#pantomime au

[wynnibee]

Having fun with no strings attached, hm?

@eyenaku HI IM SO SO SO SORRY FOR HOW LATE THIS IS BUT I WAS YOUR SECRET SANTA AND HERE'S YOUR GIFT HHHH

id in alt and under the cut!

[id: a shaded and colored drawing of harlequin sun, columbine y/n, and pierrot moon standing around a carousel coyote.

going from left to right; harlequin sun has a gold, six pointed jester hat resembling sunrays, with a bell at the end of each point. he's wearing a black mask with a line through it following his crescent. his eyes are simple white dots on a gray-ish sclera. sun has large blue and red ruffles around his neck, with a blue frill under the ruffles. he's wearing a blue, long sleeved shirt covered in alternating red and yellow diamonds, with blue ribbons wrapped around his wrists with a single bell on each. he has a barely visible blue hip drape, that sits on top of his red jester pants. he's hanging off of the carousel pole, and standing leaned over with a bent knee to look at Columbine. his other arm hangs limply at his side.

Columbine themselves has their curly brown hair pulled up into a half-bun, with a crown of white pointsettias behind their bangs. large triangle shaped earrings hang from their ears, and they have long wavy eyelashes with brown eyes, a small amount of blush and brown lipstick. they have brown eyes with large black pupils and a small white dot in the center of each pupil. around their shoulders is a large fur half jacket, held together by a sparkly moon shaped clasp. they have long, fluffy pink sleeves with blue ribbons wrapped around their wrist. while most of columbine's dress is obscured by the wrap, a gold band can be seen underneath, with then flows into their dress skirt. the skirt is blue on the outside, with an inner strip of pink bordered with red ruffles. they're sitting on the carousel animal, with both arms extended. one is held out and the other is resting on moon's face. they have a smile on their face and their head is tilted slightly towards moon while they look over at sun.

the coyote is multiple shades of brown, starting out dark on the back and getting lighter towards the white underbelly and muzzle. the inside of the coyote's fluffy ears are also white. the coyote is standing in a half running pose, with one paw pulled up. each paw is wrapped in flowing red ribbons with two bells on each leg. a red bridle and rein sits on the coyote's face, held together with a star shaped metal piece. the bridle is embroidered with simple green and gold floral patterns. a long golden pole extends from the coyote's shoulders.

pierrot moon is entirely black and white, and he wears a long nightcap with two black puffs on the tail and one at the very tip of the cap. he has large eyelashes and three jester stripes cutting through his black eyes. he has a single white dot in the center of his eyes. he also wears large neck ruffles with fluffy black trim. his shirt resembles a long sleeved pajama shirt, with black trim. his wrist is wrapped in black ribbon. he has a black band around his waist and he wears plain white jester pants. he's looking at Columbine with his hand on top of theirs, holding it to his face. he has one eye closed and he has a large smile on his face with black lipstick over his smile. he's standing mostly behind Columbine, but he's leaning slightly to the side.

the background is a blurred carousel at night, with glowing golden lights. the entire image is covered in white sparkles. end id.]

[eyenaku]

*sliiiiiides in* good evening

ooooo you wanna ramble about your pantomime au so bad ooo

I DO I DO I REALLY DO- here's a Very Long Ramble!!

let us meet our cast:

columbine (or columbina, as they're referred to in plays and promotional material)

harlequin (harlequin sun) and pierrot (pierrot moon)

Now these bad boys are the star actors (?) puppets! in a world renowned theatre specializing in Harlequinades, Melodramas, and other Pantomime-character-centric theatre.

(More accurately they're Commedia'dell arte characters, but people only know what pantomime is so. I'm calling it pantomime AU I guess LMAO)

The parent company (not quite a troupe due to their nature) also puts on other plays in other locations (with different characters and "tropes"/genres- like ballets, operas, etc. perhaps diff. fnaf characters in all of these).

The theatre is built like an opera house. The music is played by mechanical instruments- mainly a massive orchestrion housed in the back of the stage.

Now these puppets are entirely not sentient, manned by strings and puppeteered by a very advanced mechanical system of rails and the like in the ceilings (think similar to Moon's line thing in security breach- they move freely about a space, just with more lines to control each limb like a typical marionette). They're tall! Taller than the average human, Columbine included- they are very much life sized.

The characters are utilized much like human actors. They're used for meet and greets! They sign autographs! They gain fanbases and followings!

Columbine is marketed as Columbina the stock character. Female, with heavy make-up and vaguely promiscuous. Columbina is the target of affections. How attractive is she, in the eyes of the audience. How seductive. A soubrette- coy and cocky and conceited and saucy and a great deal of other descriptions.

However, just as the stock character was often the only Functionally Intellectual character in these plays despite all the not very demure connotations, Columbine, too, is multifaceted. Or perhaps single faceted, yet presented in a way that clouds the audience's perspective. Columbine is a puppet. Columbine is not female. People treat them as though they're female. People do not treat them well, especially in contrast to the followings of Harlequin and Pierrot

Columbine is pissed off.

Feeling a very strong emotion for the first time grants these puppets sentience. Why you may ask? Does it really matter? Its fiction.

Columbine's trigger so to speak was the issue of being perceived as female (and being treated in gross ways, thanks to the nature of theatre) when that isn't you. You are a puppet. Why is this happening? It's not so much being pissed off as being unbelievably frustrated. Columbine is frustrated!

So, in a huff, they carefully remove all their strings and just. Leave. Leave the theatre behind.

On the way to the exit they have to pass through a hallway with massive posters of the three of them illuminated. They see themself there and grimace.

So Columbine is gone now. And the theatre's management is sort of freaking out, after all this is one of the main three characters- arguably *The* main character. But they just try to cover it up, albeit poorly. Columbina is just under maintenance! Do not worry, audience! Harlequin Sun and Pierrot Moon are still here! Plays are still ongoing! They substitute in very basic clearly thrown together quickly "Columbine" stand ins for plays that are just. kinda sad. Blank dummies in an almost mockery of their costuming.

Speaking of sad, something is brewing within Pierrot Moon! Columbine leaving is kind of destroying him. He's sad, like really sad. Like... depressed. This is so strong that Pierrot, you guessed it, becomes sentient. Columbine being replaced is the final straw.

Moon becomes the kind of sad that drains everyone around him. He is not the only one suffering. It's not an uncontrollable thing either, he's just decided to not even attempt to manage his emotions, and everyone else has to deal with it. Anyone who is kind to him suffers for it. Moon's behaviour is not just disturbing to everyone, but is actively ruining plays.

Guess who this pisses off? Guess who else is sentient now? Harlequin Sun! He loves the theatre- a stickler for the rules and so very passionate about his plays. About his skills as an actor. Sun is incredibly unbelievably pissed off- Columbine is gone and Moon isn't doing anything right, and this stand-in dummy is godawful, and everything Was perfect, and now it isn't. and how incompetent! And so on and so forth. Sun is unabashedly pissed off. He is violent. When a play ends, he just about dismantles the stand-in dummies (more like rips them apart with his bare hands). A pile of "corpses" builds up, Everything is awful.

Moon decides it's all too much. He's going to leave. Maybe he'll find Columbine. He's desperate. He makes it to the exit hall, rips off his strings roughly with no care, and then!

Sees the same poster of Columbina from before.

Moon is just. stuck there looking up at it. Transfixed, he falls to the floor sobbing. He can't move. Sun finds him and *physically drags him* back. Hooray more violence 👍🏼

More plays, more Sun scrapping dummies, rinse and repeat. It just. Sucks. Human staff are quitting, it's too much for them. Dealing with either of them is just so horrible. Stage hands come and go and come and go and never stay.

Sun gets a turn to have a breakdown at the poster too!

He's not happy about everything sucking. Obviously he's not the issue, he loves the theatre, it's the other two. Why did you have to leave? It's not just anger but grief- he really truly misses Columbine, though he shows much differently than Moon. It's all too much.

(re)enter the new stage hand: totally not Columbine

ahaha what a nice welcome back! Columbine came back because they missed the two only to come back to. whatever tf this is that's going on. Violence from Sun, Moon's whole deal, The matter of the poster and littered approximations of their past self mangled about the backstage area. Yk how it is

Now at this point both Columbine and Moon don't have their strings (though Moon has stray bits still half tied to him). But Sun? Sun has his. They're Extremely Frayed though. His aggressive tendencies serve to have him work against the strings, even though he doesn't want to intentionally. Perhaps a lash at Moon mid-play, or pantomimed motions played out too rough. He's a touch too aggressive to be any kind of restrained. They're very close to just snapping- quite a feat considering they were made to support giant marionettes!

Anyhow, Columbine is back! They expect any sort of welcome but.. neither Harlequin nor Pierrot recognize them (and their dumbass didn't fkn think to... y'know... tell them? oh hey it's me?). They sorta assumed the two would recognize their face, or perhaps their oddly tall stature, or the remaining recognizable details (face paint, hairstyle (even with hoodie) eyelashes, etc) but nope! They're both blinded by their own selfish bitterness and can't see Columbine literally in front of them.

So the two are horrible to them, of course, since. Y'know! New stagehand! Ripe for Sun to be so passive aggressive to that it might as well just be aggressive to, and for Moon to be difficult and taxing towards.

Columbine is abhorred by this since, y'know. They missed them. And they take this as a sort of more messed up version of the silent treatment- surely they know it's them and are just acting like this out of spite! Fine, two can play at that game. Columbine can pretend they're strangers too.

They pretend they don't think Sun demolishing the faux-columbinas isn't a direct threat towards them. They pretend it doesn't affect them. They pretend Moon acting horrid and a type of sad so selfish it makes them want to leave all over again doesn't hurt. They, again, think Moon sobbing over heartbreak and abandonment is him rubbing their actions in their face. That him comparing them bitterly to themself is the same thing. They just do their job backstage. The two directly antagonizing them all of the time is hardly tolerable, but tolerable nonetheless since they do still care!

So it's horrible. At least it can't get any worse- WRONG! It can!

Sun went through too many stand-ins. The theatre can't just...get more. These are carved. They may have been simpler, and worse that Columbine, but they're still massive. You can't just get more like that. Management is freaking out- the public is getting even more upset. Where is Columbina? They need Columbina! A play is about to be put on, and the crowd is chanting for her. They're getting upset. They're demanding. But what can they do? There's nobody to put in the role- no human tall enough, no mannequins unscathed.

And then Management notices something- or someone. Columbine. Columbine is weirdly tall. Columbine would fit in the costume.

Before they know it, they're back on stage- stringless. In the same costume, the very thing they tried to escape.

The crowd goes absolutely wild- there she is! There's Columbina! The *real* Columbina! Columbine is distraught, they look around the stage for any semblance of help- Sun and Moon may be mad at them but they trust them! They know them!

And they make eye-contact with Sun. He's absolutely seething. He looks ready to rip them limb from limb. Does he recognize them? Nope! But this Stranger, this impostor is taking their place. A simple stagehand is taking Columbine's role, their spotlight, their fame, their cheering, their fans- He looks at them, who are identical in all but expression, and can't see Columbine. He's completely blind in his rage.

The bells begin to toll. The music starts to play. A final dance.

Columbine is passed between the two- spun in dizzying circles by Pierrot before being seized in Harlequin's crushing grip, and so on, and so on, and so on, again and again and again.

But then they see something change in Moon's eyes- recognition. It's actually them. He has no time to celebrate, to talk, to convey the overwhelming feelings bubbling in his chest. The dance becomes more fervor-ed- a true battle between Harlequin and Pierrot, one for Columbine's literal hand, for their safety.

The audience is oblivious to the ramifications, to the plight. They're mesmerized by the passion, the emotions so thick they can be felt in the air. There's tension, there's drama- it's a masterpiece of story and vehemence spinning and pushing and pulling and twirling about the stage.

Columbine can't tell if the snapping noises are from Sun's strings or from where his hands grip them in a stranglehold and splinter their limbs.

It's a struggle as entrancing as it is violent. The audience watches with bated breath- what will happen next? The three weave and lunge and with each forceful effort, Sun's strings making awful creaking snaps. The very system he's so desperate to maintain is working to subdue him, the two have a chance!

But just as Columbine manages to weasel their way out of his grasp-

SNAP

Nobody can do anything but watch in horror as Sun's strings feather limply at his sides, frayed like a violin bow gone sour. There's nothing stopping him now.

He's deaf to Columbine's pleas, to Moon's, to anything but the pure rage rolling through him. He lunges towards Columbine in a frenzied attack- a sickening crack ringing through the opera house.

And the audience erupts in applause as he realizes what he's done.

[cantdanceflynn]

FOR ANYONE CURIOUS YES IM GOIN A LIL INSANE OVER THE POSSESION/DOPPLEGANGER/IDK WTF IS GOING ON BUT I LOVE ITTTTTTTTTTTTT STUFF GOIN ON W LIMITEDLIFE

[skeetlebeetle]

this was going to be a doodle..

(DONT MAKE ME TAP THE SIGN!!! if yr gonna use my art [don’t repost] u gotta credit me!!)

[suzukiblu]

excerpt from a "Kara actually got to Earth on-schedule and now she's got a baby cousin to raise" AU:

Kara doesn’t understand the aliens’ language, which is fine. She didn’t expect to. She watches them interact and listens as they speak, familiarizing herself with the cadence and pitch and rhythm of their voices and doing her best to pick out individual sounds and patterns. She likes languages well enough. She did pretty well with Daxamite dialects in school last year, anyway. 

The aliens are kind, at least so far. They found her and Kal curled up in the remains of their smashed-up ships in their ruined field and brought them into their home despite the mess. Kara thinks they’re farmers, probably? So probably Laborer Guild, or whatever this planet has instead of Laborers. The House of El is mostly Thinkers, but Kara isn’t worried about that. She’ll figure something out, as soon as she figures out how to communicate with the aliens. Pantomime has not been all that helpful, at least not so far. 

They gave her a warm, unusually sweet drink that might have some kind of milk in it, with soft white pellets in it that are even sweeter. It’s not quite like anything she’s ever tasted before, but she likes it. Kal really liked it, though the aliens seemed to think he shouldn't have too much and gave her a little cup of just milk alone for him instead. Or she thinks it's milk, anyway. 

It's white. And very thick, and almost creamy? Though it tasted good too, when Kara stole a sip to make sure it wouldn’t upset Kal’s stomach if she gave it to him. 

"Pye," the alien that Kara is assuming is female announces in their weirdly simple-sounding language, putting a round plate with a slice of something on it on the table in front of her. Kal reaches for it from her lap with a burble. Kara peers at it too. The slice is triangular, with a crisp crust and an oozy red filling. She wonders why the plate is round, if the "pye" is meant to be sliced and served triangularly. It seems a little disrespectful to the cook–or baker? Or at least the artisan who made the plate, which was clearly painted with very dedicated care–painted by hand, even, not a pre-programmed design reproduced by a machine. That’s very luxurious for Laborers to be offering unexpected guests who just destroyed their field. 

Maybe they’re overcompensating, Kara thinks. Or maybe the aliens are really just that kind. 

Maybe. 

She thinks they’re little flowers, the designs around the edges of the plate. Or at least they look like they could be flowers. They’re flower-like, if nothing else, and all the weird colors of them might just be a stylistic choice. 

They’re pretty. 

She wishes she could show her mother. 

Kara crushes down the grief for the thousandth time and smiles at the aliens. They smile back. 

It helps, almost. 

Almost. 

The “pye” tastes very good.

[wynnyfryd]

Trailer park Steve AU part 31

part 1 | part 30 | ao3

updating the rating to E. cw: recreational drug use/marijuana, foreplay, mild-to-moderate spit kink

“I feel like a water bottle,” Steve slurs. At some point he wiggled his way between Eddie’s legs to get a better look at his tattoos — starting at his ankles and working his way up, pointing at each piece and asking, "What's this? And what's that?"

Eddie explained each one in turn: the quotes, the lyrics, the silly art. "This one's the Elvish word for friend. That one's from an Iron Maiden song. Oh, the asterisk? It's supposed to be an asshole. No, I'm serious! That's how Vonnegut drew them in his books."

Now Steve’s lying flat on his back between Eddie’s splayed thighs, eyelids heavy, body warm. 'Go Your Own Way' plays softly on the stereo, and Eddie continues his tattoo tour, the fingers of his free hand weaving patterns through Steve's hair — lazy, twirling zig-zags that send skitters of sensation across his scalp and down his spine.

Steve feels like he could die right now. Happy. Held. Content.

Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.

“This is fucking awesome,” he hums.

“Good,” Eddie grins at him, “I’m glad.” He scratches lightly at his scalp. “What were you, uh— what were you saying about a water bottle?”

Oh, right. Steve lifts a hand; pantomimes tilting a bottle back and forth. “Like, uh….. Sssloshy.”

“Jesus Christ,” Eddie snorts. “You’re so high.”

“Mmmmhm.”

“And you look like you’re jerking off a ghost."

“I’ll jerk off your ghost,” Steve mutters petulantly.

"I’m sure my ghost would love that.”

Eddie reaches for the joint and takes another drag, and Steve tilts his neck, arching up to look at him. Bites his lip at the pretty picture Eddie makes: the sharp shadows and delicate lines, the shape of his full lips exhaling rings of smoke. Big for a guy's. He remembers thinking that a couple weeks ago. That they were big. That they looked soft.

And now he thinks: Kissable.

Steve licks his lips. “What about your, uh- not ghost?”

Eddie laughs like he’s watching a newborn puppy try to walk. “You want to touch my dick so bad.”

“S’probably a good dick,” Steve shrugs, unashamed.

He probably should be — ashamed. Guilty for the feelings stirring deep inside his chest; feelings weed brings to the surface, sends southbound, turns to need. He can imagine how the good, god-fearing Catholics who raised him would react if they could see him now, how they'd foam and froth and rage, red-faced and covered in spittle as they shouted that he's condemning himself to Hell.

But the thing is, he's already in Hell. He's been here since July.

And anyway, Hell's kinda nice. Gentle and warm, surprisingly kind. Hell smells like leather and tobacco, like weed and aftershave, and it sounds like Lindsey Buckingham, and it likes to braid Steve's hair.

