He commented, kicking his legs back and forth on the couch. “He does music like you?” He asked.

“Yes, he does, mate.”

“He’s my favorite.” He decided.

“Oi! I am supposed to be your favorite!” He pretended to be offended, taking him in his arms and tickling him and making him let out a belly laugh.

“Stop! Stop!” He said in between giggles. “Harry, I’m gonna pee!”

“Say I’m your favorite.”

“You’re… you are… I can’t talk!” He laughed again and Harry stopped but didn’t let him go. “You’re my favorite, Harry.”  

Harry smiled, pleased with himself for getting the validation from an almost five year old. “Go wash up, it's almost dinner time." Artemis ran to the bathroom in the hallway as Harry walled towards the kitchen where Y/N was.

"I was a little behind but it's ready now."

"I'd help you, but you banned me from the kitchen the second i got in." The curly-haired man wrapped his hands from behind around Y/N's waist, resting his chin on her shoulder.

"It was because Artemis has been wanting to tell you he saw the band on the TV all afternoon." She giggled, putting the knife down and turning around to face him. "He asked why your hair looked weird."

"Wha'?" He asked, his accent getting noticeably thicker. "What was wrong with me hair?"

"He didn't like the long haired look." She passed a hand through his now much shorter curls.

"And apparently Niall's his favorite, can you believe?" Harry asked in a fake offended tone.

"Artemis likes blondes because he has blonde hair, kid's logic."

"Should i dye mine?" Harry's tone now was playful, grabbing a couple of his curls.

"Please, no."

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞𓆝 𓆟 𓆞

A week after dinner, Harry was scrolling down his phone desperately, trying to find the perfect gift for Artemis.

He had invited Harry to his birthday party, and although he was nervous to meet the rest of Y/N's relatives, he was more excited to spend this day with his girlfriend and her son. It would be the first time he was there to celebrate Artemis' birthday, so he wanted it to be perfect.

And a perfect day required the perfect gift.

He just didn't know what to buy. "Doesn't he like Legos? Buy him a set." Mitch said, trying to help. They were currently in a break from a writing session and almost everyone was out to get food.

"There isn't a set he doesn't have." Harry groaned, running out of options.

"What else does he like?"

"Books, robots, music..." He paused, suddenly getting an idea. "He likes music!"

"Buy him an instrument or something." Harry rolled his eyes, letting out a he's five to Mitch. "So?! Better start them young."

"Perhaps. But for now i think i have the perfect idea." Mitch looked confused, but Harry’s smile only grew bigger.

He wrapped up the session early and called a friend to see if they could catch up while having some drinks. His right leg shocked in anticipation, looking around trying to find that one familiar face he hasn’t seen in a while.

“Styles!” Harry smiled at that unmistakably Irish accent. “It’s been so long!” The pair hugged each other.

“Far too long. How have you been?” They took a seat on the table Harry was previously sitting on.

“Pretty great actually, tour ended a little while ago but stills feels very fresh.” He sighed. “What about you? Heard you’re dating someone.” Niall sent him a smirk, wiggling his eyebrows playfully.

Harry breathed a laugh, touching the bridge of his nose. “I am, met her at the beginning of the year. Her name is Y/N.”

“Look at you, you’re blushing!”

“Stop it!” Harry giggle, followed by Niall. “She has a kid, he’s great. They’re great.”

“I’m happy for you, H.” The blonde man gave him a genuine smile. “Is it serious?”

“Pretty much. So Artemis, Y/N’s son, is turning five next Saturday and I’ve been trying to get him the perfect gift.”

“Any luck so far?”

“Not really.” He shook his head. “That’s why I wanted to talk to you.”

“How can I help?” He readjusted himself on his seat.

“Well, I wanted to ask you a favor.” He paused. “The other day he found the band and said, for some reason, you were his favorite.”

“Ooh, and that how made you feel?” Niall teased him, knowing he didn’t like to be second in anything, especially talking about his girlfriend’s son.

“Delightful, next question.” He rolled his eyes playfully and Niall let out a big laugh.

“So want do you want me to do then?”

“Are you free next Saturday?”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞𓆝 𓆟 𓆞

Niall's appearance was a surprise, even for Y/N. He'd arrive later than Harry, just in time to sing happy birthday to Artemis. In the meantime Harry had to make sure everything else was perfect.

He was in charge to pick the cake up from the shop before heading to Y/N's mums' house. He already knew Ally and Ella, and they seemed to really like him so he felt a little less nervous.

Y/N told him a bunch of her friends were gonna be there, including Adam and his family so that was also nice. Harry wasn't very familiar with all of her friends but from what she always tells him, they're good people who care for her and Artemis.

Harry didn't have a key or anything so he knocked the door with one hand while holding the cake with the other. Ella opened the door, grinning at him right away. "Harry! It's so good to see you, love."

"Likewise, Ella." The woman pinched Harry's cheeks before letting him in. "Where should I put this?"

"In the kitchen! There's kids running around and we don't want them to drop the cake."

He did what she said and walked towards the kitchen, finding Ally decorating some cupcakes. "What do you think?" She took one out of the plate and showed it to him.

"Looks great. You've been practicing with the fondant." The cupcakes had a little whale on top of them, made with blue fondant.

"I made turtles, whales, crabs... Oh! Look at this little octopus!" Ally was so excited every single decoration turned out perfect, as her designated was getting the pastries done. "Y/N's changing Artemis's clothes in the guest room if you want to go upstairs with them."

He nodded, heading out of the kitchen and taking a quick look to the backyard. There were some people sitting on tables and a couple of children running around, but no one he knew so he listened to Ally and went up to look for his loves.

He knocked the door and heard Y/N say 'come in!' so that's what he did. "Harry!" Artemis exclaimed, trying to run towards him but Y/N stopped him.

"Stay still, baby. I'm trying to tie your shoes." She was knelt down in front of him, putting his shoes on. “Hi, honey.” She looked up at Harry as he bent down to give her a little peck on her lips.

“How’s the birthday boy?” Harry sat next to him on the bed and wrapped his arms around him gently.

“Did you see everyone, Harry? They’re here for me!” He said excitedly. He might be say, but he sure as hell likes the attention of his loved ones.

Harry chuckled, messing up his hair a little. “Happy birthday, mate. Couldn’t wait until it was time to open the rest of the presents, so here’s mine.” He handed him a small box wrapped nicely with a bow on the top.

Artemis took it excitedly and was about to tear the wrapping paper apart but Y/N took his hand gently. “What do we say to Harry, darling?”

“Thank you, Harry!” Artemis threw himself at the older man. “Can I open it?”

“Of course, it’s yours.” Artemis offered him a toothy smile, opening the box. Inside there was a package of professional colors, there was one in every shade. “I know how much you like your color books, and these are the best colors ever.”

“Wow, thank you, Harry. I love them.” The small boy hugged him one more time. “Look, mummy!”

“I see, they’re so pretty.”

Artemis hugged Harry once more before hopping off the bed. “Can I go with nana Ally now?”

“Yes, but leave your gift here, okay?” He nodded before handing his mum the box and running out of the room and off to find his nana. “Did you seriously buy professional colors to a five year old?” She asked with a smile, shaking her head in disbelief.

“What? He loves to paint.”

“Thank you.” Y/N said, kissing Harry’s cheek. “It was very sweet of you.”

Harry gave her a dimpled smile. “You look stunning, love.” Y/N was wearing a long, white summer dress with little sunflowers on it, paired with some heels.

“So do you.” She gave him another kiss. “Let’s go, I’ll introduce you to everyone.”

Going around greeting everyone, Harry had a hold on his phone all the time making sure Niall had the right address to get there in time. Y/N’s mums made a perfect job decorating the backyard, there were balloons everywhere and the tables had different marine animals on the center.

Artemis loved the ocean a lot, considering he lived in London and there wasn’t many beaches to go, he liked watching pictures and documentaries of it. So Y/N thought that instead of taking him to the ocean, she brought the ocean to him.

“Harry, sweetie, would you take the cake out of the fridge and bring it to the table?”

He nodded and went inside again. At the same time he was crossing the door, someone rang the doorbell so Harry went straight to open it, eager for Niall to arrive. “Didn’t want to show up empty handed so I bought the lad a little something. It’s a train set.” Niall said as soon as Harry opened the door.

“I’m glad you made it, mate.” They hugged and Harry closed the door behind them. “We’re about to cut the cake, he’ll be so happy to meet you.”

Harry was so excited for this surprise, ever since Artemis ‘discovered’ his band, he’s been obsessed with Niall so the curly-haired man couldn’t wait to see the look in Artemis’ face when he sees the blonde man walking into his party. He grabbed the cake before leading Niall outside where everyone was.

Y/N was the first one to notice the new man walking in, and her eyes grew wider when she recognized him. She walked towards them with a confused smile on her face. “Harry?”

“You must be Y/N.” The Irish man said with a grin. “Hope it’s okay that I’m here.”

“Uh, yeah. It’s great. Nice to meet you.” She offered him her hand for him to shake.

“I brought Niall to surprise Artemis.” Harry said proudly.

“Oh my, he’s going to be so happy, let me bring him over here.” Y/N went off to find her son. She’d never expect Harry to actually bring Niall for Artemis but it was a very sweet, thoughtful thing. “Honey, come here. There’s someone who wants to meet you.”

The five year old stopped running and walked towards his mum to take her hand and let her lead him to where Niall and Harry were. When he spotted Niall, he got all shy and hid behind her legs, like he always did when he got nervous.

Niall noticed it and crunched down to his eye level. “Hi, bud. A little bird told me you liked my music.” Artemis looked at him with big doe eyes, curious to know what was in the box Niall was holding. “Happy birthday, mate.” He handed him the gift and Artemis shyly took it from him.

“Thank you, sir.”

“Oh my god, he’s adorable.” Niall said, looking up to Y/N and Harry. “Call me Niall, okay? It’s nice to meet you, buddy.”

Artemis finally smiled at him, letting go of the hold he had on his mum’s dress. He came closer to Niall and started talking, Y/N and Harry looked at each other as she took one of his hands in hers to intertwine their fingers.

It was time to cute the cake and Artemis was stood on a chair behind it with Y/N by his side and everyone around him. She motioned Harry to come stand with them and he gladly did so. They sang happy birthday to Artemis and the boy had a big, toothy smile on his face the whole time.

Eventually the guests started to leave, but Artemis didn’t let Niall go before giving him a big, tight hug before making him promise they’d see each other again. Just before all the guests left, Artemis fell asleep and Harry had to take him upstairs to the room Y/N’s mums had for him. When he came down again, everyone was gone and his girlfriend was just finishing picking up some things outside so he went out to help her.

“Did you see how happy he was the whole day?” She said.

“Yeah, he enjoyed it.”

“It was really thoughtful of you to bring Niall, you know?” Y/N walked towards him and wrapped her arms around his waist. “He was very excited for it.”

“It was my pleasure, love to see him smile.”

“Thank you.” She told him, cupping his face with her hands.

“For what?”

“Today was good, but you definitely made it better. So thank you.”

Harry smiled happily before leaning down to capture her lips on a sweet kiss, making her smile against his lips. It was good to finally feel he belonged somewhere, and slowly started to feel they were becoming his own family. He’d never deny the way his heart skipped a beat every time Artemis laughed, or when Y/N smiled. Harry found himself wanting to be forever there for the two of them, for every single birthday, anniversary, everything.

He was in love not only with Y/N but with Artemis too, and he knew that feeling was never gonna go away.

☁☁☁☁☁☁☁☁☁☁☁☁

taglist!!

@myfavfanficsever @odetostep @la-cey @cock-a-doodely-doo @awkwardbullfrog @mellamolayla @moorgannn @bagtan-serendipity @awesomebooklover17 @finelineribs @sunnybusiness @beanholland @sweetenerstyle @cronias13 @vhsharry @maisley @seasidecrowbar @stylesfics-xx @autumnpauley20 @fineline-hs1 @stephaniemalvie @immajustreadwritereblog @jadert15 @iguessweallcrazyithinktho @abundanceofsoph @harrysthicccthighs

[sunmoonandeddie]

marriage story

pairing: bucky barnes x reader

word count: 5,641

summary: Fake marrying Bucky was only supposed to be a means to an end.

prompt: college au, fake marriage au, and enemies to lovers

warnings: swearing, talk of past sexual abuse

a/n: This was written for @broadwayandnetflix​ for @bucky-smiles​‘s Secret Santa!  SURPRISE!!!!  I’m so sorry I’m a day late, I just wanted to make sure it was as good as I could make it!!  I really hope you enjoy!!!

You weren’t sure how you ended up staring at divorce papers.

Hell, you’d just graduated college three weeks ago and had miraculously landed your first job that was conducive to your career.

And now, you were a divorcée at the age of twenty-one.

Granted, your marriage had lasted much longer than a lot of those that happened when the two people were teenagers.

It had also been fake, but that’s beside the point.

You read over the divorce papers for the eightieth time since they’d arrived.  Both of you took your individual things, no need for lawyers…

It had all seemed so simple when it first began.  A means to an end.

You were eighteen and stupid.  Desperate.  You had no idea what the consequences would be.

You had no idea that you’d actually fall in love with your husband.

He’d needed to live off campus since he couldn’t afford the on campus housing.  At a minimum of seven thousand dollars a school year, it was ridiculous.  You couldn’t really afford it either, but the school had a rule that you couldn’t live off campus until your junior year, and the two of you were still second semester freshmen.

Then there was the issue with your FAFSA.  You weren’t exactly on good terms with your parents.  And by not on good terms, you meant that you didn’t speak to them.  At all.  Getting their tax information wasn’t going to happen, and it wasn’t like they were helping you pay for college.

But FAFSA wouldn’t let you fill it out as an independent student until you were twenty-one.  Apparently, being cut off from your parents wasn’t enough of a ‘special circumstance’ to allow it.

But, there was one little thing that could fix all that.

Matrimony.

If you were married, you’d have to file independently.  No questions asked about parents.

And the university would allow you to live off campus, too.

It was a perfect solution.  A quick little trip to the courthouse.

Living together had seemed logical.  A little two bedroom apartment was much cheaper than seven thousand dollars for nine months in a dorm room you had to share.

Plus, you had to keep up the illusion to the school and the government that you were married.

Outside of living together though, there wasn’t much needed.  Each of you wore a fake ring when you went to your meetings with your advisor and your classes.  It kept the rabid frat boys away from you, at least.

And then there were the scholarships.  Turns out, there are scholarships specifically for married college kids, and your advisor thought you were just perfect for it because she’d never met such a wonderful couple.

It was all perfect.  Until it wasn’t.

First off, you and Bucky didn’t even really like each other when all of this started.  You only knew each other because you were best friends with Natasha, who was his best friend’s girlfriend.  It had actually been the two of them that had gotten the idea in the first place.

“So, I’m sure you’re wondering why we gathered you here today,” Steve said, and you couldn’t help but roll your eyes.

“Steve, this is my room.”

This was not how you wanted to spend your Saturday night.  You’d worked a double that day, from eight in the morning to ten that night.

The perks of working at a bar that did Mimosa Mornings on the weekends.  The worst part was that you weren’t even allowed to take a shot or two to help you get through it since you were eighteen.

