#oh to be a bystander in this moment... | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

sunboki · 2 months ago

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⎯ what remains unspoken. ⟡ featuring christopher bahng

🪝 : Christopher Bahng x implied! fem. reader

TROPE. best friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, jealousy, angst, two idiots chasing their own tails believing their love is unrequited (ㅠㅠ), based in australia, summer! au, beachhouse! au

WORD COUNT. 8.3k words ☆ 32min read

WARNINGS. cursing, jealousy/shame, reader moves away, mentions of drunkenness, nondesc smut, a dirty dream? (nondesc), reader is said to wear makeup, mentions cheating

AUG'S NOTES. working myself through a writing block.. this fic has helped a lot :) thank you all for being patient with me thus far, i think writing for channie is like free therapy<3 please let me know what you think!!

PLAYLIST.

SYNOPSIS. Attached to the hip, you and Chris might as well have been twins in a past life. And yet, it’s always that tiny inkling, so many years where one of the two wants something more. So when you bring home a boyfriend one summer and both you and Chris begin drifting apart, you wonder if that denial will become something permanent.

or alternatively :

Until when do you stop pretending?

Among many things, Chris likes to think there was an “oh shit” moment to his life. One, exactly.

Over the years he tried pinpointing when that would be, what that would be.

And then you brought a boyfriend home. His home. To a beach house you two would occupy together. Making shadow puppets with your hands and running out to the beach in the early mornings.

Breakfast, lunch, dinner. Making sand castles, running into the water with your clothes on and running out giggling messes.

For two weeks every summer, always. Together.

Never with a plus one.

He debated upon subtly sizing up the guy or appearing overly friendly, but not an ounce of his face seemed to move. Steely.

Cold.

Chris was never cold, and he felt that pang in his chest—guilt—seeing you notice it. That miniature knit of your brow, the purse of your lips.

Did he know you like Chris did? Know when you were angry, or frustrated. What your favorite song was, or how you preferred your hair when you were focused?

He wanted to hate comparison, he used to hate comparison.

And now he’s hating himself for being too late, letting you slip from his grasp like sand between his fingers.

When you were once protagonists of a novel written with a happy ending, that love interest was now home to another.

And he was a bystander to a love story that was never his, watching you smile at someone else.

Someone that wasn’t him.

Breakfast is hellish, not to mention the sleeping arrangements. This boyfriend of yours in the guest bedroom, while he sleeps in his.

Alone. Without you, or your pretty hair, or your pretty eyes. Void of your warm body snuggled up to his, where you used to make silly jokes beneath covers and muffle laughter in turn.

A part of him wants to cry, wants to ask you what you two used to be. What was under the covers?

“Ah.. Chris..” The soft moan of yours, all those years back. Stupid, seventeen, single. A cursed pair of “S”’s he hadn’t realized would come to haunt him each time he closed his eyes.

What was your pretty sounds, his face between your thighs those five years back?

Was it all pretend? Exploration as friends?

No, you were smarter than that.

So he tells himself he was too late, and endures.

Because maybe, maybe they’ll be a plot twist one chapter. Where you fall for the side character.

No, no book ends like that.

It all started in an editing firm’s office.

Well, not literally, considering you hadn’t even been in your mother’s mind until Jessica Bahng—mother of a four-month old Chris Bahng—held back a poor woman’s hair while she belched into a toilet.

That poor woman being your mother, who found out she was pregnant that evening after work.

And through a few Saturday’s at the corner cafe and prolonged conversation by the office’s monitors, the two became the best of friends. Watching little Chris grow into a toddling one year old, and in the process welcoming you into the world nearly ten months later.

From there, almost every waking moment consisted of time together. Chris as the lanky teenager with his brown hair sweeping across a tanned forehead, and you, following after him each step he took at less than a year younger. Kindergarten, Primary School.

Although, in the midst of the friendship, your father had found a better job opportunity in Brisbane, a decent ten-hour drive from the Bahng household you’d found second home in.

Though, after plenty of crocodile tears and mumbled “I’ll miss you”’s tumbling from an eighth grade mouth too absorbed in worrying about the matter of leaving rather than the fact you’d likely visit every month, you departed, off to a city so different from the Sydney you had known of.

Even if it was Australia all the same.

And in turn, the annual summer visits began.

Summer before your freshman year of high school, where Chris finally got his braces off in his sophomore year and you soaked up every ounce of information given on surviving the first few days of school.

Then your own sophomore year, filled with feelings and discoveries and struggles unearthed you didn’t think could be experienced so vividly, expectations in need of fulfillment the board expected a sixteen year old to answer immediately.

What do you want to do with your life? Any plans for college? What about taking these extra classes? They look good on a résumé.

And simultaneously rip the ounces of childhood from your fingertips, but no school board puts that in the papers.

So the moment the car door opens after hellish voyaging to Sydney, you allow your lungs to inhale each ounce of salty air the Bahng family house offers, the childishness allowed for once amid crushing pressure.

It is a meager five minute walk to the lapsing shoreline after all, and the ocean keeps good secrets within the sand, washing away your footprints as to flush away traces of whatever happenings occurred there.

Yet, never truly forgotten. Instead, taken into the waters for little children to tell their mother of whom never believe the ocean spilled someone’s precious secrets.

“Chris.”

June eighteenth of your second year in high school, pajama-clad knees curl close into your body, lashes dusting open in the sparsely lit room to focus on him.

A dilation of the pupils, a hitch of the breath when he turns to you.

High school has changed Chris, but not in a foul manner. Blond curls, he’s exchanged from his usual russet locks. Round cheeks shifting in tandem with a sculptors hand, the marble of his skin a bit more toned, defined.

His jaw that clicks when he grows angered—not often, sometimes at his gaming system.

Thickened brows furrowing and knitting in concentration.

Though those eyes are the same, and always will be. No other will have eyes like his, and you know in any life, in any state of amnesia, they would be recognized.

An “aha” moment where a switch flips in your brain, formulating a mere sentence involuntarily.

I love this boy, and I hope for forever he’ll look back at me.

And for that, you’re selfish. But honest.

If Christopher was a stranger, a look into that gaze and you think you’d know him instantaneously.

How silly.

But just as you had spoken, you’re reminded that childishness was something found each time you visited this place regardless of your actions. You’d hold onto that.

“I don’t want to grow up.”

The bit of fat at his under-eyes cause his eyes to form into crescent moons when he smiles, wrinkles at the corner of thick lashes crinkling.

Chris has always liked the moon.

A warm hand of his reaches forward, cupping your cheek as if the first time.

You think you like this more.

“Then don’t.”

A stroke of his thumb, and you snort a laugh when the cold of your nose bumps against the digit.

“And when you want to go back to being sixteen, come to see me, okay?”

Little did you both know that the future had a way of testing just how long sixteen would last.

Until when do you stop pretending?

An explanation as to how you ended up with the curly blond’s lips pressed to your thighs doesn’t sit anywhere in sight, and in the quiet comfort of your bedroom, you let the thought slip by.

Yet, in the end, there’s as much of a pathetic excuse as expected.

That serves for a bit of background information first.

It was a mistake.

You were just teenagers.

But the stinging feeling in your heart, like the swelling of a thorn stuck between your rib cage, tells you that’s far from the truth.

For any infant it’s easy to placate an act, a theatre of behavior. For your stuffed animals as a doctor, for diving into the pool after the rings a mother would toss in beforehand, feigning the role of an experienced diver.

But there comes both a time and occasion to weave a lie, no less complete the loom as someone cognitive enough to understand a situation’s veracity.

When the mind is said to be “not fully developed” but each and every predicament feels like it matters on behalf of the world, when a sentence a year back pops itself from hiding, appearing at the forefront of your mind.

The true question.

Just how long can one stay sixteen?

Junior year, with eighteen lingering a hairsbreadth away for the both of you.

Junior year, where talk of pressures and intimacy lead to Chris being your first time.

And in turn, you were his.

Though that came a few minutes later. Something clumsy and unpracticed the both of you laughed at on continual occasion, enacted for the pure reason of curiosity, of trust.

While everyone gave themselves to strangers, you wanted to give yourself to someone adored, whom you didn’t believe for a second you’d regret.

But was that really the sole reason?

Curiosity?

Or love?

No. Nothing along those lines.

Or that’s what you told yourself those years, those moments. And although it’s supremely underestimated by that of adults, those prolonged stares, the upward quirk of his lips when he catches your eye from across the room is but a matter a babe could understand.

It has always been more, been a new road opened since you’d kissed him. The both of you simply headed the same route you always had.

Best friends, that’s all.

But to an astronaut, the earth has never been the limit, or they wouldn’t be an astronaut. And you were someone that loved Christopher Bahng, but hid behind a title the both of you knew was untrue.

Now it exists like a flash of the mind, swift and fast and almost unnoticed if not for the lingering feeling at your skin—an insatiable itch where his fingers had laid trace.

A soft nip to your inner thigh, his thumb resting just above your navel. His chin upon your lower belly when your events had come to a close, gazing up at you, unreadable.

No. Not unreadable, but one you didn’t want to read, look too far into and get hurt.

Was that it? A gnawing fear of getting hurt holding you back from the things you wanted?

His face lingering with traces of you, lips swollen and glossy and stretched into a smile you scorned to stare at.

“You’re.. gross.”

Maybe a “thank you” or a “that felt amazing” would’ve been the more appropriate response, but this was Chris, and to not speak your mind would break a vow instilled from the earliest of your elementary days.

He laughs, a squeaky sound of happiness you soak up like a sponge—absorbing, absorbing, taking in every ounce offered.

That you can trust in, place faith within.

In a future unknown, however, a part of you knows that the only way of freedom is to prepare for a pain that may come, and may not.

For there is never a guarantee love will be fatal, but all will pass someday.

To live without a taste of that freedom seems too awful to stay in your bubble.

All so scary, uncertain. The unpredictability can be overwhelming. Somewhere in between you hope he felt it too.

Love, that is.

Ah.

A kiss at your lips, and he tastes like you—something you’d shrink away with disgust at if not for his presence, the tender manner in which he eases your shirt back down, then his own adjusted over his head.

That night, you ate dinner and never spoke of it. Not a taboo topic, merely mutually understood. His parents out for a night, Hannah off staying late for an after school activity.

A kiss after washing dishes in the sink, a kiss when you flop onto the couch. After an uno match by the coffee table, where your competitiveness sparks into screaming matches, tackling him following not long after.

Your bodies like a whirlwind of motion, writhing with chortled laughter like squabbling infants.

Overtop of you he pauses, and your earlier feigned rage fades as quickly as it was provoked, chest warming at the chaste peck to your cheek, then the press of his lips you beckon closer, hands curling into the fabric of his tee, slipping down his back to trace the bumps of his spine.

One breath, two.

Warm, and it feels like you’re melting.

Fingernails usher the shirt upwards, his lower back beared, tanned from summer sun.

More.

You want more all over again.

“Chris!”

It’s Hannah’s voice, squeaky at age thirteen, that clears the steaminess instantly, clambering off each other so quickly your foot slams into his stomach, his hand shoving your face into the carpeted floor.

“I- I won in Uno! Fair and square!”

Not a great cover up, Chris, but the flushed nature of his ears, his cheeks, makes up for the stupid excuse.

From this prompts a sequence of events, of excuses and hiding, of denial and relapsing into what’s familiar.

But just as life is unpredictable, none of those thoughts plagued your mind yet.

Nothing had happened yet.

Then it happened, and you can’t come to recall how.

A party, freshman year of university. A guy, loud music, too many drinks.

He was a sweet soul, helping you back to your dorm when the world became a distant, fuzzy memory. Someway or another (you’re betting your roomie gave it to him), he snagged your number.

Because Saturday morning, 11am, you received a: “Feeling any better?” text you gazed at in horror—believing the random number to be some drunken one night stand—before being filled in.

Jae was his name. Jae Hyeong.

A student in your Wednesday lecture, passing by unknown, now becoming known.

You told Chris about him that summer, mumbled between bites of strawberries after a stop by the market in his dad’s old pick-up truck.

Rust clung to the sides, and you could never be certain the engine would start up again. But it was loved and cherished. So faith was placed in it anyway.

Expectedly, he just nodded his head, popping another sweet bite between plush lips.

The thing was, you told Chris about him without mentioning the dating factor.

Jae was funny, sweet. The first of your dates concluding with your stomach aching from laughter. And a cowardly part of you blames forgetfulness, while the other points directly at your heart.

Even when, staring into his eyes, all you see is Chris.

How cruel, and you want to hate yourself for dragging this boy along.

Scared.

Because at the moment, pursuing music was Chris’s dream, attending Uni at Sydney was that utmost goal he reached towards.

And you’d support him through it, even if you were left behind.

It wasn’t you, your mind berates.

It never was you.

So you’ll look away, deny the love you ache for. Jae deserves that, right? Not to be treated as some source of healing for you, a rebound for love unrequited.

Maybe the friendship of yours has clouded your judgement. It’s not love you harbor, but fondness.

A soul-sucking, gut-wrenching fondness that’s unequivocally love.

“I think you’d like him.”

Maybe this is your hopes of even ground. That if the both of them become somewhat-friends, your feelings will ease and you’ll realize this was all a fever-dream and you were truly in love with Jae.

All a dream.

“Will I?” Chris grunts in reply, both of your legs dangling from the truck bed’s edge.

He thinks you’re prettiest like this. A bit unkempt, no makeup, hair left to its own devices.

You. Wholly, unapologetically you.

Blemishes and smile lines just like his, bits of strawberry lingering by the corners of your lips he wants to kiss away, lap up with his tongue and take advantage of the quiet of the morning, the lack of townspeople awake to witness his greed.

Chris is greedy when it comes to you, he’ll admit it. He wants and wants and wants, and can’t ever seem to be satiated.

Whether it’s your kisses, your laughter, that sweet, mumbled moan when you’re feeling so good.

Shit. He’s in too deep.

To his core, Chris is a gentle man. He wouldn’t allow himself to be angry at you if it cost his life but, he’s also human. And humans feel jealousy.

It’s been a while since the thought occurred to him, since that biting pit began forming in his gut, gnashing their teeth at anything in sight.

“Is he good to you?” A quiet murmur, one that’s a bit reserved compared to his usual cheerfulness, optimistic tone. This is curious, observant. That kind of behavior when he wants to know more though remain subtle.

Plus, he argues with that frothing jealously. It’s not like he’s your boyfriend, right?

Then, as quickly as it came, the jealousy is gone, swept away in the crashing tides just a few miles from where you sit. Replaced with nervousness, worry.

It’s not like Chris can control you. You aren’t to be controlled, and it’d be cruel to keep you from your potential to begin with. He’s just the coward that can’t bring himself to confess.

And neither can you, but he doesn’t know that.

Two nervous messes, fretting over love they’ve shared long before anyone speaks up about it.

What remains unspoken.

Will your boyfriend be good to you? Treat you right? His head swims, grasping a strawberry hard enough that streams of juice slip down his wrist, droplets trickling onto the top of a muscular thigh.

And heaven forbid the guy breaks your heart. He wouldn’t hear the end of it from Chris and likely earn a beat down for the road.

But then comes the hopeful thought, the “what if” that lingers under his skin, buzzes at his fingertips as an index comes to loop a strand of hair behind your ear to better see you.

The bit of pride in the corner, nudging his shoulder as if it were you. A longtime friend.

I’ll treat you well.

Please let me be good to you.

Closing his eyes, the sad smile of yours after having failed your final exam resides there. Bittersweet, somber.

Would it be considered stages of grief if he had yet to lose someone?

No less, it feels as if you’re leaving him behind altogether.

“You alright?”

But for now, you’re by his side. It’s enough.

“Hm,” A nod, eyes remaining closed.

“The sun feels good today.”

It feels better with you.

Who knew how quickly good things go.

“Hi Berry!”

The summer before your junior year of Uni, and for a moment, standing in front of the Bahng household feels nostalgic in a way that makes your heart sink.

The rose-tinted glasses feel further away than ever. Peeling paint, cracks in the wood, creaking of the paneled floors you hadn’t noticed those summer’s before.

Things have changed, and you shudder to think you were the bringer of it.

The hand in yours whose last name isn’t Bahng, however, proves the point.

This summer, Jae came with you. Officially regarded as your boyfriend.

Thus far, there has been no greater feeling of dread and guilt in your gut than right now.

Dread in witnessing Chris’ reaction, guilt from the gnawing ache in your chest. Because no, by no means did you wish to treat Jae as a buffer, an anchor to love unrequited. Nonetheless, that certainly felt the case, more so the situation responsible for your guilt.

And maybe, just maybe, it was wordlessly understood. The manner you’d speak of Chris to Jae, that hidden longing unable to be shielded by a facade.

How cruel, a heart is. To love so shamelessly. Garner affection, but withhold a love solely reserved for one.

In need of mending, care you fail to give by yourself.

Berry, the beloved Chevalier King Charles Spaniel, helps calm such a maelstrom, if only for a short amount of time.

Before Chris walks down the stairs.

If fur had lined Chris’ back, it would be spiked in apprehension, aggression. Like a wolf, scruff ruffled in the presence of someone new.

A second-long overview tells him enough. Your hand in his, the way he trails after you as if some lovesick puppy.

The taste of bile in his throat makes him want to choke.

He missed his chance. Now it’s gone.

So childish, it all is. This harrowing sadness weighing on his chest, the jealousy.

“This is Jae, isn’t it?”

Ah, you should’ve known better.

Chris could always tell.

Yet, his eyes never leave yours. A mere flicker of attention to the newcomer until you’re bathed in the spotlight again, and the hair on your arms rises unnervingly.

“Yeah,” Swiftly clearing your throat, you feebly try at gathering your wits, granting Jae a smile you hope is reassuring.

“He’s.. my boyfriend.”

All at once, Chris feels his world crashing down on him.

“What happened?” He wanted to ask, forgetting you grew up, no longer that little girl seated beside him on the playground’s swings.

Because it’s already enough in recognizing it, but another in receiving clarification.

A slow inhale is breath into lungs he feels are already too full, straining to contain oxygen.

He missed his chance. Now it’s gone.

I lost you, whispers in his mind. Fragmented pieces of a puzzle.

There was a reason an extra pillow resided in the linen closet, or the My Little Pony toothbrush tossed in the mug his old swim-team sold as merch.

For you, and only you.

Never another.

Selfishly, he feels this casting has abruptly booted him from the main position, now rooted as a bystander in a set that isn’t even his.

Of course, Chris lacks the complete asshole gene, so a hasty handshake serves as greeting enough before he’s already reaching for the door.

“Eh? But we-“

“Guest bedroom is on your left. Y/N will show you. You two can sleep there or whatever- I’m going to surf.”

Just the partial asshole gene.

And he knows you can tell. Reading each other with the ease of a lover. Attentive, observant.

Nevertheless, your love is directed to someone else.

“He uh.. isn’t usually like this.”

A mumble on your part suffices in buffering the silence. That, followed by Jae’s cocked brow.

“Real friendly guy.”

Your lip tugs between your teeth, peering back at the boy from over your shoulder. Apparently, your expression of remorse fails to be hidden well.

“Hey, it’s alright,” Jae consoles, “I dealt with that one jerk of a roommate back in Brisbane for a whole semester, y’know? A bit of coldness is nothin’.”

Ignorance only feels good for so long. Bliss is never permanent.

If only you had understood that lesson, abided by it.

Yet, just like those years before, you turn your head the other direction and allow life to pass by without him in it, despite staying in the same home.

Despite him being everything to you, despite a love shared over countless years.

He’s irritable. Chris is. The subtle grit of his teeth you've come to recognize, the harsh grip he nearly crushes his fork in. Dinner had never felt so stifling, never when you were here.

All of a sudden, the household you had once found solace inside feels all too hot, a sweltering furnace where each extra beat of silence adds a degree to the thermometer.

Jessica Bahng’s cooking was incredible, as predicted, and conversation flowed effortlessly between you, her, and Jae—the boy charming without trying, his charisma winning over the woman after a mere two bites of food.

What wasn’t predictable was Chris’ quietness from across the table. Because each time he looks up, he finds himself seated in a theatre, watching what was pass by. Watching how you’d kiss Jae, hold his hand, laugh by his side.

Was that all it was? Him as a spectator?

The chip in the corner of his dinner plate held in hand verifies emotion unwilling to be shown on the surface.

He doesn’t meet your eyes, doesn’t even acknowledge you.

Jerk.

You scoff, offering him a miniature scowl from the corner of your eye.

“So, how’d you meet Y/N? I forgot to ask last night,” Jessica insists, glancing from you to Jae in rapid succession.

Oh, great. The formalities.

“Well,” A pause on the younger boy’s end, sheepishly grinning. “It was actually at a party—“

“Pfft, yeah right,” Chris grunts beneath his breath in amusement, ramming his fork down into a piece of broccoli.

Acting like a child and he knows it, but no amount of maturity can seem to withhold the snide comments.

Either the other three didn’t hear him or chose to ignore him. He’s fine with both.

“And yeah, I just remember her being so drunk and—“

“You wish,” The dyed blond mumbles once more to himself, shaking his head in quiet mirth.

Those words beckon attention, and Chris mutters an inaudible curse after the sharp kick his mother grants in warning.

That night, dinner concluded like usual. Cheerful on one end, quiet as a mouse on the other. Figuring out who belonged on which side came easy.

Except, Chris fails to remain silent this time around whilst attending to dish duty, lips drawing into a tight line witnessing Jae place his plate beside the sink.

Not in the sink, not even an offer to help wash. No, the bastard’s eyes are dead set on you, flickering from your eyes, lips, ass—

Dammit, he wants to sock the guy right about now.

However, he waits until you get upstairs to wash up for bed before speaking.

“Gonna give me a servant uniform too at this point?” The last of Chris’ mutters, and it seems Jae is done with staying silent as well.

“Alright, just what is your problem?”

“I don’t know, why can’t you be well-mannered as a guest? At least wash your own damn dish,” Chris growls back, the two’s eyes meeting in a vicious staring contest prior to his mother’s scolding, resulting in both boys on dish-duty.

Although it’s the words muttered in his ear when Jae leaves that nearly provokes every nerve in his body to crush the man’s face in with his fist.

“Whatever was between you two, forget it. She’s not yours anymore.”

Your face appearing from the top of the stairwell keeps his urge at bay, merely evident in the white-knuckled clenching of his fist, his form hasty to disappear outside the screen door.

Instinctively, sandal-clad feet taking him to the one place that lets him think.

The ocean.

It’s late, and high tides crash against the sandy shoreline. The squawking of seagulls has drawn to a close, the enormous light of the moon overhead a constant he finds comfort in.

Pattering of your footsteps, however, gather his focus instantaneously, wordless where your form curls by his side.

Another constant, just you and him.

Something to spite the change.

So much change, in fact, he feels like each bit of the youth he’s known is being swallowed up, consumed into newness he can’t accept.

But you still open doors fully in case monsters hide behind them, and he hasn’t changed the flavor of ice cream he buys from convenience stores since he was eight, so perhaps nothing has changed but exterior.

To be ignorant is to be blissful, a lesson continually presenting itself this summer. Neither happens to be involved in your predicament.

You’re first to break the silence. Always the more courageous one, albeit he’d never admit it.

“I shouldn’t have brought Jae here, I’m sorry.”

Your slow inhale.

“This is.. our place, I get it. I just thought—“

“No,” A shake of his head, second nature upon reading the startled look you give him.

“I mean,” He has to tilt his head to peek at your face, hidden between your knees like a child.

“It’s our place, you’re right but-.. If one day.. somebody comes along, then that’s..”

A begrudging acceptance, if that’s the word.

You look up at him and- ah, you’re so pretty. Chris stops to stare for a moment, his lips parted like an infant fixated on the cookie jar.

Hurried blinking and a swift breath dispel the prior awe.

“That’s okay. If “you” becomes you and someone else, then so be it.”

A small, wry smile. Though beneath, he feels as if he’s breaking.

“I wouldn’t be your best friend if I didn’t pester your boyfriend, or, y’know, future boyfriends. ‘S what I do for my favorite girl.”

He smiles, wanting to cry more than anything while playfully pinching your cheek.

Why can’t you be mine?

Ten minutes or so separate your conversation, but you pick up again as if you’d never stopped in the first place.

“Sometimes I think it’d be easier if I could just go back to being when we were kids again, y’know?”

“And what would you do if you were kids again?”

These words are slow, patient.

His reply ruins the peace, the begrudging acceptance you had built like a wall of defense, blocking feelings foaming at the mouth to climb from your throat, echoing in the night air.

“I’d never let you go.”

“I’m going to bed,” A mumble interrupts the quietness, your head weighing against his shoulder.

An anchor, in fear you’d be thrashed into the waves without return.

Chris has always been your buoy.

If only he could keep you afloat in your dreams, but you had yet to yearn for that just yet.

The small nod where he assures you he’d stay a bit longer serves as an untold: “good night” you offer a tight smile in response to, slipping past the creaking doorway and up to your shared bedroom.

Shared with Jae, not Chris.

And no, Jae wasn’t a buffer. A substitute until you could muster courage to confess, to shout the aches and pains and torment your messy love prompts.

More often than not, Jae has been a lighthouse, helping you venture through the fog of feelings muddling your mind, decisions.

Hell, you don’t know half of what you’re doing.

So many adult responsibilities are manageable, but love provides its own labyrinth no matter the age, never a mere math equation, a problem and solution.