Hell has endless, inky eyes and probably kisses him with tongue.

Heat spreads through him like molten honey at the thought, spilling hot over the edges, curling in his core, and Steve turns his head to the side and drags his mouth over a tattoo on Eddie’s inner thigh — a cartoon cloud over a curled-up snoozing fox. He noses at the edge of Eddie's shorts; pushes them up.

Goosebumps pebble under the warm press of his lips. "What's this one?" Steve whispers, nudging the fabric further up.

Eddie’s laugh is quiet and strained. "Something I don't want to discuss with your mouth this close to my dick. Stevie," he warns, but it's breathless, full of want. There's a wet spot on his shorts.

Steve pushes onto his belly, blows hot breath over the spot, liquid fire coursing through him at he stares at the bulge in Eddie’s shorts. Blistering heat, the sweetness dense, rich and thick on his tongue; in his veins. He mouths at the crease of Eddie's thigh. Eddie smells so good, like skin and sweat and boy, and Steve wants this. Wants it so badly he feels the ache inside his teeth. I dreamed the goddess poured ambrosia...

Steve feels it drip from head to toe.

"Steve." Eddie's voice is sharp this time, commanding and firm as he fists a hand in Steve's hair — not hurting him; not letting him move. Keeping him from putting his mouth just where he wants.

Steve makes a desperate sound and rocks his hips against the bed.

"Steve, stop," Eddie scolds. Pulls his hair a little harder, like he’s tugging on a leash.

"Eddie, please.” Steve’s eyes roll back, and he shifts his hips again. Just once; just a bit. Not nearly hard enough.

"No. Behave. Be good."

Steve freezes — tenses every muscle, holds himself so still, his face flushing with shame, because he didn’t mean to not be good. Didn’t mean to do anything bad. He blinks at Eddie with watery eyes and says he’s sorry, his voice cracking around the word.

"God," Eddie groans. His fist tightens in Steve’s hair, and his hips twitch off the bed, the curve of his cock brushing the tip of Steve's nose. Fuck. "Holy shit. Roll over."

"What?"

"On your back, like you were before." He’s panting when he says it, and Steve does as he's told; flips over onto his back, face bracketed by Eddie's thighs, the tent in his own shorts embarrassingly big. Obvious.

"Good,” Eddie exhales. “That’s- Jesus. Yeah, that’s good." He sinks back against the wall with a winded sigh.

And then he doesn't say anything else.

Doesn’t even move, just slouches down to catch his breath.

Steve kind of wants to cry; feels chastised and stupid, because of course Eddie doesn't want this. He already said he didn't, didn't he? Not tonight, anyway. And now Steve’s ruined things by being high and dumb and selfish, getting himself worked up over nothing and making it Eddie’s problem, and he'll probably spend the rest of this night miserable and blue-balled because he's a horny idiot, but that's—

It’s fine, if Eddie wants to cool things off; if he doesn't want to— he's allowed to not want—

"Here's what's about to happen.”

Steve snaps his head up to listen. Twists his neck around, sees Eddie lounging against the wall like a bored king on a throne, one ringed hand cupping himself loosely through his shorts. He squeezes once, takes another deep breath; lets it out long and controlled. Steve’s gonna fucking drool. "You’re gonna touch yourself for me.”

Steve moans. Guttural and loud, the sound punched out of his lungs, because Eddie’s voice comes out like gravel — husky, deep, the words authoritative and slow; like Steve needs to be punished; like Eddie’s merciful.

“You’re going to touch yourself exactly how I tell you to, and only how I tell you to. If I say stop, you stop. If I say faster, you speed up. If it's too much—" His hand moves to Steve’s cheek, slapping lightly against the bone. “—you tap out, or you tell me.”

Steve nods his head, entranced. Eddie’s thumb moves to his mouth. “And if you’re very, very good…” He tugs his bottom lip; presses in; lets him suck. “…then I’ll let you watch me come. How does that sound?”

Steve whines; hollows his cheeks, sucking harder, flicking his tongue. Eddie’s thighs clamp down around him, and when he pulls his hand away the spit clings to his thumb, a delicate string connecting them before it breaks. “Asked you a question, sweetheart.” He smears the spit over Steve’s chin. “Does that sound good?”

Steve nearly swallows his tongue.

—

part 32

tag list in separate reblogs under '#trailer park steve au taglist' if you'd like to filter that content. if you want to be added tomorrow please comment and let me know (must be over 21; please either verify in the comment or have your age visible on your blog)

[meiieiri]

water’s edge | concept dump

₊˚.༄ pairing: crown prince!gojo satoru x f!reader | setting: modern royal au

₊˚.༄ summary: in a world where titles define their fates, gojo satoru, the crown prince of japan, and his wife-to-be, face a tempestuous court of deception and schadenfreude. as they waltz on the edge of ruin, can their love endure the treacherous waters that threaten to pull them apart, or will the whims of the enigmatic chrysanthemum throne prove strong enough to drown them both?

₊˚.༄ warnings: mean!gojo (but that’s not even the worst of it oh my god what monstrosity have i created), arranged marriage, illness, allusions to criminal activity that may include reckless homicide, physical battery and attempted murder. mentions of depression, cheating, physical and emotional abuse, trauma, adultery. fictional depiction of the japanese imperial family, etc.

LINK TO FULL FIC MASTERLIST HERE!

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who is the only son of the emperor and empress of Japan, the beloved and long-awaited child of his parents. As a child, he had been showered with endless praise and veneration as the one, true, legitimate heir to the chrysanthemum throne. The entire imperial household had expected the prince to inherit an unwavering sense of duty to the crown and to his people much like his fore-bearers, only to be severely disappointed when the prince turns out to be a pathological card shark with ambiguous morals, and a serial womanizer who has slept with countless women from aristocratic backgrounds during the height of his bachelor years.

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who finally incurs his father’s wrath after a nasty bar brawl that leads to him getting unceremoniously arrested and is stripped of his title and properties as crown prince, favoring his half-brother, Prince Suguru Geto, who had been born of the emperor’s affair with one of the empress’s ladies-in-waiting. This incident has prompted his mother, the empress, to help in ratifying his public image by arranging Satoru to marry a commoner with an impeccable standing in Japanese society in a bid to re-portray Satoru as a responsible, married man. The empress, in turn, offers to grant you, Satoru’s future wife-to-be, anything your heart could ever desire.

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who engages in a pantomime act of being a loving husband to you during a state banquet by showering you with endless praise in his speech addressed to all the world leaders in the Akasaka Palace’s reception hall. When he was asked to introduce you, his new wife, the honeyed words came so easily to him. “You see, the princess (Y/N) is no ordinary woman,” he chuckles into the microphone causing the guests to giggle at the sight of what looks to be a bashful newlywed.

“Other than being the first breath of fresh air our family has ever had the pleasure of knowing in so long, and the most active member in our family when it comes to supporting the many royal charities and foundations, she is…” he trails off. You dared to follow the wandering gaze of your husband, who seems to be searching for another pair of eyes in the room. His eyes eventually stop their search, softening at the sight of the one he loved. For a second, you think he is looking at you, and your heart naively skips a beat in your chest as if all these months of inattention and animosity were finally coming to an end.

“…My better half, the keeper of my own heart.”

Many of the ambassador’s wives who sat beside you nudged you in congratulations for being so blessed with such a devoted husband. You crane your head back to smile warmly at them for the kind words only to have ice coat your veins instantly when you see his Chief-of-Staff, Himiko Zenin, sitting about two seats behind you, staring directly at your husband with a wistful look in her eyes, exchanging words of love in a silent oath — one that is far more certain than the rising and the setting of the sun as each day passes with your husband hating you a tad bit more than yesterday, and one that is far more truthful than the wedding vows you shared.

Of course, writing this godforsaken death march-like speech was easy for Satoru, simply because these words of devotion and love were never intended for you anyway; this poetic spiel was written with another woman ensnaring his mind.

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who sneaks out of bed during your wedding night, sparing one last cold glance at your sleeping form before he saunters out the imperial villa to meet his girlfriend in a nearby mountain resort, about half a mile away from the villa. His personal chauffeur had been sworn to secrecy, else, he would incur the wrath of the crown prince.

“I thought you couldn’t get away,” Himiko moans wantonly into his mouth as he roughly takes her from behind, the lewd wet sounds of their lovemaking echoing through the room. He had taken the liberty of secretly bringing Himiko along to your honeymoon, by booking the most expensive suite in the resort for her under another name.

“The bitch is too fucked out to even notice I’m gone— mmph—“ he throws his head back, releasing a pleasured groan when Himiko meets his sharp thrusts, grinding teasingly on his cock as she does so. He grips her hips tightly, readjusting his hips to pound into her from another angle, the muscles on his abs tightening as he gets lost in the feeling of her tight, luscious walls. “Sh-shit, ‘m-m gonna cum—“

“—Ah! S-Satoru,” she was close too, her eyes rolling to the back of her head as the fat tip of his member roughly prods at her cervix.

He half-expected Himiko to be angry with him for engaging in intimate acts with you, but she simply acts like she didn’t hear him. And even if she was upset, why should he, of all people, apologize? She should have known that becoming his mistress entailed having to endure these kinds of things as these were simply Satoru’s marital duties, and by extension, his duty to the crown.

His high washes over him like a tidal wave crashing into the rock shore, grunting as he involuntarily thrusts as he releases inside her, Himiko collapsing onto the pillows as he does. “O-oh, haaa- agh,” his deep tenor moans into her long black hair as his seed paints her walls, holding her close to his form, their heartbeats racing a million miles an hour.

He pulls out his flaccid cock, plopping down next to her, pulling her small frame for her head to rest on his chest. “I just need to have father reinstate me as heir apparent and return all my estates, then,” he kisses her once, his lips moving in sync with her soft ones.

“…We’ll get rid of her.”

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who blatantly and publicly humiliates you by bringing along Himiko Zenin to a state visit to the imperial family’s counterpart in Monaco rather than you, his rightful wife. And when asked of your whereabouts, Satoru simply replies with a casual shrug, his hand squeezing Himiko’s smaller ones as she usurps the banquet thrown in your honor by the Monacan royal family while you watch the horrific scene unfold on your television screen, your heart shattering into a million pieces as Himiko and Satoru uncaringly waltz with one another in front of the watchful eyes of the entire world throughout the evening.

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who crucifies you for your acts of sincere charity, believing you to be actively humiliating Himiko despite having no intentions whatsoever resembling his baseless accusation. “Did you honestly think your little publicity antics would go unpunished? I bet you were just itching for the attention, weren’t you?” he snarls at you the second you come back from a visit to one of the hospitals you had commissioned for the treatment of children with rare diseases, a compassionate act which had been heavily televised by national broadcasting stations and even international news agencies. “If you wish to compete with Himiko, wife, then, by all means. But I swear to you, I will do everything — everything I can — to make the entire world know just how much of an opportunistic whore you are—”

You gaze up at your husband with fear in your eyes. “…I was not competing with Himiko, can I not care for our people — your people? I’m sure they need someone to promote their interests when their own prince couldn’t be bothered to do so!” you retaliate but are quickly shot down when he throws his scotch glass at the wall, causing you to flinch when it shatters on impact.

“I will make sure this humiliation you dealt to Himiko will return to you tenfold, (Y/N),” he dangerously seethes, coming to the aid of his mistress. “Celebrate your victory all you want, wife, but make no mistake, this is far from over.”

₊˚.༄ Crown Prince!Gojo who indifferently scoffs when you crumble into a sobbing mess after yet another argument with him. “W-what can I do to make you not hate me so much? P-please tell me, Satoru.” The only response you receive is your husband dangerously moving closer to you, his eyes, dark with pure loathing. Instinctively, you step backward, only to be met by the cold wall of your shared bedroom. “S-Satoru—“

“—Here’s what you can do: do exactly as I say, without question,” he traps you between his arms, his breath hot on your skin, his lips dangerously close to yours, his voice dripping with the venom that could turn every silver thread in your heart into a hue that resembled charcoal black. “If I tell you to kiss me, you kiss me. If I tell you to get out, you get out. If I tell you to shut up, you sew your mouth shut or rip your tongue out, I really don’t give a damn. If I tell you to die…”

…

…

“…You drop dead.”

a/n: meh, just wrote this at the top of my head to get rid of this stupid writer’s block since hehe i have like eighteen drafts of jjk smut and drabbles in my tumblr folder rn help :’)

might turn this into a multi-chapter fic depending on how it is received. so lemme know your thoughts by reblogging, liking or commenting on this post!

[harmonysanreads]

Hi Harmony! I just noticed that your requests are open and I decided to drop by with a small request I thought about for weeks.

I was thinking about Arlecchino for a while, and it made me ponder of the concept of Arlecchino with a darling on a reincarnation AU. Maybe Arlecchino has met her darling at such an inconvenient time, and every time that it has happened, only she remembers their past lives.

It probably goes to the point that Arlecchino starts devising ways to be able to keep her darling safe, because each time they would meet, her darling gets into an accident... And it would seem that each time she tried, then it would simply fail. And it would push to a point where she resorts to one of the more not so morally good methods.

I don't know if this counts as a req. or a brainrot, but I offer you this idea because I think it could be interesting to think about sometimes. You're free to deny it btw if its typical, hard, or overall you can't write it <3 I completely understand if that's the case.

(p.s.: this is the one running @yxstxrdrxxm BAHAHAHAHAHA I'm sorry if I haven't replied to your message during OLC, I dont know how to talk to you w/o sounding really awkward </3 also!! hydration check! Anyways thats all, have fun with the idea + I hope you have a great day Harmony :D)

Pantomime Of The Night

yandere!arlecchino x reader

cw(s) : yandere, vampire!arlecchino, mentions of blood, murder, slight gore, non-consensual touching, unbalanced power dynamics

wc : 2.1k

a/n: omg hiii! would you believe me if I said I was just thinking about you before getting this ask? also please don't worry about my message! i had a hunch that you might be in a situation of sorts. thank you so so much for requesting arlecchino because i've been itching to write for her for a long time! i decided to go with vampire!arlecchino for this because i thought it'd suit the reincarnation theme well. i hope you enjoy it<3

lovely illustration based on this fic by a lovely person <3 (spoiler alert!)

At the deepest hours of the night, even the innocent crackles of hearthfire sound as clamorous as gun-shots.

You're dazed by the flame's continuous dance until the aroma of freshly brewed tea reaches your senses and the servants have left. A sharp clank from Arlecchino's glass and the weight of her gaze prompt you to meet her eyes. The light from the fireplace casts shadows on the other half of her fair face, she seemed to have foregone her usual taught posture in favor of a relaxed one. One of her hands supports her cheek while the other holds the wine glass, the beverage within sloshes as the claw-like accessories on her fingers curl around the object.

Your side of the table is far more decorated, desserts that you've never even seen in your impoverished mortal life and that tea you've grown fond of over the course of your stay in her mansion sit appetizingly. All beckon you to feast, all seek to fan the flames of voracity and you offer but a thoughtless stare in return.

The master of the house seems to have noticed your lack of appetite as she finally breaks the stretched out silence, “These are all confectioneries of the highest quality from the town and as I recall, all of your favorites. But you give them no more than a blank stare... you've also not taken a sip from the tea. May I inquire why?”

The raspy tone of her observation has your arms covered in gooseflesh, though, you note she does not sound as confused as her words suggest. You can feel her onyx eyes gloss over every part of your person, inspecting and dissecting each and every visible clue. You swallow dryly, “It’s just that it's way too late in the night,”

“Yet you look as ready as ever to head out. Tell me, have you been anticipating my return, dearest?”

Arlecchino stares pointedly at your attire, likely referring to the traveling clothes you have on instead of the silk nightwear that she had gifted. Your shoulders tense unconsciously, there's something about the way she speaks at this instance that has your heartbeat crescendoing. The silver haired woman gives you a few more beats of anxiety, her talons scrape against the dainty glass.

“I’ve been informed that you have not eaten anything since yesterday.”

The words escape her painted lips easily, but they don't fail to send a jolt through your system. Throughout your stay, she'd never spoken to you like this, like you were one of her children who did not know better and decided to cross a line. That realization renders you further puzzled, you did nothing wrong to begin with, but her tone made you feel as though you were on the verge of doing so. You clear your parched throat and gather yourself to meet her eyes. This time, you do not allow yourself to wilt at the force of her burning stare.

“Arlecchino, I have something to tell you.”

The addressed woman straightens up at your sudden serious tone, her hand abandons the wine glass on the table and you inhale involuntarily at the scratches that now decorate the object, “I’m all ears, dearest.”

Your brows crease, as usual, Arlecchino is courteous, too courteous for someone who makes it obvious she's informed of something that she wasn't supposed to know. She's been like this ever since you and your travel-partner stepped foot in her ambiguous estate. Initially, you were touched by the hospitality she and her adopted children had shown you. Your greed lulled any arising suspicions, you neither questioned why she'd been so generous to a commoner with nothing more than fifty mora to their name nor did you bother to think about how she was affording all those gifts. You naïvely wished to believe in her kindness and that nothing was wrong about this house. But of course, self-woven deceptions last so long.

“Before you mistake me for being ungrateful, I did plan to inform you before leaving. Me and my friend are extremely thankful for the care your house has shown us, but we cannot stay in one place forever.”

“Why not?” you halt at her abrupt question but she follows up before you could even part your lips, “Have we lacked in any area to provide you with the adequate comfort? Have any of my children said something? If it's the latter, I'll apologize in their stead, they can be quite playful at times, I'm sure you understand.”

You stare dumbfounded at the sudden turn this conversation has taken, she wasn't supposed to behave like this. Why is she searching for a reason to make you stay when she should've been happy that a burden was about to be lifted off of her shoulders? Are all nobles this pushy?

“I—” you cut yourself off as the silver-haired woman leans in without warning, her shadow envelopes the delicacies laid out on the small table.

“Or… have you seen something?” she drawled.

You cannot hold back a flinch this time. A curse echoes in your mind at your stupidity, this was no ‘conversation’ to begin with ; this was yet another trap and you'd willingly played right into the palm of Arlecchino's hand. If there's one thing you've learned about this mysterious noblewoman, it is that she enjoys the process of dragging answers out of everyone. From the very beginning, she was aware of your scheme but, she chose to wear that mask of courtesy one more time and lured you out in the open, unguarded. If only your friend arrived to fetch you from your room at the right time, you wouldn't be in this messy situation.

