#some of them (like the girl whos a stack of tvs) are really cool but...

[gachaparadise]

i've been dabbling with the hot new gacha reverse/1999 and its... okay so far. like everything is presented gorgeously and the battle system seems fun! but i can just tell this is NOT a game that's going last for me >_>

[thatbanditqueen]

A Basic Training Snippet

Life has been very cruel and gotten between me and my favorite pastime... writing delusional scenarios in which I, I mean my original characters, dated Elvis Presley. So I thought for fun I would just share a very short snippet from the chapter of Basic Training I am working on, in which Elvis invites Bess to spend the weekend with him in Waco at the house of his friend, DJ and TV host Eddie Fadal.

This is very rough, I am not sure if it sounds like Elvis, I need to go back through it once I finish the chapter. I haven't even had anyone alpha this. However, I had at one point told @be-my-ally I would participate in the writing prompt "weather" and post Sunday (yesterday) and so this is my very pathetic attempt to just post something that at least mentions weather in passing...

If you want to read or catch up on this WIP you can find it here

“Well, you know I’m mainly a legs and ass man, through and through, but boy oh boy, Bessie is stacked. I tell ya what. Fa sho. I don’t know how it's possible, but they’re even bigger when you got ‘em in ya hands. Why you nodding Lamar, you ain’t ever gotten to second base, quit lyin.”

The rain had stopped by the time Bess opened her eyes again to find the bed empty, though she could still hear the drip drop of water through the hole. There it was, like an inverted nipple in the middle of the new glossy pink wall, a perfect round sphere with layers of drywall caved in around the edges where the firework had shot through. The smell of cigarettes wafted in from outside, along with a set of men's voices.  Bess was about to call to them when she heard Elvis say the word “Anita.”

There was laughter, then the sound of slaps and skids along concrete, as if a scuffle had broken out, followed by more laughter.

“Shit, but you’re wrong, Rex, cuz there are really only two types of girls. See, with ‘Nita, she is a good girl, but she puts it all on the table. If I’m happy, she’s happy, that’s all she wants. She let's it all hang out. All I gotta do is look at her and smile and she’s gonesville. But then, then there are the ones who keep it all tied up. You know, you saw it Lamar, when I come down here, Anita was ballin her damn eyes out. Now Bess, Bess’d never let you see her cry. Not if she can halp it. She plays it cool. But when you touch her you can feel her vibrating underneath that ice, jus enough to know her motor's running. And boy, when you get it going, what a motor. When she cries out, man, you know ya really earned it. Know what I mean?" 

There was some muffled laughter, and Bess couldn’t quite hear everything, but what she did hear made her face flush a deep crimson red.

“Oh, well I found out last night.  I swear, Bess tastes so fresh and sweet, I know I’m the first guy she let touch her.”

“Nah, a college girl?”

“What do you know, huh, lardass? Reckon I been with seventy five, no, I mean a hundred or more girls. Trust me, I know women, that girl spent college with her nose in her books.”

“Now you got your nose in her - OW - what the fuck?”

“I don’t wanna hear you talk bout her like that, got it?”

“But you just -”

“But you just, but you just, just mind ya goddamn manners.”

Bess sat there, unsure if she wanted to keep listening, but as she turned she was distracted by a dark set of eyes staring her from the doorway. She pulled the strap of her nightie up, and smoothed her hair back as she smiled at Janice Fadal.

“Mommy told me not to wake you up, so I’ve just been sitting here waiting. Ready to do my make up again?”

Bess nodded, relaxing as she stood and patted the little girl’s head.

“Sure, just let me get dressed, huh?’

Then Janice’s slick little tongue curved up and licked the bottom of Bess’ wrist.

“I don’t think you taste like ice cream at all. More like salt. “

*******************************************************************

more to come, let me know what you think....

@whositmcwhatsit @vintageshanny @from-memphis-with-love @peskybedtime @shakerattlescroll @missmaywemeetagain @ellie-24 @lookingforrainbows @arrolyn1114 @moonchild-daniella @richardslady121 @ab4eva @i-r-i-n-a-a @eliseinmemphis @kingdomforapony @everythingelvispresley @dkayfixates @artlover8992 @freudianslumber @amydarcimarie @toreigh @18lkpeters @yynneessmons @ashtag6887 @waiting4brucewayne2adoptme @returntopresley @rjmartin11 @bigromansgirl @louisejoy86 @notstefaniepresley

[rejectedfables]

Do you mind if I ask your top 10 favorite characters (can be male or female) from all of the media that you loved (can be anime/manga, books, movies or tv series)? And why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before.....Thanks...

Character: Draco Malfoy (HP) Why I love them: I don't. I love the version of him I frankensteined together from fics I read/wrote as an undiagnosed autistic preteen who wished I knew how to be meaner, and was hopelessly demisexually gay for a brunette with glasses.

Character: Uzumaki Naruto (Naruto) Why I love them: Emotionally neglected ADHD powerhouse who thinks "what do 600 hot girls look like? Me with titties and pigtails 600 times obviously" followed by "what do 600 hot boys look like? All my male friends with bedroom eyes OBVIOUSLY" and somehow hasn't figured out he's into dudes and is probably genderfluid. The Haku and Zabuza arc came SO close to "child soldier figures out that making children into soldiers is bad, actually, and resolves to create a better society where fewer people needlessly suffer" but then I think the author got old and forgot his own trajectory in favor of endless spectacle creep and, idk, something about the moon crushing Konoha or whatever. I lost interest in the story, but not the BOY. Also his relentless fixation with that dark haired cool guy he kissed one time makes every other character feel awkward, and I relate to that.

Character: Urameshi Yusuke (Yu Yu Hakusho) Why I love them: LOVE me a guy who even HEAVEN writes off as an irredeemable asshole surprising everyone with an act of selflessness. Love me an asshole who dedicates his life to love and friendship. Yusuke's narrative is basically "Obviously all yokai are evil. Wait, some aren't (some of my best friends are yokai)? Wait, most aren't (I actually really enjoy the yokai world/community)? Wait, I'M a yokai? (THAT'S why I am the way I am, and actually that's not evil it's just different)??? So there's evil humans AND evil yokai but neither are inherently bad, MOST are just regular people on both sides, and both are worth protecting" and anyway this is a neurodivergent and queer allegory to me, which slaps severely.

Character: Shi Qingxuan (Heaven Official's Blessing) Why I love them: Gender

Character: Luke Fon Fabre (Tales of the Abyss) Why I love them: Nobody's doing character growth like this little shit. An icon. It takes like 30 hours of gameplay for him to become likable and when he does it's somehow genuinely worth it.

Character: Changheng (Love Between Fairy and Devil) Why I love them: (I'm picking only one character per story, which is the only reason Xiao Lanhua and Dongfang Qingcang aren't also on this list.) You're telling me the God of War's narrative is a "tragic princess, betrothed since childhood, can't escape her family's expectations, constantly has to put everyone else above herself, until finally she snaps" story blended with "man who has been forced to live in war, falls for the first person who acknowledges that he, too, needs protection, ultimately rejects the violence he's been forced to endure and enact in favor of pursuing peace" and I'm what? NOT supposed to go insane? Also his nose freckle gives me heart palpitations.

Character: Logan Echolls (Veronica Mars, specifically season 1) Why I love them: What an excellent example of a badly coping shithead jerk fuckup boy who would be SO soft in any context where he's not under constant threat. Something about his mouth-breathing under duress compels me.

Character: Kyo (Fruits Basket) Why I love them: Badly coping under duress, the entire system is stacked against him, anger management issues and the snatched waist of a 90's manga twink. What can I say, a feral cat finding stability and love gets me every time.

Character: Xue Yang (MDZS) Why I love them: Irredeemable asshole feral cat ass man, coping badly at all times with all things but holding it together with a winning personality (gratuitous violence and bad jokes). Falls SO hard for the first person to show him love and kindness, becomes SO soft when not under threat for the first time ever, and then fucks up SO badly he ruins his whole fucking life. Spends more time trying to get back what he lost than he actually HAD what he lost. He's irredeemable. He's irredeemable. He makes apple rabbits for A Qing because she's sad. He's irredeemable. He doesn't pull a weapon on Xingchen even when Xingchen has already stabbed him and he's renowned for violence and revenge. He's irredeemable. I starting writing a post in his defense and hit the character limit halfway through my 'notes to flesh out later' bullet pointed list. He's irredeemable?? Xiao Xingchen could, though, is all I'm saying. The deeper you look into his actions the more humanity there is to find. I'm rotating every single thing about him in my mind like a rotisserie chicken.

Character: Chu Wanning (ERHA) Why I love them: He's hopelessly demisexually gay for literally just one guy. His story is gratuitously tragic but with a happy ending. Autistic Yearning incarnate. He's a burnt out husk of a blushing virgin, and the horniest person alive. Would readily die for his convictions, but won't ask for help. Prettiest wife anyone could ever wish for, with a strong masculine jaw. Total knockout gorgeous with body dysmorphia. Hyper competent with zero emotional intelligence. Widely respected and beloved with intense self loathing. He's never not masking. He's an atticked wife, he's a bossy husband, he's a piece of wood. He's 45. He's 6. He's 20. He's 32. He is catnip for me.

[therubyreader]

My Review of American Royals by Katharine McGee

See a full list of my book reviews here

Review Word Count: 1,195

I know this is usually where I put my spoiler warning for my reviews but since I have decided that based on the nature of this book there aren't any major plot points that I want to talk about so this review will be spoiler free.

I will give this disclaimer though, if you're a die hard fan of this book then this review isn't for you. That isn't to say I'm going to drag this book through hell and back, but it honestly wasn't my cup of tea. I will be talking about the things in this book that I personally didn't like so if you don't want to see your favorite book besmirched by some random bitch on tumblr dot com then please keep scrolling.

On to the review!

American Royals gives all of us history nerds a peek into an alternate reality where George Washington became the king of the United States instead of its first president and how that would look in modern day. In this reality we also see how the peerage system works in the States and also how many monarchies in other parts of the world have survived. For example the French and Russian monarchies and the German principalities are alive and well in this book which was a very interesting touch that I enjoyed.

The book centers around the lives of the modern royals, Crown Princess Beatrice who is set to be America's first queen regnant, her younger sister Princess Samantha who is the exact opposite of Beatrice and suffers from an extreme case of middle child syndrome coupled with spare syndrome, and Samantha's twin Prince Jefferson a.k.a. Jeff (side note I think the name Jeff is gross and I agree with Daphne on calling him Jefferson) who is quite literally just there, chilling.

Now while I was intrigued with the concept of an alternate reality where the United States is a monarchy I honestly did not expect the book to go the way that it did. I know that just writing what life would be like with an American monarchy wouldn't sell and would be extremely boring, but let me tell you I didn't not expect to essentially get into a written telenovela. You get all of the classic traits of a novela, three (or maybe four, depends on how you count it) love triangles stacked on top of each other, betrayal, romance, dramatics, and then someone just randomly dying to advance the plot. What more can you want?

I say that but in reality I wasn't really a fan of it. Sure if you like soap operas and reality tv this book is for you, but I'm not really a fan of either so I honestly got to a point at the end where all of the plot points converged and it all just got so overwhelming for me that I struggled to finish the last, like 10% of the book. That being said I'm not going to keep reading this series, though I did Google if Beatrice ended up with my favorite boy Connor just because he was my favorite and I needed to know.

Speaking of characters I actually enjoyed all of them, I was just kind of annoyed with the insane amount of love triangles happening to them. I honestly didn't hate Daphne, I don't condone literally any of her actions because she was evil but I sympathized with her motives. In the words of a wise man, "cool motive, still murder," (no she didn't murder anyone btw, but that would've been a great plot point).

Though if you read my Gods of Jade and Shadow review you might expect my favorite character to be Nina, in Latina solidarity, but she might've actually been my least favorite character. Actually her and Daphne are tied in that spot. Main reason being how they're both juxtaposed in their endeavors to win over Jefferson, and I really want to tell them it is quite literally not that serious. We get some not very feminist differences between them, Nina is "not like other girls" and a normal girl while Daphne is the embodiment of femininity and has the makings of a princess. Also Jeff fully cheated on Daphne and then broke up with her over the phone the next day and then tried to get at Nina. And then he proceeded to play with both of their emotions and yet both of these girls were fighting over him? Those are some serious red flags, I'm going to need these girls to get up, they deserve better.

I did honestly like the relationship between Beatrice and Sam, you get to see how they're opposites for the same reason, if that makes sense. Beatrice is meant to be the next queen so she has to be perfect and because Sam is the spare she wants to be the opposite of Beatrice and a party girl who's impulsive and puts herself first. I genuinely enjoyed their dynamic and how they play off of one another.

I didn't like Jeff at all, which honestly he might be my least favorite character and Nina and Daphne get the spot right above him. Literally this dude contributes nothing to the plot besides being there for two girls to fight over him and have their own character growth because of him. It's not very feminism or Bechdel test of them (though they do have a conversation which might pass if I remember correctly). The author even tells us in the story that Sam and Jeff are supposed to be very close but we don't see it, there's only maybe two instances where you can see their close bond but really nothing beyond that. Also there is literally no interactions between Jeff and Beatrice despite them being siblings, and I get that part of the plot is that they're not super close with her and they haven't been since they were kids but like come on, they couldn't have had at least one conversation in the whole book.

I do feel like the book was definitely marketed more towards a teen audience which is partially what I get for being a grown ass adult (I'm only in my early 20s so like technically I'm closer in age to a 19 year old than a 30 year old) reading YA fiction. But either way even if I was still a teen I don't think I would've enjoyed the book more than I do now, partially due to me being a weird kid who liked to consume media that was action heavy rather than romance heavy, which honestly still holds true to this day. I will say the book isn't bad, it's just honestly not for me, I can appreciate the writing and imagination that comes with creating this alternate reality, which major props to author for committing to doing that. Overall rating, not for me but for someone else out of ten. Even though I said I wouldn't continue to read the series if someone has a really good pitch I'll perhaps give it a shot but you have to do some serious convincing.

[en-hale-archives]

Me with You ~~

pairing ⑅ bestfriend!Jake x fem!reader

genre ⑅ friends to lovers, fluff, slow dancing, suggestive/smut

words/read time ⑅ 3.9k/12-19 mins

warnings ⑅ 18+ content, light cussing

synopsis ⑅ Jake is back in his hometown to spend time with his closest friend. During some fun and frivolous dancing, things start to heat up...

author's note ⑅ I’m really proud of how this story turned out. I'm not a huge fan of second person, so I wrote in first, but if anyone asks, I can copy and post again in second person. It's more fluff than anything, but it does get a bit steamier towards the end, so I’m just going to go ahead and put a warning.

————✧————

When the back door finally slammed shut and the cacophony of barks faded down the street, I could finally let out my sigh of relief that I had been holding in since this morning. I tapped on my phone. How many days had we been watching Mrs. Chen’s pets? And just how was I able to put up with hours of barking, the smell of fresh turd lying across the lawn, and dog walks till dark? Including their rigorous feeding times and bathroom breaks -- I’m surprised I haven’t exploded yet.

I had so much planned the minute they left my house, but instead, the sudden silence felt all too relaxing and I laid my head against the cold countertop. I could finally stop stressing, stop thinking, and stop worrying about reprimanding for chewing on my shoes or peeing in the house or the continued barking that never ended. I was free. I felt like I could’ve stayed laid on the countertop forever, drowning in the evening sun. Who knew watching five dogs would take such a burden out of a person. Jake and I had taken on the job of dog sitting for Mrs. Chen while she visited some family in Tokyo. We both switched off every other day; some of the dogs at my house and the others at his; until we realized it would be easier if he just spent the few days at my house as we co-doggy sat. He got up bright and early to take them on their walks while I prepared their highly detailed and specific meals. Then from there, we spent the rest of the day making sure they didn’t run off somewhere or cause too much destruction in the house. But alas, Mrs. Chen came back early from her getaway and picked up Toby, Caleb, Khao, Sofia, and Pickle on her way home. Although I was exhausted from watching 3-foot dogs all day, the pay was amazing for me, and it would help tremendously for all the online classes I was going to be taking next semester.

The warmth of the sun cast a comforting trance over my heavy eyelids, and soon enough I was fast asleep, standing in the middle of the kitchen with the soft sound of nothing surrounding me.

By the time I had fluttered my eyes open, I had realized I was now seated in my dining chair and a large black jacket was placed over my shoulders. I sat up and let out a yawn, wincing at the bright light coming from the tv and shaking my now numb arm awake. I must have been sleeping for a while because the evening sun had turned to pitch of black. The moonlight beamed through the window and danced along with the sways of the large oak tree out front. I stood up and walked over to the refrigerator in which I grabbed two water bottles and some leftover pasta.

I was sure that Jake hadn’t eaten since lunch, seeing as he only ate if someone sat food in front of his face. I dragged my feet up the stairs until I heard the slamming of a book and the fast typing of a keyboard come from the living room. I turned and looked behind me. Jake had settled his things on the coffee table and floor, large books, folders, and several amounts of crumpled up pieces of paper found their way around Jake, himself slouched up against the edge of the couch. He had changed clothes since the last time I had seen him, he now wore a plain blue shirt with grey sweats, his eyebrows furrowed as he worked hard on whatever he was getting at.

“Oh yes, I was starving!” Propping himself up on the couch, he took the plate of pasta. I placed the waters on the coffee table and settled comfortably on the couch beside him.

“I can’t say that I’ve ever seen anybody sleep standing up before. Look,” Jake took his phone off the charger. “I got a picture.” He pushed the screen in my face, and of course, there was my unconscious body laying on the counter, mouth open and all. I playfully pushed it back his way as his face lit up with a smile I was all too familiar with.

“What are you doing down here so late, it’s almost 12 in the morning,” I asked. Jake’s smile disappeared when he was reminded of the work he had been doing seconds before.

He let out a large huff of air. “Trying to get some words on paper but instead it turned into a paper massacre,” he jokingly replied, “sorry for the mess.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I replied, taking a swig of water. I was going to ask if he wanted to watch a late-night movie, or pull an all-nighter and talk endlessly until the sun rose, but I could tell by each passing second that Jake was worried about this, and he wanted the time he had now over the summer to work on his music. I wished I was motivated to work on my own music, but unlike Jake, I wasn’t in a globally popular boy band. My complicated best friend for over 10 years had been working his butt off since middle school. It was his annual time to sit back and relax while he had the time to, but instead, he chose to use that time to help watch a bunch of dogs with his hometown bestie. God, I loved him.

Jake pulled himself off the couch and right back onto the floor, leaving the rest of the pasta to me. He picked up his pen again and started scribbling down words as quickly as he could, trying hard not to forget the lyrics that had floated into his head. Until he stopped, closing his eyes for just a split second, and let out a powerful sigh. Crumpling up the sheet, he stacks it on top of the others in frustration and started frantically tapping his pencil against the table.

“Maybe it’s best to just try again in the morning,” I advised, taking a small bite of the pasta that was left by my side.

“How come I’m having such a hard time with this?” He gazed up at me frantically for a clue, as if I had the answer to fix a problem as big and as important as his was. I looked at his doleful eyes and the bags that were starting to grow underneath them. I couldn’t help but think, because I made you sit up and watch a bunch of dogs with me.

“Do you want me to see if I could come up with something?”

“If you want. But, hold on, I think my thoughts are coming back up.” He quickly grabbed another piece of paper, his eyes narrowed in concentration.

I tried my best to keep occupied by watching videos on my phone, but I found myself suddenly bored out of my mind. I laid out on my back and picked up one of Jake’s folders. Briefly looking through it, I couldn’t help but feel a bit jealous at the amount of fan art and letters, praising him and the other members. Followed with that were just more and more engene stuff, full of nothing but kind words and heartfelt messages. Part of me wished that I was able to travel with Jake and see the world like he was. How fun would it be to meet people that praised you? And how cool would it be to see that you had fans? I couldn’t help but plaster on a huge smile as I skimmed through some of the notes until I finally came to one with familiar handwriting.

Remember Me were the words written on the top of the paper in bold and bright colors. But the message written underneath is what caught my attention:

To the person that makes me the luckiest guy in the world, this song is for you. It’s okay if you don’t feel the same, but please just remember me -- it was Jake’s handwriting.

I didn’t feel like I was breaking any crime reading his stuff until this moment, but curiosity killed the cat, and right now I didn’t mind being a feline. I checked to make sure Jake was still busy, and he was, almost like he had teleported into his own world. I quietly turned back to the sheet and started reading. It was about a girl, presumably his crush I’m sure. She was someone important to him, someone who made him love so much that it hurt. But this was far from a happy song, in fact, it was terribly heartbreaking. She didn’t understand his love, she wasn’t able to interpret it like he wanted her to. But he confesses that he was scared of what telling her would do, worried that she wouldn’t feel the same. So instead, it was like he was apologizing, and asking that she forgive him for not being brave enough to tell her, and if he did ever get the courage to, for her to remember him even if she wasn’t able to love him like he wanted her to.

The song ends like how the title began, and I find myself flabbergasted at the beautiful mixes of rhymes and metaphors that read like a poem. This was the first of Jake’s songs that made me feel this way, like I had just finished watching a tragedy movie with Ryan Renolds starring. I blink back the tears that I didn’t realize were forming. How come he never told me this? We never kept secrets from each other, like ever. It never mattered the subject or the severity, we had always promised that we would be open and honest with each other. I wish I would’ve known this sooner, maybe I could’ve saved him from feeling this way. And what girl could it possibly be? I knew for sure I was the only girl he was presumably close to; but was there someone else?

I glanced down at Jake, who was still in a focused state of mind with the pencil in his mouth and mumbling lyrics softly under his breath. I tried picturing my bubbly Jake writing these agonizing words and miserably failed.

Jake looked up at me as if he could feel my gaze on the back of his head. “I think I’ve found the chorus, but it’s the rest of the song I’m not able to get, and how come it’s so hard to find another word that rhymes with severe? Beer? Sphere? Revere? Appear? Gosh, rhyming sucks some serious ass!”

“This song is beautiful.”

Jake furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. “Huh?”

“This song I found in your folder.” I glanced back at it in my hand. “Remember Me.”

Jake’s gaze leaped from my eyes to the sheet, and I felt his body tense. “Where’d you get that from?”

“I was just going through one of your folders. Did you accidentally get it mixed up in your fan folder? Cause this is -”

“Did you read it?” He interrupted.

“Yeah, and it’s perfect.”

Jake glanced at me for a split second before turning back around, obviously uncomfortable. “I was watching one of those Kdramas you love so much and it inspired me. Could you help me rhyme with severe now?”

I knew Jake like the back of my hand, so I knew continuing on with this conversation would get him upset if he’s clearly avoiding it. But, I wasn’t going to just let him off that quickly. “Jake, come on, you can tell me anything. Who is this about?”

Jake looked back at me with a hint of something in his eyes, something I’ve never seen before, and something I wasn't able to decipher. “Nobody, I was just feeling really inspired, that's it.” His tone had switched from calm to agitated.

I give him my I’m-not-stupid look and he comes back with his own you’re-being-delusional stare. “It’s seriously nobody, truthfully and honestly.”

“Okay, okay I’ll back off.” I could tell he was starting to get defensive, and when he got like that, it took him at least a few hours before returning to normal. I watched Jake's Adam's apple move up and down, a way in which I could tell he knew I was not convinced in the slightest. “Well, sometimes we go through things that can remind us of situations like that, but not necessarily in that same exact context, you know? It has to be amplified for that audience appeal.”

“Okay...but have you ever felt this way before? Not exactly like how it’s written, but maybe somewhere along these lines?”

I thought I was going to get another vague answer, or worse, an aggravated one. But instead Jake looked down at his pencil as he tapped it along his wrist. “...maybe, but I think everyone can connect to the words in some way. I mean, everyone feels some kind of heartbreak in their life, right?” Jake's answer was still pretty vague, but at least I was able to get something out of him.

“Okay, but you know you can tell me anything, like, anything ever because you know that you’ll never actually have to feel this way, right?” I said, maybe too much in a hurry.

“Of course I know that.” He replied, giving one of his awkward grins.

“And if anyone has made you feel this way, then you know you can tell me that too cause there a sucker to lose out on a perfect person like you.” I teased in a sing-song way, poking his shoulder hard. Jake chuckled and poked me back.

A weird silence grew in the room, and Jake went back to trying to find rhyming words. I tried getting back on my phone, but I knew I needed to say something to let go of the tenseness in the air.

“Hey, crystal clear rhymes!”

He leaned his head back and looked up at me. “Nevermind, I give up for tonight.”

I could see the stress that played on his face. “Don’t worry, you’ll figure it out.”

“Yeah, but by the time I do, it’ll be too late.”

“What do you mean?”

Jake pulled his knees up to his chest and spoke. “This was going to go on our album comeback that needs to be finished in the next four months. By the time I think of something, it'll be too late and I’ll have to wait until the next four months. But by then, I'll have forgotten. This always happens and I have no idea how the hell to fix it.” I couldn’t tell if he wanted my help or just a bit of comfort.

“Did you try asking the other guys to see if they had any ideas?”

“Yeah, but they’re working on their own parts, I can’t ask them to do this too.”

“I’m sure they’d be willing to help if you asked,” I assured him.

“I know they would, but I just don’t want to. I always ask them for help, I thought being away from the studio and being back home would help my brainstorming abilities.” He gave a weary chuckle that almost sounded like a groan.

“Well, maybe tomorrow will come with better results.” I did my best to give him some motivation, but I could tell I was failing miserably at that too.

Jake watched as a car zoomed past the window, a low bass sounding off as it zoomed away. “I bet it’s easier to just listen to music than to try and come up with it. I remember when I would just blare NCT all day long and jam out in my room. It seemed so much easier back then to come up with stuff than it does now. I miss it.” He took a slight pause before continuing. “ Did you know that song you read was the easiest thing I have written in my life? I remember writing too. I just had this super weird feeling in my chest one day so I basically locked myself in my room and took maybe two hours and just wrote a bunch of words down and connected them to sound like a song. For once my mind had just gone blank and I couldn’t stop thinking and feeling that song, like I knew what it was supposed to sound like, I knew what the lyrics were supposed to mean. I just knew everything. And I miss that feeling, that feeling of like- '' He broke off his sentence when he looked back up to my eyes. It seemed like he was talking more to himself than to me. He swallowed hard and looked back at the pencil still in hand.

“Well, I'm sorry you don’t feel free anymore. I wish there was something I could do to make you feel like that again-”

“No, please don’t feel like that. It’s just something that had just recently started happening, something I really just can’t fix…” His voice gets softer and softer the more he spoke.

“Have you spoken to your manager about it?” I asked. “He’s super nice from what I understand. And he’ll probably have better answers than your friend who can barely play the piano, let alone produce an entire song.”

Jake laughed before I had the chance to. “ See, now you're underestimating yourself. Remember that song from freshman year? The one about-- what was his name, Josh?” Jake teased. I grabbed a pillow and slammed it into the back of his head. “Oh my gosh, I thought we promised we’d never bring it up again!”

Jake chuckled and laid his arm on the couch completely turning towards me. “How about we sneak out and go get ice cream and try to not wake up your mom in the process?”

I suddenly jumped to my feet when I have the perfect idea on how to cheer up the gloomy Mr. Shim. “Or, we could do something even better!”

“Urgh!” Jake groaned.

I grabbed my phone and hooked it up to the speaker. I was going to turn on his hit song Drunk-Dazed as a joke, but Jake needed this break from his career, so instead, I crunk up Beyonce as loud as it could go without disturbing my mom who slept upstairs. I turn back to Jake and reach out for his hands, already moving my hips to the music.

He shook his head and threw it back onto the couch as if throwing a temper tantrum. “I literally dance for a living.”

“Okay but this will be different, I promise.” I grabbed the piles of papers on the ground and threw them in the trash, I then pushed the coffee table near the wall and piled his folders and books neatly on top.

“Come on, cowboy!” I grabbed his hands and helped him up. He was reluctant to get up, but he threw one last groan before standing on his feet.

“This will get the brain juices flowing again!” I told him. I go back to my phone and switch it to one of my favorite Beyonce songs that she covered, At Last.

I sang dramatically to get Jake to smile, and luckily, it worked. I placed both my hands over his shoulders and swayed us back and forth, still miming the song as overly exaggerated as I could. Jake still couldn’t help but smile, and it didn’t take him long to join me in the rhythm and sway naturally with me. I learned at our middle school dance that Jake had perfect rhythm. He was able to impress the rest of the crowd when he busted out moves from BTS. Everyone was impressed, including me.

Now we were on a steady roll. I accidentally stepped on his feet a few times, but it was fine seeing as I was wearing foam flip-flops and he was barefooted. After a while, the song switched and played another of my favorites that didn’t match our style of dance, but we still moved slowly to the beat. Jake tried twirling me, but since I have two left feet, I almost ended up hitting the wall each time and Jake laughed loud at my clumsiness. The moonlight from the kitchen had now switched to the window in the living room. It gleamed through and glistened on Jake like a spotlight, just like the ones on the stage did for him. In a split second, I was reminded that he wouldn’t be here forever, just like he wasn’t here for the past year. I tried to not let it settle on my face that I was scared to see him go again, so I played up on the fun we were having now. Jake looked like he was at ease; finally, since he’d been here, he looked genuinely happy and I wasn’t going to ruin that.

After another handful of songs full of laughs and giggles, we were soon sweating and taking deeper breaths than normal. Each song was different from the one before, but it didn’t stop us from sticking to our style of dance. Even with the simplicity of the moves and the slowness of the steps, I had to take a minute to relax. I hooked my arms around his neck and rested my entire body on his. I could feel Jake’s own sweat seeping through his shirt, But I didn’t mind the wetness that was now attached to my cheek. I thought he would act awkward and ask for me to pull away, but instead, he gripped tighter on my hips and started slowly moving me side to side. I let out a long overdue sigh, trying my best to match the steady breathing of Jake’s with my own. It was actually therapeutic: hearing his heartbeat in one ear and the softness of the music in the other.

I tried to continue our steady breathing together, but his had picked up a bit, almost out of nowhere. I felt the heat of his breath on the nape of my neck, and it made my entire body tingle in a way it never had before. After this sudden feeling, I realized just how close we really were. His leg hair tickled my legs, I could feel the bone of his foot connecting to mine, I could feel his thin waist against mine as well. I felt like I needed to back up, but instead, I couldn’t and continued to sway softly against him. A few seconds later, Jake’s hands rose a little higher, planting themselves on my waist and tightening their grip as if they were trying to pull me closer than we already were.

The sensation hadn’t stopped though, it clung to my body like my damp shorts did on my thighs. Sooner or later I felt pressure on the lower part of my stomach and thought for sure that Jake was messing around and wasn’t feeling what I was, which indicated that I needed to pull back before this feeling became too much.

This is so embarrassing. I thought. How could I let myself feel like this? How was this in any way okay? I finally pulled back, the sensation becoming too unbearable, and glanced up at his face. His pupils were large in a way I hadn’t seen before. His mouth was slightly open and a drop of sweat slowly traced down his forehead, onto his nose. That pressure I was feeling on my stomach had now doubled in force, and Jake's face had switched from calm and subtle, to alarmed and panicked...

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(part 2 possibly...?)

Thank you guys so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed it! Please, leave any constructive criticism you have on helping improve my writing!

————✧————

None of the images are mine, They all belong to their rightful owners :)

[1kook]

disney+ & bust

this is part of my netflix & chill collection !

summary; There’s a pounding on your door a little past noon, so hard and rough, that you almost think it’s the police finally coming to catch you for all your years of illegally pirating Phineas and Ferb. It’s not. It’s just a really drunk boyfriend wailing for your forgiveness at the door.  warnings; arguments, feelings of insecurity, bit of asshole jk, smut in the forms of degradation, dumbification, choking, fingering, spit kink, self punishment, unprotected but [ passionate ] sex, jk losing his cool, return of mean jk, he is actually an emotional mess in this one wtf miscellaneous; ANGST, anniversaries, the L word😳, app developer kook, rip ‘pretty girl’ </3, we all become phineas and ferb stans word count; 13k !!

notes; me: *writes couple who’s whole arc is being silly* y’all: MAKE THEM SUFFER GIVE US ANGST!! u ask I deliver so now we all suffer 😐 ngl it was hard writing this fic n u might notice there’s some parts that seem weird n that’s bc this was TWO fics w diff wording but I ended up mixing them bc I’m insane. still had a lot of fun! felt like I challenged myself!! not proofread bc when I say we suffer we SUFFER

please let me know what you think!!! a simple ask goes a long way <3

previous part: kissanime & foreplay

Approximately one week after The Bullet Bestie’s rise to prominence, Jungkook grows annoyed with it as his weirdly competitive nature rears its ugly head the more and more orgasms that little vibrator coaxes out of you. It turns on a weird switch in him, something slightly stuck up and snooty that he’ll never admit to out loud but is there nonetheless. By the following Friday, The Bullet Bestie is nestled deep in your garbage can and Jungkook’s back to pleasuring you with his tongue and fingers alone.

He had those moments in him, the ones where he liked to think he was better than any and everyone else, and occasionally they manifested against inanimate objects like a bullet vibrator.