But with loopholes, and heartbreak, and stupidity, and impulsiveness.

Confusion and sadness and guilt, these gut-wrenching feelings keeping someone up at night.

Like tonight, where your eyes stare daggers into the guest bedroom’s wall across from you. A wall lacking Chris’ swim posters, medals. The old nightlight still plugged into the outlet, once prominent galaxy patterns faded into nothingness.

There for the memories, it was.

Is that what you and Chris were now? A night light still plugged into the wall, left there like some somber source of recollection to look back on?

You hate how your stomach dips at the thought, the nausea building in your throat causing you to roll over, now face-to-face with a snoring Jae, limbs strung like a starfish across the mattress.

Luckily, sleep wasn’t too far away for you either, though it felt like an eternity before your consciousness fully dissipated.

“Oh… Oh my Go-“

Your arms lift above your head, reaching for something you don’t even know. Reprieve, possibly, amid the tingling of your body, the fuzziness of your head.

After months of dreamless nights, of course it’s a dirty dream.

Then an involuntary shift occurs through your body, hand extending towards the boy’s hair. And for a moment, it seems your dream-like vision flickers like a faulty lightbulb, because all you can see is Chris.

Somehow, you know it isn’t Chris, but Jae. Nevertheless, he’s the only face you can make out, the only form recognizable.

Although his name wasn’t explicitly uttered, the horror etching itself into your bones merely mouthing it has you reeling back into reality.

Not Chris’s bedroom, but your dorm room.

Not his chocolate irises meeting yours when you look down, the gentle reassurance in his warm palm, grasping the back of your thigh to offer a grounding squeeze.

This is Jae. This dream is in Brisbane. And Chris is a whole ten-hours away.

Your second day at the beach house, you wake in a cold sweat.

And right there, sixteen really did fade away.

“What’s cookin’ good lookin’?”

Apparently, on a rather comical note, Jae had anticipated your form to be standing by the stove preparing breakfast, his sleep-ridden frame the last to wake up.

Mrs. Jessica had already busied herself driving Hannah to spend the summer with their grandparents, her own annual ritual.

Trust, he wasn’t all too pleased to find Chris there instead, the pan-wielding man granting your boyfriend a venomous stink-eye.

“Sorry, I don’t play housewife,” Your slumber-ridden mumble from the countertop’s stool beckons Chris’ slight snort, pointing the spatula to himself as if clarifying a: “That’s me, the housewife”.

That, paired with containing a huff of laughter watching your form peering into the fridge, hoping the next time you’d open it up a delectable dessert would be there.

To no avail, evident in your dejected grumble.

“Hey,” The curly blond scowls, his frown growing imperceptibly deeper when Jae presses a kiss to your cheek in greeting.

You don’t notice.

“Wait for breakfast, ‘m making omelette how you like. And uh.. I made some other stuff. You can have that, Jae.”

“Thanks,” Sarcasm drips from your boyfriend’s tone, rolling his eyes.

Still on the rocks.

Got it.

“Anytime,” Predictably, Chris feeds off the sarcasm, acting as nonchalant as ever while plating the food and murmuring reminders about waxing his surfboard in the garage.

Further grating Jae’s nerves in turn, you note.

A bigger bite of your omelette feebly manages to redirect the anxiety, the remnants of stringy cheese clinging to your upper lip.

“You’ve got something there.”

Your best friend’s hum rings aloud, reaching to brush the piece of food from the corner of your mouth with his thumb.

And for a moment, a memory of the past flickers in your mind. The darkening of a room, now bright after only a second.

A memory. Not the dream last night.

His lips on yours, the quickening of breath, hands squeezing his clothing like a vice and—

“Thanks.”

The words surprise even you, not a forethought in sight.

And you also don’t notice the cock of Jae’s head, the utter “I dare you” spoken in Chris’ lifted brows, this sneering quirk of his lips offered as a war cry to the other boy before walking past without another word.

One look, and a war had begun.

“We should visit the zoo,” Jae mentions one Sunday while you’re painting your toenails and Chris is absorbed in some video on his phone.

“You seriously haven’t been to the Sydney Zoo?”

Conversations always end like this, and you’re tempted to ram your head into the nearest wall.

“I can’t believe you don’t know how to surf. You’re Australian, seriously.”

“Well I’m sorry I don’t live in my fancy beach house a convenient two minute walk from the beach.”

More bickering, bickering, bickering. Your skull wants to explode.

On an off-handed occasion, maybe they’ll behave tolerably in regards to one another.

That day was not today. Frankly speaking, tonight, where the only responsible person in the household, Jessica Bahng, had left on a work trip.

…You would admit, you also aren't immune to stupid decisions.

However, this stupid decision took the cake.

A competition, predictably, but not just mini golf or freestyle swimming; drinking.

From Asahi beer, apple-flavored soju and hard liquor, the whole assortment bedecked the coffee table, an already tipsy Christopher Bahng swaying across from you.

Sure, college paved the way for immaturity, but seriously. Seeing who could better handle their alcohol was just sad.

And trust, Chris looked about the epitome of sad (adorable, you forgot to mention) with his flushed cheeks and ears to the frustrated crease of his brows, pupils blown, eyes glossy where they fixate on a victorious Jae.

Who, in a prideful fashion, tips back another shot of soju with his own, less-tipsy hiccup prior to getting up and stretching his legs, hopefully gathering water in the process.

Nonetheless, Chris just spaces out, evidently inebriated thanks to the unfocused nature of his attention. Fleetingly, his gaze then roved on you, head tipping in a swoon-worthy fashion like some enamored first grader.

Little were you aware just how gorgeous you looked right now from the boy’s buzzed perspective, breath smelling of alcohol where he exhales short huffs, lips curving into this dumb-happy smile.

And— he passes out, thankfully already seated on the carpeted floor.

Though, leaving you and a grumpy Jae with the responsibility of lugging him onto the couch, letting sleep help sober him up until you (considering your boyfriend did everything in his power to avoid interaction with the blacked out Chris) took the role of coaxing sips of water into his mouth.

By midnight, all the glasses had been cleared, and you adjusted a blanket over Chris’s drunken, sleepy frame, Jae already preparing for bed upstairs.

“I love Berry.” A whisper, and you crane to catch the remnants of his words before he shifts beneath the blanket, dead silent for a minute or two.

Then he rolls over to face you, sporting a downright longing sort of look.

“.. I really love Berry.”

“You said that already, Chris.”

“Okay.”

And he rolls over like it was all a dream, pouty.

Too cute.

Your fond touch smooths coiling strands of hair from his forehead, sparing him a last glance prior to thumping up the stairs.

That night, lying sleepless in bed, you can’t help but wonder:

How much more of this? For both them and you. How much more competition until the calm facades crack, until your patience snaps?

The flames of a rivalry never seem to wane, each interaction adding gasoline to a heat almost unbearable.

Only a matter of time until someone pours in too much and ignites an inferno.

One week until your visit to Sydney comes to a close, and the two are still at each other’s throats.

Between mundane things like making dinner or cleaning to stupid competitions like who ran the fastest mile in junior high or who can stay underwater the longest (or the drinking competition, a notable contestant), this trip has started to feel like a babysitting gig instead of a vacation.

“Chris-“

“Christopher.” Chris corrects one evening, the snide reprimand earning Jae’s icy glare in return.

Currently seated by your side on the couch once occupied by the blond, Jae scoffs to himself, arm extending to drape over your shoulders.

Meanwhile, your attention remains solely on the nature channel, a bit dazed in exhaustion after a long day of swimming beneath the warm sun overhead.

What makes him bristle is the way Jae leans into your form, pressing a kiss to your temple whilst maintaining sole eye contact with the other man.

When your head turns, however, all is well.

This quieted, occasionally evident rivalry grates your nerves with no trace of resolve.

“Say,” An aimless hand taps against the side of the reclining chair your best friend sits within, a loose tee and sweatpants adorning his form.

And you’d be a fat liar to not admit glancing more than once at the way the fabric stretches over his torso when he shifts, squeezing against muscles unable to suitably fit.

Merely appreciative, you tell yourself.

“Why don’t we let dear old Jae pick Y/N’s favorite movie, hm?”

Such a mocking question, it is, and Chris spares no expense chucking the remote control in hand a little too hard at Jae, the man’s brows furrowing in silent irritation he refused to voice aloud.

Testing him.

Perhaps a time ago you’d mentioned your favorite movie to your boyfriend, though the topic wasn’t all too serious in your opinion.

For Jae, however, this was war, this unspeakable quiz verifying if he knew you better than Chris, knew the answer the other man knew like the back of his hand and then some.

You both know the champion title would always rest in Chris’s hands.

That you kept quiet about.

“What? Don’t tell me you don’t know her favorite movie.”

Cocky, Chris is.

And dammit, the tick of his jaw is unfairly attractive.

“It’s Tangled, now give me the remote and both of you grow up.”

It’s your turn to answer, having grown sick and tired of these childish taunts before snatching the remote from Jae’s grasp with a shared, scolding glower towards the both of them.

Comedically enough, they shrink like dejected puppies.

Fortunately, the movie helps distract you for a while, long enough that a nap becomes a decision not on your own accord—body slumping against Jae’s.

Unfortunately, Jae flipping Chris off from the couch and mouthing a “loser” beneath his breath escalates things to a level you don’t like to imagine.

Perhaps that’s the cause for either black eye decorating their face and Chris’s busted lip the next morning.

Trust, waking up to black and blue boys roaming the house was a sight hard not to laugh at.

“Did you guys.. fight?”

“Fight? I have no clue what you’re talking about.”

“You’ve got a black eye, Jae.”

By the time the last day rolls around, those arguments, petty behavior, childish games become something you want to hold onto, June and July drifting past too quickly for you to chase after.

And while you had some grasp of their fight three days ago, only half of it has been made knowledgeable.

Chris would like to keep it that way for a multitude of reasons.

The favorite movie of yours served as the gasoline, and you had foretold the inferno to come.

“It’s not my fault you can’t let go of something that was never yours!”

Chris shoves Jae’s suitcase in the back of your car harder than need be, the other boy’s words ringing in his head as if some dreaded deadline.

“She’s- she’s not something to be owned like an object! I don’t want to possess her, I want to love her! And my god if you could get that through your head I think things would become a lot easier for both of us!”

A worthy argument on his own part, Chris would argue.

“You know what needs to get through your head?” Chris recalls the events similar to replays in sports, nearly able to feel the anger that had been coursing through his veins when Jae retaliated.

Storming straight up in his face where they stood on the beach, the night sky as their audience.

“You lost your chance, Chris. Waited too fucking long to confess and now you’re acting like a little kid just ‘cause you didn’t have the balls to say something, get it?”

Jae spat his name like a cursed pseudonym, and a snort of satisfaction exhales from his frame envisioning the sucker-punch he gave the boy after that.

Followed by the clench of his fist, observing your laughter while talking with your boyfriend from afar.

Boyfriend.

Dammit.

Then the last part, before they both went tumbling into the sand in a mixture of fury-filled shouts and flying limbs.

“She’s not yours, Chris. Deal with it.”

His reply?

“Hurt her, break her heart, and I’ll give you a matching black eye.”

Who knew such a day would come so soon.

Maybe you should’ve known better.

Or that’s what you try to explain to yourself using. Some sad excuse to make up for the scene witnessed just minutes earlier.

Six months, not even half a year, and two months after traveling to Sydney together.

Stopping at crappy restaurants during the boresome ride, cracking jokes, laughing until your bellies hurt. Kissing, sex.

Was it the whole tension with Chris? Your mind rationalizes, frantically searching for some reason, rhyme.

Trick question. There is no rhyme or reason in love.

Now, Jae professes all of it amounted to nothing while staying silent at the same time.

Him kissing another girl in front of your dormitory proved that.

Cheater.

And within the few minutes you bask in realization, you wish so terribly you could unleash that wrath on him. Scream in frustration or land similar punches the two battered each other with in Sydney.

Kick him in the shins, yell manically enough to scare the sadness out of your body.

But honestly, you just want to cry.

A sharp inhale, battling the sob threatening to run free with the beep of your phone’s keypad, serving as your only companion.

Until Chris picks up the call, and shit.

You break.

“What.. What was I thinking-“

It’s a job and a half sniffling up the cries, and for once, you feel embarrassed calling Chris crying—even with this being far from the first time.

Why involve someone else in your own problems?

Realistically, a part of you knew such a happening both could and, stupidly enough, would occur, knew this placated vision of peacefulness was a meager mask, acting as a film to the truth behind the blurry camera lens.

You can’t stay ignorant to him, and there isn’t a particle of happiness in unrequited pining, no matter trying to ease the pain with someone else who’ll eventually hurt you.

Fuck.

Because you love him. That’s all.

There, said and done.

In your mind, at least. But saying that aloud results in your tongue feeling like lead, results in more crying.

“Y/N,” His voice, and you feel the coldness in your fingertips warm up, as if wrapped in his embrace. A long, safe hug.

“Answer me two things.”

Your additionally embarrassing, whimpered sound of agreement affirms his offer.

“Was this Jae?”

No it was—

Yes. Honestly, truthfully, it was.

No more pretending, excuses. Sixteen was over.

“Mhm,” Wiping your snotty nose on the back of your hand, a miniscule amount of relief comes from leaning against the wall behind you.

“And do you want me there or just want to talk?” That lilt of his tone, tender.

He’s good at making you want to cry. Though never due to meanness.

Sucking in a shuddering breath, you calm your voice as much as possible.

“Here. Here, please.”

Then a realization.

“But you’re, like, ten hours awa-“

“That doesn’t matter. I’ll make it five. Right now, go back to your dorm, get some good takeout, and turn on Tangled, okay? Find something relaxing and don’t think about anything for a moment. I’ll be right there, alright?”

Longing lies in the way you press the phone to your cheek, savoring his voice like a soothing balm.

Let’s go back, let’s try this one more time.

First that time he asked you to prom in highschool, the second in his bedroom, allowing yourselves intimacy with each other for the first time.

You’ve never heard of a third chance before.

For him, you’re willing to try.

That said, Chris held tight to his word, the rattling truck of his a miracle in managing to get here—no less get here two hours earlier than most did on the drive to Brisbane from Sydney, alerting you from the comfort of your dorm’s bed with its puttering engine and creaking brakes.

Surprisingly, however, he doesn’t spare you a word whilst rushing past, seemingly having chosen perfect timing in rushing to the dorms where a rather unlucky Jae steps out.

You don’t think you’ve heard a more dreadful noise than the crunch of Jae’s nose beneath Chris’s fist, the force alone sending the boy bowling to the ground before he’s being picked up again by the collar, your best friend downright seething.

“What did I tell you, hm?” A growl, his arm poised for another blow you can’t bring yourself to watch.

“Hurt her, break her heart, and I’ll give you a matching black eye.” Chris repeats, nothing but white-hot rage charging through his veins.

Jae, satisfyingly enough, looks terrified.

Good, Chris internally muses. Because simply pulling in, he saw all he needed to. The puffiness of your eyes, your shuddering sniffles.

And all of a sudden it feels like that time in second grade, where Chris and a few of his friends had gotten redemption on the kid who stole your favorite popsicle flavor purposefully.

And for you, you feel like you’re watching that missing-toothed, sunburnt boy stand up for you again.

“I think another black eye might compliment the nose,” He snarls, momentarily catching your gaze.

The subtle shake of your head dissipates every angry instinct simultaneously, deciding to harshly shove Jae back to the ground alternatively and, at last, gather you in his arms for a hug that felt long overdue.

Occasionally you come to think there are connections that reach deeper than love — being the connection of souls in the most intimate of moments. Being your fingertips threading through blond curls, kissing at his lips clumsily—unlearned.

Right now, this hug. Nosing into the scent of his detergent, finding comfort in the place you were meant to be in, the arms you weren’t meant to be held in.

It had always been unlearned, but it was Chris, so you didn’t mind.

Oh, you loved it.

Loved him.

A bloody-nosed Jae could wait, because the last hour of Tangled needed to be watched, and the curl of his fingers in yours coaxed you along without a chance of stopping.

Senior year and soon to be graduates. Grown up, maybe just physically.

“Chris.”

The words are nearly inaudible, drapes of the canopy bed sole privacy to the man lingering above you, blond curls just as you remembered, eyes that same, heart-stopping chocolate hue.

Your hands find themselves reaching up, tentative to touch warm skin. Golden.

Chris is always golden.

“Please hold me.”

And those arms that were always meant for you, lips kissing at your chin, pulls you into a rip current you had no intention of leaving.

Yours, his.

Messy, unlearned. Down to experience eventual problems.

But it was Chris, so you didn’t mind.

sunboki, may 2022 ©

641 notes · View notes

hiraethwrote · 9 months ago

Text

NEVER GOT YOUR NAME

✧ pairing: satoru gojo x f!reader ✧ summary: based of this drabble — you're ex is borderline harassing you. he just will not leave you alone, and in a desperate attempt to get him off your back, you tell a little white lie. in panic, you grab the first stranger to walk by and introduce him as your date ✧ cw: fluff, light profanity, one little comment about previous sexual relationship, arguing, word vomit ngl (i'm describing too much sorry) pining, reader is smaller than satoru, mild use of petnames, no use of y/n ✧ word count: 3.5k

He was a menace. A true and genuine menace, who seemed to have some sort of natural ability in finding you, no matter where you were.

Maybe getting a restraining order was the next step — there was no way he managed to just randomly run into at the rate that he was, whether that was in the grocery store, the gas station or just on the street. No, he had to be stalking you, right? The universe wouldn’t be so cruel to give this guy, your god awful ex, the privilege of fulfilling his desires of bumping into you.

Yet, here you stood in front of him again.

His eyebrows pinched together, an innocent little smirk tilting his mouth crooked, feeding you the same lines he always did.

“Great seeing you again,” like you hadn’t ran into him not even three days ago. “You look fantastic, as always. How’ve you been, sweets?” Urgh, one of the many nicknames he had named you — your stomach turning at the sound of it. You were scared you might actually hurl.

“Stop calling me that,” you demanded, keeping your voice low. He always managed to bring your anger right to the surface, to which you had to use all your energy not to blow up in his face. It had already happened once, about two months after you broke up with him. You had raised your voice at him and lashed out, causing some random bystander to interfere — who had then proceed to take his side. Unbelievable, as if he wasn’t the one who had taken you for granted for the entirety of your relationship.

“Sorry, old habits die hard, you know.” So full of shit. You’d been broken up for months, there shouldn’t have been any problem dropping the pet names. He only did it as a tactic to try and manipulate you into his arms again. And to think you willingly used to sleep with this guy. “Since we’re both here, why don’t we grab lunch together?”

“Oh, please,” you breathed, pinching the bridge of your nose.

“It’ll be good for us, sweets-“ don’t punch him, don’t punch him, don’t punch him. “Maybe we can talk some things-“

“I’m actually here on a date!”

Finally he shut up, only for his face to twist into an expression of pure disgust. It was clear the idea had never even crossed his mind — and you would have been able to enjoy his agony had it not been for the fact that it was a complete and utter lie, thrown out in a moment of desperation.

What were you to do when your ex decided to wait around for your date to arrive, and he never showed? You could already picture his face — the patronising pity he would pay you, while you’d be able to read his satisfaction behind his eyes, as he would use it against you for months to come.

You had only bought yourself some time and you needed to think fast.

“Who? I mean, do I know them? Have you met them before?” He stuttered out questions of bewilderment as your limbs were growing ever more frantic at your side.

And then the bell above the entrance of the cafe chimed a sweet tune, eyes snapping towards the sound. “Ah, there he is!” Your arms acted on their own accord, hands grabbing onto the bicep of the person who had been so unfortunate to walk in right as you were spiralling.

Swallowing the worst of your anxiety, you dared turn your head towards the random person, hoping to god he wasn’t ugly (because that would just be yet another thing your ex would badger you about).

Due to his height, you had to angle your head more than expected to meet his piercing eyes that were ogling you with complete confusion — but you only had time to take in his appearance for a slit second before you shot him a pleading look, betting everything on the off chance that he would be able to read the situation — but also finding it in himself to play along to your little performance.

Your fingers squeezed lightly at his arm, bringing him back to reality. Then it only took him a second to make up his mind, the white haired stranger wiping off his confusion and confidently throwing his muscular arm across your shoulders. Once he turned to face your ex, he had painted his features with the smuggest grin one could imagine, revealing a charming dimple.

He tilted forward slightly, which only brought more attention to how much taller he was than your ex, and shot his hand out between them. “Satoru, pleasure to meet you.” His tone matched his expression, not a single speckle of insecurity to pick up on anywhere. Your ex stared at his hand with disdain before begrudgingly accepting the gesture and introducing himself in return. “Hm, don’t think she’s mentioned you.”

Your lips parted in surprise, not expecting this Satoru to take his role so seriously — and then put on an award winning show right off the bat, nonetheless. Was it finally your turn to be blessed by the universe with some good karma in the shape of the most perfect stranger to deal with the situation?

Turning to take a quick glance at your ex, you had to press your lips together to choke back the cackle that threatened to escape. His expression was priceless, Satoru’s innocent little comment rolling of his tongue so effortlessly, causing a slight twitch in your ex’s eye.

“Well, I’m her-“ then he cleared his throat, struggling to finish his sentence. You weren’t surprised his title died in his throat, having never really accepted the fact that the relationship with over.

“He’s my ex,” you said, finding some courage to casually place your hand on Satoru’s chest, hoping and begging you weren’t making him uncomfortable by crossing a line.

“Aaah, your ex,” this Satoru trialed off with an awkward raise of the eyebrows before he turned to look at you again. That’s when you finally got to take a proper look at his breathtaking eyes, the whole ocean trapped in his irises. But you couldn’t let yourself fall completely mesmerised — you shook off the affect his piercing eyes seemed to have. “Sorry I’m running a little late. I stopped by the bookstore down the street to see if they had that book you recommended on our first date.” Then he served you what seemed like a genuine smile.

Stop, not the time to admire the handsome stranger!

You bashfully tilted your head forward while the sweetest chuckle traveled past your lips, also having to sell the performance. “How sweet of you to remember.”

“Of course!” He smoothly removed his arm from your shoulder to slide it along your back, moving it in comforting circles — but he never let it travel too far.

Your ex had his glare glued to Satoru’s gesture, unable to look away no matter how badly he wanted to.

“Never got around to that one,” your ex said with an awkward, forced laugh in an attempt to shift the attention back to him. He probably thought he was being charming (he always thought he was), but his little comment only gave you another reminder to why you had broken up with him — he never cared about your interests, as he couldn’t be bothered to pick up your favourite book, no matter how many times you had asked him if he could at least give it a try.

“Huh, how unfortunate.” Again, your ex couldn’t conceal the little reaction Satoru caused in his face by his incredibly taunting tone.

He cleared his throat again, and you could see how he was grasping at straws trying to redeem himself. “So, what do you have planned?” It wasn’t too obvious, but you could tell — you could tell he asked as a challenge, certain your “date” wouldn’t be able to suffice an answer that would leave him satisfied.

You opened your mouth to answer, but only managed to take a breath before Satoru had already started his lengthy explanation. “Well, first I’m taking her out for lunch, obviously,” he mused, taking a quick glance around your surroundings. “And I didn’t want to ruin the surprise, but I got us entrance tickets for the botanical garden uptown. She told me she’s been wanting to go for months.” Then he turned to look at you.

He said it with such a genuine smile painting the corner of his lips, both of you letting the eye contact linger for a second. For once you were thankful for your ex, because if it wasn’t for him drawing Satoru’s alluring eyes away, you were scared you might just have found yourself swooning a little.

“Oh, yeah, of course,” your ex chuckled in response with a nonchalant eye roll, “she might have mentioned it once or twice.”

“Hm,” Satoru huffed, sucking in his cheeks and eyeing him up and down

Pathetic was really the only word that Satoru would use to best describe the individual in front of him. He just seemed so puny, reeking of insecurity, only amplified by how he had so easily went along with the lie of a botanical garden — something Satoru had just pulled from the top of his head.

A huge, nervous lump traveled down his throat as Satoru held his gaze hostage, his dominant behaviour easily smothering any sprinkle of confidence your ex might have possessed at one point — all by just being there. And it was just so satisfying that it was finally your turn to watch your no-good ex being the one who was tormented for once.

“Well-“ his voice cracked the slightest, Satoru pursing his lips in amusement at the little slip, “I have to get going now. I’ll see you around,” stumbling over his words as his face shyly grew redder. Then he just turned on his heel and left, leaving no time for you to even say goodbye.

Satoru instantly felt your body relax at his side with a deep exhale, the hand that had shyly rested on his chest with modesty falling the second the door was shut — and once you took a step in front of him, he became hyper aware of how close to him you had been the entire time. With the sudden absence of your body next to his, he realised how perfectly you had just seemed to fit next to him. Nearly as if you had been made simply to be by his side.

And stood in front of him, he finally got the chance to take a look at you. A proper look at you, and damn, you were beautiful. Your eyes were kind, which amazed him considering the unpleasant encounter that had just taken place.

The chuckle you’d faked along with his act was still resting on your lips, but now it definitely seemed more real — warm.

“Thank you so much!” You gushed, “I am so sorry I just dragged you into that! I was panicking.”

Satoru watched intently as you spoke, unable to peer his eyes off you. His attention held on to every syllable, entirely captivated by your person, eyes roaming your face to take in every little detail there was to observe.

“Shit,” you suddenly interrupted yourself, taking a glance at your watch.