Your eyes dart from her unblinking expression to the sharp accessories that adorn her gloved fingers and something about them forces you to reply quickly.

“No! I mean, you know that I'm a traveler, do you not? It's already been six months since we came to your estate, me and my friend were starting to.. crave that adventurous thrill—yes! We were starting to miss being on the road and decided to depart in the early morning.”

Once upon a time, your late mother had told you that some people in this world are like spiders. They're always at the centerpiece of their lair, leaving intricate translucent webs for unassuming prey to get tangled upon. Although the croaked warnings of your bedridden mother did not make much sense to the younger you, you understood now exactly what she meant.

“Incorrect. You were planning to escape with that friend of yours, weren't you?”

The hearthfire burns bright, shrouding Arlecchino's expression in shadows. The chilling octave of her voice defeats the warmth of the fireplace and has every muscle in your body stiffened. Escape? Her word choice never ceased to baffle you throughout this faux tea-party. She speaks as though you were her prisoner instead of a guest. She tilts her head and has the audacity to look betrayed as though you were a possession she held dear, and not a random human she decided to take pity upon.

Arlecchino runs a hand through her silvery hair with a sigh that actually indicates ennui and you bite back a scowl, “Honestly, I do not understand why you even befriended that thing. He's an obnoxious blabbermouth with a nose bigger than his brain. And he's loud, too. You've always preferred to mingle with level headed people with a sufficient intellectual capacity in the past and here you are, glaring at me as though—”

“Don’t speak like you know me!”

You pant after the force of that outburst, your voice ricochets across the walls of her room and further beyond. You open your mouth to continue but stop when you notice a strange flicker in the silver-haired woman's eyes. It's gone in a blink and is replaced with irritation just as quickly however.

“Oh, but I do know you. I know you better than you know yourself, in fact. I know that there are exactly 11 moles throughout your body, I know all your preferences and fears. Don't believe me? Did you really never stop to question how I managed to give you things that catered to your tastes? How I knew what you desired even before you did? Or were you so mesmerized by the words of that friend of yours to pay minimum attention?”

If the tone of a person's voice could kill, you'd be rotting in a ditch by now. You would've never believed someone could sound this malicious while not even raising their voice. You want nothing more than to shrink away but the adrenaline accumulated through your anger pushes you to keep digging your grave.

“And so what if that's exactly how it is? You have no right to have a say in who I choose to be ‘mesmerized’ by!”

A ‘ha!’ laden with disbelief escapes Arlecchino's lips. Fine silvery strands bounce at the mocking tilt of her head, “So what will you do now? Walk out of the gates with that waste of space like nothing happened?”

“Oh, you bet I will!” you fume, rising from the chair and turning on your heels. You barely take one step away from the table until the full weight of Arlecchino's malice crashes down on you and you remember something important.

“Arlecchino, where is my friend?”

The silver haired woman leisurely raises her wine glass at your stilted words, “In my glass.”

You swivel towards her, blinking several times as if to confirm you didn't mishear.

“Well, here and… probably in the stomachs of my pet vultures, excluding the carcass, that is. I'll admit, the taste is subpar compared to the trouble I went through. That thing kept on screaming until one of the vultures tore its heart out. Ugh, my ears are still ringing.”

Your wide eyes tremble towards the glass in her hand, the deep red liquid within sloshes to the direction of Arlecchino's hand ; paired with her words, your friend’s destiny becomes a no-brainer. All your wits abandon you in that instance and in a moment of sheer panic, you take a step back. Arlecchino promptly interferes with your plans, the door and windows close with no little sound and the table and your chair disappear without a trace—all in the snap of her fingers.

“What are you?”

You would've screamed if you didn't forget how to use your lungs. But then again, you doubt anyone would come to save you from her clutches even if you did. Your eyes connect to her onyx ones and in that moment, she appeared far less human than she'd been this whole encounter. Her pupils flash as two red xs and you feel an invisible pull tugging you to her side. The temptation dominates any coherent thoughts until you find yourself an arms length away from her seated self. Her claws dig into the flesh of your arm and yank you to her lap.

Free from the haze of that strange sensation, the first thing that permeates your senses is how cold Arlecchino's proximity is. Your palm meets her chest in a feeble attempt to push her away but all it does is stun you when you notice the absence of a heartbeat. You feel the sting of something sharp on your chin and waist, your eyes glance back and forth between the sources—dread pools in your stomach. Because of your closeness and the light from the fireplace, you're able to see that the sharp objects you'd mistaken for accessories are actually her nails and the gloves, her real skin.

Perhaps your trembling was so pitiful that Arlecchino could not help but soften her gaze, “Do you truly not recall?”

You look up at her, thoroughly perplexed. There's that previous glint in her eyes again but you've already accepted that understanding this woman was beyond you. One moment she accuses you as though you've been unfaithful, then she vividly describes how she murdered an innocent man and the next she looks almost… hurt?

“Recall what?”

The silver-haired woman’s red lips part and you gulp as unnaturally sharp fangs sneer at you. Albeit, she does not answer you and you wonder if you should get accustomed to playing mental gymnastics with her just to get a simple answer. Her talons let go of your waist and drag their up to your collarbone, creating a deliberate and irrepairable tear on your clothes. Her nails drum against your skin for three seconds before they latch onto your throat.

“Although, that'll no longer be an issue.”

She forces you to make eye-contact with a sharp tug on your chin, the color drains from your face as her cool breath washes against your skin. You open your mouth to say something, anything, but are quickly shushed as you feel her fangs sink into your lower lip.

“Because, we'll have ample time to get acquainted with each other starting from today.”

[siriusleee]

LIKE BLOOD ON IRON

Historical Executioner AU

Summary: The executioner has always been an enigma to you - drawing you in. His sword drawing a line in the dirt as he made his way to the village center, and leaving back to his cottage on the outskirts of town. However, your curiosity can't stop the future your family has planned for you.

Warnings: mentions of blood, family dynamics, semi-forced marriage mention, implied age gap, future smut, future blood and gore.

Word Count: 6k

A/N: This is a three part series that I intend to be pretty long - at least 20,000 words. If you want to be added to the tag list, make sure you comment below. This is a historical fantasy, however, it is not magical. spotify playlist part two

His sword carves a gorge in the dirt, dust swirling in the sunlight left behind him. The sun threatens to fall before he makes it to the center of the village, but it doesn't dare fall before he gets the chance to finish his day's work. 

You watch him from the window of your family's house, lucky enough to be close enough to the center that you can see him coming for ages. Your fingers dig into the windowsill; the wind - salty from the nearby bay- blows gently through, rattling the windows you threw open the moment your sister whispered that he was coming down the road. There are only moments before Mother will storm upstairs, chastising you for trying to watch what's going down below.

"It's not appropriate for a girl your age to see this," she'll say for the hundredth time, slamming the windows shut. The wavy glass will distort his features, and leave you nothing but a hint at his form, but even then Mother won't let you continue looking. She'll pull you downstairs into the kitchen with your two sisters and set you all to work. 

"Your father and uncle will be hungry when they get home; you all pitch in," she'll say, pantomiming joy when just outside a man will lose his head - your father and uncle observing from the crowd. Father will come home grim, and not speak over the dinner that you and your sisters cooked, and will go to bed silent.

In the morning when you go to the market for whatever Mother needs for the day, blood will have stained the stones paving the center of the village. And the executioner will be back in his small cottage situated far away from everyone in town, not to be seen until he was needed again.

But this time, Mother takes longer. You hear her speaking sharply to your youngest sister, about how she needs to be more aware of her surroundings and stop sloshing all that damned water all over the place. Today you get the chance to see him come closer.

He's large and cloaked - you know from the village boys whispering that he has a mask on to cover his face. 

"It's covered in ashes - smeared to look like a skull."

"It's to remind those on his chopping block that he is Death."

No one accompanies him on his journey to the dias that all the buildings spiral away from; every person that will be there is already waiting for him to arrive, breath held in their throats as they hear his approaching footsteps. You watch as each house he passes draws its shutters shut to him as if they could be next if they looked at him. The sea rages down past the docks, far enough away to be just a faint chorus as he approaches your house. 

The tilt of his shoulders enamors you - he's enormous, but walks with a grace you can only wish to have. You don't need to be near him to know that the only sounds are the swish of his cloak against the ground, and the sword drawing against the ground.

You startle when Mother grasps your shoulder, letting out a gasping noise, but you don't turn away from the window. As if he could hear you, the executioner's head snaps towards you. You see just a hint of the white ash smeared across his mask before you're pulled inside. Mother throws you into the room with enough strength to cause you to hit the wall behind you, rattling the porcelain that sits on a nearby shelf. She slams the window hard enough that the glass rattles before slamming the storm shutters and latching them.

"What are you doing?" Mother's voice is venomous as she rounds on you, eyes burning. "You are going to humiliate this family acting the way you do."

"I'm sorry Mother," you appease, pulling at the wrinkles in your skirt and avoiding her eyes. "I was just curious."

"Your job isn't to be curious."

"Yes, Mother."

"How would your suitors think about you hanging out the window to watch something so grim?" 

You close your eyes to hide the sudden anger behind them; your head stays down and you don't answer. Anything you say won't be good enough for her. It's the same every time there's an execution. 

"Come - let's prepare dinner."

You follow, slowly. Inside the kitchen it's warm, and smells of honey and meat. Your mother gestures to a lump of dough that needs kneading and you roll your sleeves up. Your sisters, still eager to get a nice word out of Mother, patter around, stirring and checking on the baking. You know you were given the dough because everything else in the kitchen fails you.

Mother had been attempting to get you some proficiency in the kitchen, giving it her damnedest, curses flying out of her whenever you burnt something. For the past two years, she tried to no avail.

"At least you're a smart girl," she'd say with a sign. "And you can do books - you'll just have to hire someone who can cook."

For three years, your father and mother had been trying to find someone for you to marry.

"Seventeen is when I met your mother, and I courted her for three years to finally get her yes. And you're her elder by three."

The story sickened you. 

You'd had some luck that not many wanted to court you - it wasn't unknown in the village that you argued with your mother and father. Everyone whispered behind your back about the time you tried to smuggle yourself on one of your father's cargo ships, bound for somewhere far away and exotic. They whispered about how you fought the sailor that found you tooth and nail, leaving him a scar down the side of his face as he dragged you to the deck. No one wanted a wife that wouldn't listen. 

But still, some had come knocking.

Nice young men who would wait the years it took you to be ready to marry if you would just say yes. Nice young men who winked at your younger sisters across the dining table, who pressed flowers into Mother's hands, who clapped Father on the back at the end of the night.

Nice, young, boring men who wanted a boring wife to oversee someone else doing the cooking. 

Nice young men who would want their wives on hands and knees cleaning during the day, tongue out at night.

Nice young men you detested. 

You'd rejected each one that came knocking - fits that included screaming loud enough that the neighbors could hear, and a few shattered glasses. Once Mother locked you in your room and threatened to send you to a nunnery if you didn't stop screeching. But your father had called on them, spinning a web that you'd been intrigued by them and to come back for dinner again in a few weeks. 

You'd been threatened with the nunnery and the whip if you misbehaved the next time they came back, so you sat there, unspeaking while the men spoke only to Mother and Father. 

You're broken out of your reverie by your youngest sister, Lily. She presses against your side, tugging your apron to pull you down so that she can whisper in your ear.

"Mother is going to check on you tonight."

You give just a curt nod, eyes trained on Mother and your oldest sister, Maggie. They have their backs turned to you and Lily. Lily who has always hidden your secrets and you have hidden hers. Lily who knows you sneak out at night, climbing carefully out of your window onto the trellis and down where the horse is stabled. Lily who knows you spend all night swimming in the dark ocean, imagining the merfolk and monsters that linger there. 

You press a quick kiss to her temple, a thank you for the heads up, as you begin shaping the dough into two loaves of bread. 

The front door opens and the sound of your father's boots on the wood breaks through the kitchen. Mother wipes her hands on her apron, flour falling onto the dark blue skirt below, and leaves to say hello. Maggie follows closely behind, leaving you and Lily behind to finish dinner. Lily does most of the work, directing you on what to do to keep everything from burning. 

When everything is finished, the two of you cart it to the dining table where Maggie straightens the plates to perfection. You hear the gentle hum of Mother and Father talking, no doubt about your antics in the window. There's an extra plate at the table.

"Who is this for?" You ask Maggie, skewing one of the spoons. 

"Edward. And don't mess everything up." She reaches across to straighten the spoon. 

Edward the apprentice tailor, her two-year suitor who no doubt will agree to marry before the end of the year. You feel relieved that tonight you will be ignored, you and Lily can eat at the end of the table in peace, whispering jokes to each other. 

You leave to wash up in your room, scrubbing at the black dirt that you collected from the windowsill. You wonder if the executioner has made it home; if he drags his sword behind him or does he sheath it. Does it drip blood as he retraces his path?

Lily waits for you at the top of the stairs, and you lace your fingers together as you make your way down the stairs and into the dining hall. You pull faces at each other across the table, and stifle giggles into your napkins - ignoring the dirty looks Maggie sends to the two of you down the table. 

Dinner is tortuously slow - when it's over and you're clearing off the table you can see Edward and Maggie in the hallway, pressed against each other in a way that would make Mother blush if she were to see it. You elbow Lily and point toward them, sticking your tongue out and pretending to puke. She laughs loud enough to catch Maggie's attention and the two of you scurry out of her line of sight. 

After getting ready for bed, you brush out Lily's hair, perched on the bed you share. Her hair shines midnight beneath the brush, long and thick. The most gorgeous in the family.

"Can you braid it in two tonight?" She asks, trying to turn and look at you, but you turn her head forcefully back to the front.

"If you stay still I can. Keep wiggling little mouse, and you're going to have crooked braids."

Her hair slips heavily between your fingers as you cross one strand over another. You're wrapping a tie around the bottom of the first braid when she speaks again, this time in a whisper.

"Do you think being married would be terrible?"

You concentrate on the tie, measuring out each word before saying it.

"Why do you ask, my little mouse?"

"It's just - Maggie seems so eager to marry, and you're the opposite. Mother and Father seem happy."

"Well, Maggie and I are different people. Maggie is wonderful at this house stuff, and she wants that life. I want to explore, to see more. I want to fall in love with someone that isn't a pick of Father - someone…" You trail off, unsure of what you're trying to say. "Anyway, marriage isn't terrible for everyone. And if your marriage was, I would come and rescue you myself. Even if it means killing your husband. I'd sweep you out of that house, and back with me."

Lily giggles at the suggestion.

"You would end up under the executioner's sword then."

Inside, something twists at the idea of lying down, looking up at the broad man staring down at you.

"He doesn't scare me," you tell her, finishing the second braid. "Nothing scares me."

"Nothing?"

"Nothing."

The two of you settle into bed, Lily tucking herself into your side. Just as she said, in the middle of the night, Mother comes in, candlelight casting long shadows across the room. You keep still, pretending to sleep until she disappears. It's too risky to leave tonight, so you let Lily's warmth and soft snoring lull you to sleep. 

***

The next night, you press your ear to your bedroom door. You can hear Father snoring faintly down the hall; the moon, directly overhead, tells you it's late enough to slip out. You press a kiss on Lily's forehead and slide your legs out of the window, skirts bunched up to keep from getting caught.

The trellis groans under your weight, but you're sure it won't break underneath you. You climb down, familiar with where to put your hands, where the spiders like to build their webs, and the weak spots - you drop the last few feet down to the ground. The horse nickers softly from her spot in the small stall she's in. The village is quiet, the only sound the whisper of the sea. 

You keep to the darkest spots, the shadows even the night fears as you sneak through town. It's too hot for a cloak, but you still keep yours over your head, just in case anyone other than the spiders and bats is awake to see you. The closer you get to the sand, the faster you walk, pausing just once for a drunken sailor to slip past you without noticing you are hidden just feet away from him.

The port is small - bringing in just one or two ships - nearly all of them laden down with wool your father sells. But this time of year there is only one ship, here to pick up sailors that were on leave. It bobs gently across the water in the small port, the flicker of a candle seen sporadically. From this distance, any soldiers on it look like dolls in the distance. The air is cooler rolling off of the ocean, and the salt in the air sticks to your skin. Your bare feet hit the sand and you race to a spot hidden in a cove that separates the village from the ocean - a hidden spot used by couples in the town when they wanted to get away. But at night it was always empty.

Your toes dip in the water, and the bottom of your cloak gets soaked each time a fresh wave breaks on the sand. The water in the distance is still, reflecting the moon and stars. You let your cloak slip off of your shoulders, beneath you'd laced a dress up loosely, enough that if you were caught, you could feign innocence. It comes undone and pools at your feet. Your skin erupts in gooseflesh when the ocean air rolls over it - your chemise not thick enough to block out the wind.

You wade to your hips- the water is warm and still. Beneath your feet the sand shifts, shells sharp against your skin. You turn, making sure that you're still hidden from anyone who may be walking to the port at night, and when you're sure no one is there looking at you, you dive.

Your eyes burn in the darkness, moonlight filtering down just enough so that you can see your hand in front of your face. You push farther out into the bay, not resurfacing until your lungs burn from lack of air. Breaking the surface, everything is blurry, you fall back so that you're floating on your back until your eyes readjust and the stars come back in sharp focus. You float there, watching the subtle shift.

And all at once you feel it: someone's eyes on you. You flounder until you can get your feet underneath you, eyes straining to see the shore - you're farther out than you thought you were, toes barely able to scrape the sand below. You can see your dress and cloak, still pooled on the shore, but there's no sign of anyone nearby. Slowly, worryingly, you push towards the shore, until it's back to your hips. Your eyes never leave the shore, looking for someone there.

That's when one of the shadows ripples forward. You freeze your heart stuttering in your chest as you watch someone walk towards you - you can't think of what to do. Even if you screamed, no one would be able to hear you. You realize for the first time how foolish the venture is.