Despite his polite and generally soft exterior, you catch glimpses of that cocky spirit more than anyone else. Over the past year, you’ve come to realize that Jungkook’s personality was like a coin that had been left out in the sun too long. He had this sweet and reserved nature you saw most times, a kindhearted boyfriend who adored you almost as much as you adored him. He was your angel whom you knew had a heart of gold, even if you were slowly bringing out his more childish tendencies. You knew him like the back of your hand, knew what his mom’s favorite color was and how he liked to stack the plates in his cabinet according to size and make. It was a side that was rusted from years of being out in the sun, basking in its adoring warmth, and you loved every inch about it.

And still, there was this other side to him you rarely saw. This cocky asshole who hid beneath the soft smiles and careful hands, making his appearance only through sly smirks and a tongue prodding against the inside of his cheek. He was a braggart, a man who knew his greatness yielded for no one and wanted that fact shoved down everyone’s faces. This Jungkook, this other side that never saw the light of day, was like the Hyde to his Jekyll. An unexpected, almost mean side to him that only dared make his appearance when his exhilaration was at an all-time high. Like when he was fucking you into another dimension, or kicking your ass in Mario Kart, or like now, when he was receiving an award at an annual tech ceremony.

On the eve of your one year anniversary, Jungkook’s company invites him to an awards ceremony for other web and app developers like him. It’s a grand event, filled with all the biggest nerds in the developing industry here to present the baby nerds with awards. Jungkook lies somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, both a seasoned player and a rookie all at once. He spends the night tolling you around in a floor-length gown and fangirling over all the “legends” in the room.

You know next to none of these people and none of their accomplishments but still pretend you respect them to hell and back. By the end of the main dinner, you’re sympathizing with Barbie’s ever-smiling features because your cheeks feel sore.

Towards the end of the night, Jungkook wins that random award— okay, who were you fooling? He wins the Platinum Mobile Standard of Excellence Award, recognizing him for all the hard work you’ve seen him put in this past year. It’s probably the highest recognition he can receive at this point in his career. It was an esteemed award that was bestowed upon only the most innovative developer of the year among tech companies, something Jungkook had briefly mentioned he always wanted. It’s basically the equivalent of placing first place in his field, but given Jungkook’s competitive industry and his young age, you think it’s like telling all these old Facebook lords to suck his big fat cock. (But that was your job when you got home.)

He gives a short little thank you speech, promising to work hard and own up to this title. The people around you are swooning, obviously endeared with his soft puppy dog features and melodic voice. They don’t know him like you do, don’t know that uppity twist to his grin like you do. It doesn’t slip off his face even when he steps down off the stage, arms wide open as he comes barreling towards you. Even with you in his arms, the congratulations that are thrown from every direction ring loudly in his ears and swell that ego of his.

The night goes like that for the most part, Jungkook’s acquaintances approaching him every few minutes to rain down their praises. He goes a little crazy at the open bar after a while, shoving the gold trophy into your arms as his beloved work seniors whisk him off for drinks. You don’t mind because you resigned yourself to a night of playing Jungkook’s perfectly perfect partner anyway, watching him politely mingling with his coworkers. Despite his earlier success, you know he won’t brag about it verbally. No, he’ll wait until the two of you get home—your place or his—and remind you how amazing he is with a quick snap of his hips.

As you said, he’ll never boast aloud.

However, that doesn’t mean you won’t.

“That’s my boyfriend,” you explain to the seventh person that greets you that night, excitedly pointing to where said boyfriend was slowly losing all sense of self by the bar. You don’t know anyone here beside Jungkook, and you’re pretty sure no one in their hammered minds is going to remember who you are anyway, so a little gloating never hurt anyone. “He won the ‘I’m Better Than Everyone Else’ award tonight,” you emphasize to the tipsy woman beside you who only laughs at your exaggeration. You assume she’s like you, accompanying one of the many developers here, because as soon as you finish boasting about Jungkook she moves to brag about someone too.

Truth be told, you spend the whole night re-analyzing the Zootopia movie you saw on Disney+ the other night in your head. So if the little fox fellow didn’t control himself would the city have fallen to ruins? Why was the useless sheep girl so evil and bitter? Why was there an unreal amount of romantic tension between the fox and the rabbit? Whatever, you’ll have to rewatch it some other night, and with your new Disney+ account, you could watch it anywhere you wanted to.

Now, you had never bothered to purchase a Disney+ subscription or even tried to swindle Jungkook for his password before. As far as you know, Disney+ was filled with old tv shows from your childhood, sitcoms that made you laugh when you were ten. There’s nothing wrong with that, but personally, you were a firm believer that that which was perfect should not be touched once finished; in other words, you were utterly terrified you’d rewatch an old episode of The Wizards of Waverly Place, only to find out the same joke you’ve been regurgitating for the past ten years doesn’t actually go that way.

However, the harsh reality was that Disney+ was good for a few things. Ugh, you hate when giant corporations provide decent services. Aside from Zootopia, you’ve watched about every animated media on there as well, all of which you replay in your mind as Jungkook has the time of his life with these nerds, knocking back champagne glass after champagne glass.

Anyway, the night ends a little past midnight, and Jungkook who is buzzed on alcohol and high on exhilaration ends up calling an Uber for the two of you. Your apartment— the new one he had not only helped you hunt for but also helped you move into, greatly cutting the cost of movers out with those glistening biceps and thick thighs —is still going through her rebellious phase where the potted plants are trying to take over, courtesy of Kim Namjoon. So for now, there’s a potted plant in an awkward corner that both of you stub your toe against on your way to your bedroom.

You’re thinking Jungkook is going to go to town tonight, given the fact he’s on Cloud 9 and has had his ego stroked by a bunch of dudes for the past couple hours. Maybe you guys can try out the hot role-playing scenario you saw on GirlsWay a few weeks ago, or the handcuffs you impulsively bought from Amazon one Monday night. Or maybe, and this one really makes you flutter, he’ll let you fully take the reins for once.

All those lewd fantasies end up being for naught because just as you shimmy out of your gown (with the help of his hands, of course) and turn to climb him like a tree, he’s on the other side of the room getting your makeup remover out for you. And also talking. A lot. And way more than usual.

“Did you see him, babe?” he sighs, dare you to say, dreamily, handing you the cotton pads as he begins pulling a million pins out of your hair. Slowly and with a lot of confusion, you pull your fake lashes off and begin cleaning your face. “He was amazing.”

“Uh-huh,” you say, having absolutely no idea who ‘he’ is or why Jungkook is so in love with him and not you at this very moment. “But so were you,” you add. Perfect. Stroke his ego and then stroke his cock.

Jungkook sputters at your praise. He’s carefully placing your hairpins on your thigh, cheeks flaming red every time he leans over you. “Was I?” he murmurs, voice sweet in that cute little way it always gets when he’s downed one too many shots of whiskey, enough to be buzzed but not enough to be wasted.

You turn and the pins clatter to the floor and across the bedsheets. “Yes,” you confirm, ignoring his sad huff at the mess you’ve made. Instead, you grab him by the collar of that pink button-up he taunted you with all night. “You were fucking incredible and I think incredible men deserve to have their dick sucked.”

Jungkook laughs at your vulgar statement, holding you gently by the hips as you climb into his lap. “Is that so?” The soft, shy persona is gone now, replaced by the gentle stirring beneath his dress pants. You nod hurriedly, plopping down on his lap and running your hands through his styled hair.

“Yes,” you confirm, kissing the corner of his mouth. “Luckily for you, I know this nymphomaniac who would gladly gobble up your cock at your every command.”

He snorts just as you push him into his back, nose adorably scrunched up. “First of all, you know I hate that word,” he chuckles, finally gracing you with a sweet peck that only makes you want him to fuck you into the fifth dimension. “Secondly, please don’t ever say you’ll gobble my cock up ever again.”

Something inside of you squeals with excitement as he rolls the two of you over, firm body pressing down on yours. “Oh, baby,” you groan, lazily throwing a leg over his hip. Jungkook grins and then decides to entertain you for a few minutes with a sloppy kiss.

You say a few minutes because just as things are heating up, he pulls away. He smiles apologetically. “As much as I’d love to be here with you, I actually have an early morning tomorrow.”

You frown at the sudden change in events. “Huh? They’re gonna make you work the morning after a Gatsby party?” you gasp, sitting up as he gets off of you. With every step he takes away from the bed your heart breaks a little more. “They can’t do that— that’s illegal!”

From the doorway he levels you with a comically raised brow. “No, it’s not.”

You scamper after him down the hall, watch the muscles in his back flex as he pulls his suit jacket on. “You can’t work on our anniversary— that’s illegal!” you offer instead.

He stops at your front door, feet squeezed back into his shoes. “Baby, it’s not,” he rolls his eyes, leaning down to peck your forehead. “It was either I work in the morning or work at night,” he explains, giving your messy hair a soothing caress. He’s looking at you with those eyes, the ones that make your heart lodge itself into your throat and make life a tightrope experience. There’s a devastatingly lovesick part of you that wants this moment, this kind face, to be engraved into your mind for the rest of your life. You want this to be the first and last thought you have and nothing else: just Jungkook’s adoring gaze on you for the rest of time.

The moment ends too soon when he flutters one last peck against your lips. “I’ll be done in the afternoon, okay?”

You pout. “Okay, your place?” you huff, making sure to get one last octopus squeeze around his waist. He nods. “Promise you won’t be late?”

The corners of his gaze soften. “You know I won’t,” he smiles, leaning down to bump your noses together playfully. “Can’t stay away from my pretty girl too long. Besides, I have a gift for you tomorrow.”

It’s with that sentiment and a hammering heart that you let him go. With Jungkook gone, there’s really nothing for you to do now. You took the next two days off in preparation for your anniversary sex, so you don’t have to head to sleep early like usual.

With nothing else planned, you decide on rewatching that Zootopia movie that had plagued you all night, ready to dissect every plot hole to hell and back. You don’t think Jungkook’s seen this movie yet so you add it to your long list of animated movies you’re forcing him to watch.

Part of you is actually really surprised Jungkook left. Well, kinda sorta, very, but not really. Jungkook was a good boy, that much was obvious. He took his job seriously, and if his job wanted him to come in at the asscrack of dawn, then he’d come in before the sun even rose. He was a goody-two-shoes, but even so, you were occasionally able to bring out that darker side in him.

Jungkook working, like actually working in an office setting, was pretty rare though. The dude had a chill job that let him stay home most of the time, and essentially clock in whenever he wanted. Every now and then you were able to convince him to stay, tucking him beneath your body or the covers, depending on the night, and refusing to let him go the morning after.

Once he had eaten you out until the wee hours of the day, ravenous between your thighs, and then went to work the next morning like he hadn’t broken you. Another time you had persuaded him into watching every season of the 2017 DuckTales reboot through the night. When the alarm had rung in the middle of the season finale, he had simply gotten into your shower and gone off to work.

So maybe you were a little confident in your skills, and Jungkook slipping between your fingers tonight was a huge bummer. But there was no use crying over spilled milk, you tell yourself, flinging your bra off somewhere in the corner as you snuggle back into your sheets. You’re ready to tear this Zootopia movie apart, scene by scene.

Even though your apartment is a little cold, you’re comforted by the fact Jungkook will be here to keep you warm all day tomorrow.

All men do is lie.

Despite his promise to come home early the next day, Jungkook ends up lying. The meeting he had been in all morning— the same one that had stopped you from getting bent like a pretzel the night before —drags on well past noon. Then, Kim Namjoon, AKA Jungkook’s favorite senpai in the entire world, catches wind of Jungkook’s success last night and absolutely has to take him out to lunch to celebrate.

You scoff, glaring down at your phone and the impulsive messages you’d sent out an hour ago when Jungkook had first texted you telling you he would be late.

You whirl around to stomp off in the direction of his living room, where all of yours and Jungkook’s favorite foods were growing colder by the minute. You had spent the longest time carefully laying them out, making sure the fried chicken was closer than the pizza but not closer than the breadsticks. Truthfully it’s a nightmare. There are about eight stomach aches worth of food sitting on his coffee table, the greasy stench makes you gag and will certainly stick to your hair for weeks, but none of that mattered because it was all for your beau.

Your very late beau who was making you grow more and more agitated with each minute that passed. Ugh! How inconsiderate of him to test your patience on a day like this. You didn’t want to be upset with him, but this was your first, real milestone as a couple with him. You had wanted to spend the whole day cuddled up, maybe finally tell him how much he really meant to you— definitely not waking up alone with eyeliner crusted eyes and an aching heart.

Deciding you’re being a little too dramatic, you head into the bedroom to calm down. This was fine, you tell yourself, carefully laying out the damn near harlotrous lingerie you had yet to put on. Jungkook would come over soon and everything would be A-okay.

Except for the part it’s actually F-not okay because soon it’s nearing sunset and the food has gone cold so you’ve stocked it into the fridge, and the pretty sheer bra has a wonky wire that’s two seconds away from piercing through your heart, but that doesn’t even matter because Jungkook being late for your all-day anniversary celebration has already ripped it to shreds anyway.  

You plop down on the couch in defeat, impulsively opening up the Disney+ app to cry through another episode of Phineas and Ferb. You’ve abandoned the satin robe that came with the lingerie in favor of donning a big t-shirt that smells like him and makes your heart hurt even more. The setting sun paints the living room in muted oranges, the chirping of birds outside the soundtrack to your lonely day.

You end up watching some other cartoon on Disney+, avoiding the Marvel section because you had promised Jungkook he could be there when you lost your Marvel virginity. Well, at least one of you was good at keeping promises, you think bitterly. For a second, you think about randomly watching one of the infamous MCU films out of order just to spite him. But then you think of that soft puppy gaze and how disappointed he’d be in you.

Whatever! It wouldn’t ever match up to the way you felt now.

Anyway, you circle back. When you’re five episodes into Phineas and Ferb you hear the doorknob rattle.

You sit up just as the door swings open, visible from your spot on the couch. He meets your gaze almost immediately, big doe eyes caught in the act. What act? You’re not really sure. In fact, you don’t even know what you’re looking at when he walks in because he’s drowning in shopping bags. His lips twist into a grin. “Honey, I’m home,” he says playfully.

You don’t laugh.

Jungkook frowns, dumping all his bags down at the entrance before waddling over towards you. “Hey, what’s wrong?” he asks, coming to stand before you and cupping your face in his hands. He’s towering over you, so tall and gorgeous but for the first time, you’re not dazed by his beauty.

“Kook, you said you’d be back hours ago,” you say slowly, avoiding his gaze. You try to keep the frustration out of your voice, but you’ve had hours to dwell on it now, and those annoying cartoon characters, though charming at first, had only served to multiply your annoyance.  

Jungkook blinks, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. “I mean… yeah. But I got you presents?” he beams, glancing back at the mountainous pile he made by the door. You look over too. There are some luxury bags squeezed in between other shops you like, the occasional jewelers' logo on the side.

You stand with a sigh, sauntering off into the kitchen with him on your tail. “I don’t want presents,” you mumble, reaching to pour yourself a glass of water. You’re briefly aware of how childish you must seem. Jungkook hovers behind you.

“What? Yes, you do,” he says. “You had an entire wishlist on my Amazon of things you wanted.” It’s his turn to level you with an unreadable expression, slowly crossing his arms over his chest.

Your frown only deepens as you turn to match his stance against the counter. While it may be true that you did indeed have an entire list of impulsive items on his Amazon, that didn’t necessarily mean you wanted them all. Sometimes you just wanted to stare longingly at a pair of satin gloves without actually buying them. You don’t know how to explain this much to him. “They’re not…” you stop with another deep breath. “Forget it. Thank you for the presents.”

Now it’s Jungkook’s turn to question you. “What,” he says in an unimpressed tone, padding over to you before you can escape back into the living room to watch the entire princess movie collection on Disney+. “No, tell me what’s wrong.”

For some reason, that’s exactly what you don’t want to hear. “Jungkook,” you say flatly, narrowing your eyes at him. “You come home six hours after you said you would without telling me why, and normally I wouldn’t care, but today was supposed to be a special day for us.”

Jungkook reels at your bluntness. “Babe, I was out getting stuff for you. I know it’s our anniversary— that’s why I wanted to treat you,” he responds, oddly condescendingly like you’re a child who doesn’t understand what exactly he was doing.

You brush his hands away from your shoulders. “Yeah,” you huff. “Now I know that. But I spent all day waiting for you,” you stress, chest puffing as you grow more and more agitated by his inability to understand you. God, can he let you go now? At least a bunch of animated, geometrically drawn cartoons won’t question you like this and make you feel as childish as he was.

When he doesn’t say anything else you stomp back into the living room, snatching up your phone from its forgotten spot against the couch. “I’m going to bed.”

At that Jungkook seems to kickstart back to life. “What? ___, it’s barely six,” he says as he follows after you into your bedroom. You ignore him, shuffling beneath the covers. In all actuality, you’re going to bed to mope and watch more animated family shows, maybe cry under the guise of the plot just being so sad. Jungkook sits beside you just as you click back on to finish off your episode. “Baby, I don’t get it,” he sighs. “You’re always talking about how much you want this or that, and I go out and get you it all but now you’re mad?”

You bite down on your lip, eyes lasered in on the pictures moving before you. “Jungkook, just forget it.”

“No,” he says, more sternly than he’s ever been with you before. “If there’s a problem, tell me.” There’s a heavy pause, and then he says, “don’t make me waste my time guessing what’s wrong, okay?” 

“Waste your time?” you scoff, sitting up with pinched brows that you find match his. “I’m not trying to waste anyone’s time— in fact, that’s hot coming from you, Jungkook.”

He rolls his eyes. “What are you even saying? You’re mad because I took a little long getting presents, for you, might I add,” he huffs, plopping down on the edge of the mattress beside your knee. “You’re always saying you want this and that, but you can’t handle me going out to get those things? Do you hear how weird you sound?”

You whip the covers off of you. “Me talking about things doesn’t always mean I want them,” you defend.

Jungkook snorts. “Yes, it does,” he says. “Anytime you ramble about stuff for minutes like a little kid it’s because you want me to buy it for you.”

You blink. “Like a little kid?” you repeat, stunned by his comparison. Granted, you always knew you were the more childish of the two, but you never thought that would equate Jungkook thinking of you as a child. Something red and nasty flares in your chest. “Well sorry,” you spit, crossing your arms over your chest defensively, “sorry we all can’t be perfectly mature golden boys who would never see the light of day if I constantly wasn’t dragging them out.” You know it’s a somewhat low blow, especially because Jungkook’s told you before how his introverted tendencies were a sensitive issue growing up, but you can’t help it.

Jungkook groans, dropping his head into his hands. “Baby, don’t do this now,” he warns, digging the heels of his palms into his eyes. “Stop acting like this.”

“Like how?” you spit, “like a kid?” Jungkook says nothing, leveling you with a blank stare from the corner of his eye. You roll your eyes, phone falling off your lap. Another episode of Phineas and Ferb had started, the corny opening tune filling the space between the two of you. “At least now I know what you think of me,” you mutter over the guitar riff.

“Oh my god,” Jungkook blurts, sitting up wildly. “Of course I’m gonna think of you as a stupid little kid, look at you,” he seethes, gesturing at the phone beside you. You flinch. “All you do is watch kids shows and whine whenever I wanna watch anything normal adults watch. You complain every single day about the most normal things, like your job? Why should I fucking care that you’re working a dead-end office job in a field you didn’t even study for— that’s not my problem, __!” he snaps, eyes narrowed into little slits. “I just won an award last night,” he says suddenly, voice back to its regular volume. “I’m at the height of my career and I’m only going up, but I can’t even enjoy that because I have to come home and cater to you,” he finishes, a loud scoff punctuating the final word.

You had never imagined Jungkook finally bragging about himself would be at your expense.

A beat of silence passes, the angry glint in his eyes quickly fading away the longer you don’t say anything. You sniff once, turning your head idly to the side where Phineas and Ferb is still blaring loudly from your phone speaker. Picking up the device, you throw it across the room where it hits his closet door with a terrifying bang the breaks the silence.

The sound snaps Jungkook out of whatever shock he’d been in. “Baby…” he says slowly, carefully, like you’re a caged animal that’s just escaped the zoo.

“I’m going home,” you say, also a little too calmly. You saunter over towards his closet where your shattered phone screen glares up at you as you yank a pair of sweats off a hanger. Jungkook is still frozen on the edge of the bed, watching you with wide eyes as you move about the room.

It’s when you’re in the hallway leading downstairs that Jungkook finally snaps out of his daze, scampering behind you as you descend the stairs. “Baby,” he rushes out, loudly bounding down after you, “___, wait,” he gasps, catching you by the kitchen counter collecting your keys. “I-I didn't mean that,” he rushes out, eyes wide and frantic as they flicker over your expression. “I don’t think that—I don’t, baby, please, just… let me explain, please.”

“Jungkook, let go of me,” you respond, shaking your wrist in an attempt to release yourself. He’s not even holding you tightly— he never would—but the sound of your heart pounding in your ears makes your movements jerky and erratic. “I wanna go home.”

“No,” he chokes, cornering you against the counter. “No, baby, please just listen to me, I-I—“

“You what, Jungkook?” you snap, placing a hand on his chest and forcefully pushing him away. He lets you, stepping back with a wobbly bottom lip. “You need to tell me how you’re too good for me? How much I hold you down because I wasn’t lucky enough to get a job like yours straight out of college?” He says nothing, swallowing roughly as you jab a finger into his chest. “Well let me tell you something,” you snarl, chest heaving, “I may be childish and a huge complainer, but I’m not stupid enough to let someone walk all over me like this.”

With that, you make your great escape. Truthfully, you don’t want him to see the tears in your eyes as you yank his door open, stomping down his steps and in the direction of the nearest bus stop. The door opens right after you tug it shut, painting your shadow across the sidewalk. There’s the scrambled sound of house slippers against the concrete that follows you down. “Go the fuck back inside,” you snap without missing a beat.

Sensing your obvious anger, he pauses before he can reach you. “Text me when you get home?” he calls out quietly.

“No,” you respond.

You would never admit to anyone that you spend the entire night eating a tub of mint chocolate ice cream. It’s disgusting and makes you gag, but it’s the only one you have in your apartment. And of course, it was brought over by none other than Jeon Jungkook himself a few days ago. Even when you’re trying to comfort yourself over how mean he was, on your anniversary night no less, you’re plagued by thoughts of him everywhere.

As much as you want to brush his words off, put on that cool girl exterior you’ve maintained since high school, there’s something different about this situation. You guess it’s impossible to brush off such hateful words when they come from someone you love and adore so much.

Were you too childish? You had always believed that side of you was what made your relationship with Jungkook so perfect. The two of you meshed well because of your differences, like yin and yang. So how had he been able to so easily deconstruct every inch of that balance in a matter of a few seconds? Was this perfect reality all in your head this whole time?

You want to tell yourself it was just a heat of the moment outburst from Jungkook, give him the benefit of the doubt because he’s never snapped at you like this before. Of course you’ve fought a couple of times in the past year, but neither of you had ever stooped as low as you did yesterday. Furthermore, the insecure part of your brain says he obviously felt this somewhere in his heart to bring it up at all. What he had said to you wasn’t something someone could make up on the spot.

You don’t text him when you get home, partly to spite him, but mainly because you had left your phone at his place anyway. You know he tried calling you last night because the call log is synced up to your laptop. He called on and off for about thirty minutes before he probably found your phone in his room. Whatever, he can mope in his regret for all you care

—is what you wanna say, but the longer he goes without showing himself to you the more your insecurities and hurt fester. Was this it? Was this the end of what was probably the best year of your life? It’s too painful to think about, to even consider the possibility that Jungkook might have gained a new insight last night and decided, hey, maybe this is for the best after all.

You drown yourself in an ungodly amount of sugar for breakfast, your laptop blaring yet another episode of Phineas and Ferb on the dining table. Muscle memory has you making Jungkook’s favorite pancakes before you can stop yourself, and by the time you do realize, you’ve resigned yourself to the blueberry smell anyway.

There’s a pounding on your door a little past noon, so hard and rough, that you almost think it’s the police finally coming to catch you for all your years of illegally pirating Phineas and Ferb.

It’s not.

It’s just a really drunk boyfriend wailing for your forgiveness at the door. You open the door with a fright, jumping back when he slumps forward and almost crashes face-first into the floor. “You didn’t call,” Jungkook cries, leaning a little too much of his weight onto you when you reach out to steady him.

The thundering of your heart slows upon registering it’s him. “Kook?” you frown, nose pinched at the ungodly stench of alcohol wafting off his clothes. “Have you been drinking?” you ask even though the answer is staring you right in the face (and in the nose).

He groans, staggering deeper into your arms. You blindly push the door shut behind him, resigning yourself to this new situation while your pancakes grow cold in the other room. “Baaaby,” he slurs, letting you guide him into the living space. He’s unceremoniously dumped onto the couch, half-opened eyes gazing up at you. “Let me,” a hiccup, “explain.”

You won’t lie. There’s a very obvious sense of discomfort sitting in your chest, torn between two paths that you don’t wish to choose between. His skin is warm and flushed like he’s just walked all the way here in this morning sun. You step over to the window that faces down onto the street below. There’s no sign of his car; you would have killed him if he ever tried to drive in this state.

“Did you walk here?” you ask instead, deciding there’s no need for one singular path, not when you can walk straight down the middle, both cleaning him and grilling him at the same time.

Jungkook’s response is delayed, head lolling from side to side as you help him out of his sweater. His skin is sweaty beneath, scorching to the touch. “Uh-huh,” he groans. Jesus, you sort of assumed but him confirming it really set things into perspective.

By no means did you and Jungkook live on opposite ends of the earth. On a good day, a drive from your place to his took about ten minutes. But walking? Easily an hour. Had he walked all the way from his place, drunk on top of that?

You brush his hair away from his face, his eyes fluttering shut at your touch. His lips are pouty yet chapped, dehydrated from the sun and the alcohol he reeks of. “Sit up for me,” you instruct, scampering off to your room for chapstick and water.

“Anything for you,” Jungkook wheezes, throat probably dryer than a desert. When you return, he’s two seconds from face planting into the coffee table and breaking that pretty face of his. You catch him with a hand on his shoulder, keeping him balanced. “Tell me what to do,” he chokes out, voice hoarse.

“Just need you to drink some water,” you say, pressing a cup against his lips. He drinks it, but a drop still dribbles down his chin.

“No,” he groans, catching your wrist in his hand when you reach up to apply some chapstick on him. “Tell me what to do,” he stresses, “to fix this. Fix us.”

His words make you pause, the tube of chapstick hovering over his plush lips. “You don’t have to do anything,” you respond quietly, trying to finish the application so you can pull away.

Jungkook doesn’t let you go. You try to look away, but there’s something about him that looks off. Maybe it’s the raw skin under his eyes, red and swollen. Or the sad droop to those same eyes that hold you captive. Or maybe it’s the subtle tremble in his hands, the fingers that hold tightly to your wrist, not to keep you there but to ground himself. “I don’t wanna lose you,” he rasps out, shakily bringing your hand to his mouth, where he presses one airy kiss to your knuckles. “Tell me ho-how to fix this and I’ll do it,” he pleads, a vulnerable look in his eyes.

Unable to withstand the sheer amount of agony on his expression, you look away. “___, please,” he chokes out, stumbling off the couch in his drunk and desperate haze until he’s kneeling in front of you. “I can’t… I can’t,” he sniffles, tears clouding those pretty eyes you’ve come to love so much. “I don’t know who I am without you.”

You clench your jaw. “You’re Jeon Jungkook,” you murmur, slipping your hand out of his hold to run through his hair. It’s knotted and a little too greasy, two things Jungkook would usually never allow. “This year’s Platinum Mobile Standard of Excellence Award recipient,” you remind him, trailing your thumb across his cheekbone when he turns to look up at you with those big Bambi eyes. “Sweet and shy, but you love being rowdy with your friends. You love movies and TV and organizing your shirts according to fabric type. You work harder than anyone I know and never complain. You date me, even though I’m a huge child,” you smile sadly.

“No!” he jumps, turning that frantic stare back into you. “Y-You’re not— it’s not,” he stammers, words still slurring together. “I’m a liar,” he cries, resting his forehead on your knees. His shoulders shake. “I don’t deserve you,” he weeps quietly. You place a hand on his shoulder. “Y-Y-You make my life so much better, ___, so colorful and fun. I-I wish I knew you in high school,” he admits, “maybe I wouldn’t have been so emotionally constipated now.”

“You’re not,” you reassure him softly.

He disagrees. “You bring out the best,” he hiccups, “the best in me.” Your heart skips in your chest. “I-I love you, you know that?”

You sputter, eyes wide at his sudden confession. “I… love you so much, y’know? I think about you ev-every night, ___,” he rambles, eyes dreamily gazing off into some miscellaneous spot on the wall behind you. “I can’t get you out of my head. Like you're a song, o-on repeat but it’s not annoying because it’s my favorite song, and I could listen to it for the rest of my life, y’know? My favorite song, I know all the words b-because it’s all I think about! I love... My love… I love you so much.”

“Kook,” you rush out, cheeks flaming as you try to pull him away from where he’s slumped over your legs. His passionate speech has you abuzz, body tingling everywhere until you feel overwhelmed, head spinning like you’re on a rollercoaster. “Let’s get you to bed.”

He nods sleepily, seemingly coming down from whatever alcohol induced rampage has allowed him to walk for an hour straight in this searing heat just to confess to you. “Y-You don’t have to say it back,” he continues to stutter as you guide him through the living room on wobbly legs. “I just-I just— can I?” he babbles. “Can I love you, ___?”

You pass through the kitchen space, where whatever you were watching on Disney+ is blaring loudly. It distracts Jungkook for about two seconds before his attention returns to you. When you don’t answer, he presses on. “Is that okay?” he asks, whirling around to face you, catching your shoulders in his hands. He towers over you by the entrance to your bedroom, dark curls tickling your forehead. His eyes are dark and glazed over, both in tears and an emotion so raw and unfiltered it squeezes around your chest until you can’t breathe. “Is it okay for me to love you?” he murmurs softly, knocking his nose against yours.

Your cheeks blaze. “Yes, th-that’s fine, Kook,” you blubber, placing a hand over his chest, where his heart is also hammering away. “Just need you to go rest now, okay?”

He nods sleepily, nudging your nose with his one last time, like a soft almost-kiss, before letting you push him into the room. “Yes, yes,” he breathes, his body finally crashing from his adrenaline spike. He flops down onto the bed unceremoniously, dark waves fanning across your pillows. You try to wiggle him out of his shirt, but it only gets about halfway up his chest before he blindly reaches for the covers. His legs stick out awkwardly, clad in the sweatpants you’ve come to associate with him.

When he’s all swaddled up in your blanket he finally goes limp, tiny snores leaving his lips as he dozes away from reality. You sigh, pressing a palm to his forehead. He’s still warm and clammy, but at this point, there’s nothing you can do but wait for him to sober up.

With a final kiss to his forehead, you leave the room, closing the door behind you before sliding against the wooden surface. There’s a trapped bird in your chest, wildly flapping its wings in an effort to get out, and it’s all stupid Jungkook’s fault in the next room. Stupid Jungkook who demolished and remodeled your heart all in less than twenty-four hours. It doesn’t calm down, even when you rush off into the kitchen for a glass of water, or when you try to immerse yourself in some other show on Disney+. It stays beating against your ribs and your chest until you’re forcing yourself to sit down on the couch and process.

He wakes up a little before dinner. You hear him from the living room, where you’re flicking through the options on Disney+ for the nth time that day. You’ve seen the first fifteen minutes of about twenty different series and movies by now, always growing antsy and abandoning them early on. The only reason you know he’s awake is because the shower turns on for a few minutes, and then his bare feet are heard padding across the hallway back into your room.

By the time he resurfaces in the living room, you’ve resigned yourself to just more Phineas and Ferb, nonchalantly watching the silly cartoon. (Except you’re anything but nonchalant, and your heartbeat rings in your ears.)

Jungkook hovers by the door, clad in a pair of shorts he’s left here before, and a t-shirt you stole from him. “Hey,” he says quietly, lingering by the doorframe. You nod back in response. “Can I watch with you?” Again, another nod.  

Slinking over to the couch, he’s rather careful as he sits down, leaving a few inches of space between the two of you. You don’t even think he can see the screen of your laptop until he murmurs, “he’s my favorite character,” when Perry the Platypus appears on the screen.

You hum. “Thought you didn’t like these kids shows?” you ask. You don’t mean it to sound as petty and backhanded as it comes out, but that’s really no one's fault but his own.

Jungkook’s breathing tightens beside you. “No,” he admits, “I don’t. Only watch them because I know you like them.” You contemplate pausing the episode and engaging in a real conversation with him, but at this point, you’re very tired from the events of the last day. Jungkook doesn’t press either, just shuffles more comfortably beside you.

You get about five minutes in, quiet chuckles shared between the two of you, before he strikes. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” he says, so hushed you almost don’t hear it. His hand is resting in the space between you, pinky brushing against yours. “About… being late. And the presents.”