“I never caught-“

“I really wish I could stay and treat you for lunch, as thanks,” you cut him off, seemingly not even acknowledging how he had tried to speak, rummaging through your bag frantically before pulling out your wallet, “but because of him I’m running late. So, here, take this,” you chuckled lightly while stuffing his hands full of cash. “I really appreciate what you did!” Satoru was barely able to decode what you were saying as it all came tumbling out in one breath.

Continuing to spew a string of thank you’s, you quickly backed out of the cafe, his eyes following you as you jogged lightly down the street and out of sight.

Satoru was left utterly baffled, simply ogling the vacated spot you had occupied seconds ago.

Of all the times Satoru would end up tongue tied, this was the worst possible moment — he was cursing himself relentlessly for not being quick enough to demand a name, and now you were just gone, some random person he’d been lucky enough to cross paths with for a moment.

He knew he should just get on with his day — use the money you had gifted him and buy himself that sweet treat he wanted and forget about you. But he couldn’t — he wouldn't.

Had you just decided to walk into a random cafe you had just so happened to walk past that particular day?

Satoru certainly thought so. Because when he couldn’t rid you from his mind, he had gone back to that very same cafe, childlike optimism filling his body while he lingered the area, waiting for your figure to show.

It never did.

His patience quickly ran out, growing more restless every day that passed where he didn’t see you stroll down the street to return to the cafe to grab the lunch you never got to have.

He couldn’t let it rest in the hands of the universe any longer. After days of casually stalking the area, he decided to strut through the entrance of the building to simply ask.

“And how can I help you today, sir?” The sweet girl behind the counter mused, the perfect customer service smile greeting him as he leaned his entire weight in the edge of the counter.

“Hi there, remember me?”

He saw her shoulders rise slightly as she took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I don’t,” yet another polite smile.

“I was in here about three weeks ago. Was with this really pretty girl-“

“Sir,” she gently interrupted him, still the same smile on her face, “we see hundred of faces every day. We have no way of remembering them all.”

His head fell back dramatically, huffing in disappointment as his fingers flexed against the marble top. “Thanks, anyway,” he mumbled quietly, shuffling over to a secluded table in the corner, sulking in his lonesome while his eyes were locked on the door, still filled with a light glimmer of hope that you would show.

It became routine — sitting in the same corner in the back, ordering the same thing while he waited for three hours everyday before he eventually had to leave, with a heavy heart, to attend to his duties.

And if the nice barista didn’t recognise him before, she definitely did now, walking over to his table and serving him his plate with a sympathetic smile. “No show today either?” The most theatrical sigh would leave his lips every time she asked the question, sad puppy dog eyes on display as he shook his head. “Sorry, buddy.”

“It’s getting a little sad, don’t you think?” Her coworker would comment once she rejoined her behind the counter, both of them keeping an eye on him with pinched eyebrows.

“I don’t know,” she breathed, crossing her arms over her chest. “It’s a little romantic.”

Then they would share a look, some judgement passing between their eyes before they burst into innocent laughter, wondering how long they would get to witness his yearning before he eventually gave up his dreams of finding you again.

For days, Satoru’s head would snap towards the door every time the tiny bell rang, witnessing all sorts of people come to enjoy a little treat but not a single one of them fit your description.

Maybe this was just too hopeless? Tokyo was the most populated city in the world — bumping into the same person twice was like finding a needle in a high stack. Scratch that, it was like finding a rice grain in the great Sahara desert. But he kept praying, hoping the universe would bless him with his desire.

It was a perfectly okay day.

The temperature was nice — higher than expected for a mid-fall day — but the weather wasn’t much to brag about. For the past week it had been raining. Not pouring, but a light, constant drizzle that tapped quietly against the cafe window as Satoru stared mindlessly out at the scenery of concrete buildings and trees changing colour.

There was only a single string of hope that kept him sitting in that chair day after day, but it was destined to break soon. His head didn’t even turn towards the door anymore when that little bell rang with the familiar chime. He simply rested his chin in the palm of his hand, giving all the responsibility back to the universe.

The familiar barista came to his table, picking up the plate littered with only crumps and not one, but two, empty coffee mugs (that had been more sugar than coffee).

“Same time tomorrow?” She asked sweetly, wiping the table clean while balancing the dishes in her other hand.

He instantly wiped away his disappointment, plastering on the most convincing smile he could muster as he turned to face her. “I don’t think so.” She stared wide eyed at him, mouth parted into a shy ‘o’, a little disappointed to see him finally give up, having started to root for him a long time ago. “You’ve had exceptional service,” he beamed from ear to ear as he got up from his chair, her eyes never leaving him as he stood to tower over her.

He gave her one last tight lipped smile as he passed her. “Goodbye,” she stuttered quietly, keeping her pitying gaze on him as he headed for the exit.

The bell rang one last time, and Satoru was a little relieved he wouldn’t have to hear the obnoxiously high-pitching ding again — his relief short lasted as he crashed into a figure smaller than himself the second he was about to exit.

“Oh, I’m so sorry. I wasn’t watching- well, if it isn’t my knight in shining armour!”

What were the chances?

After all those days — waiting, staring, stuffing his face with sweets — and to think he was just about to give up. Maybe the universe had finally decided to take pity on him, wanting to reward his patience.

You looked as breathtaking as the day you had desperately latched onto his arm — maybe even better. You seemed lighter almost, as if someone had lifted off pounds from your shoulders. Same kind eyes, but a sense of peace glossing over them instead of frustration.

“It’s you,” it fell from his lips involuntary.

“In the flesh,” you chuckled. The sweet, vibrating sound faded into a clear of the throat when Satoru only continued to ogle you without a word. “Oh, sorry, you were leaving-“ you stuttered, stepping aside to let him pass. You were left confused when he didn’t walk past you, but rather kept his glare on you.

“I never got your name.”

“Sorry?” You asked, his voice too quiet to pick up on.

The same smug grin you’d seen on his face so many weeks ago greeted you, swallowing the nervous lump in your throat. “I never got your name,” more assertive now that he had increased his volume.

“Oh,” you said shyly, your fingers tightening around the strap of your bag. Eyeing his attractive smile, you let your name roll off your tongue before mirroring his expression of happiness.

If it was even possible, his smile stretched even further across his face, the dimples you’d noticed last time appearing on each side of his face. “Nice to finally meet you. Properly this time.”

His natural charm just steamed off him in abundance, something you had only appreciated in glimpses in your stressed haze. “You too,” you smiled.

“I haven’t seen you here since that day.”

“Well, that’s because I haven’t been here since then,” you chucked nervously, glancing towards the register when you felt some interrogating eyes on you — both of the girls behind the counter wringing their heads away from you and Satoru. “My ex has had a tendency to linger in areas we ‘bump’ into each other,” you raise your fingers to gesture the quotation marks, “but I actually think meeting you might have scared him off for good. Haven’t seen him since, so thank you again.”

“Truly my pleasure,” he straightened his posture, his height growing even more impressive. He spoke your name, and despite not really knowing you, he said it with a tenderness your ex always lacked. “I was wondering,” he took a step closer, his eyes flittering between yours, “I owe you a trip to a botanical garden, don’t you think?”

Your breath instantly hitched in your throat, heat spreading modestly across your face.

Of course the handsome stranger who had come to your rescue in a moment of genuine despair had crossed your mind from time to time since then — you had just come to terms with the fact you would never be as lucky to cross paths with the polite stranger again. And the part of you that had been plagued with embarrassment was okay with that.

But the excitement in his eyes as he waited for you to answer slowly erased the uncomfortable feeling.

“Sure, I’d like that.”

tags (taglist form) @sad-darksoul ﾉ @05-simply-06-simping ﾉ @geniejunn ﾉ @alixris ﾉ @shadava

@gdamnackerman ﾉ @sunfl0werlevi ﾉ @gojonegs ﾉ @m0nsterzl0ve

@cupidxml ﾉ @lashaemorow ﾉ @cirquedelooney ﾉ @itsinherited

@elenor222 ﾉ @mima0127 ﾉ @lem-hhn ﾉ @mechanicalmari

a/n it's finally here and i think i'm happy with it... not entirely sure. think i've seen myself blind on this fic. however, thank you so much for the reception on the little drabble that took me literally ten minutes to write, hope this lives up to your expectations <3 likes, comments and reblogs is much appreciated

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hedwig221b · 4 months ago

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hello! are you still doing sterek recs? if so do you know of any good ones where stiles has no idea how gorgeous he is/has no idea how obsessed derek is with him and genuinely thinks he doesn’t stand a chance in hell??? my heart burns for the drama

Sure! May I offer you these?

Gorgeous by Asterekmess (Livinginfictions)

Derek didn’t actually notice anything strange until the middle of the pack’s second year, but once he realized how many layers of clothing Stiles wore all the time, he couldn't stop noticing it. Curiosity and worry ate away at him every time the weather turned warm, until he felt he had to do something about it.

The Courting Dilemmas of a Spark and a Werewolf Prince by greenleaf

Talia smiled calmly. “I am well aware that you are not a werewolf, my darling, but I thought this would be the best reading material for you to use as reference. After all, how would you know how to act during a courting ritual if you do not study it?” “But I don’t… I’m not…” Stiles narrowed his eyes at her. “Are you setting me up with someone?” Talia rolled her eyes at him. “Don’t be obtuse, my darling. Why would I set you up with someone –” “Oh, well, that’s good, because–” “–when I have a son who is already perfectly enamored with you?”

There's a Wolf in My Bed by halcyon1993

Three weeks after helping Derek stop his uncle, Stiles returns home from school to find the new alpha fast asleep on his bed. He doesn't know what to do about it, especially when it keeps happening.

What's Held on Our Shoulders by chameleonoverhere

Derek drops Stiles off at school, and this attracts the unwanted attention and harassment of some kid. He exploits Stiles' greatest insecurity, has him asking questions about his relationship with Derek that he never had before.

Pack nights are not for getting laid by igotdamn

Stiles goes out clubbing, Derek doesn't like that very much.

Unknown Power by LadyDrace

Stiles never really understood what Derek actually saw in him. But thanks to some filth and the scientific method, he finally starts getting the hint

Stiles is a Hottie series by dragon_temeraire

A series of unrelated fics where Stiles is just too hot. (I love this trope, so I will probably end up writing a lot for this)

it's obvious, you're oblivious by EvanesDust

Derek’s new roommate is alpha bait but seems disinterested in everyone—especially Derek. Stiles is suddenly popular, but can't seem to catch the interest of the only alpha he actually likes. …or the one where Stiles and Derek get paired together in room assignments and are secretly in love with the other.

Oh. . . you love me? by yeemo_crack

Stiles is bait. . . again. Stiles is injured. . . again. His wounds are so bad he ends up in hospital, and is shocked to find Derek there when he wakes up. What follows is a very interesting conversation with said Sourwolf where feelings are revealed and Stiles says some very dumb things. Excerpt As he traced the lines on his palm he also gradually drew away Stiles’ pain. The relief was dizzying, so as a result Stiles said something dumb. “Careful Dramawolf, if you carry on like this people might start to think you’re in love with me or something.”

How to Woo Your Local Omega by alocalband

Stiles knows a pity gift when he sees one. Mostly because that’s all he’s ever gotten from anyone since the moment he hit puberty.

erroneous manoeuvres by slippingfromreality

"Hey, Stilinski!” Stiles clenches his teeth. “What do you want, Hale?” he shouts back, not bothering to turn around. The smug smirk that’s most likely waiting for him is already seared into his mind from overexposure. “A date!” the answer comes, still as loud, and most of the bystanders giggle or snort in Stiles’ direction. Stiles rolls his eyes. This is the third time this week. He’d complain that Hale’s jokes are getting pretty stale, but he’d probably be milking this situation for all that it’s worth, too, if their roles were reversed. “Wrong aisle,” he grouses back, “try the bakery section. I hear they have fresh tarts.” Or, in which Stiles grievously misjudged his bullying situation.

[masterlist link]

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ozzgin · 5 months ago

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Ozzgin more than ever I really need a hacker yandere out to fight injustice done against me. Because why was my bank account hacked and someone tried it ed to steal 500$ bucks from me. Luckily I was able to lock my card and my bank is sending me a new one but I'm so so anxious at this point 😭

Yandere hacker would never let some twerps swindle me for my money like this(I'm sure they're a bunch of kids since the person tried to buy cs go ). He cares deeply for my digital footprints.

Oof, sorry it happened to you, pookie. Though I doubt a yandere would help you out of the goodness of his heart... content: gender neutral reader, obsessive behavior, manipulation, stalking

Yandere!Hacker always makes sure that your digital presence remains untouched. Through some sheer luck or unknown forces, you've never had to deal with any kind of online misfortune. You'll offer your friends a sympathetic smile whenever they bemoan the persistence of some internet pervert, but you've been spared of such predatory approaches.

You'd almost be tempted to believe that these said malicious attacks are mere myths meant to scare the unseasoned traveler. You've never been hacked, never been scammed, never had your data or photos stolen from anywhere. Maybe you're just particularly careful, you tell yourself.

In reality, you've been under the watchful gaze of your online stalker. He dutifully keeps track of every move and every click you make. If someone were to save one of your photos for later purposes, for example, he'd immediately track them down and make sure they can never access a computer again.

Yandere!Hacker doesn't protect you out of pure, selfless intentions, however. When it comes to invading your privacy, he's a meticulous sleuth constantly outdoing himself. It's just, you see, no one else should have this kind of control over you. From the moment he stumbled upon your profile, he knew you'd be his. Thus, he can't allow anyone else to interfere with his grand adoration.

Your dating apps always fail to show you any matches, your flirty messages from suitors never arrive. He'll watch through the webcam he's hacked into as you sigh, disappointed, from yet another case of being ghosted. Oh, sweet, darling (Y/N), give him a little more time.

Yandere!Hacker isn't quite satisfied with watching you from afar. While it certainly is endearing to observe you in your raw, innocent obliviousness, while he frequently touches himself to the exhilaration of voyeurism, being a passive bystander can become exceptionally boring. He often wonders if your skin is as soft as it looks, or if you smell as sweet as he likes to imagine.

"This can't be..."

Tears well in your eyes as you stare, helpless, at the notification: your bank account has been drained. Someone must've emptied it, and - as a consequence - you are now utterly penniless. Just as another sob escapes your mouth, your screen lights up with a new message. An acquaintance you don't remember too well.

"Is everything alright with you, (Y/N)? I just wanted to remind you that you can always count on me for anything. I mean it."

He leans back in his chair with a grin. Now he waits. You're desperate enough that it shouldn't require much convincing for you to move in with him. Of course you can have his spare room. No, he truly doesn't need anything in return. You're his dear friend, and he's at your service.

You can always rely on him.

[More Yandere Stories]

#yandere hacker #yandere #yandere x reader #yandere x darling #yandere scenarios #yandere imagines #yandere headcanons

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niccolites · 6 months ago

Text

i don't wanna break the heart of any other man (but you)

johnny (soap) mactavish x fem!reader, brother's best friend au. cw dub-con

read on ao3 here, originally based off of the very talented @ceilidho 's ask here

It starts with a ribbon in your hair, neat and pink, ripped out by Johnny’s hand. He laughs in your face, all gummy smile at the age of eight, grinning as you cry and try to get it back.

You are seven-years-old, and you don’t know why your brother hangs out with this bully. Even worse, the inaction. Your perfect big brother, reduced to a faceless bystander.

Lungs catch and then stutter, devastation as you learn and relearn the same lesson until it sticks. A boy can treat you how he wants, as long as he minds his ps and qs about it.

The world around you is defined in the short-term - the sky is blue, your mary-janes have a scuff on them that your mother is worried people are going to notice, and you hate Johnny Mactavish.

He becomes friends with your brother and steals him away from you. Best friends once, you and your brother. Now you've been replaced by some snotty little boy who is constantly yanking on your pigtails. In your own living room, your brother is silent when you run from the room crying.

He's your bully, a twist in your stomach when no one seems to understand this. You sit on the back step, hiccuping tears as you listen to Johnny and your brother have fun in the living room. Only Johnny seems to notice your tears when you come back in and sit, sullen, in the corner. His gaze is a living thing that crawls over you, something alive that shudders like a second skin over yours.

The defining story of your childhood is told like this, after the fact: Johnny keeps picking on you, one day he steals your ribbon and you cry. He keeps the ribbon to this day. Cue the hand on the heart and the coos from the audience. A hit every time, an instant classic.

(One part of the story that is always missed out when this is told and retold again and again is how you actually swing at him. The last time you’re on an even playing field because he unwillingly takes it on the chin.)

Respective parents swoop in, fussing and pulling the two of you apart. Injustice doled out swiftly as Johnny clings to that ribbon, as no one takes it off of him.

“Oh, honey, boys do that when they like you,” your mum coos at you. It's a pathetic attempt to comfort you, leaving you confused more than anything. Here is the sharp reality, your perfect hair undone and mussed. Here is the crack that distorts the image, smoothing over the edges and makes it more palatable.

Johnny catches this, mouth agape as he takes it in. There’s a red mark on his chin from your hand, blue eyes wide and watery.

You wonder if Johnny remembers this. You can see the exact moment that this registers with him, as if he had never considered the ‘why’ of what he was doing to you. And here was the reason, delivered to him from the woman who always gives him an extra cookie when he comes over to play. A click, the universe has righted itself. Something slotting into place according to some higher power. Path set, direction coordinated. Your ribbon clenched in his fist. Meaning applied, after the fact.

It matters to you, you suppose. A politically incorrect statement that alters the start of your life, for all intents and purposes. Here is the centre of it, tattered ribbon and throbbing knuckles, and a lie that is swallowed and turned into truth. Johnny probably doesn’t care. The centre of his entire infatuation does not matter as much as the gulf of the rest of it. Who cares about him snapping your training bra, what matters is the image of his fingers as they wriggle under the strap, the warmth of skin before the snap of plastic. Johnny’s vision of you seems to be half-eclipsed by what he does to you.

It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but Johnny is a lesson that the bitterness is quickly forgotten once the pill hits the bottom of your stomach. Well, then there’s just the acceptance of how things are meant to be, right?

What starts off as the play fighting of a rough child in puppy love becomes the earnest approaches of a lovesick teenager. Supposedly.

Before, maybe someone would have eventually stepped in. Maybe there is a finite number of times that a girl can come home crying after having her hair pulled before someone does start to get concerned. Maybe you were a few hundred short when puberty hits and Johnny makes a sharp pivot.

Gone are the shoves, Johnny sticking his foot out to trip you up. Pulling your hair and dashing away, as if unable to stand being near you. His attention is an ugly thing that sits between you. Even he doesn't seem equipped to handle it, breath always coming a little bit too sharp when he steals your teddy, eyes on your reaction even as he tries to dart away.

Now, Johnny is always near. He doesn’t shove anymore, just stands, always too close. You start wearing a training bra and he is a bit too focused about it. Asks you how it feels, gaze hot on your face, like he wants you to say something hot. (You know it doesn’t matter what you say, he’ll likely think that anyway). Petty at the age of 13, you spit into his drink to try and gross him out and he downs it like he had been waiting for it.

Years are not defined by time passing, but rather Johnny and his relationship to you. Years pass with the deterioration of the two of you, scratches in the wall to track the history of how bad everything spirals out of control.

You’re thirteen, and Johnny is pinging your bra strap. He's fourteen, and now he's a few inches taller which he starts using to his advantage, leaning over you when you try to get by him.

You're fourteen, and Johnny is telling you that he jerked off to the thought of you last night before smiling at your mother while you scoff in disgust. He's fifteen, and deciding he wants to start heavy-lifting, wanting to get in shape for you.

You're fifteen, and Johnny is begging you to come swimming with them, hands smoothing over your hips while you try to shove him off. He's sixteen, and he’s holding an enlistment pamphlet and asking how much you would miss him if he went.

You’re sixteen, and Johnny is yanking up your jumper and his breath comes out as a wheeze when he sees the light blue cups that he is convinced match his eyes. He’s seventeen, and trying to get you to drink with him, pupils blown as he tilts the bottle to your mouth and some of it spills over your bottom lip.

You’re seventeen, and Johnny is shoving his hand down the front of your panties, won’t you let him see his favourite girl before he leaves? You don’t know if he’s even really referring to you anymore. He’s eighteen, and he’s almost gone. The weight on your shoulders is heavier, the way it must be before it’s lifted. Almost out, the crack of light in a tomb, mouth watering for it.

He’s trying to be gentle with you, he explains, nights before he leaves. Your nipples are raw under your shirt from where he had yanked your shirt up and ducked down to bite them with a groan. You scowl.

Sitting in your room, your family downstairs. He had asked for a moment with you, for the third time that day and your mother had been charmed. She had been blubbering since she found out that he enlisted, back bowing as you seem to lift higher with each hour that passes.

He needs to make you understand what is going on between the two of you. Needs to make it clear to you before he goes. “We’re meant to be,” he says, patient, even as his hands flex, smoothing over your knees. A creak of bone against muscle, seconds away from wrenching your thighs open and taking what he believes he is owed.

It seems like some kind of stupid honour code. You’re too wriggly. He can have his pound of flesh but he wants the full slab. Maybe he thinks he has to earn it, wants you to spread your legs and let him in.

Fat chance. You tell him as much, delighting for a moment at the way that dopey smile drops off his face. You imagine punching him now, wonder if you could break his nose this time, you think you have enough anger built up to really manage it.

Before you get a chance to really think it over, he grabs you, hands hard on your hips. Yanking your leggings down, and you think that you were wrong, if you didn’t bring over the full cow he was just going to and wrangle that fucker himself.

Minutes later and he’s puffing hot breath into the crook of your neck, the head of his cock between the gusset of your underwear and your pussy. He had gripped your hand and guided it around his dick, up and down. You would stop, but his hand is manacled around your wrist, palm hot against the pulse of your veins. Two layers of skin between your respective flesh, nothing really.

He whines when pre-cum aids the way, huffs a laugh when he nudges against your clit and you tremble. Barely any slick between your folds but he hones in on it like he does with everything to do with you. Dips the head of his cock further down to catch it, forehead thumping against your shoulder to watch as his cock shines with the slightest bit of your juices.

Here is the body’s natural reaction to stimulation. And here is Johnny taking the explanation that he has been waiting for.

“A knew it,” he mutters, feverish as his hips stutter, your hand tightening for a second as he nudges against your clit again. “Knew you were wantin’ it, lovey. But you had tae act like a right cow, eh?” He chuckles, dark before he yanks your chin up (you had been staring as well, you realise with a flush of shame), slants his mouth over yours.

He’s still angry, thumb digging into the soft flesh beneath your skin as he drags his tongue over yours, sucking it into his mouth until you hiccup.

He’s big like this, eighteen, and the puppy fat had shrank off years ago. Shoulders hunches to reach you, hand cradling your jaw in place, almost ear to ear.

He pulls back and you loll forward, pressure that had been holding you in place suddenly gone. You reel with it, almost falling forward before he nudges you back again. He huffs, a mean thing into your temple, hand sliding to the back of your neck. “Ye wantin’ it?” he asks. You wonder if he actually wants an answer, know that he already has his confirmation between your thighs.

His hand squeezes your wrist, and you clumsily twist your palm when you reach the top of his shaft, morbidly curious. He told you how he liked to jerk off two New Years ago, did it how he thought you would do it for him. Prophesied.

His shoulders shake, moaning wantonly as if you aren’t in your bedroom with your parents watching TV just downstairs. “Fuck,” he hisses, eyes on how your hand barely covers half of his cock as you stroke him. His hand thumps into the wall beside your shoulder, other hand flexing with his thumb on your wrist bone.

“Ah, fuck, dae that again,” he huffs until you do, again and again until he whines, head back into the crook of your neck as he drools into the collar of your shirt.

Both his hands are on your arse now, squeezing and kneading as he humps like a misbehaved dog into your hand. “I know you didnae mean it,” he mutters, pulling the spit soaked collar of your shirt down to kiss and lick and bite your collarbone. “You were jus’ missin’ me already, eh? A know, lovey, a know, there we are, just havtae show you the way sometimes, my poor wee angel, a forgive ye, a dae, a swear.”

He grips the backs of your thighs and squeezes when he comes, pushing until the head of his cocks kicks up near the entrance of your cunt, whining and shuddering through it. He pants as he comes back down, cock jerking idly in your now loose grasp, red hot against where you are now wet. Probably, mostly with Johnny’s cum.

He gives a heaving sigh, pushes his palms against the wall to look down at you. He likes what he sees - spit slick mouth, red neck, bare pussy with his cum staining you and your underwear.

“A willnae be gone long,” he says, as if you had been mid conversation. “A will come back f’ you, angel,” he promises, gaze hot on the crux of your legs.

You stare up at him, hand still loose around his shaft before you let go. A curdled desire settles in your stomach. Always for Johnny, and always half ruined at inception because it’s for Johnny.

Hours later and he’s gone. You sit at the breakfast table, your mother fussing in her upset about him being gone. Your brother is quiet as always, gives you a strange look. Johnny’s cum is dried out in your favourite pair of panties upstairs. You bite into a piece of toast, feel each crumb as it digs into your gums and dirties you.

It gets worse again after he officially enlists in the army. Before Johnny is the cute teenager that trails after your every move, intent and so so sweet.

Now he is Johnny, the childhood sweetheart. Before both of your parents had viewed you as scorning a poor lovesick puppy. Now you are a couple, constantly bickering about something or other. You insist that he is not your boyfriend, and are met with rolled eyes and knowing looks.