Stupid fucking law.  If you could work in a bar, you should be able to drink to deal with the customers.  Because fuck, they’re horrible.

But you made more than you’d be making at Buffalo Wild Wings, that’s for sure.

“Can we just get whatever this is over with?” Bucky asked from across the room.  He definitely wasn’t keen to be stuck in a room with you for any longer than necessary.  “I have work in the morning.”

“Same here,” you added, narrowing your eyes at the two who sat in front of you.

Natasha was your best friend and your roommate, but fuck were you ready to put out a ‘New Friends Wanted’ sign.  You could take applications.

Requirement number one: Must not be dating the best friend of the most annoying prick in the world AKA Bucky Barnes.

Requirement number two: Must not be waiting to ambush you in your own dorm room with said prick.

“So, both of you are having issues with the university,” Nat said as she took out a bunch of papers.  “The dorms are crazy expensive and you’re not allowed to live off campus.  Also, FAFSA is ridiculous.”

“And we have a solution,” Steve said, a grin on his face.  He was such a giver.  He loved his friends more than anything in the world and would literally give anything for them.  Seriously.  You’d once watched him actually give the shirt off his back to Bucky when the latter had gotten drunk at a party and puked all over his.

He’d also gotten it on your shoes, and Bucky had just burped and said, “They look better now.”

The disgusting asshole.

“Well, spit it out,” you said, rubbing your temples.  You were still in your uniform, a pair of cut off jean shorts and a tank top.  Your hair smelled like cigarette smoke and someone’s beer that they spilled on you.  “I’d like to go to sleep before sunrise, please.”

“You two could get married.”

Both you and Bucky stared at them like they’d grown two heads.

“I’m sorry…  What the fuck did you just say?” You asked, standing up.

Natasha rushed to continue, still grinning.  “If you two get married, the university will let you live off campus, and FAFSA will let you file as independent!”

“And it’s cheap!  A marriage license only costs like… fifty bucks?  Something like that!” Steve said.

Well…  It wasn’t… a horrible idea, even if you and Bucky might end up killing each other before then.

“I don’t know...,” you said, the whole idea making you nervous.  Marriage?  Come on.

Bucky crossed his arms over his chest defensively.  “I really don’t want to be married to her.  We’d kill each other before we hit our six month anniversary,” he mocked, shooting a glare your way.

“It would only be until you graduate!” Natasha said.  “And then, you two get divorced and it becomes a funny story to tell at parties!”

You shared a look across the room with the brunette.  It would solve your problems…

“Fine.”

Turns out, getting married was a lot easier than you thought it would be.  All four of you went to the courthouse that next Tuesday when all of you had a break in between classes.

You wore a sweatshirt and leggings, your ratty sneakers that were covered in mud along the bottom.  Bucky wore jeans and a university hoodie.

Not exactly usual wedding attire.

Natasha, ever the optimist ever since she met Steve, had shoved a daisy she’d picked in your hair.

And an hour later, you’d walked out as Mrs. Barnes.

Wrapping your arms around yourself, you stood up from the couch and walked around the little place you’d called home since you were eighteen.

It had been quiet the first few months.  You signed a lease on an apartment a few blocks from campus and had moved in right at the end of the school year, but he went home with Steve to Brooklyn, New York.

You were alone the entire summer except for the few weekends that Natasha managed to come visit.  The only time you and Bucky spoke was when he texted you to let you know when he was moving in.

And that’s when the fighting had started.

As you stared at a picture of the two of you on the wall, you couldn’t help but laugh.  In the photo, you two were sitting on the couch, holding a cake that Natasha and Steve had gotten you as a joke.  HAPPY 2ND ANNIVERSARY! was written across it in bright blue icing.

It was a far cry from when you two had first moved in.  Everything was an issue.  You didn’t do this, he did that, the both of you wanted to watch different movies and he had brought the television but you’d brought the DVD player.  Everything.  Hell, you’d sleep on the bean bag in Natasha’s dorm some nights because even being in the same apartment as him was too much.

Eventually, there was compromise.  An understanding grew between you and with that, a truce.  You couldn’t keep living like you were.

You were pretty sure the war had finally, silently ended one late night in October.  It was the weekend before Halloween, and you’d had the worst shift of your life.

Your keys clanged as you unlocked the front door, trying to open it as quietly as possible.  Even from where you stood, you could see the clock above the stove that read 1:42 AM.  You were supposed to be off at ten, but that clearly hadn’t happened.  One of the other girls working had gotten sick and you were forced to cover the few hours she was supposed to work alone until close.

And to add onto that, you made less the entire weekend than you had last Friday night.  You’d been hit on, groped, yelled at.  Fuck.  You just wanted to collapse in your bed.

“You’re home late.”

“Fuck!” You jumped in shock, your heart pounding in your chest.  God.  Your anxiety had just spiked and the exhaustion you’d been feeling was replaced with your fight or flight instinct.

Bucky was standing in the hallway entrance, brows furrowed.  “Sorry.  I didn’t mean to scare you.”  He had on those gray sweats that he looked so good in…

No!  Down girl!  Bad!

It didn’t matter that he was hot.  He was a total dick.

Though, lately he’d be rather kind.  Nice.  There’d been less fights in the past few weeks.

You cleared your throat, looking away from him.  “Yeah, Wanda got sick, so I had to close.”

“There’s dinner in the microwave,” he said, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Oh.  Thank you.”

He nodded, before disappearing down the hall.  It surprised you when you heard the bath start, but whatever.  Whether or not he took baths was none of your business.

You were surprised to find a huge bowl of vegetable soup in the microwave.  Huh.  You’d just been talking to Natasha about how much you missed your mom’s homemade version.

Whatever.  It wasn’t like you’d ever be having that again.

You let your head rest on the counter as you waited for the soup to heat up.  Fuck.  Your entire body ached.

“Hey, do you want epsom salt?” Bucky called out from the bathroom.

“Uh, what?” You said as you raised your head.  Even just moving that little made your head pound.

He poked his head out of the doorway, his long hair pulled back in a bun.  “For your bath?  Do you want epsom salt?”

“My bath?  What the hell are you talking about?” You asked as the microwave beeped.

Bucky leaned against the doorframe.  “The bath that I’m currently running you.  Do.  You.  Want.  Epsom.  Salts?”

There was a long pause as the two of you stared at each other.  “Yeah,” you said finally, your voice coming out a lot smaller than you expected.  “That would be nice.”

Once he’d disappeared back into the bathroom, you pulled out your phone and texted Nat.

To: Tasha

Why is Barnes acting weird?

From: Tasha

Which one of you?

Get it?

Cause you’re married?

To: Tasha

Yeah

I got it.

But he’s being fucking weird.

From: Tasha

How so?

To: Tasha

He made me dinner?  At least, he poured vegetable soup from a can into a bowl and left it in the microwave.

Oh

And he’s running me a bath???

V V strange.

If I don’t text you tomorrow

It’s probably because he killed me

From: Tasha

Oh that

To: Tasha

What do you mean

“Oh that”????

NATASHA

ANSWER YOUR PHONE

From: Tasha

Sorry, was talking to Steve

He mentioned you’d been working a lot and how tired you were so I told him he should do something nice.

And I may have told him that you missed your mom’s vegetable soup.

So that probably explains that.

“Hey, it’s ready,” Bucky said as he came into the kitchen.  “I’ve got some towels in the dryer going, so they’ll be all warm when you’re ready to get out.”  He seemed so… laissez-faire about it.  Like you two didn’t fight on a daily basis usually.  He watched as you took a bite of the soup, his blue eyes zeroed in on you.  “Do you like it?” He asked.  “I tried following my ma’s recipe.  Don’t know how well it went.”

You couldn’t help but moan around the spoon as the warm soup went down.  Even reheated, it was amazing.  “This is your mom’s recipe?  It’s amazing.”

His cheeks flushed as he tried to hide a grin.  “Thanks.  I’ve missed her cooking.”

It was silent as you finished up the soup, the only sound being the spoon clanging against the bowl.  It wasn’t until you set your dishes in the sink to wash the next day that he spoke again.

“Oh, I got you this,” he said as he pulled out a box.  “I saw my advisor and he knows that we’re married and he mentioned that we still don’t have rings, so I just went and grabbed a ring from a thrift store.”

It was then that you noticed the simple silver band on his left ring finger, glinting in the low light.

“You didn’t have to do that,” you said as you took the box.  But your breath was stolen from your lungs as you opened it, revealing a gorgeous diamond engagement ring with a matching diamond wedding band.  “It’s…  It’s beautiful…  Thank you…”

“You’re welcome,” he said softly, rubbing the back of his neck.  “Uh, you go ahead and get in the bath.  I’ll bring you the towels when they’re done.”

As you sat in the bath, you couldn’t help but stare at the rings that now resided on your left hand.  They glinted in the low light of the candles that had been placed in various places around the bathroom, most likely lit with Bucky’s lighter from the local smoke shop.

They were absolutely stunning.

Maybe… just maybe… this marriage wouldn’t be as bad as you first thought it would be.

You glanced over at the table as your phone buzzed, running to it.  Maybe it’s Bucky…

But your hope was dashed as you realized it was Natasha calling you.

You hadn’t realized you’d been crying until a drop of water fell on the screen.  Wiping your eyes, you brought it up to your ear.  “Hey, Tasha!  What’s up?”  You couldn’t help but wince.  You sounded like a fucking real estate agent.  Perfect and peppy and… not you.

“Hey, I just wanted to call and see how you’re doing,” she whispered, as though she was trying to keep someone else from hearing.  “Bucky got the divorce papers today and I figured that meant you did, too.”

Ah, another thing.  He’d been staying at Steve and Natasha’s place since all of you had graduated, and the time had come for the divorce.  He’d gotten all of his things out within two days, except for the hoodie you were currently cocooned in and your wedding rings.

“I know how much you love this place,” he’d said with a wry smile.  “So you can have it in the divorce settlement.”

It had been a joke.  The divorce settlement.  Like you two had actually been in love and things just hadn’t worked out.

“You aren’t gonna change the Netflix password on me, right?” You asked as you stood in the doorway of Bucky’s room, arms crossed over your chest.  “Because I’m still paying for half of it.”

Buck grinned at you as he taped the last box shut.  “I don’t know…  Might change it up on you.  Have it all to myself.  Then my suggested movies and shows won’t be so fucked up,” he teased.

You rolled your eyes, glaring at him.  But there was no heat behind it.  “We have separate profiles on there, you dumbass.  So if Gossip Girl is on your suggested, that’s your fault.”

The laugh that erupted from his mouth made him throw his head back, his eyes crinkling at the corners.

Seeing Bucky Barnes laugh was one of the Seven Wonders of the World.  It was better than the Great Pyramids of Giza, the Taj Mahal, and the Great Wall of China all rolled into one.

“We’re still gonna have Thursday night movies, right?” You asked, trying to ignore the way your voice cracked.

In the three years since you’d gotten married, Thursday night had become your sort of fake Date Night.  You two would order takeout and watch movies until the both of you passed out of the couch.  You both changed your availability at your jobs to let them know that you couldn’t work Thursdays.  Not even Natasha and Steve were allowed to intrude.  It was just your special night to hang out.

“I’ll bring the food.  Do you want Thai or Mexican?” He asked, his features a little softer.

“I’ll text you what I want,” you said.  Biting your lip, you toyed with the rings on your left hand.  “I guess I should give you these back, huh?”  You started to slip them off, but he stopped you.

“They’re yours,” he said, his hand closing over yours.  His blue eyes shimmered in the light as you swallowed.  “Keep them… as a reminder of your former husband.”  The corner of his mouth twitched, but you couldn’t tell if he was going to smile or frown.

“I’m gonna miss you,” you said, suddenly surging forward to hug him.  “Even though you’re super annoying.”

Bucky laughed as he wrapped his arms around you just as tight.  “I’m gonna miss you, too.”

“How’s he doing?” You asked as you moved to what had formerly been Bucky’s room.  It was now completely bare, except for a single gum wrapper on the floor.  You sank down against the wall as you stared at it.  Extra wintermint gum.  Because he absolutely hated spearmint.

“About as well as you, I imagine,” she said slowly, choosing her words ever so carefully.  “I don’t know.  He went out for a walk a few minutes ago.  But he locked himself in the guest room for hours after getting the papers.”

You let your head fall back against the wall, staring up at the ceiling as you tried to stop another onslaught of tears.  “This is what we wanted,” you said, your voice cracking.

A pause.  You could feel the tension even through the phone, a can of worms Natasha was about to open.  “Is it?  Is this what you wanted?”

“This was always the plan!” You retorted, the tears coming in a wave now.  “We’d stay married until after we graduated and then we’d divorce.  No drama, no court, no lawyers.  Just a means to an end.”

You could hear her whispering to someone that you knew was Steve on the other end for a few seconds, the sound muffled.  She’d probably covered the speaker.  “Do you want me to come over?” She finally asked.

“No,” you said with a sigh, rubbing the hell of your palm against your eyes.  “I just wanna… curl up in bed and watch cheesy movies and never come out.”

You didn’t understand.  Why did this hurt so bad?  He was just a friend.  You two had never even kissed, for crying out loud.  This wasn’t some fanfiction where you two fell into bed one drunken night and then woke up with feelings.  This wasn’t an ‘Oh no, there’s only one bed’ type of deal with 100K+ words on AO3.  You two were just friends.  Really.  There was no happy ending for the two of you waiting.

“Are you still gonna go to the Barnes’s Fourth of July party?” Natasha asked, her voice softer.

You pulled your knees up to your chest, resting your chin on your knee caps.  “There’s no point.  We’re not married anymore.”

“Sweetheart,” she chided.  “You know he’d want you there.  So would his family.  You’re still a Barnes, even if you change your last name back.”

“I don’t know,” you said, chewing on your bottom lip.  “I like the last name Barnes better.  It’s not like I have any connection to my old last name.  Maybe…”  You swallowed.  “Maybe I should keep it.  It costs money to change it back, after all.  It’s on my license now.”

Ah, yes.  Because your license had expired while you were married and you’d had to get a new one.

“You’re a Barnes now and forever, hon,” she teased.  You could hear her smile through the phone.  “And you know Winifred would be pissed as hell if you didn’t go.  You’re her daughter now just as much as Bucky is her son.”

God, the tears came on like a tsunami when you remembered the Barneses.  George, Winifred, Becca, all of them.  Especially Winifred.  Sweet, sweet Winnie that had become your mom in the years since you’d met her.

“Bucky, I don’t know about this,” you said as you walked up the steps to his place.  Or, rather, his parents’ place.  “I should just go home.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he scoffed as he searched for the right key.  “I’m not letting you drive the way back just to spend Christmas alone.”

Truthfully, it was stupid to even suggest.  Your apartment that you shared with him now was over eight hours away, and it was two days before Christmas Eve.

God, how the hell did you end up here?  You’d been planning on spending it alone, just like you had Thanksgiving.

But when Bucky had come back from the break and realized that you hadn’t gone anywhere, it’d prompted him to ask why, which had then resulted in him insisting on you accompanying him to New York City for Christmas with his family.

“What if they don’t like me?” You asked, barely audible.  In truth, you were terrified.  This was your first holiday season that you were away from your parents.  Thanksgiving had been strange, and you had certain it wasn’t going to get any better up until a few weeks ago.