When the moonlight fully covers the figure, they stop feet from your clothes. Your hands clamp across your chest, the thin white fabric covering you completely transparent now that it's wet. Neither of you moves, and you realize that if you don't, they probably never will.

Hands still clamped across your chest, you walk to the shore. With each step it becomes clear just how massive the person on shore is - it has to be a man, you've never seen a woman that tall, that broad. You're in ankle-deep water when you catch just a glimpse at them beneath the hood of their cloak: white ash, reflecting in the moonlight.

Your panic increases tenfold, but you think if you move too fast, he'll move faster. Snatch you up. So as if he were a dangerous animal, you reach down and grab your dress from the ground, leaving it over your arm as you pull your cloak around yourself. Your eyes never leave him. He waits until you're completely covered before he turns to look at you - just the barest hint of flesh around his eyes. 

"Don't you think it's dangerous to be out here alone?" His voice is gravel and honey, deeper than you'd expect. You wonder if it's that way because he doesn't get to speak often.

"It depends on who's out here," your voice wavers, but doesn't crack. He seems to like that answer, letting out a short 'hmm'. 

"There's plenty of monsters out here in the darkness." He speaks but still doesn't step toward you. You tighten your cloak around you, wishing for once to be back in bed with Lily. 

"The merfolk and the selkies are the only things I worry about." You take small steps backward as you speak, feet shuffling over the sand.

"I've seen worse lurking in the near forest," he says, suddenly stepping towards you. You trip over your own feet, but before you can crash into the sand, his hand is around your elbow, pulling you up roughly. You don't mean to, but you let out a small squeak at his touch and recoil away; he drops your arm as if it burns him.

"You should go home," he says, nodding his head back towards the village. "It's too late for you to be out."

"I think you and my father would agree on that matter."

You can't tell if it's a trick of the light, but you see the corner of his eye crinkle for just a moment. 

"I'll walk you back up, then you are on your own to get home safely."

He walks ahead of you as he talks as if he expects you just to follow without saying anything. And you do, terror and intrigue mixing inside of you. His scent wafts to you in the wind, woodsmoke, and metal, and something sweet- like rotted wood. It flashes through you, just a second long - to bury your face in his cloak and take a deep breath. Your curiosity is raging inside of you, mingling with the apprehension of being near him - the same man Mother refuses to let you even look at through the window.

You slip on the sand and rocks behind him, his boots leaving footprints that dwarf yours. It takes just moments, but the two of you emerge out of the hidden crag and onto the soft grass that overlooks the ocean. 

You're panting, your heart still beating erratically in fear of him, the executioner, here at night on a dark roadside, and no one to notice the two of you. He pauses, just long enough to throw a look over his shoulder at you - you recognize his silent instructions to hurry home. You take two small sideways steps, eyes trained on him as he walks in the opposite direction, to the small cottage situated between the forest and the sea and far away from where he found you. His exile - where he never ventures out unless called. As soon as he's far enough away, you turn and run. 

When you make it back to your trellis you're out of breath, a stitch cutting your side open. You ready yourself to climb up, trying to catch your breath and remember his scent and the way he towered over you.

You wonder if he'd been there with you before, hidden in the shadows. 

***

"What are you doing? Are you senseless?" Maggie's voice cuts through your thoughts, pulling you back to the present. Your fingers slip over the apples in your hand as she grabs your wrist, pulling you back towards her.

"You're supposed to stay with me and Lily; not wander off to do god knows what?" 

Her face is pinched, angry - you jerk your wrist out of her touch. 

"I'm sorry Maggie, I just got busy looking at the produce."

She gives you a look that says she knows you're lying, but you fall in step behind her anyway. You had been lost in thoughts of the executioner, of how his eyes shone in the moonlight and his smell. Her hair, lighter than yours and Lily's, is pinned up elaborately; she spent two hours in the mirror this morning doing it. She didn't have to say it, but you know she hopes to run into someone who will run back to Edward and tell him about how gorgeous his future betrothed was today in the market. 

Lily slips her hand into yours, and you two trail behind Maggie - ducklings behind their mother duck. Lily had whispered to you this morning between bites of breakfast that Mother had set Maggie to watch you to make sure you didn't slip off. She couldn't catch you out at night, but she knew you were disappearing somewhere. 

She'd been creeping into the room for the past two weeks, only to find you pretending to sleep beside Lily. You'd close your eyes, and bury your face into the pillow, trying to sleep, but instead filled with thoughts of the executioner. Wondering if he was out there standing in the same spot, the waves soaking the bottom of his cloak, the ash on his mask shining in the moonlight. Wondering if he was thinking about you.

"I'm going to take Lily to the butcher; it's stupid for all three of us to go to the same place," you say, winking down at Lily. Maggie stops and sighs, heavy enough that you can see her shoulders heave. 

"Mother said for us all to go together."

"What trouble can I get into with Lily?"

You elbow Lily just before Maggie turns to level a suspicious look at the both of you. Lily speaks up for the two of you, trying to keep her face serious.

"I can keep an eye on her - no one will get into any trouble when I'm around."

Maggie rolls her eyes at the two of you, you can see her wearing down.

"Besides if we go to the butcher, then that means you can take the long way home. And pass the tailor's shop."

That gets her - Edward will be there, working with his father, and if she doesn't have to cart you and Lily around, the two of them can meet in the alley. 

"Fine. But meet me at the end of the street and don't tell Mother."

"I would never think of it."

You and Lily watch her disappear into the market vendors before the two of you turn in the opposite direction. 

"What do you want to do?" You ask, nudging Lily with your shoulder. "We have at least an hour of freedom."

"Let's go by the bakery; I want something sweet."

"Something sweet? You are the best baker in the house, all you do is eat sweet food."

The wind blows your skirts around as the two of you walk across the village, dodging loose stones and puddles. You're trying to jump from one stone to the other when Lily grabs your arm.

"Look!"

Thirty feet away from the two of you, in the middle of the street, the executioner stands. People shove themselves onto the sides of the buildings, straining to get away from him. He doesn't seem to pay anyone any mind as he walks. Lily pulls on your arm, trying to pull you to the side, away from him. But you're stuck fast to the ground; even from this distance, you can see him looking at you as he walks.

Lily whines your name, pulling harder on your arm. He gets closer, close enough that you can almost make out the wrinkles beside his eyes. His eyes catch yours - you can tell recognition sparks in them. You want to say something to him, but you know if you do, it will get back to your Mother. So you let Lily pull you away from him, closer to one of the buildings, but your eyes never leave him. 

He passes by, nearly silent for such a large man, black boots shining in the sunlight. 

"Why is he out?" Lily hisses in your ear as he passes. You pull your attention from his broad back to her.

"I'm sure he also has errands to run."

"He's so scary."

You watch as he disappears around the corner - wondering what he thought about you, about what he'd say if you stopped and spoke to him, say hello here in public. The thoughts stick with you as you and Lily duck into the bakery. You're stuck thinking about it as she bribes the young boy behind the counter to give her two sweet rolls for free, promising that she'll pay him back next time. The two of you eat them as you walk to the butcher's, honey coating your fingertips.

You watch the butcher wrap meat in brown paper, but your mind is on the executioner: on how he refused to look at you until you were dressed, how he walked you back to the edge of the village. It takes just a short walk to make it back home, Maggie waiting for you at the end of the street so that you can all walk in together. You notice the way one of the pins in her hair is gone, a single lock of hair falling.

Inside it's a commotion - the three of you come through the door to your Mother rushing past with an armful of clothes. 

"You all took your damn good time! Hurry up and go get clean for dinner. We're going to have guests tonight."

You press yourself against the wall as one of the hired girls hustles past, a tablecloth in her hand.

"Who's coming? What is this?" You inquire, as your mother shoves a dress into your arms. You try to peer at her over the royal blue material.

"Your uncle is coming to dinner, and so is Jonathan." Your heart sinks. Jonathan. A suitor hand-picked by Father for you. You've barely digested the information before your mother whirls on you, hair in disarray and fire in her eyes.

"And you will not act like a brat tonight. You are twenty years old - nearly twenty-one. Your sister will be getting married this year and I intend to announce your wedding shortly after. You will dress like a lady and act like one or so help me, I will send you to the nunnery this time. 

And you," she whirls to Lily, her chest heaving. Lily shrinks half behind you, "will behave also young lady. You and your sister will not make a fool of me tonight. Do you understand?"

The two of you nod in unison together, too scared to say anything else. Mother waves the two of you upstairs - you trip over the dress in your arms, slamming your shin into one of the stairs. You emerge at the top, cursing under your breath.

The two of you rush to your room - Lily's dress laid across the bed; you shake the one Mother shoved in your hands out, nose wrinkled. It's one of Maggie's old ones: dark blue and heavy, elaborate embroidery across the bottom. 

"I don't know how she expects me to fit into this," you mutter, throwing it across the bed. Maggie, taller than you by an entire head and more willowy, had never been able to share dresses with you.

"What do you think Uncle is coming for?" Lily asks, emerging from the neck of her dress, turning around in a silent request for you to lace her up.

"Probably to ask Father for money for another stupid business prospect, just like the last time."

You lace her dress, loosely.

"Can you tighten it up?"

"Why do you need your dress tighter? You're thirteen."

"The other girls wear theirs tighter."

Lily pouts at you, and you sigh at her.

"Come here; I'm only doing it a little tighter. When you lace mine, make sure it's loose, if I can even get it on. I'll braid your hair for you."

You re-lace her, just incrementally tighter, and redo the braids you did for her that morning, pinning them up in the back. From below, Mother is yelling to hurry up! You get dressed in a hurry, and to your surprise, the dress slips over you, but you know lacing it up will be difficult.

When your mother comes up the stairs ten minutes later, you have your hands braced against the end of the bed; Lily is pulling with all her might to try to get the back to close.

"Go wash your face, Lily," she says, brushing her away and taking the strings herself.

You know what's coming next; you breathe in, and she jerks the laces tight - you can feel the boning squeeze your ribs.

"Does it have to be this dress?" You ask as your mother pulls the strings again. You press your hands to your stomach, trying to breathe better as Mother ties the back, tucking the strings so they can't be seen.

"Jonathan likes the color blue."

"And that means I have to be packed into this like a sausage?"

Mother sighs, pushing on your shoulders so that you sit on the end of the bed. Her hands are soft in your hair as she pulls it down, and twists it back up, pinning it into place.

"You could do much worse than Jonathan. At this point, he's the only man that will have you."

"Have me? Like I'm a cow."

She sticks another pin in your hair, nearly stabbing your scalp.

"No. Like you're a woman; you can't do everything in this life alone. Besides," she tucks the last piece of hair in, "he travels. You could go with him."

Your hands smooth down the skirt of the dress, picking at a loose thread. 

"I want to travel where I want to go, not where someone is going to show me off."

Your mother's fingers are soft on your shoulders as she turns you so she can look at you.

"We don't always get what we want in life. Sometimes we just have to take what we're given. Come on. Your uncle is waiting downstairs to say hello."

She holds your hand down the stairs; at the bottom, your Uncle Henry stands - taller than your father and thinner but not nearly as imposing. He kisses you on each cheek before moving to Mother. You leave them to talk and take your place at the dining table. It's empty except for the plates already sat down. In the kitchen, you can hear the hired girl banging around. The sound grates at your nerves, and the dress itches at your back where you can't reach.

There's a knock at the door - it sounds like a funeral cannon going off. You try rearranging your face into a smile and push yourself up from your chair. You're sure you look more like you have an upset stomach. In the hallway everyone explodes into a chorus of greetings. A moment later, Jonathan walks into the dining room.

If you're being honest, he's not the worst pick that your mother and father could have chosen. He's never been rude or forward with you, and he's not horrible looking, but as he reaches you and takes your hand, all you can think about is how small they must be compared to the executioner's hands.

"Hello, Jonathan." You try to smile at him as he kisses your hand. 

"Hello, darling."

He turns just in time to miss the grimace on your face - turning to shake your father's hand when your father walks in behind him. You take your seat, waving at Lily to come sit down beside you quickly. 

Dinner passes slowly; you're barely able to eat anything from the rolling in your stomach and the way the dress presses into you. The conversation is flowery and fake - Uncle Henry laughing too loudly, Jonathan smiling to politely across the table. It sets you on edge; Lily can see it because she reaches under the table to pat your knee.

It comes to a boiling point when Uncle Henry begins to describe his new business of shipping items.

"We've got a new ship; smaller and faster than the ones usually used. It can't hold as much cargo, but it can sail routes in half the time. With just two of them we can double how much cargo we're moving out of ports."

Your mother is leaning into the conversation, no doubt to know what she's going to tell Father no to later, Father is enraptured by your uncles conversation, and Jonathan leans across the table, listening in.

"You know," Jonathan says, cutting into the conversation, "I think you'd have more success using them to ferry people. Imagine how much people would pay to get where they're going faster."

Uncle Henry points at him across the table, a grin spreading over his face.

"The boy understands."

"Of course he does," Father says, pausing to take a drink, "he's already got plans to take my daughter on a cross-oceanic trip after the wedding."

Your fingers falter on your glass, it nearly spills, red drops spattering across the table like blood.

"Excuse me?"

Everyone turns to look at you, and you get the feeling that there's a joke you haven't been let in on.

"Well," Father says, shifting awkwardly in his seat. Mother cuts her eyes at him, a look you don't miss. "We were going to discuss this later."

"Discuss what?" You ask, voice rising. "Because it seems as if the decision has been made for me."

Jonathan's gaze swivels between you and your father; you bunch the tablecloth in your hands.

"Calm down dear," Mother says, rising slightly from her seat, "we will talk about this later."

"No!" You yell, slamming your hands to the table and pushing yourself up. "We won't. Because I know how the conversation will go. I will be forced to agree. This is an ambush!"

Your cup spills, staining the table red. Everyone in the room seems to hold a collective breath. Jonathan moves to stand; you turn, knocking your chair over. Across the table, Maggie gives you a look of contempt - it's enough to push you toward the door. 

Everyone calls your name; you can hear your uncle laughing behind you. Someone's hand grabs at your wrist, but you jerk yourself away without looking to see who it is. Outside it's dark; windows are lit up with candle light and fires flickering. In the distance lightning strikes, grey clouds rolling towards you. 

You run, slipping on the grass, towards the cove. You scrape your hands, cutting one of them on a sharp rock as you scramble down. You ignore the sting, and the sound of fabric tearing. You land hard on the sand, scrambling to pull yourself upright. 

Across the cove, you see a flicker of white and a shadow ripple.

[wintrwinchestr]

kiss it better

the killer & the sound - chapter 2

summary: you’re with the band, officially. you’ve met them, rehearsed with them all of two times, and now it’s the tour’s opening night. pretty nerve-wracking, but nothing you can’t handle, right? that is, until Joel asks you last-minute to perform their suggestive hit single Kiss it Better with them, live on stage. before you know it, your teenage dreams are coming true, in more ways than one.

warnings: 18+, smut, no outbreak au, no use of y/n, rockstar!joel, aspiring rockstar!reader, d/s dynamics, pretty major daddy kink, age gap (reader is early-mid 20’s, joel is early-mid 50’s), heavy flirting, pet names (darlin’, sweetheart, baby, babygirl, etc), shy/anxious reader, a little dub-con bc reader has a couple drinks but is alert and consenting, joel refers to reader’s pussy as she/her, smoking, power imbalance & joel using it to his advantage, exhibitionism (suggestive performance onstage but no sexual activity), lapsitting, praise kink, finger sucking, tummy bulge, unprotected p in v sex, some angst, let me know if i missed any!!

word count: 11.5k (i’m sorry or you’re welcome)

a/n: thank you so much for your patience and interest in this story!! i’m sorry i took so long, but i hope you enjoy another chapter of rockstar!joel that somehow turned out longer than the first one. thank you as always to my best girl kiers i love you so much and i’m so happy our baby rockstar brought us together <3 thank you for reading, nice comments/reblogs appreciated if you enjoyed!!

series masterlist

divider by @saradika-graphics

It was only a handful of days ago that you had received the life changing invitation to open for Death’s Head on their sold out national tour. And it was only a handful of years ago that something like this was an unachievable fever dream, something you could pantomime in the shower or in the car, but still unsure if your hard work and commitment would ever pay off.

It’s been a complete whirlwind, your teenage dreams coming true in the span of less than a week. And now here you sit, shut away in your dressing room, leg bouncing up and down like a jackhammer as you add a final coat of mascara and one last sticky swipe of lip gloss. Meeting your own gaze in the vanity mirror, you fidget with your necklace, eyes wide and unblinking as you try to suppress a complete freakout.

A sudden knock on the door startles you from your daze, followed by a familiar gravelly voice asking your name. It’s Joel. You invite him in, and although you had seen him at soundcheck earlier in the day, it’s the first time you’re seeing him in the clothes he’s chosen to perform in tonight: black button-down shirt with western-style embroidery on the pockets, generously opened at the top to expose his tattooed chest. He pairs it with his signature black leather jacket, black jeans, and black boots with a pointed silver toe. He’s got various chains and metalwork adorning his ensemble, making him jingle and clink as he moves.

“Jus’ wanted to drop by before you go on, tell ya to ‘break a leg’ and everythin’...” He stands in the doorway, the thumb of one hand hooked on a belt loop while the other rests above his head against the doorframe. He looks you up and down quickly. “Look real pretty, darlin’, ‘s a nice dress.”

You look down at yourself, so flustered and not in your own head that you have to remind yourself of what you’re wearing. “Oh, th-thanks. Just bought it yesterday, got it special for tonight.”

“Certainly is special…” He muses, shutting the door behind him before taking a few long strides in your direction. “You feelin’ okay, sweetheart, feelin’ good?” He pulls up an extra chair from the corner of the room as he speaks, setting it down next to where you sit in front of your vanity. He spins it around in his grip to sit on it backwards, dark denim-clad thighs straddling the backrest of the chair. You resist the urge to stare at how his strong body stretches the material.

You opt to answer him with a lie, trying to sound as convincing as possible. “Yeah, ‘m fine.”

He drops his chin, looking at you from underneath his dark lashes. “Now why don’t I believe you? We've been over this, darlin’. Nothin’ to be scared of, yeah?” He places a large hand on your knee in an attempt to halt its incessant movement.