You inspire slowly. “That wasn't even the problem, silly,” you brush off. From your peripheral, you see Jungkook’s slow nod. “I didn’t want any presents,” you mention, “I just wanted you.” You look away from the screen immediately after, pretending like the spot on the ceiling is actually really interesting.

The two of you fall into silence, the animated characters on your screen rapidly chattering away. “Oh,” Jungkook says after a moment.

You roll your eyes. They’re moist but you don’t want him to see. “Yeah, oh,” you parrot back softly, relaxing into the couch again. “Did you eat the food I left out?”

Jungkook shuffles beside you, the soft lull of the speakers soon being cut as he reaches over to pause Phineas and Ferb. A couple of seconds pass and then he’s leaning into you, head resting on your shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he apologizes again, placing a palm over the hand he had been teasing for the past few minutes. “I thought I knew what I was doing but I was wrong.”

His voice is so soft and sincere, it makes your chest ache. You try to burrow your face against your opposite shoulder, try to hide the stray tear that escapes out of the corner of your eye. “It’s fine,” you brush off, voice choked off and hoarse.

Jungkook leans up, pecks your cheek so tenderly it makes you go mushy. “No, it’s not fine. I acted like a know-it-all and said something way out of line,” he murmurs, raising his head to look at you. His hand feels warm over yours. It’s the touch you craved all day and yesterday, the warm feel of his body against yours. You’re embarrassed at how easily you melt into it. “You’re the best thing that has happened to me in a long time,” he tells you, holding your hand close to his chest. “I had no right to say those things to you.”

You sniffle, resting your head against his shoulder now. His heart beats loud enough for you to hear. “Was it true?” you mumble. “Do you really think of me like that?”

He shakes his head, his soft breaths fanning across your forehead. “No, never,” he answers. “I think you’re incredible. My brain was just trying to justify my dumb anger.”

You nod, even if you don’t believe it just yet. But that was a conversation for later, you suppose, sometime in the future when you aren’t on the verge of tears and threatening to crumble apart at the simplest word that leaves his mouth.

“I should have come home like you wanted, thought about my words before saying them,” he says, snuggling closer to you. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop,” you sniffle, covering your face with your free hand as he presses a kiss to the vein that runs over the back of the hand he’s holding captive. “Now it just sounds like I'm just being inconsiderate of your gifts and a crybaby.”

Jungkook kisses your temple softly, gently. “Don’t think about the gifts,” he says. “Just tell me what you wanted to do, doll.”

His voice calms you, has you like putty in his arms. “Watch movies,” you mumble, toying with a thread on your couch cushion. “Be with you.”

He hums. “Then we’ll do that,” he says, reaching for your laptop again. The screen nearly blinds you when it flickers back to life before you, Jungkook’s low breaths against your ear making it near impossible for you to process the titles on the screen. “You liked Disney+?”

Belatedly, you nod. “I like the animated movies,” you admit quietly, the anxieties of before slowly melting away, even more so when he slides his arm around you, pulling you close against his chest.

Unlike other times where he’ll critique the hell out of such childish films, Jungkook says nothing as he starts up the Zootopia movie instead, the same one you had wanted to show him before, right from the beginning. “That bunny looks like you,” you murmur when Judy Hopps first appears on the screen.

Jungkook snorts. “You say that about every cartoon bunny.”

You turn your head to glance at him over your shoulder. He meets your gaze with a small smile you return. “It’s because you’re so cute,” you say softly, lips twisting playfully when his cheeks grow scarlet.

He knocks his forehead against yours, eyes fluttering shut. “Not cute, just lucky,” he chuckles. “Lucky enough to have you.” Your heart turns over in your chest, threatening to burst out of your rib cage at his words. You try to turn in his arms. Before you can say the words that have been sitting on the tip of your tongue for months now, he’s beating you to it once again. “I love you,” he confesses in a hushed whisper, no alcoholic influence. 

Something inside of you blossoms, eyes wide as he chastely kisses you. He pulls away without you ever reacting, too caught up in surprise to kiss him back properly. He stays close, curls tickling your forehead as he leans over you. “You don’t have to say it back, I just wanted you to know. I love you,” he says again, long lashes blinking down at you. “So much. It makes me feel like a stupid teenager again, going to the mall to buy a gift for my crush.” He laughs sheepishly, reaching down to tangle your fingers together. “Is that okay?” he asks quietly, pressing a kiss to your knuckles.

It mirrors the confession he’d given you that morning, those slurred words and teary eyes. It had been difficult to pinpoint the legitimacy of it before, the meaning scrambled by his hazy mind. But with him staring at you like this now, like you single-handedly plucked the stars from the sky to put them in those sparkly eyes of his, it makes something inside you ache.

Still, you choke on your own spit. “I-Is it okay for you to love me?” you sputter incredulously, realizing the oddity of the same question he’d thrown at you earlier. But now, you’re both sober and you can really tear apart that sentence. Jungkook nods a little too seriously for your liking. “Are you crazy?” He blinks in confusion, brows pulling together as you slowly but surely lose the last bits of your sanity. “You’re an idiot, Jeon Jungkook,” you huff, “a stupidly handsome, rich, walking dream, idiot who goes out with stupid girls like me.”

“Not stupid,” he murmurs, closing in on you again as he finally understands the truth behind your masked insults. He smells minty and like his favorite body wash of yours.

“No,” you deny. “You’re actually, like, insane. You have a bachelor pad, make enough money to sustain an entire litter of kittens, look and talk like every teenage girl’s dream boyfriend— but you mess it all up by dating evil, conniving hoes like me who lose their shit over Disney cartoons.” He says nothing, watching you with an amused grin as you talk over yourself, basically regurgitating his statement from yesterday except it kinda seems plausible now that you’re over it. “It’s stupid. No, you’re stupid. No— I’m stupid.”

Jungkook chuckles, kissing the corner of your mouth gently. “Done?” he says, a dimple appearing on his cheek. You could kiss it away, but you need him to know the amount of stupidity in this room was astronomically high. “You’re not stupid, baby,” he says. You level him with a look. “Well. You have your moments.”

“Moments?” you repeat, standing up in a hurry that has him flopping down beside you. Your laptop is lost somewhere on the cushions, the voices faded as they grow farther away. “I am so stupid. I called Namjoon a whore for taking you out for lunch!” you cry. “I am the stupidest person in the world.”

Jungkook cackles, standing up beside you. “Yes, yes, you’re my stupid girl,” he teases, tapping the pout on your lips playfully. “So stupid she slanders herself instead of just telling me she loves me too.” He bumps your noses together, dark eyes staring at you almost daringly after his claim.

You fold soon enough. “I love you,” you mumble, “even if I’m too stupid to say it.”

He rewards your confession with a kiss, pulling you into his arms soon after. He sighs, almost wistfully. “Whatever shall I do with my very stupid girl?”

After exactly three minutes of feeling safe and loved in his arms, he abandons the living room in favor of leading you back to your room, where he pushes you down against your mattress. You cling to him, leaving him positioned over you at an angle. His chest presses against yours, arm curled around the back of your head. “Gotta get up, baby,” he laughs.

You shake your head, caging him in your arms. “Nuh-uh,” you murmur, legs wiggling when he places a hand on your hip.

Jungkook chuckles, pressing a kiss against the side of your ear. “Your movie is still playing in the other room,” he reminds you, thumb drawing soothing circles on your hip. You don’t release him, his mindless touch only encouraging you to keep him close. “Babe?”

You say nothing, relishing in the comfort of Jungkook’s presence. His hair smells good and feels even softer against the side of your face. The cotton shirt he found is crumpled beneath your fists, dark blue pattern wrinkling. Finally coming to terms with his new home, Jungkook eventually relaxes into your hold with a sigh.

“Alright,” he hums, patting your hip as he repositions himself more comfortably. “I get it. My pretty girl must’ve missed me, huh?” You nod, soaking in every detail about him in this moment. Jungkook shifts, the hand on your hip suddenly falling over your thigh instead. “Or should I say my stupid girl?” he purrs, hand slipping between your thighs. “My stupid, little girl?”

A gasp catches in your throat when he runs his fingers over the front of your panties. Your legs kick out wildly at the sudden touch, toes curling at the hands you dreamt about all day and night. “Oh,” you pant, each brush of his fingers feeling better than the last.

“What?” he says, mouthing against the side of your neck. His tongue feels warm, but the trails of saliva he leaves have you shivering. “Too dumb to speak?” he scoffs, biting down against a particular spot on your neck. You whimper, unsure if it’s because of his hands or his mouth.

“N-No,” you try to sneer back, fingernails digging into his skin through his shirt. His hands are getting braver now, the pad of his pointer finger dancing over your engorged clit. The sheer material of your panties certainly doesn’t help, each touch feeling like it’s being magnified three times over. And if it felt this good with underwear, you can’t even begin to imagine how it’d feel without.

You don’t have to ponder for long, because soon after Jungkook is slipping his hand beneath your waistband, touching your sensitive pussy head-on. “Kook.”

He uses your momentary vulnerability to ease himself from your hold, finally recoiling enough to smother your mouth with his. You moan in surprise, thighs quivering as he gets to work circling your hardened bud sans your panties. Jungkook isn’t the least bit kind as he kisses you ruthlessly, likes he’s trying to compensate for something with his movements. When he finally pulls away it’s with an obnoxious pop and cherry red lips. He huffs, glancing down to see where he’s got his fingers pleasuring you.

Your thighs are squirming back and forth, closing around his hand every few seconds. Jungkook snorts. “Huh, look at that,” he mutters, trailing down until his fingers are gliding over your quickly sopping folds. “Stupid girl is good for something.”

Your cheeks burn. “Kook, I’m not—“

Jungkook levels you with an unimpressed glare. “Not what? Not stupid? But I could’ve sworn you just spent the last few minutes saying you were,” he drones meanly, landing one light slap against your cunt that makes your hips buck.

You bite down a whimper. “I was just…” you trail off, eyes rolling back when he teases one finger against your opening.

“Kidding?” he supplies. “Well, I wasn’t.” Your heart stutters in your chest, eyes growing wide as he finally pushes himself off of you, propping himself up with an elbow beside your head. His gaze is dark and unrecognizable. “I think you’re so fucking stupid, doll,” he sneers. “And what are you gonna do about it?”

You should have seen this moment coming, the manifestation of that shiny side of the coin finally reaching its full potential.

While Jungkook wasn’t exactly shy about his interests, he certainly wasn’t tripping over himself to tell you every new kinky thing he wanted to try. You sort of guessed he had some interest in this sort of play a few weeks ago when you watched the Barbie movie at his place. A lot of that night had branded itself into your three am wet dreams, but there was one particular moment that stood out to you. That was you, on your knees, with him condescendingly patting your head. Or just last week, you vaguely remember the term slipping through his lips as he pleasured you with The Bullet Bestie.

The thing about Jungkook was that, until last night, he would have never admitted, or so much as even thought, that he was better than you. That was fine because you would say it enough for the both of you anyway. Did you think Jungkook was amazing, an absolute diamond among these measly rocks? Absolutely. (Were you slightly biased because you were his girlfriend? Skip.) However, you also had this insane evil villain complex that made you want to brag about everything you possibly could, especially if that meant bragging about your boyfriend.

Realistically speaking, he was better than you, that much you could look past yesterday’s anger to admit, and not even in a stuck-up, conceited way; he had a really good job, an architecturally amazing house, and a hot girlfriend. Meanwhile, you had a mediocre job, an okay apartment, and an insanely sexy Calvin Klein boyfriend, half of which he had pointed out yesterday. Regardless of how powerful that third factor was, he still outnumbered you three to one.

Sue you, Jungkook was amazing. Anyone could see that! Except, maybe, himself.

And if the only time Jungkook would openly brag about his greatness or establish how much better than you he was, was in a post-fight, sex-induced setting, then you were more than happy to be his punching bag. So long as it was on your terms, and not as a result of his weirdly bottled up feelings.

(Yeah, you would have a long talk about that tomorrow.)

But for now, you pout up at him, clamping your thighs shut purposefully. “You’re stupid too,” you defend, “stupid and mean.”

Something in his expression changes. Suddenly, he’s moving at superhuman speed as he snatches his hand out from where you had previously trapped him between your legs, yanking you up by the front of your shirt. “Mean?” he mocks. “Isn’t that what you always wanted?” You shiver, fingers wrapping around the wrist that holds your sweater. “Wanted me to be mean and push you around like a little rag doll?”

Jungkook looks at you for another two seconds, before he’s slowly pulling away from you, leaning back on his knees. His tongue is pressing against the inside of his cheek, jaw tightening from the movement. “Baby,” he says so quietly it instills a prickle of fear in you, tainted with delicious excitement.

“Yeah?” you whisper, sitting up tentatively as you watch him, He was a bit frightening, like a wild animal about to devour you whole.

Jungkook rolls his neck, the joints in his spine cracking as he begins tugging off his shirt. You salivate at the sight, too focused on the sinewy muscles of his body to catch the dark gaze he levels your way. He throws it off to the side, his sleeve of tattoos that wraps around his bicep and begins to crawl down his chest wonderfully unobstructed now. “Eyes up here,” he says and you quickly meet his gaze. He leans forward, muscled arms coming to cage you against the headboard. “Stupid little sluts don’t have the room to make such comments,” he rasps out, unamused expression adorning his normally soft features. “Don’t you think so?”

“I-I don’t know,” you stammer, leaning away as he comes closer and closer, eventually just turning your head to the side to avoid that emotionless look. It’s the wrong move, and Jungkook lets you know as much by forcefully digging his fingers into your cheeks and turning your face back around to meet his gaze.

A hand grabs beneath your knee, tugging harshly until you’re flopping down onto your back with a squeal. You settle with his knee pressed hotly against your core. Jungkook stays towering over you. “Dumb little girls who make me watch cartoons,” he spits, tracing a hand over your chest, molding your breasts beneath his hands roughly enough to make you gasp. “And watch little animal movies on Disney+. Aren’t they just so stupid?”

“So stupid,” you concede, subtly shifting your hips for some desperately needed friction. Jungkook snorts, finally granting you your wish with one rough slide of his thigh against your core.

“I agree,” he says, and surprises you with a hand around your throat as he leans in to properly grind his thigh into you. “All they’re good for is being dumb little sluts with good pussy,” he murmurs darkly, thumb pressing into the side of your neck forcefully. “Sometimes, they don’t even do anything,” Jungkook continues, his other hand on your hip hauling you higher up his thigh. You mewl, soaked panties rubbing roughly against your folds. You miss the soft swirl of his thumb, the gentle prod of his fingers. Even so, you can’t deny this change in Jungkook is doing something to you, riling up a part of you that you hadn’t known existed. Maybe it’s the horniness from yesterday that was left unfulfilled, the one year anniversary sex that was put on pause. “Just lay there and take it, too fucked out and dumb to say anything.”

His fingers loosen for the briefest of seconds and you gasp for breath. “That’s terrible,” you whimper, rolling your hips up into his thigh, so close to his swollen cock.

Jungkook chuckles without an ounce of humor, pressing your foreheads together as he helps grind you to completion. “Isn’t it? I think that stupid little girl is cute though.”

“I’m sorry,” you blurt, vision spotting as he tightens his hand back around your throat. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you moan, stomach tight from all the stimulation.

Jungkook hums, slowing you down with a tight grip on your waist. “Hm, what are you sorry for?” he croons, pink lips pulling into an evil smile. “You said you weren’t that stupid girl, __.”

You shake your head, trying to roll your hips up again but he’s holding you too tightly now, rendering you immobile beneath him. “I am,” you choke out shamefully, grabbing at the hand on your hip in a feeble attempt to remove it. “I am a stupid little girl.”

Jungkook smirks, leaning down to slot his mouth over yours. “That’s right,” he murmurs, “nothing but a dumb little slut.”

You shiver, opening your mouth when he slides his tongue against your bottom lip. He’s not the slightest bit nice, and more messy than usual. He pulls away with a bite to your lower lip, meeting your trembling gaze with that same unrecognizable glint in his eyes. “Come on, dummy, keep up,” he snarks before devouring you again. You try to, you really do, but he’s moving like an animal today, despite his slow and drunken movements from that morning. So you end up with his saliva dripping down your throat, clinging to the corners of your lips as he begins slowly grinding you against his thigh again. He flashes you a wicked smile, pearly teeth on display for you as he glances down at your messy appearance.

“Are you gonna touch me?” you ask, lower lip trembling at the thought after your desperate rutting. Jungkook purses his lips together in thought.

“Mmm,” he hums. “Don’t know yet.”

You whine. “Jungkook, please,” you whimper, wrapping your legs around his waist. “I need you.”

Jungkook chuckles, running his hand up your waist and taking your shirt with him. He slips his fingers beneath your bra, pushing the wire over your chest as he mouths at your neck. “Cute,” he says. “Can’t do it yourself?”

You tremble, chest arching into him as he rolls your nipple between his fingers. “I-I can,” you gasp. “Just feels better with you.”

Jungkook follows your statement with a nip against your skin, tongue soothing over it right after. “Why? Because I do everything better than you? Even make you cum better than you?”

Your cheeks heat up at his blatant ego rearing its head, hands carding through the hair at the nape of his neck. You say nothing, and that only eggs Jungkook on. “Come onnn,” he teases, finally, finally rolling his hips down onto your core. You squeak, head falling back against the pillows as you’re granted the one thing you’d been chasing. “Say it.”

“Say what?” you ask, voice wobbly as he continues to slowly rut against you, the front of his shorts pressing against the soaked crotch area of your panties. “Oh, oh, Jungkook,” you whine.

Suddenly he bites down harshly, teeth digging painfully into your skin. You yelp in surprise, pussy throbbing at the pain that shoots throughout your body. Jungkook pulls away and doesn’t bother soothing over it as he leans up to capture your jaw this time. “Say you’re a stupid little slut who can’t do anything without me,” he purrs, kisses too soft for the words he says.

Your mind blanks, torn between the humiliating phrase he wants you to say and properly checking him in his place. In the end, it’s with a twisted need to please him that you’re repeating the words back to him. “I-I’m a stupid slut,” you whimper, fingers digging into his shoulder blades as he continues pushing you right along the edge. The rope pulled tightly in your core is slowly being pulled apart, threads hanging on for dear life. “Can’t... can't do anything without...”

“Without who?” he asks, reaching down and untying the front of his shorts. “Can’t do anything without who, baby?”

“Without you, without you,” you cry, bucking your hips up against his, the combined movements of both your bodies making you shake like a leaf. “Ah, K-Kook,” you wail, hips stuttering as your orgasm finally swallows you up. Your panties quickly grow wet and icky from your own arousal that pools between your thighs. Jungkook lets you writhe beneath him as you chase your high, mouth sucking a pretty blossom against your jaw.

You know better than to expect the night to end here, especially after seeing the glint that had been in his eyes as he watched you unravel.

He leans close, let’s his nose brush against yours as you catch your breath. “So perfect for me,” he groans, slotting his lips against yours. You can barely keep up with him, languidly going along with his hot tongue. “Perfect, perfect girl,” he murmurs, a stark change from the less than friendly adjectives he used just moments before. “Tell me you love me?” he says softly.

You nod, mind fuzzy as you wrap your arms around his neck. “Love you,” you exhale, letting your fingers knot in his hair. Your proclamation does something to him, makes him grind the front of his cotton shorts hard against you. For someone that was often rough and brutal with you in bed, he sure was sensitive to the mushiest of things.

“Don’t deserve you,” he huffs, hot breath fanning across your skin. He switches gears fairly quickly. “Tell me you hate me,” he begs hoarsely, rutting against your soiled panties. “Tell me I’m a piece of shit and you could do better without me,” he pleads, voice too airy to be another one of his usual sex-induced thoughts.

You shake your head, pressing a kiss to his cheek as he rolls his hips. “It’s not true,” you whisper, “I love you more than you’ll ever understand.”

Jungkook groans, suddenly winding back and tearing your ruined panties down your legs. You gasp in surprise, letting him haul you about in his blind, self-inflicted rage. “Stupid, stupid,” he huffs, though at this point you can’t tell who it’s directed at. With your underwear out of the way, he wastes no time plunging his fingers back into your cunt, bypassing the tight ring of muscle around it without any of his usual care. “You should hate me,” he snarls, lips pressed against your ear.

You moan, back arching at the sudden pleasure that blossoms between your thighs. “I-I don’t,” you gasp, toes curling.

Jungkook groans, the sound traveling down your spine and straight into your pussy. “Stupid girl,” he huffs, slipping an arm around you to pull you so close until you can’t breathe, chests lined up together. His skin is warm to the touch, scorching almost. “Fuck,” he groans, curling his fingers inside of you. You whimper and moan, incapable of staying still beneath him as he tortures you with a thumb to your clit. “Tell me you hate me,” he seethes again.

Despite the fog that’s settled over your mind, you still manage a resolute shake of your head. “N-no,” you cry, digging your nails into his back. They run dark red lines over his skin, making him hiss at the sting.

Whatever punishment he’s trying to put himself through is falling through with your refusal to admit such a thing. It aggravates him even more, your adamant stance on loving him so, and he’s retracting his fingers before you can cum again. “Please,” he chokes, face tucked into your neck. He’s sloppy with his movements; as he pulls his shorts down and kicks them away, he nearly suffocates you with his weight. “I don’t deserve you, ___, please.”

“I love you,” you whimper for lack of explanation. Jungkook leans back, that same madman gaze in his glossy eyes. He’s looking at you in disbelief almost, pouty lips puckered and swollen. Your hands slip from around him, falling on either side of your head.

Like a cobra he strikes, collecting your wrists in one hand he pins above your head. The sudden movement has him leaning in close, lips brushing over yours. His lashes are coated in a wetness he refuses to acknowledge, looking at you like you drive him insane. “If you ever try to leave me,” he whispers, jerky breath fanning over your skin, “I’ll lose my mind.”

He loves you so much it aches.

“I won’t,” you whimper, feeling your own eyes well up with an emotion that consumes every inch of your being. “I’ll never leave you, you stupid, stupid boy.”

A faint smile crosses his features at your words, lips quirking to the side. You relish in it for all of two seconds before he’s ramming his cock into you, your sensitive walls spawning around him. You sob loudly, eyes rolling back into your head. Your legs instinctively hook themselves around his waist, digging into the base of his spine as he rolls his hips into you.

You feel full and complete like he belongs there in this moment and every moment after this. It makes your heart constrict painfully. Jungkook’s soft groans follow your more unraveled noises, the vulgar slapping of skin on skin the underlying melody to it all. “Ffffuck,” he spits, greedily swallowing your moans up. You whine, arms bucking in an effort to hold him close. But he’s determined in his act of restraining you, long fingers tightening around your wrists until they hurt. “I warned you, didn’t I?” he huffs, snapping his hips into you.

Your walls clench around his hard cock, the drag as he exits sending shivers throughout your body. Jungkook’s body towers over you, glistening in sweat as he nails you into your mattress. “Remember what I said?” he asks, voice but a shuddery exhale. You shake your head numbly, overwhelmed by the rough drag across your walls. “All those months ago, when you first came over,” he adds. The hand on your hip abandons its post to cup you beneath the jaw, palm pressing sinfully against your throat enough to block the tiniest of airflow. “I’ll fuck you and keep you forever,” he murmurs, voice deeper than the pits of hell. He licks a fat stripe over your cheek like you’re nothing but a sweet for him to devour. “Do you remember that, pretty girl?”

You nod jerkily, hips arching up into him when he thrusts into you again. It’s a memory that replays in your mind every so often, your first night with the man you had planned to humiliate over a mere misunderstanding, now your boyfriend of one year. “Want that,” you gasp, tears blurring your vision when he begins picking up the pace. “Wanna be y-your pretty girl forever.”

Jungkook groans, kissing the corner of your mouth. His thighs are some magnificent beings, keeping his pace consistent even as he loses himself in his overwhelming need to kiss you. “Always,” he manages, soft lips pressed against yours. “I won’t ever let you leave.”

A shriek tears itself from your lips as he picks up that harsh piston, releasing your jaw to hold both wrists above your head. It makes his curls dangle in front of his eyes, covering that beautiful dark gaze. It makes his thin little necklace swing back and forth too, though it’s too small to actually touch your face. The rhythmic swing has you hypnotized, just like everything else about Jungkook.

With the length of his hair, you’re left staring at his lips, pulled taut between his pearly white teeth. The word from before sits heavy in your chest, begs to drip from the tip of your tongue. But he’s moving too fast and too hard, scrambling your thoughts until all you can think about is the cock plunging into your heat. His name falls from your mouth like mindless blubber instead, arms thrashing as your second orgasm swallows you up. It sends you crashing, body spasming as the sheer euphoria waves over you slowly and then all at once.

“Perfect,” he grunts, leaning down to slot his mouth against yours, “my perfect girl.” Your cum makes the sound of his hips erotic, the loud squelching following your panting. Still sensitive from your high, your body unconsciously tightens around him, keeps his cock from fully leaving. It brings a soft whine out of Jungkook, one he tries to muffle against the side of your face.

“Inside,” you whimper, even though your body feels like jelly beneath him. “Cum inside, Kook, please,” you beg.

It only takes a few more thrusts into your leaking hole for him to finally reach paradise, hips stuttering when that first shot of pleasure hits him. “Fuck, fuck,” he growls, wildly snapping his hips into your achy cunt. You moan, feeling just about brainless at the overstimulation. His cum leaves you full, almost makes your belly bulge from it. When he’s done he doesn’t bother pulling away, simply slumping into your limp form. His cock, though quickly softening, serves as a plug for the cum threatening to spill out of you.

There’s a muted noise coming from the other room, the faint sound of the mail slipping through your letterbox, the quiet chattering of the street outside. And of course, the loud blaring of your laptop playing the Phineas and Ferb theme song. Jungkook registers it at about the same time as you, a soft chuckle leaving his lips.

He pushes off of you soon after, leaning on his palms over you. He’s got that molten look on his eyes, the heat of a thousand suns burning behind those irises as he looks at you. Like he can’t get enough, even though he’s just about taken everything there is to take. “Love you,” he murmurs quietly.

A drop of sweat rolls over his forehead, clinging to the end of his eyebrow. You reach up and brush it away, let your hand trail down his face to cup his cheek. Immediately he leans into the touch, eyes falling half shut. “Love you more,” you respond.

“Impossible,” he scoffs.

Soon after you’re both stumbling out of bed, clothes haphazardly shrugged back on as you drift through the living room. There’s a thin, hot pink package sitting at the door, just having slipped through the letterbox; the stark Sexuality Unleashed logo is printed on the visible side, so you have to wonder what Doyeon could have possibly ordered this time that could be so thin. The laptop is awkwardly sandwiched next to a throw pillow, barely open a crack. Jungkook retrieves it, sets it on his lap as you scamper over to the couch.

“More Phineas and Ferb?” he asks quietly. He hates it, you know he does. And still, he wants to watch it with you.

You nod. “Please.”

He isn’t so concerned with the plot as you, clicking some random episode to start. You snuggle into his side, quietly singing along to the opening. After a moment, Jungkook speaks again. “Phineas and Flirt?” he offers cheekily.

You roll your eyes. “That might’ve been your worst one yet,” you sigh, trying to drown out his indignant huff by focusing on the screen.

“I don’t exactly see you coming up with these,” he points out, obviously feeling wronged.

Without missing a beat you say, “Disney+ and bust.”

epilogue

commercial break one ; the resolution

Copyright © 2020, 1kook on tumblr. absolutely NO reposts allowed.

[shorkbrian]

💖💘my heart’s dizzy and I my dose of serotonin whenever I read your prose🤟🏽😩 was wondering if you could do reader with an erratic future-vision!quirk so when they first meet yandere!Hawks they’re suddenly plagued by erotic, sensual, 365days-level of disturbing visions of them, so reader actively avoids them (it’s like those Tik Tok future-seeing videos playing to “Play Date”)

Prelude - Hawks isn’t a famous pro-hero in this, but he still has his quirk. It’s not really mentioned a bunch tho lol.  This is rlly long, but I decided not to put it into two parts because the smut is so slight lol. Hope this meets your expectations anon, thank you for reading!

Pairing -  Keigo Takami X Reader

Warnings - NSFW mentions, dubcon, noncon. No out-and-out explicit smut, just a really long story. Hawks is manipulative and gets what he wants

Music - https://open.spotify.com/track/5ukAQcKEIJuzIbP55xp07x?si=iz6I-RoDSdCNYhT2Du8etg

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He was a friend of a friend, someone you had only met once or twice.

Your friend kept bringing him to hangouts, he kept showing up on her instagram feed,  getting mentioned in her twitterbio, and eventually it came out that they had started dating. It didn’t catch anyone by surprise.

What did catch you by surprise, was how infatuated with him your friend was.

“He’s just sooooo hot, isn’t he?” She squealed, shoving her phone in your face to show off a shirtless pic he had just sent her.

You nodded in agreement, quickly appraising the pic before turning your head. Yeah, her boyfriend was attractive, but you weren’t one to ruin relationships. Plus, you and Keigo had never really talked past the brief “Hey” and “Wassup?” said in greeting when introduced the first time.

“Can he come to the mall with us on Friday? I promise there will be no third wheeling.” Your friend begged, clasping her hands together. You thought about it for a second - this had been a fun shopping trip the two of you had planned a few weeks ago, meant as a girls date on a day the mall wouldn’t be crowded. But would it really hurt anything if her boyfriend came along? Probably not.

“Yeah, I don’t mind.” You shrugged, watching your friends face erupt into a wide grin. “But don’t ditch me to go makeout in a bathroom or something, got it?”

“Sir yes sir!” Your friend faux saluted, before patting you on the shoulder. “Thanks girlie!”

You jerked back, head suddenly swarming with visions, your quirk activating. Your quirk was helpful in some ways, but you mainly tried not to use it - headaches resulted, and you hated getting glimpses of the future. Sometimes they’d be good, but they were often bad - you had gotten a screenshot glimpse of your brothers death, his face marred and bleeding out onto the pavement.

It still made you sick to think about it.

Touch wasn’t something you could always avoid, but you tried, seeing as how it activated your quirk, giving you visions of your future with whomever you touched, or whoever touched you.

You saw your friends face, eyes puffy with tears, shouting something. Then another scene flashed, your friend on TV, talking to a reporter.

Thankfully, the visions ended, this episode relatively quick due to how short of a time she touched you.

“Oh shit, I forgot, I’m so sorry.” She rushed to apologize, holding her hands up and backing away from you.

“It’s-it’s fine.” You wheezed, waving your hand in the air to signal that it wasn’t a big deal. The vision just probably meant the two of you would get into a fight soon, which wasn’t uncommon.  It was fine, you were fine.

——

The mall wasn’t too crowded, which made the day pleasant. Your friend was talking to her boyfriend, hand tangled with his as the three of you walked in.

“So (Y/N), what do you think about that new Victoria’s Secret launch?” Your friend bumped you with her hip, drawing your attention as she pulled you into the conversation between her and her boyfriend.

“Oh, um… what?” To be fair, you had zoned out when the couple started being gross and mushy, which was like, the second your friend met Keigo at the door.

The blonde man laughed. “Victoria’s Secret just launched a new line of lingerie, have any thoughts about it?”

Turning red, you smiled sheepishly. “Ah, well…. From what I’ve seen of their stuff it’s… nice? So I’m sure it’s good.”

Your friend mock-gasped, almost slapping you on the arm before quickly remembering your quirk, drawing her hand back. You gave a quick nod of thanks.

“(Y/N)! Don’t tell me you didn’t even know about it?! I practically live, eat, and sleep Victoria’s Secret, it’s impossible to miss their product drops when you’re one of my friends.”

Unsure how to respond, you floundered, opening and closing your mouth like a lost fish.

“Babe, leave her be, she’s probably just shy.” Keigo stepped in, giving his girlfriend a chuckle as he steered you both towards a shop.

“Fineeee.” Your friend whined, turning to focus on the task ahead. “They have a VS shop here though, you’re not getting out of here without going in with me!”

----

The VS store was huge, smelling sweetly of flowers, bright colors assaulting your vision, soft pop music filling your ears.

It was hard not to cringe at all the fancy lingerie, you were honestly a bit embarrassed to be strolling through the store with your friend, let alone her boyfriend by her side.

“Does-does Keigo mind?” You quietly asked your friend, out of earshot of her boyfriend, who was looking at perfumes, last time you checked.

“Not at all birdie, I’m used to clothes, any form, any shape.”

You whirled around, squeaking in surprise at Keigo, who had apparently finished with browsing the perfume. He was flashing you a 1000 watt grin, continuing with what he was saying. “I’m a model, practically every girl I’ve ever met I’ve seen in less than full underwear, it’s no big deal.”

“Oh…. Cool.” You offered, cheeks turning red again. You felt like such a blushing schoolgirl, turning red when faced with looking at bras and panties, flushing when a man got too close.

It was the nature of the store, you told yourself, that was making you so embarrassed.

“Oo! What do you think of this one?” Your friend was holding up a babydoll, pink, with light fabric and zero coverage.

Keigo wolf whistled. “Man, that’d be a good look for you. Lets buy it.” The couple moved on, pointing at different clothes, your friend occasionally picking one from the rack to hold up against her body, looking for Keigo’s opinion.