Johnny’s mother confesses that half of his calls to her are asking for you. You briefly consider moving to another country.

He sends pictures of his cock while he is away, the head red and you hate that you know how hot it would be to the touch. You reply and tell him to cut it off and he tells you that you’re the one.

Your mum doesn’t understand when you complain so heavily about him. Every complaint is met with a rebuttal, as if Johnny’s hand is at the back of everyone’s throat, puppeting everything that they say.

He’s too touchy. Because he loves you sweetheart, my god, I wish someone would want me that much.

He’s too close. God forbid someone enjoy your company.

Don’t you think he’s a little bit strange? He’s in the army, you dick, don’t you think you could be just a little bit nicer about it?

You feel half insane, the only one protesting the way that he treats you, the way he has always treated you. The capacity for cruelty has just shifted. Johnny has always worked within the parameters that were available to him. Sure, he can’t get away with yanking on your pigtails anymore, but biting a bit too hard at your neck has the same result. Tears in your eyes, and everyone tells you that this is how Johnny shows you he likes you.

After his first deployment, he gets so close to fucking you that you get spooked. Eighteen now, and suddenly ten years younger, Johnny taking something that doesn’t belong to him. You let him fuck up the length of your cunt, let him lick his cum off of you. He keeps his head between your thighs, eats you out like a man starved until you shake, tears in the corners of your eyes. Shame again, at how sloppy he is, spit and slick and cum everywhere. He likes it, likes how shameful you get about it. Laps that up too, tongue buried in you like he wants to get to the back of your throat. He always wants more of you than you think you have to begin with.

He lies back, barely sated but will at least lie still now and pulls you over to drape over his chest. He’s getting bigger, you think. Maybe he’s taking parts of you, squirreling them away in himself, until you don’t know you unless you find it in him.

You curve one hand over his barrel chest, barely any give in the muscle. He hums, a booming noise beneath your ear. “Tha’s all it took,” he murmurs, hand smoothing over your head like you’re a cat. “A bit ae missin’ me and yer as sweet as a kitten.”

You’re too tired to give a snarky response, though you briefly wonder if you can get away with pinching his side a bit too hard in retribution.

You know he’s going to be even more pent up the next time he gets back, that he’s going to think he’s owed your virginity. You refuse to give him another reason to tie the two of you together indefinitely. You think he’ll propose if he does, he has already been messaging you about it, asking when the two of you were finally going to walk down that aisle that he’s been building around you for years.

You go to a pub the next time he leaves, ignore his messages to call because he misses you so much. Sit at the counter until some sleazy guy who looks double your age saunters up and offers to buy you a drink. You shouldn’t, it is so dangerous. You barely have to cut your eyes towards him before he’s taking this as forwardness. Offers to take you home and immediately starts pawing at you in his truck.

You let him bend you over, the clink of a belt and its all over. You rock with each thrust, hating yourself for catching sight of the man’s hand on yours and knowing that Johnny’s is bigger.

You bring a hand down to rub along your clit, but the first whine that leaves your mouth brings the entire show to a close and you stand up, furious. The man wheezes in the seat as you barely say goodbye, wrenching your panties up and storming home.

Johnny’s been calling you, must be on whatever type of break he gets wherever he is, and you answer after the third missed call. Low timber floods your ear and warms your bones.

He’s so excited he caught you, been missing you so much, baby. Thinking about you all the time, he got in trouble for not being able to focus. Asks if you’ve been taking care of his pretty girl for him?

You let him yap in your ear the whole way home, wanting desperately for your vibrator. “You missin’ me too, baby?” Johnny huffs in your ear. You hum, absentmindedly in response. He’s on it, scenting blood.”Aye? Tell me, how much, eh? You been petting yourself thinking of me?”

You’re home, Johnny still trying to goad you on over the phone, the connection is bad but he seems to overcome it. Hulking, even over a wire to get to you. Maybe you could get him to talk through getting yourself off. It’s disgusting, but maybe you could give yourself a pass this one time. He’s allowed to do whatever he wants, where are your allowances? Johnny gets to hop back and forth over the line of propriety, you’re allowed one slip up before you return to your factory settings.

Your vibrator, hidden in the back of your bedside table, gone. You know it was him, know he binned it. Know he probably didn’t want anything getting you off except him.

You stare at the empty space in the back of your drawer, cold water down your spine that douses any flames of arousal you think you have ever felt and maybe will ever feel again. Anger is back, and so beautifully familiar. Johnny is still droning on, something about letting him see a picture of how much you’re missing him.

“I fucked someone else,” you say, voice gritty.

The line goes quiet. Small buzzes that make up the distance between the two of you, the call dropping and reconnecting. Universe bringing you back together again.

“That’s not fucking funny,” Johnny says, voice low in a way that you don’t think that you’ve heard before.

“Good thing I’m not joking,” you snap back. You feel frightened, eyes darting to the window as if he is about to start running in your direction, all the way across the globe. You wouldn’t put it past him. But never let it be said that you wouldn’t put your hand to the snapping teeth of a rabid dog.

He’s silent, breath heaving before the line goes dead.

You drop your phone to the floor and stand in the quiet of your room. A bird chirps in the distance, life reinstating itself even in the absence of Johnny. You crawl into bed and refuse to get off tonight. A competition where you are the only participant and the only loser too. Fitting.

You don’t see Johnny for months after that. Which makes sense, because he is across the globe. But the silence feels eerie, the way you imagine it might be for him. The thunder of a gun and the shutter after. Silence ringing, not due to quiet but because of the absence of sound.

He doesn’t message you at all during this period. Clearly he says something to his mother, because she gives you a frown at church that Sunday. “You must’ve done something,” your mum hisses at you, embarrassed that the story of childhood sweethearts that she gave birth to has become a story of a surly woman who cannot appreciate the man who loves her as he risks his life for his country.

You don’t bother replying. There’s no point, really. Everything has been set in motion and everyone had climbed on board. You were the one that derailed the track and upset everything.

You refuse to admit that you miss Johnny. That your phone buzzes and there is a moment where you think it could be him. For months, it isn’t. You feel like you’re floating out in orbit and your lifeline has gone silent on you. Drifting, the cold slowly creeping in, nothing around to propel yourself off of. Gain some momentum, do something.

You sit and wait for Johnny’s judgement day.

He gets back on a Friday, and he doesn’t come to see you. You know he’s back, because you can hear your brother on the phone to him, asking if he got back alright. You skulk around the corner, waiting for any mention of your name. If there is any, you don’t hear it.

You sit in your room, uncertain. The thing that you hadn’t considered is that while you had been complaining about how you and Johnny had been set up in the direction that you were going in, you hadn’t thought about what you would do if you weren’t doing this. You have derailed the train now, but you don’t remember when you got on, or how to get back there.

You mull this over, legs tucked to the side as you lean into the large bear on your bed. Won for you, by Johnny of course, at some fair when you were kids. Maybe you could leave. Nothing as drastic as another country, but another town maybe, escape the suffocation that comes with being here and everyone knowing you as Johnny’s girl.

Daydreaming, imagining yourself in a place where no one knows who you are, you are startled out of your thoughts when your window slams open. Soap hoists himself up and into your room, with an ease you imagine he must not have had before.

You blink at him as he stands next to your open window, gaze hot on you without saying a word. You shuffle a little, uncertain, refusing to speak first. You feel bizarrely guilty, as if you have done something wrong. Even though you know you haven’t. Just because a man decides he is owed your virginity, doesn’t mean you’re in the wrong for not giving it to him.

Still, you swallow an apology on the back of your tongue and it tastes like ash.

Johnny quietly reaches over and slams your window shut, making you jump.

“Y’know, a went around town and tried to figure out who ye cheated on me wae,” he says, at last, face darker than you have ever seen it. His hair is slightly grown out along the sides, mohawk less stark like this. Hair like he had when he was ten, almost.

“I didn’t cheat on you -” You try to interject, remembering your indignation more than anything.

Johnny lunges for you, hand hot around your ankle as he yanks you down the bed. “Who fuckin’ was it, huh? Y’ know, ave been tryin’ so hard wae you, thinkin’ that you’ve been missin’ me just as much as a have you, but instead you’ve been tryin’ tae hurt me, whorin yourself fae anyone -”

You reel your arm back to punch him in the face, and he catches your wrist just before you can make contact with his jaw. “I didn’t fucking whore myself out, I’m sorry that you’re fucking delusional -”

A hand in the length of your hair and he wrenches your head back, slamming his mouth against yours. It’s sore, all teeth as you both hiss and spit at each other. It feels like an even playing field again, even though you feel swallowed up in his bulk. His hand leaves your hair and grips you everywhere he can, like everything belongs to him already.

You feel white hot, letting him lick across the back of your teeth like he doesn’t want any part of you untouched by him. You hold onto his shoulders, letting him pull you all over, leans back and hooks a finger over your jaw. Pulls your mouth open. You realise what he’s going to do a moment before he does it, spit landing on your tongue. Instinctive to swallow it.

He moans wantonly at the sight, a sound that flushes you in embarrassment. For god’s sake, you’re in your mother’s house. He’s licking into your mouth, spit everywhere and making you feel sticky.

His hand slides between your thighs and you feel the moment that he finds out how wet you are, his hips stuttering a quick grind against your hip. “Jus’ for me, huh?” he asks, feverishly hot. He pulls back as he yanks your shorts off, panties dragged along with. Groans at the sight of you, wet and swollen between your legs. “Eh? Is this what ye did wae that fuckin’ boy?”

Your thighs shake, hands trying to catch his wrist as he slides two fingers into you, thumb mean against your clit. “What?” you croak, blinking up at him.

“Whatever loser you took home with you,” Johnny asks, hawk-like focus on your face. Strange for him, when your pussy is on show. “You take him back here and did ye let him dae this tae y’? Ye think aboot me when he brought his small dick oot?”

You don’t respond and he pinches your clit until you squeak, trying to buck away from him.

“I’m sorry, angel,” he coos suddenly, eyes no longer on your face but between your legs. “My pretty girl, you just need someone to show you, right?”

He fingers you, thumb intent on your clit until you start to shake, voice getting higher, Then he stops, fingers slipping out of you (when did it become three?), with a wet noise that if you were more in your mind, you would flush about.

You start to whine, and he flips you over onto your front, hikes your ass in the air and coos of the sight of your cunt throbbing at the injustice of it all. “A know, angel, A know. A want to give ye what yer wantin, but a don’t know if you deserve it,” he hums. Fucking liar, if the clink of his belt is anything to go by, then the hot stroke of his cock between your sticky folds that has you arching your back like a cat in heat. He’s trying to be teasing, but his voice shakes, restraint held together by a thin chain and he is a big man.

He holds you still with a hand on your hip, the heat of it sinking into your skin. You can hear him beating off, using your slick to aide the way as he stares at your holes. You feel like you want to cry, sitting on display for him to get off on. You do, but it also makes you feel piping hot all over. There’s a sickness in him and he’s been dosing you up on it for years. Viral disease, his spit in your mouth until it clogs the back of your throat and finally takes root in your bloodstream.

“Was thinking about this so much,” he murmurs, as if caught up in a dream. “Wanted tae be the one to make y’ a woman - “

“It was bad,” you manage, throat dry, gaze on the opposite wall. The slick noise behind you stops and you can only hear the sound of his breathing. His scrutiny of you on the back of your skull pulling you down. You don’t know why you’re saying this. There is a cliff edge and you want to say you stepped off of it with your next words, but you’re already freefalling, and you’re hoping for the crash into him rather than the cold dirt. “I didn’t know him, I didn’t get off, and I thought about you and how good that you would have made me - “

Half a sentence in and he sinks in, cock splitting you open. He groans, loud and shameful as you whine, thigh kicking until he stills it, pushing down to get further into you, It may as well have been your first time, it takes a few shallow thrusts and Johnny reaching down to rub at your clit to ease the way before he manages to get balls deep into you.

“Oh fuck,” you wheeze, full. At capacity. You can’t think beyond the stretch of yourself around Johnny, air knocked out as he pushes more weight onto you.

“Fuck, this fuckin’ cunt,” he groans. Hands smooth over your arse, spreading your cheeks to better view what he’s doing to you. “Knew ye would be so good, dreamed ae this - ah - you just wanted tae deny yerself. Don’t worry, angel, I’ll give ye what ye need.”

Then it starts, the pulling out just bottom out again, fast and hard and any air you manage to suck in is immediately shot out.

Your head lolls to the side, you think you might be drooling onto your sheets, but can barely find it in you to care. His balls slap against your swollen clit, so loud and yet you cannot remember why you should care about that beyond getting him to keep doing that. You realise that your muttering please, over and over again, not even aware of it.

He shifts to the side, and suddenly his thrusts are deliberate, and you tense up even more. No pause, no grinding out, you come and he keeps going, grunts as you tighten up and spasm, sobbing into your sheets.

It’s like a point is being hammered into you. You suspect if you hadn’t admitted that you didn’t come with the other guy, then Johnny wouldn’t have given a shit. But this is purposeful, a lesson being taught until only the whites of your eyes are showing. It always did so many times for you to take a telling, Johnny coos in your ear. Thank god he’s here, he’s got you.

He comes with a groan, mouth hot against the back of your neck as he mouths at your nape, teeth a little bit too sharp for your liking. Damning, feeling his cum in you. No part of you, untouched.

You want to say it gets worse from this point again. You think that it has actually just always been the same level of awful, the scale has just broadened.

Johnny tells everyone that you’re engaged after you let him cum in you again. There’s not even an engagement ring. Spitting in anger at your future being decided for you again, Johnny interprets this as you being upset he didn’t take you ring shopping. Drags you to the bathroom and fucks you on the sink with your ankles over his shoulders.

It’s relentless. There is a hairline fracture along the tender tissue of your brain and Johnny has pried it open to fit himself, crawled in and made himself at home.

He tells you that you were made for him. That he had came first, that he had wished for you and you were delivered to him. Guides your hand to his ribcage, tells you there is one missing. “Would give that an’ mare,” he vows, hands swallowing up the arch of your torso, a perfect ring made with the circle of his hands.

He’ll probably marry you the next time he’s back. He can barely be held back from it just now, that leash he places in your hand even if he yanks so hard that the control is all just for show. Just another link between the two of you, his neck yanked back to you up at you.

He sleeps in your childhood bed, muscular arm a band around your waist. There’s a version of you in the corner. She’s still weeping and now only you know. A tear against Johnny’s shoulder and he shuffles closer, tucking you under his chin. “Ave got ye, angel,” he slurs, half-asleep.

You feel restricted, unable to move. And it soothes you to sleep.

(Johnny begs you to suck him off just before he leaves for his next deployment. His come tastes bitter as you swallow. Go figure.)

#johnny mactavish x reader #johnny soap mactavish x reader #johnny soap mactavish #cod x reader #nic writes #johnny mactavish #cw dub con #definitely could have been more catholic. an improvement for next time haah #let me know ur thoughts !

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after-witch · 7 months ago

Text

Quicksilver Girl [Yandere FF7!Remnant Trio x Reader]

Title: Quicksilver Girl [Remnant Trio x Reader]

Synopsis: You help a silver-haired man and his silver-haired brothers find their way in the city–didn’t anyone ever tell you not to talk to strangers?

Word count: 11,000ish

Notes: yandere, threats of violence, stalking, mommy issues

It was a solid testament to the bittersweetness of the world’s regrowth that the simple sight of an ice cream truck in the city made you want to cry. But for all the destruction that had rained on the city, that had rained on the world; for the terror that was Sephiroth and the near-destruction of the planet, it was these simple sights that healed (and hurt) the most.

It didn’t help that you had especially tender soft spots for children. Oh, soft spots for anyone, really–and your neighbors, the people you worked with, what was left of your family would attest to that.

When someone said they were hungry, you did your best to feed them. When you overheard someone weeping over a debt, you would lend a coin or an ear or a pen and paper to plot out a way to dig out of a deficit.

People’s troubles troubled you, and it made you feel better to take care of those around you. Friend and stranger alike.

“Soft hearts have no place in this world,” you’d overheard your father tell your mother one night, mumbling, half-drunk.

Maybe he was right. Maybe in a world like this, your soft heart would get you into trouble one day. Or it would be hardened out of you like water grooving its way into a rock, with time and troubles. An inevitable weathering.

But maybe you would be content to be the type of person who smiled and wiped away the edges of tears at the sight of a gaggle of children eagerly buying frozen treats, each running away with a smile–and often, already-melting ice cream–on their lips.

And it wasn’t just the children who wanted to reap the frozen fruits of the ice cream truck’s welcome arrival, you notice–a man, clad in what must be an entirely too-hot black leather outfit, awkwardly making his way to the front of the truck.

He runs his hands through his cropped silver hair–it almost glitters, in the sun–and looks up and down at the time-worn stickers plastered to the front of the truck. One of the children behind him huffs a little and stands on her toes, bending sideways to peer around him.

The truck driver says something, and the man frowns. He points to one of the stickers and waits, expectantly.

You can’t help but overhear the exchange that follows.

“If you don’t have any money, move out of the way. There’s kids that are ready to pay.”

The little girl shoves her hands in her pockets, fingers no doubt touching the precious gil she was able to borrow for the treat.

The man makes a noise, something in between a growl and a whine, as he looks behind him at the growing line of kids–and in front of him, at the unimpressed driver.

“No fair. It doesn’t say anything about money here!” The young man jabs a finger on the truck and–did the truck rock just a bit? No, of course not–and crosses his arms over his chest. He’s almost like a kid himself, you think, and a familiar tugging sensation in your chest creeps in.

You’re already hustling your way up to the truck, fingers digging into your purse for a few coins, when one of the kids in line lets out a barking, sneering laugh.

“Everyone knows ice cream costs money! What’re you, stupid?”

Perhaps if you had been a moment later, it all would have gone wrong here. That kid would have been pulverized by an impulsive, angry punch and any bystanders would have fled screaming and you would’ve known to stay far, far away from this man and his silver hair and anyone else who showed up alongside him.

But you were a moment sooner, and nothing went wrong.

Instead, just as the young man turned towards the sneering kid, a scowl on his face, you were primly handing the truck driver enough coins for an ice cream bar.

“Please, let me,” you say, voice soft but firm–a I-won’t-take-no-for-an-answer tone, and the tension from the interaction melts as easily as the ice cream inside the truck under the hot sun. The truck driver shrugs and dips away from his window for a moment, before coming back and holding out a fresh chocolate ice cream bar.

The young man stares at it for a moment, then slowly reaches out to take it. The girl behind him doesn’t wait for him to move, bumping past him to get to the front of the line. And if you hadn’t just enabled him to get the creamy frozen treat he’d clearly wanted, maybe it would have bothered him.

But he doesn’t seem to notice. He simply stares at you, brows furrowed, gaze looking all sorts of ways. Surprised. Pleased. Annoyed. It’s an expression you’re a bit familiar with; the sort of mixed-emotions that come with favors you didn’t quite ask for, but wanted, anyway.

You don’t take it to heart. You smile and step back from the truck, and he follows–sticking the ice cream into his mouth before abruptly yanking it out, mouth half-opened, a bit of chocolate dribbling on his chin.

“It’s cold,” he says, shock at the edge of his voice. But the heat of the day and his outfit and the richness of the chocolate must overpower the initial trepidation, because he slowly sticks it back in his mouth, savoring it.

“Have you… never had ice cream?” You ask. You shouldn’t; you should just go, good deed done for the day.

But.

It’s hard not to be curious about him. His outfit is unusual; more like something you’d see in the old days. A roaming thug hired by Shinra, maybe. But they wouldn’t be out in the day, at least not anymore.

But it’s the rest of him that really stands out. Silver hair that, even cropped short, has a shimmery look in the fun. And his eyes are, well. Unusual to say the least. A vibrant sort of green, like a living light.

His eyes glance towards you, then towards the ground. Shame, maybe.

“Of course I have,” he lies, and your heart pangs just a bit. He wouldn’t be the first person in this world to grow up deprived. The soft, stretchy bit your hard pulls towards him, and you look around for anyone that might know him. Might have come here with him, before he got sidetracked with a sidequest for ice cream.

But there’s no one that you can see who might call this strangely dressed young man “theirs.” So you worry at your lip with your teeth, weighing the options, before finally asking–softly, kindly.

“Are you alone?”

“No.” He looks up at you with something like indignity. “I’m with my brothers.”

There’s a bit of good news. You smile. “Oh! I’m sorry…” But when you look around, there’s no sign of anyone that looks like a brother. The silver hair would be a giveaway, wouldn’t it?

He looks around, too, and after a moment, meets your gaze with a lost expression that you can’t help but compare to the kids around you.

“They were supposed to meet me here… at… at…” He huffs out a sigh, and pulls out a cell phone. The sight is surprising–they can be pricey, although they are getting a bit more common. He flips open the top and presses a few buttons with his thumb, before holding it up in your face. “Here.”

Oh. He’s in entirely the wrong spot. And if he’s not from the area, there’s no way he’ll find it alone. That soft, squishy part of you squeezes your chest hard and despite hearing your father’s mumbling disapprovals through the metaphorical wall of your mind, you offer another smile.

“That’s on the opposite side of town. It’s a bit of a confusing way… I could walk you?”

A few emotions cross his face. Surprise. Annoyance. And finally, a sort of mild distrust. Again, so much like the children around you. Children who grew up on or off the streets but in a world where the next day was never a guarantee. It hurts a little to see this expression on a grown man, however young he might be.

“Fine,” he tells you, half-mumbling. “If you want.”

“Well, I do want,” you answer cheerfully, and the surprise on his face doesn’t seem to quite go away even as he begins to follow you, frowning, shoving the rest of his ice cream bar in his mouth.

The stares you get as you escort this strange young man through the city are worth the feeling of accomplishment you get–warm and fuzzy and light–from helping someone out. Especially someone who seems so lost, in more ways than one.

As for the strange young man himself, he’s not much of a conversationalist–but you’ve never minded doing most of the talking. He seems content to listen, mumbling yeses and no’s, or occasionally asking you questions about buildings you pass.

He even tells you his name, after a while: “I’m Loz.”

And if you tell him your name, and he repeats it a bit gruffly, chocolate ice cream on his lips, is it wrong to find it a bit cute?

After all–

It feels good to help someone in need, doesn’t it?

–

There’s no mistaking it: the two men standing in front of an abandoned city hall (ruined, more like; no one had enough money to fix it, so the city hall was now in a repurposed hotel) must be his brothers. The silver hair with the same sort of sheen, and nearly matching black leather outfits. Part of you wonders if you ought to have gotten ice cream for them, but it would have melted anyway.

Neither of them look particularly excited to see you. Well, you can’t blame them. You are a stranger. There’s surprise tinged with a wariness and a not-so-thinly veiled irritation, at least on part of what looks to be his younger brother. Silver hair cut short and slightly uneven, like he hacked it off himself. The other brother looks older, with long silky hair that must, you decide, take forever to comb.

It’s Loz who breaks the tension, stepping forward, running a hand through his short hair. There’s still some chocolate ice cream left on his mouth.

“She uh, showed me the way. I got lost.” The brothers’ gaze roams over you. Loz holds up his ice cream stick. “And she bought me this.” When his brothers merely blink at it, he shoves it closer to them. “There was ice cream on it!”

It is the brother with longer hair who speaks first. Smooth and calm, and you get the image of one of those upper-crust salesmen, the kind who could convince someone to buy a motorbike they couldn’t afford in a thousand years.

“I see.” His gaze turns to you and there’s something in those eyes–the same as Loz, but vaguely different. Whereas Loz felt like a lost dog with a–haha–bone to pick, his gaze feels a bit more intent. Like it could pin you to the floor, if it wanted. “Thank you for assisting our brother,” he says, voice as silky as his hair.

The younger brother scoffs at that. Scowls. Won’t even look at you.

Well–you were never one to outstay your welcome. Clearly they have business here, and it certainly doesn't involve you. So you smile at the brother with the long hair and then turn to Loz, half-grin on your face.

“Well, I’ve got to get going. I’m glad you found your brothers! Bye! Be safe, okay?”

You raise your hand and wave and Loz–to his brothers’ surprise, it’s written on both their faces–waves back.

“Uh… bye.”

As you walk away, you can’t shake the feeling of three pairs of eyes on your back.

–

You never expected to see Loz again. Or his brothers. Yet it is exactly these three people that suddenly walk through the doors of the diner you waitress at, and how could you not notice? The diner itself seemed to freeze as soon as the door swung open, and a trio of young men with matching silver hair and leather outfits walked through.

While everyone else was keen to stare, you were quick to welcome them. It was hard, being the odd one out; well, in this case, the odd trio out.

“Good morning,” you chirp, menus already cradled in your arm by force of habit. “I’m glad to see you!” And you were, a little, in the way you were always happy to see anyone you’d helped again.

Predictably, Loz is the only one who smiles at you. It’s a shy sort of grin that almost seems out of place on his muscular frame.

“Hey,” he says. “Someone said you worked here, so we… uh…”

In hindsight, this was perhaps the only chance you had to sidestep the horror to come; the only chance to realize you were being sought, and that to be sought by three young men with strange clothing and stranger hair was no simple thing.

But hindsight is never there when we want it to be, and instead of taking the phrase for the warning it ought to have been, you let it wash over you.

“Yep! I’ve been working here for a few years now. Why don’t you sit down?”