Bucky stopped suddenly, looking at you with big blue eyes.  “Sweetheart, they’re going to adore you,” he said, more sincere than he’d been since the two of you had gotten married.  “How could they not?”

“You didn’t!”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t like me either.  And then we got to know each other.”

He had a point.

You grumbled, staring down at your boots.  They were still covered in snow.

“And besides, Ma hasn’t shut up about meeting you ever since she found out about you,” he muttered as he finally found the right key.  “Dad said she’s been obsessively cleaning the house since she found out you were coming.”

As soon as the opened the door, you were hit with a wall of sound.  A woman with the same shade of hair as Bucky rushed forward, trapping the six foot man in a hug.  “YOU’RE HOME!”

“Winnie, come on, don’t suffocate the boy.”  A man with Bucky’s eyes appeared, his hands shoved in his pockets.  He was trying to appear nonchalant, but the second he was free of his mother’s grasp, he was dragging him into another hug.  “I’ve missed you, son.”

“And you must be his wife!” Winifred Barnes said, suddenly turning on you.

“Ma, she has a name.”

“I know that!”

“Winnie–”

You were pulled into a hug, and you were suddenly overwhelmed with feelings.  Maybe it was just the fact that you hadn’t hugged your own mother in so long, or maybe it was just because Winifred was that lovely of a person.  Either way, you were tearing up as she hugged you tightly.  You gave her your name as she pulled back, looking over your face.

“Oh, you’re even prettier than Jamie said!”

Your cheeks flushed as Bucky grumbled out a quiet “Ma…”

It was then that you were swept into the apartment, finding it bustling with people.  You were then introduced to the rest of his family: his younger sister, Becca, who was going to be a senior in high school and was SO grateful to have a new sister, his aunts, his uncles, his parents.  The entire apartment was bursting with people even days before the actual holiday.

It wasn’t until after dinner (which was absolutely delicious) that you were able to capture a quiet moment in the kitchen, helping Winifred wash dishes.

“Thank you for having me over,” you said, to break the silence.  It wasn’t uncomfortable, surprisingly, you just felt like you needed to vocalize your thanks for what was probably the third time.  “It means a lot.”

“Any friend of Jamie’s is a friend of ours,” she said as she rinsed off a plate.  “And we’re so grateful for what you’re doing.  He mentioned that it helps you, too, but…  Our family can’t afford to pay for his housing.  We can barely make his tuition.”  She looked at you with crystal clear eyes that seemed to bore into your soul.  “We’re so happy to have you.”  She then paused, glancing over at the side of the sink, where you’d set your wedding rings just to make sure they didn’t slip off in the water.  “You know, I was so happy when he asked for my ring.  He’s always dreamed of giving it to a girl.”

“What?” You asked, looking at her in shock.

Winifred paused, her brows furrowed in a way that really reminded you of your husband.  “Did he not tell you?  The engagement ring is mine.  But he saved up over the summer to buy a matching band for it.”

Your heart raced in your chest as you stared at the rings.  Bucky had gotten his ma’s ring for you?  But… why?  You two were barely friends at this point.

“I would’ve been spending Christmas alone if it wasn’t for him inviting me,” you said, breaking her stare to look down at your soapy hands.  “He found out I spent Thanksgiving at home and almost shit a brick.”  You rushed to cover your mouth, to apologize, but she just snorted.

An easy smile tugged at her lips.  “Holidays are a big thing for our family, and I guess we passed that down to Jamie.  Everyone comes to town for about a week and we spend it drinking and shooting the shit, baking.  We can’t afford much, so our gifts are usually just spending time together,” she said.

“It sounds nice,” you whispered as you scrubbed absentmindedly at a pan.  “My family… even when I still talked to them, we were never big on holidays.”  Winifred had gone quiet beside you.  “It was always just us.  We’d eat dinner together and sometimes I’d get a present, but mostly it was just spent like any other day.”

She took a deep breath, setting a plate on the drying rack.  “What… happened?  If you don’t mind me asking?”

“I… confronted my parents about the sexual abuse I went through as a kid,” you said slowly, swallowing around the lump that had suddenly formed in your throat.  “My cousin…  He, uh…  He’s only a year and a half older than me.  From the time I was… four or five, I think, to about twelve, he would… you know.”  The kitchen felt deadly silent, and you were so glad that the rest of the Barnses, including Bucky, were in the living room.  Even though he knew the basics of what had happened, you never told him details.  “And my parents would punish me for it when he got caught.  They blamed me.  They’d ground me or spank me or… whatever.”  You let out a weak laugh, trying to lighten the mood.  “They didn’t really take it well.  It doesn’t matter though.  I’m fine.”

You were shocked when you were suddenly pulled into a tight hug.  Winifred’s arms formed a cocoon around you and you could feel her tears on your face.  She was only an inch or two taller than you.  “That was not your fault,” she gasped out, holding you to her.  “That was not your fault.”

Before you realized what was happening, you were clutching onto her as hot tears streamed down your cheeks.

You didn’t know how long she’d held you before she leaned back, wiping away your tears.  Or at least, trying to before they were replaced with more.  “You are not what he did to you, you hear me?” She asked, wiping at her own face.  “You are always welcome here.  We’re your family now.”

“What’s going on here?”

The both of you turned to see Bucky in the doorway, his sea blue eyes wide.  He was holding a few extra plates that had been left behind.

“Nothing,” she said with a watery grin.  “Just… talking.”

“Here,” he said as he walked over and put the dishes inside the sink filled with soapy water.  “I’ll finish up with my wifey here, and you go clean up before dad freaks out because you’re crying.”

She barked out a laugh, nodding.  “Fine.  Fine.  You know how he gets if I’m upset,” she said, kissing your forehead before leaving.

“So… You actually okay?” Bucky asked as he took over rinsing the dishes you washed.

The smile that found its way onto your lips was real, surprisingly, as you said, “Everything’s great, Jamie.”

And even though he let out a groan, he was smiling, too.

It was after that trip that you’d started calling him Jamie.  It just… felt better rolling off your tongue than Bucky ever did.  It was also when holidays in Brooklyn became a permanent thing.  Anytime Bucky went home, so did you.

They were your family.

But now…  Now what?  Did you lose them like you lost your parents?

Granted, losing your parents wasn’t exactly the worst thing.

“Sweetheart?  You there?” Natasha asked, bringing you back to the present.

“Yeah,” you said, shaking your head to clear out the cloudiness of your memories.  “Yeah, I’m–”  You broke off as you heard a knock at the door, a frown tugging at your lips.  “Hold on, Tasha, I’ll call you back…”  You hung onto your phone as you walked to the front door, peeking through the peephole.

Bucky?...  What the fuck was he doing here?

You opened the door wide, shocked to find him crying.  His eyes were puffy and red, his nose running.  “Jamie?  What’s wrong?”  You reached forward to touch his shoulder, shoving your phone in your back pocket.

“Don’t sign those papers.”

“Wait…  What?”  Now you were even more confused.  Your brows furrowed as you pushed his hair back from his face.  God, he needed a haircut.  Maybe you could…  No.  Not the focus right now.

He stepped toward, half inside the apartment that had been his, too, just two weeks before.  His large, calloused hand caressed your face.  “I don’t want to not be your husband,” he said, his voice cracking.

Your heart thundered inside your chest and you were half sure this was some kind of trick of your mind to soothe its aching.  “What do you mean?”

“I want to make this work,” he said as he cupped your face in his hands.  “I… I want to actually have Thursday night Date Nights and take you out and when we go home for the holidays, I want to kiss you under the mistletoe my ma always hangs up, and I want you to wear my ma’s ring.  I want to be your husband.  Please.”

You didn’t realize you were crying–yet again, fucking damn it–until he wiped them away.  “I don’t want to not be your wife, either,” you said, your voice shaking.  “I love you, I love you so much.”

His lips met yours in a blazing kiss, holding you closer than you thought possible.  “I love you more,” he whispered against your lips.  “I’m never letting you go.”

You dragged him inside, shutting the door before kissing him again.  “You’re staying here.  None of this bullshit of you staying with Tasha and Steve.”

“Gladly,” he chuckled, holding onto your waist.  “But only if I get to sleep in your bed.”

“Only if we can shred those divorce papers.”

The moment was interrupted by his phone ringing, and you couldn’t help but giggle when you saw it was Winifred.  He shot you an apologetic look as he answered it.  “Hey, ma.”

She was speaking so loudly you could hear her clearly.  “Well?!  How did it go?!  Did you ask her?!”

“Yes, I asked her,” he said slowly, squeezing your side.  “She said yes.  I’m with her now.”

Both of you flinched away as she screamed in excitement.  “GIVE HER THE PHONE!  GIVE HER THE PHONE!”

You smiled as you pressed it to your ear.  “Hi, mom.”

“BABY!  I’M SO HAPPY!  NOW WE CAN HAVE A REAL WEDDING!”  She was speaking at a hundred miles an hour.  “Do you want a summer or fall wedding?  I think it might be too late to do summer, but I’m sure we could scrounge something together!”

You giggled as Bucky stole kisses from you while she was speaking, distracting you.

“Sweetheart?  You there?”

“A late summer wedding sounds perfect,” you said, unable to wipe the grin from your face.  “Absolutely perfect.”

[rosaliepostsstuff]

Little steps (George Weasley x reader) | pt 3 - Awe

Pairing: George Weasley x reader, (hinted) OC x reader

Part 1 • Part 2

Word count: 3254

Summary: Y/N and George deal with everyone around them with a week left to the ball, and then the big moment comes

warnings:  probably cursing, but nothing worse

a/n: it’s long but I’m not sorry this time. Next part will most likely be huge too, because I don’t really feel like dividing it up more, but maybe I’ll have to?..

George closed the door to his dorm room behind him and paused for a second, leaning back on it. “How’s the schoolboy doing? Library air working wonders?” His brother looked up at him before going back to the ‘Which broomstick?’ issue Lee and him were huddled over. His reflex was to get back at Fred for that lazy jab, but he didn’t, too dazed to care. He came over to his bed and plopped down onto it.

“I asked Y/N to the ball.” Both his roommates snickered and looked up at him. When he didn’t continue, they looked at each, then back at George. “You did?” Asked Fred, to which George answered with a confirming  “mhmm”.

Now they were both laughing. “How loud did she laugh at you, mate?” said Lee between wheezes. “On a scale of Pince’s shushes” added Fred, trying to fake seriousness. George smirked looking at the roof of his four-poster “She agreed” he said trying not to be smug, the idea still odd to him.

“Sure she did. If you snatched Y/L/N as a date, then I’m running for Minister when we graduate.”

The same night, you were all showered, in your PJs. You were standing in your little section of the dorm room, slowly brushing your long, h/c hair, getting ready for bed. Hermione already tucked in with her book, the rest of your roommates still out and about, so you were just with your friend, in that comfortable silence.

“I have a date to the ball” you broke it. “Hmm?” Hermione got detached from her evening read. “Oh, yeah. So he finally got around to asking you?” You broke your gaze from your reflection to look at her. “Actually, it’s not Matt.” Hermione raised her brows and closed her book after marking her page, but did not interrupt. “George asked me.” You pressed your lips tight. “George?..” You nod. She sits up “Our George?” Nod. “George Weasley..?!” “Well what’s wrong with that?” You stop brushing your hair, voice tone still soft, but you got slightly defensive when it was so hard to believe. “No, no.. not wrong�� she assured quickly. She was now fully sat up, pushed her covers off and swung her legs over the bed. “I – I guess I just.. didn’t realize the two of you talked? … Like that, I mean. You know, besides when we all hang out or we’re at the Burrow.” She was now examining the rug at her feet. You bit your lip and shrug, looking her in the eye.

As the end of term was getting closer, the time only seemed to speed up. You managed to finish the assignments you planned to do that time and tried to stay on top of the ones still coming up.

Week after your encounter with George were limited to the polite ’hi’ and small smiles across the table or the common room, when you caught each other’s eye, before looking away.

Matthew got around to asking you to the ball when you visited Hufflepuffs’ common room last the previous weekend. He wouldn’t bring that topic anymore.

You were sat on the couch, Matt’s long arm rested on the back of the couch behind you. Your friends were doing some kind of roast contest after a few butterbeers. You were laughing under your breath at them, your own bottle in hand. You felt his hand trace circles on your exposed upper arm – the fireplace in front of you and the faint amount of alcohol consumed enough to keep you warm. You looked up at him to see that his piercing eyes were studying your face. “Everyone in this castle seems to be talking about the ball” he said. “all the girls are freaking out.” accompanied by his iconic eye-roll, which earned your chuckle  “..are you excited, Y/N/N?” “For the ball? Of course.” you said, looking down at your lap. You started fiddling with the bottle in your hand, already knowing what’s about to come. “Will you be my date?” he said delicately poking your side with his free hand, his bottom lip caught between his lips in anticipation.

There was a week left till the end of the term. You were sat at the table with Hermione, who was pouring over her potions notes, Harry, reading Flying with the Cannons for the millionth time according to you, and Ron, who was  building a card castle out of his Exploding Snap cards, a novel in front of you. You were half listening to them bicker about schoolwork and Harrys lack of preparation before the second task of the tournament.

“Leave him alone, Hermione, he’s earned a bit of a break,” said Ron, and he placed the last two cards on top of the castle and the whole lot blew up, singeing his eyebrows. “Nice look, Ron… go well with your dress robes, that will.” It was Fred and George. They sat down at the table with you. “Ron, can we borrow Pigwidgeon?” George asked. “No, he’s off delivering a letter,” said Ron. “Why?” “Because George wants to invite him to the ball,” said Fred sarcastically. You kept your gaze fixed on the book and tried to hide how you twitched at that sentence, with the words ‘George’, ‘invite’ and ‘ball’ in it. “Because we want to send a letter, you stupid great prat,” said George. “Who d’you two keep writing to, eh?” said Ron. “Nose out, Ron, or I’ll burn that for you too,” said Fred, waving his wand threateningly. “So… you lot got dates for the ball yet?” he asked missing how you lifted your eyes from the book in front of you to George’s face for just two seconds, biting your bottom lip; his twin’s half-smile “Nope,” said Ron. “Well, you’d better hurry up, mate, or all the good ones will be gone,” said Fred. “Who’re you going with, then?” said Ron. “Angelina,” said Fred promptly, without a trace of embarrassment. “What?” said Ron, taken aback. “You’ve already asked her?” “Good point,” said Fred. He turned his head and called across the common room, “Oi! Angelina!” Angelina, who had been chatting with Alicia Spinnet near the fire, looked over at him. “What?” she called back. “Want to come to the ball with me?” Angelina gave Fred an appraising sort of look. “All right, then,” she said, and she turned back to Alicia and carried on chatting with a bit of a grin on her face. “There you go,” said Fred to Harry and Ron, “piece of cake.” “Well, I don’t suppose, Y/N..?” asked Ron quietly. You snorted without looking up. “Yeah, that’s what I thought…” Fred got to his feet, yawning, and said, “We’d better use a school owl then, George, come on…” They left. Ron stopped feeling his eyebrows and looked across the smoldering wreck of his card castle at Harry. “We should get a move on, you know… ask someone. He’s right. We don’t want to end up with a pair of trolls.” You looked up from your book now, and Hermione let out a sputter of indignation. “A pair of…  what, excuse me?” “Well — you know,” said Ron, shrugging. “I’d rather go alone than with — with Eloise Midgen, say.” “Her acne’s loads better lately — and she’s really nice!” “Her nose is off-center,” said Ron. “Oh I see,” Hermione said, bristling. “So basically, you’re going to take the best-looking girl who’ll have you, even if she’s completely horrible?” “Er — yeah, that sounds about right,” said Ron. “I’m going to bed,” Hermione snapped “you coming, Y/N?” You didn’t feel like going back to your book anyway, so you nodded and together you took off towards the girls’ dorm without another word.