They were cute together, laughing over the cheesy names on the tags of the lingerie, holding hands as the browsed, your friend occasionally stopping to plant a kiss on her boyfriend’s cheek.

“I think that’s everything that I like…. (Y/N), your turn!” Pulled out of your casual observance, you back pedaled. “Me? No, I’m not really the type to wear this kind of stuff - I don’t even think most of it would fit, I have weird proportions.“

“Nonsense!” Keigo looked around for a moment, going to the nearest rack to quickly sift through bras, before pulling one out. “This one would make all the boys drool over you honey.”

He held it out towards you, shaking it slightly when you hesitated to take it. Was your friend okay with him talking to you like that, pushing underwear at you to buy? A quick glance sideways showed she was more than okay with it, clasping her hands excitedly as she watched you.

The bra was sheer, soft lavender fabric forming the cups, an intricate embroidered detail of flowers dotted haphazardly over the bra. It was pretty, but you weren’t exactly partial to it. When would you wear it? Who would you wear it for? You weren’t sure it was your style. Plus, it probably wasn’t even your size.

“My arm’s gettin’ real tired.” Keigo joked, before you finally took the garment from him. Checking the size, you paused for a second, blinking towards the man.

“How did you-?”

“You spend enough time in the fashion industry, you learn to tell a girl’s size just by looking at her.”  He seemed to puff up, as if he was proud of his bra-sizing skills.

“Let me help her pick out some things too!” Your friend cried, rushing past you to head over to the next rack, ushering you to follow with a wave of her hand.

You ended up with an armful of lingerie - bras, panties,  an odd bustier or two, and some other flowy items, like a sheer robe and a lacy chemise. The choices weren’t exactly made by you, more so made by a combination of your friend and Keigo together. They had alternated holding up items towards your body, comparing color and garment cuts, lost in their own mushy-gushy world, and it was almost like you didn’t exist for a few moments, nothing more than a barbie doll to dress up.

But now the three of you stood in line to checkout, and you felt included again, your friend cracking jokes that were making you snort, Keigo watching the two of you interact.

Until your friend accidentally brushed against your arm as she shifted forward in line.

Again, you saw her tearful face, heard her sobbing, before the other scene flashed, of her on TV, talking to the reporter. She still looked upset, eyes rimmed red, nose running, hair a mess.

With a gasp, your vision returned to the present, and you were wobbling on your feet, almost falling.

“Oh god, I’m so sorry (Y/N), I’m so so sorry. Here, let me take that, go sit down by the entrance.” She fussed over you, face concerned as she carefully took the stack of clothes from your arms, making sure to not make contact.

“Oh fuck, is she alright?” You heard Keigo ask, your friend stepping in front of you as he moved forward to check on you.

“Yeah, she’s just feeling a little dizzy. Can you make sure she doesn’t fall and crack her head open? Just wait by the entrance please.”

“Okay. Oh, here-“ You were a bit dazed, but you saw Keigo fish his wallet out of his pocket, thrusting the entire thing into his girlfriends hands before patting her on the shoulder “Whichever card is fine.”

And then you were stumbling towards the entrance, towards the bench right outside.

You hated seeing the future. Why was your friend crying? What had happened to elicit such a reaction? The unknowns killed you, kept you up at night as you tried to puzzle out the events that could lead up to the scenes from your visions.

Not looking where you were going, you tripped on air, unable to catch yourself as you plummeted towards the ground.

But then you were seeing Keigo.

He was above you, face flushed and sweaty, hair tousled, his chest bare. The room was dark, barely lit, and he was so close. The man leaned down to kiss you, then the scene changed.

You were bent over a table, only able to see the solid wood your face was smushed against. There was a heat in your belly, a tingling between your thighs, and pressure. Someone was talking - Keigo, muttering behind you angrily. You head was pulled up, a hand fisted in your hair, and then one of your knees was pushed up onto the table, and the pressure inside exploded into pure pleasure.

You felt yourself screaming, bucking your hips as you suffered through whatever the feeling was.

The scene changed again.

Hands tied above your head, you were pressed against a wall, sitting on some kind of…. Saddle? Your legs couldn’t touch the ground, and you squirmed, before gasping loudly.

There was a nub in the seat, ribbed and textured, slick with some kind of liquid… From you? Then you saw Keigo, standing in front of you, smirking at you with hardened eyes.

He had something in his hand, arms crossed over his chest while he fiddled with the object, muscles flexing. He was shirtless again, and-and his cock was hanging out of his sweatpants, pressed against his belly, smearing precum over his skin.

You tried to say something, anything - the visions never lasted this long, it was too intense, there was so much sensation. But your mouth wouldn’t move, choked up.

Keigo’s hand was on his length, rubbing slowly, saying something that didn’t reach your ears.

The scene changed.

Something was shoved down your throat, warm and twitching. You were sobbing, choking, clawing at whatever was in front of you. A dark laugh filled your ears, and you opened your eyes, met with the clenching abs of a strong stomach.

Keigo was brushing your tears, no, smudging them over your face. Were you wearing makeup? His cock was sitting in your throat, his hips moving in tiny jerks, stabbing your esophagus, making you gag.

Then you were back in the present.

A hand was holding your arm, keeping you from falling and making contact with the hard floor.

“-N)? (Y/N)? Are you okay? Talk to me birdie”

You made a panicked noise, pulling yourself out of Keigo’s grip so fast that you fell flat on the floor, scrambling backwards away from the man.

He almost looked scared, confused as he followed after you, holding out his hands. “(Y/N), you gotta calm down, you’re gonna make yourself sick.”

The man reached for your arm again and you pressed yourself against the floor, screeching out a loud “No!!” before he could touch you. Keigo paused, looking at his hand, then at you. “Hey, hey, I’m not gonna touch you. It’s okay little birdie, you’re alright.” He cooed, sinking to his knees in front of you.

You were hyperventilating, wide eyes trained on Keigo. Your thoughts were swirling in your head, you couldn’t focus, the sensations of the future still echoing through your body.

Keigo crouched there while you steadied your breathing, talking to you the entire time, trying to help you relax and calm down. You weren’t sure what he was saying, something about the weather? Or a dog? But you could feel your breathing evening out, head clearing.

“Hey, she fall?” You friend was carrying two bags, crouching down beside Keigo, cocking her head at you.

Her boyfriend nodded, turning to her and taking one of the bags. “I caught her, but then she freaked out and fell for real.”

Your friend nodded. “I should’ve told you earlier, she has a touch-based quirk. Every time someone touches her, she sees snippets of her future with that person.”

Keigo cocked his own head, gazing at you curiously. “I guess her future with me isn’t too positive then?”

Your friend shrugged. “Eh, she just hates seeing parts of the future. She doesn’t want to know what’s going to happen, makes her worry or something like that. Don’t take it too personally, she’s like that with everyone.”

“It-it-“ you rasped out, causing both sets of eyes to swivel towards you. “-I hate it... because-‘cause I can’t ever cha-change it.” You shivered.

Keigo nodded in understanding, before rising to his feet. “Think you can walk to my car? I’ll drive you two home, I think you’d benefit from some rest.”

He dropped you off at your apartment, and you wearily waved at the couple as they drove off, before heading inside.

----

A week passed, then two.

The visions you had concerning Keigo were plaguing your mind, filling your body with anxiety. There had been a distinctive feel of fear during each one, and despite all the other various sensations felt, the most overwhelming had been distress.

Whatever was going to happen, you weren’t going to like it.

You were holing up in your apartment, ignoring your roommates when they knocked on your door, only leaving your room to eat or grab water. You couldn’t sleep, too scared you’d have dreams, or more accurately, nightmares of what you had seen.

Curse your quirk.

Trying to pass time, desperate to keep your mind off of the future, you threw yourself into any activity you could find.

First you tried coloring - it was supposed to be relaxing, but it gave you too much time to think.

Then you tried gaming, spending hours in front of your computer mashing the keys. That worked for a bit, but your eyes and head soon protested.

You listened to music at full volume, tried several workout videos, even resorted to cleaning your space with fervent energy.

None of it took your mind off the inevitable.

“(Y/N), someone’s at the door asking for you.” You jerked awake, slumped over uncomfortably on the floor, the half finished card tower in front of you promptly knocked over at your erratic movements.

“(Y/N)?” Your roommate called again.

“Yeah! Coming, sorry.” You mumbled, scrubbing sleep from your eyes. You guess your body would give out sometime and force you to fall asleep, but as you moved to stand, you sorely wished your body had chosen a more comfortable place to pass out.

Opening the front door, you immediately took a cautious step back, sleepy demeanor vanishing.

Keigo smiled at you, one hand in the pocket of his jeans, the other holding a bouquet of flowers.

Flowers?

“Hey birdie, mind if I come in?”

You stared at him for a second, immediately on guard. Why did he have flowers? Why did he want to come in? Wasn’t he dating your friend? She didn’t live here, what was he doing here?

The man cleared his throat, raising an eyebrow at you. You moved to the side, holding open the door for Keigo to come inside.

Your roommates were home. If anything happened, they would be within earshot.

Keigo shot you a smile and a thanks, before immediately moving into the small living room, taking a seat on the couch. When he saw you still hovering by the open door, he patted the cushion beside him.

“Come sit, I promise I don’t bite.” He thought for a moment, before grinning. “Well, not unless you want me to.”

Hesitantly, you shut the front door, going to sit in a ratty armchair further away from the winged man. If this bothered him, the man didn’t let it show other than a short pause before he spoke.

“So, I know it probably seems like, super weird for me to show up at your apartment, but hear me out.”

Flowers were shoved in your lap, Keigo taking great care to avoid touching you.  “I felt bad about the other day, and my girl and I decided that we should get you some flowers. She picked ‘em out, it even says so on the note.”  The man laughed, running a hand through his hair.

“She’s so uptight about this kinda stuff. Anyways, just wanted to say that I’m sorry for grabbing you like that. If I had known, I would’ve let you fall flat on your ass. But I know now, so I’ll be better, cool with you?”

Finishing his little speech, Keigo held out his hands, wings stretching behind him to mimic the gesture.

Looking at the flowers in your lap, you felt your hands shaking. Picking up the little note attached to the bouquet, you found that your friend had indeed picked out the flowers, which made sense. They were your favorites, and in a nice color too.  Keigo had left a messy, scrawled “Sorry!” in one corner, before signing by his girlfriends name.

“Um, thank you Keigo, you didn’t have to apologize.” You murmured, rubbing one of the flower petals between your fingers. You were so glad your quirk extended solely to humans - if you were shown glimpses of the future of everything you touched, you would most likely go mad.

“Nah, I wanted to. Also wanted to swing by, check how you’re doing. You been taking care of yourself?” He relaxed on the couch, legs spread, arms resting behind his head. This wasn’t his home, yet you totally could believe that it was by the ease with which he owned the space with his presence.

“Oh, well… I’m still here, so…” You shrugged.

Keigo frowned. “That’s not a fun answer. How much sleep you been gettin’ each night? Eight hours?”

You shook your head, huffing out a breath in place of a laugh.

Keigo clicked his tongue. “No sleep? That’s bad for you y’know. Have you at least been drinking water? Eatin’?”

You nodded quickly, looking up to meet the man’s gaze. “I’m not a kid. I appreciate your concern, but it’s not necessary.”

At this point, you think the best thing for your health would be for the man to leave.

The blonde man stared at you for a moment, before sighing. “Alright, I get it. But I don’t want to hear that you’ve passed out or something, got it? Your friend would kill me.”

He rose to his feet, and so did you, walking him to the door. “Thanks Keigo, and thank you again for the flowers. That was very sweet of you both.”

Keigo beamed, giving a two fingered salute. “You deserve it birdie. Well, have a good rest of your day, yeah? Eat something.”

You smiled, at Keigo as he turned away, beginning to whistle as he strolled down the hall.

Once the door was shut, you found a vase for the flowers, filling it with water and setting it on the table. Your roommates would think it was pretty, and it was, a nice little centerpiece.

That really was nice of your friend and Keigo to offer you flowers.

——

“Welcome to Gold Nile Jewelers, how can I-“ You blinked at the man entering the shop. “-Keigo.”

“Birdie? You work here?” He looked just as confused as you felt, cocking his head to the side as he approached the counter.

You looked around the small display room, nodding your head. “Yep… You looking for anything specific today?”

“Ah, right!” He clasped his hands together, bending over to lean on the display counter as he looked up at you. “So professional (Y/N), it’s just me.” The man chuckled.

“Actually, I thought I’d get my girl a cute little bracelet or something like that, you think she’d like that?”

Knowing your friend, she’d be ecstactic. “Oh, absolutely. Any particular occasion, or just an “I love you gift”?” You asked, already running through the list of bracelets in stock.

“It’s our two month anniversary in another week, thought I’d get her a little sumn’ sumn’, y’know?”

Gold Nile Jewelers was an expensive store. You patted yourself on the back for not dropping your jaw when he said “two month anniversary”. People came here for wedding rings and special occasion jewelry, not monthly anniversaries like some high schoolers.

Well, unless they were rich.

You showed Keigo the selection of bracelets currently available, the man listening quietly to your product descriptions and recommendations, asking questions about the fit and feel, and if you think your friend would like a particular one.

“Honestly Keigo, I could choose one I think she’d like, but it’d be more special if you chose for her.” You finally told him.  He wasn’t annoying you, but you felt frustrated with his apparent lack of knowledge about his girlfriend. How did he not know what her favorite color was? “I’d suggest coming back in a few days. Go home, see what kind of jewelry she wears, pay attention to the colors she gravitates towards, if she’s allergic to any metals.”

Keigo tapped his chin. “Hmm, you have a good point. I guess I should pay more attention to those kinds of things.”

You nodded as you began to pack the expensive bracelets back into their display cases. “Gifts for a significant other can be hard. Honestly, it means a lot if they pick it out themselves and surprise you with it. Makes it special.”

“Oh, you have a partner?” Keigo asked, bright eyes watching your hands work.

A frown almost crossed your features, but you stopped it before it could show. “Ah, sorry, that’s not really a work-appropriate question.”

“Awh, c’mon! It’s just me, we’re friends, can’t you tell me?” Keigo pouted, batting his eyelashes at you in an exaggerated, dramatic fashion. The display made you laugh, so you indulged him. After all, he was a friend. No harm in telling him something he was bond to know sooner or later.

“I’m actually single right now. But as a jeweler sale associate, I know how much it means to a person when their partner picks out a gift for them, especially if it’s a surprise.”

Keigo nodded his head solemnly.  “That makes sense. I better follow your advice then eh? Find out what she likes-“ he mused “-I can do that.”

“Good luck Keigo!” You called after him as he strolled through the door, waving when he smiled at you, giving that same, goofy two fingered salute that he always did when saying goodbye.

The man unnerved you, the visions you had experienced concerning him making you worry. But as long as he was dating your friend, you felt that you’d be fine.

-----

Keigo showed up again two days later.

“Back so soon?”

“You know me-“ He shook out his umbrella, placing it in the drip-bin by the door, wiping his shoes on the mat. “I always try to be speedy with my work.”

It was grey outside, drizzling slightly. You loved these kinds of days, where you could sit near a window and watch it rain while sipping tea. It was so peaceful and calm, and always soothed your stress.

“Find out anything useful?” Whatever he could tell you would make it easier to refine the jewelry selection for his particular needs.

“So, she doesn’t have any bracelets, and I asked her about why and she said they annoy her. She likes necklaces.” He clarified,. You could tell by the way he puffed up that he felt proud of his detective skills. “I even made a note of the lengths - she likes ones that dip low, which-“ He wolf whistled, and your stomach turned. But it was fine, just awkward.

“Alright, I think we have quite a few like that. Let me collect them for you and lay them out.”

Keigo strolled around the display room while you bustled about, looking in each case at the shiny metals and stones  

You laid out the necklaces, calling Keigo over. The man smiled brightly at you as you showed him the selection, noticing he was gravitating towards the more simply, elegant choices.

“I’m sure she would be thrilled with any of these.” You offered, Keigo silent as he tried to decide between two necklaces.

Still, the man shook his head, quirking his lips. “I just…. I need to see them on, y’know?” Then he brightened, as if he had just thought of something. “Hey, can you try them on? Model one for me? Just to see what it’d look like.”

You laughed nervously. “Sorry Keigo, but I’m not allowed to do that, it’s against company policy. Only customers get to try on the jewelry, and that’s if they’re supervised.”

“Awh, c’mon! No one else is here, and I won’t tell.” The man leaned forward, shooting you a quick wink before he snatched up one of the necklaces, holding it out towards you. “Please? I just need to see it. I promise I’ll buy it.”

He was so insistent, and no matter how loud the alarm bells were wringing in your head, you felt cowed by his confidence.

“Um, still… I don’t think it’s allowed-“

“Fuck what’s allowed-“ He cut you off, snorting. “-I want to see what it looks like. It’s just me (Y/N), I’m not gonna snitch.”

A heavy sigh, and you finally agreed, taking the necklace from his nimble fingers.  You slung it around your neck, not fastening the back as you held it in place. Hopefully that would be enough to sate Keigo’s curiosity.

His eyes immediately followed the curve of the necklace, how it dipped low towards your cleavage (curse you for wearing a lower-cut shirt today). You tried to ignore the leering.

“Here, let me help you fasten it, doesn’t look right otherwise.”

Before you could protest, he was sliding behind you, deft hands reaching for the necklace your had in your grasp.

“Keigo no-!”

But it was too late.

You were pressed up against a wall, face-first, your hands gathered into the small of your back and held there with a vice-like grip. There was pressure between your legs, something hammering into you, in and out, in and out, in and out.

Keigo was talking to you, you could tell it was the man by his voice. What was he saying? You were too overwhelmed with the sensation between your legs to focus on the words falling from his lips.

Sweat dripped from your temples, Keigo’s chest pressed up against your back was slick with perspiration, his nipples hard and pressing into your skin. It was an uncomfortable situation-

And then it changed.

You were tied up now, tight enough that you couldn’t move no matter how you thrashed. Knees bound in such a way so your ass was up in the air, arms stretched out in front of you, anchored to the headboard of the bed.

Keigo was behind you again - nothing to indicate that the tongue running through your core was his, but somehow, you knew.

You were begging and pleading, withing in your restraints against his tongue, but he wouldn’t let up, he wouldn’t let you crest the mountain that had built up inside. He kept chuckling, the vibrations running through you and making you buck your hips. You felt disgusting.

Then the bed was gone, and Keigo was in front of you. He was sitting in an office chair, your legs straddling his lap. Hands on your hips were dragging you back and forth, grinding you on the hard member protruding from Keigo’s lap. He was flushed, letting out little moans as he kept eye contact with you, smiling and praising you.

Then you were back.

Gasping, you shot away from Keigo, the expensive necklace clattering to the ground as it fell from your hands.

The man froze, confusion etched across his features as he watched you bend over, trying to catch your breath, to calm down, to ignore the lingering sensations from the futuristic visions.

“(Y/N)…”

“I think-I think you should leave.” You heaved, tears building. That had been awful, everything had felt good but you hadn’t. You felt uncomfortable and disrespected and stupid. That couldn’t be your future with Keigo, you wouldn’t be able to handle that. He was your friend’s boyfriend, for goodness sake!

Keigo opened his mouth to say something, but you snapped at him “Leave.”, making the man click his jaw shut.

He walked out the door, shooting you concerned glances the entire way.

You felt better as soon as he was gone, the door clicking shut after him. Thankfully, you were the only employee out front at the moment, and no other customers were present, so no one but you and Keigo had experienced your outburst.

Bending down to pick up the necklace, you inspected it carefully, horrified that you had dropped such an expensive item. It was alright though, so you brought it back to the others, shakily beginning to gather them up to put away.

You didn’t want to see Keigo again.

——-

“I just don’t understand!”

Your friend sobbed, surrounded by tissues on your bed, eyes red and blotchy.  You wished you could rub her back, our give her a hug, but you knew what would happen. So you stayed on the floor, passing up tissues and offering wordless sympathy.

“Why would he break up with me? Why?”

You shrugged, looking for words. “I don’t know… I’m sorry that this happened, but if he can’t see how awesome you are, then he’s an idiot.”

She sniffed, blowing her nose. You could tell she wasn’t convinced, but she didn’t say anything further, instead choosing to wipe her eyes.

She had called an hour or so ago, tearful, asking if she could come over. Refused to tell you what was wrong, but the second you let her in, she had burst into tears, explaining everything.

Keigo had broken up with her via text, that asshole.

“I just…. I thought we were good. Did I do something wrong? I just don’t get it.”

“Neither do I. You said he just texted you out of the blue?”

She nodded her head, going to blow her nose again. “We were supposed to go out for dinner tomorrow, it’s our two month anniversary.”

You cringed. Did your encounter with Keigo in the jewelry store have something to do with this? Had you driven your friend’s boyfriend away? Had you weirded him out? Oh god, what if this was all your fault?

Your friend broke down into a sob again, slumping onto your bed. You passed her another tissue. “It’ll be okay. I think he’s a stupid fucker that just wanted to play with your heart.  He isn’t worth shit. You deserve so much better than him.”

She nodded, blotchy eyes seeking out your own. In the back of your mind, you cringed, seeing the exact same scene from your vision. Well, at least the two of you hadn’t gotten in a fight.

——-

A few weeks later, Keigo was at your door.

“You need to leave. Now.”

“Aw, c’mon (Y/N), at least hear me out?”

You huffed, crossing your arms. Maybe he had a dumb explanation for why he had dumped your friend. You were wary of him accidentally touching you again though. “Fine, but make it quick.”

“No promises.” He grinned, breezing past you and into your apartment. He beelined for the chair you had sat in last time he was here, leaving you to take a seat on the couch.

“Alright-“ He settled in, fixing you with a gleeful eye. “How do you feel about your quirk?”

Caught off guard, you blinked. Wasn’t he going to explain why he had broken your friend’s heart? “Um, what?”

“Your quirk, y’know, the one that makes you see the future?” He leaned forward, rubbing his hands together with a smile. He seemed far too pleased, and it made you nervous.

“I hate it. If I could get rid of it, I would.” You stated, ready to move onto a different topic. But just as you were about to ask him about your friend, he rose to his feet, fishing in his pockets.

He drew out a bracelet, black and red, thin. “Well then, lookie what I have.” The man walked over, sitting down quickly on the couch next to you, causing you to immediately scoot to the end. You didn’t want him touching you.

“Oh, sorry.” He apologized upon noticing your unease. Instead of scooting closer, he simply tossed the bracelet onto your lap, leaning back as he watched you look at it curiously. “Put it on, see how it fits.”

“I don’t need jewelry Keigo, and I think we should be spending our time discussing why you bro-“

“Just put it on (Y/N), please? I promise you won’t regret it.”

Huffing, you did as he asked, clasping the bracelet around your wrist. It fit snug, almost too tight, but it hugged your wrist comfortingly. It was pretty, but you didn’t see what this had to do with your quirk, or with your friend, or anything that held any relevancy.

Bracelet now on, you fixed Keigo with a blank stare. “Happy?”

“I don’t know.” Keigo grinned. “Are you?” And then he was hugging you, arms wrapped around your shoulders, face buried in your neck.

You shrieked, already panicking as you tried to ready yourself for the onslaught of  visions that accompanied physical touch.

They never came.

Choking back a surprised gasp, you drew back from his hug to find Keigo’s eyes, the man smiling down at you as he watched your reaction.

“Kei-Keigo…” You stuttered, shocked, surprised, euphoric, confused - so many emotions, all at once. You couldn’t even think to brush off the hands still around your shoulders, thumbs brushing at the tops of your exposed collarbones by the neck of your shirt.

You weren’t able to think rationally, couldn’t focus on anything but the awe you felt at being touched without being slammed with visions of the future.

You forgot about the terrifying visions you had gotten when Keigo touched you.

You forgot about how he had hurt your friend, broke her heart with no explanation.

You forgot about his hands refusing to leave your body.

“Keigo, this is…. Amazing” You breathed, wide eyes snapping up, catching his smiling face, eyes crinkly and twinkly.

“I had my team modify some quirk-cancelling cuffs! You seemed so upset whenever someone touched you, I couldn’t leave you with such a burden.”

Nodding, you returned your gaze to the bracelet, turning your wrist this way and that to look at the bracelet from different angles.

“I mean, I know how much I like being touched, and touching. I think I’d totally die if I couldn’t.” Keigo chuckled, but you weren’t listening.

The rest of his time sitting next to you on the couch was spent explaining the colors he had spent so long picking (“They’re my personal favorite, aren’t they nice?”) and why he had decided on a bracelet (“It could’ve been a necklace, but I think it looks better in it’s original cuff design, looks cooler that way.”).

By the time he had to leave, you were completely sidetracked, so distracted with your shiny new jewelry that you didn’t even remember to ask what his deal was with being a jerk to your friend, his now ex-girlfriend.

-----

“-and then he gave me the bracelet. I wasn’t thinking much after that, I just… I can hug you, isn’t that incredible?”

You gave your friend another squeeze, feeling a smile dance across your face. But then you sobered, pulling back from her with your hands on her shoulders, quickly becoming serious.

“But he’s really starting to kind of weird me out. Why won’t he explain why he broke up with you? He’s being a little bitch. I tried asking him a couple times, but he kept cutting me off, and I feel like the bracelet was a distraction to stop me from busting his chops about his behavior towards you.”

Your friend looked sad for a second, before shrugging. “I dunno, he just said things weren’t working out, and that while he liked me, he’s not ready for a relationship right now ‘cause of where he’s at in his life.”

“Psh-“ You scoffed, going in for another comforting squeeze for your friend. “-that’s code for “I’m a fuckboy and want to sleep around”.”

“I know….. But it still hurts.” You friend sighed, wrapping her arms around your neck. “But at least he gave you that quirk thing. I’ve never seen you so happy.”

“I just wish he was a mildly decent person.” You grumbled, detaching from the hug to sit back, glaring at the ceiling. “He gives me the fucking creeps.”

“How so?” You friend locked her head to the side, throwing her arm over the back of the couch. You had called her over the second Keigo had left, finally gathering your wits about you.

“I dunno…” You shrugged, not quite ready to tell her about the disturbing visions containing him. Did that have something to do with their breakup? Was it your fault? What was going to happen with Keigo? It honestly scared you, the residual feelings and sensations you could remember from the visions.

Your friend nodded understandingly. “Some people just give off those vibes. Well, at least we don’t ever have to see him again. Good riddance I say.”

You agreed.

——-

Knocking on the door, you shuffled your feet as you took in the house.

It was one of those rich places - nice neighborhood, fancy street filled with lavish houses, expensive cars. You felt slightly out of place, shifting from foot to foot in your clearance-rack clothes.

The door swung open, revealing a sleepy Keigo, shirtless, clad in nothing but sweatpants.

“Oh, um-“ You quickly turned, averting your eyes, trying to give the man privacy in case he hadn’t realized he was shirtless. It looked like he had just woken up from a nap, eyes blinking owlishly, hair mussed.

“Hey (Y/N), come on in.”

Still keeping your eyes turned away, you stepped inside the opulent house, trying not to gape too much at the decor inside. You didn’t want to look like a complete peasant in front of Keigo, but he’d already been to your house, so you could imagine that he knew of your poor-ness.

“Something wrong? You can look at me y’know, I’m not gonna turn you to stone or something.” Keigo joked, voice entirely too close for comfort.

Head whipping around, you found that he was too close, practically almost touching you as he stood beside you, head cocked as he watched you.

“No… nothings wrong, you’re just…” You gestured to his torso, and Keigo looked down in confusion, before looking back at you, a grin on his face.

“Ah, just woke up.” He shrugged, before reaching out to touch your arm. “Bracelet still keeping that quirk at bay?”

You nodding, following the blonde as he turned and walked further into his house, towards the kitchen.

“Glad to hear! I just wanted to look at it a bit, make sure nothing’s worn or torn, y’know? Hate for you to have to deal with the no-touching thing again.” He said over his shoulder, gesturing for you to sit down at the island, on one of the barstools.

You did so, watching the man open his fridge, take out a carton of milk, uncap it. “Is it too tight?”

“Nope.”

He drank right out of the bottle, and you watched some dribble out of the corner of his mouth, down his chin. The man finished gulping down the milk, taking the bottle away from his lips to swipe at the white trail of liquid rolling down his chin.

Eyes dark, he made contact with your own eyes as he cleaned his chin with a finger, stuffing it in his mouth to suck it clean.

That was gross.

The next second, he was back to normal, cheerfully putting the milk back into the fridge. “Good, good. Now, mind if I take a look at it? You should keep it on though.”

You nodded, and Keigo straightened, walking around the island to sit next to you, shuffling his stool closer.

He grabbed your wrist, laying it out on the island, before beginning to poke at the bracelet, running his fingers over it, fiddling with it, squeezing the tendons in your hand, smoothing his hand up your arm.

It felt a bit intrusive.

“So the visions are all blocked?”

“Yep.”

“And you can touch and be touched?”

“Yeah.”

“How’s your appetite? Sometimes complete quirk suppression can make you lose your appetite.”

“It’s been normal, I guess I’m a little hungrier than normal, but I’ve been getting out more too, not as afraid of crowds.”

“Nice! And how about your libido?”

You spluttered, choking on your own spit, snatching your hand away from Keigo’s wandering touches.

“Excuse me? That’s a bit personal, thanks.”

Keigo shrugged, bright eyes hooded and lazy. “It’s just a question.”

“Are you done making sure it’s all good? No broken parts?” You changed the subject, narrowing your eyes. You can’t believe your friend had ever dated him, that you had ever thought he was anything but a playboy.

You wouldn’t even be here, in his house, but he had come into the jewelers a while back (both you and your friend had blocked his number), spouting something about your bracelet needing constant checks and maintenance in order to keep suppressing your quirk. (“Wouldn’t want it to stop working, right? Just stop by sometimes, here’s my address.”).

So here you were.

Keigo leaned back a little, raising an eyebrow at your irritated tone of voice. “Woah there, don’t get snippy. I’m doing you a favor, right? I’m not trying to hurt you or something.”

Technically, you guess he was right. But he had played your friend, had fucked with her feelings. He was a fuckboy, liked messing with each and every girl he could find, and you didn’t care to be one of them.

“And I appreciate that Keigo. But I like to keep my private life private.”

Keigo was silent, simply holding out a hand for you to place your arm in, so he could fiddle more with the bracelet.

Several moments of awkward silence passed before he spoke again. “You’re being awfully ungrateful. It makes me think you don’t even want this little gift. If I were you, I’d be doing everything I could to show the person kind enough to do such a thing for me how thankful I was.”

Lost for words, you stared at the man. Was he expecting some sort of award? Some sort of prize? It’s not like you had anything to give him.

“I don’t have anything to give you in thanks. Just my words, which I’ve said plenty of. I didn’t ask you to make this for me.” You pointed out.

“Sure, but you use it, don’t you? You wouldn’t like it if I took it away, right? Think about how miserable your life was before I gave you this.”

Your life had been miserable. Afraid to go out in crowds, afraid to leave the house, Nervous about grocery shopping, about paying and having the cashier touch your hand as they handed over the change.

Scared of public transportation, of coffeeshops and bookstores, of public parks, even your own home. What if one of your roommates forgot and touched you? Or accidentally bumped into you?

Plus, you could hug now, and shake hands, and slap your friends back when she told a horrible joke, or tap her when you wanted her attention.

You didn’t want to go back to before. “I’m sorry Keigo… I really do think it’s lovely, and I can never thank you enough for doing this for me.”

Keigo let go of your arm, and it swung back to your side. You could feel the man looking at you.

“You know what would let me know that you mean it?”

God, it better not be something sexual.

“You could buy me coffee. Or maybe a cookie from that bakery on 1st Avenue, you know the one? With the little bunny pastries?”

That surprised you.

“You go there? That’s my favorite place.” You mused, looking at Keigo in surprise. He didn’t seem the kind of guy who’d like a place like that. But appearances could be deceiving.

“Of course! I really like their stuff.”

“Alright,” You conceded, rising to your feet. “I’ll get you some stuff from there. Want it today?”

Keigo rose to his feet as well, crossing his arms over his bare chest. “Yeah! Let me get dressed real quick, and then I’ll go with you. Don’t go anywhere birdie.” He shot you a wink, before sauntering past you, out of the kitchen.  You raised a brow, surprised. He meant to go with you?

“Make yourself at home while you wait, don’t be afraid to kick up your feet!”  

——-

The bakery smelled as lovely as usual.

A warm atmosphere, good food, friendly employees. It was your favorite place for a reason.

“Alright, what do you want?” You asked Keigo, the two of you staring up at the menu.

“Hmm, I don’t know. What are you going to get?”

“Probably a muffin, those are my favorite.”

“What!?! That’s my favorite too! How crazy.” Keigo smiled at you, dimples showing. You got the feeling that he was brown-nosing you, but you kept the thought to yourself, striding up to the counter to order.

Muffins purchased, you approached Keigo, who was lounging by one of the display cases, admiring the delicate, mouthwatering masterpieces held within.