They follow–the youngest first, you realize, and the other two fall in line as you lead them to a corner booth out of the way. Less stares, you think. But what a very strange family dynamic, indeed. From the friends you knew with siblings, it was the oldest who called the shots. But then, the world wasn’t exactly rightside up anymore, was it? Things changed all the time. Even sibling pecking orders.

You dole out the menus as easily as you dole your smiles. Each brother picks up a menu in turn. The youngest looking at it with something like scorn, Loz furrowing his eyebrows, and the brother with long hair and a smooth voice quickly taking in the fare.

“Do you need any help deciding? We’ve got a bit of everything.”

The brother with the long hair sets down his menu. “May we have three waters?”

You don’t need to jot it down–lots of practice, and all that–so you nod. “Of course! And what can I get you to eat? I’m pretty partial to the sandwiches here myself, but–”

His smile is smoother than his voice, and it’s almost unnerving, almost enough to make you take a step back, when Loz interrupts, mouth pouting, eyes downcast–

“But I’m hungry!” As if on cue, his stomach growls. And not for the first time, you’re struck by how new he seems, despite his appearance and demeanor. And clearly, despite these what-should-be expensive leather outfits, this trio of siblings has fallen on hard times.

Oh, your damned soft heart would get you fired one of these days.

“You know!” Your voice is a bit too high, a bit too chipper. “We actually just had a table return some dishes because I got the order wrong… I was going to have to just throw it out and eat the loss but, if you guys wouldn’t mind taking them?” You smile, a bit crooked. “It would really help me out.”

Loz grins.

The brother with the long hair’s eyes widen, just a fraction, before they return to their serene-like stance. “Thank you,” he says, softly.

The youngest frowns, his lips curling into a bit of a sneer. His brothers look to him, and you’re struck again by the topsy-turvy pecking order you see in them.

Finally, he sighs.

“Fine.”

–

The brother with the long hair, you finally learn, is called Yazoo. And the youngest–his name cannot be pried out of his own mouth, and it is Yazoo that tells you–is Kadaj.

They don’t say much about why they’re in town, and you don’t pry. It must be hard enough with everyone staring at them, whispers slinking over from the other tables. Well. With their silver-shimmer hair and leather outfits, it would be hard not to notice them.

Still. You do your best to put them at ease.

Maybe that’s why, when their meals are finished, Yazoo asks you:

“Do you know of a place to stay in the area? Somewhere… affordable, please.”

Your heart–soft, stupid thing–pangs. There isn’t much in the way of affordability anywhere, but you suspect they already know that. But you know a few people, can pull in some favors.

“There’s lodgings above the cafe,” you say, pointing to the staircase in the far corner. “It’s where I live, actually! I’ll tell them you’re looking for a place to stay, and we can work something out.” You don’t tell them that “work something out” usually means you picking up extra shifts for free in exchange for someone else getting a discount, because then they might decline your offer, and who knows where they’d end up?

“That is… much appreciated,” Yazoo replies, weighing his words carefully. Loz looks between his brothers and decides on a nod.

It is the words of Kadaj–his first words properly directed to you without a grimace or huff–that surprise you the most.

“Yeah,” he says, and both his brothers look to him with something akin to surprise of their own as he looks up at you, his own mako-green eyes catching your gaze. “Thanks.”

–

It is not quite a surprise that you see the brothers every day. Neither does it shock you that Loz, in particular, seems taken with you; he follows you around the cafe, and you even wrangle him into collecting used dishes when the normal busboy decides to skip out on his shifts.

He doesn’t like the customers–none of the brothers seem to–but he always beams when you thank him for his hard work. It makes your heart pang, just a bit; where were these three before all this, that simple praise makes him look so happy?

It is, perhaps, Kadaj’s turn that genuinely surprises you. For within the days, the weeks, he goes from sneering at you to quietly popping up by your side when you least expect it.

When you’re out for a morning errand, he asks to come along, sometimes not saying a word the entire time–sometimes asking questions about everything he sees, which you happily (if a bit sleepily) answer.

When you’re sitting in the cafe on a rare free hour, reading a book, he (with or without his brothers) slides into the booth and wants to know what you’re reading, and why you’re reading it, and how long you’ve read it for–

When you’re in the back on an overnight shift, doing dishes, he shows himself in the doorway and asks why you’re spending your free time scrubbing other people’s messes.

“It’s not my free time,” you tell him, once. “I’m working.”

He scoffed. “Do you always work all day, then all night?”

You smiled, perhaps a bit of a grimace, given the hot water and occasional wad of tobacco you had to crape off a plate. “Oh, It’s just–I’ve got some extra bills to pay, so I pick up late shifts sometimes.”

And something in his gaze then–did he know about your deal with the owner? Picking up extra shifts when your bleeding heart got the better of you?--made you want to look away.

“You shouldn’t work at all,” he muttered, as he pushed himself from the doorframe and left.

Well.

It was a nice sentiment, but not a realistic one.

–

One day, Kadaj is not downstairs with his brothers in the cafe when you come down in the morning, apron freshly tied. It is only Loz, sitting in the booth, turning an ashtray over and over in his hands with an almost fittingly ashen expression on his face.

“Loz?”

His head jerks up at the sound of your voice, and you swear–it couldn’t be a trick of the light–that there are tears in his eyes.

Instantly, you swoop down into the booth, reaching across–fingers grazing the ashtray and taking it from his fingers. He clenches them, keeping them hovering into the air, until you (bold thing) grip his hands in your own.

He stares down at your hand like it’s a foreign object.

“What’s the matter? Where are your brothers?”

His gaze pulls away from your hands and there’s no mistaking the watery lashline this close up–he has been crying. A pang in your chest makes you squeeze his fingers. Poor dear. Poor Loz.

“Kadaj is–there’s something wrong with him.” His lips pout, and up close, you can see them quiver.

“What’s wrong with him?” You keep your voice soft and slow; like how your teacher used to talk to you, when you fell on the playground and couldn’t articulate what happened through your blubbering lips.

“He’s…” Loz frowns, squeezes his eyes shut. “His head is really warm. And he’s coughing!” He says the next part too loudly, and a few early-morning heads turn towards the booth. “I think he might be…” The word dying does not come out, but it’s there, written in his worry-stricken face.

You fight against the urge for an indulgent smile. Instead, you squeeze Loz’s hands, and he makes the softest noise of surprise. “It sounds like it’s a cold.”

Loz frowns deeper. “A… cold?”

You do smile, now. Not out of pity but that sense of warm upcoming accomplishment: if there’s any type of crisis you’re completely capable of handling, it’s a simple cold. “Yes. Let me get some things together, and we’ll go take care of him, okay?”

Loz pulls one of his hands from your grip, slow and reluctant; but only so that he can wipe away his tears with the back of his hand.

How endearing–if strange–these brothers have come to be in your eyes, you think, as you begin to create a mental list of supplies to bring up to their room.

–

For once, Yazoo does not look perfectly serene and put-together. He looks–well. Frazzled. Hairs out of place, a dull darkness lining underneath his eyes, and you sense a sort of soft fracture in his expression that widens when you step through the open doorway, Loz just behind you.

There are a million things that enter your mind when you enter their rented room–how sparse it looks with so few personal items, for one; how uncomfortable it must be for them to squeeze into the small space, for two–but foremost on your mind is that Kadaj is never going to get better like this.

Curled up on a bed wearing his full leather outfit, shivering, sweat plastered to his forehead. You can see the remnants of where Yazoo has attempted to tend to him, but in all the wrong ways–not that you can blame him, considering how inexperienced and naive these strange silver brothers can be.

Kadaj is so out of it that he doesn’t realize you’re in the room for a few long moments. When he does turn his head, his gaze narrows.

“Who said you could come?” He murmurs, bitterly. “Go away. I’m not well.”

Your lips press down and your hands find themselves moving to your hips. You feel like your mother, in more ways than one.

“That’s why I’m here.” You glance at Loz, at Yazoo, then back at Kadaj. “You’re not well, and we’re going to get you better.” You take a glance around the room–at blankets strewn about, none of them on Kadaj to keep him warm; at half-empty glasses of murky liquid that may or may not have once been milk from downstairs; at trash, bits and bobs, things that make the place cluttered–and your thoughts click into place.

“Loz, Yazoo,” you say, gentle, but firm, as you set your bag down on a thankfully clear side table. “The first thing is to get this place clean. People heal better in clean spaces.” You nod towards the cups, the blankets, everything else strewn about the room. “You two clean that up while I get to work on your brother, okay?”

There’s a brief moment where the two brothers glance at each other, then at Kadaj, sick and sweaty on the bed. He huffs out through his nose and turns away, which must mean something to the two of them, because they both get to work on clearing up the room.

It’s cute, in a way.

It would be cuter if it didn’t leave you with a sense of pity in your stomach; just how did these three grow up, if this is how they lived?

But there would be time to think about that later, when Kadaj was better.

You’ll start with his choice of sick outfit.

“Kadaj,” you say, lowering your voice, taking a step forward. “You need to change into something more comfortable. A loose shirt and trousers.”

He doesn’t look at you, not yet. Instead, he curls in further, and says, low but clear: “No.”

Ah, there’s that stubbornness from when you first met rising forward. Pride, too, you think. Well–what man wanted to be sick and weak in front of someone else? Especially someone he followed around like some sort of strange puppy with increasing frequency.

Your hands go to your hips. A well-practiced gesture your mother used to give you when you were equally stubborn. “Kadaj,” you insist. “You are going to change into something more comfortable. No ifs, ands, or buts.”

It’s like the air gets sucked out of the room. Loz and Yazoo pause, each of them halfway to picking up something strewn about the room, looking to Kadaj. Kadaj, for his part, seems to scrunch. His expression, his body–before he looks to you with an expression almost as unreadable as the ones he gives you in the kitchen on certain evenings.

Mixed in with the urge to roll your eyes–men could be so dramatic–is a sprinkle of uneasiness in your stomach.

“Fine,” Kadaj mumbles, finally, unfurling on the bed and sitting up. You pluck up a discarded sleep shirt and what appears to be sweatpants and hold them out. When Kadaj takes them, you just manage to resist the urge to smile–you don’t want to poke his wounded pride, after all.

As he leaves to get dressed, you finally attend to your supplies. Inside of your bag is a hefty container of freshly made warm soup–your mother’s recipe, of course–and a batch of cold medicine. The sight of it makes you want to hum; it’s nostalgic, these trinkets from the days of being-cared-for.

When you turn, all three brothers are standing in front of the bed. It’s a bit like something out of a story. There’s the brief thought of being a governess to abandoned children, but it is brief; these aren’t children, and you are just helping out three young men who seem ill-equipped to deal with life on their own.

“Let’s get you tucked into bed,” you say, and you watch as Kadaj slowly climbs onto the bed, his face turned to watch you–like an animal, you think, afraid to turn around. All the while Loz and Yazoo stand to the side, looking anxious. For his health? Or waiting to see if he’ll huff about being told what to do? Perhaps, you think, a little bit of both.

And you haven’t even made him take the medicine yet. It’ll be the worst part, you know from experience. The taste is–well. It tastes like medicine. But better the taste of medicine than to be sick. That’s what your mother used to say.

It’s what you say, when you hand Kadaj the spoon, he takes it into his mouth, and promptly chucks it towards the wall.

“Perhaps there’s another medicine we could use,” Yazoo offers. Calm, like always, with a hint of something else underneath. It’s probably not the first time his younger brother has expressed… displeasure at doing something he doesn’t want to do.

“Nope,” you say, cheerfully, retrieving the spoon and doling out another dosage. “This is the best medicine in town.” You sit down on the end of the mattress, and hold the spoon to his mouth. “Here, we’ll do it the way my mom used to.”

You don’t miss the way Kadaj tenses; the way Yazoo and Loz tense too, the creak of their leather a telltale giveaway.

“One spoonful of medicine,” you murmur. “Then you can have as much soup as you want. Okay?” Kadaj eyes you warily, and you can’t help but smile, indulgent, soft. Like baked bread out of the oven. “I promise, the soup tastes much better than the medicine.”

There are a few almost ridiculously tense moments–you’re tempted to shove the spoon into his mouth, for goodness’ sake–before Kadaj opens his lips. You slide the spoon in and tilt it, and he swallows it down, grimacing all the while.

“There,” you say, beaming. “That wasn’t so hard! You’ll just need a dose of this every 2 hours–”

“What?”

Sometimes you can forget how young he seems–no, not young exactly. Green. Like he sprung fully formed out of the ground, all green shoots, and nothing substantial underneath.

“Every two hours,” you continue, ignoring his outburst. “And drink some soup afterwards. It’ll help with the taste and help you feel better.” The mattress creaks when you stand up and retrieve the container of soup, along with a second, medicineless spoon.

“I have to go in for my shift. If it’s too hard to eat, let your brothers feed you, okay?” You glance towards Loz and Yazoo and it’s briefly startling, the way they look at you. Like you’ve done some sort of wondrous thing by simply getting Kadaj to take medicine, by handing him a container of homemade soup.

“Thank you,” Yazoo says, almost slowly.

Loz cracks a smile–and cracks his thanks. “Yeah. Thanks.”

“Of course,” you don’t hesitate. You never have, when it comes to helping others. Especially, no–increasingly, these three–despite the sometimes off-putting greenness to them. Strange, you suppose, how they’ve begun to be woven into your life. “It’s nothing,” you finish, giving a wave as you leave.

But from the way you feel three pairs of eyes on your back–one staring longer, much longer, much harder–you get the distinct feeling that they don’t see it as nothing much at all.

–

You are doting and warm; inviting, like a blazening hearth stumbled on in the middle of some frigid night. A welcome, after being stuck in the dark for oh-so-long.

It’s a strange, blurry emotion. One he had never truly experienced until he met you. He tried to ignore it, at first. This strange sensation–this tug, this pull.

Loz did not try at all, he thinks. Yazoo held his own, but not for long. But for Kadaj, the idea of viewing you as anything but yet another human in the way of him and Mother was abhorrent. Unnatural. Obscene.

At least, it was like that. Until inch by inch, you peeled back the hardened shell, like a knife slicing away an apple. Like the potatoes he sometimes helps you peel in the kitchen. You don’t even know what that gesture is, how significant you should find it.

He likes it, in some ways. That naive core.

But right now, he can’t think about the things he finds appealing in you. He can only see ugly green, a nasty tinge that spreads through his veins, as you smile and dote and coo over a gaggle of children.

“Why is she wasting her time with them?” He murmurs, almost spitting.

They followed you here when you didn’t show up for your morning shift. It was easy enough to track you, all they had to do was find someone who withered easily under a well-placed scowl from Loz, and your destination was revealed.

An orphanage.

It’s sickening, the way you smile at these children. Like they matter to you. Like you would barge into their rooms and make them rest and drink medicine. Things you should reserve for him–and his brothers–alone.

“Perhaps,” Yazoo says, ever practical, “she’s getting paid. Perhaps she needed another job.”

Kadaj doesn’t resist the urge to scoff. “No chance. She wouldn’t accept money for this.”

Behind him, he hears Loz whimper. If he turned, there would be tears in his brother’s eyes, no doubt. The tears are irritating–he can be such a crybaby–but Kadaj would not deny that they were understandable at this exact moment.

It’s a betrayal, a wound. Every smile you give these damned children is stabbing it further in. It’s enough to make him want to dash forward, reveal himself, slash a silver path through the crowd of orphans and demand an explanation from your blood-spattered face.

“Brother,” Loz says, interrupting this fantasy and sounding as weak as the children you’re currently fawning over. “Do… you think she likes them more than us?”

Oh, you are maddening. Loz was perhaps the softest when it came to you. You, who gave him ice cream, who walked him across town like a lost child. You, who are currently making him cry.

It is Yazoo, as usual, who comes to his rescue.

“Of course not, Loz.” He can hear the reassuring smile in Yazoo’s voice, the way he talks Loz down from cries that go beyond sniffling. “She spends far more time with us, does she not?”

Loz hums in affirmation, as you say something–energetic, grin wide–to the children and usher them inside the orphanage.

All three stare at the empty doorway where you used to stand. The emptiness is palpable, creating an endless series of questions that lead to only one answer: you’re giving someone else what you should be giving them.

“Kadaj?” Yazoo doesn’t turn, and he doesn’t need to. Kadaj knows what he’s going to ask before he asks it. “Do we need to teach her a lesson?”

And oh, that thought is tempting. An apple dangling from a tree, half-rotting, desperately wanting to be picked before the last of its flesh went sour.

How easy it would be, to grab that apple. How easy, to teach you this lesson now, he thinks; to keep you from straying from the path you ought to be on.

But Kadaj is nothing, if not someone born to think about the bigger picture. And something in him, something he recognizes ought not to be there at all, is inclined to give you an ounce of mercy. If you behave.

So–

“Not yet,” is what he says, leather gloves creaking while his fists clench, imagining all the sweet things you’re saying to the children inside. Reassurances and treats. “We’ll give her one more chance.”

–

You are a naive thing who is not aware that you have one last pitiful chance, and you squander it just two weeks later.

To you, it is a casual announcement that you’ll be leaving for 2 weeks because you’re housesitting for someone in the sticks. A friend. The one that introduced you to the director of the orphanage.

“And who knows,” you say, a smile on your face, “maybe I’ll even hear back about that assistant director position soon.”

The nail in your coffin, not that you know it.

At least you are smart enough to pick up on the shift in mood, when the three of them look at you like you’ve just admitted you killed their childhood pet. Not that you can imagine any of them having something as mundane as an old barn cat.

“I’ll be back soon?” you try, offering the words slowly, something soothing held out on a platter. “It’s only for a little bit. My friend needs my help–” But you don’t even finish the sentence, because you get the distinct impression that it’s not helping in the slightest.

Yazoo–the most restrained of the three, you know, the most practical–moves forward, his shoulder angling towards you.

“You shouldn’t go. It won’t be safe. It’s better to stay here with us.”

Loz looks at him hopefully–it almost makes you feel bad, but Loz often does–and Kadaj simply stares ahead at you, like he’s been doing since you said you were leaving. There’s something petulant in his stare, but it’s glossy. Like it’s covering something else up. Something you don’t want to peel back and see.

Something that makes a soft thought that’s been there all along, too quiet to hear and easily resisted before, get just a bit louder.

Maybe, just maybe, when you get back–you should think about distancing yourselves from these three. It would be inevitable, anyway, if you get the new job.

But it can wait until you return. Some time away will do you good, anyway. You’ll be able to think more clearly at your friend’s house, out in the sticks, with nothing to worry about except insects getting in through a rip in the window screen at night.

For once, when you leave, you don’t feel their eyes on you.

They’re only looking at each other.

–

Your friend lives in the middle of nowhere. In a small house surrounded by dense forest, all signs of civilization reduced to the dirt road that was cut through the area years ago, connecting the sparsely placed houses with the rest of the world with chunks of dusty gravel.

Your friend lives in the middle of nowhere, with no neighbors in sight or sound. Peace and quiet, is what she said, remarking that you’ll have a chance for some actual alone time. Something you’d never get in the city, that’s for sure.

Your friend lives in the middle of nowhere, and it’s dark outside. There is no sound by the natural buzz of the world, insects, chirping, the hum of the night.

You are alone, in the middle of the woods, with no one around. And yet–

And yet someone is knocking on the door.

A firm knock. Intentional. One that makes your body jerk like a puppet.

Your first thought–some kids playing a prank, knowing your friend wasn’t home–is quickly washed away. She didn’t have neighbors even remotely close nearby, and this was not the haphazard, giddy knock of some teenager being dragged away by friends, lest you catch them in the act.

So who…?

The knocking comes again. Louder. Slower.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Then a more reasonable thought: someone is lost. Their car broke down on this shitty dirt road and this house was the first one within miles.

That thought gets you out of your seat, a cushioned recliner with a worn out cover, and you set down your book to attend to the stranger in need. How funny, that even when you’re meant to be taking a break, you’re bound to help someone out.

But when you open the door, nothing greets you but the night, lit only by the moon ahead and the dim yellow light hanging above your friend’s front door. Insects dash against the glass bulb, hitting it with a desperate ferocity.

Strange–you swore you heard a knocking. But as you go back inside, leaving the breeze and darkness and insects behind, it’s easy enough to wave it away. You’re alone, in a new place, it’s only natural to hear strange sounds.

The house settling. An animal in the woods. Some nocturnal bird, maybe, pecking at the window frame.

By the time you sit down again with your book and a quickly cooling cup of tea, you’ve already put the sound out of your mind, wiped away all traces of who-what-could-be-at-the-door.

It’s easy to get lost in your book now, without life pulling away your mind every few moments. Without the cafe, without the customers, without the familiar faces. Without–and it’s a guilty acknowledgement–three brothers trailing behind.

It is when you have just crossed that threshold of being immersed in your book that–

There is another knock at the door.

Louder, this time.

And oh, how unmistakable in its human origin.

Knock-knock-knock.

Not the wind or some wayward bird, but someone with knuckles, curling them up and rapping them against the door.

It takes you longer to get up from the chair this time. Something tight and low settles in your stomach–dread, taking root as you force yourself up and over to the door.

This time, you don’t open it right away. This time, you lean closer, pressing your eye against the peep hole, to see… nothing. Literally, nothing. Complete darkness, without even the light of the bulb above the door to give you a glimpse of the few feet in front of the house

Something has been taped over the peep hole. And it wasn’t there when you opened the door the first time.

That low dread in your guts begins to strum faster, tingling up and down your arms. You stare at the useless, black peep hole for far too long as you try to decide what to do–what to think.

Someone playing a stupid prank? Maybe. Kids who live out in the boonies and maybe heard from an aunt-uncle-cousin-brother that someone would be housesitting out here, and made the trek for some fun.

Someone trying to rob the place? More likely, you think. Just as easy for a robber to hear from an aunt-uncle-cousin-brother that the normal inhabitant would be gone, replaced by a stupid city girl.

Those options are the only two that really stick in your mind as you peel yourself away from the door and make a pitstop at the kitchen. Your friend was no gourmet cook, but she did have a large, sharp kitchen knife.

Perfect for slicing through hard vegetables. Perfect for–what? Defending yourself? If it was kids playing a prank, well, you wouldn’t dream of it. But on the chance that it was someone with less-than-good intentions… it might be necessary to defend yourself.

It might be necessary to have a weapon.

It just might.

–

A few minutes turn into an hour, and there are no more knocks on the door. No more unusual sounds. Nothing but the breeze and the insects, and your occasional hum as you read your book. Though your mind never gets fully engrossed in it; you’re on the surface of the world, ready to step out at a moment’s notice, if necessary.

But you no longer feel like your guts are ice and the idea that this was either some silly prank or game–”I dare you to knock on the door and run off!”--becomes stronger and stronger. Heck, maybe there wasn’t anything taped to the peep hole after all. Maybe it was just hard to see out of it in the dark. Maybe the light bulb went out.

Who knows. Not you, that’s for certain.

But that lack of knowledge becomes less frightening and more a simple, accepted fact. Someone knocked on the door, or someone didn’t. It was dark, and hard to see. You were overreacting, that’s all.

And as soon as that simpler–sweeter–accepted fact coats over the dread in your guts, you decide you’d like nothing more than to get dressed for bed. The book and tea and lamp light will seem all the cozier when you’re wearing your softest pajama set, certainly.

The knife is left next to the book while you head for the bedroom. It’s a cozy little room, with a warm bed and a quilted blanket that you think, if you remembered correctly, had been passed down in your friend’s family for at least two generations.

Or was that the plaid curtains, currently pulled over the half-open window, billowing ever-so-slightly with the mild night breeze? A nice breeze, inviting enough that you’re debating keeping it open all night, even now, as you slip out of your trousers and stand there in your underwear. Your pajamas are resting right on top of that maybe-antique quilt, and you pick up the soft pajama shirt and pull it over your head. They’re soft, light blue, one of the few things you’d decided to splurge on buying new.

Hmm. Actually… new curtains might be nice in your little room, wouldn’t they? Something to freshen it up, change it a little. Life had begun to feel more stale lately, more suffocating. You can’t quite pinpoint when, but–

A loud engine revs from the other side of the house.

Your entire body jerks and you instinctively jerk back so hard that you slam your elbow against the wall, pain radiating up your arm. The pain takes a backseat to the sudden numbness of the unexpected sound, the way your heart feels like it jumps out of your chest.

Your socked feet pad hard against the floor as you run, almost slipping, back to the front of the house. Your fingers shake as you yank back the curtains of the kitchen window, just in time to see a shape–someone on a motorcycle, the brightness of its headlight breaking through the darkness–riding away.

Instinctively, your eyes dart to the front door. It’s locked–good. That doesn’t make your heart feel any less jumpy. Maybe you should call someone. You can’t afford a cell phone, but your friend had a house phone. But who would come out here in the middle of the night?

Especially over what might be–could be, still could be–some stupid prank. Bored teens on motorcycles who have nothing better to do than scare the shit out of you.

Well. Let them scare you. Your heart begins to thud instead of pitter-pattering like some terrified rabbit, and you breathe in-and-out through your nose to bring down the panic. You’re okay. You’re an adult. And you have a knife, anyway. Should you need to scare someone off.

The house seems less cozy and more achingly empty as you creep back into the bedroom and finish getting dressed, slipping on soft pajama pants that feel less comfortable than they did yesterday.

Habit makes you force yourself to see the bright side. You’ll have a story to tell your friend when she gets back. And a story to banter about with customers at the diner, when you need to make that connection and get extra tips.