“‘S just a lotta people… never played in front of crowds this big before. Mostly just did a bunch of bars before now, maybe a community center or somethin’ every so often, but never a crowd bigger than a thousand. And there’s gonna be, like, ten thousand people out there.”

“Try doublin’ that.”

Your eyebrows shoot towards your hairline, and it feels like your heart just dropped into your stomach, a red hot piece of iron ore sinking into freezing water.

“Shit, shouldn’t’a said nothin’.” Joel shakes his head, pinching between his brows before lightly gripping your chin so that you stay focused on him. “Look at me. Remember our talk in the car the other day, don’tcha?” You nod your head in his grasp. “Said all about how good you are. Believe force o’ nature is the term I used, wasn’t it?” You can’t help but crack a smile at his compliment, and he returns one in the form of that canine-like grin of his. “You can do this, babygirl, yeah?”

Oh, that’s a new one. You decide you like the sound of it already, how it rolls off his tongue coated in his gravelly drawl.

You nod again in understanding, but he seems dissatisfied. “Say it back to me, sweetheart,” he instructs.

“I-I can do this,” you reply, your voice quiet, embarrassed of having to reassure yourself to his face.

“One more time, lil’ louder, like you mean it.”

You try again, attempting to infuse the sentence with a little more confidence. “I can do this.”

He seems content with your second try, and swipes at your chin before rising from his seat. “Fuck yeah, y’ can. Gonna knock ‘em dead, baby.”

He takes one last look at you before he leaves the room, and reminds you that you’re ‘Sposed to be on in fifteen, darlin’. See ya out there. He winks at you before closing the door, and then you’re alone again. Savoring your last few minutes to yourself, you decide to pace a few laps around the small room, running through a few more vocal warmups in an effort to drown out the sound of babygirl, babygirl, babygirl echoing around in your thoughts. Jesus Christ. It’s like he finds it impossible to comfort you without throwing in a little something extra to work you back up again. Though, you suppose you’d rather have your nervous energy redirected to him than to keep it focused on the endless expanse of people you’re about to be introduced to for the first time. 

What if they hate your music? What if you forget your own lyrics? What if they think you’re not good enough?

You take a guess that they’ve hit the lights in the venue now, judging by the cacophonous roar of voices that just erupted from somewhere sounding altogether too close and too far away at the same time. Too late to back out now. Not that he’d let you.

You brace your hands on the vanity counter, looking yourself in the eye one last time before you make your way to the stage. “I can do this,” you repeat the little mantra to your reflection. “I can do this, I can do this, Joel said I can do this.” A final deep breath and a tousle of your hair before you’re swinging the dressing room door open, heavy lace-up boots carrying you to the wings of the stage where your band members are already waiting to go on. It’s dark backstage, and it takes your eyes a second to adjust before they land on Joel. The accents of silver decorating his face and scattered throughout the clothing he wears catch some of the light from the stage, helping you to identify his form. You acknowledge him, but keep your feet planted where they are, flexing your hands and then clenching them into little fists as you try to peek at the audience, relishing your final moments of being a relative nobody. Your chords, your lyrics, your innermost thoughts are still only known to you and a few handfuls of others, for the next few minutes at least. Your life, your career, begins tonight, there, on that daunting and expansive stage. Angel is already out there waiting for you, beckoning to you, if only you could just push off the balls of your feet and go to her. You wish Cat were here.

A rough hand perches itself on your shoulder, and a low voice begins to speak close to your ear. “Everythin’s all set, show starts whenever you’re ready, sweetheart.”

“Okay,” you half-whisper, giving a swift nod of your head, swallowing hard and worrying your bottom lip between your teeth. His hand applies some pressure to the slope of skin between your neck and shoulder, massaging the muscle.

“Gotta relax, sweetheart, c’mon. Breathe with me. In…” He inhales deeply, and you mimic the action, holding your breath until he permits you to let it go. “And out…” 

He moves his hand to your upper back, course calluses scratching against the patch of soft skin exposed by the low back of your dress. “Gonna be back here the whole time. You start gettin’ nervous, you look at me, ‘kay?” He speaks the phrase slowly, like he’s trying not to spook a newborn animal. You suppose he’s validated in that, the way you do feel a little like a fawn about to walk out onto a frozen lake.

You turn your head to face him over your shoulder. “Okay. Um… wish me luck, I guess.”

“Don’t need it, babygirl.”

The both of you share a knowing smile once more, and it makes enough of your nerves melt away that you don’t even realize that Angel is becoming closer and clearer in your vision. Your feet had started carrying you out onto the stage before you had given them permission to, it seems, and now the embroidered luna moths are wrapped around your body. The hot lights are shining brightly in your eyes, and you’re suddenly enveloped in a dense cloud of white noise that sounds like cheering and screaming. 

You look behind you, and your band members have each taken their positions. They all give you a nod or a thumbs up, and now it’s up to you to kick off the tour’s opening night. When you turn your head toward the wings one last time, Joel is still standing where you left him, arms crossed in the darkness. He juts his chin upwards and mouths something to you, the shapes of his lips forming the phrase you can do this. You whisper the affirmative phrase back to him, the same way he had you do in your dressing room.

After you’ve introduced yourself into the mic using the steadiest voice you can muster, you shut your eyes, take a final stabilizing inhale, and then a metallic chord reverberates around the venue as you begin your set.

Instincts and muscle memory carry you most of the way through the first half of your songs. You can worry about building up your confidence and stage presence after you’ve come out the other side of this first night in one piece, you resolve. Right now, you’re just trying to work up the courage to unstick your eyes from the setlist taped to the floor in front of you. Those titles printed in bold black ink are the only familiar things you can see, and you wish someone else covered in black ink were standing in front of you for you to rest your gaze on. Someone to use his tattooed fingers and devilish grin to charm you like a snake, prevent you from curling up and hiding from him, from the tens of thousands of people who traveled and paid good money to see you. You can’t let them down, let him down. You won’t.

One of the songs toward the end of your set requires Angel to be the sole performer for the first few measures before your voice and your band come in behind her. The song starts with a repetitive, hypnotic strum pattern, one you’ve practiced hundreds of times by now. But, it’s easy to get lost in it, lose track of your place if you allow your mind to get distracted or your fingers to be on autopilot for too long. 

That’s exactly what’s happened, you realize, when the first verse starts without its igniting lyric. You come in just in time to sing the second line, hoping your voice isn’t coming out too shaky as you try to cover up your mitsake. Your face feels hot, fingers struggling to grip your guitar pick as they become sweaty with embarrassment.

You start gettin’ nervous, you look at me, he had told you, what seems like hours ago now. 

When you feel you’ve got a better handle on the song, you turn your head toward the wings to find him already looking at you. If he had noticed the slip-up, his face doesn’t let onto it, which helps to relax you. He wears a proud smile, and holds eye contact until you’re ready to let it go.

His reassuring presence allows you to finish strong, and the remainder of your set is over before you know it. When the drums and bass have faded behind you, and the remaining tones of your closing chord have dissipated into the air, you start to come back into your own body as the white noise filling your ears turns into voices. They’re cheering, whistling, screaming. You raise a hand above your brows, blocking the harsh spotlights so you can get a better look at the crowd, at the thousands of people you had been too scared to acknowledge the reality of earlier this evening. You break into a laugh, eyes becoming wet when you realize Joel was right, you could do it. You did do it. And the crowd fucking loves you. 

Unable to contain your elation, you step back from your mic to do a little spin in place, strumming out some final nonsense chords with your nose all scrunched up as the skirt of your dress flutters around you. You take a bashful bow and wave to the crowd, your cheeks burning with the stretch of your smile. Stepping forward again, your voice echoes around the venue as you extend some final “thank you”s to your incredible audience, reminding them of your name one last time before skipping offstage, your band following close behind. 

Although your vision is still recovering from the blinding lights, you don’t find Joel in your quick scan of the dark backstage area, and you figure he must be doing some last-minute warm ups or pre-show rituals with the rest of Death’s Head. You share a quick celebration with your bandmates, and then head your separate ways for the night, realizing when you go to change your clothes in your dressing room that you’ve still got Angel draped across your body. It’s going to take a few shows to get used to leaving her onstage for a roadie to pack up for you, you suppose. It’s difficult to remember that you’re not the only one taking care of yourself anymore. But if this was what the rest of your life was going to be like, what your years of hard work and trying and failing and rejection and acceptance had gotten you, you could certainly learn to get used to it.

For now, you detach yourself from Angel and lay her down gently on the couch in your dressing room, setting a mental reminder to find a stagehand later to surrender her to. You know it’s strange to feel such fondness toward an instrument, but she’s like a close friend to you now, a partner. “We did it,” you say to her quietly, smiling to yourself.

Your sentimental little moment is interrupted by another knock at the door.

“You in there, darlin’?” Joel calls from the other side of the wall.

“Oh, yeah! You can come in,” you permit, and he pushes the door open as you turn to him. “What’re you still doin’ back here?”

He scoffs and makes a face in mock disgust. “Damn, could act a lil’ happy to see me.”

“Sorry,” you giggle as he steps fully inside the room, shutting the door behind him. For a beat, you just stand facing each other in silence. You bounce on your heels and fiddle with the hem of your dress, waiting for him to say something.

“Fuckin’ incredible out there, babygirl. ‘Bout knocked me on my ass, I swear.” He steps closer to you, taking your face in both of his large hands. It makes your breath hitch, your eyes widening as they look into his. “Goddamn superstar, you are. They fuckin’ loved you.”

You break into a grin, swollen cheeks pushing into his calloused fingers. “Thank you… Took me a while to get it going, slipped up a little towards the end, but it was fun. Can’t believe I did it.”

“Well shit, I can. You should be proud of yourself, baby.”

“I am.”

“Good.” He studies your face for a moment, and for a split second, you think he might kiss you, and that you might want him to. You try to knock the thought from your head swiftly, and he drops his hands from your face as you do.

“So listen, came back here to ask you somethin’ actually. I know it’s pretty short notice and all, but the guys and I were wonderin’ if you’d wanna come back out and open our set with us.”

Your lips part in surprise, blinking quickly as you process his request. “Oh, um… That’d be really cool, but–”

“But what? C’mon, sweetheart, they loved you. They’ll go crazy for it.” He almost sounds like he’s getting impatient, the way he cuts you off. 

You try to justify your hesitation, hoping he’ll understand. “We just didn’t rehearse it together, I don’t really know the chords–” He interrupts you again. “Don’t matter, we’re changin’ the opener, anyway. Gonna play Kiss it Better instead. Gotta know that one, right? Since you’re such a huge fan and all.”

He’s caught you, and he knows it. Of course you’re familiar with Death’s Head’s biggest hit. When you first fell in love with their music, it was one of the first songs you taught yourself to play. He had probably heard you absentmindedly plucking out the chorus during your soundcheck. You know you can’t lie to him now.

You take a moment to consider, then nod. “Okay, yeah. I’ll do it.”

The stern look on his face melts into one of smug satisfaction. “Good girl. Now c’mon.”

You lean over to grab Angel from the couch, but Joel stops you with a hand on your arm. “Won’t need her.”

You pause, turning your head to look at him with your brows furrowed. “I won’t?”

“Thought you just said you knew the song, baby. You forget how it starts?”

Oh.

He wants you to perform that part of the song with him. You wish you had remembered how the intro goes before agreeing to go back out there.

Shit.

Joel jerks his head toward the hallway with a “c’mon”, and you follow him out of your dressing room and back to the side of the stage. The rest of Death’s Head is already waiting, looking exasperated by Joel’s tardy appearance. Tommy gives you a double take, a brief look of confusion washing over his face before adjusting his expression to offer you a friendly smile instead. He and Joel exchange a few hushed words, and it doesn’t take much for you to gather that the guys weren’t in on this at all. This last minute switch up had all been Joel’s idea.

When the brothers are done speaking, Tommy nods in understanding, then passes the change in plans along to Eugene and Jesse. Joel must hear the erratic metallic scrape of your crucifix dragging across its silver chain as you fidget with it, and he turns his attention to the thousand yard stare you’re wearing.

He nudges one of your shoulders with his own to jostle you back to reality. “Where’d my confident girl go, hm?”

“Nowhere. Just… wasn’t really prepared to do this.”

“Just follow my lead, sweetheart. It’ll be good, promise.”

You nod, blinking rapidly, trying to focus on his face in the dark.

“You ready?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

Joel grins down at you in satisfaction, then turns to face the band. “Whaddya say we get this show on the road then, boys?”

Tommy claps him on the back with a “Let’s do it, brother,” and then Joel is taking your hand in one of his big paws, leading you back out onto the stage you thought you’d already seen the last of.

An explosion of screams and cheers even louder than the one you’d received nearly knocks you over where you stand next to Joel, unsure of what to do with yourself while you await his instruction. He lets go of you briefly to pick up his guitar and situate the strap across his broad chest, then replaces his hand against the small of your back. It feels a little grounding, reassuring, and prevents you from being consumed by too many questions of what the fuck you’re doing out here. You’re pleasing him, that’s what. Not letting him down, right? Doing what he asks, because you’d do anything he asks, and he knows that.

He introduces himself and the band to the crowd, not that they need reminding of who they shelled out a couple hundred each to see tonight, and then you realize he’s talking about you.

“Remember her? Beautiful, ain’t she? Hell of a performer, too,” he speaks into his mic. You turn to smile at Joel while the sea of voices threatens to swallow you up, and the way he’s looking back at you is doing much the same. His expression is hungry, almost, and it reminds you of what it is you’re about to do.

He turns to face the crowd again. “Y’all seemed to like her so much, thought she could be my lil’ helper for our first song this evenin’. That alright with y’all?” Another ground-shaking response from the audience, and he leans closer into the mic to huff a laugh and say, “Thought so.”

Joel covers the head of the device with his hand, so that he’s only speaking to you now. “C’mere, sweetheart. Stand in front o’ me.” His other hand tightens against your lower back, moving you to where he wants you. “Want you to kneel for me now, baby.” He moves his hand up to your shoulder, applying downward pressure and helping you sink to the floor. Your eyes are doe-like and sparkling as you look up at him, heart pounding and breath quickening as you settle at his feet. The sound of your own blood rushing through your skull almost drowns out the fit of ecstasy erupting behind you, the band’s most loyal fans already knowing where this is going. And so do you.

Joel removes the mic from its stand, holding it to his lips and speaking a final “You know what I wanna hear, go ahead, now,” before lowering it to your mouth, his hand now level with the growing bulge in his jeans. The other one begins to strum a steady rhythm against steel strings, building up to the crescendo into the crash of the song’s first verse.

You hesitate, opening and closing your mouth once as you reach a wavering hand towards the microphone. Joel shakes his head in disapproval, and his lips form shapes that look like “hands to yourself”. He smirks down at you when you quickly snatch your hand away, pleased with your obedience. His silver brow piercing catches the light when he jerks his chin upward, the bright lights making his eyes appear to flash like a cat as he encourages you to speak.

“Please…” you squeak out, your voice providing the queue for Tommy’s thrumming bassline to come in.

Joel swings the mic back up to his mouth to speak into it once more, initiating this depraved little game of give and take. “Please, who?” he challenges, and then it’s your turn again.

You swallow, knowing what he wants to hear. “Please… Please Da– Daddy…” The title catches in your throat, this being the first time you’ve ever spoken it aloud the way you’ve always fantasized about. What a debauched sight you must be, pretty young thing on her knees for her teenage rock idol, calling him Daddy in front of thousands and thousands of strangers. If only your mother could see you now.

A kick drum comes to life somewhere behind Joel’s towering form. It vibrates your already sore knees, the feeling traveling to the apex of your thighs. “Tha’s it. Now please, what? Use your fuckin’ words, baby.” His demanding tone prompts a soft whimper to escape your lips, and you shift on your heels. His eyes flick down to where the hem of your dress just barely conceals your panties, licking his lips before focusing on your face again.

“Please kiss it better, Daddy,” you plead, and a warm, fluttery sensation begins to wash over you. Your eyelids feel a little heavier, your brain feels a little cloudy, and he knocks the underside of your chin with the mic once to bring you back to him.

“Hm, I dunno… Still think you can beg a lil’ prettier than that. Try one more time for Daddy...” He flashes his canines as he watches your hips rock back and forth, unsure if you even know how your body is reacting to him. He’s got you exactly where he wants you now, making a mess of yourself for him, shedding the skin of that shy little girl he first met not so long ago. 

“Mmh, please, Daddy, need you to kiss it better, please…” Your voice sounds fucking wrecked, and you almost don’t recognize it as your own. It takes you a second or two to realize that Jesse’s guitar has joined in over top of the drums, and you know your little performance is over now.

Joel steals the mic from your panting mouth for a final time, slotting it back into its stand. With lips pressed against the device, he growls, “A’right, good girl, tha’s enough, baby,” and his shrieking guitar resounds all around you as your reward. 

You stay kneeling for the remainder of the song, recovering from the whiplash of sinking into such a soft, unfamiliar headspace for the first time only to have nothing come of it. Attempting to recenter and distract yourself, you study Joel’s fingers up close as he plays, trying not to think too hard about those gothic letters adorning his knuckles. It’s no use, of course it is, and you shift around on your sore knees as the memory of that title leaving your lips, being commanded of you by him, replays itself like a skipping record. You’re a little ashamed at the feeling of how soaked your panties are, only being made worse when you chance a look up at Joel to find him already staring down at you, singing the suggestive lyrics of the song to you.

The final chords ring out a few minutes later, and then he’s reaching an inked hand down for you to take. You use it as leverage to push yourself back up to your feet on shaky legs, and you attempt to smooth out the bottom of your dress while Joel maneuvers you to face the crowd again.

“What a performance, huh? God damn,” he praises, making your cheeks burn as he drinks you in again. “‘S all I need from you for now, sweetheart, catch up with you later, yeah?” 

You nod, doing an uncoordinated little curtsy toward the roaring crowd, cheering voices peppered with a few lewd-sounding whistles and hollers. “A’right, you run along, beautiful thing,” and he sends you offstage with a wink and what seemed like an unspoken promise for more, later.