“All good to go?” His smile was so charming, so friendly, you almost caught yourself wanting to see it more. Huffing in irritation at yourself, you pushed past him, shoving the bag with his muffin into his chest.

“Here’s your stuff. I’m going home now, see you around.”

“Wait!” Keigo turned, jogging a little to catch up as you exited the bakery. “We gotta eat these before they get cold - hey, birdie, are you listening to me?“

You weren’t, stoically keeping your head turned forward, walking with determination. There was only so much of Keigo that you could tolerate, and you had reached your limit. He was starting to really annoy you, didn’t he get that you wanted to go home? You’ll just eat your muffin on the subway, it’s not that hard.

“(Y/N)-“ His sudden growl was punctuated by an arm on your shoulder, spinning you around and pulling you towards the man.

“Hey-!” The sudden collision of your face with his chest knocked your breath away, almost causing you to drop your own muffin in the process.

When you managed to gather yourself, you shot a glare up at Keigo’s face, only to find the blonde smirking down at you, a fierce glint in his eyes.

“I expect you to listen when I’m talking, got it? I don’t like being ignored.”

That’s evident.

You tried to back away, but he still had a hand on your shoulder, squeezing you tight to him. “Keigo! Let me go, you stupid idiot-“

“Stop it, I’m not doing anything to you, ya big baby.” He cooed down at you, before taking his hand away, letting you stumble backwards.

He was just messing with you, teasing you. It was obvious, yet still you allowed him to be around you.

“Alright, I’m sorry, I know all the touching’s gotta be new still. Wanna go eat these in the park? I’ll buy you some ice cream if you want.”

“I don’t want ice cream, I want to go home.”

Keigo frowned, walking after you when you turned on your heel, heading for the subway. “Why do you dislike me so much? I’ve done so much to help you, and yet you spit in my face. Your parents ever teach you how to be grateful? Or even respectful?”

You gasped at his accusation, stopping in your tracks to whirl around, only to find the man far closer than what you had expected. Still, you tried to hide your surprise at his proximity, jabbing a finger in his direction.

“You are a playboy, you broke my friend’s heart, and you want to sleep with every single person you come across just to mess with their feelings. I don’t want to be around you. I won’t get dragged into that.”

The man watched you, face solemn and contemplative. “Is that really how you see me?”

“Why would I say any of that unless it was true?”

He ran a hand through his hair, looking up and around, as if gathering his bearings, before back down at you.

“Have you ever considered that I’m the one getting my heart broken?”

“Yeah right-“ You scoffed, only for Keigo to cut you off.

“People want to sleep with me because they think it’ll get them something that they want. Fifteen second fame, a piece in a tabloid about my “new lover”…. Think it’ll help them further their career, or that I’ll give them money. I can’t find anyone real.

“And my friend wasn’t real enough for you?” You spat, not believing him for a second.

“Nope.  You think she liked me for who I am?”

“Uh, yeah? She gushed to me all the damn time about how good you were, how she felt about you. That girl held nothing but love and affection for you.”

The man snorted, rolling his eyes. “Yeah, sure, love for my wallet.”

“She’s not like that.” You argued, brows furrowing.

“Really? Cause she was sucking me dry, and not even in a sexy way.”

You crinkled your nose at what he was implying. Your friend wasn’t like that, she truly had felt for Keigo, had liked him as her boyfriend. She wasn’t just a leech.

“I’m done talking about my failed love life.” Keigo said lowly, nudging your shoulder. “I just thought two friends could hangout, but it seems like you think all I do is try and fuck people.”

“No, Kiego…. That’s not what I meant.” Maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t, but right now…. You almost felt a twinge of sympathy for him.

Some of what he was saying made sense, how people would try and use him for various reasons. But that still didn’t explain his sudden and harsh breakup with your friend. And over text no less, a complete douche move!

But you felt bad about his words, about how he seemed to actually want to hangout, and yet you were accusing him of trying to sleep with you. But what about those visions you had had? Was that even how they went? Or were you remembering falsely based on your bias towards the man?

And what about his suggestive touches, his leering gaze? Was that maybe just how he always was, and it wasn’t exclusive to you? Were you inflating your place in his life, thinking that he wanted you?

It was confusing, and you didn’t want to think about it, try and untangle the lies from the truth. Right now, you just wanted to eat your muffin.

“If you really didn’t mean it, then can we go eat these in the park? I just want to chill with someone that isn’t trying to gain something from me. I want to spend time with someone that’s real.”

With a half-irritated sigh, you nodded, hoping you wouldn’t regret hanging out with the obnoxious man.

-----

He kept calling you, texting you. You’d had to unblock his number at some point, in order for him to text you about the bracelet and when he needed to look at it.

“Come overrrrr, I’m bored!”

“Birdie, are you hungry? The delivery place gave me extra Torikatsu and I don’t want it to go bad. Can I come drop it off?”

He’d swing by the jewelers, leaning over the counter to talk to you about a recent shoot he’d booked, or something he saw recently.

Keigo seemed to slowly insert himself into every facet of your live, against your will, ignoring every subtle, irritated attempt of yours to turn him away. Every single time you saw him, your mind would inevitably think of the visions, but you felt like you couldn’t trust yourself with those anymore.

The man assured you at every step, he had no romantic feelings for you, he just wanted a friend, someone to put him in his place, be honest with him.

You definitely were honest.

Snapping at him when he showed up at your apartment uninvited, coming up behind you on the street and grabbing your sides, laughing when you shrieked and tried to hit your attacker, only to realize it was Keigo.

Tearing into him when he tried to talk badly about your friend - she had been having less and less contact with you, and you couldn’t figure out why. Now your relationship with her was reduced to curt text messages. Maybe she was just going through a hard time, and wanted alone time? Still, you let her know you were there for her, whenever she needed.

You were honest when Keigo asked your opinion on food, TV shows, clothes, movies. It was almost satisfying saying something sucked, just to see Keigo’s face fall slightly, before he shook his head, whining.

“Then help me pick something out! I can’t do it without you-“

He totally could, he was just being a baby.

The more he inserted himself into your life, the more you realized that he was akin to a petulant child, just with muscles and a penchant for inappropriate touching.

Whenever he saw you, he’d try to draw you into a hug, letting his hands drop far down your back, way too low for you to feel comfortable. You’d slap them away, and Keigo would laugh, before ruffling your hair.

He’d have you come over so he could check your quirk suppressor, except he was in the middle of a show, and it was getting to the best part. (“Sit down, shhh, it’s just getting good!”) You’d have to sit through the entire thing, enduring Kiego’s hand lazily drawing shapes over your pants on your thigh, simply putting it back whenever you shoved it off.

He was insufferable, irritating to no end, but you could tell he was a lonely man, bitter about his love life and with his friendships.

So you tolerated his presence.

After all, he wasn’t trying to hurt you. That’s something he reiterated every single time you shied away from his touch. He made you feel like a fool for thinking the man was hitting on you, when he made it so clear that he wasn’t, only interested in friendship.

Until you fell asleep at his house.

Another one of those days were he needed to look at your quirk suppressor (which you were 99% sure was fine, it seemed like he just enjoyed seeing it on your wrist). He had been rummaging around in his room before he had to run and open the front door for you, talking as he walked back to return to his previous task.

Apparently he was trying to find a good shirt, seeing as how he had pants on, but his chest was bare. Keigo instructed you to sit on the bed for a second while he retreated into his massive closet, trying to find a good shirt  to go with the rest of his outfit.

His bedroom was pretty large, a full California King taking up the majority of the space, neatly made. The sheets and blankets felt soft beneath your fingers as you sat on it’s edge, prepared to wait for Keigo for a bit.

The man always took his fashion very seriously - one time he’d even spent two hours trying on clothes until he’d decided on an appropriate outfit to go to the park.

So you followed your tired eyes, exhausted from work and dealing with Keigo, worrying about your friend, daily life stressors and the like.  Keigo wouldn’t mind if you laid back, right? Your feet wouldn’t be on the bed, so it’d be fine.

And it was fine, pleasant, the room the perfect temperature.

You were roughly jerked out of sleep by pressure. Pressure on your hips, pressure on your lips.

Eyes jolting open, you tried to inhale, only to find yourself unsuccessful.

Keigo was on top of you.

Panicking, your hands came to push at him, a muffled sound of protest being squeaked out from where his lips pressed against yours.

Noticing you were awake, Keigo pulled back, smiling the whole while.

“I’m not willing to wait anymore, I just gotta have you.”

His eyes were glinting, hair tousled, still shirtless. You felt goosebumps arise as you remembered the vision you had so long ago, of this exact moment.

“Wai-mmph!” His lips were on yours again, passionate and warm, moving eagerly. A wet tongue pressed at the seam of your mouth, surprising you and making you blanch, which allowed the man access.

Kiego’s tongue explored the inside of your mouth, playfully tapping your own wet muscle, encouraging you to lift it and wrestle with him.

This was too weird, this wasn’t happening, you couldn’t do this-

Biting down hard, you snapped your teeth shut on his tongue, and Keigo yelped, drawing back immediately.

“Ouch, what the fuck!?! Chill out (Y/N), geez.” His hand was dabbing at his mouth, wincing when it came in contact with his bleeding tongue. You had bitten him deep, but you weren’t focused on that right now.

“What are-what are you doing?” Your voice was breathless, disoriented. The room felt…. Dark, and suffocating, as if it was closing in on the two of you, trapping you.

Keigo looked down at you, and it was only then that you realized you had been moved to lie on the bed fully, shoes off, legs splayed. The man rested on his stomach between them, his weight pressed against your body, keeping you still.

“I told you, I can’t wait anymore. I’ve been as nice as I can, but it’s time you started paying me back for everything I’ve done for you.”

What? Paying him back-was he talking about the quirk suppressor he had gifted you? Had he been lying about his true intentions this whole time?

“That’s not right, it was a gift, you-you don’t have to pay back a gift.” You spluttered, feeling as if your chest was collapsing.

Keigo shook his head, swooping down to leave a bloody kiss on your forehead, which you cringed at, before pulling back to speak.

“Nah, it wasn’t a gift. You know how expensive it was? You were always gonna have to compensate me. Now shush, I wanna feel you-“

One of his hands grabbed your jaw, keeping your face turned towards his, pressing down until tears formed in your eyes. His lips were bloody from the bite on his tongue, tasting unmistakably like iron.

You didn’t want this.

Trying to bite him again left you with a slap to your thigh, making you cry out. Keigo huffed out a laugh against your mouth.

He detached from your lips, just to start nibbling at your jawline, elating streaks of red where his lips touched.

“God, you are so sexy. I was trying to chill, but then I came out and you were sleepin’ all cute, and I couldn’t fucking stop myself from touching.”

“Stop doing this, I can pay you with something different. I don’t wanna do this Keigo.” You whispered, on the verge of crying.

“No, I get to decide what you’ll be doing for me, it’s my bracelet-“

“It’s not, you gave it to me, please stop-“

“Shut up.” He growled sinking his teeth into the side of your neck, nipping at the skin hard enough to have you screaming. “You’re so ungrateful, where’s my thanks? I’ve done so much for you.”

“Thank you, thank you Keigo, I appreciate it all-“ You hurried out, hoping it was what he wanted to hear “But I can’t do this, please don’t make me. I wanna go home.”

“There we go, I like the sound of you thanking me. You’re going to thank me for each and every time you cum tonight, got it?”

“No, no, we can’t do this, I can’t! Get off of me, please-“

“You’ll do it, or else I’ll whip you until your flesh hangs off of you in strings.” He hissed, squeezing your jaw cruelly.

The tears in your eyes overflowed as you fell silent.

“Aw, birdie, don’t cry. I’m not gonna hurt you, I never have, right?” He waited for a second, watching your face before he pressed harder, eyes hardening “Right?“

You nodded jerkily, and Keigo came to kiss your tears away, savoring their salty taste as they rolled down your cheeks.

“Keigo, this isn’t right though, please get off me. I don’t want this-“

“You want me to take this away?” A hand caught your shaking wrist, the one that had the quirk suppressor fastened snugly around it, wrenching it up so both of you could see it. “Huh? Put you back where you were in your miserable little life? Running away from everyone, holing up in your apartment, not willing to touch or be touched…”

The very thought made your insides churn, and a fresh round of tears rolled down your face as you shook your head no, lips wobbling as you whined. You felt so pathetic, so small and dumb underneath Keigo.

“That’s what I thought. You’re going to relax now, right? No more begging unless it’s for more.”

He didn’t wait for an answer, beginning to shuffle around until he could slide his hands under your shirt, pressing against your tummy as you flinched away.

“Don’t worry birdie, you’re gonna like every single thing we’re gonna do. You’ve had sex now, yeah? Since I gave you the bracelet?”

You shook your head “no”, it’s not like you were eager for sex before you got it, and all the touching-without-terrifying-visions thing was still new to you, the dating world was being eased into. Somehow though, every single date seemed to be crashed by the man on top of you.

Keigo lit up like a Christmas tree, licking his lips gleefully. “Okay, okay, I can-whew, that’s hot-I can be gentle.” It sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than he was trying to convince you, his hands skirting up your ribs, shucking up your shirt as the traveled higher and higher.

“Keigo please-“

“Don’t you dare say stop, I’m not gonna. You’re the first person that doesn’t want anything from me, you’re real, and I’m not stopping.”

His admission made you cringe, recoiling from his touch. He followed you, palms finally smoothing over your breasts, over your bra.

“You’re going to do what I say, or else this-“ Your wrist was wrenched into view, red-and-black bracelet glittering. “-gets removed. And I’ll still do whatever the fuck I want, but you’ll be off in your mind having visions of who-knows-what while I have my way. Got it?”

Your blood chilled, body suddenly feeling ice cold. His tone was dead serious, spitting out the words with a sense of finality.

“So, just lay there and take it birdie, I’ll be good to you.”

[dynamoe]

SUMMARY: Pete vents his spleen on his personal pirate radio. Billy proves his boy genius mettle with some after-school tutoring, but ends up getting schooled... in matters of the heart?

read part two on archive of our own | TOMORROW chapter index

← go back to part one | go on to part three

Trigger warnings: Comparable to parent series— swearing, slurs, implied xenophobia/racism, cruelty-disguised-as-affection and affection-disguised-as-cruelty

Pete eyeballed the stack of tapes on the kitchen counter before turning back to the dumpster-salvaged IBM clone he was defragging.

"Jeeze, more videos, pal? Can we take a break from movies and, I dunno, do some science?" 

"Chut chut chut chut-chut-chut," defragged the PC in agreement.

"Like I actually believe you want to work," Billy scoffed, unplugging the Sega Genesis and hooking up the VHS player.

"All of a sudden you're, like, Mr. Big Cinephile," White rolled his eyes, "I don't have time to watch all this stuff, fella."

"So, don't. I'll watch them alone," Billy dismissed, throwing himself onto the couch and feeling under the cushions for the remote.

He defragged a full 5MB before Pete finally put it together, "This is so you can see that girl who works in the video store?  Aw, man. You pathetic loser."

"What? What makes that pathetic?" Billy shouted angrily over the MGM fanfare blaring out of the TV, "We're friends!"

Pete shook his head, "As if."

↓ 📼 continues below the fold 📼 ↓

"Street of Crocodiles, The Third Man, and The Apple . That's quite a varied buffet you got there, Simply Red," the Riot Clrrrk remarked as she scanned each barcode into the register

"What complements a luxurious meal of caviar and filet mignon—" Billy explained, gesturing to the Quay Brothers and Carol Reed, "More than a dessert of rat shit and cocaine à la mode," and held up the VHS of The Apple like it was toxic waste.

Alison smirked hard and bit her lip. Was it a laugh? Maybe that's how she laughed – just too cool to laugh audibly.

Billy explained, "When we do a double feature, I let my roommate narrow it down from Class, Sass or Ass."

"Wow," Alison said sarcastically, looking over her Buddy Holly glasses, "You cool, cool guys sure have a jam-packed social life."

"Mock if you must, it only draws attention to your jealousy for not being on our exclusive guest list," Billy said archly, pushing his already upturned nose higher with his fingertip.

"You and that ersatz Winter brother don't party too hard this weekend. I don't want to read any obituaries on Monday."

"We will have died how we lived. Half asleep on our couch watching Cannon Films dystopian disco musicals."

She pushed his tapes to the edge of the desk so he could grab them easier.

"Have a good weekend, NYPD Blue."

Billy paused mid-stride on his way out the door.

"Why NYPD Blue?" Billy was stumped, "Sipowicz doesn't have red hair," 

"No, not Dennis Franz. The other one," Alison shook her fingers, searching for the name, "You know who I mean. His partner."

"David Caruso? He left after one season."

She shrugged, "I'm not really a regular watcher."

"Well, you should be. NYPD Blue's a great fucking show."

"Ugh, Get out of my store, Anne of Green Gables,"

Billy cheerfully waved, "G'night Alischon."

Billy conceded may have been overdoing it. He may have been going into Video Madness too often and  renting too many videos. He may have been coming off a little puppy-like.  He just had never had someone before he could just come by to shoot the shit with so casually. Someone who was generally happy to see him and remembered what he liked enough to recommend moves he "absolutely had to see." 

Even though she posed cooler-than-thou and spoke in a bored monotone, she was matching his enthusiasm in her own way. It wasn't one-sided. She even once ran out of her store to find him out on the strip mall's one bench, waiting for Pete to pick him up after work as usual, because she was so excited about Video Madness' new arrival.

"Oh my God!  Look what we just got in!" she waved the cassette an inch from his face.

"Skidoo?! I didn't think that was ever made on VHS," Billy admired, and then automatically quizboyed, "Groucho Marx's last movie. He dropped acid with Paul Krassner to prepare for the role."

"I set it aside for you," her eyes sparkled in delight, "It. Is. Horrible!"

Her passion, although bizarre, was infectious. He felt like she had permitted him to be a member of their secret two-person club— the only intellectuals sophisticated enough to appreciate the worst pop-cultural garbage that the squares overlooked. (And, as Groucho said,  no one would want to be a member of a club that would have them as a member...or something)?  

At home, White voiced the counter-argument.

"What really sets me off? She's a tourist," Pete circled the kitchenette as he gathered his thoughts, punching the air with his half-eaten sloppy joe in one hand for emphasis. 

"'Cause everybody hates a tourist," sang Billy under his breath, "Especially one who thinks it's all such a laugh…" Billy gave him a side-eyed glance from the breakfast table and then put the watchmaker's loupe back in his eye. 

Pete swung around, thrusting his sloppy joe accusingly, "A freak tourist!"

"Don't use that word," Billy scowled, guiding his scalpel through the wall of the left ventricle of the heart on the pie plate in front of him, "And you're getting Manwich juice all over the floor."

"No, pally, that's not me saying that. That's what it is to her. You're, like, her own personal sideshow. She comes around to gawk. See Jo-Jo The Pug-faced Boy! Shock! Alive!"

"You're full of baloney," Billy peeled back a membrane with tweezers, "Alischon has never treated me as anything other than a friend."

"To your smooshed up face maybe," White explained, "Behind your back, she gets sick thrills over how weeeihhhd you are. 'Ew, look at his big head. Gross! His ears are on sideways!' Etc."

"I'm not listening to you," Billy looked from the textbook diagram to the organ on his dissection tray.

"Bored suburban teenagers are boring," Pete stated authoritatively, " So, she decides she's going to go all Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club. Why have a personality when you can be 'so out there.'" White air-quoted with disgust.

Billy just let him rant. White sometimes went on a tear and it was best to let him peter himself out. (Peter. Heh.)

"So she dyes her hair rainbow colors. Wears ugly clothes and homemade jewelry. Claims only like annoying music and stupid TV shows. Stop me if I'm getting close, pally."

Billy flinched. White wasn't exactly wrong, in a nutshell.

"...And she needs to prove her freaky bona fides by having a weeeeiiiihhhhhd boyfriend."

Billy exploded angrily, pounding  his fist on the table, "I'm not her boyfriend. Friend! We're friends."

White ignored him, affecting a 'girl voice,' "Oh, she's so avant-garde she's fucking that albino kid from our literature seminar. Wow, such out-there taste makes her so cool and different and whatevah."

Billy collected himself, "Now you're projecting."

"And you're supposed to be so grateful that this normal is lowering herself to be seen with you twisted genetic monster. And she gets off on your worship. It's all a big ego boost."

Pete shouted right in Billy's face, "Don't you get it? You're an accessory to a lifestyle. You're not a person, you're a handbag."

Billy sputtered, "I'm not a handbag!"

The commotion shook the table enough to knock the dissection subject over into a mushy pile with a squish-thud. Pete finally noticed what Billy was working on.

"What the hell is that?!"

"A sheep's heart. I bought them from the butcher at the supermarket to practice."

"To practice... open sheep surgery?"

Billy blinked. "Unless you have a ready supply of human corpses, this is the best I can do."

Pete thought a minute, then realized something. He started to speak, "Actually—"

Billy cut him off," No. No. I'm sure you could find a dead body, but I don't want to even know who you know. I strike the question from the record."

Pete tossed the remains of his sandwich in the trash and opened the fridge

Bill called out preemptively, "Don't open that Tupperware in the fridge. It's full of cow's eyes."

"Aw, you're making my favorite dinner for our anniversary!" Pete cooed mockingly.

Billy tapped his anatomy textbook, "I'm doing ophthalmology in the next chapter."

Pete bypassed the stay-fresh box of bovine eyeballs and grabbed a Fresca, "I'm going to the studio."

"You mean the shed?" Billy taunted.

"The broadcast studio, you dink."

"When you ordered it from Sears was it in the 'broadcast studio' section or the 'garden shed' section?"

Pete grumbled. 

Billy dropped it, "Whatever. Go play with your HAM radio. "

"Goddamn it, Billy. It's not HAM radio, it's pirate radio. HAM radio is for weird lonely dorks."

Billy stared. "I'm not touching that set-up. Too easy."

Pete scowled at him and snapped the cordless phone from its cradle, "Stay off the modem for the next hour. I'm taking calls."  

He harrumphed out the front door, attempting to slam the screen door, which only weakly squeaked shut behind him.

"Calls from who?" Billy asked the empty room*. 

II. CIRCUIT BREAKER BREAKER

As much as they argued, it never ended with a huge blowout. The trailer lacked doors good for slamming required for an angry flounce. It also didn't have enough isolated spaces for solitary brooding afterward – just one long room. There was the bathroom, but occupying that any longer than necessary was both gross and cruel to the other party. Pete could climb on the roof to "get away" but he had already ripped one hole in the ceiling by doing just that. Driving around on the Conjecture Scooter to cool off was out with the price of gas as high as it was. Wandering in the desert was far too Biblical and carried too big a risk of getting lost – one sagebrush shrub looked a lot like another –  with the sun coming up.

Buying a shed was an imperfect solution but was within their shoestring budget— a  little prefab corrugated aluminum tool storage building so small he had to duck fit into it. It was originally just a sulking shed, but as he moved in more of his recording and broadcasting junk and then his full record and CD collection, it gradually transitioned itself into a broadcast studio without him trying. Building the aerial was a weekend project and with that up, he was in business, pirating frequencies within a 20 km radius to blast his European Only-release Duran Duran B-sides plus the latest in DIY bedroom label lo-fi off into the ether. 

Was anyone listening? No idea. He gave the fax number and the PO Box on the air every show but never heard anything back.

"Okay, down to business,"  White cracked his knuckles over the transmitter, "Got my Wild Cherry Fresca and I got my Black Jack gum," he popped a stick in his mouth and then spit it out immediately, "Oh god, that's horrible! Why do I keep buying this?" 

Every night at 10, he sent out his signal. 

His college radio show was "The White Room." In his brief and inconsistent commercial radio career, he tested tryout shows under titles "The White Void," "White Noise," "Pale Shelter," and "Unto Whited Sepulchres" (during his embarrassing goth/Christian phase), none of which found an audience and were canceled immediately.  The whole world was his audience now so he referred to the show as "White Nation." (It never occurred to him what that phrase actually implied; it sounded cool to him and that was as much thought as he gave it.)

"You're listening to the Evah Populah Pete White on White Nation, commandeering the airwaves from the powers that be. A lone voice in the wilderness, screaming." 

He usually just plunged into his playlist, only coming on to name tracks once every 5-10 plays, but he needed to vent to somebody. The open airwaves were his best option. 

He pulled the mic arm over to his mouth, set a bed track (Yellow Magic Orchestra, Firecracker)  and growled "We are under attack, y'know. Don't get complacent that you got a good thing going. The outside is always trying to break in, ruin what you've got. INVADING your space."

Yeah, it was little melodramatic, but what's wrong with a little showmanship? He vamped while trying to pull the next LP out of a sleeve.

"Your happiness is under constant assault! These OUTSIDERS want to take away what's yours and even your closest friends will call you a LIAR for telling them the TRUTH that they can't see."

Damn, the record was really stuck in there. He didn't want to rip the cover. 

".... these...seductive women...with their...colored hair and their...um...pigment. Turning your closest family against you. Somebody oughta do something…"

Got it. Must have caught on some old glue seepage inside  the sleeve. He slid the platter out and onto the turntable. "Coming up— Talk Talk, Alphaville, Gary Numan. Now here's Blancmange's 1983 track Living on the Ceiling. He gingerly placed the needle on the spinning disc and faded the input from mic to LP-1, letting out a breath. He felt a little better. 

In between Tears for Fears and Spandau Ballet, the power suddenly cut out, plunging the shed into darkness. He could hear Billy shout from back in the trailer. They were putting a lot of demands on one home-made generator. Being a self-taught engineer with little interest in "best practices" or "basic electrical safety," Pete expected his equipment to short out regularly. 

"Turn it off and turn it back on again" always worked in computing...why not here?, he thought as he flicked a power strip (with 27 different fraying extension cords plugged into it) on/off button with his toe. Everything back up, no problem. It even activated a rainbow flashing party light, an executive desk toy of a tsunami in a box, and a rock tumbler he hadn't even realized were plugged in, mixed in with the piles of old junk. He could just barely make out a tiny crackling voice through static coming  from somewhere in the shed.

"... fzzzt….Breaker Breaker…crrrckkkkkk."

He looked through the shelf for the source, then under piles of boxes and  shifted over a stack of CDs and a bin of hex-nuts, digging to find a dust-crusted CB Radio he got for Christmas 1976. How the hell did he still have that? How the hell was it still working? Why the hell did he have it plugged in?

The CB scanned the local airwaves picking up on truckers too traditional or too cheap to upgrade to car-phone, picking up casual conversation and speed trap alerts from anyone in range. He picked out three or four different voices and CB handles.

"Get your ears on, Dinner Plate – White's broadcasting again. 97.88 AM" "I can't stomach that haircut music. I'm 10-10 on the side. Over." "Negatory, good buddy. That boy's spitting some truth. Dial in." "He's taking back the airwaves from the man, Soap Suds. 10-4."

Hey, someone was listening. 

"Oh, you're listening to the Evah Populah Pete White, reclaiming the airwaves from our corporate overlords. If you're listening...if anyone is listening, you can call our studio at ___," Pete gave the number for the fax line. He usually did as a matter of routine but never got a call before.

The cordless phone suddenly rang. It startled him. Pete reached for the phone and flipped some switches to couple the line with the transmitter.

"Uh, hello?"

"Is this the Ever Pop'lar Pete White," a gruff voice with a heavy Texas accent asked.

"You've got White and you're on the air. What can I do for you, caller?"

"Oh man, that's awesome," the voice drawled, " I'm restin' at a truck stop just outside Pueblo. I drive the Juarez to Saskatoon  run and I always scan my radio for your signal when I'm passing through Colorado on I-25. Tell all my friends to listen, too."

"You play them songs that remind me of high school. Y'know just 'cause I'm a trucker doesn't mean I can't like the New Wave. Driving a big rig don't mean I'm required to like country music or...or…or...CW McCall. I hate that shee-it. That is a rank ster-eo-type. Oh, sorry. Can I cuss on the air?"

"Do whatever you want, pally. This is PIRATE AIR. No rules."

"Damn straight. Anyway, truckers can like electro pop."

"Right on."

"Duran Duran really takes me back. Some of the other stuff you play, well...it's kinda faggoty."

Pete winced. Things were going so well up to this point.

"But it's really the stuff you were saying, about invaders and protecting what's ours? It just speaks to me, man. I feel the same damn way. I wanna send y'all some tokens of my appreciation."

"Stay on the line, caller and we'll take it off air. For the rest of the White Nation out there listening, here comes Orchestral Manoeuvers in the Dark."

He dropped the needle on the 45, faded in the record and switched the caller to a private phone call.

"Still there, caller?"

"Yeah, but I gotta get back on the road. Lemme get that PO Box you said on the air. I wanna send y'all stuff you might find purty interesting."

III. HAVING FUN ISN'T HARD WHEN YOU'VE GOT A LIBRARY CARD

"Alischon!" Billy said, so startled he toppled a stack of returns he was scanning into the computer as soon as he spotted her approaching the checkout desk of the North Mesa Junction Branch Library.

"I finally learned how t' read so I thought I'd celebrate by getting me a library card," Alison belted far too loudly in her best hillbilly-moron voice.

"I'll take care of this patron, Mrs. Schebeliusch," Billy cut off one of the senior librarians circling behind him. 

"The tables have turned. A real reversal of fortune we got going on, Cherry 2000 " Alison pointed out, looking up at him for the first time as he lorded over the checkout desk while standing on a kik-step stool.

"Now you're in my world and the advantage is mine," Billy pronounced nefariously but at library-appropriate volume, robbing it of impact, "Eh, I'm not great at supervillain patter."

"Too much of a hero, right?"

"I'd like to be a good guy but I'm more of a neutral guy. I don't do enough to be good or evil."

"Making some brownies later?" Alison nudged Billy's oven mitt. 

"My hand sets off the bar-code reader," Billy explained, waving his mitt at the infrared checkout desk wand,  "I have to insulate it or the computer thinks someone's checking out 10,000 copies of The Bridges of Madison County.

He hopped off his stool and momentarily disappeared behind the desk to retrieve "new library card" paperwork. He walked Alison over to a side table and set out the forms for her to sign as he stuck a barcode sticker onto a card-blank. 

"I hate working at the front desk. I'm usually in the back." he explained as she filled out her contact info, "I sort the returns and inter-library loans."

"And the bandage?" Alison tapped a square of gauze taped over Billy's right eye with her pen.

"When I applied for this job I thought it seemed less depressing to make it look like something that could get better. I told the head librarian it was a T-ball injury."

"More hopeful," Alison nodded with appreciation.

"But I've been working here for four years and no one's questioned why it's still wrapped up. Maybe they think I'm accident prone in a very specific way and keep re-injuring it."

"Had your cornea bisected by a spat watermelon seed's errant trajectory?" suggested Alison.

"Exactly. Or targeted by a random rogue owl attack. Every day it's something else," Billy agreed to the strategy, "But people only ask about it if I'm at the check out desk, that's why I prefer to stay in the back."

"You're probably not much help at reshelving books, huh?" she stated the obvious, "Or do you only do the children's section."

"Goddammit," Billy scowled, "Why does everyone just pick on me constantly."

"Because you look hilarious when you're furious?"

Billy scowled even more. Alison lit up. "See?"

Billy released a breath and shook his head. It was just his lot in life.

Pete's arguments cycled in his brain, Billy hated himself for even asking, "You're not friends with me just to make fun of me, are you?"

"No, I'm friends with you because you're so goddamned sexy," Alison said completely deadpan with a blank expression.

"More jokes," Billy looked crestfallen. White might have had a point.

"Hilarious when angry. Adorable when hurt," Alison repeated while gesturing into the air like it was an advertising slogan. 

Billy was still mad, but couldn't fight breaking into a big stupid grin.

"And you're cute when you smile, too. You look like a Boston Terrier." 

Billy's ears blushed pink. She stuck out her tongue and flipped him the bird.

"Now, point me to the smut section, I'm gonna check me out ALL them Harlequin Romances. Woof!"

IV. EDUCATING ALISON

A week later at Video Madness, something seemed off.

Just going through the motions, Alison took Billy’s tapes (M, Malice and They Live!), scanned their barcodes and passed them back without eye contact

“No insulting nickname today?” Billy mocked, “No ‘Conan O’Brien?’ No ‘Judas Iscariot?’”

“Like from the Bible? Judas had red hair?” Alison asked vacantly.

“In some other cultural traditions,” Billy shrugged, “Shakespeare says he did. Medieval Jewish stereotypes are always red-haired and— are you OK?”

Alison had a thousand yard stare. “Oh, sorry I just…” Alison seemed to deflate, “I found out I might not graduate. I’m failing too many classes and I’m gonna get held back.”

“What classes?”

“Chemistry. Trig-B. AP US History,” Alison listed.

“Why are you taking an AP if you’re such a dumbass?”

Alison shrugged.

“I can tutor you,” Billy declared.

“As if. You’re just a little kid!”

“I’m a ‘little kid ’ with a high school diploma offering to help you get yours,” Billy snapped.

📼 – 📼 - 📼

Back in the stockroom, Alison perched on a shelf next to a pile of returned tapes while Billy skimmed her Chem test papers, wincing at the grades – 75%. 59%. 11%!

“Eleven percent? How did you get 11%? You get ten points automatically just for spelling your own name right.”