As both Harry and Ron got rejected by the first girls they asked and the topic of Hermione’s mystery date came round you kept quiet, not because you didn’t know, but you wanted to see the look on their faces when they saw him next to her.

  One day during that last week, when afternoon lessons were over with, you decided to finish the chapter you weren’t able to the other evening. So there you were, lying on the couch, in the mostly quiet common room, as you heard multiple voices and laughs coming down the stairs to boys’ dorms. “I’ll believe it when I see it” said Lee, walking into the common room with Fred, George, Seamus and Dean. “Oi! Y/L/N! “ Seamus called over “Yes?..” you said without looking up “That true you’re going to the ball with Weasley?” You sat up, finally looking at the boys over the backrest “You dimwits got nothing better to do? Like last minute homework before the break?” “No” he said quickly, the boys still grinning, looking between each other. George was behind them, arms crossed at his chest, leaning back on one of the tables. “Well there’s lots of them, you’re gonna have to be more specific, dear” George looked at you, tilting his head to the side “Yeah, I am” “Seriously?! What’s he got, that I don’t?” asked Dean, pretending to be hurt “See - if you have to ask, you’ve got your answer, love.”

   December 25th, 1994

You stood in front of your great mirror, examining your appearance carefully. You were mentally checking all the steps of your preparations – make-up done, your hair done in a loose low-bun, delicate jewellery complimenting the dress you had on. Oh, that dress. Its colour worked with your hair and eyes beautifully, golden accents making sure you stood out, but not too overbearing. Your shoulders were exposed and the length of the dress was comfortable, so there were no accidental dance-related exposures, but short enough to accentuate your legs. Your feet were adorned with surprisingly comfortable heels, and you used just the right amount of perfume.

You kept wondering if there was something you could’ve forgotten. In that moment, when million thoughts a minute flooded your mind, you wondered if George had asked you, like many others, because you were popular and pretty. Then, you got worried if he even thought you were pretty at all. Glancing at the clock you concluded, you just did everything you could to live up to your reputation.

The entrance hall was already bustling with chatter, students talking to their friends and dates or still waiting for them.

George was standing with Fred and Lee, half-listening to their bickering. His hands slightly sweating in his pockets, he was subtly looking over everybody’s heads to try and find you, then glanced through the entrance to the Great Hall, checking for the third time already if you were perhaps waiting for him there.

His attention brought back to his friends after Lee mumbled a string of rather rude words. “Should I shake your hand or something, mate? Cause damn…” Said Lee directly to him. What was he talking about? Then George saw his twin stare at something behind him with his mouth slightly open. “You might wanna turn around, Georgie.”

Before that night, saying what he thought of you would’ve been difficult. He met for the first time when you were still just a kid. A friend of his brother, a fellow Gryffindor, who after your first year everybody was sure had a knack for heroics. He enjoyed his interactions with you, you weren’t quite like anyone else. Not always saying a whole lot, but when you did, it was on point and your comment only got more bold over the years. You were also popular in the school, especially after puberty hit, and you seemed to interact with people from all the houses. He couldn’t deny it, you were naturally beautiful. That used to be just a fact, irrelevant to his life.

At this very moment in time, as you were slowly making your way down the steps to the Entrance Hall, he couldn’t fathom why you would want to be his date.

Your eyes found him quickly, his tall figure standing out amongst the crowd. Your excitement and unfamiliar nervousness showing in a smile that could light up the darkest of times.

Your heart was hammering in your chest and you were begging the universe not to let you trip on those stairs, when you really couldn’t watch where you were going, your eyes glued to ones across the room. Damn, he looked good in those dress robes.

“Hi.” you said, still grinning, once you walked up close to him. “Hey..” he smiled at you, still feeling as if he was in some kind of limbo. “You look beautiful” he said sincerely, without much thought “Thank you” you almost whispered, looking down at your shoes and blushing a bit. You weren’t really good at taking sincere compliments. “You look real smart” you looked up at him. He was grinning and playfully ran a hand through his hair.

You were saved from trying to fill the silence, as it seemed that the champions had started to gather for their opening dance. “We should go inside.” you gestured towards the great hall with your head. He offered you his arm to take, which you did. As you made your way inside and stepped aside with everyone else, you didn’t let go, but tried to place that feeling. The feeling of being next to George.

As the two of you were dancing, that electric feeling didn’t leave you and you were enjoying George’s company and the comfort it brought you more than you even anticipated. An he was surprised with himself, how the tiniest of your reactions to his jokes, laughs or the most irrelevant comments encouraged him to just let go and be himself.

“I mean,  by now you should really just tattoo ‘Death threats welcome’ on your forehead.” he tapped his finger on your forehead “Haa-haa.. you’re the one who had a one-way snowball fight with You-Know-Who.” you replied, to which he scrunched up his eyebrows and looked at you in confusion.

The two of you were having a break from dancing, sat side to side at your table, butterbeer in front of you.

“Three years ago, we were all staying at Hogwarts for Christmas. You and Fred bewitched some snowballs to hit Quirrell on the back of his head, remember?” He nodded, smiling at the memory, but didn’t quite get where you were going just yet. “Well Qu-qu-quirrell turned out to be his number one fan, sharing a head with him, didn’t he?” George raised his eyebrows and you both laughed, leaning on each other as the realization dawned on him. “We’re on the hit-list too, then.”

You talked some more, of the events from the past you never shared your thoughts on, family, people from the school. Then you saw him, across the hall, looking at you.

“Do you mind if I go and catch up with some friends for a bit? I promise to come back.” “Yeah, sure.. of course.” George tried to sound casual. He joined some of his friends in a conversation and mentally scolded himself for feeling possessive of you when some tall Hufflepuff bloke kept smiling, standing so close to you. Or when he took you to dance.

 When you walked up to your best friends later, it didn’t go at all as intended. Before the ball you were anticipating Ron’s reaction to Hermione going with Victor Krum, just wanting to get back at him for being nasty. You didn’t expect him to be even nastier after finding out, as you were currently listening to their fight. Truth be told, Ron’s dumb accusations made you speechless at first, but it was getting out of hand. “Obvious, isn’t it? He’s Karkaroff’s student, isn’t he? He knows who you hang around with… He’s just trying to get closer to Harry — get inside information on him — or get near enough to jinx him —” “Would you listen to yourself?! Or have you gone bonkers sitting at the table, green with jealousy the whole night?!” you stepped in “Oh, what would you know about that? I’m surprised you noticed what I did tonight as you were having so much fun with my brother. What’s up with that, huh?! Were you planning on telling me about it?” “Okay, that does it!” Hermione grabbed your hand and pulled your speechless form out of their sight.

 When you eventually got back to him, George sensed something was off, but he didn’t feel in place to ask about it. He did the best he could in this situation – take your mind off of it. You were dancing, both your hands in his, and he did everything so over-the-top. Spinning you, then pulling you close to him. After a while, you were a giggling mess, enjoying the sound of his laughter, worries forgotten.

“All right Hogwarts, just a couple numbers left until this night is over, so make the most of it.” said the vocalist of the Weird Sisters, before a slow song came on.

You both froze, testing each other’s reaction, hands still together, though the grip a bit looser.

“Do you.. want to..?” he trailed of his question. “I mean, the ball is almost over, it would be a shame to just sit it out..” was the best answer you could gather up courage for. With that you let go of his hands to place hands delicately on his chest. You were looking at your feet, feeling as if looking up at his would be too intimate. His own hands went carefully to your waist, both of you testing the waters.

And you swayed like that, content with what you had, close to each other, but neither pulling the other in completely.

Being close felt like the forbidden fruit you took a single bite out of, but taking another one would be pushing your luck.

And then the music stopped. You joined in as the crowd clapped the band one last time, listened in silence as Dumbledore thanked everyone and bid you goodnight.

“Let’s let the crowd pass a bit, yeah?” you asked, and he squeezed your hand lightly and nodded.

You were walking back to the common room in silence. Almost comfortable silence. It was just such a shame the night was over, when it could go on forever.

“I had fun tonight, so I guess, thanks for that? I mean, I expected no less” you bumped his side with the little energy you had. “At your service, m’lady” he bowed his head with a charming smile “I had fun too”

Silence.

Before you knew it, you were in front of the Fat Lady. George told her the password and the both of you came through. You only stopped next to the stairs to the girls’ dorms.

“I really had a good time” you were stalling. “Me too”

You let go of his hand to face him properly, standing on the first step to be a little taller, to which he chuckled. Now, closer to his eye level, looking at him was truly intoxicating.

Tonight changed how you saw George. It showed you just how much you liked him as a human being and how well you got along. When you looked at each other, relaxed smile on his face, you looked at his lips and wanted to kiss them so bad.

But you had forbid yourself to jump head first.

You kissed him on the cheek. “Goodnight, Georgie.” you said softly, pulling away. “Night, Y/N..”

You walked up the stairs, leaving him dazed at the bottom.

Part 4

[adoras-last-braincell]

It’s Catra’s birthday time to repost my tiny fanfic about Adora making* her a birthday cake

(*attempting to make)

---

This, Adora thought to herself as she blew a strand of flour-covered hair away from her eyes with an aggravated puff of air, had been a terrible idea.

It seemed like a great idea earlier. Catra had just learned when her birthday was. Catra had also learned that she really, really liked sweets. Not that she’d admit it, of course, but the dilated pupils when she wolfed down her first dessert and the way the kitchen’s candy bowl always seemed a little less full after her nightly patrol had been more than enough for Adora. Bow nearly choked when Catra, whose previous drink order consisted of coffee “black as night and bitter as my soul,” showed up to morning meetings nonchalantly sipping on something more cream and sugar than actual coffee.

Glimmer and Bow had made Adora a cake for her “birthday,” even if the date was just a guess, so... why not return the favor?

Well, that question had answered itself pretty thoroughly.

Adora surveyed the flour-covered kitchen, trying and failing to clean sticky hands on her apron before wiping the back of her wrist across her sweaty forehead. Something smeared. Ugh.

All because Glimmer’s aunt had to knit a sweater for Catra, and had to ask when her birthday was.

-

Catra blinked. “I don’t know.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to try harder than that, dear,” Castaspella said with a laugh. “If you don’t tell me your birthday I’ll simply give it to you for Winterfest. Although that’s such a long way off...”

“No, she really doesn’t know,” Adora broke in. “The Horde brought us in when we were babies, and we never knew about birthdays. Neither of us know when we were born.”

Castaspella gasped in horror, bringing a hand to her chest. 

“Oh, you poor children!” Adora felt Catra bristle by her side. “Why didn’t you tell me! Here, I know a very simple spell—” 

Before either of them could explain how much Catra hated magic, Castaspella lightly touched their shoulders.

“Let’s see,” she muttered, “seven thousand, three hundred and two… Why, Catra, yours is only two days away! And Adora, yours is…”

She barely heard. Two? Only two days? She had planned to do something nice for Catra, like Bow and Glimmer had for her, but in months—not days. What could she even do?

A cake. She should be able to learn how to do that, at least. How hard could it be?

-

Pretty hard, as it turned out—in both the literal and figurative sense. She poked at the misshapen slab that lay on the plate before her. Not even frosting could disguise that.

It was an unmitigated, indisputable, irreparable disaster.

Which must have been why Catra chose that moment to poke her head into the kitchen.

“Don’t!” The squeaked protest escaped Adora before she could stop herself, sudden and loud. Catra jumped.

“Adora? What the—” Her eyes swept the disaster area before her. “What happened?”

Well, too late now. 

“Nothing good,” Adora sighed, leaning her elbows on the counter and letting her head hang low as she deflated. Something was soaking into her sleeve from the countertop. Her feet hurt.

The mighty She-Ra, laid low by a cake recipe.

“Did a bomb go off in here?” Catra asked, stepping carefully around the sticky patches and clouds of flour that littered the kitchen floor.

“I was trying to bake,” Adora mumbled.

“Why?” Catra sounded genuinely horrified, which would have been almost offensive if Adora had heard it several hours ago.

Instead, she pushed off from the counter with another sigh, mustering up a fake smile as she gestured to the… thing… on the plate behind her.

“Ta-da.”

Catra stared.

“You frosted a rock.”

Hours of frustration solidified, and Adora narrowed her eyes. “I will kill you.”

Catra poked experimentally at the mound of hardening frosting. “I think you’re already trying.”

“It was supposed to be for your birthday, you jerk.”

“Right,” Catra said, trying to shake a glob of frosting free from one claw, “Because nothing says ‘happy birthday’ like attempted homicide.”

“Oh, come on,” Adora said. “It isn’t that bad.”

They stared in silence at the misshapen mound. Catra raised an eyebrow.

“Okay, maybe it is.”

“Yep.”

“Argh!” Adora raised her hands to her head in frustration, then pulled short when she remembered their current, sugar-sticky state. “Stupid recipe—stupid cake! I just wanted to give you a stupid gift for your stupid birthday—”

“Oh, trust me,” Catra said with a wicked grin, “Seeing you screw up this spectacularly? Best gift I could have asked for.”

“Catra.” Adora dropped back down to the counter with a heavy sigh. “Look,” she said a moment later, raising her head enough to stare at a wall. Somehow she’d managed to get frosting all the way over there, too. Impressive. 

“This is your first real birthday outside the Horde. First birthday ever, really. I just… wanted to do something nice.”

“You did.”

Adora looked up to see Catra staring at the counter, absently tracing a pattern into a small cloud of flour. “I’m being an ass about it, but… it means a lot that you tried. For me.”

A beat.

“Even if you really, really failed—”

In the next instant, Adora had stepped forward and wrapped Catra in a tight embrace. She jumped slightly with a short, startled inhale, then relaxed and returned the hug.

“Happy birthday, Catra.”

Catra laughed slightly, and the breeze of it stirred Adora’s hair. “Thanks. Sap.”

A pause.

“You have frosting in your hair, you know.”

A heavy, tired sigh.

“I know.”

-

[uhgoodmoni]

Valentine Schmalentine | JJK

Summary: Jungkook and his best friend thought that the best way to spend valentines was with each other! What a better way to spend the sometimes dreaded holiday by making fun of it with your bestie! Their ‘anti date’ is more of a date than they think it is.

pairing: jungkook x female oc (for those who hate y/n :D )

warnings: - This is all fluff - teeny bit of angst - gets a little heated but I promise it’s just fluff

links: Ao3  wattpad

—

I giggle at the little presentation in front of me. Wow! I did good. Jungkook will wish that he’d get a girlfriend as good as me. I’ve prepared a disgustingly beautiful spread of treats and gifts for him. There’s no way I didn’t one-up him. He made the mistake of letting me host. 