–

Earlier in the day, you had been looking forward to watching the band from the wings after you were done performing, realizing how cool it was going to be that your first time seeing them live would be from somewhere even better than the front row. You can’t even bear the thought of that now.

You make a beeline from the stage to your dressing room, searching frantically for the lighter and pack of cigarettes in your bag. God damn, you need a fucking smoke right now, and some fresh air. It’s like striking gold when you find them buried underneath receipts and gum wrappers and makeup, guarding them with your life as you head out the venue’s back door.

You let it slam behind you as you press your exposed back up against the cold exterior wall, shaky fingers trying desperately to flick the lighter on and ignite the cigarette between your lips. Closing your eyes for a moment, you take a deep inhale of smoke, letting the cool night air wash over your heated skin. It’s impossible to escape him entirely, even all the way on the other side of the amphitheater, his muffled timbre still audible as the breeze carries it across the dark sky. You let your gaze rest on nothing in particular as you puff through your cigarette, trying to process what the hell just happened out there.

The problem isn’t so much what you did, it’s that you liked it, the evidence of which is still smeared along your aching cunt and between your thighs. The light wind flutters the skirt of your dress, and the sensation on the cooling moisture at your core sends a shiver up your spine, igniting goosebumps all along your exposed skin.

When your cigarette is almost burned down to a nub, you’re tempted to put it out on your arm, just to see if the burn might wake you up from whatever insane erotic dream you seem to be having.

‘S all I need from you for now, sweetheart, catch up with you later, yeah?

For now. Catch up with you later.

You’re sure he meant nothing by it, the “catching up” most likely referring to a conversation where he tells you not to look too far into what happened tonight, that it was just a performance, all a part of his act. You had played your part, it was a one time, spur-of-the-moment thing, and now you navigate the rest of the tour pretending it never happened.

You toss the smoldering butt of your smoke onto the pavement, stomping it out before heading back inside, the majority of your racing thoughts now slowed by a dense cloud of tobacco. You feel a little more stable than you did twenty or so minutes ago, letting your heavy boots lead you to the venue’s green room. You plant yourself on one of the large couches upholstered in tacky paisley fabric, preparing yourself for the awkward but professional talk you’re bound to have with Joel once the show is over.

Eyeing the bar cart in the corner of the room, you decide to get up and pour yourself a drink to pass the time. You don’t typically go for brown liquor, but it’s what’s in front of you, likely at the band’s request. Joel certainly strikes you as a whiskey kind of guy, at least. You hope he won’t mind if you help yourself to some of his share, pouring a finger into a short glass with ice and filling the rest with half a can of Coke from the ice bucket on the cart.

There’s a small, square television in the room, which you notice is playing a live feed of what’s happening on stage. You spot its accompanying remote on the lacquered coffee table in front of you, and grab it to turn the volume up as you begin to sip on your drink. 

It’s not the most high-definition feed you’ve ever seen, and you can tell the television is a few years outdated. But it’s good enough for you to use to pass the rest of the time. You could woman-up and just watch from the side of the stage like you had planned on, but it’s nice to have this little room to yourself for now. The combination of watching Joel through the shabby screen and the sagging couch you’re practically sinking into reminds you of home, in a way, of the first time you’d ever seen his face aside from album covers and posters ripped from magazines. It’s still hard to believe you’ve met him now, performed with him, been on your knees for him. The memory makes you squirm uncomfortably, both from arousal and humiliation. 

You allow your focus to be shifted to the small pile of Rolling Stone copies on the coffee table instead of your little performance, and flip through the pages while the crackling sound of the rest of Death’s Head’s set plays in the background. You’d always had a knack for finding ways to keep yourself distracted, and you’re thankful for that skill now.

After another hour or so, your attention is pulled back to the television when you hear the words “thank you” and “goodnight” in the mix of what Joel is shouting to the crowd, and you realize the show must be over now. A glance at the clock on the wall lets you know it’s almost eleven thirty, and a yawn takes over the muscles of your jaw on instinct. Between all you’ve been through tonight and what ended up being two Jack and Cokes, you’re looking forward to finally changing out of your clothes and tucking yourself into your tour bus bed. You hope it’s at least somewhat comfortable, having not had a chance to lie down on it yet. 

But before you can succumb to the temptation of sleep, you have to catch up with Joel first. You’ve already gone over what he might say to you a dozen times in your head, prepared for any and all possibilities when he pulls you aside tonight to set the record straight between the two of you. 

The stage is dark and empty now on the square little screen, the sound of screams and applause replaced by baritone laughter and heavy footfalls approaching the green room door. When Joel pushes inside with the other men in tow, you sit up a little straighter and offer him a friendly smile as he heads straight for the bar cart. You were right in your assumption of his alcohol preferences, watching as he pours himself a generous glass of the same whiskey now working its way through your bloodstream.

“You stealin’ some of my good liquor, darlin’?” he jokes, noticing that the cap on the bottle had already been unscrewed and spotting the glass on the table in front of you.  

“Yeah, sorry, was hoping you wouldn’t mind.”

“Nah, ‘s fine by me. Want me to top off your glass?” He asks as Tommy relaxes into the other end of the couch you’re perched on. Jesse and Eugene sit down together in a creaking loveseat to your left, already engaged in a conversation of their own.

“I’ve already had two, I probably shouldn’t–” you protest.

Joel interrupts you, reaching a hand out and making a grabbing gesture towards your quarter-full drink. “We’re celebratin’, baby. C’mon, hand it over.”

You oblige, surrendering your glass, and it becomes more and more true with each interaction with Joel that he really doesn’t ever take ‘no’ for an answer. At first, you had thought Tommy’s warning was because Joel was just stubborn, which does seem to be the case. But he doesn’t have to argue much to get his way, he gets it just because his charm and demeanor warrant it. It’s like he cast a spell on you the moment you first met him, and now you can’t help but to say ‘yes’ to whatever he asks of you, even if it might be against your better judgment. 

Joel hands your glass back to you, a little more Jack and a little less Coke than you would’ve poured for yourself, but you only have to sip on it long enough to get through the “catching up”. Maybe the extra helping will make the whole thing a little easier, anyway. Joel plants himself on the black leather chair across from the couch you’re sitting on, groaning as he spreads his legs and relaxes his forearms on top of the chair’s wide armrests. There’s a lamp that sits in the corner of the room, and the warm glow illuminates the back of his head of curls, still damp and sticking in odd directions from the sweat he worked up while performing. The slight golden halo almost makes him look like a king sat atop his throne. 

He catches you staring, studying him, and his lips tug into a smirk. He chooses not to taunt you about it, instead turning his attention to Tommy to talk about the show. That’s what you assume they’re talking about, at least. You feel a little awkward, out of place among the group of men, and your eyelids are getting heavier with each passing minute despite their gruff voices and sharp bursts of laughter. You let yourself shrink into the couch's worn fabric, swirling your glass around and taking an occasional sip just to look like you’re doing something. You’re half tempted to reread one of the magazines you had already looked through.

Eventually, after each of the men have gotten a drink or two in them, Tommy is the first to rise from his seat. You had been playing with the lace hem of your dress, tracing the patterns with your finger, so engrossed in it you had almost forgotten you were sharing the couch with him.

“Well, you ready to head out, boys? Keep the party goin’ a lil’ bit longer?” he proposes. “You’re welcome to come too, sweetheart, if you wanna. Just not sure it’d be your kinda scene,” he adds, turning to you.

“Oh, it’s okay, I’ll probably just head to bed soon. Thank you for offering, though.”

Tommy smiles at you and nods in understanding. Jesse and Eugene accept his invitation, and then there’s only one member of Death’s Head whose plans you’re unsure of. “You comin’, brother?” Tommy asks him.

“Nah, I’ll stay here. Make sure our special guest gets to her bus alright ‘n all.”

“Good idea... Well, see y’all later, then. You were great tonight, darlin’, by the way,” Tommy compliments, and you smile politely as you thank him.

The three men leave the room, closing the door behind them, and now you’re alone with Joel again. It’s mostly silent, save for the squeak of the leather and light jingling of metal chains when he decides to get up from his chair, replacing Tommy in the empty spot beside you on the couch. He crosses one leg over the other, resting a calf atop the opposite thick thigh. You can feel his gaze on you as he stretches his arms across the back of the couch, not quite sitting close enough to you for his arm to reach across your shoulders. You fidget with your fingernails, avoiding acknowledging his presence until you have to. Please just get it over with.

“Said it once, said it a million times, but you really were amazin’ out there tonight. Appreciate you bein’ so willin’ to do that for me last minute.”

“Oh, um… yeah. I mean, the crowd seemed to like it, so–”

“And how’d you like it?”

His question takes you by surprise, and it finally makes you turn your head to look at him. Why does it matter if you liked it or not? You’re sure nothing like it will ever happen again as far as you’re concerned, as far as you’re sure he’s concerned.

“How’d I like what…?” You question, just to make sure he’s asking you what it seems like he is.

“You know exactly what I’m talkin’ about, sweetheart,” he speaks lowly, those carnivorous eyes of his scanning over your body, coming to rest on where white lace just barely conceals the tops of your thighs.

“Oh… I, um… I liked it, I guess,” you admit sheepishly.

“‘S okay if you did, I could tell.”

And there he goes again, always being fucking right about you. You should know by now that there’s no use in trying to skirt around the truth with him.

You continue to try, anyway. “I just haven’t really done something like that before, wasn’t sure if I was doing a good job.”

“Did a perfect job, babygirl. Looked so pretty on your knees for me, sounded so sweet when you were beggin’ for Daddy.”

Oh. 

You aren’t sure what you were expecting him to say next, but it certainly wasn’t that. The room starts to spin a little, either from the alcohol still floating through your veins or from the sharp turn your catching up has taken, you can’t say for certain. Joel huffs lightly through his nose, and you think he must have noticed your breath catch in your throat and the shift of your hips in response to his filthy compliment, punctuated by the title he used so casually. 

“C’mere, sweet thing. Sittin’ so far away, you scared o’ me or somethin’?” He teases.

“N-no…”

“Didn’t think so. Now don’t make me ask again, sweetheart.” He pats the empty cushion beside him as he speaks, brows raised at you expectantly.

You obey, of course you do, and your heart hammers against your ribcage as you slide closer to his side of the couch. Your eyelids start to flutter against their own volition, and that candy-sweet, far away feeling from earlier on stage begins to make its second appearance of the night.

“Good girl… So beautiful, baby, you know that?” he praises softly, tucking a stray lock of hair behind your ear before lightly rubbing his thumb across your pouty bottom lip. He presses it downward against the pillowy skin, and pushes the digit inside with ease when your mouth parts for him so eagerly. You close your lips around him and swirl your tongue along the calloused skin a few times, and he looks like he wants to eat you alive as he watches you fall apart for him so easily.

Joel pulls his thumb from your mouth, dragging it down your spit-slick lip so that it bounces back into place when his finger leaves your skin. He wears a satisfied grin at the way he has you completely at his mercy now, looking up at him with your glazed-over doll eyes. They scan back and forth between his glowing amber ones, awaiting your next direction.

“Gave you a compliment. What do you say, babygirl, hm?”

“Thank you, Da– unh…” The word starts to come out before you can catch it in time, shove it back into his cage. Your face runs hot immediately at your slip-up.

“‘S okay, sweetheart. You can call me that, if you wanna, say it real pretty for me. Don’t got it tattooed on me for nothin’,” Joel soothes, still-wet thumb rubbing across your cheekbone in placating strokes. “C’mon, finish your sentence, baby.”

“Th– thank you, Daddy,” you repeat, so lost in this saccharine headspace he’s coaxed out of you that you can’t even feel ashamed anymore.

“There we go, good girl… Y’know why I got that special word tattooed on me, hm?” He asks, already knowing you’re too far gone to come up with an answer. But it’s fun to watch those little gears behind your eyes struggle to turn. If you did ever know the reason, it’s long gone now. You shake your head, humming an mm-mm.

“Figured if it was part of the song that made me famous, might as well own it. Don’t you think, sweet girl? Think it belongs to me, that it should always be there to remind you who I am?”

You manage a weak sounding noise and nod in response, cheek brushing up and down against the skin of his palm.

“And who am I, sweetheart? Wanna hear you say it again…”

“D-Daddy…”

He smirks, enjoying how quickly he’s been able to reduce you into nothing more than a wet, pliant puddle of a girl. “Yeah, tha’s right… c’mere, baby. Lemme feel you.” He uncrosses his legs, returning them to their trademark spread so that he can pull you into his lap and situate you into straddling his hips. The position makes your dress ride up so far that your panties are exposed to him now, soaked-through gusset and all. His fingers make to tease the wet spot there, but change course to pay attention to something else first instead. Something scrawled in uneven black linework, peeking out from underneath your dress’ hemline. He pushes the fabric further up your bare thigh to fully unveil the shoddy little illustration, tracing around it with a roughened finger.

“Wha’s this, sweetheart, hm? This for me?” He prompts, hooking a knuckle of the opposite hand into the little dip in your chin, guiding your head downward to look at his discovery. A death’s-head hawkmoth, bearing a striking resemblance to the band’s logo, with its scribbled wings made of bleeding ink spread out across your skin.

You hum in confirmation, not trusting your own voice anymore. He squeezes at the plush skin of your upper thigh, massaging around the tattoo. A faint growl rumbles from deep in his chest. “Tha’s cute, babygirl. ‘S real cute.”

“Th-thank you,” you return, politely accepting his compliment the way he likes you to. 

His large hand migrates from the moth to your dampened core, nudging at your clothed clit with a tattooed knuckle. “All this for me too?” 

You’re so sensitive there, his touch sending a shock through your nervous system that makes your hips rock into his hand. You nod, your affirming noise sounding more like a whimper. He pinches the swollen nub between two knuckles, and you let out a pained little yelp. “Yeah?” he taunts. 

“Yeah, yes, Daddy,” you squeak out, so fucking gone for him already as his other hand guides your hips to move along his covered crotch. Even through his tight jeans, you can feel how hard he is, his cock straining against the thick material.

“Fuck, need to feel this lil’ pussy, baby. You gonna let me?”

“Uh huh, please,” you whine, ready for him to see you, touch you however he wants right here on the worn-down couch cushions. You’ve never felt anything quite like the hazy little cloud he’s got you floating in, shyness and inhibitions suddenly gone, replaced with unabashed submission.

Joel glances at the watch on his wrist, then over your shoulder to the door you’ve got your back to as you continue to unconsciously roll your hips in his lap. 

“Reckon someone’ll be back here pretty soon to clean up for the night, don’t want no one walkin’ in on what I’m about to do to you, do we?” You barely register what he’s saying, making some unintelligible sound in response as you fight to keep your eyes open. “Well, maybe you do… Had you whimperin’ and whinin’ for me in front of all those people pretty quick, didn’t I? Hardly even put up a fight, just wanna be good for me so bad, don’t you sweetheart?”

“Yes, Daddy, wanna be good.” Another wave of wetness seeps from your aching core, staining your panties a shade darker and making the fabric adhere to the shape of your swollen pussy.

“Yeah, fuck, know you do. Hang onto me babygirl, gonna take this somewhere else, let you prove it to me.” He stands up as he speaks, and you wrap your limbs around him as he carries you out the back door of the venue and onto the Death’s Head tour bus.

When he steps onto it with you clutched tightly against him, you can see the bus is spacious enough to have a bedroom in the back, which of course gets to belong to Joel for the next several weeks as opposed to a cramped bunk. You’re not sure there’s ever been a time in his life when he hasn’t gotten exactly what he wants, what he deserves, it seems, and tonight is no exception.

He tosses you onto the bed, and you don’t even have time to unlace your boots before he’s gripping your ankles and yanking you down toward the edge of the mattress. The movement hikes up your dress all the way up to your tummy, and you attempt to pull it back over yourself before his hands are replacing yours on the hem. “Nuh uh, way past that, sweetheart. Off,” he orders, and helps you sit up enough to shimmy it over your head and discard it onto the floor. “Get these off too.” His fingers hook into the waistband of your underwear, and you lift your hips to help him rid you of the ruined fabric. “Now lay down, baby, spread ‘em. Lemme see her.”

You pull your knees in towards you, and Joel places two rough hands on your inner thighs, pushing them apart to slowly reveal your glistening cunt to him as he crouches down to face her. “Oh, she’s pretty, ain’t she?” He marvels, collecting the slick pooling at your entrance with a calloused thumb and using it to circle your sensitive clit. All you can do is whine and let him play with you, so entirely blissed out that you can’t be sure if any of this is real. “Knew you’d have such a pretty lil’ cunt like this.” The sensation of his warm breath ghosting against your sensitive bud combined with his touch and his praise makes you squirm, shifting your hips into his hand and silently begging for more. He uses his thumb to tease your dripping entrance a few times, and laughs when it makes you whine a little louder, a little more pathetic-sounding, before abandoning it to pay attention to your clit again.

“What’re you makin’ all those pretty sounds for, sweetheart, hm? She feelin’ empty, ‘s that it?” He goads, fingers leaving your core entirely as he stands up to finally free his cock from his jeans, hard and angry and leaking. He taps the head against your hole, enjoying the sight of it constricting around nothing. “This what you want, baby? Need me to fuck you full?”

“Unh, uh huh,” you cry, still desperately bucking toward what he’s so close to giving you. 

“Might be a lil’ selfish of me, but I think I wanna hear you beg for it again. Just sounded so sweet tonight, can’t help if I wanna hear it some more... Look at me,” he barks, and you hadn’t realized your eyes were closed until he demanded you to open them. He towers over you, sliding a thick hand up and down his shaft, the wet sound of it making you salivate. “You want this cock?”

“Yeah, yes, Daddy, please…”

“Please, what?”

“P-please gimme your c-cock, Daddy, please… Please f-fuck me.” It almost sounds like you’re crying, the way you’re hiccuping and sobbing through your words, one slurring into the next as you beg him.

“So fuckin’ eager, Christ. Such a good girl for me,” he praises, moving to line himself up with where you’re aching for him the most. You’re probably dripping onto his nice sheets, so soaked that he’ll barely have to put in any effort to fully slip inside you. “I’ll give it to ya, babygirl, fuck. So goddamn desperate.”