“I dunno,” Alison muttered, pushing another returned tape into the VHS rewinder.

“Are you failing because you don’t understand the material or you just don’t care?”

“I don’t really study.”

“Obviously,” Billy rolled his eye, “But can you cram enough to pass a make-up test or do you need to learn the material first.”

“I don’t know,” Alison said, embarrassed. She didn’t like this power dynamic at all. She was the one who made him uncomfortable, not the other way ‘round. Billy was hit suddenly by how young she looked, like a naughty kid told to sit in the corner.

“It’s been like ten years since I took high school Chemistry. Hand me your textbook,” Billy reached out behind him.

Alison fished it out her backpack and placed it in Billy’s metal hand. In one sweeping gesture, Billy pulled it forward and flopped it open one-handed. He traced his finger down the lines of text speed-reading, flipping the page every few seconds while his other hand mechanically filled a piece of paper with notes in precise tiny handwriting. He finished the book in a minute and a half.

He did the same with the Trigonometry and US History tests and textbooks. Each process took about five minutes from beginning to end: reading the test questions, skimming the text and  breaking down the material into an outline with appropriate sections flagged and noted.

“Jeeze,” Alison sighed, “I guess you really are a boy genius.”

“This is nothing. You should have seen me when I still had both eyes,” Billy boasted, “I could summarize and write breakdowns on two books at the same time.”

“Um… why do you have only one eye?” Alison asked tenuously. He brought it up first so it didn’t seem completely rude to ask.

“A Mexican rottweiler ate it because I shouted trivia at him,” Billy said dismissively, going over his notes.

Alison was too confused to even ask if that was a joke.  

“I can make 100 test prep lists with my eye closed, but if you don’t actually study you’re still going to fail. Are you actually going to make an effort?”

“Oh god, yes,” Alison assured him, “If it means I get to the hell out of school by June, I’d walk through a river of liquid shit naked.”

Billy tried not to dwell on the visual,  “No one’s asking you to do that,” Billy said haltingly, “Just… study, please.”

Alison crossed her heart with her fingers and held up three fingers in a mangled scout’s salute.

“When are your make-up tests?” Billy asked. Alison showed him her schedule. Billy made an outline for what sections to re-read and what to memorize for each test. They made plans to meet during her lunch break next week to do a review and take a practice test.

“Or you could just take my tests for me,” Alison suggested.

“I don’t have the right color wig to pass as you,” Billy said, “Or tall enough platform shoes.”

“Why do you bother even helping me when I’m nothing but mean to you?”

“We’re friends, right?" Billy said, closing the textbook and meeting her eyes, "I know you don’t mean anything by those names anyway.”

“Yeah, it’s just teasing,” Alison admitted without actually apologizing, “I’m only a massive jerk to people I really like.”

Billy's heart lurched.

V. PETE DROPS SCIENCE

“Alischon’s taking me to a show as a thank you for helping her pass her make-up tests,” Billy panicked, “What do I do?”

Pete grumbled, not looking up from the paperback of None Dare Call It Conspiracy that had come in the mail the day before.

“Please, White,” Billy pleaded, “Help me.”

Pete still had reservations about this girl jerking his best friend around, but Billy never asked him for help. It was so rare Pete knew more about anything and got to play older brother and explain how life works.

“You’ve never been to see a band?" Pete asked in disbelief, "Not ever?"

Billy shook his head. No.

Pete cracked his knuckles. By the time he was Billy’s age he’d been to about 8,000 rock shows. He went to even more when he worked at a radio station and was “on the list” to “scout bands.” Free tickets, drinking all night on the company account and makin’ it with sweaty girl bassists sticky with Aqua-Net on top of filthy bar bathroom sinks. Funny how unlimited access to cocaine and the man who could get them played on the radio made him irresistible to women. He never had it so good since.

He got lost in the memory until he noticed Billy looking up at him making puppy-dog-eyes, begging White to save him from doing something lame in front of a girl.

“Number one, never wear the band’s shirt to their concert.”

“Band shirts don’t fit me. They only come in XL. It’d be like wearing a dress.”

“And don’t buy a shirt from the merch stand and then put it on at the concert, especially not over a collared shirt. Absolute massive douche move.”

“These are all local bands so I don’t think any of them even have t-shirts. Any non-shirt related advice?”

“Ok, take these,” he pressed a small plastic snap-top container into his hand.

“What is this? Is it condoms? Are you giving me condoms?”

“Slow your roll, Casanova. It’s earplugs. Brand new pack.” Billy popped the gumball-sized case; six little silicone T-shaped blobs inside stared back at him.

“Find a spot towards the front but not closer than three people in, OK? Not in the direct path of any amps or speakers. Make sure you can see the exit, too.”

Billy wrote his advice down on a square of graph paper. Still a quizboy. What a dweeb. Totally uncool.  White rolled his eyes, but kept going.

“Offer her the earplugs first. It shows you’re thinking of her and you’re a gentleman . Then put yours in as the band first comes out. Just pinch and push them in with the big end facing out.”

Billy knew nothing should go in your ear that was smaller than your elbow but he also picked his nose with a metal finger until it bled so silicone earplugs seemed fine.

“They’re one-size fits all, but they’re designed for human ears. They oughta work in those stuck-on-sideways radar dishes on your head.”

Billy was too nervous to start a fight over baseline insults.

“If a mosh pit forms, move back but don’t surrender too much territory. Or, hell, jump in. Work off some of that anxiety. Just don’t clock anyone with the metal hand – lawsuit.  Head butts are enough. You’d be really good at those.”

Billy nodded and walked off. White called after him, “And don’t attempt to crowd surf— they will drop you.”

to be continued...

*Billy is a huge nerd but even he doesn't throw around "whom" rhetorically even if it is grammatically correct.

_____ ← back to part one | → on to part three | read on archive of our own

→ ask story/character questions here→ see all Billy & White posts

I didn’t even remember Ally Sheedy’s character was named “Allison” in The Breakfast Club (1985) until rewatching this clip. I just think of her as “Ally Sheedy in Breakfast Club."

Pete’s Radio Show Names

White Noise 

Pale Shelter 

Unto Whited Sepulchres (via Matthew 23:27) 

"Got my Wild Cherry [Diet Pepsi] and I got my Black Jack gum” - Pump Up The Volume (1990)

HAVING FUN ISN'T HARD WHEN YOU'VE GOT A LIBRARY CARD this "music video" was aired constantly on PBS. Almost unavoidable. It bores into your brain.

Torn between what line want to hear Billy say more: "Sass, Class or Ass" or "Det. Sipowicz"

[atlafan]

Lock the Door

a/n: college!Harry one shot because why the f not??????? I’ve wanted to write a good college!Harry au for aw while, and I’m happy with this. 11K of friends to lovers. (not proofread) 

Warnings: Smut.

It was junior year of college, Y/N and her friends were thrilled to finally be out of the dorms. Even though they were still living on campus, they were in a student apartment, and incredibly thankful. Now instead of sharing a bathroom with hundreds of other people, there would only be four of them. The only thing was Y/N’s parents weren’t thrilled about the people she was rooming with.

There was her best friend, Liv, who her parents actually really liked. It was the other two roommates that made them feel uneasy. See, Liv really wanted to live with her boyfriend Chris, but they didn’t want to exactly live by themselves, and the student apartments for just two people were really expensive. They’d been dating since second semester their freshman year so it wasn’t weird that they wanted to be in closer proximity. Y/N also thought Chris was an amazing person. He and Liv never made her feel like a third wheel, it was an ideal situation. The three would have been fine to live together, but the university had certain policies in place. One guy was not allowed to live with two girls, they needed another guy. That’s when the topic of Harry came up.

//

“I know he’s not your favorite of my friends, but the other people he was supposed to live with are going off campus, which he can’t afford to do.”

“It’s not that he’s not my favorite, I just don’t know him that well.” Y/N shrugged. “If that’s the case, I think Liv and I should share a room…”

“Yeah, that works. Chris and I don’t wanna be on top of each other all the time, we’re just sick of going across campus all the time.” Liv says. “So, you’d really be okay with Harry living with us? You’ve said before you don’t really care for his lifestyle…”

“He’s just not the first person I would hang out with, but if it means we get this apartment, then I’m cool with it. We’ll get to know each other better if we live together, right?”

//

When Y/N broke the news to her parents they got into a big fight with her about it, but she assured them that a lot of other students did what she and her friends were doing. Living with boys really wasn’t that big of a deal. If anything it would give her practice for when she someday actually got a boyfriend that she would eventually move in with.

The four of them got coffee together the morning they had to have the housing application in. Harry didn’t say much, clearly not a morning person, but he seemed alright with the situation. He and Chris were good enough friends, and he was also excited to not be in a dorm next year.

“I just have one request.” Y/N says. “A lot of the apartments usually have one room that’s bigger than the other, from what I’ve noticed. I’d like for Liv and I to have the bigger room. Chris, I’ve seen your dorm, you literally have like nothing in there. Liv and I have a ton clothes and other things that we’ll space for…”

Chris and Harry look at each other and shrug.

“Alright, that’s not problem.” Chris says. “We should make a group text so over the summer we can see who’s bringing what. We need to figure out dishes and other kitchen shit.”

“And we’ll still need a mini fridge for extra shit, one of my friends was tellin’ me there’s not much room in the apartment fridges. I can bring the one I have.”

“I have a microwave.” Y/N says. “Happy to bring that too.”

“We’ll also need a chore chart.” Liv says. “Just because Y/N and I will be the women of the house does not mean we’ll be the maids. I am not going to be on my hands and knees cleaning the bathroom all the time. We should also pool in money for toilet paper and stuff like that.”

“Good idea, babe.” Chris kisses her cheek and Harry rolls his eyes.

That was is right there, the attitude that turned Y/N’s stomach. She thought Chris and Liv were a really cute couple, their affection didn’t bother her at all, but Harry seemed overly annoyed. All it was, was a peck on the cheek.

//

You all wished each other a good summer when the time came. The four of you group texted off and on best you could to make sure there was little miscommunication about who was to bring what. Since Harry was an international student, he would be moving in a week before everyone else. Y/N was actually happy about this because he would be there to help her move in. She’d be coming up the night before move in to get a good parking spot, and then her parents would come the next day with the rest of her things.

For the first time, she texted Harry outside the group chat when she arrived at her apartment. He opened the door for her only wearing a pair of shorts. Her eyes grew wide, and he notices.

“Sorry, it’s hotter than satin’s asshole in here, I hope you brought a fan for yourself.” He rubs the back of his neck, and you laugh.

“I did. That’s the worst thing, no A/C in these old apartment. At least it’s only hot like this for a couple of weeks, right?” He hums his response as she walks in. “To be honest I was expecting a mess…but it looks good in here.”

“Not much to make a mess with.” He shrugs. “I rearranged some of the furniture in the living area so it was less tight next to the kitchen. Got the TV set up too.”

“I can see that, it looks nice.” You smile.

“So…do you like need some help with your shit?”

“That would be great, actually. The microwave is pretty heavy.”

“Thank god you brought it with you. I’ve been dying for some popcorn.”

“Great, you can stink it right up.”

“Relax, I was kidding.” He rolls his eyes. “Take a joke, Y/N.”

Her mouth falls open as he walks out to her car. He opens the trunk and hoists the microwave out while she grabs her luggage bags that were full of clothes.

“I can bring that up for you. It’s an up and up, so Chris and I are on that level, and you and Liv will be up top. That was the bigger room just like you requested.”

“Thanks, I appreciate that.”

Harry helps get everything else inside while Y/N goes to get a prime parking spot. Harry felt sort of awkward just standing around while she unpacked certain things for the kitchen.

“Jesus, it really is hot in here, I need to go change.” She wipes some sweat from her forehead.

Y/N goes up to her room and opens the two small windows, and turns her fan on to try to get the air to move. She comes down a few minutes later in just a sports bra and a pair of shorts.

“This is sort of awkward, but you help me with my bed? I’m having a tough time getting it up a little higher…”

“Not awkward…at…all.” When he looks at her he sees how little clothing she’s wearing.

“If you get to be shirtless then I get to dress like this.” She says, putting her hands on her hips.

“I didn’t say anything.” He smirks. “Besides, I’m sure we’ll be seein’ each other in a lot less as the year goes on.”

She shakes her head and follows him up. Harry’s able to get the bet up a few pegs so Y/N can slide the small dresser underneath it, creating more floor space.

“That’s perfect! My parents are bringing those plastic pins you can stack as like a makeshift dresser that fits in the closet tomorrow. Hmmm.”

“What?”

“Well, usually my mom helps me make the bed. It’s just so long, it’s hard to get a good grasp on the sheet.”

“I can help if you want.”

“You’ve done enough.”

“It’s fine, I don’t mind.” He smiles. “After this though would you wanna get out for a bit? I feel like it’s cooler outside. We could go downtown for a slice.”

“Oh, I like that idea a lot. Pizza is a must right now.”

Harry helps you get her sheets on her bed, and she tell him she’ll fix the rest later. Y/N knew she wouldn’t need a lot of extra blankets tonight. She throws on a shirt and so does he, and out the door they go. They walk down town the local pizza place, and grab a booth after getting their slices.

“Nice and cool in here, huh?” He says.

“So much better.” She giggles. “Where are your other friends living?”

“They’re over on Russell Street. It’s kinda nice, I’ll have a place to go party, and then have a quiet place to come back to afterwards. Think it all worked out for the best.”

“Can you remind me again what your major is? I know Chris is Sports Management…”

“I’m an Art major…” He says quietly. “And yes, I know it’s going to be hard for me out there once I graduate.”

“Woah, I didn’t say anything.” She puts her hands up in defense. “I think that’s cool actually. What do you do? Paint? Sculpt? Draw?”

“Mix of all three actually. Basically if I can get my hands dirty, I will.” He smirks. “I just wanted to get a degree in something I liked doin’, but I do have a minor in graphic design just in case I need somethin’ to fall back on.”

“Oh, is that how you and Chris met? That’s his minor too.”

“Mhm.” He takes a bite of his pizza. “We had a couple of classes together and got paired on some projects, hit it off right away.”

“That’s great.”

“How did you and Liv meet?”

“We roomed together second semester freshmen year. Our other roommates both dropped out so we got paired randomly. She’s the best, I got really lucky. She was already dating Chris when we met.”

“The three of you seem close.”

“He’s really nice, always included me. They never made me feel like a third wheel which was nice. I mean, I have other friends, don’t get me wrong. I found things to do when they needed their alone time.”

“And you ever find any alone time?”

“That’s an awfully personal question, don’t you think?” She scoffs.

“Thought we were gettin’ to know each other a bit here…sorry.”

“It’s okay…um…I mean, there are guys I’ve been alone with…” Y/N clears her throat. “I use Tinder like every other college student, you know?” He hums his response and finishes up his slice. He leans back and sits with his arm strong across the back of the booth. “What about you?”

“Eh, I like to meet people in person, at like a party or somethin’.” He thinks for a moment, and leans on the table to be a bit closer so no one else around could really hear. “You’re pretty, Y/N, why do you use Tinder?” She blushes. “I mean, surely you could just meet someone out.”

“I…well, I don’t really go to big parties, mostly kickbacks.” He nods and finishes up his bottle of soda.

“You ready?”

“Mhm.”

They both walk back to the apartment, and he keys in. She goes upstairs to keep unpacking and to tidy up. She was trying to hang up some curtains, but she fell back from trying to reach to high. Harry hears the thud and rushes right up. He had a nicer short sleeve shirt on now, and a nicer pair of shorts.

“Are you okay?!”

“Yeah.” You laugh. “Just lost my balance. Do you think you could help me hang these up quick?”

“Sure.”

The curtains get hung and they look great with the twinkling lights Y/N strung up.

“Liv and I love these lights.” She looks at him. “You like nice.”

“Matt’s havin’ a party…do you wanan come?”

“God, with the amount of time I’d need to get ready you’d be late.” You laugh.

“I wasn’t plannin’ to leave for another hour, plenty of time to freshen up.”

“Sure, I could come out for a bit, thanks.”

He leaves her to get ready. She puts her hair up in a cute, messy bun, and touches up some makeup. Y/N finds a cute pair of shirts and a crop top to throw on and down the stairs she goes. Harry was pouring two shots of raspberry vodka into two small glasses.

“Here.” He smiles. “Wait, you drink, right?”

“Yes.” You giggle. “I can’t wait to turn twenty-one. Just a few more months.”

“Same here, February actually.”

“No way! Me too. When’s yours?”

“The first, yours?”

“The fourth.”

“Wow, that’s crazy.” They clink their glasses and off to the party they go.

//

Y/N drank way too much last night, and she knew her parents would be able to tell. They were there bright and early with the rest of her things. They also put Harry to work.

“You have a lot of shit, you know that?” He says, setting another box down.

“I’m well aware.”

Eventually Liv and Chris show up and it’s hugs all around. Y/N and Liv get a minute alone in their room, finally.

“So how was last night with just you and Harry?”

“It was good! We went out for pizza, he helped me a bunch with my things, and he took me to a party. I’m glad we had the time to get to know each other a little bit.”

“Me too. He can be kind of shy from what Chris tells me.”

“Apparently he’s an art major.”

“I wonder if he’ll hang any of his things up.”

“You know, he’s been in our room a ton already, but I didn’t think to go into his.”

“Well, let’s check it out.” They both go down and into the boy’s room.

Both sides were organized, but they could tell whose side was whose. Harry had his art supplies all over his desk, and had boxes of paint and brushes under his bed. He had a couple of things up as well.

“Looks good in here guys.” Liv says.

Y/N and Liv end up going out for lunch with Y/N’s parents, and then they go on a trip to the grocery store to pick up what they think they need.

“Alright honey, I guess we’ll see you at Thanksgiving, if not sooner.” Y/N’s mother says, giving her a hug.

“Please, be careful.” Her dad says.

“I’ll be fine. Let me know when you get back home. Thanks for everything, love you both!” She sighs as she closes the door. “Finally.”

Y/N and Liv go up to their room and continue decorating it to their liking while Harry and Chris get their gaming consoles hooked up to the TV in the living area.

“So…you got to know Y/N a little last night?”

“Yeah, she’s pretty cool so far. I was kinda worried, I didn’t think she liked me every much.”

“She just didn’t know you, that’s all. What did you guys do?”

“I helped her with her things, we grabbed a slice of pizza, and then I took her to Matt’s for a party. I think there were like three different guys that tried to take her home, but she turned them all down.” He shrugs.

“And what did you do?”

“She didn’t have a key yet, so I made sure she got back here, and then I slipped out an hour or so later to hook up with this girl that gave me her number at the party.”

“Well, thanks for getting her back here at least.” Chris chuckles.

“I’m not a fuckin’ asshole.” He nudges him playfully. “She did have fun at the party, I’ll probably bring her out again. You all can come any time. I feel like that place is gonna be my second home.”

Y/N and Live come down with all the things they like to keep in the bathroom and the boys look scared. For a student apartment it was a decent size bathroom, with a good size tub-shower. Liv opens the cabinets under the sink, and you hand her two boxes of pads and tampons.

“Yup, definitely livin’ with women.” Harry smirks and crosses his arms.

“If feminine products are going to bother you-“ Liv starts, but he cuts her off.

“Got a mum and a sister back home, periods don’t scare me. Was just simply makin’ an observation.”

“Good.” She grabs a small trashcan puts a bag in it. Y/N hands her the lid. “Listen to me very carefully, this is just for Y/N and I. There’s another small can for community use, but this is for her and I’s…”

“Say no more.” Chris says. “Just keep it under the sink and we won’t touch it.”

“I also would like some courtesy with shaving.” Y/N says. “I really don’t wanna see pubes around the toilet.” She crosses her arms. “If you make a mess, you clean it up.”

“I feel like the two of you think we’re savages.” Harry laughs. “I’ve been in a girl’s bathroom before, and I have to say, I think girls are way more disgusting.”

“Why were you in a girl’s bathroom?” Liv asks.

“I was asked to join someone in the shower.” Harry says bluntly. “And it didn’t last long because we both walked in and saw a fuckin’ bloody tampon on the floor. So we went to the men’s bathroom and it was spotless. And while we’re on the topic, you both have long hair, so if you don’t wanna see pubes around the toilet, I don’t wanna see hair in the drain.”

“Deal.” Y/N says. “Let’s move on to the kitchen, shall we?” The four walk out to the kitchen area. “If you make a mess in the microwave, you clean it immediately, don’t leave it for someone else.”

“If someone’s name is on something in the fridge, don’t eat it.” Chris says. “However, I would like to see us cooking together. Like if someone makes pasta, someone else could throw in a meat or veggie.”

“That’s a good idea.” Liv says. “If you make a mess in the fridge clean it up. Check expiration dates. Oh! Trash is a big thing. We all need to take turns with that. If you see it getting full, just take it out, don’t leave it for someone else.”

After spending over an hour on a chore chart and going over more house rules, the four feel satisfied.

//

A few weeks into the semester, and Y/N noticed that Harry wasn’t home a lot. He was either down at the art studio, or at his friend’s apartment. She also noticed he didn’t sleep there much on the weekends, but it worked out well for Chris and Liv so they could have the room alone when they needed. Y/N never saw Harry bring a girl home with him, and she was sort of relieved.

Living with two guys wasn’t as awkward as Y/N and Liv thought it might be. Everyone was really chill, and it was nice to cook together. It was like being in a little family.

One morning Harry woke up late for class, but desperately needed to shower. Y/N happened to be in there. Everyone usually showered at the same time, but Harry was in a rush and annoyed. Liv and Chris had already left for class. Harry was standing the hall, just in a towel, waiting for you to finish. When he hears the water turn off, he sighs with relief. When she didn’t come out right away, he groans.

“The fuck is she doin’ in there.” He knocks on the door. “Y/N?! I’m runnin’ late, and I need to shower!”

She opens the door immediately and they both freeze. Her eyes fall to the towel that was hanging low on his waist, and then up to him. Her towel wasn’t exactly as secure as it could be either. Her hair was just brushed out and dripping wet down her chest.

“I’m so sorry, why didn’t you knock sooner? I, uh, just let me grab my blow dryer…” She snatches it and scoots by him.

“I’ll be quick if you need to get back in there…”

“Thanks.”

Harry takes his very quick, and semi-cold shower, and gets ready for class. He had ab out ten minutes to spare. Y/N comes down the stairs, and slips into the bathroom to grab some spare tampons, and bumps into Harry on her way out, causing her to drop them.

“Shit sorry, I’m fuckin’ up your entire routine this mornin’.” He bends down to pick up what he caused her to drop and blushes when he sees that they’re tampons. He grabs them anyways and hands them to her.

“It’s okay, really.” She takes them and sticks them in her bag. “Um…well, have a good day Harry.”

“You too.”

//

“Y/N?” Harry knocks on her bedroom door late one night. She climbs out of bed and goes down the few steps to open it.

“Is everything okay, Harry?”

“Yeah, I think Liv and Chris fell asleep…and I really don’t wanna sleep on the couch, nor do I wanna go in there in case they decide to get busy again.” He huffs. He looked exhausted, he was at the studio all evening and just wanted to sleep.

“Oh! Well…okay, I could sleep in her bed if you wanna sleep in mine?”

He follows her up the stairs.

“I’ll just sleep in hers, we’re all close enough now. She doesn’t really have a leg to stand on to say much about it.” He yawns and takes his shirt off.

“Okay.” He watches as she uses the small step stool to get back into her bed. He waits until she’s scrolling on her phone to take his pants off, and he climbs into Liv’s bed. “I’m gonna turn the light off now.”

“Alright.”

“Goodnight, Harry.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

//

Similar nights to those kept happening, and Harry was starting to get aggravated, so he called for a roommate meeting to discuss it.

“I’m sick of not bein’ able to sleep in my own bed. I know I’m not here a lot, but when I am, I’d like to be able to just go to my room and go to sleep.”

“You’re right, Harry. I’m sorry.” Liv says, sort of embarrassed.

“I think you two should just share a room. It’s clear that’s what you want anyways.”

“But what about Y/N?” Liv looks at her.

“I feel like Harry’s been my roommate anyways.” She shrugs. “We share every other room with guys, guess I wouldn’t mind rooming with one either.”

“What if your parents find out?” Chris asks.

“It’s not like we’re gonna push the bed together and sleep next to each other like you both are probably gonna do. He’ll have his side, and I’ll have mine. I think it makes the most sense too.”

That afternoon everyone helps move things around. Liv gets situated with Chris while Harry gets his things the way he likes.

“You know secretly, I’m happy they didn’t ask for the bigger room. It’s way nicer up here.” Harry says, sitting down on his new bed. “You sure you’re okay with this? I don’t wanna take away your privacy…”

“I’ll just change in the bathroom more.” She shrugs. “Or, I mean, just look the other way if I happen to need to change quick up here and I’ll give you the same courtesy.”

“I know I’m not here a lot on the weekends, but for the times I am, I mean, uh, like do you ever bring anyone back here with you? If you could just text me a warning or somethin’ or put somethin’ on the door.”

“I don’t…I haven’t, um, it’s been a dry start to the semester.” She blushes. “I had my period, and then I’ve started to get busy with my classes…I’ve gone out a few times, but there’s also no one I’ve really wanted to hook up with. Don’t worry, if the occasion happens I’ll give you a heads up.”

“Cool.”

“Is that what you’re out doing on the weekends? Hooking up?”

“Sometimes…mostly I just end up sleepin’ at Matt’s. They have a futon for me there for when I get too drunk to walk all the way back here. You should come out to another party, he’s havin’ people over tonight if you wanna come. Let the lovebirds down there have a little privacy.”

“Good idea, yeah, that sounds like fun.” She gets up and goes into her closet to pick out a casual dress. “Is your friend Matt single?” She asks without looking at him.

“Uh, yeah. Why?”

“I don’t know…I think he’s cute, and he was really nice to me last time I was there. Gave me a bunch to drink.”

“Well, that’s just common courtesy when you bring a girl to a party. Get her all liquored up.” Harry smirks.

“Mhm.” She rolls her eyes at him, and grabs a blue dress from her closet and her jean jacket. “Do you think he’d be into me?”

“What’s not to be into?”

“Oh stop it.”

“M’serious! You’re really nice, and you’re cute. He’d go for you.”

“Thanks, Harry.”

//

Harry walks Y/N to the party after pregaming a bit at their place.

“Harry!” Matt says as he walks in. “And you brought Y/N again, hey.”

“Hi.” They smile at each other.

“We’re just setting a game of flip cup up in the kitchen, you guys wanna play?”

“Sure!” Y/N says brightly.

The night was a lot of fun. Harry found himself talking to some girl who was clearly trying to get him to go home with her, but in the pit of his stomach he wanted to make sure you got home okay.

“Let me just find my friend and make sure she’s all set, okay?” He say, leaning into the girl and she nods.

Harry searches for you. Come to think of it, he hadn’t seen Matt in a while either. He walks into the kitchen and stops short when he sees Y/N sitting up on the counter with her legs wrapped around Matt’s waist, and his tongue down her throat. He wants to say something, but he opts to just text her that he’s left with someone.

“She’s all set, let’s go.” He takes the girl by her hand and leads her out of the house.

She tells him where she lives and that her roommate was gone for the weekend so they wouldn’t be disturbed. She was a good shag, Harry was having fun, but just as he coming an image of Y/N’s legs wrapped around his own waist, instead of Matt’s popped into his head.

“Shit.” He groans and looks down at the girl underneath him. She smiles up at him and he smiles back.

He pulls out and throws the condom away. She frowns when he starts to get dressed.

“You don’t have to leave…”

“I know, usually I would spend the night, but…uh…I.” He sighs and looks at her. “Listen, I don’t really have a good excuse, I just wanna go sleep in my own bed, I’m sorry.” He leans in and kisses her forehead. “I had a lot of fun though.” He gives her a reassuring smile. “You have my number?”

“Yeah.”

“Text me anytime.” He winks, and leaves her there.

When Harry gets back to his empty room, he’s not entirely sure what it is about it that’s bothering him. Eventually he’s able to fall asleep, but he’s woken up a few hours later by the sounds of Y/N coming up the few steps to their room. She was carrying her shoes to not make much noise. She gently opens her dresser drawer to grab a large t-shirt and shorts. He looks away while she changes, not that he could really see her anyways with how dark the room was. He hears her get into bed, and the satisfied sigh she makes turns his stomach.

//

The light creeping in from the curtains punched Harry in the face. He sits up and see Y/N on her side facing him, scrolling on her phone. She looks up at him when she sees he’s awake.

“Morning.” She says quietly.

“Hey.” He stretches and gets up. Even though they’d been sharing a room for a while, she would never get used to seeing him in just a pair of boxers. “M’takin’ a shower.”

“Okay.” He stops short before going down the stairs.

“What time did you get home last night?”

“Um…like 3AM I think. I was surprised to see your shoes downstairs. I’m glad I caught them or I would’ve flipped the light on and barreled up here.” She laughs. “I thought you went home with someone.”

“I did.”

“Oh.”

“Didn’t feel like spendin’ the night.” She hums her response. “Did you hook up with Matt?”

“Yeah.” You blush. “Is that okay?”

“Yeah, why the fuck would I care?” He crosses his arms.

“I don’t know…I mean I figured you knew what my intention was since I asked you if he was single, but if you don’t want me hooking up with your friends, I don’t have to again.”

“So if I really had a problem with it, you wouldn’t fuck him again?”

“If you had a valid reason, sure. I mean…it was a nice hook up, but not the best I ever had. It’s not like I need to have his dick again.” Harry had never really hard Y/N talk like that before, it surprised him. “Oh god, don’t tell him I said that…”

“What wasn’t good about it?”

“I…what?”

“Well, if it wasn’t the best you ever had, what wasn’t good about it? Come on, you can tell me?” He leans back against the wall.

“I didn’t get off.” She says bluntly.

“Oh.”

“And I had to fake it so we could be done.” Her cheeks grew redder.

“You sounded pretty satisfied when you got back…”

“I sighed with relief because I was exhausted and was finally in my comfy bed.”

“So you faked it.”

“Mhm.”

“Why not just tell him he was doin’ it wrong.”

“He was so drunk, Harry, I don’t think it would’ve made a difference. He passed out after, and I slipped out the door.”

“Wait, you walked back by yourself?” He frowns.

“Yeah.”

“If that happens again, just call me, okay? I don’t like that.”

“But you were with someone.”

“So? I’m always there for my friends, come on Y/N. What if somethin’ bad happened?”

“Okay, okay, I won’t walk alone again.”

“Good.”

“Go shower so I can shower, will you?”

“We could just save water and shower together.” He jokes, and she whips her pillow at him. “Oi!” He picks it up and whips it back at her, making her laugh.

//

Harry came home with paint all over his hands, and was scrubbing them profusely when Y/N came in through the door.

“Thank god it’s Friday, I’m beat.” You sigh and flop onto the couch.

“Me too, I think I’m gonna stay in tonight.”

“Oh?” She was shocked.

“Mhm.” He sits down next to her. “Might play some video games or somethin’. What about you, do you have plans?”

“As of right now, no. But who knows, my friends my text and say something’s happening.” She shrugs.

“We could hang out if you wanted.”

“What would you wanna do?”

“We could watch a movie.”

“Sure! That sounds nice actually. We should see if Liv and Chris wanna join. I feel like we never all hang out.”

Harry was annoyed, but not visibly. He really hated hanging out with couples.

//

That night the four get cozy on the couch for a movie. Chris made everyone drinks, and Y/N popped some popcorn. The girls sit in the middle of the couch while the boys take the end seats. Not that that mattered, because eventually Chris pulled Liv into his lap, and they got comfortable together. The wine Y/N had been drinking was making her sleepy, and her head dropped onto Harry’s shoulder, not that he minded.

She wakes up to the feeling of being carried up to their room.

“Harry?” He sets her down on her bed.

“Yeh fell asleep.” He smooths her hair away from her face. “Brought yeh up.”

“Do you…never mind.”

“What?”

“I don’t know…it’s stupid, never mind.”

“Y/N, would you just tell me what you want?”

“Well…sometimes I get a little jealous that Chris and Liv can just cuddle, and I didn’t know if you’d wanna have a platonic cuddle with me for a bit.”

“A platonic cuddle?”

“Yeah, but only if you want.”

“What does that entail exactly?”

“Well, you could lay next to me and I could just rest my head on your chest. No spooning unless I’m the big spoon.”

“Why’s that?” He chuckles. “Not that I don’t like being the little spoon.”

“I wouldn’t wanna give you a boner if I was little spoon.”

“Ah, right, because I have zero zelf control.”

“Do you wanna cuddle or not?”

“Yeah, alright.”

He climbs onto her bed and lays flat on his back so she can rest her head on his chest, just like she wanted. He puts an arm around her and rests his hand on her shoulder. What Y/N didn’t know was that Harry had gotten a booty call text, and was supposed to be out the door, but this was something that Harry just couldn’t say no to, so he texts the girl and apologizes, and tells her he’ll be over another time. He feels her nuzzle into his chest further. Harry realizes he very much likes the attention he’s getting from wine-drunk Y/N.