I decorated, the pink ribbons swirling down from the high ceiling. I baked, which I’m sure he’ll be expecting, but I’ve really outdone myself this time. Heart-shaped cookies, decorated with colorful sprinkles and pink frostings. Muffins with little paper hearts stuck in them. Of course, how could I forget chocolate covered strawberries. On the left of the counter was a shrine of gifts. A teddy bear. A card is written with absolute bullshit but a token of our friendship as well. Some chocolate boxes and I had found this cheesy snow globe that you can put pictures in. So I put myself in it of course. Bet he’ll love seeing that. And one gift that I am actually excited to give to him, is matching bracelets with little rabbits on them. Maybe I did a little bit too much. After all, this is supposed to be a joke. 

His job is to bring dinner, so there is no way he can beat this. Not that it’s a competition, but it kind of is. 

‘are you almost here?’ I type into our chat. 

‘otw’

I roll my eyes, going to unlock my door, ‘being late to your valentines date isn’t very impressive’

He doesn’t respond, and I double-check the positions of the cakes on the counter. It has to seem overly perfect, like some white mom on TikTok put on the display. I smile, looking over my creations one more time, as I hear the knock on the door. 

He normally comes right in, but maybe he’s putting on some charade for the night. I hop right over, pulling it open to reveal many, many bags.

“Oh, my gosh,” I look around, trying to find his face in all of the stuff. “What’s all this?” 

His figure shuffles in, and I close the door. “Oh, only the best for my darling.” He hums, and I almost snort. So he is acting?

There are a few bags, some with the label for a fancy new restaurant that was down the road. Oh? I heard they have incredible seafood. The rest of the bags are pink and frilly. Gift bags. That is one thing I didn’t think to do. Wrap my gifts. He begins to pile them down on the opposite side of the counter, his face now in plain view. 

He’s slicked his hair back, a single strand dangling over his forehead. Quite dashing. Like me, he’s worn his best, a black button-down and dress pants. He grins, seeing me checking him out. Well of course I know he’s hot. I’d be lying if I said I thought he wasn’t attractive. 

“Dea?” He mumbles, arms outstretched for a hug. I huff, trying not to laugh, as this all feels a bit ridiculous. Him dressed up, and me in a black dress, hair curled and makeup done. All we are going to do is watch movies. It’s all… very silly. 

“Happy Valentine’s day!” I lean in to hug him and he squeezes me tight to his chest. It lingers and for a moment I think it’s the longest hug we’ve shared. 

“Happy Valentine’s...” He pulls away halfway, looking me up and down, “You look beautiful”

I blush, feeling the warmth of his hands on my arms “You do too.” I say and he smiles softly, before turning to the counter. I shuffle my feet on the tiles of the floor, “You ready for our fake Valentine’s?” I grin, sliding over to the counter.

“Fake?” His eyes widen in faux surprise. He then chuckles, “So you baked? What else should I have expected?” He takes up one of the cookies in his hand, taking a bite. I grin, already knowing he loves my cookies. With a hum of satisfaction, he finishes the whole thing. 

“I got you like a garlic shrimp noodle dish!” He beams, looking over his take out bags, “So let’s not let our food get cold.” I smile because he knows my favorites. 

“I’ll pour some wine okay.” My hands find my finest bottle, still cheap but what is a college student gonna do? Two glasses find themselves a quarter of the way full. I saw in some movie that it was proper that way.

I hear a groan from Jungkook, making me lift my head, “if I’m gonna be on a date with you I’ll need a lot more liquor than that.” 

“Tch.” I roll my eyes, pushing the bottle away. “We can drink later. Get like... wasted while we watch those god awful movies you mentioned.” With glasses in hand, I walk to my table where Jungkook has already laid out the food with silverware. 

My dish looks incredible. A garlic noodle with shrimp? I practically drool a little as I join him at the table. Jungkook is no different, staring at his meal as though he’d like to swallow it whole. 

“Thanks for dinner.” I hum, twirling my fork into the noodles. I felt a little guilty, wondering what the receipt for this meal looked like. We both had spent money, but as it looked, he has certainly spent more. 

“Of course! Thanks for dessert.” He cuts into his steak, something I expected he would have ordered, and he seems pleased with how it looks. We both dig in, and the majority of our dinner is silent. Too busy enjoying our meals to say anything. It really is delicious, and it’s hard to savor as I chow down. By the time we are both finished, our glasses of wine were long gone. Jungkook was fighting himself on pouring more. Instead, we tossed the take out containers and placed our dishes in the sink.

We stood, arms crossed looking over the desserts. “Well if I’m honest I am too full to eat any of this.” I sigh, feeling the same way. Jungkook made the right decision, eating a cookie before the meal. 

“There’s always later.” With a shrug, I move over to my gifts. “But now you should open your gifts!”

“There’s nothing to open.” He teases, eyeing all the gifts. 

My body slumps in annoyance, “Jeon Jungkook come open them.” He giggles at my irritation, reaching for the teddy bear. 

He holds it close to him, “Okay, okay. Let me name him.” his eyes scan fondly over the stuffed toy. “Mhmh, James.”

“James?” I snicker, and he glares at me. 

“James can hear you mocking him.” He growls, with a smile before setting the bear down. 

“Sure, sure” I nod, encouraging the next gift. 

“Woah, this is so funny,” He only glances at the globe for a moment, immediately grabbing one of his gift bags and handing it to me. “Here open this.” His cheeks raise up, his smile lines deepening as I look on towards the gift. “No way did you get one too?” I reach inside, feeling the smoothness of a round gift. I pull it out. A matching snowglobe. His picture is much less flattering than the one I chose. “Oh my gosh.” I giggle looking at his stupid little face. 

“This is awesome.” He stares into his little globe, for a little bit too long and too softly. He looks up, making eye contact with me. I swallow, and he grins, taking the globe and shaking it violently. 

“Okay, okay,” I pull on his arms, “Open the next thing.”

He obliges, looking through the chocolates, and finally picking up the card. He stares into it, reading it thoroughly and leaving me to awkwardly stand there. It was long. Thanking him for being my friend, the one person I can always count on. 

“It’s cheesy I know.” I glance down, knowing that this wasn’t the point of the night. Now it’s kind of weird. What if he thinks this is some sort of love confession or something? I should have saved all the sappy stuff for another time. 

“I love it.” A small smile forms on his lips, his mood has changed and I can tell. I’ve fucked up one hundred percent. He pulls me into another deep hug. His warmth blanketing over me, and his heart beating. Really. Fast. “Thanks Dea. I love you.” He doesn’t let the hug linger this time. He glances back to his gifts, “I didn’t really get you anything that special, but you’re still the bestest friend I’ve ever had.”

I let out a breath of relief, letting him pick out the braided bracelet. It was blue and green, and he immediately slipped it on, admiring the bunny charm. “I made it myself.” I grin, showing him my matching one. He smiles at my wrist but stays silent. Did I do something wrong?

“Okay, your turn.” 

The first bag is full of sweet treats. Chocolates and a whole assortment of candies. There are so many sweets in this room it wouldn’t hurt to share with our other friends. Jungkook hands me the next bag. A teddy bear, almost just like the one I gave him. 

“I’ll name her Janet.” I grin, mocking the name he gave his. “Janet and James.” I set her down next to the other bear. “Quite a pair.” 

“Quite a bear.” Jungkook stares at me, taking the moment to soak in his joke. I ignore him, hiding a smile as he hands the next one over.

“This one's the best one.” He pouts, “there are two parts” I shake my head reaching in. and finding a small box. I don’t hesitate in opening it, two little rings are inside. Raising an eyebrow I examine them further. 

‘I heart you’ one says, and I feel that it's plastic. “Great right?” He takes the other and tries to stick it on his fingers. Eventually, he fits it on his pinkie. They are clearly from a gumball machine or something, for kids. I shake my head with a laugh, sticking it onto my pinkie as well. I reach into the bag again. The fluff of something soft meeting my fingers. I pull it out. 

“What’s this?” I ask, seeing as there are two. One has a heart and arrow pattern and the other has pink teddy bears. 

He blushes, his hand resting on the back of his neck, “I thought it would be fun to have matching pajamas while we watch the movies.” He huffs, looking down at the ground.

Oh! My eyes widen at the pink teddy bears, and I rip the package open. “That's the best idea! That's the silliest Valentine's thing ever.” I shake it out, a pair of pants and a long sleeve. “I’m gonna put it on now!” We share a smile. “You know where the bathroom is.” I wave him off as I walk towards my bedroom. 

I slip out of the dress, and I am grateful to be getting into something more comfortable. Feeling giddy I look into my mirror. I look like a kid, and I feel like one too. This is so much fun. We should do fake Valentine’s more often. Who needs a real date anyway? Best friends are most definitely the better option. 

If it weren’t Jungkook, I’d be worried about every little thing. If something got stuck in my teeth at dinner. If I got him the right kind of chocolates. If my dress was riding up. Too many things to worry about, with him I can be comfortable. And now, extra comfortable with this cute new pajama set. 

I head back out, and soon Jungkook returns from the bathroom, folding his clothing up and leaving it on the table. He’s a sight to see, looking very soft, “You’re cute.” I say heading over to the couch.

“Oh,” he laughs awkwardly, “Thanks.” He comes around joining me. We sit together crossing our legs up on the couch. 

“So which of these shitty movies are we gonna watch?” I flip on the screen, opening up Netflix. He shuffles getting comfortable. 

“I think we should watch one that’s not that shitty, but like To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before?” He says and I shrug, searching it up. It didn’t matter to me. I’ve seen this one, but it was a while ago. I think I remember liking it. One of the better cheesy rom coms. 

As long as we can make fun of it. That’s the point. We’d planned this night a while ago. Thinking how much fun it would be to make fun of Valentine’s day by doing Valentine's day things. It’s turning out to be the best Valentine’s I’ve ever had. 

“How can she say that and feel differently?” Jungkook curls his lip in annoyance at the main character. We were far along with the film and he was getting annoyed with her. “It’s basically lying.”

I groan, “No? She’s just apprehensive cause he’s been giving her mixed signals and been wishy-washy the whole movie.”

He takes the remote and pauses it rather aggressively. “If anyone’s sending mixed signals it’s her. All girls do that. If she was just straightforward with her feelings then so could he.” 

“Why is it her responsibility to be straight forward? Can’t he do it? She’s the inexperienced one? He knows that.” 

He rolls his head back against the couch, his hair falling from its confines. “My point is that girls are confusing.” His neck tenses as he pulls his head back up. “And he,” he points to the screen, “Is confused. So of course he isn’t gonna be straightforward.”

“Girls are not confusing.” I roll my eyes if anyone is confusing it’s boys. His brows are furrowed in frustration, and I think it’s funny that he has such a serious opinion about it. His demeanor changes again, and he seems to squeeze his fists open and closed. 

“Yes, they are, like you.” 

I scoff, “Me?” 

He interrupts before I can continue. “Yeah, you. Your signals are so mixed and it fucks with my brain. One minute you're cold and the other you’re hot. I try and understand but it always just makes me more confused.” He rambles, not looking at me, “I just want to understand you.” He sighs, realizing he got heated.

My head shakes, “I’m so confused, which only proves that boys are more confusing.” He doesn’t respond. “Understand what?” I look over him and his face has fallen to his lap. My eyes shadow with worry as I cross my legs scooting closer to him. “I don’t really know why this turned into an argument… Did I say something wrong?” He shakes his head, more hair sliding out onto his forehead. 

“Seriously Jungkook I don’t want tonight to end in us being upset over something so stupid, but like you’ve been a little off the whole night. Was it me?” 

A deep groan escapes from his throat, and he cringes, “No, no Dea.” He buries his head into his hands.”I mean…” I really don’t understand what changed his mood all of the sudden. My hands fold in my lap. What could I have said to upset him? It really can’t have anything to do with the stupid movie. Can it? Maybe it had been the card. I’ve always expressed how much I care about him but maybe the timing was wrong. Maybe it came across weird and now he thinks that I like him. 

“So it was me?” I swallow, pursing my lips. 

His eyes shut as he takes a breath. “No, Dea you didn’t upset me.” He brings his hand to my wrist, clasping over it. His face softens, but he still looks confused. His fingers, soft and warm, tickle over the bracelet, running it in between his fingers. The simple touch sending tingles down my arm. “I promise.” He mumbles, opening his eyes, which meet mine. My breath speeds up and I feel nervous all of the sudden. My heart races as he stares into me. Those eyes have always been beautiful. The way they shine as the light hits them, always wide and searching. 

What was he searching for?

His eyes don’t leave mine, but his hand fades from the bracelet, traces of his touch still at my skin. I can’t help the butterflies in my stomach. Especially, as his hand meets my cheek. Its presence lingers, soft and kind. Under the coolness of his fingers, my cheeks are heated, and I want to tear my eyes away from his, but my gaze stays. 

His fingers flit over my skin, his hand hooking around my neck and thumb meeting my ear. I try to slow my breaths, which are too fast and heavy. I notice he bites at his lip, contemplating? Searching with those searching eyes. His thumb moves again, brushing against my cheek that is surely rosey enough for him to see. 

Slowly his body inches towards mine, his face coming closer and pulling mine in tandem. God so excruciatingly slow, but his eyes still haven’t left mine. His chest rises and falls, his nose bumps mine. Finally, his eyes drop, glancing at my lips. His part slightly, as he leans further. 

They touch, Jungkook pressing his lips into mine and pulling me into him by my neck. Gently, softly, he kisses me. As if relieved he sighs into my mouth, his other hand snaking into my waist. I breathe in a sudden breath, shocked at the cold of his fingers there. 

Immediately he breaks the kiss, eyes wide and confusion filling them. “I’m sorry.” He says breathy, his hands retreating. I too am breathless, unsure of what to say. That certainly wasn’t what I expected, but I liked it. God, I fucking liked it a lot. I wanted to do it again. But doubt clouds his eyes, scanning me over. 

“God Dea. I’ve royally fucked up haven’t I.” His breaths are getting fast and I can tell he's about to panic. Why? Couldn’t he tell I liked it? I shake my head fervently, but he’s not looking. “I’m so sorry, I don’t want this to change anything.” He chokes, his eyes watering.”You’re… you’re my best friend… and” 

“Jungkook!” I try to muster up some courage, one hand planting itself on his chest hesitantly. He goes silent, “I... “ I swallow trying to find the right words. “Don’t apologize.” My heart pounds in my ears, unsure of what this feeling is. His eyes look somewhat relieved, and my hand falters at his neck. I take a deep breath. “I… want you to kiss me…” I say shakily before biting my lip, my other hand finally rests at his nape. Maybe that was too forward? I can’t read him now as he stares on, eyes flipping over me. 

“You do?” He mumbles, sounding wary. Making me say it again? My stomach twirls, answering silently. I mean I do. Does he not? 

I squeeze my hand shut that lays on his chest, “ah… yeah.” My eyes fall, wondering what he’s thinking. Under the soft fabric of the pjs I feel his heart, racing just as mine is. His hand, the left this time, reaches up, taking my neck much more firmly, pulling my face into his. He halts, his breath hitting my lips but nothing more. His lashes batting and dancing with mine. Together our heavy breaths fall onto one another. He does want this right? My fingers clasp at the sew line of his top, and I tug the fabric with both hands, pulling him the rest of the way. 