What a laugh–you finally get some alone time and someone decides to ruin it by being an asshole, and all you can think about is how to use the story to make more money.

It’s kind of funny, actually. What is less funny is the realization that hits when you go back into the living room and–

The knife is gone.

The knife is gone–it was right on top of your book. You remember setting it down carefully. You remember it cutting through the title of the book. You remember seeing it before you went back into the bedroom–

Well. Wait. Do you remember all that? Had you actually set it down before you went to get changed? Maybe you set it down somewhere and just thought you put it down on the book. Maybe you left it in the bedroom, or–you whirl, looking towards the open-floor kitchen–you set it back on the counter.

Or maybe, you whirl around, you put it by the front door.

Which is open.

Just a crack.

No.

You locked it. Didn’t you? Yes, you checked it, you must have locked it. You’re not aware that your body is trembling until you take those few steps forward towards the door, heart thumping again, listening intently for the sound of someone outside.

Kids. Pranksters. Robbers. Murderers. Whoever, whatever.

But when your sweaty palm grips the door handle and turns it, there is nobody there. Again. Just the night, just the insects. One dives for your face and you gasp, jumping back in the house and locking the door–surely, double checking–with a thunk of the lock.

The mind makes wonderful leaps and bounds when it wants to rationalize something. And that is what your mind does now. You put the knife somewhere else–you’ll find it in a moment; you were mistaken when you thought you locked the door the first time. Even though you looked at it after you heard the motorcycle outside.

A trick of the eye, a trick of the brain. That’s all it was. Some bored teens playing a joke and you’re out here alone, turning it into something much bigger than it needs to be. Your friend did tell you that it’s easy to get paranoid when you’re out here, in the dark, all by yourself.

The house creaks, she told you. Settles in the night, groans when the wind blows. Thoughts mush together, and there’s a brief thought that you ought to call someone, before you hear it.

A motorcycle. Again. This time, it comes from behind the house and you’re aware enough to immediately dash for the back door. There’s a window–shut–and you push aside the curtains. It’s harder to see in the back, with no porch light at all. But you do see wisps of engine smoke, the red lights of the motorcycle dash.

Stupid kids. Stupid, bored, mean kids. A brief flicker of sympathy–they must get lonely out here–is stamped out when the engine revs again and you jerk in surprise.

Well. Better to be bold than let them keep bothering you. With a swift motion, you undo the lock and peel the door back, just enough to take a step out onto the small pad of concrete outside the door.

Your mother always told you to pretend that your father was coming home, should you be caught alone by someone who ought not to be there. So the thought on what to say comes quickly, a half-remembered lesson taught to you on your mother’s knee.

“Hey! You’d better get out of here! My boyfriend is coming back any minute, and he doesn’t mess around!”

The words echo into the night, bouncing off the crickets of insects. The figure on the motorcycle doesn’t move.

“Liar,” someone whispers next to your ear.

You have just enough mental coordination to stagger backwards into the house as you choke on your surprised gasp, pushing the door shut out of pure primal instinct rather than anything resembling a cognitive choice. Likewise, your fingers twist the lock shut, and it’s only after you hear the steady thud of the lock that consciousness returns to you.

There’s someone out there. No. Two people. One on the bike, and the person who spoke. You didn’t see them, didn’t even feel them next to you. Like they were some sort of ghost, only you know it’s not a ghost, because ghosts did not ride motorcycles.

Probably.

But now is not the time for debating the ins-and-outs of supernatural entities, as you head right to the house phone hanging on the wall and dial your work. The numbers twirl with each twist of the round dialer, leading you closer and closer to someone on the other end. The restaurant is open late; whoever took your shift should still be up and about, taking care of the stragglers, scrubbing everything up for the night.

It rings once, twice, and it’s a certainty that you’ll soon hear the blissful sound of someone picking up–when it cuts out.

Fuck, seriously? You hang up the phone and pick it up again. But there’s no dial tone. There’s nothing at all. You try again, pushing every button a dozen times. It’s clear, however, that the phone isn’t working.

The receiver hurts underneath your tightening palm. The phone ought to be working. The phone ought to be able to call for help. But it’s not, and you can’t.

And someone is knocking on the door.

Again.

A polite, firm knock that does not at all match the frantic beating of your heart. It doesn’t stop when you don’t answer, standing frozen by the phone. It just keeps going.

“Go away!” You all but shriek. The knocking pauses–they must hear you through the door–before it resumes. Just as politely. Just as firm.

They aren’t going to go away. The phone is dead. You need–something. Protection. Leaden feet take you into the kitchen, where the big kitchen knife may no longer be, but there’s a smaller one stuck in the knife block that should do in a pinch.

If you had to defend yourself–could you? The most you’d ever done before was kneeing some creep in the balls when you were a teenager, just the way your mom had taught you, way back when. But kneeing a creepy jerk who cornered you in an alleyway is different than dealing with two strangers in the dark, in the night, in the middle of the forest.

When you reach the door, knife gripped in your hand, the knocking stops. Your breath comes out in loud, nasal spurts as you lean in towards the peep hole. Which is stupid, you realize, because it’s covered and–

Only it’s not covered anymore. You can see outside now, the dimly lit front of the house all tinged yellow from the bulb. And it seems impossible, but that’s all you see. The dull grass, the forest ahead, shrouded in darkness. Insects bopping to and fro, heading up towards the light.

There’s no one standing in front of the door. No one could have been standing there, knocking, fist curled and firm. You would have seen them running away, or seen the edge of them; a leg, an arm, as they darted away.

“This is bullshit,” you mutter, and with a brazen sort of bravery rushing through you, you decide to tell these pranksters off once and for all. It’s the only thing you can do, with the phone not working. The door unlocks with a twist of your fingers and you step out into the night air, the hum of insects louder now.

“Hey!” Your voice seems to echo into the trees, where whatever nocturnal animals rest in the branches must flinch at the disturbance. “I mean it! Leave now and we won’t call the police! My boyfriend is–”

But you don’t get a chance to puff up the qualities of your imaginary boyfriend, because something loud and close and awful suddenly comes to life in front of you.

A motorcycle.

Revving its engine at the edge of the clearing where the dirt road connects this quiet little house to the forest trail. The headlight bursts through the darkness, unnaturally white, and with the help of the faded yellow bulb behind you can just make out the figure.

A young man with long silver hair.

It’s Yazoo. Yazoo, sitting on the motorcycle, revving the engine.

There is a brief rush of relief. A brief whirling thought of–Yazoo is here, and so his brothers must be here, and they can help you scare away these robbers or teens or whoever has been messing with you.

It’s a stupid rush, a stupid relief. It fits you well, you think. That the first thing you thought to do was smile and think your worries were over, because the trio of brothers you’d been helping decided to check up on you.

And then common sense hits you in the back of the head, and that relief is gone, replaced only with an ugly dread.

It is Kadaj and his brothers who knocked at the door. Kadaj and his brothers who revved their engines. Who whispered in your ear. Who are scaring you.

But–why?

“What do you want?” You mean to scream it, to put some kind of force behind the question; but the words come out all tangled and choked. Like a pitiful whine.

And then the world goes dark. The headlight turns off at the same time as the porch light shatters, and your body reacts with a jerk that nearly sends you to the ground. You can hardly see, just the dimmest bit thanks to the light bleeding in from the opening door, and you hear the sounds of sets of feet moving in the darkness–

They’re coming for you.

By pure luck, you fumble your way back into the house, slamming the door shut with silver glinting in your line of sight. The sound of the lock is melodic and you take a few steps back, as if they might just walk right through the closed door. Like ghosts in a folk story.

But they don’t.

And then you wonder if you locked the back door after all, and your socked feet slide on the wooden floor as you pound towards the back of the house.

It’s locked–yes, yes, yes–and you think about trying the phone again when you hear it.

A window rattling.

You locked the doors, but what about the windows? They let in the night breeze, pretty curtains billowing. And they might just let in so much more.

It’s a mystery how your fingers manage to work, with so much fear coursing through your body, as you rush from window to window, double checking the latches. Locked, locked, all locked, thank goodness. Your friend must have locked them before she left, and you’re glad for it.

But the sound doesn’t stop, and now you hear the sound of a window shifting and–

The bedroom.

You make it to the bedroom just in time to see a figure clad in black leather, silver hair shimmering like a curtain in front of his face, climbing through the open window. Limbs all tangled, like some creature hauling itself out of a dirty well in the woods.

One of them–it’s Yazoo, you realize, his hair skirting well past his shoulders–is in the house. There’s no time to run, you’ve got to hide. Then find a way to get out of the house and get help. The practical details–how are you going to find help in the middle of nowhere, in the dark, with no shoes on?--don’t matter now.

All that matters is that Yazoo doesn’t see you. So you jerk away from the bedroom, forcing yourself to slide along in your socks, and open the hallway closet as softly as you can. But you don’t shut it–you need to see.

And you do see. You see Yazoo emerging from the bedroom door like he belonged there, and didn’t just crawl in through a window.

Hiding inside the closet, it’s suddenly so easy to see why your boss thought you’d lost your mind when you started connecting with them. He’s–wrong, isn’t he? All three of them are wrong. The way he looks, the way he moves. Like some sort of sinewy animal, mako eyes almost flashing in the lamplight of the house.

He says your name, softly, in the darkness. It makes your stomach clench.

“Where did you get to?” He asks you. You don’t dare answer. Instead, you watch as he dips in and out of view, checking the rooms, the corners, the crannies.

Please don’t check here, you beg the world.

The world must be listening, because instead, he looks towards the back area of the house. The back door.

“Perhaps you went back outside?” He murmurs, and the sound of his feet approaching the back door, the door itself creaking open, gives you the precious moment you need to flee.

There’s no time for plans and proper thoughts. As soon as you realize Yazoo doesn’t step right back into the house, you throw open the closet door and dash for the front of the house. Fumbling fingers manage to undo the lock, and you fling open the front door–

To find Loz standing there, a half-grin on his face, an arm reaching out for you. You slam it shut and it bounces off his hand, catching it in the door as it slowly swings back open from the momentum.

Your brain registers his reaction–”Hey! Ow!”--as nothing but background noise as your own awful, incomprehensible noise of terror rushes from your pounding chest straight out your mouth.

There’s nowhere to run but the back door and you flinch sideways when you see Yazoo standing in the threshold, arms crossed. Instinct takes you to the only room with a lockable door, the bedroom, and you slam it shut behind you, locking it with a swift turn of your wrist.

The window–the breeze is still wafting in, those pretty curtains that did nothing to protect you billowing. The window slams shut with ease and you turn the latch, blocking the only other entrance to the room.

You just–you just have to wait them out. That’s all. The thought is stupid and pathetic and you sit down on the maybe-antique quilt with it, running it through your head until it dissipates into nothingness.

They’re going to get in. They’re going to get in, and then–then what? What do they want? To kill you, surely. Maybe something more. Above all, above even the terror, you just feel incomprehensibly stupid for trusting them. Not just trusting them. Liking them, even. Fuck–

Something slams against the door.

There’s another sound–a huff, a complaint. Loz?

Then that something-what-is-it slams against the door again. And again. And again. And you hear the wood splinter before you see it caving in, see the edge of someone’s shoulder splintering the wood.

Then a leather clad hand busts through the hole, reaching for the lock that did little to keep them at a bay, after all.

You’re lifting the window and pushing yourself through before they can even open the door, and if you had the breath (you don’t) you would surely let out a noise of triumph. They didn’t get you, they won’t. You’ll run–run until your feet bleed, until your lungs pop out–and get help. Someone on the road or someone else out there, cozying up in some middle of nowhere house.

The darkened vision of trees whip by as you dash into the woods, barely able to see in front of you in the darkness. You don’t know how far you run before you finally trip, a wayward limb or stump taking you out. The ground connects hard with your knees and your breath gets knocked out of your chest.

Get up, stupid, you think, just as someone’s gloved hand latches around your ankle.

You scream all the way to the house, digging your nails into the ground as you go; into the grass, at first, then the dirt of the backyard, and then scratching along the wooden floor as you try to claw your way to freedom.

The world goes topsy-turvy as you’re hoisted into the air–it’s Loz holding you, bigger and wider–and set down unceremoniously on one of your friend’s kitchen chairs. There’s a padded cushion on it. It’s red, with a dainty illustration of a flower embroidered in the middle.

The rope wrapped around you, pinning you to the chair, is not so dainty. It’s harsh and unyielding, digging into your skin as you struggle. All struggling does is make your breath come out even more ragged, until you find you can barely breathe at all.

Is this how you die? Tied to a chair, suffocating on your own fear? You can hear the wheeze of your own breath, feel the way your eyes hurt, wide and buggy.

Someone taps your cheek with their gloved fingers. Enough to startle you with a faint sting. Your tear-filled vision makes out Yazoo in front of you, crouched, a look of awful concern on his face.

“Calm down,” he says, in a way you might have admired before. He was always the one to calm down Kadaj, when he was being something of a brat. “Breathe in, through your mouth.” You do. “Now out through your nose.” You do, and he smiles. “Good. Now do it again.”

And you do, and you can breathe, and you don’t feel like you’re going to die choking on air; it doesn’t lessen the knowledge that they’re going to kill you some other way, now. But at least you won’t suffocate to death.

It’s a poor comfort, as your pathetic struggles fade to nothing, and you slump against the rope. You look up towards the three brothers you’ve come to know, each of them staring down at you with expressions you can’t quite measure up.

They’re going to hurt you, before they kill you. That seems like a certainty.

It’s Loz who steps forward first. You expect him to take a swing, to use those muscles of his to break something. Your jaw, maybe. A few fingers.

Instead, he sniffles.

“You don’t really have a boyfriend, do you?” The frown on his face makes you wonder if this is actually a dream. But it’s not. The rope, the pain in your sore feet, the sweat on your neck. Too real for a dream.

Yazoo looks towards you as he speaks, voice soft, edged with a warning. “Of course not, Loz.”

When his gaze deepens, you shake your head.

“I-I don’t. I was just… trying to scare you away.” How stupid that seems, now. A fake boyfriend to scare away these three, who could probably snap your neck with a gesture.

Loz smiles through the beginnings of his tears, and rubs at them with the back of his hand as he nearly chuckles out a response. “I knew it.”

It’s this that does you in–Loz smiling and wiping away his tears like any other day, like you’d told him they were out of strawberry ice cream then found a pint in the back of the freezer. How can they act so casual, with everything they did? With you tied up on the damn kitchen chair in front of them?

You burst out with the plea, tears prickling your eyes again, voice strained and terrified.

“Please, just let me go. I won’t tell anyone.”

Yazoo leans down, ghosting your tears with leather fingers. His expression is calm as ever. It would be soothing, in any other circumstance.

“We aren’t letting you go. There’s no use in getting upset.” It’s spoken so softly, almost sweetly. Bile rises in your throat.

“But what do you want? Why are you doing this?”

Your breath comes out faster again, no matter how much you try to slow it down. They aren’t letting you go; they’re going to hurt you; they’re going to kill you. The thoughts come out on an awful loop until the vision of Yazoo in front of you blurs away, and you hear the sound of a chair scraping.

It’s Kadaj, sitting on another kitchen chair, his arms wrapped around the back. He rests his chin against his hand and it’s like he’s looking at you for the first time. Mako eyes burn into your own and you wonder how they didn’t strike you as so wrong before. Before, you’d thought them pretty. Now you feel them pinning you, looking through you.

Kadaj–was he even human?

“You were going to leave,” Kadaj says finally, voice low and icy. You don’t know what he means, and it must show in your ragged, tear-stained face, because he scoffs. “You were going to leave us. For those orphans.”

Abandonment drips from his voice and your mother would slap you for the way something like pity still sparks inside your chest. Faint and buried down underneath the ropes, harsh and scratching, but still there.

They didn’t want you to leave them. Would they kill you, if you did? If they thought you would?

Words fail you, until they don’t. Until you’re promising stupid things, anything, to make them let you go. To make them not hurt you. To live through this night and then get home and gather anything sentimental and disappear into the world. You’d helped others do it, and you could do it, too.

“I won’t leave,” you offer, voice choking. “I promise. I won’t take the job. They–they didn’t even offer it to me, they probably won’t, I’m awful, I have no experience, they wouldn’t–” Your voice hitches and your lips wobble as you make your promises.

Kadaj stares at your mouth like it’s the most fascinating thing in the world, even as you end your pitiful diatribe with the words on loop. “I’ll stay, I promise, I promise, I’ll stay, I promise, I promise, I promise–”

Kadaj pushes the chair back and he and his brothers exchange a look between them. A secret language you’ll never be privy to, these looks; these wordless glances that say more than anything.

Maybe they’ll let you go. Maybe they’ll have their fun–the way Kadaj looked at your mouth did not escape you–and let you go. Or kill you. If they kill you, let it be quick. At least let it be quick.

Kadaj is smiling when he turns back to you.

“You are going to stay with us.” It’s a matter of fact that sits low in your gut as the three of them approach the chair. These three men, now strangers to you, all smiling down in a way that makes you feel sick.

You look at their hands for weapons–the kitchen knife, lost to the wilderness–but see nothing but the leather as Kadaj brings his hand up to your neck and gives it an awful squeeze.

The ocean rushes in your ears as the world goes spotty, then black–

And when you wake up, surrounded by three silver-haired brothers, you’ll be nowhere near this cabin or even the city. You never will be again.

Soft hearts weren’t made for this world, after all.

#yandere #yandere final fantasy #yandere ff7 #kadaj #afterwitch writes #/slaps trunk #this baby can fit so many mother issues in it #I love these fuckers

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tls12lessthan3 · 7 months ago

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never before has this type of self-insert fantasy ever sold me on a main character's powers like omniscient reader's viewpoint does. normally when the main character recieves some kind of insanely powerful skill due to their previously useless/cringe/lame/etc hobby or career i have a reaction of like. ok sure. yoo joonghyuk was a pro gamer so now in the star stream he has a pro gamer attribute that lets him fight like he's playing a video game. ok sure! not exactly difficult to grasp.

but kim dokja's skills are so clearly not just based in his favourite hobby but like. reflective of his entrenched ideas about himself and the world. there's a moment in chapter 2 where yoo sangah sees that kim dokja is feeling down about not getting his contract renewed (unlike her, who as a Heroine would obviously be better than him and be recognized for her talents), so she offers to send him a link to her language learning app in an attempt to connect with him and cheer him up. and this immediately sends kim dokja into intense dissasociation because he interprets it as her trying to make him like her - a protagonist, a hard worker, someone of value, all of which can be summed up in this case as an active 'Character' and all of which kim dokja has strictly barred himself from. he sees it as yoo sangah trying to pull him from his place in the story as just a reader who lets things happen to him into a proper character role and this is something his mind rejects almost violently. and its like oh! hello fourth wall! i see you! cause thats exactly what the fourth wall does! it protects him from becoming a 'Character' and therefore having to get hurt as characters (people who try hard, interact with the world, and thereby impact it) do by rejecting any notion of him being an actual part of the story, rather than the useless bystander he's always characterised himself as. which is what he's doing here. this dissasociation and that dissasociation are so clearly linked.

and its just one example i can see of how kim dokjas neuroses and issues are so clearly displayed to the reader (disguised as the typical eye-rolling self-deprecation we expect from these sort of self-inserts, almost on par with isekai fl's who proclaim they will never attract the attention of the ml). and then they go on to so clearly build his skills in a way that makes you go oh yeah i guess i get it on a first read and make you want to chew glass on a second. the way his abilities aren't just deus ex machinas he gets as a reader and instead so clearly foreshadowed in and influenced by his psyche........ough. did you guys know this book is good actually.

#orv #victor's liveblog two: electric boogaloo

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evielmostdefinitely · 2 years ago

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Just read Cold Tonight! It was AMAZING pls do a (kinda) part 2 about the time she yelled @ him at the university? I know it was only a small part but I would love a fic about it! Thanks! Your an amazing writer

jealous girl |young!coriolanus snow x capitol!reader|

prompt: your jealousy leads to you causing a scene at university. coriolanus has to correct you. a/n thank you!! i'm so glad you enjoyed cold tonight and hope you enjoy this!

contains: smut 18+. dom/sub themes (consensual). dark, possessive but in love snow. jealous!reader. manhandling. degrading-ish??? spanking with implements (cane).

Coriolanus knew the flush of his cheeks matched the red of his uniform, that familiar burn searing through his veins. Embarrassment? Fury? He wasn’t entirely sure.

“Can you wait for a moment?” Corio tried to keep his tone light, tracking you without running. It was embarrassing enough, your little tantrum. Storming out of the library in a fit, huffing and puffing petulantly down the stairs. Coriolanus was mortified, biting his tongue to keep it from lashing at you in public, causing an even bigger scene.

“Darling, please,” Corio hissed, chin ducking, avoiding the wandering gazes of passersby. “Please calm down and act rationally.”

“Rationally?” You halted, whipping around with a look so dangerous and threatening, it made him flinch. “You want me to respond rationally to that?” You threw your hand out, a woman possessed, blinded by fury. All education, etiquette casted outward at the glimpse of him in the library. Clemesia’s hand on his arm, leaning in flirtatiously.

“Lower your tone.” Coriolanus hissed, eyes cutting around him. Peers and instructors glancing over at the two of them. Snow and Duke, the couple that already had enough eyes watching, now with even more, putting on a show.

“I told you it wasn’t like that-”

“-Oh, save me the lies, Coriolanus.” You huff, waving your hand dramatically. He flinched at the use of his full name. You never called him that, not unless you were truly furious. “She was all over you.”

“We’re study partners, sweetheart.” Corio gritted, pulling you closer to him, hand squeezing your bicep in warning. “We were just studying.”

“Oh? Then you’ve studied with me in a very similar manner, haven’t you?” You sneered, eyes narrowing in challenge.

Coriolanus wasn’t sure if he could flush any deeper red, burning even more with embarrassment at the alluded comment to your sex life. The girls passing giggled, covering their mouths with their hands, eyes cutting back at the two of you.

“How dare you.” Corio snapped, pulling you roughly into him. He continued his steps towards the door, his hand holding you close even as you struggled. “Can you try and have a little decorum? Some manners? Or have you lost your mind entirely?”

“Have I lost my mind?” You gaped, digging your heels and coming to a complete stop, yanking his grip off your arm. Coriolanus cringed, the few bystanders turning. “You’re asking me if I’ve lost my mind? Have you lost yours?”

Coriolanus hissed your name under his breath, reaching back for you. You smacked his hand away. “Let's go.” He hissed. “You’re causing a scene. You’re embarrassing me.”

“Embarrassing you? I’ll show you embarrassing, Coriolanus Snow, because you have embarrassed me!” Your voice rang through the tall ceiling, bouncing off the marbled floors. The building seemed to settle into complete silence, and Corio thought he might pass out from pure embarrassment.

Your eyes were wild, furious, chest heaving with rage. Corio knew the Peacekeepers outside wouldn’t dare lay a hand on you, not without your father having each of them tortured. Still, Coriolanus grabbed your hand, dragging you out of the building, head tucked in shame at the snickering laughter that floated out after him.

***

“You embarrassed me-”

“-I embarrassed you? You embarrassed me, you bastard!” You roared over him, pacing in the small living room of your penthouse.

“I told you we are just study partners!” Coriolanus roared back, teeth bared in a nearly animalistic way. The embarrassment had fizzled into fury.

“Oh, it really looked like study partners.” You scoffed, rolling your eyes. “She was all over you! What if I did that, hm?”

“Stop it.” Corio growled.

“What if I went out with my ‘study partner’ and let him touch all over me, or touched all over him? What would you think then?” You sneered, challengingly. “It would be alright, right? Because we’re just study partners, so he can touch me anyway he wants-”

Coriolanus felt it coming, the snap. His composure busting, nerves fried, and sanity on the brink of dissolve. His hands found your shoulders, pinning you roughly against the couch, hovering over top of you with a wild-eyed glare that had you gasping in surprise.

“If you ever let another man touch you, I would cut his fucking hands off on the steps of the Capitol Building for everyone to see.” Corio hissed, eyes dark, teeth gritted.

You gaped, heart hammering in surprise, maybe fear. “And don’t you ever accuse me of looking at someone else, do you hear me? Don’t you dare speak so lowly of me. Disrespect me in that way. Insulting me, thinking I’d ever give a damn about Clemensia.” Corio spat, face twisting in a soured expression.

You shuddered, your own eyes wide watching him, still under his pinned grip. “I have and only will love you. My heart belongs to you, my soul belongs to you. You have every piece of me, and you dare insinuate I would give a part of me to someone else? There’s nothing left to give even if I wanted to. You have it all.”

Your lip wobbled, tears brimming your vision at the passion of his words. Your own anger and frustration dwindling, squirming under the bruising grip of his fingertips in your shoulders. “And to ever think I would entertain the thought of someone else.” Coriolanus' nose snarled in disgust. “To cause a scene like that? Embarrass me and yourself over your own blind jealousy? Over your own insecurities? Throwing a fit like a child.”

Your lip wobbled, cheeks flushing furiously with embarrassment at your actions, suddenly very aware of how public they were.

“I won’t stand for it.” Coriolanus shook his head firmly.

“Corio,” You whisper, words strangled in your throat, nose burning with tears of embarrassment. “I-I just-”

“-Don’t you dare try to excuse your actions.” Corio snapped fiercely, but his grip loosened. “You embarrassed me.”