They both asleep like that, cuddled together on Y/N’s bed. Her eyes fluttered open, at first she was confused when she saw Harry, but then she remembered she asked him to cuddle with her. She didn’t remember getting so comfy she had fallen asleep. Both of his arms were around her, and she had a leg over one of his. His lips were parted and light snores were coming from him. Y/N desperately needed to pee, but she also didn’t want to disturb him. She notices his phone lighting up with texts, and her curiosity got the better of her. After all, it could’ve been an emergency.

Lindsay – Matt’s Party: are you serious?   12:04AM

Lindsay – Matt’s Party: you’re rly not coming over? 12:07AM

Lindsay – Matt’s Party: this is the 3rd time you’ve done this, H. I’m done. 12:15AM

Y/N sets his phone back down, and looks back up at him with a raised eyebrow.

He blew off some girl for me? She thinks to herself. He could’ve gone…maybe he didn’t really like her that much.

Harry’s eyebrows furrow and his eyes slowly open. He has the same slight confusion Y/N did, but then he relaxes when he remembers he voluntarily slept next to her.

“Hey.” He mumbles in a sleepy voice, one she had gotten quite used to and liked a lot.

“Hi.” The air suddenly felt awkward. “I need to pee.”

“Okay.”

“I didn’t wanna wake you up.”

“Okay.”

“So, I’ll just…”

She sits up slightly, and ends up straddling him to try to climb over him. Her head suddenly started hurting and she almost fell off. Harry grabs her by her hips to steady her.

“You’re like really clumsy.” He says to her.

“I’m aware.” She looks down at his hands. “I still need to pee, can you let go of me.”

His cheeks heat up and he lets go of her so she can continue trying to get off her bed. Harry was still tired, and he could easily go slip into his bed, but he liked Y/N’s bed, for whatever reason. So he rolls onto his side and checks his phone.

“Fuck.” He says when he sees the texts from Lindsay. He thinks to text her back and apologize, but he didn’t want to lead her on anymore because odds are he’d stand her up again. ]

Y/N comes back up a few minutes later, feeling much better after having used the toilet and brushed her teeth. She chuckles when she sees Harry still on her bed.

“What are you doing?”

“M’not awake enough to move yet.” He mumbles as she grabs some clothes from her dresser.

“Well, I have some homework I need to get done, so I’m gonna shower and then go to the library.”

“I’ll be at the studio most of the day, and then I’ll probably go to Matt’s tonight…”

“Okay.”

He watches her go back down the stairs and he sits up. The two had gotten into the habit of giving each other a play by play of their plans. Harry figured it was just common courtesy as a roommate, but maybe it was a little bit more. It was like they were an old married couple who slept on two different beds. Harry changes into some new clothes quick and goes downstairs. Chris was eating some breakfast as he grabs a Gatorade from the fridge.

“Mornin’, mate.” Harry says, taking a sip of his drink.

“Morning, thought you went out last night?”

“Nope, I stayed in with Y/N instead.” He shrugs. “I feel kinda bad, the girl was pissed…but I think it was for the best.”

//

Things were a tad awkward between Harry and Matt since Y/N slept with Matt and never really followed up.

“Did she ever say anything to you?”

“No.” Harry lies. “You hook up with girls all the time, why are you hung up on her?”

“I don’t know, she was a good fuck, I’d like to hit it again.” Harry rolls his eyes as bites down on his cup. “You haven’t brought her here since.”

“She hasn’t seemed interested.” Harry shrugs and turns to see Lindsay talking to her friends. They make eye contact and she flips him off. “Jesus.” He walks over to her. “Can we talk?”

“Why? Because you suddenly have the time?” She huffs.

“Please?”

“Fine.” They step aside from her friends.

“You know, you act like I didn’t even tell you I couldn’t come over…”

“One second you’re saying see you ten, and the next you’re saying not tonight. So what happened? Get a better offer?”

Yes.

“No, it wasn’t that…my roommate needed me…”

“Right, the girl you conveniently share a room with.” She crosses her arms.

“It’s only like that because our friends are dating.”

“What did she need from you then, Harry? Your dick?”

“No!” He groans. “It’s not like that with us, we’re just friends.”

“So then what did she need?”

“She got a little wine drunk, and she seemed like she needed me to stay, so I did. She didn’t know I had other plans when she asked me to hang out a little longer…” Not a total lie, not a total truth. “I really did wanna see you.” He puts his hand on her shoulder.

“I hate how crazy you boys make me, I swear. It’s not like you’re the only person I’m hooking up with…”

“Yeah, same goes for me.”

“I just thought we had a regular thing going, and that was like the third time you blew me off. If you don’t wanna-“ Harry cuts her off by kissing her.

“Let’s get outta here.”

She nods and takes his hand. They walk back to her place, and start to get busy. He was just about to go down on her when his phone rings. He pops his head up to grab it.

“You can’t be serious.”

“It could be an emergency.” He sits up and squints to see it’s Y/N. “Hello?” He starts fingering Lindsay while he’s on the phone with her.

“Harry?” She slurs.

“What’s up?” He rubs Lindsay’s clit and her head rolls back into the pillow.

“I’m sorry to bother you, but.” She hiccups. “Liv and Chris left, or maybe I just can’t find them, anyways, I wanna go home, and you told me to-“

“Where are you?”

“On Russell actually…uhhhhh, 19D I think.”

“Okay, I can be there in like ten minutes, can you hang tight?”

“Mhm. I’ll sit out on the steps for you.”

“Okay.” He hangs up and tosses his phone. “What?”

“You’re a nutbag.”

“Do you want me to fuck you or not? Yeh get me for ten minutes, how do you want it?”

//

Y/N was sitting on the front steps of the house she was at, waiting for Harry. She was slightly cold from the crisp fall air.

Harry: be there soon :) 1:30AM

She sighs with relief when she gets his text. She sees him walking up the drive and stands up and walks towards him.

“I’m so sorry if I ruined your night.” She stumbles as she walks over to him.

“You didn’t, I’m glad you called.” He hooks his arm around her waist to steady her.

“You smell like perfume.”

“I just hooked with someone, sorry.”

“You what?!” She starts laughing.

“I was in the middle of it when you called, actually.” He starts laughing. “She wasn’t too happy, but I made up for it. Although I deleted her number after I left, it was sort of a parting gift.”

“Sometimes I forget you can be just like every other guy.” She scoffs.

“Hey, I told her it was the last time before I left. She said it was probably for the best anyways.”

“Oh, well as long as she knows.”

“I thought you didn’t really go to parties like this often.”

“I don’t…but Chris got invited out so he brought me and Liv with him, and we all drank a lot. I don’t know how I lost them. I texted them both and told them you were coming for me.” She looks down at the heels on her feet. “I have to take these off, they hurt.”

“It’s too cold to walk barefoot. Lemme give you a piggyback ride.”

“Really?!”

“Sure.” He shrugs.

Y/N gets on his back, and he carries her the rest of the way home. When he gets her inside they see Chris and Liv on the couch.

“There you two are?!” Y/N yells as Harry sets her down. “Where the fuck did you two go?”

“Liv got sick at the party, so I brought her home, we’re so sorry Y/N.” Chris says standing up.

“Yeah, Y/N…this is the first time in over an hour I haven’t had my head in the toilet. Chris cleaned it up so it’s all good.”

“Well I’m sorry you got sick.” She starts unbuttoning her pants and scurries to the bathroom. “I have to pee so bad!”

“Thanks for getting her.” Chris rubs the back of his neck.

“It was no problem. I told her I didn’t want her walkin’ alone and to call me if she was in a place where that might happen.”

Y/N comes out of the bathroom and looks at everyone.

“Feel like I’m gonna pass out so I’m going to bed.”

“I’m gonna take a quick shower, I’ll be up soon.”

“Okay.”

“You two sound like us.” Liv jokes.

“M’just bein’ courteous.” Harry points out and goes to take his shower. He didn’t wanna smell like Lindsay anymore.

When he gets upstairs, only in his towel, he see Y/N sitting up in bed wearing just a large t-shirt and panties. Harry walks by her quick and hope to god his face isn’t red.

“Harry?”

“Yeah?” He turns to look at her.

“Would you come cuddle again?”

“Course. Now turn around so I can change.”

She playfully covers her eyes and he shakes his head as slides his boxers on.

“This is all I’m wearin’, hope that’s okay.”

“S’fine with me.” She yawns, and he turns off the light.

“Scootch over.” Instead she just rolls onto her side, facing the wall. “Thought you said no spooning.”

“Thought you said you had self-control.”

“I do…” He looks down and sees the t-shirt was now bunched around her hips and he could see the lovely curve of her ass in her cheeky panties. “Just don’t wiggle against me like a brat.”

“I’m never a brat.”

“Mhm.” He mumbles sarcastically as he settles in. He slips a leg between hers, and wraps an arm around her stomach. She adjust against him, just to get comfier, and they both settle.

“Goodnight, Harry.” She yawns.

“Night.” He liked the smell of her perfume much better.

//

“What the hell happened up here?” Liv cackles the next morning, well, more like afternoon, it was already noon. Harry and Y/N wake up and groan. Harry was still spooning her.

“Liv…no offense, but this isn’t your room anymore.” Y/N groans as she rubs the sleep from her eyes.

“I just came up to grab my sweatshirt that I let you borrow a couple days ago, but I can see I walked in on something. How long has this been going on for?”

“How long has what been goin’ on for? We’re just sleepin’.”

“Harry you don’t have any clothes on!”

“Not true! I’m wearin’ boxers.”

“What’s wrong with your bed?”

“I asked him to sleep with me, just sleep, well cuddle really.” Y/N speaks up. “It’s platonic.”

“Yeah, not all of us have a boyfriend to go to sleep with every night, Liv.”

“Well, pardon me.” She scoffs and grabs her sweatshirt. “You know it wouldn’t be a big deal if you two hooked up. I think it would make sense, and-“

“Goodbye, Liv, have a nice lunch with Chris’ parents.” Y/N says. “Hope you’re feeling better.”

“Much…and I’ll tell them you say hi.”

“Thanks.”

They watch as she goes back down the stairs, and then look at each other.

“Wanna grab brunch downtown?” Harry asks.

“God, that sounds amazing. Just let me jump in the shower quick?”

“Go for it.”

Harry waits for her to leave before getting out of bed. He removes the blanket and looks down at his morning wood. He was sort of glad Liv woke them up so Y/N didn’t have time to notice it poking her. Or maybe she did and just didn’t say anything or care. Either way he wasn’t going to say anything.

He gets dressed quick and waits for her in the living area. Once she’s ready they walk downtown to the diner, and get a booth for two. They both order coffee and water.  

“Wanna split some hashbrowns?” She asks, looking at the menu. “I might get a veggie omelet.”

“Yeah, we could do that. That sounds good too, I think I’ll get the same.” He chuckles.

They both give their orders to the waitress.

“I hope Liv didn’t bother you, you can sleep in my bed any time you want. I kinda like having your wait on me.” She blushes.

“You mean your three weighted blankets aren’t enough for you?” He laughs.

“I do not have three…I have two, and no, they’re not.” She crosses her arms. “I don’t really think it’s that weird.”

“It’s only happened twice too…” He takes a sip of his coffee. “Your bed is way comfier than mine, so I think I’ll be taking you up on that more often than not.”

“Works for me.” She smiles. “I’m really glad we’ve gotten so close, Harry.” She puts her hand over his and it gives him goosebumps. “You’re like my best guy friend.” A punch right to his gut.

“I’m glad we’ve gotten closer too.”

//

It didn’t happen every night, but Harry and Y/N had gotten into a habit of cuddling and falling asleep together pretty often. There was just something soothing about it for the both of them.

“What the fuck happened up here?” Harry says coming home late from the studio one Thursday night.

“I’m so sorry, I have like two midterms tomorrow and I’m trying to study for both of them and I’m freaking out!”

Y/N had papers and books all over the place. Her laptop was open and she had music playing.

“How long have you been studying for?”

“Hours.” She groans.

“Well, maybe you need a break.”

“I can’t take a break! What if I don’t…what are you doing?!”

He was in the middle of taking his clothes off.

“Hi, I’m Harry, and I tend to get paint all over me, so it required me to change quite frequently. What’s your name?”

“Your sarcasm isn’t helpful. You’re supposed to tell me to turn around.” She pouts.

“Y/N.” He sighs. “You’ve seen me in next to nothing, and to be honest, I don’t really care if you look.”

“You don’t?”

“No.” He throws on a fresh shirt and some sweatpants. He sits down on the floor in front of her. “Look all you want.” He shrugs and picks up her flashcards.

“What are you doing?”

“M’gonna help you study.”

“You don’t have to. I’m sure there are better things you could be doing with your Thursday night.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know, don’t you have some girl you need to go fuck?” Harry’s jaw drops. “I’m so sorry, that sounded meaner than it was supposed to. I didn’t mean-“

“But you still said it.” He shakes his head at her. “Is that what you think of me? Some guy that just fucks a ton of girls.”

“Well, to be fair, you do fuck a lot of girls, Harry.”

“A lot of guys do.” He huffs, and then he smirks at you. “You know what your problem is?”

“What’s my problem?”

“You don’t get fucked enough, no scratch that, you don’t get off enough. That’s why you’re so stressed. You get A’s all the time, you know this shit. You’re just tense because you can’t get there, and you share a room with a dude so it’s not like you’re gettin’ yourself there, unless you’re doin’ it in the shower.”

“Would you listen to yourself?” She laughs. “Can you please quiz me?”

“Thought I had better things to do?” He grins.

“Harry.” She sighs.

“Okay, okay.” He squints at the flashcard. “What is Andre Bazin’s main film theory?”

“Realism.”

“Correct, see, you know this.”

“That’s an easy one!”

“I still think you’re just wound up.”

“Would you like to do something about it?” She scoffs.

“I would, actually.” He puts the cards down.

“What? I was kidding, Harry.”

“Well…I’m not.” He sighs.

“You…wait, I’m very confused.”

“To be blunt, I’d like to have sex with you.” Her eyes grow wide and her cheeks flush. “But…I don’t wanna do anything that might ruin-“

“Go down and lock our door.” He’s stunned.

“Wait, really?”

“Do it before I change my mind.” She whispers.

Harry stands up and quietly goes down to lock their door. When he comes back up he sees Y/N bent over cleaning everything up off the floor. She puts everything on her desk, and turns her twinkling lights on. Then she turns the main light off, creating more of an atmosphere.

“You really wanna do this?” Harry asks.

“You’re like the hottest guy I’ve ever met, of course I want to…I just didn’t think you wanted to. You treat me like your little sister or something sometimes.”

“I…wouldn’t call the way we sleep the way I would sleep next to my sister.”

“You really do like grind right into me.”

“So you have noticed that.”

“Of course I have…I just figured it was something all guys did in the morning so I never said anything.”

“You’re on the pill?” He asks, stepping closing to her.

“Yes.”

“Do you want me to use a condom?”

“Yes.”

He nods and goes into his desk drawer to grab a couple, he sets them down.

“Let’s do it on my bed, it’ll make less noise, yours will rock too much since it’s up higher.” She nods and goes over to his bed and sits down. He sits down next to her. “You’re positive?”

“Yes.”

He caresses her cheek.

“You’re shaking.” He says softly.

“I’m nervous.”

“Why? S’just me.”

“That’s exactly why I’m nervous. You’ve always made me nervous, Harry. I’ve just been good at hiding it.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

“Because we have a really good, chill thing going here. And I like being your friend.”

“This doesn’t have to ruin anything…” He cups both of her cheeks with his hands. “Let me make you feel good, Y/N.”

“Okay.”

He pulls her in and crashes her lips to his. Her eyes flutter closed as he swipes his tongue across her bottom lip, and she opens up for him. He tasted just like the mint gum he chewed constantly. She was making out with the guy every girl wanted. Y/N knew about Harry’s reputation, but she also knew a different side of him. She knew the side of him that liked his head scratched to help him fall asleep, and the way he really did just want a banana and nothing more for breakfast, and the way his hands always smelled like paint no matter how many times he scrubbed them.

He pulls back from her to get some air, or so she things, but his lips connect with her jaw and then to just under her earlobe. She gasps when she feels him suck on her skin, but she loves it. She wasn’t sure what to do with herself, so she just grips at his shoulders, while his hands roam down to her hips.

In a swift motion, he sits back on the bed, and pulls her onto his lap so she’s straddling him. She rolls her hips down on his while they’re lips find each other again. He groans against her bites down on her bottom lip. He hands tug at the hem of her shirt.

“Can I take this off?” He says, panting.

“Yes.”

He lifts it up over her head, revealing a sports bra that was really pushing her boobs up. He pulls her close and kisses on the tops of her breasts while she continues to grind down on him. She was starting to feel how hard he was and it was making her wet.

“Just take it off.” She says.

He nods and lifts the bra off her. He moves to take his own shirt off as well before cupping her breasts in his large hands. He tweaks her nipples, making her head roll back.

“I’ve wanted to see you like this for a long time, Y/N.” He says as he wraps his lips around her, sucking one of her breasts into his mouth, and letting it go with a pop.

“You have?” She gasps as he does the same thing to other one.

“You have no idea.”

He pulls her close so they’re chests are flush and they go back to kissing. His hands slide down to the globes of her ass and he gives her a good squeeze. He shifts them to lay her down, and she wraps her legs around his waist, just like how he’s wanted for a while. He kisses down her neck, chest, stomach, and then hooks his fingers into her leggings.

“You’re sure?”

“Please, just get them off. Get my underwear off, just take everything off of me.”

He smirks and does everything she says. She was full exposed to him and it was a glorious sight to see. Every curve, every dip, every mark on her was beautiful. He kisses her left knee and works his way to her inner thigh. He looks up at her one more time and he gives him an approving nod. She grips the blankets when she feels his tongue on her. Her hips buck up towards him, but he uses his arm to press down on her waist. He gives her a few slow licks at first, and then flicks his tongue back and forth on her clit. She moans softly, and then grits her teeth when he sucks on her. Her hands fly to his hair when she feels a finger slip inside. He looks up at her again and she just nods yes.

His mouth works her clit while he pumps in and out of her, knuckles deep, curling his fingers up. She gasps and groans, desperately trying to stay quiet so Liv and Chris don’t hear anything. Y/N’s legs were shaking around Harry, and he loved it. Her back was arching, he could tell she was close from the way she clenching around his fingers.

“Oh, shit!” She gasps and claps a hand over her mouth.

Harry waits for her to finish riding for him to pull his fingers out. She watches as he sucks them into his mouth, and hers falls open. She blinks tears away.

“Are you crying?” He runs a thumb under one of her eyes.

“I just…um…that was intense is all.”

“Do you wanna keep going?”

“Yes.” She props herself up on her elbows. “Do you want me to, uh, return the favor?”

“Maybe another time.” He stands up and pulls his joggers down. “I really just wanna fuck you, if that’s alright.”

“Mhm.” She smiles. Wow, we haven’t even finished yet and he’s already talking about another time. She thinks to herself.

She watches as Harry slowly takes his boxers off. Her eyes grow wide when she see it. It was big, and thick. Suddenly her mouth felt dry. He grabs a condom from his desk and rolls it on with ease. He gets back on the bed, between her legs.

“Y/N?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re certain?”

“Yes, Harry, I want you.”

He smiles and kisses her quick. He looks down so he can line himself up with her dripping center. He slowly presses his tip in, and she can already feel him stretching her out. He accidentally slides in a little fast, though.

“Holy shit!” She moans loudly, and he presses his hand over her mouth. Her eyes were wild looking up at him.

“I know, okay, I know, but if you wanna do this you need to stay fucking quiet. I don’t want them to hear. Can you do that f’me, Y/N?” She nods her head yes, and he takes his hand away. “I didn’t mean to just shove it in like that, m’sorry.”

“S’okay, it felt good.” She giggles. He looks down between them.

“S’really snug…you’re so tight.” His words make her clench around him. “Can I move?”

“Please.”

Harry pulls out slightly and thrusts back in, and eventually he found a pace that suited the both of them. He buries his head in the crook of her neck, and hooks his arm under one of her legs, while her other leg was wrapped around his waist. Her nails were digging into his back, and it all just felt so fucking good. Her face was hidden in her shoulder to keep her moans and cries muffled.

“Takin’ it so well, Y/N.” He peppers kisses to her sweaty forehead. He drops her leg and uses both of his arms to prop himself up so he could really give it to her. The bed was shaking, but it wasn’t making much noise. “How’s it feel?”

“So good, so fucking good.”

“Yeah? Like havin’ me in you like this?”

“Yes!” She gasps as he hits her g-spot. “Oh my god.” She says shocked and then looks up at him. “Do…do that again.” He gives her another thrust right on the spot and her eyes roll into the back of her head.

“You’ve never come vaginally before, have you?” He grins.

“No.”

“Oh, baby…hold on tight.”

She grips his shoulders while he hits the spot over and over. Her teeth were clenched, trying so very hard not to make much noise, but when he hits it just right again, she lets go and cries out. Harry crashes his mouth to hers to swallow it best he can. She was writhing beneath him, having never had orgasm so strong before. Harry can’t last much longer after that, and spills into the condom. He collapses on top of her for a moment or two, just trying to catch his breath. He slowly pulls out of her and she winces.

“Sorry.” He whispers. “You…might be a little sore.”

“A little?” She scoffs. “I can’t believe you fit that whole thing inside of me.” She sits up and grabs her shirt. When she stands her legs feel like jello.

“Where are you goin’?”

“I have to pee, you went down on me, I’m not gonna risk getting a UTI. Just get into my bed, I’ll be back in a second.” He smiles and nods. He was happy she wanted to cuddle.

It stung when she went to the bathroom like she figured it would. She was thankful Liv and Chris didn’t seem to be awake. She fills a glass of water and brings it up with her. She takes a sip and hands it to Harry as she climbs into bed. He takes generous sip and hands it back to her to finish. He puts it on her desk when she’s done. They both sink down and she lays her head on his chest.

“How do you feel?” He asks, breaking the silence.

“Good, how do you feel?”

“Good…didn’t realize there was that much tension between us.” He chuckles.

“Harry, I don’t wanna be one of those girls, but what’s supposed to happen next…”

“We’re gonna cuddle and go to sleep like we usually do. Then tomorrow you’re gonna ace your midterms.”

“And after that?” She looks up at him, and he looks down at her.

“I think I only wanna be a one woman kinda guy…” She smiles up at him. “Would you wanna try going out on a date?”

“There’s a free skate happening down at the ice arena on Saturday night…any interest?”

“No interest in doin’ anything tomorrow?”

“Someone’s a bit eager.” She smirks.

“Alright, ice skating actually sounds good for Saturday. I have a couple of midterms tomorrow too that are gonna take a lot outa me.”

“How about pizza and a movie tomorrow night then?”

“Oh, I like the sound of that.” He kisses her hair line. “What should we do about Chris and Liv?”

“Let’s see how a couple of dates go before we tell them anything.”

“Good idea, although, I’m sure they probably heard you.”

“I wasn’t that loud, and it wasn’t my fault if I was.” She swats at his chest.

“True.” He looks over at his bed. “This could work really well. Use my bed for the fucking, and then we have your nice comfy bed for sleepin’.”

“Yeah, and then there’s no gross wet spot to worry about.” She giggles, and he bursts out laughing.

“I didn’t hurt you or anything did?”

“No, not at all. It felt really good the whole time, I promise. It hurt when I went to the bathroom though.”

“M’sorry.” He sighs. “You were so tight, I didn’t really know how to be any gentler than I was.”

“It’s okay, really. You took really good care of me. I feel way more relaxed now. I think you were right about me just needing to de-stress before my exams.”

//

The two end up falling asleep, and it’s a miracle Y/N hears her alarm go off the next morning. Harry knew Chris and Liv would be gone already since they both have 8AM’s, so he gets up with Y/N to take a shower. They didn’t do anything sexual, but it certainly was an intimate shower. She thought about him all day, everything from last night replaying over and over in her mind. It was a wonder she could concentrate during her exams.

She orders the pizza when she gets in later and sets up the movie. She bumps into Liv after freshening up upstairs.

“Hey, haven’t see you all day. How’d your midterms go?” Liv asks, about to take a slice of pizza.

“That’s not for you!” Y/N yelps. “And they went fine, Harry, uh, helped me study last night.”

“Oh, good! And who’s it for?”

“It’s, um, for Harry, as a thank you for him staying in to help me last night.”

“Um, okay?”

“Sorry…in fact, I’m gonna go put it on his bed so no one touches it. What are you and Chris doing tonight?”

“We were gonna go to Charlotte’s place. Do you wanna come?”

“Nah, I’m exhausted, I’m gonna stay in, but thanks.”

Y/N: I’m bringing the pizza up to our room, I think we should watch the movie up here too…

Harry: are chris and liv home??

Y/N: for now, but I think they’re going out. I just don’t want them snooping

Harry: good call…I’ll be home soon btw, just finished one of my graphic design exams

Y/N: Yay!

Harry gets in, and goes right upstairs. He locks the door behind him. Y/N was sitting on his bed with her laptop and the box of pizza.

“Hey.” You smile.

“Hi.” He smiles back. “That still warm?”

“Mhm.”

“Think it’ll stay that way?” He asks, taking his shirt off.

“I guess we’ll find out.” She sets it on his desk, along with her laptop.

“Been thinkin’ about you all day.” He says, leaning down to kiss her. She lays back on the bed so he can get on top of her.

“Really?” He hums his response as he kisses on her neck. “I thought about you too.” He yanks her shirt up over her breasts and kisses on them. “Harry, I really wanna do this again, but I’m…too sore…” She sighs and he sits up. “But…maybe now I could return the favor.”

“Yeh wanna suck me off, baby?”

“Mhm.”

After one hell of a blowjob, Harry and Y/N cuddle up and crack open the pizza that was waiting to be eaten, and they start their movie.

“How do you think your exams went?” He asks.

“Good, I think I did really well. What about yours?”

“Piece of cake.” He scoffs. “Graphic design is so easy, I don’t know why Chris complains about it all the time.”

“He’s just not as creative as you are. I wish you’d hang more of your paintings up…”

“Really? I have some down at the studio I could bring home.”

“Please! I’d love it, and I’m not just saying that, I think you’re genuinely talented.”

“Thanks.” He kisses her temple.

“I have to say, I was nervous having a guy I barley know as a roommate this year, but it’s worked out way better than I ever could’ve imagined.” They both giggle.

“Mm, I’m sure your parents will be thrilled when they found out their fears came true.”

“God, I can’t even think about that.” She takes a bite of pizza. “I was gonna ask you to come home for Thanksgiving before all this happened, but now maybe that wouldn’t be such a great idea.”

“You were?” He gives her a thoughtful smile.

“Yeah…I didn’t know what you normally did.”

“I usually stay here and eat shitty food at the dining hall. I’d come home with you.”

“You would?”

“Sure.” He shrugs. “We’re tryin’ somethin’ new between us, but at the core we’re still friends right?”

“Yeah.”

“So then I’d love to come home with you for Thanksgiving either way, and I think it’s very nice of you to think of me.” He takes a bite of pizza. “Plus, then I can see if your family likes me at all.”

“Good point.” She puts the pizza box on the desk and nestles in closer to him. She looks up at him and puckers her lips. He happily gives her a kiss. “I like you, Harry.”

“I like you too.”

[tedturneriscrazy]

Through the Looking Glass Ruins. No preamble. Let's do this.

Oh, hey, I finally figured out how to do the "keep reading" thing! Neat!

So that's how they're explaining Willow not being in this, huh? Pixies must be a nasty piece of work.

Incidentally, I really hope we get a Willow-centered episode this season.

"What's the point of being good at this if I can't do anything good with it?" Helluva line

Gus lying on the floor groaning in frustration is a mood

Fuck yeah Gus has a Bad Girl Coven shirt

I don't know how King was talked into recording that "leave a message" bit, but I'm into it.

Hi Willow. Bye Willow.

Loving Luz's permutations of "Gus"

Okay but the whole library card bit implies Luz does this all the damn time.

I'd ask why not get her own, but then I remember who she lives with.

I must admit, it's somewhat jarring to see Gus so filled with self-doubt.

Braxus! (Not worried about his fate so I can just enjoy his presence)

So Construction = earthbending. I knew it!

I also knew that Warden Wrath and Braxus were related! Turns out Wrath is a single dad.

Yes, Gus, those are their tracks.

Mattholomule (God, I hate writing his name) simping over Bria, aka how some people are about Felicia Day. (No problem with her, for the record, I'm just being a smartass)

Gus is actually invited to the adventure rather than offering to come along? That's a refreshing change of pace.

How long was Luz holding her breath?!

It seems the call to adventure won't take no for an answer, Gus.

I know Gus crushing on Bria puts a damper on the Ace Gus headcanon, but consider: Ace Biromantic Gus!

Eda making headlines with her human market, we love to see it

Planet of Humans "Too implausible" lmao

Ah, there's hair down Amity! So good!

"Finally! I can learn how to summon the Dark Lord!"

Luz is yearning

Do Ed and Em just...go around like that?

"Nah, looks like you've got that covered." So everyone just knows, cool cool.

Ooh, they/them date for Ed!

In this episode: blushing, and lots of it!

Also Luz is such a bi disaster it's great.

The twins definitely know what's up. Then again, Luz and Amity are not in the least bit subtle.

¡Más español!

Amity breaking the rules to help her gf? Now that's character development!

(Although it seems to me they could've just tried asking Malphas about that diary, but whatever)

"You have to do everything I say" I'm sure this won't come back to bite them.

Man, Matt really is quite little. Even Gus is taller than him now.

HADOKEN!

(Not sure if he figured out it was a fire glyph or if he was just guessing)

I say the buffing properties of illusion magic are underappreciated.

Ooh, what if the Galderstones were made by illusionists? That might help explain why illusions aren't boosted by them!

Forbidden Stacks really going hard, huh?

More blushing, always nice

So that's how Amity has her own secret room in the library.

Potential future date in the human realm is a powerful motivator, I see.

That "Don't tread on me" snake never said anything about poking.

Make the butterfly boi lookout, sure.

Beginning to think Bria is not as...nice as she puts on...

Grave robbing is a perfectly wholesome activity for teenagers, right?

Yup, I was right about Bria.

"Who's that Pokémon?!"

"Deadwardian Era" I love this show's wordplay

Y'know, considering all these ancient books have their own separate area, they are not kept in the best condition.

This is still cute as hell.

So much for the being quiet part...

Of course Malphas talks like an old hippie. Why did I expect any different?

That whole exchange...I just...😭

The "doing stupid things," the dawning comprehension on Amity's face, Luz vowing in Spanish to make things right...so much to unpack here!

Also, I'm still waiting for Amity's turn to have a proper cry this season. That doesn't count.

"It's a faaaaake!" Callback to the Pokémon bit and a Star Trek DS9 reference? I am a master wordsmith!

(Disclaimer: I haven't really watched any Star Trek. Everything I know about it is through osmosis)

Strange, Gus seems less than thrilled by being hugged by a frazzled old man.

Illusionists guarding the Galderstones makes perfect sense, but unfortunately it does require that that fact not be widely known.

Call me crazy, but I think Bria was bullshitting when talking about "changing things for the better."

Wait, are they making Matt less of a shithead? I think I'm okay with this.

Oh, Angmar, a shame you have to hang with such a crowd.

Regardless of that development, I maintain that Angmar>Alador in the contest of butterfly bois.

Come on, Gavin, you can't seriously be falling for this. (Everything about this is hilarious. Big mustaches, man)

"I'm not dumb enough to fall for these tricks!" Give it a moment.

ANCIENT SINS ANCIENT SINS

Yeah, it's an obvious reference, but it's a good one, dammit!

Damn, Gus, going ham with all that. And the whole graveyard, to boot!

That's the thing about illusions, you can get super fucked up with them. Look what they got away with for a TV-Y7 rating!

Welp, Gustholomule just got some fuel.

Aw, sibling bonding moment.

"Is that so bad? You weren't happy before."

New hair color!

Luz is into it!

Ed and Em are us.

Time for lore!

Ah, conveniently timed wind blowing through Luz's hair, I see.

"Don't worry. You have a way of sneaking into people's hearts." This is some Kingdom Hearts bullshit and I am here for it!

I think I spent all my freakout energy last night, so no all caps for the kiss.

Oh who am I kidding AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Luz's turn for dawning comprehension!

Amity's whole reaction to what she just did is 100000/10

The way Luz just sinks to the ground

So yeah, that was something, huh? Gus adventure and Lumity development! What more could you ask for?

(Maybe a few things, but we can talk about that elsewhere)

Anyway, I'll be doing this again next week! Probably sleep deprived as usual.

[sunsetcurvecuddles]

“Let me bandage you up,” Tía or Ray and Reggie, just to be different. 😁

hi i loved this so much omg. huge thanks to Ángela @angela-feelstoomuch for the spanish help as well, any remaining mistakes are totally my own fault haha. warning for some swearing and mentions of bl00d/minor injury.

ao3 link in reblogs!

--

Honestly, being an honorary Molina is pretty great most of the time. Reggie loves having a little brother, would have done anything to convince his parents to have another kid when he was younger (and alive), though he knew they never would, since one kid was already such a pain in the ass. So Carlos is amazing.