With his mouth on mine, I take both hands around his neck pulling him deeper into the kiss. Again he pulls at my waist, less hesitant this time. His hand finds the small of my back, supporting himself as he leans into me. He leans closer and closer until my back is against the cushions, one of his legs between mine. The kiss softens, we both need to breathe, but neither of us pulls away.

His hand knots itself in my hair, keeping my lips against his. Holding on to the last moments. Until they aren’t. My lungs are heaving in need of air of my own. His breath flutters over my face, and he kisses softly at my cheek.

“Can I be straightforward then”?” He asks into my ear, the humming sensation tickling at my face. I nod, keeping my hands on him, not wanting him to leave. Not wanting him to say it was a mistake, or that he doesn’t want it to be a forever thing. He smiles softly, showing the teeny mole under his lip, reassuring me slightly. He must have noticed the worry in my eyes, brushing through my hair with his hand, tracing a finger over my cheeks. 

“I… like you Dea.” He says soothing himself with a deep breath. “I love you.” He swallows, nodding slowly, “I love you.” 

My lips curl up in the slightest smile. “I love you too.”

—

for more :D

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Another One?!, Part 5

First > Previous > Next

It turns out that people with access to military-grade equipment are not the type of people you want to dislike you.

Really, the only reason she was still alive was because being Ladybug made her marginally more lucky than the average person.

From people in holding randomly getting out from time to time and somehow managing to get their hands on a weapon, to getting shot by ‘malfunctioning’ firearms, to constant bomb threats, to the one time someone actually tried to drop an anvil on her head, things were just not looking good for Marinette.

And, it turns out, being a boss is just a hard thing in general. When they weren’t attempting to kill her, they were coming to her with questions. She spent most of her day in the office, scanning through manual after manual. She got basically zero breaks, because even when she had a sign on her door saying she was eating lunch they still came in to ask her things.

And then, at the end of the day, she’d get home… things weren’t great there, either.

Barbara had moved in after a year of dating Dick (Marinette had been stunned to learn that their relationship was actually real but that had quickly been dropped when she realized that Barbara was actually a responsible adult that could take care of herself). She had banned caffeine in the house when she’d seen Marinette and Tim’s coffee habits and, unfortunately, everyone else had been perfectly happy to enforce this for her.

This meant that she only had about four hours when she got home to patrol before her exhaustion caught up with her and she’d be forced to go home and collapse on the couch.

On top of that, tensions in the house were high. It turns out that one of the biggest problems with avoiding your problems for years is that emotions get pent up inside and it gets harder and harder to ignore. No one had completely snapped yet, but even the densest person in the world would have been able to recognize that it was coming.

It didn’t help that she no longer had time for baking, which was her normal way of relieving stress…

And let’s just say they were lucky none of them were going on patrols together, those kinds of high-stress situations do not help.

~

Adrien needed sleep.

He worked ten hours a day, which isn’t that much longer than average but was still emotionally taxing considering his job was teaching.

Then, he’d go on patrol for a few hours. He liked patrol, beating up random people is great for stress, but it was physically exhausting.

Then, he’d come home.

And he’d have two kids and an adult to keep alive.

(Barbara had the night shift, which meant that Adrien was alone for this. He swore it was on purpose.)

He’d go to his room and find Dick swinging around on the indoor gym they’d had installed (they were getting tired of him breaking light fixtures and had given in and put little hand and footholds on the ceiling for him to climb around on).

And then Dick would fall asleep, often hanging from the ceiling still, and Adrien would pick him up and take him to his room and tuck him in.

He’d rush back to his room, desperate to get there for just a second of sleep, only to find that, no matter how quick he was, Jason would already be on the bed. You would think that Adrien would be able to sleep. After all, Jason would be reading a book... that’s supposed to be a quiet thing…

Well, you see, the problem is that Jason reads books like people watch soap operas. He’d curse out characters and call them stupid, tell Adrien contextless jokes, and occasionally close his book to vent about what was going on.

And, eventually Jason would sleep. Adrien wouldn’t move him because a) it would wake him up and b) on the very small chance it didn’t wake him, Jason sometimes half-joked that when he woke up alone he feared that they’d left him behind…

So, yeah, Jason got to stay in the room.

Adrien would blink and then he’d find Tim in the door with his computer.

Tim, it seemed, would actually wait to see if Adrien was okay with it if he came in. He always stood in the door, hugging his laptop to his chest, and wouldn’t dare come inside until Adrien said he could.

Of course Adrien would sigh and nod his head yes, making a joke about how his kids were sleeping in shifts to annoy him, and move over on the bed a bit to let Tim on.

And then Tim would do homework or play games on his computer.

Adrien hated the sound of clicky keyboards. He’d had no clue he was alone in this until one day he complained about it and everyone in the room had stared at him like he was crazy.

But, yeah, the keyboard made him want to die. He just wanted to sleep...

And then Barbara would poke her head in after a long night’s work to tell Adrien that it was time for him to get ready for work.

Sprinkle in one or two probably life-threatening accidents and you’d have a typical night for him.

Now, you might be thinking, why doesn’t he just fall asleep on the couch?

Beyond the fact that the kids would just… follow him there, Adrien was also a rich kid growing up. He couldn’t sleep on couches. They’re uncomfortable.

No, now his only saving grace was the fact that Barbara didn’t have a way to monitor the coffee machine at his work.

… Oh kwami, he had become what he’d hated.

~

She dropped onto the bed -- she’d had enough energy to make it all the way there for once -- and glared at the mostly empty bulletin board on Antony Agoura. The man was smart, unfortunately, opting to keep his identity a secret as much as possible. He used a fake name. He wore gloves no matter what. He used solely cash…

And it wasn’t like she was going to be able to lure him out again. That had been an intimidation tactic, a way of saying ‘leave it alone or you’ll see exactly what I can do’.

And, as much as she hated to admit it even to herself, she was a little bit scared of him. For the first time since Zucco, the person she was facing knew who she was as a civilian, and she hated that she’d lost that advantage. Even if her family was better trained in self-defense than most, they weren’t invulnerable and they couldn’t be careful every second of the day.

Part of her was tempted to pack up and go on the run like they had done with Zucco… but the situations were different. With Zucco they knew they would eventually be able to catch him but with Agoura...

She closed her eyes, unable to look at it any longer.

Fuck. She was really screwed this time, huh?

She felt someone sink into the bed next to her and reached out for them. She didn’t really care who it was as she buried her face in their shoulder.

Sleep…

Less than a minute later, her phone buzzed to tell her that it was time to start cooking everyone’s meals for the day and she mumbled a curse before peeling herself away from the person. She squinted a little bit in the dark to see who it was. Tim.

She yawned and pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “Want to cook with me?”

“I’d burn the house down.”

“Probably. Want to stand nearby and make sure I don’t fall asleep while cooking so nothing burns?”

He shrugged a little bit. “Don’t see why not.”

They both crawled out of bed and she used him for support as they made their way down to the kitchen.

~

Adrien had been on patrol when she’d appeared.

And ‘appeared’ was definitely the way to describe it. He’d been relaxing on a rooftop, giving himself a few second break to just breathe in silence for once… and then he’d felt a hand shaking his shoulder.

He fought the urge to jump or lash out, his head whipping around to look at the person who was shaking him.

It was… a girl?

Actually, she looked about Jason’s age, so maybe a woman?

It didn’t matter. She looked terrified. Her eyes were so wide it looked almost exaggerated, her lips drawn into a deep frown.

The more he took in about her appearance the more concerned he was. Her stance was wide, which likely meant she fought often. Her clothes were ratty and torn. The little parts of her skin that weren’t caked in dirt were split with cuts that were either infected or about to be infected.

He rested a hand over hers as gently as he could and looked at her. “How are you up here? Actually, that doesn’t matter. What’s wrong? Are you okay? Are you hurt? Is your family hurt?”

She waved her free hand around frantically. Wordlessly.

He raised his eyebrows.

“Do you not speak English? Or are you mute? Deaf?”

He realized all these questions weren’t going to get answers and he sighed. Crap, what could he do?

He mulled it over for a second before snapping his fingers. He held up a finger for one minute, then held up his hands and made a tiny ‘stay’ motion with them just in case, and then ran to the nearest convenience store.

He didn’t care enough to detransform. It got him through the line quickly, at least.

He found a pen and a pad of paper and returned to the rooftop…

She wasn’t there anymore.

He sighed, a mix of frustration and concern coursing through him. He closed his eyes and shook his head. He should get back to patrol. Maybe he’d find her and/or whatever situation she was trying to get his attention for…

He opened his eyes and actually did jump this time. She was right in front of him. What? He hadn’t heard her…

He shook off his growing unease and handed her the notepad and pen.

She frowned, her face a little more than confused. Had she never seen a pen and paper before? Surely that couldn’t be right…

Still, he gently took the paper and pen back and wrote a tiny question mark.

He handed it over again and she looked at the mark like she’d never seen it before. Maybe her language didn’t have question marks…?

Then she started doodling.

Well, his plan had been for her to write whatever it was down and he would see if his phone would translate it, but he guessed this would work, too.

The first drawing explained some of the girl’s problems with communication. It was a little doodle where the mouth and ears had been X-ed out. She couldn’t speak or hear… or, at least, that’s what he’d figured.

He searched his memory for his old sign language lessons. Unfortunately, though, sign language is something that has to be practiced. All he could do is fingerspell “U O-K?”

She didn’t seem to understand.

Fair enough. He was pretty sure he was using LSF, anyways, and he didn’t exactly know for sure how close that was to ASL… or whatever other language she could have known. He couldn’t really tell much about where she was from, her skin was covered in dirt, okay?

She started doodling the rest of her life story and he nearly punched something. Probably would have if he hadn’t been scared he’d startle her or scare her off.

Whoever her dad was, he was committed to killing him if he wasn’t dead already.

He smiled at her and tried to think of a solution. He couldn’t take her to the police. Even with Marinette in charge, there was only so much she could do to keep the kid safe. An orphanage wouldn’t accept her because he doubted she was a legal US citizen.

He sighed. Marinette was going to kill him…

He reached out a hand to her to tell her to follow and blinked in surprise when she actually took it. Wow. He trusted her.

He tried not to feel proud as he led her home. He probably should have been scared that she was a spy or lying, but he found himself trusting her…

Weird, but he had bigger problems.

He detransformed a little bit outside the house and slowly walked to the door. He pushed it open and cringed when it creaked. Please don’t be home…

Marinette shifted under her blanket and opened an eye to look at him.

He quickly pushed the girl behind himself and smiled at his wife. “Wow, it’s you. You’re home. Wow.”

“Yeah, amazing, right?” She rubbed her eyes and gave him a tired smile. “How was patrols?”

“Great. Uneventful. Definitely good.”

Her smile dropped into a frown. “You’re acting weird.”

“What? Me? Acting weird?”

“Yeah… are you coming inside?”

“Uh… no. Actually, I think I’ll go back on patrols.”

She clicked her tongue. “You’re hiding something. I’m too tired for this, Adrien. Fess up.”

He cringed a little bit and slowly led the new adoptee inside.

The girl clutched Adrien’s shirt sleeve anxiously. He did not think this was a good thing.

Marinette stared at the girl in front of her for a while before a way too wide smile crossed her face. “Adrien…” She began slowly, before shaking her head. Her smile widened, somehow. She looked up, her voice sickly sweet: “Hey! Sweeties! Come down here.”

The reaction was instantaneous. There was a mad scrambling noise and they appeared in the doorway, expressions frazzled.

“Whatever happened, it was Dick!” Said Tim before anyone could speak.

Dick gasped. “No! It wasn’t!”

Marinette gave a pleasant laugh. “You’re not in trouble. Boys, could you help her get cleaned up for me, please?”

“Why is there another kid? Why does he have another one?” Said Jason incredulously.

When neither parent answered, they started ushering the girl away.

She grabbed Adrien’s arm when he tried to disappear through the door with them. “Not. You. Transform, we’re going out.”

He tried not to look too scared as they both transformed. She kept a way too tight grip on Adrien as they made their way through the town, as if she thought he was going to suddenly run away.

Fair enough. He was absolutely considering it.

But he didn’t. That would only make things worse.

They stopped at a relatively abandoned part of town and she turned to him, letting go to cross her arms over her chest.

“Explain.”

~

Did she feel bad for the kid that Adrien had adopted? Sure. No one deserves that kind of life…

But that didn’t calm her down in the slightest.

She was trying to relax herself. Her lips pressed into a thin line as she heard him out to keep herself from yelling or interrupting, her nails dug into the skin of her palms to keep her grounded…

Adrien finished with a sigh and a “I don’t regret it, she was in trouble and it’s our job to protect civilians.”

She didn’t know why those words made her anger worsen. There was some sense in them, and yet she had to strain to keep her voice level when she spoke: “Just once, could you actually just own up to a mistake you make?”

“I’ll own up to a mistake when I actually think it’s a mistake!”

“Whatever.” She thrummed her foot on the floor. “We can’t keep adopting random kids, Chat, there’s only so much we can do!”

“They need our help!”

“Bullshit! You need them more than they need you! Newsflash! Helping a bunch of kids isn’t going to make your own childhood any better!”

Adrien flinched and she felt a twinge of guilt finally poke through the anger, but before she could apologize he was jabbing his finger in her chest.

“At least my terrible coping mechanism helps people! You want to pull trauma into this? What about the fact that we still can’t say Lila’s name? What about the fact that you refuse to make friends with people our age because you fear them leaving you?”

She winced and her face reddened. “Okay, but does that inconvenience you? No! At least mine is only self-destructive! Yours is going to drag the entire family down with you! We’ve already fucked up these kids for sure, but you just keep making it worse and worse by spreading our limited time thinner!”

“Shut up! What do you know? You hardly ever talk to them anyways! You’re always at work or asleep!”

“Really? And whose fault is that? If you’d just stuck to the actual plan B instead of going out and attacking all the cops in the GCPD there wouldn’t have been as much attention on what had happened!”

He rolled his eyes. “I’VE ALREADY TOLD YOU THAT I HAD TO DO THAT! IT WAS TO KEEP EVERYONE AWAY FROM THE SECURITY ROOM TO KEEP PEGASUS SAFE!”

“PLEASE! NO ONE WAS GOING TOWARDS THE SECURITY ROOM! YOU’RE JUST AN IMPULSIVE DICK!”

“ARE YOU REALLY CALLING ME IMPULSIVE?!”

“YOU ADOPT KIDS LIKE THEY’RE POKEMON! OF COURSE I’M GOING TO CALL YOU IMPULSIVE!”

“YOU’RE THE ONE WHO ALWAYS GETS IN RANDOM FIGHTS BECAUSE YOU’RE NEVER CAREFUL!”

She groaned and fought to make herself relax enough to speak without yelling. They were in a relatively abandoned part of Gotham but that didn’t mean that there was no one around. The last thing they needed on top of everything going on was to have their fight end up in the papers.

Adrien was clearly doing the same, because he was quiet for a long time before he spoke in little more than a whisper:

“Do you not want to be a part of the family anymore?”