You prop yourself up on your elbows to get a better look at him before he spears into you, and you let out an involuntary little mewl at how big his cock is. You only have the one experience to go off of for comparison, but Joel is fucking huge. He’s thick and long, with a blushing mushroom tip and a prominent vein running down the length of him. Your reaction to him makes him refocus on your face, noticing how wide your eyes are as you take him in.

“Can’t promise I’m gonna be gentle, don’t got it in me. Say somethin’ if you can’t handle it, I’ll put your pretty mouth to use instead, ‘kay?”

“O-okay,” you promise, continuing to watch as he begins to push inside with a groan, just the tip at first, until he quickly loses his patience and sheaths the rest of himself inside you.

“Tight lil’ cunt, suckin’ me in already, sweetheart. So fuckin’ good…” He releases a strained breath once he bottoms out, and you swear that swollen tip of his is kissing your fucking cervix. You feel so full, letting out a debauched sound as you adjust to the burn and stretch of him. He lets himself sit inside you for just a second before he slides out almost completely, growling again when he pushes back inside.

“Oh fuck, look at that,” he muses, trailing a hand from your entrance to the expanse of skin just under your belly button. His touch tickles, making you shiver, and you direct your attention from where the two of you meet to whatever it is he’s suddenly become fascinated with. “So big inside you, huh? Tummy’s tryin’ to push me out, can’t hardly take it, Christ… You’re gonna, though, huh sweet girl? Gonna take it for me?”

“Y-yes, Daddy…” you cry.

“Yeah, y’ are, good girl,” Joel says through gritted teeth, and you let your back fall flat against the bed once more as he quickens his pace, rough hands gripped onto the underside of your thighs as he pistons in and out of you. Each slap, slap, slap of skin on skin is accompanied by obscene wet squelching, the sounds becoming more distant in your ears as you let yourself drift away into some dreamy, filthy space. God, you almost wish that stupid bartender you unfortunately gave your virginity to were here to take notes on how to actually fuck a girl. Joel’s got a dirty mouth, and he knows exactly how to use it to push and pull you, mold you into exactly what he wants you to be, at least for tonight. And you’re more than willing to give in.

You’re not sure how much time has passed before you feel a thumb and fingers squeezing either side of your face, forcing your lips into a pout as he jostles your head to bring you back to reality. When your fluttering eyes finally focus on Joel’s face hovering over yours, you can see that his lips are moving, teeth bared as he speaks. He’s looking at you expectantly, his pierced brow twitching into an arch, and you assume he must have asked you a question.

“Hm?” You mumble, and he gives your jaw another little shake.

“Asked you if it feels good, sweetheart. Tell me it feels fuckin’ good, need to hear it, babygirl. C’mon,” he spits through gritted teeth, that rockstar ego of his taking over in its need to be aroused. He punctuates his request with a particularly sharp thrust, one that makes you yelp.

“F-feels… feels good, Daddy. Feel so… so– unh,” you cry out, unable to finish your string of nonsense reassurance, the jumbled mess of sounds only spurring him on to fuck into you even harder. He returns his thumb to your clit, using your slick to rub quick circles around it. It’s all too much, too fast, too hard, too big, but it’s just the right amount of overstimulation to launch you to the edge of your orgasm. You can feel yourself constrict around him, abdominal muscles contracting as you shut your eyes so tight you start seeing stars.

“Oh fuck, gonna come for me, baby? Gonna soak my fuckin’ cock, huh? C’mon, pretty girl, come for me, can feel you chokin’ me.” All it takes is a few more rubs around your aching clit, a few more of his filthy words, few more stuttering pulses of his cock inside your walls so deep and powerful you know you’ll be sore tomorrow, and then you’re howling, spasming on the sheets as he groans above you. Fireworks are exploding on the backs of your eyelids, so vivid you swear you can really hear them. The imaginary booms muffle Joel’s voice as he floods you with his come only a moment later, grumbling good girl, such a good fuckin’ girl, so god damn perfect. 

Falling forward to brace his hands on either side of your head, he stays inside you for a couple of minutes, still rock hard as his cock finishes out its last few shudders. He pulls out all too soon, and you let out an involuntary little whine as soon as he does, your subconscious’ way of protesting the loss.

“I know, babygirl, I know. She misses me already, don’t she?” he placates, thumbing some of his spend still dripping from your fucked out hole and smearing it around your pussy. Not to provide any more pleasure, just to play with you, enjoying the sight of what he did to you. “Did so well for me, sweetheart.”

As you half-whisper a “thank you, Daddy,” you hear what sounds like the bus door open and close, followed by boisterous laughter and clumsy footsteps getting louder and closer. You’re quickly snapped back to the reality of your situation, and panic begins to set in when you fully realize where you are and what you’ve just done, and with who. You’d been so lost in arousal and pleasure you’d lost track of how much time had passed. Joel hears them too, and notices the fear in your expression as he sucks his finger clean from your shared release.

“Oh, shit... It’s fine, sweetheart, it’s okay. Listen to me.” You lock your eyes onto his, your brows knit together in worry as you push yourself up to a more alert sitting position. “Just stay put, alright? You can… just sleep here tonight, I guess. Not gonna sneak you out like a fuckin’ teenager.”

“Okay,” you reply, wrapping your arms around your body as you start to shiver. For some reason, you feel the need to apologize. 

He looks around the room, quickly shoving himself back into his jeans and running his hands through his damp hair. He reaches into a still half-packed suitcase and tosses you one of his t-shirts, black with a fading whiskey brand logo printed across the chest. “Here, uh… put this on. I’ll bring you somethin’ to clean up with, just try to relax.” 

You make quick work of slipping it over your head, enjoying the comforting feeling of the soft cotton on your skin, providing some warmth on your chilled skin as its thin layer of perspiration begins to dry.

Joel slips out of the bedroom in the second that the dark fabric covers your eyes, closing the door behind him. You can hear the men’s voices erupt at the sight of him, greetings coated in their slowly dissipating inebriation. Thankfully, it doesn’t sound like they’re asking him any questions, mostly just laughing at themselves as they talk over each other, struggling to recount some apparently hilarious story from earlier in the evening. From the sounds of it, you just had to be there, you guess. Tommy says something to Joel of a similar effect, and then the commotion seems to quiet down as they each collapse onto their bunks.

The bedroom door opens again a minute later, and you lean back where you sit in an attempt to duck out of the sight of the other band members.

He lets out a light chuckle at your stealthy movement. “They ain’t gonna see ya, darlin’. Wouldn’t remember it tomorrow even if they did. Here, brought you these–” He sets a glass of water down onto a nightstand with one hand, the other occupied with a damp washcloth. You extend your arm to take it from him, and he tuts. “I don’t think so, sweetheart. Lemme do it. Lay down again, like I had ya before.”

You obey him wordlessly, resuming the same position he had just fucked you in a few minutes prior. His touch is much softer, gentler this time, as he uses the warm cloth to pet at your still-sensitive pussy, cleaning her of your shared fluids. It’s such a striking difference, the two sides of him you’ve seen tonight, and you’re surprised when he completes the task without so much as a suggestive praise or filthy remark. It makes you start to think that he might actually care about you, that maybe he could see you as something more than a plaything, something fun to tease. But he makes it so goddamn difficult to tell for sure. 

“There we are, she’s all cleaned up.” He discards the cloth into a pile of laundry, then bends down to retrieve something else from his suitcase. “Why don’t you cover up with these tonight, too. Since the pair you came in here with is a lil’... outta commission, for the time bein’.” 

You gather that he’s referring to your panties, how they wouldn’t be very comfortable to put back on again, what with how they’re still soaked through with your arousal. He seems to smile at the notion of that being his doing.

“Lift up,” he commands softly, and you raise your feet off the bed, still laid flat on your back with your knees bent. He slides a clean pair of his briefs up your legs, situating them around your waist, before applying light pressure to the tops of your feet to help you lower them once more.

“Alright… Just, uh, make yourself comfortable, then,” he says, laughing quietly when a yawn overtakes your face before he can even finish his sentence. “Think I’m gonna rinse off quick, so… ‘night, I guess.”

“Okay, yeah. ‘Night, Joel,” you reply, and he offers a quick nod as he slips out the bedroom door again. You infer that he’s expecting you to fall asleep before he comes back, which is fine, you suppose. You’re not sure you could force yourself to stay awake much longer to wait for him, anyway. Reaching over to the glass on the nightstand to take a few sips of the water he brought you, you let your mind wander to what he could be thinking right now, what any part of tonight could mean. He cleaned you up, he’s letting you sleep over, he didn’t sell you out to his bandmates. That means he cares about you, right? He didn’t kiss you, but everything happened so fast, and you could’ve been the one to kiss him if you had enough wherewithal to do so. Maybe he’s just not much of a romantic guy. But he cares about you, you’re sure of it now.

You pull back the sheets and curl yourself into a ball underneath them, then extend a hand up to turn off the bedside lamp. Now shrouded in darkness, the muffled sound of the bus shower running nearby prompts your heavy eyelids to pull further and further over your eyes. It only takes a few minutes for you to finally succumb to the temptation of sleep, feeling sore but satisfied, hoping that tonight will be the first of many spent like this with him.

–

You wake up several hours later to an empty bed, having been so exhausted last night that you don’t have any recollection of if Joel had ever joined you there in the first place. You don’t even remember hearing the shower turn off, or feeling his big, warm body slide into bed beside you, or even noticing the bus lurch into motion at some point to transport you to the next city. You wonder if he had pulled you close to him, let you nuzzle into his chest, if he had scratched the top of your head to soothe you after you had made some little noise in your sleep. You think at least one of those things might have happened, you’re just not sure which one. You smile to yourself at the dreamy memory.

Sitting up, you rub the sleep from your eyes, then reach out a hand to feel where the sheets are mussed on his side of the bed. The fitted sheet feels cool, indicating that he must have gotten up a while ago, but let you sleep as long as you wanted. The digital clock on the nightstand reads a little past 10 AM.

You peel back the comforter, swinging your legs around and letting your bare toes touch down on the carpet. You carefully pad your way to the bedroom door, staying quiet in case any of the other band members are out there. Cracking the door open ever so slightly, you check if the coast is clear. The men’s bunks look empty, but you can see the boots of someone sitting on a couch near the front of the bus. The silver tips make them unmistakably Joel’s.

When you make your way over to him, it almost looks like he’s just been sitting there waiting for you to finally wake up, the way he’s hunched forward over last month’s issue of a guitar magazine. He’s fully dressed, and you feel a little embarrassed to still be wearing his shirt and briefs.

He flicks his eyes up to you quickly before returning them to his reading, and greets you with a curt “Mornin’”. Not spoken playfully, not punctuated with one of his charming little names for you or a scan of his eyes over your bare legs, just “mornin’”. You repeat the word back to him, taking a seat on the couch opposite him. You’re not really sure what else to say or do, the air feeling tense and thick for a reason he hasn’t let on to yet. You decide to be brave and break the silence first, but he cuts you off, closing his magazine and tossing it onto the coffee table between you.

“Listen, last night was a mistake, alright? I shouldn’t’ve let myself get carried away like that, should’a shown you some more respect, treated you like a professional. That’s what this is gonna be from now on, okay? Professional. Tell me you understand that.”

Your heart plummets into your stomach at his words, and you try not to let your face reflect the cocktail of confusion and disappointment and hurt you feel. You take a deep inhale and nod your head. “I understand.”

He looks like he wants to say more, something with some actual emotion behind it, maybe, but he pushes it down. “Already dropped your clothes from last night back onto your bus. Best go on before the boys get back, get yourself somethin’ to eat before soundcheck this afternoon.”

“Okay,” you reply quietly, eyes glued to the floor so he doesn’t see the whites of your eyes turn pink and the shine begin to well up in them. “Um, see you later, then, I guess.”

“Yeah,” is all Joel says back to you, but you hardly hear it as you swiftly exit the Death’s Head bus and slam the door behind you. You don’t have far to go, you and your band’s bus being parked right behind theirs, but it feels like the longest, most shameful sprint of your life. You allow your tears to fall once you’re safely cocooned inside your own bunk bed, thankful to be alone. You figure your band must be out for a late breakfast or exploring the city together, and you’re grateful that even if they did notice you missing last night, they probably won’t ask any questions about it.

You feel so fucking stupid, like such a naive little girl, for ever entertaining any of your childish hopes that some playful flirting and a one night stand might ever turn into something real. He’s made it very clear to you now that you’re nothing more than a little mouse for him to bat around, toying with your emotions and your cunt any way he pleases, just because he can. Because you’re so inexperienced, such an easy target, too good and too eager and too willing. And he knows you’ll do exactly as he asks now, keep it professional, because it’s what he commanded of you. And you want to please him, don’t you? Despite the hurt you feel now, you still can’t make yourself disobey him.

You feel drained all over again once your tears finally run dry, but decide you can’t let yourself wallow on your own shattered girlish dreams all afternoon. You turn over and pull the curtain back on your bunk to check the clock on the wall, and realize you have a good handful of hours until you have to be anywhere. You’ve done more with less, you think to yourself, springing out of bed to pull on some of your own clothes. You rush to locate a pen and a notepad, and retrieve Angel from the storage underneath the bus. 

With all necessary items in your possession, you sit yourself down on your own bus’s couch, and let your tangled mess of feelings transform themselves into chords and lyrics. You’ve always used your music as an outlet to cope with what you’re dealing with, why should now be any different? He wants a goddamn professional, you’re going to show him one, and if he can spring a surprise on you as big as moaning for Daddy on stage in front of tens of thousands of people, you can certainly perform a brand new song just for him, tonight.

tag list: @beefrobeefcal @iamasaddie @rebel-held @dilfgestivo @zliteraturehoe @joeldjarin @kamcrazy123 @hellowoolf @rexamongthestars @stevie75

message/comment/ask if you'd like to be added!!

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

Steddie Upside-Down AU Part 57

Part 1 Part 56

The dark, it turns out, is better than sunset. Sunset turns the sky pinks and purples and reds. Will can’t be sure where he is. At least in the dark, all he has to worry about is a Demogorgon taking him.

Still, every shadow is a threat that Will’s running from soon enough. And once he starts running, there’s no way to stop. Will’s panting and breathless in the 2 a.m. darkness by the time he’s crawling through Eddie and Steve’s bedroom window.

It sticks briefly when he opens it, making an ungodly screch but then he’s up and through, and falling on and then over Eddie’s dresser with a loud clatter.

“What the fuck, Byers?” Eddie says, bolting out of bed to click his lamp on.

Will looks around the carnage that surrounds him – Eddie’s knick-knacks and books all over the floor and looks up at him sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“You should be!” Eddie replies, arms pantomiming a punch in Will’s direction. “I could’ve killed you!”

Steve, still laying down on the far side of their bed, snorts. “Like you’ve ever fought anyone in your life.” His voice crackles with interrupted sleep. He doesn't roll over, just keeps his face smushed into his pillow.

Eddie squawks. “You got something to say, Harrington?” he demands, finally standing up and putting his hands on his hips to loom over Steve where he’s still lying prone in the bed. Not that Steve notices, seeing as his eyes are still closed.

“Weak ass bitch.”

As Eddie gasps in affront, Will feels the sickly panic he’d felt upon waking slowly start to fizzle out.

Eddie kneels down beside Will to pick up his belongings, grumbling about his strengths, and how Will’s lucky he could feel him coming, and thank fuck Wayne’s not home. He doesn’t mention the spilled objects, doesn’t try to kick Will out. Will helps him pick up his belongings and hopes he can stay.

“What’re you doing here, baby Byers?” Eddie asks, flopping back onto the bed.

Will follows, burrowing into Steve’s side until he groans and slides over just enough that Will can fit. He turns his head on the pillow, opening one bleary eye to squint at Will.

“Can I stay here?” he asks, not looking away from Steve, living and breathing beside him.

Steve blinks a few times rapidly, clearly trying to wake up, before shifting his gaze past Will to look at Eddie. “Does your Mom know you’re here?” he asks.

Will turns onto his back to stare up at the ceiling. He bites his lip, doesn’t respond at all. Not that they seem to need it with the way he can feel them having a silent conversation above his head.

“She’s gonna freak out,” Eddie says gently.

Will slumps further into Eddie’s sheets. He can already feel the nip of the cold night’s air when they kick him out. Only, he doesn’t want to go. “She doesn’t get up until six.” He says it like a prayer. If he leaves this bed right now, Will thinks he might just explode.

Eddie blows out a breath. Will can’t tell without looking if he’s exasperated, or resigned, or just done entirely. He doesn’t look. Not until he feels Eddie slump into the bed next to him, bracketing Will between his and Steve’s warm, protective bodies. “What happened?”

He turns his head, not toward Eddie but to look at Steve, who’s looking back, breathing and alive. “I had a nightmare,” he says. The word doesn’t seem loaded enough for the way his breathing had ticked wrong through his lungs.

Steve turns his head, finally uncovering both eyes. There’s pillow marks on his cheek. He looks sleep-rumpled and soft. “About me?” he asks.

Eddie sucks in a quiet breath behind Will. Neither of them look his way. Will nods, chokes out, “you were back there,” through his dangerously clogged throat.

Steve’s eyes soften further, and he smiles sadly. “It’s alright, Will,” Steve says, ruffling his hair the way he always does. “They got me out, remember?”

Will nods. He doesn’t correct Steve; doesn’t mention that he woke up thinking of Steve’s quiet voice – it’s like, sometimes I blink, and it’s like I’m there – or how when he woke up, he was sure Steve’d been taken again, until he crawled in through the window and spotted two snoring lumps.

“Yeah, they got you out,” Will says, trying to convince himself that out means back.

They hold eye contact for a while, until Steve's eyes begin to droop. None of them have been sleeping well lately. Guilt curdles in Will’s stomach that he’d interrupted both of their sleep. But, he might’ve died if he’d stayed at home; just shriveled up like a raisin in his own worry.

“How about you stay for a little bit, and we drive you back before your Mom wakes up?” Eddie asks.