Your eyes casted downwards, looking at the rose pinned to his shirt. You couldn’t meet his eyes, not when they chastised you, made you feel so small.

“I should take you back there. Punish you in front of everyone so they know I’m not weak.” Coriolanus sneered. “So they know that I don’t allow my girl to act in such an ill mannered way. So hysterical and crazed, you should be ashamed.”

Your lip wobbled, swallowing the thick tears building in your throat. “I’m sorry, Corio. I just-I thought you-”

“-You should know better.” Coriolanus shook his head, releasing you from his grip, sitting back so he hovered over you. “I’ve taught you better than this. I know I have.”

Your spine tingled with an icy chill, the lingering threat in his tone, lips set in a displeased snarl. “I thought you were finally learning. Finally better. Clearly, you still need to learn.”

“No,” It sounded far too whiny for your own liking, further proving Corio’s point. “Corio, I’ve learned, I swear. I just- I just lost my temper when I saw her touching you-”

“-I’ve had enough of the excuses.” Coriolanus snapped, hand wrapping back around your bicep, pulling you into the small study. It was your apartment, but the study was Corio’s. You had it converted for when he stayed over and needed to do school work for University.

It also harbored all his favorite torturous toys for your thrilling sex life.

Corio pulled you over the mahogany desk, flipping your skirt up like a naughty school girl. His cock throbbed at the sight, your bottom raised and presented for him. He knew you’d be upset, already sniffling and pouty, which is exactly why he pulled out the cane.

“I want you to remember this lesson,” Corio’s voice was commanding, rolling the sleeves of his shirt up before he stood behind you. You gasped, writing away when he tapped the cane gently against the skin of your ass, one hand anchoring your back into place.

“The next time you think of behaving so inappropriately.” Corio looked at you through the mirror, holding your gaze. “The next time you forget your place in my life.” The cane cut through the air with a ominous swish, landing on cheeks, etching a thin line over the two globes.

The caning Coriolanus gave you was brief but brutal. Ten strokes, raised onto your skin, leaving you sniffling and sobbing over the desk, a pool of tears pathetically beneath your chin. Corio spent the night babying you, after rutting into you, grunts and whispers of his own affections pressed into your tear soaked cheeks.

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rafesbabygirlx · 1 month ago

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ONLINE LOVE | 𝙵𝚛𝚘𝚖 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙿𝚊𝚜𝚝

𝚂𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚕𝚎𝚍𝚊𝚍!𝚁𝚊𝚏𝚎 𝚡 𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚎𝚖𝚊𝚝𝚌𝚑!𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚎𝚛 𝙰𝚄

✧ 𝙼𝙰𝚂𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃 | 𝙰𝚄 𝙼𝙰𝚂𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃 | 𝚃𝙰𝙶𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃

✧ Summary- Rafe Cameron used to avoid love, only having flings and never getting close to anyone. Now 27 and raising his 3-year-old daughter Harper alone, he wants something more—a real connection. Tired of being judged on the island, he tries Hinge and sets his location to the mainland. After days of no matches, he finds your profile and is instantly drawn to you.

✧ Right now- they had no idea that a drunken set up on the mainland would end up being the person they’d end up falling in love with.

✧ Prompted here

5 months in and it’s been nothing but laughs and good moments. You could only think of how amazing all this could be in person. Even miles away, you can’t help but feel so connected to him.

You’re learning so much more about him and his life. His life at work. His life at home. His friends, Topper and Kelce, Sarah and John B and their friends that Rafe used to despise, but aren’t so bad anymore. Even from this long distance, you really feel like you know all about his life.

There is only 2 months left of your 1st year of residency. You can’t believe how far you gotten. In just a short amount of time, you’ll be a year 2 and despite the work load still being crazy, but it comes with a little more flexibility. Maybe a time to make more memories, meet in person, maybe even a transfer if (when) you and Rafe get to that point.

You never saw yourself this way before, but with him the future doesn’t seem so intimidating anymore. To think of a future with him felt unreal. But you wanted it. You wanted all of it.

Rafe had you cracking up all day. He brought up a story about a drunken night with his friends. Something about Kelce and a pair of missing pants. Honestly, it was so hard to follow when he was cutting himself of with laughter every few seconds. It sparked a memory hilarious story that you once had a few years ago, when you first started med school, causing me to have a laughing fit thinking about it. It caught Rafe’s attention so you began to tell him.

“…So I’m with my friends downtown and we’re bar hopping. She was talking all about this guy who she had met who was visiting town and how we were going to meet him and his friends. I couldn’t care less about it. I don’t care about your little hookup, one of my own would’ve been nice, but I couldn’t even see straight.”

Rafe throws in a laugh of his own, “Oh this is gonna be good.”

“It will be trust me.” You matched his laughter.

“We get there and this place is packed. The music is rattling my brain so bad it feels loose in my head. She spots who we’re meant to meet and she drags me and my other friend through the crowd. I’m bumping into people and stabbing my heels into poor bystanders toes. it was such a mess. At this point my eyes were barely open and I couldn’t even tell you how we made it there. I was on auto pilot.”

Rafe lets out another laugh, “I could picture you, wreaking havoc in this bar. Heels are a deadly weapon.”

“Haha! It was not easy for me! If I wasn’t such a germaphobe, I’d been bare foot! But I swear my whole body felt like concrete. It was so bad!”

You continue your story, “when we got to the table, my other friend was completely checked out, immediately ordering shots on this guys tab. I gave a drunken smile when she introduced us, and also checked out. We just kept taking shots, avoiding the awkwardness of being third wheels. I didn’t feel bad because one friend ended up asleep on the table and the other was leaning onto the wall for dear life, looking like he didn’t want to be there anymore.”

Rafe nearly chokes on his drink. “Wait, asleep? In a bar?”

“Dead serious! Face all in the spilled tequila! I was so zoned out, I had no idea they were trying to set me up with their other friend, the one who was awake, haha. I was in no mood, or condition to speak to anyone. They were convinced it was a matched made in a twisted drunken heaven. Next thing I know I’m sitting at the corner of the bar with that friend, trying to get away then accidentally taking a sip out of the guy next to me drink thinking it was mine somehow.”

Rafe is full on laughing, wiping a tear from the corner of his eye. “Oh my God. You were out there stealing drinks and dodging blind dates. This is chaos.”

“Complete chaos, I can’t even imagine what a mess I looked like. Luckily I think we were both the same level of drunk and he forgot about it the next day. Anyways, trying to make it less awkward I just start babbling about god knows what, it probably wasn’t even English, but it was better than sitting in silence. He didnt really react from what I could remember, I’m really not sure, my vision was so blurry and I can’t even remember his features. All I remember was his bright blue button down and curtain bangs the stuck to his sweaty forehead.”

Rafe raises an eyebrow, “curtain bangs? Jeez.”

“I know but they weren’t like the ones you’re thinking about, haha. His hair was nice, but then all the sudden he got extremely serious. Like he was thinking about something and he just combusted. Something about his dad, and how he could never do anything right in his eyes. All the coke he has to take just to deal with his family’s issues. His precious little sister got away with everything. He resented them for it… just on and on, like I was his therapist. Drunk me was not ready for this.”

You laugh at yourself reminiscing when you notice Rafe’s face had dropped. “Are you ok, Rafe?”

“I think that was me.”

“What?”

“The drunken guy spilling his life’s issues to you was me. That was, I was in a really dark place before my dad died and the guys took me to the mainland to get away from it all. It was me. That’s my story.”

“I um… I’m so sorry. Oh my god, I’m so fucking sorry. I’m not just saying this but please don’t think I’m making fun of what you were dealing with, I was making fun of the situation as a whole.”

“No it’s ok, that is really funny. I don’t remember that night or meeting you honestly, it’s all good. It’s all in the past and those bad relationships have all healed. My dad was a bad guy and now he’s gone. I miss him, but I’m glad he’s gone. It was a really bad period of my life. I’m glad I’ve grown and gotten out of that pit.”

“I’m sorry Rafe. I’m glad you did too. You’re healthy and look amazing.”

“Me too. But just think how crazy it is how little the world is. We’ve met each other. In person before and had no fucking idea.”

“It is really insane. Too bad we weren’t sober, knowing how well we work together.”

Rafe’s face lightens back up as he’s brought back to the present. “We do work, don’t we?”

Harper reveal will be nextttttt! Everybody cheer!

Tags+ some moots: @rafestoothbrush @weluvwbb @itsforeverandalwayz @butterfly-ibuki @megiiite @siredbtches @bigenergy777 @aupernatural-teenwolflover @runawayrafetrain @rafegf-real @skywalker0809 @snowtargaryen @kieeslove @leather-n-velvet @avada-kedavra-bitch-187 @diasnohibng @slurpdew @alphabetically-deranged @currentresidentinhell @slut-4-rafey @akobx @rafesheaven @laniirackssss @jjmaybankmylovee @slut4you @larema121 @sc05 @k4yr14 @chromeheartsbaby @jennieonline @tul1preads @wuluhwuhmaster @inthelibrarybtw @littlelamy @cooper8224 @lolabunnyworldss @ijustwanttoreadlols @emmaaas-posts @matthewswifeyy @grapejuice32 @namelesslosers @superlegend216 @smutwzrd @zyafics @writingroom21 @cherrywriterrr @nemesyaaa @rafesfavegf @maybankslover @maybejj

I think I have everyone tagged <3

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sunboki · 2 months ago

Text

⎯ what remains unspoken. (teaser) ⟡ featuring c. bahng

🪝 : Christopher Bahng x implied! fem. reader

TROPE. best friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, jealousy, angst, two idiots chasing their own tails believing their love is unrequited (ㅠㅠ), based in australia, summer! au, beachhouse! au

WORD COUNT. estimated to be around 4k-7k words

WARNINGS. cursing, jealousy/shame, reader moves away, mentions of drunkenness at a party, nondesc smut

AUG'S NOTES. my annual summer pieces are unearthing themselves as we speak and i’m so so so excited. i began this as a tiny snippet of thought while on the train :) who knew it’d be developed into a fic! although this is just a teaser, please let me know your thoughts!!

PLAYLIST.

or alternatively :

Until when do you stop pretending?

Among many things, Chris likes to think there was an “oh shit” moment to his life. One, exactly.

Over the years he tried pinpointing when that would be, what that would be.

And then you brought a boyfriend home. His home. To a beach house you two would occupy together. Making shadow puppets with your hands and running out to the beach in the early mornings.

Breakfast, lunch, dinner. Making sand castles, running into the water with your clothes on and running out giggling messes.

For two weeks every summer, always. Together.

Never with a plus one.

He debated upon subtly sizing up the guy or appearing overly friendly, but not an ounce of his face seemed to move. Steely.

Cold.

Chris was never cold, and he felt that pang in his chest—guilt—seeing you notice it. That miniature knit of your brow, the purse of your lips.

Did he know you like Chris did? Know when you were angry, or frustrated. What your favorite song was, or how you preferred your hair when you were focused?

He wanted to hate comparison, he used to hate comparison.

And now he’s hating himself for being too late, letting you slip from his grasp like sand between his fingers.

When you were once protagonists of a novel written with a happy ending, that love interest was now home to another.

And he was a bystander to a love story that was never his, watching you smile at someone else.

Someone that wasn’t him.

Breakfast is hellish, not to mention the sleeping arrangements. This boyfriend of yours in the guest bedroom, while he sleeps in his.

Alone. Without you, or your pretty hair, or your pretty eyes. Void of your warm body snuggled up to his, where you used to make silly jokes beneath covers and muffle laughter in turn.

A part of him wants to cry, wants to ask you what you two used to be. What was under the covers?

“Ah.. Chris..” The soft moan of yours, all those years back. Stupid, seventeen, single. A cursed pair of “S”’s he hadn’t realized would come to haunt him each time he closed his eyes.

What was your pretty sounds, his face between your thighs those five years back?

Was it all pretend? Exploration as friends?

No, you were smarter than that.

So he tells himself he was too late, and endures.

Because maybe, maybe they’ll be a plot twist one chapter. Where you fall for the side character.

No, no book ends like that.

It all started in an editing firm’s office.

That poor woman being your mother, who found out she was pregnant that evening after work.

Although, in the midst of the friendship, your father had found a better job opportunity in Brisbane, a decent ten-hour drive from the Bahng household you’d found second home in.

Even if it was Australia all the same.

And in turn, the annual summer visits began.

What do you want to do with your life? Any plans for college? What about taking these extra classes? They look good on a résumé.

And simultaneously rip the ounces of childhood from your fingertips, but no school board puts that in the papers.

Yet, never truly forgotten. Instead, taken into the waters for little children to tell their mother of whom never believe the ocean spilled someone’s precious secrets.

“Chris.”

June eighteenth of your second year in high school, pajama-clad knees curl close into your body, lashes dusting open in the sparsely lit room to focus on him.

A dilation of the pupils, a hitch of the breath when he turns to you.

His jaw that clicks when he grows angered—not often, sometimes at his gaming system.

Thickened brows furrowing and knitting in concentration.

Though those eyes are the same, and always will be. No other will have eyes like his, and you know in any life, in any state of amnesia, they would be recognized.

An “aha” moment where a switch flips in your brain, formulating a mere sentence involuntarily.

I love this boy, and I hope for forever he’ll look back at me.

And for that, you’re selfish. But honest.

If Christopher was a stranger, a look into that gaze and you think you’d know him instantaneously.

How silly.

But just as you had spoken, you’re reminded that childishness was something found each time you visited this place regardless of your actions. You’d hold onto that.

“I don’t want to grow up.”

The bit of fat at his under-eyes cause his eyes to form into crescent moons when he smiles, wrinkles at the corner of thick lashes crinkling.

Chris has always liked the moon.

A warm hand of his reaches forward, cupping your cheek as if the first time.

You think you like this more.

“Then don’t.”

A stroke of his thumb, and you snort a laugh when the cold of your nose bumps against the digit.

“And when you want to go back to being sixteen, come to see me, okay?”

Little did you both know that the future had a way of testing just how long sixteen would last.

Until when do you stop pretending?

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myhouse-mychair-myfics · 1 month ago

Text

Building Bridges

Part 2 of Suppressed Bond

Ridoc Gamlyn x Marked!Reader

“You are still mopping over your princess, pay attention,” Aotrom chastised inside Ridoc’s head as he once again lost focus in class, daydreaming about you.

“Since when do you care?” Ridoc fired back, “besides, she’s not a princess.”

You weren’t. The daughter of a former Tyrrish lord, yes. Not a princess, but close enough in title that he liked to call you that. Liked to imagine you if you weren’t forced into the harsh hell that was this godsforsaken military academy. Liked to imagine the life you could have lived if not for the fate of your family.

“Demoting her doesn’t seem like a good first step in mating her.” Ridoc felt Aotrom’s laughter in his chest more than he telepathically heard it.

“Would you piss off?” Ridoc thought, scribbling notes in frustration.

“If you want any chance of getting near her in the sense you mean-“

“-She’s more than just a quick-“

“I am viscerally aware of all the things you feel for her, both romantic and otherwise. If you want to win her esteem and attention, you’ll have to get through her father of a dragon, first.” Ridoc imagined Aotrom preening at the next part. “For that, you will need my help. So no, I will not piss off.”

“Had to make it about you, didn’t ya?”

“Do you want my assistance or not, Gamlyn? Or are you content for Andell to scorch you on sight?”

“Cadet Gamlyn!” Professor Devera called over Battle Brief, “If I could have your attention, please? It would be greatly appreciated.”

“Sorry.” Then, to Aotrom, “Look what you did!”

“What I did? I am nowhere near. I remain an innocent bystander.”

“Innocent my ass,” Ridoc grumbled under his breath.

“Psst,” you whispered from your seat beside him, bumping him with your elbow, “what’s going on?”

Ridoc mimed the beating of leathery wings with his hands, pointed at his head, then made the yapping signal, eliciting a giggle from you.

Ridoc would swear in that moment, that sound, changed the shape of his eyes to hearts. He prided himself on making those around him laugh, part of his charm, he’d always said. But your laughter? The sound of your amusement? The fact that he could pull that sound from you after all you had suffered throughout your short life?

It was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard.

And he’d do whatever he could to hear it again.

“Oh brother,” Aotrom complained inside his head, “this is going to be a long handful of days.”

Had Violet not been up to whatever weird and secretive shit she’d been dealing with from a day to day basis, she would likely have had something smart to say about him pouring over a book.

Colonel Kaori’s Guide to Dragonkind, to be specific.

“How do you get another dragon to like you?” Ridoc thought aloud, absently.

“If you want advice, you can ask me.”

“And,” Ridoc spoke to his dragon aloud, a fun little habit he’d unwittingly picked up from you, “you have made it clear you don’t have any interest in being helpful.”

“You are serious about this, aren’t you?”

“Yes!” Ridoc exclaimed, tossing his hands up in the air.

“…Tell me about her,” Aotrom said.

“Seriously?”

A grumble of draconic impatience in his head.

“Well, she’s beautiful-“

“-By human standards, sure.”

“Ass.”

Aotrom said nothing, but there was a feeling through their bond that had Ridoc imagining the dragon sticking his tongue out.

“She’s smart, brilliant even. Violet doesn’t talk about it in any detail, but she was apparently indispensable during that battle in Resson-“

“Her having seen combat so early, with that relic on her arm, is likely not going to help Andell’s protectiveness…” Aotrom mused, sounding as if he really was thinking through the problem.

“I just want… I just want her to be happy. To see her smile. Make her laugh. She isn’t just another girl to me, you know. She’s… I… I’m in love with her.” Ridoc could hardly breathe, having finally voiced the inkling of a thought that had hung in his head for weeks.

Ridoc heard Aotrom hum in his head. “Wait,” he said, “you actually are going to help me?”

“As much as I enjoy getting my amusement at your expense, Gamlyn, I enjoy working with you, rather than against you. I also… happen to find this cause a worthy one. Of course I’ll help you.”

“Hey, uh, thanks,” Ridoc said.

“Keep the sappiness out of it.”

“Sure thing,” Ridoc laughed, “Sure thing.” He felt ghosts of dragon laughter, but let it go. “Alright, dragon expert, pun intended by the way, where do we start?”

“Are you alright?” Andell’s soft voice filled your head with his usual check in after most of your year filed out of the flight field. You did not have anything to compare it to, but something in you felt Andell’s voice was uncommon among his kind.

Someone had ambushed you leaving breakfast this morning. You had a bruise on your cheek Andell had already seen and fussed over, demanding to know if any rider was responsible so he could take it up with their dragon. You’d told him truthfully that it was one of those infantry thugs Colonel Aetos had been sending and he’d been summarily dealt with.

“Besides all the threats upon my life? Great!”

Andell snarled, his front claws churning the dirt beneath him.

“Not the time for jokes about that, noted.” You switched into mental communication for the next part. “How’ve you been doing? I know you know what I mean,” you thought, kindly but firmly.

A mental sigh reached you as Andell lowered his head as you approached. “This is a decent day. You?”

“I’ve had better ones in this regard. Two days ago would have been a family birthday.”

Andell’s head reached the right height as you held your hands out to either side of his face. Carefully, you held your foreheads together and just breathed. Your go-to way to comfort each other.

You smiled at him as you sat down at his feet, resting your back against his leg. You could feel Andell sigh contentedly as he curled his front around you. The two of you alone in the field, resting your weary souls together.

You were not alone in the field for long. Andell sensed it just slightly before you. He shifted his leg, protecting you between his claws as he raised his head slightly in the direction of crunching dirt.

“Hey!” A familiar male voice called, “funny catching you guys out here!”

Andell’s growl rumbled in his throat, but you placed a hand on his leg.

“Play nice,” you said, “it’s just Ridoc and Aotrom.”

Andell’s attitude did not change.

“Relax, Ridoc’s a… friend. You can trust him,” you whispered, shifting fully into telepathic communication for the next part, “I know you’re jumpy after everything but my friends aren’t part of the whole Post-Resson shit.”

“Not what I’m worried about…” Andell grumbled, his gaze flicking between Ridoc and Aotrom. “And watch your language.”

“Very funny,” you said sarcastically, earning a chuff from Andell.

“Ridoc,” you addressed, moving beyond Andell’s protection a fraction. Enough that Ridoc could reach you without getting his head bitten off, but not enough for Andell’s anxiety to spike. “What brings you by?”

“Well,” Ridoc drawled, crossing his arms behind his head as he flashed his boyish smile, “you two always seem to have fun sitting out here. I’ve had a lot on my mind, I thought it might be nice to sit out here too! Take the edge off.”

“A lot on your mind,” you said, amused, “that can’t be good. Like what?”

“Like,” Ridoc began, but then his eyes finally lit on your cheek, at the fresh purple bruise there. “Like who the hell did that to you.”

“Challenge accident, my fault” you said, easily, the go-to lie.

“Respectfully, Princess,” Ridoc said, a bit of outrage mixing with his voice, “that’s horseshit.”

“Ridoc?”

“I was at challenges with you, I watched all your fights. No one hit you there. You never let them.”

Shit. That’s right.

The dragons were silent as they watched you both, Andell taking an ever so slight step forward. He didn’t care if Aotrom was right there, if Ridoc proved to be a threat to your safety, to the fragile happiness his beloved human had to chisel out of this place with a pickaxe, he’d tear the boy to shreds.

Instead, Andell was surprised when he heard Ridoc snarl, “who did this to you?”

“Ridoc, it’s fine,” you said, “I’m putting a salve on it and it’s healing just fine. I don’t need you to-“

“Who did it?” Ridoc asked again and you fell silent. You’d never seen Ridoc this angry. Both dragons were shocked too, their heads pulled back, eyes wide.

Sensing your unwillingness to answer, Ridoc continued his tirade. “Is it some bullshit about your family? Of all the shitty things to do. I’ve seen the other marked ones beat up as well. This is about that isn’t it? You guys are being targeted.”

“Ridoc-“

Ridoc was lost in the other world that was his outrage. He was furious at the injustice of it all and said as much, “Why the fuck isn’t leadership doing anything!? You guys are already forced to be here! What more blood do they want!”

“Ridoc!” You finally shouted and he stopped, wide eyes gaping at you.

You crossed closer to him, mildly surprised that Andell did not voice any trepidation at your movement.

You placed a hand on Ridoc’s shoulder and said, “while I find your outrage on my behalf sweet, I can fight my own battles. The cadet who did this won’t be doing it again. Tyrrish kids are made of sterner stuff than most. I’ll be fine.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m going to like seeing you hurt,” Ridoc said, almost a whisper.

“Then let’s do this, hmm? We can take care of and look out for each other, stepping in when asked or absolutely necessary. That way neither of us lose our cool or pull a Dain, sound fair?”

“Yeah,” Ridoc said, “look there’s been something else I’ve wanted to tell-“

Ridoc stiffened as Aotrom spoke to him in his head, his eyes taking on that same glazed quality whenever their dragon spoke to them. Present in the moment but listening to something only for them. Once the sharpness returned to Ridoc’s eyes, he glanced fearfully up at Andell.

Your dragon stared down his snout again, blowing a stream of steam out over him. No one moved until the smoke dissipated. Ridoc’s eyes remained on Andell as the dragon stared at him again for a long moment, expecting him to run. Ridoc stayed right where he was, softly holding your hands.

Andell’s head bobbed slightly once in a way you couldn’t even figure out the meaning of.

The moment came and went as you turned back to Ridoc, “what was it you wanted to tell me?”

“Uhh…” Ridoc gulped.

The shout of your last name and Ridoc’s over the flight field suggested that the two of you had been missing for too long. Andell leveled his head in the direction of Dain’s voice and growled, loudly.

“No, no, we should go,” you said, not in the mood to pick another fight, verbal or otherwise. “I’ll see you later big guy,” you told your dragon who you could almost swear pouted before surging off into the air, Aotrom soaring quickly behind looking for all the world to be nagging your older dragon.

“Come on,” you said to Ridoc, mentally preparing for the rule laden speech you’d receive from your Wingleader.

Ridoc tried to come up with something to say, some joke to make, but for once he was at a loss for words.

Maybe appeasing your dragon was the easy part.