She opened her mouth to say ‘of course I want to be a part of the family’, but no sound came out. She wasn’t sure why she was even hesitating. She cared about them, obviously. She wouldn’t be working so hard if she didn’t…

But it was definitely a lot.

She could only handle so much at once. Beyond the powers she was just a human, and supporting that many other people is hard. Especially considering she essentially had two jobs to keep up with, as well…

The longer she went without answering the more tears spilled over his mask. Still, he was waiting for her answer. He was waiting for some kind of verbal confirmation that she couldn’t do it anymore.

She reached up and gently cupped his cheeks, wiping his tears away with her thumb.

“Chat, I…” She swallowed thickly. “I don’t know how much more we can do.”

He hesitantly brought his hands up to rest over hers. “I know. I just… I can’t just leave them. They always look so sad.”

She’d fallen in love with Adrien for his kindness and now it was the thing that was threatening to tear their marriage apart.

But he’d fallen for her because of her problem solving skills. And she was determined to not let this be the one problem she failed to solve.

The problem wasn’t exactly that he was getting more kids. Marinette loved kids.

The problem was that they didn’t know if they could raise kids without messing them up too badly.

Part of it was that everyone in the family had had one or more big events that had traumatized them, and it looked like it was finally time that they started getting past it.

Could they even get past it at this point? It had been over two decades since Marinette and Adrien had originally gotten their traumas, what if it was too late? What would happen if they somehow did get over it? It had been a part of them for such a long time, what would they be without it?

And then there was the kids. Could they even get them to go?

It was worth a shot, at least...

And the other change they needed to make was to make more time for their kids.

Neither of them were going to give up their day jobs (Adrien wouldn’t and Marinette, unfortunately, couldn’t just yet). That meant that they either needed to get caffeine in the house or give up vigilantism…

Well, cross of the giving up vigilantism thing automatically. On top of just not being able to give up on the city they were in when there was still so much to fix, they knew it would only be temporary. They’d already tried to give up vigilantism. They simply couldn’t bring themselves to.

So that left trying to get caffeine past Barbara. The kids (outside of Tim) were very much against caffeine and they worked very hard to make sure neither Marinette or Tim ever managed to get their hands on it. From purposefully making sure Marinette and Tim couldn’t go anywhere without one of them to monitoring the break room camera at her work to make sure she didn’t drink any, the kids were determined to make sure Marinette couldn’t get her hands on anything.

But Adrien could. No one would suspect him.

She bit her lip. This wasn’t going to go over well. Getting Adrien to therapy AND make him get caffeine? Man, this was going to suck.

“Chaton… I might have an idea… but you’re going to have to hear me out…”

~

He and Marinette were arguing again, though this was far more light-hearted.

“We are not opening another portal. We’re already lucky enough that this dimension hasn’t collapsed on us, we aren’t testing it.”

He rolled his eyes and stopped scratching runes into the wall to glare at her. “Would you rather we let a girl-woman-female-you-know-what-I-mean room with a guy?”

“What about we give her Jason’s room and let Jason sleep with us? He comes into our room to sleep either way.”

“Jason still uses his room to store things.”

“This is a bad idea, Chaton…”

He grinned. “Mhmm.”

“This is what I meant when you said you’re stupidly impulsive.”

“Would you rather do it?”

“Sure.”

He rolled his eyes. “And that’s what I meant when I said you don’t care about your own health. It’ll be fine.”

She clicked her tongue and motioned for him to go on.

He finished scratching the last rune and sighed when he saw some weird tentacle monster slowly unfurling itself on the other side. He got to his feet quickly and raised his staff to fight it, only to cringe when he heard Dick and Jason scream downstairs.

“I’ll deal with that, do you have this taken care of?”

She winced. “Sure. Where exactly is the portal, to be sure?”

He pointed it out and then ran downstairs.

Jason was currently not having a good time, it seemed. The bottom half of his body had been swallowed by a hole in the floor and he was struggling to get a hold on the slick floors.

Dick was also there, screaming incoherently from one of the ceiling lights.

Adrien ran over and grabbed one of Jason’s arms and started slowly pulling him out of the portal. After a bit Dick snapped out of it and scrambled to help.

The three were panting by the time they managed to get him all the way out.

“What the heck what the heck what the heck what the heck --,” Dick mumbled, holding his heart.

Jason, though just as shaken, seemed to be getting over it quickly. “How do we fix that?”

“Don’t remember, ask your mom,” mumbled Adrien as he crawled over to the portal on the floor and peered down.

It was a tiny group of people crowded around a computer.

Wait, what the heck were they wearing? Were they cosplaying as vigilantes? They definitely had the tacky outfits down if they were but Adrien didn’t know who they could be. Well, it had been a long time since they’d visited the Justice League, maybe he just didn’t know them…

He cleared his throat awkwardly and flashed them a blinding smile.

“Um… sorry about this, we’ll fix it as quickly as possible.”

“Was that… was that Dick Grayson?” Said the tallest of them.

Was he dressed as a bat? Why was he dressed as a bat? Dressing up like animals wasn’t technically their thing but on the other hand it was absolutely their thing. Adrien was almost offended.

Wait, he’d said something. He tried not to go pale when his brain finally processed it. This wasn’t exactly how he’d wanted the world to find out their identities…

“What kind of name is Dick Grayson? Ha! Lame!”

Dick sent him an affronted look from where he was on the floor. Adrien gave him an apologetic smile and a shrug.

Jason came back down with a baking pan. “Mom said to drop something through, so…”

“What’s that?”

“Brownies.”

“You’re dropping our brownies down there? Are you trying to kill them?” Asked Dick.

Adrien blinked once then sighed. “It could have worked for once. Be nice.”

Jason scoffed. “It didn’t. She forgot sugar. That’s why we’ll give it to them.”

“Sorry about this!” Said Adrien as Jason dropped the pan through the portal.

As promised, it closed now that something had been sacrificed.

The three looked at each other for a few seconds before Dick looked away and said, “So… pretend this never happened?”

“Yep.”

~

She cursed as she fell back on the couch, never mind the fact that Adrien was already laying there. Her husband made a quiet ‘oof’ sound as she dropped on top of him. She was hopped up on caffeine and ready to bond with her kids but the problem was that the kids, in fact, had lives.

The little time that Marinette and Adrien didn’t have work was taken up by patrols, by Jason’s homework, by Tim’s extracurriculars, by Dick’s job...

“There’s still not enough time.”

“We might have to stop being vigilantes for a bit…” He said, though he sounded reluctant. “Or rotate off by day…”

She didn’t like the idea either, but it didn’t seem like they had much choice in this if they wanted to be better for their kids. They’d already had to cut back on vigilantism because of their jobs and need for sleep, could they really cut it out of their lives entirely? Just like that?

No, there had to be something they could do. The city was still the most crime ridden city in the world. They couldn’t give up on it.

But then what to do…?

She watched Tim stumble in with a dislocated shoulder and squeaked, pushing herself off of her husband and rushing over.

“Shit! What happened?”

“I… might have messed up a boomerang-horseshoe-thingy catch and it might have hit me in the shoulder.”

She clicked her tongue. “Right. I’m going to reset it on three. One, two --.”

Tim gave a grunt of pain as she pushed his shoulder back into place.

“You should have told someone, how long were you fighting with a dislocated shoulder?”

“A little while…”

She shook her head and glanced at Adrien to give him the ‘kids, right?’ look, only to find him lost in thought.

He snapped out of it and flashed her a grin.

“I think I have an idea. How do you feel about going back on patrols with partners?”

~

He stretched across his family’s lap as they waited.

Adrien, Marinette, Dick, Jason, and Tim all sat in a therapist’s office for family counseling. They would have invited Cass but the whole ‘not speaking’ thing made therapy difficult. They actually had invited Barbara, only to get shut down because apparently she didn’t want to ‘deal with all that mess’.

So, it was just them.

Well, I say ‘just’ like five people isn’t a lot of people to have in a single therapy session. The poor therapist looked like she was going to have a heart attack when she saw all of them waiting for her.

Good thing they'd chosen the shortest session...

“Um… Agreste?”

“Yep!” Said Dick, far too brightly for a therapy session but whatever.

“Cool… right this way!”

His family glanced at each other before shrugging and pushing Adrien off of their laps in unison. He pouted up at them from his new place on the floor, but no one seemed all that guilty about it.

Marinette did reach out and pull him to his feet by the back of his shirt, though, so there was at least that.

They filed into the therapist’s room and took a seat on yet another couch.

Dr. Quinzel smiled at all of them. “Okay, does anyone have anything they’d like to start us off with?”

The family eyed each other warily. They were here as civilians, so they had to make sure not to slip up and talk too in depth about most things…

“Jason keeps calling me ‘Replacement’!” Said Tim, finally.

Marinette and Adrien frowned at Jason, who was attempting to sink into his hoodie.

“Well, we definitely didn’t know about that…” said Marinette.

“Of course you didn’t!” Said Jason. “You’re hardly ever around!”

Tim sighed. “They’re just busy.”

Adrien flinched. That was way too close to the excuse he used to make for his own father for his liking. Were they really that bad? Sure, he and Marinette were definitely not around as much as they’d like to be, but they were making an effort… did that really matter, though?

“No, Jay is right. We’ll try and do more. We’ve talked about how we’re going to free up time for you guys recently, actually. We’re hoping to include you more in our...” He glanced at Dr. Quinzel. “... hobby. Do more things with you in general, really.”

Marinette nodded her agreement.

She glanced at the boy’s faces and then clicked her tongue. “Anyone have problems they want to share?”

“No, our family is perfect how it is!” Said Dick brightly, his gaze fixed on the window.

Adrien followed his gaze to make sure nothing bad was going down on the streets and then sighed. “Dick, there has to be something. You’ve been just as tense as the rest of us recently.”

“Nope! Everything’s great!”

Everyone else exchanged skeptical looks but they couldn’t really feel comfortable pushing --.

Dr. Quinzel frowned a little bit. “Okay. We’ll come back to you when everyone else has had their say, then. Hopefully you’ll be more comfortable then.”

Dick gave a charming smile. Dr. Quinzel didn’t seem all that perturbed as she turned to look at Marinette.

His wife pursed her lips tightly as everyone else’s eyes went to her and she smoothed out the front of her dress. “We’ve already talked about this one-on-one, but… I think Adrien could maybe think a bit more before doing things. Or, at least, he should tell me when he makes major decisions like adopting kids.”

Dick’s smile dropped instantly. “Are you really complaining about not being told things? You guys tell me nothing! I have to figure everything out myself!”

Everyone startled a little at the sudden change of heart and gave each other wary glances before finding their way back to Dick.

The man in question had pushed himself to his feet (Adrien whined a little bit about losing the person to lean against) and started pacing. “You even ask Barbara things before me! It’s like you think I’m stupid!”

“Sweetie --.”

“Dont!” Dick sighed and came to a stop. He shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s fine, it’s just… don’t you trust me?”

Marinette and Adrien looked at each other before nodding.

“Of course we do,” he said gently. “We’ll talk more about this at home, okay? When we’re not in the present company?” He looked at Tim and Jason, but he meant Dr. Quinzel. That was a hard subject to tiptoe around.

Dick took a seat on the armrest, likely so he could get up again without disturbing anyone.

Dr. Quinzel nodded. She looked at Adrien, and he fought the urge to try and hide behind Jason. She looked way too smart for his liking, it felt like she knew just by looking at him exactly what was wrong with him...

“I…” He struggled to find the words in French, let alone in English. “... think I try and get a lot of people in the house so I never have to be alone for long. I used to be alone all the time. I can’t do that again.”

Dr. Quinzel nodded thoughtfully. “It seems that all of you feel excluded or lonely in some way. Thankfully, that means all of you are the solution to each other’s problems. But, also, I suggest branching out some. Family is good, but so are friends. Everyone understand?”

They all gave each other wary looks, but they smiled all the same.

“Great, we can have a session again in a month or two to check your progress. That’ll be $7000 --.”

~

Marinette met her husband’s eyes and they exchanged nervous looks before walking into their room. As expected, Jason was already there. He was ready for bed, it seemed, with his pajamas on and his book out.

They took seats on either side of him and each took a hand.

“Jay…” Began Adrien. “We don’t love you any less because you’re not the newest kid anymore.”

“I know…”

Marinette bit her lip and pressed a tiny kiss to his forehead. “We’re not lying. And you don’t have to, either, just tell us why you think that.”

Jason looked at both of them warily before sinking into his shirt. It didn’t work as much as it did when he was wearing a hoodie or turtleneck, but it still worked surprisingly well.

She looked at Adrien nervously and he took the lead again:

“The reason we tend to focus on the newest the most is because they usually have the freshest problems. When we first got you we focused on you more than Dick because you were still struggling with old habits you picked up while homeless, and he was mostly over what had happened with his original parents.”

Marinette nodded. “And when Tim came in we focused on him because he was dealing with realizing his parents weren’t great and adjusting to a family who loved him. Now we have Cass, who…  will definitely need some extra care…”

Jason sniffled a little and nodded his understanding. “I know you have to, I just… it feels like you don’t want me as much anymore...”

“No way!” Marinette said, squeezing his hand tighter. “We love you, sweetie, you’re just as much our kid as any of the others.”

Adrien smiled. “Exactly. You’re stuck with us, whether you want to be or not.”

Jason gave a wobbly laugh before slowly drawing them in for a hug.

“I love you, too, guys.”

They hugged him back.

“... and I’ll go easier on Tim.”

“Thank kwami, I didn’t want to ruin the moment by bringing it up, but… yeah, be nicer to Tim, please,” said Adrien half jokingly.

Marinette grinned. “Maybe give him a nicer nickname, at least?”

“How about Timbers?”

“Uh…”

“Timberly?”

She clicked her tongue. “How about just Timmy? Or Tim?”

“No, no, I think I’m on to something.”

~

Adrien stared in disbelief.

“You… you did what?”

Dick fiddled with a Rubix cube. Adrien wasn’t sure if that was just to help stay concentrated on the conversation or so he could more easily avoid eye contact.

“I joined the mob two years ago because I wanted to be more in the loop…”

Adrien and Marinette exchanged exhausted looks.

“Don’t be mad! I’ve been rising in the ranks for years now, eventually I’ll be close enough to Agoura to help you guys!”

Marinette sighed lightly and shook her head. “Sweetie, we aren’t mad.”

Adrien raised his eyebrows. “Yes we are.”

“You’re right. We’re mad. But we’re going to let this one slide.”

“No, we aren’t.”

“I can’t read minds!” She said, then she shook her head again. “Look, we just want you to be safe.”

Adrien nodded. “The reason we don’t tell you much isn’t because we don’t trust you, it’s because we don’t like involving you guys in dangerous things when we can avoid it.”

“But Barbara --!”

“We asked her about her opinion on one thing. She actually gave the same answer as you, and we turned her down, too. We’re sorry that you felt like we didn’t trust you, though, that wasn’t ever our intent.”

“And, besides,” added Marinette. “You have a tendency to snoop. We always figured you’d learn everything on your own.”

They took a seat on either side of Dick on the couch and wrapped him in a hug.

Dick beamed as he hugged back.

“... you’re still in trouble, though. That was stupid and dangerous and neither you nor your siblings can never do that again,” said Adrien.