Will finally turns away from Steve. Eddie looks sad, and worn, and worried. Still, Will takes what’s on offer with both, greedy hands. “You won’t tell her?” he asks.

Eddie shakes his head, glaring over Will’s head when Steve makes a protesting noise. Steve sighs. “Fine, fine, we won’t tell her,” Steve mumbles. “She’d flip out anyway.”

Will settles into the warmth, lets it soak through his bones, and closes his eyes. He tries to fall back asleep, but the darkness behind his eyelids is where the monster’s live. He opens his eyes.

“What are you guys doing for Halloween?” he asks. The guilt surges again when Steve snuffles like he’d almost been asleep, but Eddie answers readily.

“Fuck all, I imagine.”

“Language,” Steve murmurs around his pillow, cutting the G and making it sound more like lan-wah. Will snorts.

“What about you?” Eddie asks, ignoring Steve entirely.

Almost vibrating with excitement, Will replies, “we’re going as the ghostbusters!”

“Haven’t seen that one,” Steve mumbles, making Will gasp, outraged, even as Eddie chimes in, “me neither.”

“You’re both dead to me,” he says on instinct. Then the memories of all the times he thought Steve really was dead trickle through his mind, and his intestines prickle. But then Steve and Eddie laugh quietly – alive alive alive. “Anyway, we’re going to dress up for school and I get to be Egon!”

“Gesundheit,” Eddie replies.

“Wait, you’re wearing them to school?” Steve asks, sitting up like this news is enough to invigorate him. “Bad idea, Byers.”

Will glares at him, brow furrowed. “Uh, why?” he asks, in that same tone that gets Jonathan to call him a brat.

Steve just rolls his eyes, and ruffles his hair again, this time much more violently. “No one dresses up in eighth grade, dummy. You’re gonna get like, beat up.”

Eddie reaches over Will to smack Steve on the head. “That’s terrible advice!” he says, shoving Steve back into the pillows and looming over Will with intense eyes. “You gotta embrace the whimsy of childhood while you still can, baby Byers.”

Steve scoffs. “Yeah, if he wants to get picked on.”

“That’s going to happen anyway,” Will says without thinking. When both boys’ eyes narrow, he continues hurriedly, “so I might as well have some fun with my friends!”

Steve grumbles his unintelligible complaints while he settles back into his pillow. Eddie wraps his arm around Will and shakes him around. “That’s my boy!” He says it like a proud parent. Will preens, ignoring the way his cheeks are warming at the praise.

Eddie yanks him down so they’re all three horizontal, cramped together in his small bed. “Now, sleep!” he demands.

Will dutifully closes his eyes, but even as the breathing of his two companions evens out, Will doesn’t fall asleep. He doesn’t mind, just revels in the warmth of being where he truly belongs.

Part 58

Taglist: @deany-baby @estrellami-1 @altocumulustranslucidus @evillittleguy @carlprocastinator1000 @1-8oo-wtfbro @hallucinatedjosten @goodolefashionedloverboi @newtstabber @lunabyrd @cinnamon-mushroomabomination @manda-panda-monium @disrespectedgoatman @finntheehumaneater @ive-been-bamboozled @harringrieve @grimmfitzz @is-emily-real @dontstealmycake @angeldreamsoffanfic @a-couchpotato @5ammi90 @mac-attack19 @genderless-spoon @kas-eddie-munson @louismeds @imhereforthelolzdontyellatme @pansexuality-activated @ellietheasexylibrarian @nebulainajar @mightbeasleep @neonfruitbowl @beth--b @silenzioperso @best-selling-show @v3lv3tf0x @bookworm0690 @paintsplatteredandimperfect

[eyenaku]

anotha palette challenge w @cero-sleep!! this one of my pantomime au y/n (👁👁 columbina) cero be pickin the cool palettes hsjkjshdahjds i dont rlly like this one as much as yesterday's,, there's no dark colour in this pallette so I couldn't get any good contrast

[noisycroissant]

I Will Find You

Astarion x Reader (Soulmate AU)

Based on that aquarium scene from Romeo + Juliet (1996)

*******

She hated the costume. It was a sick twisted joke on her Mistress' part to make her wear this to the damned ball at the Szarr Palace.

A vampire ball on Hallow's Eve. How tasteless.

An ankle length white gown, plain and unadorned except for trimmings of lace at the hem and scooped out neckline. Of course her mistress would never let any of the spawn wear high-necked outfits or wear necklaces when they were taken out to mingle in high vampire society. The bite marks must be visible to everyone. The ownership must be acknowledged.

It was the wings that sealed the pantomime of it all. Stiff lacquered wings, covered in soft goose feathers, tied on to her shoulders with string. With the pale skin, she could pass easily for an angel should anyone see her flitting about in the darkness.

But one flash of her smile or a second look at her eyes and they would know that she was just another monster in sheep's clothing.

*******

Over the decades, Cazador had done several tasteless things to seal his status as the patriarch of the Szarr clan. From using his spawn as "entertainment" to holding lavish balls were his spawn waited hand and foot on drunken patriars of Baldur's Gate, there was no level Cazador would not stoop to to ascertain power.

But this? This took the cake.

A high vampire society ball on Hallow's Eve. Complete with costumes and candles and music.

Pathetic.

The armour and chainmail looked heavy but was actually just made of paste and cleverly dyed. As one of the prized spawn in the palace, it was imperative that he "mingled with anyone who looks important, if he knew what was good for him".

The threats didn't register anymore. After all, how different could this night's ending be from all the other times there was a ball in this wretched place? Some drunk and out-of-it duke or duchess would fancy him, he'd have to sweet talk and charm them into a chamber, do what was expected, make the necessary sounds and words, and it would be over.

And another piece would be added to the mosaic of power Cazador was building.

The hatred made bile rise in Astarion's throat and he retched into a nearby vase. It was better his stomach remain empty for what was inevitably to come.

******

It was not as bad as she'd imagined. There was a certain flair and theatre to seeing vampires of all classes costumed and swanning about.

Like they were normal people at a Hallow's Eve party.

Her mistress had let her "loose" for the night. Which meant she could walk around with the rare gift of turning down propositions. A small mercy, but after a century of servitude, she would take what she could get.

She walked along the edges of the great hall, trying to stay out of sight and in the shadows, trying to avoid anyone's eye. Just one night to herself. That's all she wanted after a century of turning.

******

Astarion saw the person with wings in a plain white gown seeking the edges of the room from the moment the Eastern Vampire Court's Mistress and her brood had arrived.

He'd been following her, unnoticed, since. He didn't know why but he had to see her face. It wasn't mere curiosity. It was an unexplainable pull he couldn't fight.

He followed and followed and finally had her alone in his sight. She was watching the ornamental fish in the aquarium near the archway to the garden. Her pale fingers following the path of a bejeweled looking fish. He moved to the other side of the glass and slowly walked into the faint light emitting from the aquarium.

Her smile was the first thing he saw on her face. The warmth, the soft creases at the ends of a generous mouth. The way her cheeks rose to her eyes.

His eyes were what she saw first. A warm burgundy, like aged wine, surrounded by soft lashes and sharp cheekbones. The curiosity pooling in those eyes as they took her in.

Astarion didn't believe in gods anymore. He didn't believe in love anymore. He didn't believe in fate anymore either.

But for one moment, he believed the goddess Sune had touched his heart.

The angel smiled at him and he knew. He'd heard of fated mates but he'd never dreamed he'd find his while living a life shackled to Cazador. But now he knew.

That fate spins along as it should. No point in fighting or denying it.

******

The spell was broken as another spawn of her brood appeared seemingly out of nowhere. "You must come immediately. The mistress requires you," says the spawn as he grabs her elbow and pulls her towards the dance floor.

Astarion did not think twice before dashing after her. He deftly moved between people, watching as she was pulled away further and further into the crowd.

Their eyes never left each other.

The curiosity and subtle longing in her eyes was enough for Astarion to know that she had felt what he'd felt too.

That damned, inescapable pull.

He'd found the one thing that was going to be his, and come hell or rapture, he was going to claim it.

[foolishlovers]

good omens WIPs i'm loving at the moment

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an ineffable midsummer night's dream by the_serpent_and_the_guardian - set in 1605, aziraphale convinces crowley to save shakespeare's latest play - he reluctantly takes on the role of puck (not without some shenanigans ensuing, of course). the banter in this fic is absolutely precious, the writing is so lovely and the dynamic between our beloved almost friends demon and angel is so spot on!! 20k, 4/5 chapters, rated T

living in sin by jade_valentine offers an insight into what could have happened if aziraphale had discovered a little earlier that crowley was living in his car. yes, oh my god, they were roommates. i honestly can't wait to see how their new living arrangement will develop 2.5k, 1/? chapters, rated M

wilde flowers by rocksaltandroll is a human au! starring aziraphale as a lonely bookseller and crowley as the new, handsome florist down the street. maggie, nina and muriel are inspired to do some matchmaking, but the old men seem to be falling for each other even without their meddling... they're both nervous about starting something new, but there's so much fluff, the writing is great and frankly, all whickber street characters are such a joy to read about!! 15k, 4/? chapters, rated M

mon horrible cher by ghostrat is an enemies to friends to lovers fic that features aziraphale and crowley as teachers on a sixth form field trip to paris. they despise each other… until they don't. i have so much love for these characters, the path from annoyance to precious pining is just so good. crowley being good with kids is honestly going to break me at some point. the writing is utterly amazing, just perfect to get lost in, and there's stunning fanart included too 30k, 7/9 chapters, rated M

once upon a time by tawnyowl95 is a human au! with actors (and childhood sweethearts) aziraphale and crowley finding their way back to each other as famous comedian crowley (currently going through a rough patch) accepts aziraphale's offer for him to play the pantomime villain in his production of dick whittington. there's flashbacks to their time at high school and tons of bickering in the present time line, where crowley continues to be quite the troublemaker, keeping aziraphale and everyone else on their toes and i absolutely love it 10k, 4/15, rated E

london, libraries & love by wolftea features librarian! aziraphale and history teacher! crowley. while they're both excited to go on an excursion to london for a couple of days together, at the beginning of their acquaintance, they had quite a hard time warming up to each other.. this fic is so precious, the flashblacks to crowley's first weeks at the school are full of pranks and shenanigans between the two of them that made me laugh so very much. it's so fascinating to explore how their relationship develops over time. the pining in the present is perfectly wholesome as well!! 9k, 5/17 chapters, rated E

[hood-ex]

So as you may know, Dick has a magikarp (that eventually evolves into gyarados) in my Pokemon AU. However, I think it would be fun if Dick acquired a Mr. Mime from someone in the circus so that Mr. Mime could build shields of defense around Dick and the Titans during battle. Plus... would it or would it not be funny if Mr. Mime constantly pantomimed around Bruce as a way to piss him off aslkdja.

[suzukiblu]

updated/expanded "Kara gets to Earth on-time with baby Kal" AU excerpt:

Kara doesn’t understand the aliens’ language, which is fine. She didn’t expect to. She watches them interact and listens as they speak, familiarizing herself with the cadence and pitch and rhythm of their voices and doing her best to pick out individual sounds and patterns. She likes languages well enough. She did pretty well with Daxamite dialects in school last year, anyway. 

The aliens are kind, at least so far. They found her and Kal curled up in the remains of their smashed-up ships in their ruined field and brought them into their home despite the mess. Kara thinks they’re farmers, probably? So probably Laborer Guild, or whatever this planet has instead of Laborers. The House of El is mostly Thinkers, but Kara isn’t worried about that. She’ll figure something out, as soon as she figures out how to communicate with the aliens. Pantomime has not been all that helpful, at least not so far. 

They gave her a warm, unusually sweet drink that might have some kind of milk in it, with soft white pellets in it that are even sweeter. It’s not quite like anything she’s ever tasted before, but she likes it. Kal really liked it, though the aliens seemed to think he shouldn't have too much and gave her a little cup of just milk alone for him instead. Or she thinks it's milk, anyway. 

It's white. And very thick, and almost creamy? Though it tasted good too, when Kara stole a sip to make sure it wouldn’t upset Kal’s stomach if she gave it to him. 

"Pye," the alien that Kara is assuming is female announces in their weirdly simple-sounding language, putting a round plate with a slice of something on it on the table in front of her. Kal reaches for it from her lap with a burble. Kara peers at it too. The slice is triangular, with a crisp crust and an oozy red filling. She wonders why the plate is round, if the "pye" is meant to be sliced and served triangularly. It seems a little disrespectful to the cook–or baker? Or at least the artisan who made the plate, which was clearly painted with very dedicated care. Painted by hand, even, not a pre-programmed design reproduced by a machine. That’s very luxurious for Laborers to be offering unexpected guests who just destroyed their field, even being the wrong shape for the "pye". 

Maybe they’re overcompensating, Kara thinks. Or maybe the aliens are really just that kind. 

Maybe. 

She thinks they’re little flowers, the designs around the edges of the plate. Or at least they look like they could be flowers. They’re flower-<i>like</i>, if nothing else, and all the weird colors of them might just be a stylistic choice. 

They’re pretty. 

She wishes she could show her mother. 

Kara crushes down the grief for the thousandth time and smiles at the aliens. They smile back. 

It helps, almost. 

Almost. 

The “pye” tastes very good. 

.

.

.

It takes some effort, but Kara learns the aliens’ names after she and Kal finish their “pye” and she cleans up his sticky little face. The possibly female one is “Ma Mar-Tha”, and the possibly male one is “Pa Jona-Than”. So . . . maybe they're both female, actually? Going by their names, anyway. They both identify themselves as “Kent”, too, though she’s not sure if that’s another name and they’re either married or related, or if it’s the local word for “farmer” or “Laborer”. It’s unclear. 

They don’t look related, but she doesn’t really know how “related” this species would look to her eyes anyway. The colors of their skins are close, although their hair, though similarly textured, doesn’t really match–Ma Mar-Tha’s is an oddly neutral brown, and Pa Jona-Than’s is an even more oddly dull blond. Kara’s never seen hair in such faded colors. Her own is as bright as this planet’s strange sun, and Kal’s is as black as the space between stars. And both of their eyes are the El blue, of course. 

Pa Jona-Than’s eyes are blue too, but a washed-out shade of it. And Ma Mar-Tha’s are brown, which is so exotic and unusual that Kara has a little bit of trouble not staring too much. They’re very warm and very soft, though, and she likes how they look. 

They’re both middle-aged, she thinks, or at least strongly resemble the Kryptonian version of it. Their clothes are soft and shapeless, with very little structure or sign of formality to the garments, though Kara supposes they might be some sort of sleepwear? She and Kal did crash very early in this planet’s morning, from what she can tell. 

She tells them her name and Kal’s, though they pronounce them a bit oddly. She’s sure she’s pronouncing theirs oddly too, so it’s not as if it’s an insult. They say their names all at once, though, as if they’re singular words–"Karazorel” and “Kalel”, almost. She manages to get them both down to “Kara” and “Kal”, and they get her down to “Ma” and “Pa”, so she supposes “Mar-Tha” and “Jona-Than” are their surnames, and “Kent” does mean “Laborer”. Kal isn’t verbal enough to get to any of it, of course, but laughs sweetly and claps as he listens to them all exchanging names and sounds back and forth. 

Kara crushes down the grief again and wonders how long it’ll be until he cries for Aunt Lara and Uncle Jor. He’ll miss them soon, she’s sure. He’s a sweet, good-natured little thing, but he’s not even old enough to walk properly yet. And they’re his parents. 

She only hasn’t cried for her own because she doesn’t have the room to. Not until she’s sure they’re somewhere safe, and that Kal is going to be alright. That she can take care of him here, however she has to. 

Who knows, maybe this farm needs some more “Kents” on it. 

.

.

.

Ma gives Kara clothes: a strangely soft knee-length dress patterned with more pretty alien flowers and clunky, heavy boots with actual laces in them and a sturdy blue jacket with a surprising amount of pockets and a thick, warm, fleece-like lining, accented with flat metal studs and an odd metal trim with a tag hanging from one side of it. It takes Kara a moment, but then she realizes the trim actually seems to be some sort of fastener. 

Huh. 

The clothes don't fit quite right–Kara thinks the dress is probably meant to be a little longer, from the cut of it, and the jacket is a bit too big and the boots are a little loose too–but she does appreciate them. She's been in her own clothes since . . . 

Krypton died while she was in these clothes. 

Everyone she's ever loved, everyone she's ever known, everyone she's ever seen . . . 

Kara appreciates the new ones. 

. . . although, do clothes on this planet just not have house crests? Or are Ma and Pa just not from families that have house crests? 

She supposes they might not be. They are Laborers, so . . . maybe. But they also served her on a hand-painted plate, if with strange manners, so she's not sure what to think. 

Maybe she just doesn't understand the specific signifiers in their clothing, or maybe their house signifiers are just in their jewelry. Ma is wearing tiny gold hoops in her(?) ears and a thin gold necklace and Pa is wearing a thick leather bracelet with a glass and metal circle in the center of it, and they're both wearing gold rings on the third fingers of their left hands. Pa's is just a single plain band, but Ma has two–one just plain like his(?), but thinner, and one with a trio of little clear gemstones set in it. Diamonds, maybe? That would make sense, for a Laborer's jewelry. Diamonds are pretty, but they're both reasonably common in nature and simple enough to recreate under laboratory conditions, so they're certainly affordable enough for a farmer to wear even day-to-day. And they're sturdy, too. Gold less so, obviously, but maybe the rings are just gold-plated or an alloy.

It's something to think about besides the end of the world. 

. . . their world, anyway. 

As far as clothes go there's nothing that'll fit Kal at all, so Kara just keeps him wrapped up safe and secure in the bright red El crest blanket Jor and Lara sent him here in. Though she knows he'll need more diapers soon, obviously, and something he can actually crawl around in too. He can't stay in her lap forever. 

She wishes he could, right now. Even letting Ma hold him while she changed was . . . stressful. 

A little too stressful, maybe, but Kara tries not to think about it. Not right now, at least. 

She needs to protect him. Needs to take care of him. Needs to–

Kara exhales. Wraps Kal up in his El crest blanket and her borrowed jacket, and smiles at Ma and Pa. They smile back at her. 

Well, that's a start.