A/N: And yes, I am absolutely planning on writing a third part! <3

#ridoc gamlyn x reader #ridoc gamlyn #fourth wing #ridoc and aotrom #the empyrean #fourth wing x reader #iron flame

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tinyluvs · 2 years ago

Note

Hi! Could you do reader being pregnant with Hotch’s baby but she accidentally blurts it out to the whole team, Hotch included at the same time? Thank you if you do!

i absolutely can angel! you’re welcomee, enjoy !! ♡ cw; mentions of pregnancy sickness! nowt detailed/gruesome

the drive from the airport to the local police station is rough because of bumpy country roads, your stomach already feels uneasy and the local terrain is not helping at all

behind you, derek, jj and spencer squabble like children over something you don't care to listen to right now and beside you aaron is silent, eyes focused on the dark road ahead of you

your eyes flicker quickly to the mirror, seeing dave, emily and penelope following close behind in their suv before they clamp shut, focusing on the inside of your eyelids in a desperate bid to ignore your stomach churning

blindly, you feel around in the console for your bottle of water, sipping slowly while you stare at a barely there scratch on the dashboard

"kid, no, sorry but you're wrong!" derek huffs and turns in his seat and in turn, drives his knee into the back of yours, jolting your body cruelly

your eyes widen in panic, the gps estimates another fourty minutes to the station and unfortunately for you, you don't have that kind of time. heat prickles over your body uncomfortably underneath your fbi issued sweatshirt

"aaron," you mumble, looking up at him slightly. he turns his head towards you briefly, eyebrow raised before he's turning back to the road, "can you pull over?"

he turns back to you, no raised eyebrow but concern filling his eyes, "are you okay?" he asks quietly, though he doesn't make any attempt to get the suv off of the road

colour drains from your face, you feel it happen and your boyfriend watches it happen, "no, please, pull over," you rush out before swallowing thickly, your hands fumbling with your seatbelt

aaron pulls over as fast as he can without getting rear ended by dave. you're not entirely sure the car has completely stopped before you're jumping out to make a run for it

"what's going on?" you hear spencer ask

you're all of ten steps away before your body betrays you, lurching forward, hands gripping at your thighs as your lunch and the three bottles of water you'd drunk, repeat on you

a hand smoothes over your back, familiar, aaron, "honey," he sighs, using his free hand to collect your hair up gently. he rubs gentle circles into your back until your knees fail you, causing you to crouch

"is she okay? oh my god," penelope rushes over from the other suv, pulled in behind your one, blue lights lighting up the tree line a few feet ahead of you

you groan and rub a hand over your forehead when it's over, breathing in deep before standing. the entire team stares at you, all of their eyes wide and panicked, "guys, i'm okay," you offer up weakly

aaron pushes a bottle of water into your hand, "just sip it, please," he hums, guiding you a few steps back towards the cars

spencer visibly grimaces, face twisted in slight disgust and honestly, you can't blame him, "we should get you checked over," he says and you do your best to shake your head while sipping

"i'm sure she just ate something bad," jj offers up, sending you a soft smile and you wonder distantly if she knows. none of them should know, aaron doesn't even know

you had a plan, to tell aaron, a big breakfast and a cute announcement all on your day off but time had not been on your side. up until this point the sickness had been timing itself nicely with moments you could break off from the group without them noticing

"but it could be contagious!" spencer shrieks and then yelps when derek and jj both swat at his arm, hands slapping against his coat

"i'm okay, just give me a minute," you breathe, bending slightly to put the water bottle on the floor before leaning against aaron's side, "guys i swear,"

none of them look convinced and hell, if the situation was spun so you were a bystander, you wouldn't believe it either. aaron's hand slides across your back again, thumb tracing up the dip in your spine

penelope extends her hand, a few loose mints roll around in her palm, "thanks," you smile gently before swiping them from her, pushing all four into your mouth at once

"i'm just saying, i, don't want to get sick," spencer starts to argue with the rest of the team, "we have a case guys, if she's contagious and it's airborne we will all already have it!"

you frown as dave rolls his eyes as the younger boy, "you are not going to get sick spence, i swear," you reassure with a huff

"how can you be so sure about that?"

loudly, you groan, "because i'm pregnant, not sick," you snap and that shuts him up but everyone else gasps, all of them turning towards you, "oh my god," you slap a hand over your mouth in realisation

"you're what?" penelope shouts though emily and derek parrot her reaction. aaron's hand stops on your back as he stares down at you, his profiling skills being forgotten while he scans over your face

"i had a plan!" you cry, "i had a whole, elaborate, plan as to how i was going to tell you guys, i swear and now i've fucked it up, i'm so sorry," tears well up in your eyes before they overflow, spilling down your cheeks

aaron turns you towards him slightly, "hey, why're you crying, why're you saying sorry?" he asks gently, a small smile creeping over his face, "you're serious?"

you nod, sniffling gently when you wipe at your face with your sleeve, "i was supposed to tell you first and then the-"

your boyfriend has never been one for public displays of affection in front of the team, outside of a few pecks here and there but in this moment he doesn't care very much about the team

he surges forward, arms sliding around your waist to pull you closer for a kiss. you gasp against his mouth, suddenly very thankful for the mints you'd swallowed seconds earlier

around you the team hoots and woops, partly at the news and partly because aaron is kissing you like it could be the last thing he ever does

"you're not mad?" you ask when he pulls away, your fingers squeezing at his arms through his suit jacket before you turn your attention to the team, the question directed at them too

you get a clean sweep of no's before everyones rushing forwards, arms tangling around your body and whispers of congratulations passing your ears before they turn to your boyfriend to give him the same fate

"i, for one, cannot wait to tell baby hotchner this is how we found out," dave chuckles, hands shoved inside his pockets as he sends a wink your way

"what a story," you agree, fingers tangling into aaron's as the group divides up to get back into the suv's. jj's hand pats at your shoulder when you slide into the passenger seat

"when we get there, i'll take you to go and get some anti sickness pills" she whispers, "congratulations, again,"

before you can reply aaron's hand squeezes gently at your knee, "if you need me to pull over again, please don't wait until the last second," he scolds you through a smile

"yes boss," you giggle, eyes fluttering shut as he leans across the console to kiss your forehead. the suv rumbles as it peels away from the side the road and for the rest of the journey, aaron doesn't stop smiling, not even for a single second

thanks for reading! remember to like! reblog! and comment! i’ll give you a kiss if you do, mwah ily !! send prompts to my ask box!

❥ aaron hotchner masterlist !!

a/n proofread badly, sue me xo

#❥ my works #aaron hotchner #aaron hotchner x reader #aaron hotchner fic #aaron hotchner x fem!reader #aaron hotchner imagine #aaron hotchner x you #criminal minds #aaron hotch x reader #aaron hotchner fluff #thomas gibson #❥ my aaron works #❥ aaron hotchner #❥ aaron hotchner fic rec #❥ aaron hotchner drabbles

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stxneflxwers · 2 months ago

Text

heart of spades.

⋯⁂ summary. it's aventurine's birthday.

⋯⁂ a/n. this was fun to write, despite that it's rather short!! pls enjoy <3

⋯⁂ cw. tender angst. recollections of aventurine's past (re: avgin massacre). reader luvs aven lots. phone call / facetime call. sweet ending.

⋯⁂ obligatory tags. @tojiswhore-aventurinesslut ; @aventurineswife (hiiii 👋👋 im evil btw)

…it’s raining.

dreadful, he thinks.

he hates the rain.

like a storm cast over the bank of a river, his mind floods with memories of that fateful day so many years ago. it didn’t just rain, it poured – all while those haunting screams echo in his mind, even now. he can even still recall the dark of night consuming his vision.

he still wonders how he’s managed to stay alive until now.

he wagers that a decent portion of his will to live is nestled within you. only you. his sunshine. he isn’t as sunny as most would portray him to be – the sun doesn’t just survive, it lives. but you – you live, casting a bright glow on his darkness, allowing him to shine a little bit longer.

his train of thought is derailed the moment someone comes by to his hotel room, dropping off a package from you. how funny, he was just thinking of you moments ago— oh, he remembers now. it’s his birthday.

fuck.

sometimes he wishes you’d treat this day like any other, but then he remembers that you put him through a lot (of love). both sugar and spice. right now, it’s evidently sugar. maybe too much sugar.

after thanking the subordinate that left the package in his care, he carefully unwraps the brown paper and unties the silly bee-printed ribbon. regardless of how silly it is, he thinks he’ll keep it. just in case (of what? he doesn’t know either.)

he doesn’t notice, but his shoulders feel so much lighter while he sits on the hotel bed, rummaging through the small birthday gift. a smile cracks on his face when he discovers the ingredients for his favorite coffee order. medium roast, subtle hazelnut flavoring, steamed milk, and a single droplet of honey.

you’re sneaky, he thinks. but he knows someone has to get back at him once in a while. it may as well be you.

oh, there’s even butter cookies in the package… you spoil him too much. then again, he can never spend enough on you (you beg to differ.)

without another beat of hesitation, he begins to put the coffee together. as routine as it may be, he’s thankful for the brief period of respite from his tormented mind. at first, anyway. and then the thoughts return, unbidden and unrelenting. he would grimace if he wasn’t already used to all of this bullshit—

—he nearly drops the small glass jar of honey. he catches it just before it rolls off the countertop in the kitchenette. he sighs tersely, pinching the bridge of his nose as he feels an oncoming migraine – no surprise there. aside from the emotions that storms bring, the humidity and pressure changes never fail to give him a low-thrumming headache.

once the coffee is finished, steamed milk poured on top and honey stirred inside, he stands at the sliding patio door.

he simply…watches the storm. perhaps, in a way, he’s witnessing. but witnessing what? maybe witnessing the echoes of his past coming back to tear away at his flesh, his soul – if he dare believe in such a concept. all he can do is watch like a helpless, hopeless bystander.

ring-ring!

the sound of his phone buzzing nearly makes him throw his mug at the door. can’t he have a semblance of peace? just this once. please. please, gaiathra—

instead, he shakily sets the simple black mug back down in the kitchenette, and pulls out his phone. he leans back against the nearest counter as he answers the call – it's you.

you and your angelic voice.

“hey!” you chirp, “wanna facetime? i wanna see your handsome face, birthday boy!”

handsome face? sure, he’s handsome to most, but he looks like total trash right now – the dark circles under his drooping eyes more evident than ever. hell, he can hardly even keep a smile on his face.

he holds back a sigh, at the very least.

“...hey,” you say before he responds, “c’mon. i don’t care if you look ‘bad’ right now. i just need to see you. please?”

“alright, alright,” he relents too easily this time, but you do have so much sway over his heart, as usual. he turns on the front-facing camera, the tiniest of smiles curling his lips – still rather performative, if you had to say anything about it. “better?” he asks, too quietly.

“much better,” you have your own camera turned on, a sunny grin on your face. “i love seeing you regardless of how you look! you know that, right? if not, i’m happy to remind you.”

“...i know,” he mutters, “just…hard to believe you truly don’t care about my performance anymore—”

“i never did care about your performance, aventurine!” you pout, “i’m not here for the performance, i’m here for the actor underneath it all.”

he licks his lips nervously, tasting remnants of coffee and dryness.

“...sorry, i’m not angry, i promise,” you soothe, “hmm… let’s see… did you get the package? how’s the weather?” you pivot the topic – for his sake.

“i did, and thank you for the gift, as well. you must’ve known that i’d need a pick-me-up this time,” he chuckles breathlessly, hardly even audible. “and… the weather? seriously?” he teases a little, but really, he’s reluctant to answer. he knows it’ll worry you—

“aventurine.” you say, but it’s a tender kind of firm.

“...well, it’s raining pretty hard. headache included.” he finally answers, quieter this time, losing all of the performative gleam in his expression.

“i see,” you nod, “...would meds help? do you have any? more importantly: have you been drinking water?” ah, typical you, that’s where your mind jumps to.

…he’s definitely not been drinking enough water. not that he wants to admit that.

you know better, though.

“i see that guilt!” you accuse with worry, “please, drink some water. i will remind you every five minutes tonight until you tell me you did it.”

“and…you’d believe me? do you look up when someone tells you ‘gullible’ is written on the ceiling, too?” he sighs, his joke falling flatter than a board.

“i’d believe you without hesitation.”

“...”

he’s at a loss for words. he often is when he’s alone with you. maybe it’s for the best.

“...and…by the way, happy birthday, aventurine!” you chirp, your grin returning full force.

“i—” he sputters, “...thank you – for spending it with me. despite everything. despite…me—”

“i would do it a thousand times over.”

#aventurine x reader #aventurine fluff #aventurine angst #🌠— hurt/comfort #💕— aventurine #hsr x reader #honkai star rail x reader

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doodle-pops · 3 months ago

Text

Dating Someone Younger Than Them

☾ Characters: Maedhros, Fingon, Turgon, Finarfin, Beleg, Gwindor

☾ A/N: Been wanting to write a version for the Silm after I did one for Bleach. It was just perfect for our elves considering they’re ancient lol.

☾ Synopsis: When their mortal love calls them ‘old man’ and other ancient terms of endearment.

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︶꒦꒷Maedhros꒷꒦︶

➽ The first time you called him an old man, he just gave you a long, unimpressed stare, as if weighing whether it was even worth his time to respond. Then he sighed, rubbing his temples. “I have lived through the ruin of kingdoms, the fall of civilisations, and the wrath of Morgoth himself, and yet this is what finally tests my patience.”

➽ It became a game after that. You would drop an ‘old man’ comment in the middle of a conversation, and he would try to act as if he hadn’t heard it. The twitch in his jaw always gave him away.

➽ He never fully humours it, but he doesn’t ignore it either. If you push too far, he’ll turn it around with some impossibly poetic insult about your youth. “For one so new to this world, you have a remarkable talent for being insufferable.”

➽ If you ever say it in front of his brothers or anyone else, he will immediately deny you. “This is slander. I am not old.” Then he turns to the unfortunate bystander. “Do I look old?” If they hesitate for even a second, he’s going to be even more annoyed.

➽ He could handle the name-calling when it was just the two of you, but when you casually threw out a “Move faster, ancient one” in front of Elrond, Maedhros genuinely looked like he wanted to walk into a volcano all over again.

➽ When he’s deep in thought or strategising, you like to sit beside him and start listing the benefits of being old. “Wisdom, experience, a nice slow pace—” “I am not slow.” “Your reflexes might not be what they used to be.” “You’re welcome to test that theory, though I doubt you’d survive the lesson.”

➽ He tries to get back at you by calling you ‘child,’ but it never has the same sting because it’s factually correct. “Oh, what’s that, grandpa? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of your joints creaking.” He looks like he’s regretting every life decision that led him to this moment.

➽ One day you asked him if he needed a walking stick, just to see his reaction. He didn’t even blink. “Perhaps I do. I can use it to beat you with.”

➽ He refuses to admit it, but he finds your antics mildly entertaining. It’s a welcome distraction from the heavy burden he always carries. If he didn’t enjoy your company, he wouldn’t tolerate you at all.

➽ There was one occasion when you woke up with a sore back from sleeping in an awkward position. The second you so much as winced, he was on you like a vulture. “What’s this? Ailing already? I thought only old men suffered from such things.”

➽ He once caught you whispering to one of the horses about “taking extra care of the old man,” and you have never known true fear until you turned and saw the way he was watching you from the doorway.

︶꒦꒷Fingon꒷꒦︶

➽ He takes it with absolute grace. The first time you called him an old man, he just burst out laughing. “Oh, is that how you see me? I’ll have you know, I am in my prime!”

➽ If anything, he started playing into it more than you did. You accused him of being old, so he leaned fully into it. He started dramatically pretending to mishear you like some ancient relic. “What was that?” he would say, cupping a hand to his ear. “Speak up, my hearing isn’t what it used to be!”

➽ If you say it in public, he just rolls with it. If someone asks how old he is, he’ll sigh wistfully. “I lost count after the first thousand years. But it is a heavy burden to be so ancient.” He then promptly challenges someone to a footrace just to prove he’s still in perfect shape.

➽ The first time you called him ‘old man’ in front of Turgon, the sheer look of delight on his brother’s face was enough to make Fingon immediately declare, “Okay. I will not stand for this slander around my siblings.”

➽ He does this annoying thing where if you ever complain about something even remotely difficult, he pats your head and says, “Ah, you young folk. So fragile, so untested by time.” It makes you want to fight him.

➽ You once jokingly suggested getting him a cane, and he immediately turned it into a whole thing. “Ah, a cane! Lovely! Now I can whack you each time you refuse to be nice to your old man.” You realised too late that you had given him an actual idea.

➽ When introducing him to new people, you would say things like, “This is Fingon. He’s about ten thousand years old. Probably met a few dinosaurs in his youth.”

➽ “There were no dinosaurs,” he said one day, rubbing his temples. “You don’t know that,” you shot back. “You’re old enough that you might’ve forgotten.” He had to physically restrain himself from throwing something.

➽ You tried to call him ‘grandfather’ once, just to mess with him, and he whacked you with the cane before picking you up and throwing you over his shoulder. “Disrespectful children get carried off into the mountains, did you know?” He had you hanging there for a good five minutes before he let you down.

➽ He does have moments where he flips it on you. If you ever struggle with something, he’ll just fold his arms and shake his head. “Tsk, tsk. You youngsters, no stamina at all.” Then he walks off whistling, leaving you to yell after him.

➽ He keeps an actual tally of how many times you’ve called him old. Every time you say it, he smirks and says, “Ah, that’s another one. I believe we’re at…oh, at least a hundred now, and it’s only been a day.”

➽ Despite everything, he wouldn’t have it any other way. If anyone else had dared to mock him like this, he would have thrown hands. But you? You made eternity a little less lonely.

︶꒦꒷Turgon꒷꒦︶

➽ He is absolutely scandalised the first time you call him an old man. He stares at you as if you’ve just insulted his entire lineage. “Old? Old?” You’ve broken his brain.

➽ He cannot believe you would say such a thing to him. “I am in my prime!” He spends the next five minutes going over how elves don’t age like mortals. You nod along, taking none of it seriously.

➽ If you ever say it in court or around his people, he’ll pretend he didn’t hear you. If someone else reacts, he immediately dismisses it. “Do not humour them. They are young and foolish.”

➽ He’s far too serious about it. If you keep teasing him, he will launch into a lecture about the differences between elves and mortals, as if he genuinely thinks you might not understand. “Age, as you perceive it, does not apply to me in the same manner—” “Yes, yes, that’s what all old people say.” He looks like he wants to strangle you.

➽ You tried to give him a ‘wise old sage’ persona once, asking for ‘the wisdom of the ancients.’ He was not amused. “If you wish for my wisdom, then cease your foolishness.”

➽ He does get his revenge, though. If you ever ask for his help with anything, he tilts his head and says, “Ah, but I am an old man. Surely you would not ask such a burden of me?” Then he watches as you regret everything.

➽ He tries to turn it on you by calling you ‘child’ but ends up making himself sound even older. “You are but a mere infant in the grand scheme of things.” “Alright, grandfather.” He clenches his fists.

➽ You’ve tried to get others in on it, but most of his people are too respectful to join. Idril, however, betrayed him once by smirking and saying, “Well, you are older than the moon.” He was horrified.

➽ Still, you were insufferable about it when the mood was light. The time he hesitated for just a second before kneeling and you went, “Careful, old man, don’t throw out your back,” had him seriously considering revenge.

➽ You once dramatically gasped and pointed to a grey hair (it wasn’t grey, it was just the light hitting his hair in a certain way). He immediately went to check a mirror. You laughed for five minutes.

➽ If you ever try to help him stand up as if he’s frail, he will walk away without acknowledging you. But if you trip, he’s the first to say, “Ah, how clumsy youth can be.” You hate that he’s learning.

︶꒦꒷Finarfin꒷꒦︶

➽ He takes it with the patience of someone who has raised multiple hot-headed children and lived through millennia of nonsense. The first time you called him an old man, he just gave you a very calm look, folded his hands, and said, “Ah, so this is how we’re speaking to our elders now.”

➽ Every time he started waxing poetic about the past, you’d lean in and whisper, “Tell me, old man, what was it like when the world was flat?” just to watch his expression twitch.

➽ He tries to be above it, but the more you push, the more you can see that tiny flicker of exasperation in his eyes. “I do not feel old,” he tells you one day after you make some comment about him needing rest. “Then why do you sigh like a man who has carried the weight of time itself?” He does not respond with an answer.

➽ If you ever say it in front of others, especially his courtiers, he just offers a serene smile and responds in that terrifyingly diplomatic tone: “Yes, I am indeed quite old, and with that comes the wisdom to know when to ignore a foolish remark.”

➽ You sometimes get him gifts with ‘Number 1 Grandfather’ written on it, which makes him mentally age. “Got this for you while I was at the art shop. They had this as a giveaway gift. Thought of you,” you say with a brilliant smile. He secretly uses that item when you’re not looking.

➽ He won’t openly challenge you, but he gets his revenge in subtle ways. If you ever need his help, he pauses for a long moment and hums as if in deep thought. “Ah, but you just said I was an old man…surely, you would not burden me further?” He only helps once you’ve suffered enough.

➽ You tried to make it worse by referring to him as ‘grandfather,’ thinking you’d finally get a real reaction. He only smiled and said, “Ah, then I expect you to act with the respect due to one’s grandsire.” You lost that round instantly.

➽ If you ever ask if he remembers something from thousands of years ago, he gives you an almost pitying look. “My dear, I was there when the Two Trees shone in all their glory. This event you speak of? It is recent history to me.” You can’t even argue.

➽ He once overheard you talking to a servant about how he was probably the type to grunt when sitting down. The next time he lowered himself into a chair, he made a point of doing it completely silently while staring directly at you.

➽ You once got overly confident and teased him about ‘his old man hands’ when he reached for something. He just slowly raised his eyebrows and then gestured for you to hand him a sword. “If you wish to test them, we may spar.” You swiftly remembered that he was, in fact, a Noldorin warrior.

➽ When he catches you struggling with something, like carrying too many things at once, he doesn’t say a word. He just watches, waiting for the inevitable. When you drop something, he finally hums. “Ah, youth. So full of energy, yet so lacking in foresight.”

︶꒦꒷Beleg꒷꒦︶

➽ The first time you called him an old man, he just stared at you for a moment and then burst out laughing. “Old? Me? My dear, I can still outrun and outfight you before breakfast.” And he proves it, too.

➽ He is the absolute worst about it because he finds it hilarious. If you bring it up, he immediately goes into an exaggerated act of being ancient. “Ah, my weary bones, my tired limbs! The years have been so cruel to me!” He says this while effortlessly stringing his bow.

➽ If you ever suggest that he needs rest due to his ‘age,’ he takes it as a personal challenge. “Oh? Do I seem tired to you?” And then he drags you on a full-day hunt through the wilds, moving like an unstoppable force while you suffer.

➽ He gets back at you by constantly referring to himself as a ‘wise elder’ and you as an ‘inexperienced youth.’ If you struggle with something, he leans against a tree and sighs. “Ah, I remember my younger days, when I too was reckless and foolish.

➽ Sometimes, it backfires like when you’re hunting together and request that he assist or carry you. “You would not make such a request of your elderly? I am but a fragile old man—weary are my bones. You, my dear, should carry me instead.”

➽ You tried to get Túrin in on it once, but the clueless man actually believed you and started treating Beleg with exaggerated concern. Beleg had to sit him down and explain that no, he was not, in fact, on the brink of death.

➽ He once let you tie a ‘wise old sage’ beard onto his face just for fun. He wore it for exactly ten minutes before it got in the way of shooting an arrow.

➽ His patience was legendary, but you had a way of testing it in ways no one else could. Like when he was lost in thought, you would ruin the moment by poking his cheek and saying, “Careful, old man, if you frown any harder, your wrinkles might become permanent.”

➽ If you ever call him old in front of other elves, he leans into it. “Yes, indeed, I am ancient,” he says dramatically. “I have seen centuries of battle, and yet I still find myself suffering through this torment.” He gestures at you with exaggerated despair.

➽ He once saw you rubbing your shoulder after a long day and immediately smirked. “Oh, what’s this? Are you aching? How terrible! I thought only old men suffered such things.” He enjoys payback too much.

➽ You tried to call him ‘fossil’ once, thinking you could win the game. He immediately scooped you up and ran at full speed through the trees until you begged for mercy.

➽ He never lets you forget that, compared to him, you are essentially a newborn. “I remember when you were not even a thought in the world,” he tells you cheerfully.” Meanwhile, I was already legendary.” You groan.

︶꒦꒷Gwindor (Pre-Angbang)꒷꒦︶

➽ He reacts like you’ve just struck him with an arrow the first time you say it. “Old? Old?” He looks personally betrayed.

➽ He immediately tries to defend himself. “I am hardly old! If anything, I am in the prime of my years!” You nod solemnly. “Yes, denial is common among the elderly.” He groans.

➽ He actually gets concerned the first time you say it. “Do I look old?” He immediately checks his reflection. If you don’t reassure him, he starts overthinking it.

➽ When he realises you’re just teasing him, he starts throwing it back at you in the most dramatic ways. If you ever complain about anything, he sighs. “Ah, such struggles of youth. You will understand in time.”

➽ He’s the type to get flustered if you say it in public. If someone overhears and laughs, he immediately tries to explain himself. “This is slander! I am not old!”

➽ He tried to retaliate once by calling you ‘youngling’ in the most patronising tone possible, but you just blinked at him and went, “So you admit it. You’re old. Practically dust. Thank you for your honesty.” He has never attempted it again.

➽ You once left a walking stick outside his tent as a joke. He picked it up, twirled it in his hands, and then used it to trip you. “Ah, it seems this old man still has some skill.” You regretted everything.

➽ He doesn’t take it too seriously, but there is one thing that gets to him: the reminder that time moves differently for you. “One day, you will be gone, and I will remain,” he says quietly one night. You feel a little bad, but then he sighs dramatically. “Then again, perhaps by then, I will be an old man.” He always finds a way to joke about it.

➽ He once caught you massaging your hands after writing for too long and immediately smirked. “Oh? Are your hands aching? Perhaps you, too, are ageing faster than you thought?” You wanted to throw something at him.

➽ If you ever try to claim he’s losing his edge, he challenges you to a duel on the spot. He fights with all the skill of a seasoned warrior and does not go easy on you. By the end of it, you’re the one exhausted, and he just grins. “It seems this old man still has some strength left.”

➽ He gets extra petty about it. If you ever ask him to carry something for you, he makes a show of pretending to struggle. “Oh, my weak, ancient limbs! Alas, I can barely hold such weight!” Then he immediately lifts it with ease.

➽ You tried to ‘help’ him up once when he was sitting on the ground. He just raised an eyebrow and yanked you down instead. “If I must suffer, so must you.”

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