Dick started whining.

~

Marinette bit her lip anxiously as she looked at her phone. All it would take was one click to call, but…

Adrien sighed beside her and reached over. He took the phone and pressed to call, then tossed it back at her.

She panicked, juggling the phone in her hands as it dialled. Nononononononono don’t pick up don’t pick up --

“Hello?” Said Nygma.

Fuck!

She looked at her husband anxiously.

“This or the Justice League,” mouthed Adrien.

She squeaked and brought the phone to her ear. “Nygma! Hi!”

“... Hello?”

“Hey! I’m a bit bored, so… I was just wondering if, um, you want to do something as…” she wheezed. “... as um… as…”

“I don’t really have anything prepared right now, I’m still waiting on that shipment of penguins...” The Riddler seemed confused, which was a first.

Was she a little concerned about whatever Riddler was doing with penguins? Sure. Then again, this is Riddler she was talking about. What was he going to do? Steal one of her ninja kids and then tell her exactly where they were? Whatever.

“No no! Like um…”

“Friends?”

“Yes! That!”

Adrien rested his head in his hands with a deep sigh. She flipped him off despite knowing he couldn't see it.

“I guess my schedule is free until the penguins come in... Sure! Want to go try an escape room?”

“No, I do an escape room every time I see you. I’m making you a new outfit.”

Adrien and Riddler both groaned.

She smiled.

~

He hesitated, messing with the strap of the bag over his shoulder.

“The city might need me --.”

“The city will be fine for a week,” said Marinette.

“The kids might need me --,” he tried, only to get silenced by a kiss.

She pulled back a little bit later. “It’s one week. Besides, we’re all doing what Dr. Quinzel said, and you’ve stalled long enough.”

He sighed. “For good reason! It’s a week alone! I’m going to go insane.”

“Chaton, we’re murderers. I think we crossed over that line a while ago.”

He cracked a grin, weak as it was, and pressed another kiss to her lips. “Are you sure --?”

“Yes! Oh my kwami! Now go!” She gave him a playful shove.

He raised his eyebrows and crossed his arms over his chest. “It almost feels like you’re trying to get rid of me.”

“And it almost feels like you’re stalling.”

She waved down a taxi for him and he couldn’t help but cringe as they took the bags from him. It made it feel much more real…

“I love you, Chaton, I’ll see you in a week.”

“I love you, too, M’lady.”

He waved at the kids long after they had disappeared over the horizon and he sighed as he sunk back in his seat. He knew it was for the best, he needed to learn how to function as a person on his own, but…

It was only a week. Only a week.

Besides…

He looked down at the coordinates of the last known location of David Cain (it was amazing what Tim, Barbrara, and Marinette could do when angry enough).

He wasn’t going to be bored, at least.

~

She turned away from the cake she’d been decorating and nearly screamed when her eyes landed on Cass. She hadn’t even noticed her walk in.

Marinette forced herself to relax.

She glanced over the tiny girl in front of her and bit her lip. She was wearing a mix of different shades of black which…

She suppressed a shudder. The outfit was okay, if she was being honest, but it definitely needed a splash of color.

“Right, that’s it, we’re finding you some new clothes.”

Cass looked at her blankly.

Right. She didn’t speak language. Marinette pursed her lips as she tried to think of some sort of movement that would convey what was going on, then settled for reaching out a hand for Cass.

She couldn’t help the smile that broke across her face when the girl took her hand. She trusted her! Score!

She hesitated for a minute before yelling: “SWEETIE! I mean… JASON! COME ON WE’RE GOING SHOPPING YOUR CLOTHES ARE GETTING SMALL FOR YOU!”

There was a few seconds’ pause before Jason poked his head in. He glanced at the two of them and frowned, sinking a little bit into his hoodie. “You noticed?”

“I… don’t even know how to respond to that. I’m a designer, of course I noticed. If you want to keep going for the grunge look that’s fine but you need to up your size.”

Jason nodded.

She rested her arm around his shoulders (something that was very hard for her to do now that he was both taller and wider than she was) and pulled the two kids out to the mall.

Jason was getting used to buying things for himself. He still resisted a little bit when people spent money on him or asked what he wanted, but he was making progress.

She pressed a kiss to his cheek and handed him a credit card. “Buy what you want. Remember the PIN?”

“Mhmm…” said Jason. He sent a wave over his shoulder as he made his way over to the men’s section.

She hummed lightly as she walked through the girl’s section to look for things for Cass. The girl was short and skinny for her age -- she was determined not to think about it for too long -- and she could easily fit in kid’s clothes…

But no kid of Marinette’s would have a shirt with the words ‘Girl Power!’ or ‘I love tacos!’ on it.

She helped pick out different shades of black shirts and jeans for the girl, mulling over the different colors she should give her. Yellow and red matched her skin tone but she doubted the kid wanted anything bright…

Marinette settled for giving Cass a blue scarf and some gold accessories.

She smiled and offered them to Cass, only to pale when the girl burst into tears. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck --

Cass hugged Marinette around the middle and buried her face in her chest and Marinette was just very confused.

Jason came back with two bags of new clothes and he blinked a few times as he took in the new situation.

“What the fuck happened?”

“I don’t know!” She hissed back, waving her hands vaguely. “She’s crying and I can’t even ask what’s wrong!”

“We need to teach her a language,�� mumbled Jason.

“No shit, Sherlock!”

“Fuck off, Watson!”

She was getting judgemental looks from fellow shoppers now. Great. Amazing, even. She rested an arm around Cass and then used the other hand to flip them off. How dare they judge how she parented her kid she just met.

She waited until Cass was done to pull away and lean down to check her face. Even if she couldn’t really speak, her expression should be a good gauge of what was wrong --.

Cass gently took the items from Marinette and flashed her a blinding smile.

Damn it. Now Marinette was going to cry. This kid was so cute.

She leaned over and gently pressed a kiss to Cass’s forehead.

HER kid was so cute, she reminded herself as she led her along to .

She helped her wrap the scarf around her neck. Was it kind of hot out? Yes. Was Cass super cute with her mouth hidden behind the fabric? Also yes.

She glanced at Jason, who was also smiling a little bit despite not having all the attention.

His smile dropped at her next words, though:

“I know you still have my card. Hand it over.”

“Fuck.”

~

It turns out ASL is hard.

It also turns out that teaching ASL, while you’re still learning it yourself, to a person who doesn’t even comprehend language is even harder.

Weird how that works out.

They started with simpler things. Everyday objects, basic emotions, the first letters of their names so she could say who she was talking about. It was a slow process, especially because they often would take two days per lesson because of everyone’s conflicting schedules.

But it was a process.

And he thought the family was doing pretty well, too. It probably helped that Cass was, at least so far, the nicest person in the house and none of them wanted her to be sad or lonely.

Look at that. They were working on making her not feel excluded. Progress! Dr. Quinzel would be proud.

~

Marinette paused her walk to the kitchen when she saw blonde hair. Adrien had blond hair, but he was still out on patrols with Dick so…

She turned and looked at the person on the couch with Tim. “Please, kwami, tell me he didn’t get another one when we just started making progress.”

Tim barely even looked up from his computer. “No, just my friend, Steph. She’s here because she thinks I’m sad my parents died.”

“Oh, oka --.” Marinette took a step back. “Hold up, what?”

“Yeah, they were killed by this guy in Haiti. I was sad about it for a while but then I was like ‘wait a minute! I can just kill him back!’ Anyways, it’s all good now.”

Steph didn’t seem all that perturbed about the murder thing, so she brushed past worrying about their identities or, y’know, her kid getting prosecuted...

Marinette pulled out her phone. “Yeah, Dr. Quinzel? I’m going to need to schedule another appointment…”

Tim frowned. “I’m fine, Mari.”

“Oh! Yeah! This isn’t for you… but, Steph, he doesn’t have anything going on Friday night, right?”

“I’ll make sure he’s free.”

She nodded. “Thanks, sweetie. Want anything to eat?”

“Guys! I’m fine! I got my revenge! I feel great!”

“Of course, you do, Timmy. And… waffles?”

She continued her walk to the kitchen to finish up scheduling and make Steph waffles.

~

Listen, at this point Cass having a miraculous was a given.

He might as well make sure it was a good one that would come in useful. And, it kind of matched her fighting style of predicting people’s moves to have one that allowed her to go five minutes into the past. She’d be even better at predicting people’s movements if she’d seen them before!

Besides, she liked the color blue. Perfect fit.

Marinette had agreed to train her, but Adrien was the one to take her out on patrols with him.

It was good to have people with different fight styles together, it made solving problems easier. Adrien paired with Dick and Cass, Marinette tended to pair with Jason, and Tim would tag in on either side since he had no real consistent fight style (he liked to change based on his opponent).

Besides, with group patrols they got to spend more time with their kids! They were nothing if not efficient people.

He and Cass sat on the rooftop across from the building Agoura had asked to meet Dick in. There was a low chance it was going to get violent, there should be no way that he’d know anything was off (Marinette and Dick had been publicly fighting for the past year to make it seem like they were on opposite sides), but it was better safe than sorry.

He watched Dick wave to Agoura and head off. Adrien and Cass watched carefully for any sign that they were suspicious, that they were going to do something underhanded, but Agoura just turned and started heading off into the night.

When his oldest son came up to sit with them, he had a thought. He glanced at Cass and made a swiping motion on his wrist.

She nodded her understanding.

They waited for Dick to transform before following Agoura and his goons. Five people were with him, but that wasn’t actually that bad by Agoura standards, so...

“Y’know, if he gets suspicious of me because of this, I’m never going to forgive you,” said Dick.

He shrugged absently, then broke into a wide grin when Agoura turned down an alley. “Living hotel to hotel wasn’t that bad back in the day.”

“Hm. I disagree, but…” The three of them exchanged grins as Cass activated her power. “Let’s do this.”

Dick brought his flute to his lips and played a high-pitched note that made Agoura and his goons stop in their tracks. Duplicates of each vigilante slowly spread out over the rooftops, as well as a replica of Dick.

The vigilantes and their fakes dropped down to surround the group and Cass suddenly reached out and jerked Adrien’s hand. He almost complained but then a bullet soared past where his head had just been and he went pale.

He squeezed her hand once as thanks and then pulled away so he could activate his Cataclysm.

Doubles went after the goons while Cass went to work disarming people. It was kind of creepy how she disappeared into the shadows without any help from Dick, but no one said anything because it was useful. She would pop out of shadows and break arms and legs to put goons out of commission.

Dick was giving himself an alibi. The fake lawyer ran into the action, only to get taken out by a fake Cass.

Agoura was making a run for it. Too bad, really, that he couldn’t exactly see anything that was going on. The world in front of Agoura was a mess of dumpsters and trash bags that he was struggling to run around. Adrien, who knew for a fact that everything was either fake or light enough to brush away with his staff, followed after him at a calm pace.

He grabbed Agoura by the back of his tailored suit and smiled at him.

“Agoura! Buddy! Where are you going? I just want to chat!”

“Nice one!” Yelled Dick from somewhere in the chaos.

“Thanks, Robin!”

He tipped his head to the side and regarded the man in his grip. It was clear he didn’t really know that much self-defense, but he must have some kind of weapon hidden on him…

Cass seemingly materialized out of the wall nearby and threw herself at Agoura, a blur of blue and black, and the man was nearly knocked out of Adrien’s grip by the force. Then she pulled away with a gun and a few knives.

Adrien raised his eyebrows a little bit before sending her a smile. Yeah. It was definitely a good thing that he’d given her that specific miraculous...

He turned his attention back on the mobster, who was beginning to look a little pale.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m not here to kill you. You deserve way worse,” he said brightly.

He pressed his hand to the man’s wrist. He closed his eyes and forced himself to concentrate on just dissolving the wrist. It was kind of hard to do with the mobster screaming his head off. Kwami, you’d think he’d be quiet so Adrien wouldn’t dissolve him into nothing but apparently not…

The hand popped off and he let go instantly. He looked down and winced at the black webbing its way under the glove.

He glanced at the mobster nearby, who was still screaming, and rolled his eyes. He punched him as hard as he could and smiled when he fell to the ground in a heap by the hand. Good, now that that was dealt with...

He scrunched up his nose a little bit as he slowly peeled the glove off of the hand and then his face split into a wide smile. Thank kwami, he hadn’t ruined the prints.

He turned to his kids and found them waiting for him amidst a pile of bodies. He didn’t know if the henchmen were alive or not, but when he saw the tiny scrape on Cass’s cheek he decided he didn’t care.

He waved the hand at them.

“We got him!”

~

Listen, Marinette had considered staying commissioner…

For approximately two seconds.

The vigilantes had made their point in getting Agoura arrested (they gave him about four days before he ‘mysteriously committed suicide’ in jail thanks to either underpaid henchmen or old victims). They were done. It had been way too hard to even think about doing it consistently. No, murder was definitely the way to go.

She glanced over at Nygma. “Thanks for helping me pack up.”

“Well, I figured it would be nice to visit again.”

She nodded slowly and looked around her old office. Tomorrow there would be someone else in that chair, someone likely far more corrupt…

“Got a knife on you?”

“Obviously, but why?”

She shrugged and took it from his outstretched hand. She knelt down by the chair and sawed on one of the legs until she had taken off a tiny piece of it. She pushed on the chair and giggled a little when it wobbled. Yes. Perfect. That would be so annoying.

She tossed the piece of chair leg in the air and then caught it, sending Nygma a wink. “The budget here is terrible, it’ll take at least a few months to get a new chair.”

Nygma rolled his eyes and took his knife back from her. “Hm. And they say I’m the evil one.”

They each grabbed a box. His was full of personal items, hers was full of files on every person currently in the GCPD and every mobster and goon she could think of the name of.

“You owe me one escape room.”

She groaned as they slipped out into the halls. “Why? Wasn’t it enough to spit on the floor?”

“Nope! Spitting on the floor was payment for me showing up, you’re making me do manual labor so I get one hour of escape rooms with you.”

“Don’t you know every solution already?”

“A new one opened up across town!”

She clicked her tongue irritably but shrugged. “Fine. But only because I owe you, not because we’re friends.”

He rolled his eyes and then looked down at the box he was carrying. “Wow, it sure would suck if all these pictures of your kids just… fell.”

Her eyes widened. “You ARE the evil one!”

He raised his eyebrows.

“And… you’re also my friend.” She made a retching noise. “Kwami, I’m going to die.”

“What?! No! Only one of my traps is allowed to kill you!”

“Too late! I’m dying. I’ll never recover…”

“Nooooo…!”

~

He raised an eyebrow at the girl on his couch. He was pretty sure she was Tim’s friend but… she was definitely around a lot…

Whatever, he might as well at this point.

“Hey, how many parents you got?”

Steph didn’t even glance up. “Zero, thanks to you.”

He went still. Wait, was she saying this in the ‘my parent(s) was evil and you killed them’ way or the ‘they were civilians and they got caught in the crossfire and I blame you’ way?

“Um… did you like them?”

“No, he was a dick.”

He allowed himself to breathe. Cool. Great. That would have made everything difficult…

“Want to be adopted?”

Steph laughed a little and shrugged. “Do I get to be a vigilante, too?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Then... yeah, whatever.”

~~~

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