And obviously Julie is his favourite girl ever, and his favourite still-alive person in the world, and she sings like an angel and thinks his country songs are cool and he would do anything for her and et cetera. It’s nice to see Luke and Alex settle in, get more relaxed - Luke doesn’t shy away from Julie every time Ray enters a room, and Alex doesn’t make excuses to miss dinner so that he doesn’t have to say grace, because he’s realised Ray doesn’t make him say grace.

“Niños!” Ray is calling from the kitchen, oven mitts on his hands, grin on his face, “Help setting the table?”

Even from here, dinner smells amazing. “Coming!” Reggie calls, manages not to say ‘dad’ at the end but it’s close, as he and Carlos bounce up off the couch and run to the kitchen.

Ray is the best. Reggie’s own dad was - look, it’s not that he was awful, it’s not that Reggie hates him, it’s just - he saw these dads, in movies, and on TV, and in other peoples homes, and he wanted one even more than he wanted a puppy, or a little brother, and Ray is that dad. He’s understanding, and encouraging, and funny, and a great cook, and he never raises his voice even when he should be mad about something. Reggie feels so lucky that Julie and Carlos let Reggie share their dad, even unofficially.

“Carlos!” Tía snaps, as he runs past her and ducks under her elbow, narrowly avoiding the tray in her hands, “Cuidado! La bandeja está caliente!”

It’s Tía Victoria who kinda scares Reggie.

It’s not that she’s not nice. Tía is nice. She brings over food and drives Carlos to ball games and pesters Ray about dentists’ appointments he almost forgets to go to. It’s just that she’s a little more like the other adults Reggie knew. She barks her words, sometimes, and she doesn’t get Julie’s music thing quite like Ray does, even if she’s supportive for the most part. And she doesn’t always believe Carlos about things, which Reggie understands more now that he’s been conned by Carlos about several random things (for example, Eggos are not in the house-sized waffle business in 2020 as Carlos told him, and they did not manage to breed dragons into existence with new DNA cloning technology) but still. It makes him nervous.

“Sorry, Tía!” Carlos chirps as he slides on his socks into a crouched position in front of the cupboard where they keep all the plates and bowls. Since Carlos has them handled, Reggie goes for glasses instead, reaching overhead for the cupboard on the opposite side of the room.

“Carlos!” sighs Tía again, more irritated than before, and Reggie feels his shoulders tense even though he wills them not to. “Let me help carry some of those, you’ll drop them, sobrino.”

“Fine,” Carlos huffs, and there’s the clink of plates as he passes half his pile off to her and they head for the dining table.

Reggie counts in his head as he stacks the glasses in the crook of his arm. There’s him and the boys, so four - wait, no, three - plus Julie, so four - then Ray and Carlos and Tía so five six seven -

He’s too caught up counting, is the problem, and doesn’t focus enough on how he has the glasses balanced. It probably would have been fine, except there’s a loud thud! Which Reggie registers a moment too late as being Luke, jumping from the top of the stairs to the bottom, enjoying his alive body. The sound scares Reggie about a foot in the air, and he fumbles the stack of glasses, and almost manages to save it.

The glass from the very top of the pile smashes on the floor, a harsh shatter that makes every head in the room turn in his direction. Reggie feels the panic surge up in him like a forgotten pot on the stove suddenly bubbling over. With trembling hands, he puts the rest of the glasses on the counter and scrambles down to the floor, tries to gather the glass shards together into a pile from where they’ve scattered, desperate to tidy the mess, to give some sense of responsibility, instead of just standing there like a stupid kid. “I’m sorry,” he starts, and his voice shakes more than he’d like, almost more than his hands had, “I’m sorry, I can clean it-”

“Reggie!” interrupts Tía, and her voice seems sharper than the glass.

“Victoria-” Ray begins, but Tía doesn’t let him finish, either. She’s already practically at Reggie’s side, crouching down next to him on the floor.

Her closeness makes Reggie’s hairs stand on end, and he’s not sure what he expects, but it’s not for her to gently lay her fingertips on his wrist and say, in a much softer tone, “Mijo, you’re bleeding.”

“Oh.” Reggie blinks. Looks at his arm, next to where her perfectly manicured nails have landed. She’s right, he sees. There’s a few little gashes, nothing huge, trickling blood in tiny streams down his forearm. In a few more moments, the blood would have reached his hand, and he would have noticed, probably. Except when he turns his palms up to look at them, he realises they’re cut up, too. Probably from grabbing glass shards with no protection.

His lip wobbles before he can stop it. He can still feel everyone looking at him. Knows what they must be thinking.

Stupid fucking kid.

“What are you staring at?” Tía says, back to business as usual. He flinches at her voice, before he realises she’s not talking to him. She’s talking to the others. “Come on! Ray, grab the dustpan and some shoes, clean up this glass before anyone else gets hurt. Carlos, finish setting the table, and Luke, go fetch the others para la comida.” In his peripheral vision, Reggie sees everyone bounce back into action, like her words broke a spell on them, and it’s a relief to know they’re not all looking at him any more. Tía continues, as she tucks an arm around Reggie’s shoulders, “Reggie and I will be back.”

“We will?” Reggie asks automatically, as she helps him balance on his wobbly, baby-giraffe legs.

“En un minuto,” she tells him confidently. “But first, let me bandage you up.”

He’s not exactly going to argue with her. Honestly, any excuse to get out of the public space is appreciated when his eyes still feel so close to swimming with tears. Firm yet warm, she leads him to the bathroom and has him sit on the closed toilet lid while she pulls Ray’s first aid kid from the cabinet, pulling from it some disinfectant, bandages and a pair of tweezers.

“Just in case any glass is left,” she explains briskly, settling on the edge of the bathtub and turning his arm over, palm up, so she can see the scratches. She tuts softly. “Your poor hands!”

Reggie ducks his head, whispers, “I really am sorry.”

“¿Por qué?” she asks. “It was an accident, right?”

“Huh?”

She sits back again and looks him in the eyes for a moment. If it was Ray, or one of the boys, Reggie would shy away from the look, but she has the same skill Julie has, to pin you in place with her gaze, so Reggie assumes it’s from Rose’s side of the family. “I know you didn’t throw that glass on the ground on purpose. It was just an accident. These things happen.”

“You’re not angry?” The question slips out before Reggie can think about how silly it sounds, but instead of rolling her eyes, or her jaw clenching in annoyance, Tía’s expression softens somehow.

“No, mijo. Not at all. Estaba un poco preocupada, maybe, but that’s only because I care about you.”

Reggie doesn’t know what to say to that. Bites his lip as she gently applies disinfectant along the wounds, once she’s declared them sufficiently glass-free, and wills himself not to cry as she wraps the bandages around his arm and a little around the palm of his hand. At least if he cries she’ll just think it’s because of the sting, and not because he braced himself so hard to be yelled at and called names and then it never came.

Not because he keeps remembering that he feels like glass himself. Always a moment away from falling onto the ground and shattering, so teeter-y that the kindness of adults he barely knows can almost knock him over the edge.

“Terminado!” she declares, tying off the last of the bandage, and gives him a big smile. It looks genuine enough. Not like she’s bottling anything up to let out at him later. Not like she’s fronting, or lying, not that Reggie’s ever been particularly good at telling the difference with anyone. She must see the puzzlement in his face, because she adds, “Just an accident.”

It really seems that simple. Like everything’s just fixed and okay. Like she doesn’t think Reggie is stupid. The feeling is sort of overwhelming; Reggie’s stomach feels all warm, and - empty, actually. It grumbles loudly in that moment, and Tía laughs, and Reggie laughs with her.

“Vamos a como?” he tries, because he’s been listening, and trying to pick things up.

“Vamos a comer,” she corrects him, but he can’t mistake her tone this time for anything other than delighted, her expression for anything other than fond and relieved as she helps him up. They go back down the stairs, her loosely holding his hand the whole way, not enough to hurt his wounds, but enough to remind him she’s there.

She presents him to the table with a goofy little ta-da! gesture, much to the joy of those already at the table. “Our Reggie, back in one piece!” she says. Laughter and relief radiates from all the others, and Tía grins, pleased, puts her hands on her waist. In that moment, despite all his preconceptions, she reminds him more of Julie than anyone else.

Maybe she isn’t so scary after all.

[ushidoux]

Be My Last - Iwaizumi x  Reader (Pt. 5)

Summary: You have trouble getting over a past relationship and it’s preventing you from moving forward. (~1.6 words)

Warnings: angst, mention of kid and implied marriage.

A/N: We’re at the end here! I hope you’re okay with the way this ended, and if not... *shrug* LOLLLL, we can talk about it. Thanks for reading up to now!! <333 See you in my next fic!!

Part 1|| Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4 || Part 5

-

Iwaizumi returned late that evening to realize that you were nowhere to be found.

It shouldn’t have been this alarming for him to not see you hanging upside down off the edge of the couch watching tv, futzing around in the kitchen, maybe staring out off the small balcony or snuggled up under the covers.

But you were absent, and on top of everything, the sight of a dark home proved to be too much for him to handle. Moreover, the home hadn’t always really been his, had it? It was yours and Ushijima’s far before he’d even come into the picture.

He had just been filling a space, just as he’d promised you.

He checked his phone only to be further defeated by the lack of a text message to let him know you were going out. You always let him know.

Iwaizumi turned on his heels and went back to his car. The roads were clearer now and he needed to drive. He needed to go, somewhere. It didn’t matter where to.

Years pass.

“Hot cocoa, please!”

Your daughter collapsed in your arms as she made this request, having run in your direction from the opposite side of the sitting room. She grinned widely, her brownish-green eyes seeming to sparkle despite the low light of the room. She is truly the happiest child, you thought for a moment, smiling as you mussed her hair affectionately.

“Okay, baby, we can get some,” you agreed, pulling her close for a kiss on the forehead, because how could you say no to that pure joy on her face?

“Did you have fun with your new friends?” You asked, rising.

You’d been watching her for a while now, seated in an overstuffed armchair by a roaring fire, thankful to be insulated from the frigid winter weather (turned out the cold of Eastern Europe was an entirely different type of cold than you were used to). It was a pleasure to see her discharge energy, bouncing around the other little kids at the ski lodge resort you’d been residing at since this past weekend.

She nodded. “That’s why I’m gonna drink it really fast so we can play some more!”

You chuckled, and held her little hand tightly. At least someone was having fun.

You on the other hand had decided you hated skiing with a passion six hours into the vacation after spilling spectacularly more than enough times on one of the beginner slopes. Not wanting to ruin your husband’s fun, you’d convinced him to let you stay behind with your four-year-old so that she could socialize, you could have a break, and he could try one of the more exciting slopes. 

Everyone won.

Well, sorta. He’d pouted as he set out on his own, and now you felt a little bad. Maybe you’d try again the next morning for him after you left your little one at a kids’ event.

“Is Daddy coming back soon?” 

Your little princess’ legs swung excitedly as she sipped her hot cocoa with far too many marshmallows, just after you’d blown at it a little to make sure she didn’t burn herself.

“Daddy will join us soon,” you assured her, your own hands warm with a cup of tea.

---

“I’m sorry.”

Before you is a glass of water with too much lemon. You’re seated at a diner, the very diner where you’d first confessed your feelings for him, and he’s speaking to you but you barely hear him - all you hear is the rushing of blood in your temples. 

Why now? What do you do with sorry after all this time?

Wakatoshi sees your expression and cracks a weary smile. 

“I shouldn’t say that, should I? It’s too little, too late.”

He’s right but you don’t answer.

It’s weird to see him after all these years, seated just across from you as though you were on a date as usual. You can imagine a heaping stack of pancakes between you, covered in too much fruit and too much syrup and him chastising you before you force a berry into his mouth. You can imagine laughter. You can imagine gentle touches, kisses, hugs. You can imagine the words ‘I love you.’

Is that what he’s sorry for?

“To-... Wakatoshi, why did you message me?” You don’t mean to sound curt, but if you speak longer you feel as though your voice will give out.

He winces almost imperceptibly at the use of his full name. But he’s always been steadier than you, emotion-wise. At least you think so.

“I wish it had been different.”

“So do I,” you say, quickly before thinking. But you don’t really, do you? 

There’s a man who loves you, possibly more than he loves himself, than he loves anything in the world. And if it weren’t for this, for Ushijima ‘releasing’ you, no matter how harshly, you wouldn’t have had the experience to be loved by him.

“I was wrong.”

He was. He was absolutely wrong. But what’s wrong and what’s right no longer matters. What matters is what is.

He pauses and sighs. You can see his hands now grip the end of the table as though to keep steady. 

“Thank you for coming.”

There is another pause, one that is suddenly too great for you to handle, where you want to sigh but instead you draw in a double breath.

You’re embarrassed because you do not intend to cry. Not after all this. Not in front of him. 

“You didn’t love me enough to compromise,” you end up sputtering out.

Your tears aren’t falling yet but your eyes swim and you blink them back furiously. “Why all this? Why now?”

He blinks once and you can see his fingers tighten around the edge of the booth, knuckles white.

“I was stupid then. I’m different now.”

The fact that his eyes are so sincere makes your heart wrench. You know that he doesn’t lie, he’s never felt a need to.

It’s a response that infuriates you but your anger is cool rather than hot and it’s diffuse, deafening and directionless. There’s no one to be mad at except the very fabric of time.

What do I do with this? What can I do?

Your heart settles, and you measure your next words carefully. 

---

“Daddy!”

Your daughter’s eyes widened immediately as she saw him approach behind you, and in mere seconds, she jumped out of her chair to embrace her father, nearly knocking over her hot cocoa in the process. You managed to salvage it to your credit, and you turned in your chair to flash a teasing grin.

“How were the slopes?”

---

“There was once a time where I would have followed you anywhere if you asked me to. Maybe it was unhealthy, maybe it was naïve, but I truly loved you to that extent. I would have left everything behind if you asked.”

The solemn look he sports on his face, so stoic as a defense mechanism that it seems almost caricature-like, only confirms that he knew. He knew that every word you said was true, and yet... 

“I thought it was the best decision at the time. I didn’t want to hurt you anymore.”

Maybe he was right. That sort of reckless love, especially when not reciprocated in earnest could only result in pain. 

His intentions were good. They were good. That’s what matters.

He had a reason.

----

Hajime frowned at you, which in turn made his little princess, now perched on his hip frown as well. 

“Your mother’s not being very nice, now is she?” He murmured, as he approached, now settling her back in the chair across from you. “She didn’t even want to ski with me!”

His arms crossed over his chest as he stood beside you now, a pretend-grumpy look on his face.

Your four year-old gasped. “What?! Mommy’s mean? Are you a bully?”

“Hey!” You nudged Iwa in the ribs. “Don’t make me out to be the bad guy! I’m coming with you tomorrow!”

To this, your husband’s eyes lit up, and he wrapped his arms around your shoulders, resting his chin on your head.

“You’d do that for me, my clumsy little penguin?” He whispered, just low enough that your little girl, who had now contented herself back to drinking her hot cocoa couldn’t hear.

Your eyebrows furrowed.

“If you keep making fun of me, you’ll be on your own again, and possibly so for the rest of this vacation,” you grumbled back, but he laughed in earnest to your threat, pressing a quick kiss on your cheek before dragging the nearest chair towards your table to complete your circle.

“So what do my favorite girls want for dinner?”

---

When Ushijima’s hands finally relax, and he places them clasped together on the table, you find yourself reaching for them. It’s no longer a natural, intrinsic movement of the arm and hand, the way it was years ago when you always yearned for physical contact. It’s now measured and intentional.

You squeeze his hands and they feel different. They’re larger, colder, rougher than Iwa’s are. It’s not a bad thing; just not the same. You can imagine that intertwining your fingers with his would feel imperfect, maybe even wrong.

You’ve changed. And he’s changed.

“Wakatoshi…”

You pause, and your hands linger. 

It’s hard to look in his eyes when you say this, but you do anyway. Their eyes are almost the same color, but Iwa’s are greener. An old idiom comes to mind and you banish it from your mind.

“You will always be my first love, but Hajime will be my last one.”

[beeirifulmer]

Letters Pt.2

Warning// This contains all book spoilers. And the letters to Jude are revealed.

Prompt: if Jude DID receive the letters.

"Jude you have another one," Heather walked over to her girlfriends sister, who was watching So You Think You Can Dance.

"Cool, just set it beside the other two please." Jude responded, never taking her eyes off the TV as the girl spun in circles to the point Jude became dizzy herself. She found it fascinating how people can dance in different ways, she always danced with her father in the kitchen, but both her parents knew the Elfhame ways. She remembered Taryn dancing with her while Vivi and Oak would dance in the living room and Oriana and Madoc would sit and watch with smiles.

Back when their family was more like a family than a war.

"Who are they even from?" Heather did as Jude requested and sat beside her. Perhaps Cardan had glamoured the letters before he sent them, cause it was obvious who it was from just from the envelope.

"My.." Jude trailed off, what was she to say? "My ex-boyfriend, he kicked me out and now he's sticking with letters instead of texting." Jude lied right through her teeth. Well, she wasn't completely false. Her husband kicked her out of their land, and is resorting to letters to tease her and trick her.

"Ouch!" Heather hissed, Jude couldn't tell if it was a reaction to her situation, or because the partner almost dropped his girl on the TV. "That's gotta suck, this is why I'm gay."

Jude couldn't help but snort at the comment, perhaps Jude should go for another team. Venture out and get a girlfriend. Vivi seemed more happy with a female than Oriana seemed with Madoc, and than Jude seemed with Cardan.

"Maybe I'll switch," Jude grinned as she joked, Heather shooting a grin back as she pulled her knees to her chest, hugging them as she continued to watch the show with Jude.

Jude kept glancing at the small stack of letters, two opened one unopened. She thought about maybe reading it, but she decided against it.  She was still telling herself it was all a trick. After all, why would he ask her to come back after he married then exiled her?

~~

"Sir, someone is here to see you."

Cardan's head jolted up when a guard stoos at his door. "Did they say who they were?"

"No, but they said they were a friend and you'd know them." Cardan's heart jumped. Was it her?? Was it really her? Cardan stood up and made his way downstairs, opening the door to see her face.

It was her face.

But it was not Jude.

"Good afternoon," Taryn began, Cardan felt disappointed, holding back shutting the door in her face and walking away. "Locke said he had left some things here, would it be alright if I grabbed them?"

Taryn stood off, in all the years Cardan has known the twins, Taryn always stood tall and polite. She never shielded herself unless Cardan was going at her again, in which she convulsed to submit. But this time was different, she switched glances and such, picking at the skin of her fingers.

"You may be able to lie," Cardan started, "but you are horrible at concealing it. What are you truely here for." His eyes narrowed at her, unable to hide the fact he was staring taking in the features they did share. Their eyes, whether Jude's had a more murderous meaning behind them. Their lips, the only different thing Cardan could find was that his body did not react the same way it did whenever he saw Judes', imagining them dragging over his body and beg him to take her.

"Can I come inside, I fear people will hear me." Taryn questioned, brows furrowing softly. Another difference, Jude would have walked in not needing an invitation.

"If you must." Cardan cocked a brow at the least-interesting twin (in his opinion, at least) before he moved, letting her into the big house Cardan would rather be sharing with his wife.

The girl entered, fiddling with her fingers as Cardan closed the door and crossed his arms, awaiting for her to speak.

"Why did you exile Jude?" She finally asked, and Cardan frowned immediately.

"You came all this way from Locke's manor, just to ask me about your sister who wants nothing to do with you?" Cardan asked, the question coming out harsher than he meant. "Wait," the King stoppes before she could answer, "did she send you? Please, be honest, Taryn." Cardan stepped forward, interested in what she could say.

"What? No, I haven't heard from her in a long time. I myself am just curious. What could she have possibly done so wrong that you exiled her?"

Cardan's excitement bursted once again. She was just curious. Not even sent by Jude. Cardan went cold, "that is none of your business." Taryn looked up at him, Cardan could tell she wanted to say more, but instead she bid her goodbyes and left.

Once the door was shut, Cardan walked to his room again. His boots hit the floor with momentum as he got angrier and again more frusterated. He was sick of this, sick of her ignoring him. He was sure she was recieving them, but why was she ignoring them? Was she truely that angry?

Jude,

Here we go again.

Cardan kept it short, short and full of frusteration.

Not even responding to my missives is ridiculous and beneath you and I hate it.

Cardan

That was all he had to say that day. Hoping maybe some threats would being her back to prove she was not some coward, for she wasn't. She did not need to prove it, that's what Cardan feared she knew.

~~

Cardan sat at his baywindow, looking up at the sky. The stars were pointing many directions, a few Cardan did not know because he rarely paid attention in class. The moon was a beautiful silver, shining down to glimmer on his pale face.

He imagined what it would be like, be like to look forward and see Jude in front of him watching the moon. Explaining the stars to him and always bringing up that 'he would know, if he paid attention' Cardan would have made a comment along the lines of 'I was too busy looking at you.' Be like to see the moon on her mortal skin, her collarbone exposed and a silk dress drapped over her body.

Cardan brought himself back to when they shared one of their kisses. A blade against his throat and her lips against his, Cardan didn't care how far the blade dug into his neck at that moment. He was kissing Jude Duarte, and that was all he thought of.

With a sigh, Cardan sat back down at the window, a paper and pen now in hand as he started yet another letter.

To the High Queen of Elfhame,

Above me is the same silvery moon that shines down on you. Looking at it makes me recall the glint of your blade pressed against my throat and other romantic moments.

I do not know what keeps you from returning to the High Court -- whether it is vexation of me, or whether, having spent time in the mortal world, you have come to believe that a life free from the Folk is better than one ruling over them.

   In my most wreched hours, I believe you will never come back

Cardan did not sign this one. Blinking, he felt a tear slip again and fall onto the paper, bleeding through. Cardan sat his head back on the wall, looking at the flowers spouting on the ground outside his room. With a flick of his wrist, the flowers froze up in ice.

"Screw this," the King uttered to himself as he shoved the letter in the envelope and just tossed it to his desk, unaware of the owl that snuck into the room and continued it's job to deliver said letter.

[kurt-nightcrawler]

How to know if the lost girls have a crush on you

𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐰𝐚𝐩! 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐋𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐁𝐨𝐲𝐬 𝐱 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

Warnings: mentions of drug use and language

Word Count: 1.9k

A/N: I know requests aren’t open jddndjdj but I enjoy writing for the lost girls so enjoy!!

Darcy

Darcy is a sucker for romance

She’s a bit shy and awkward, despite her semi-scary looking demeanor 

(She’s 6’0 and has resting bitch face)

Darcy isn’t going to be super obvious or up-front about her feelings at first though

It will be the cliche “we’ve been friends for 10 years and everyone knows we like each other except us” 

Darcy will always have a hand on you. She wants to feel your presence 

subtle touches, little “pinky holding” or her playing with strands of your hair

Her poking any freckles you have when she first discovers them

You’re one of the few people she let’s mess with her hair. Which is a telling sign

“Your hair looks nice Darce” “thanks, (Y/N) did it” “oh worm? 👀” 

She loves having you run your hands through her hair, it soothes her

Sometimes, if you can’t make it to the cave— bad weather, car trouble, etc.— shell come over and you guys watch a movie together

Darcy’s got an extensive tape collection of rom-coms, so she’ll pop one into the tv and snuggle under covers with you

She’s probably going to ask to borrow your clothes if she’s “really cold” since she exclusively wears sports bras and her leather jacket

Also she likes that your sweaters and sweatshirts smell like you 

But you’ll definitely have to have been friends for awhile before she even CONSIDERS telling you how she feels

“I live forever. I have to be sure about my feelings and what if I get rejected?” “Anyone who rejects you is stupid. Almost stupid as Michelle—“ “HEY!” 

But overtime she’ll try to make things more obvious— to the point where Pauline and Marcella are teasing you both and then she kind of HAS to come clean

But you find it sweet! 

And a bit shocking, someone as powerful and strong and amazing and gorgeous as her, has feelings for YOU??? damn okay babe 

Dominique 

Dom is going to be a bit cold at first

It’s not necessarily intentional, but she just has this aura of mystery around her

Those icy blue eyes that peer into your soul

And anyway she wants to get to know what you like and if you like her

If not, she can’t exactly force you 

Cough cough Michelle cough cough

 Anyway, Dominique will try to learn about the things you like so you have something to talk about

Even if they aren’t her cup of tea. She’s a good listener and likes seeing your face light up and you so passionate about a subject/hobby

Dom is going to steal buy you things she thinks you’d like

“You said you liked cherry chapstick. I got you some.” “I got you some chips and your favorite soda in case you’re hungry” “Here. I saw this giant care bear and thought of you.”

It’s sweet, but you feel a bit flustered and embarrassed, not giving her anything in return

“Seeing you smile is enough, Kitten”

Speaking of! Pet names! 

Dominique finds using your full/actual name too personal

So if you have a nickname she’ll use it. If not she’s given you pet names— most notable are Kitten and Pumpkin

She’s not big on physical touch but sometimes she’ll put the idea of it into your mind so you want it

She won’t manipulate you, but she wants you to come to her. She’s had too many bad experiences where she confessed first, and she doesn’t want another one

So when you do finally confess to her she’s all smug and knowing

“I um… I really like you… and uh well—“ “I know.” “Oh…” “I like you too.”  “Oh!”

 Marcella

She’s going to be playful and flirty with you but quick to deny anything the other girls accuse her of

“No I don’t have feelings for (Y/N)! Shut up!” “Haha you so do!”

She’s rowdy and high energy but also more quiet than Pauline

So she’s not going to just blurt it out or recite sonnets for you

Instead she’ll give you a patch she was going to put on her jacket. Or make you a cool little pin

She’ll constantly hype you up if you’re wanting to try new fashion styles or wear something out of your comfort zone

“You look amazing! Better than any girl out on the boardwalk” “You really think so?” “I would never lie to you. Honest.” 

She’ll let you braid her hair and stick all kinds of colorful little clips and barrettes in her curls 

(I know they weren’t popular until the 90s but imagining covering her hair in hundreds of little butterfly clips!) 

Honestly she’ll be like those movie scenes where “do you like it?” *it’s hideous* “if not you don’t have to wear it!” “No. I’m never taking it off.” 

She asks you to help care for her pigeons so you guys can bond together more

“Does Pauline or Sebastian usually help you feed them?” “No. No one does. I don’t let them.” “Oh…”

If someone upsets you she's ready to go and have them as her meal for the night

Sometimes you have to stop her

“Look! Cathy from my work is a total bitch but you can’t kill her! I won’t have anyone to cover my shift tomorrow”

“Fine… You're lucky I love you”

“What?”

“What?” 

She’d probably accidentally tell you and then act like she has no idea what you could be talking about

“Well I like you too. But I dunno… Dom’s pretty cute too—“ 

“Oh that’s it!” She’s definitely smothering you in little kisses and tickling you, getting you say you’re sorry and say you think she’s the cutest

 Pauline

She’s just going to blurt it out point blank. 

Why wait? If Pauline likes someone, she likes someone! She may be immortal but she’s also immortally impatient 

She tells you she likes you so much you start to think she’s kidding

But she’s not! 

She’ll bring you baked goods edibles and take you out to concerts and maybe steal your shoelace to wear on her wrist

Sometimes you’ll have little “sleepovers” and you’ll hangout at the cave. Usually this means sharing a joint and watching her play songs on her guitar

She’s definitely not exclusively playing romantic songs for you

One night she’ll get high and just pour her heart out to you

“And I think you’re one of the coolest people I’ve ever met, and I’ve met a lot of people, babe… And sure, I’m definitely a bit ditzy but I’m not completely stupid! I know you don’t believe me, but I really really like you! I think about you a lot and I hate when you have to leave right before the sun rises. And on nights you can’t hangout with us it’s so boring! We do the same things every night, but you always make them special. I really like you babe… I really really like you…”

She’ll wanna take you out on a little date to one of the small bands playing on the boardwalk and you’ll both dance together and she’ll be real giddy and excited and probably kiss you but it’s really messy and quick because she was just so wrapped up in the music! 

 Michelle

She’s really obvious

Like, staring at you with heart eyes when she first sees you out on the boardwalk

She’ll try to not-so-subtly follow you around. She’s not being creepy, but she just wants to admire your beauty 

She thinks she’ll never see you again

Imagine her surprise when she sees you again! 

“Told you! She probably lives around town” “Shut up Sam!” 

You’ll eventually confront her and ask what her deal is

“Oh! Uh, um, well, I just— I... like... your outfit?...” 

She’s bad at coming up with an alibi

“thanks. I get most of my clothes at the thrift store away from the boardwalk. Wanna join sometime?” “Uh yeah! Sounds good!” 

She’s going to do some dumb things to impress you— racing on her bike, getting more piercings, dressing in lots of leather, offering to buy you food— but you think it’s cute

She’ll follow you around like a lost puppy at times, partially cause she’s new in town

Sam likes you though!

When you and Michelle hangout, you’ve usally got the braincell and you don’t tease Sam for liking comics so much

“No Samantha, I’m not taking you to the comic shop” “Aww Sammy I will!” “Thanks (Y/N)! You’re the best”

Honestly you knew the whole time she liked you! You had moments of doubt but she’s always so obvious about it. Once you even swore she drooled over you

A bit gross, but you were also eating ice cream so…

Visiting her at work! She’s a lifeguard down at the beach! She’s definitely trying to get you visit her ;) and go swim and sunbathe ;) maybe have her “perform cpr” on you ;)

But you’d still have to make the first move if you wanted it to go any further 

 Sebastian 

He’s got this aura of mystery around him 

But he’ll steal glances if he spots you in the crowd, thinking you’re cute

The lost girls will want him to bring you back to the cave

He will, but not for awhile

It will be small one on one hangouts and dancing together on the boardwalk 

Walking in and out of shops, saying you’ll buy things but you never will

Sebastian will offer to pierce your ears and paint your nails 

Night swimming together! 

Sebastian definitely has really floral swim trunks, almost like tacky dad Hawaiian shirt print 

He’ll do the thing where he’s under water for a long time and then jump up and scare you

Once you meet the girls you’re all playing games together like sharks and minnows, chicken

Sebastian always wants to team up with you though. Even if teams aren’t a part of the game

He likes to read. He’ll spend a good amount of time at the bookstore on the boardwalk, staying there for hours reading books, and leaving with a whole stack

If YOU have a book he wants to read/borrow he will definitely maybe leave a little sticky note in it as a thank you

“thank you! ur sweet :D <3” 

Laura will love you!! 

She’s very close to Sebastian and everyone thinks they’re siblings, and they most definitely have the dynamic 

So if Laura likes you, Sebastian will definitely like you. I mean, he already does, Laura just kind of seals the deal, ya know?

Dominique and Pauline will be the most blunt about Sebastian’s feelings for you

“He’s like Darcy. Not necessarily the most obvious but you can tell” 

“It’s so obvious. He like, talks about you all the time when you aren’t around and he’s got this real love sick look in his eyes”

Dominique is going to interrogate you to see if you’re “worthy” or not of Sebastian. 

“Sebastian is my— our friend— like a brother almost. Hurt him and I will kill you :) that is a promise” 

Once she deems you good enough she’s going to push Seb into asking you out. “You guys already go on enough ‘dates’ just make it official” “no” “-_-“ “hhh fine”

Sebastian is going to be really simple with it but also kind of coy and shy. He’s nervous. He’s much rather you asked him out or confessed your feelings but he’s willing to go first. He finds himself trying to compete and keep up with the girls. He’s the only boy, and while it may not matter he doesn’t want to seem weak and pathetic while they’re big strong vampires

Anyway once he tells you how he feels he’s all red in the face and nervous!! Poor boy

He’ll constantly ask to kiss you all the time, worried maybe you don’t want him to but you’re always reassuring “yes, Seb. you can have a kiss” “thank you” 

[hsmtmts-justsomewriting]

Not to be your stereotypical second semester senior but EJ Caswell is a bit too busy to be thinking about sports metaphors...

(Alternative title- overcommitted..sounds like a Caswell)

Senior year was insanely busy. Being so overwhelmed EJ had been slowing down over the last couple weeks, but he was brushing it off just fine.

EJ has arrived late that day, which was unusual in itself, as he prides himself on being on time. Holding a half eaten packet of Oreos he shuffled into the rehearsal room slumping on the bleachers away from his chattering cast mates.

“EJ honey great you could join us, you’d think a senior couldn’t get lost in the halls!” Miss Jenn giggled at her own joke as the cast were suddenly alerted to the older boys presence. EJ absentmindedly nodded and grabbed out his script.

“Yeah...sorry..um...where are we at?”

“Page 63” “Cool... thanks”

Flipping to that part in the script, he looks up to take in the scene. Kourtney, Gina, Seb and Carlos are clearly half way through blocking a castle scene- Carlos complaining his arms are tired from ‘staying in character’, Kourtney and Seb working out where they are going to come in from and how to negotiate Sebs big box costume (although it’s proving very difficult considering the rehearsal room is about a quarter of the size of the stage) and Gina is animatedly discussing the scene choices with Miss Jenn.

Within an instant, EJ is startled from the scene as Natalie is beside him rambling something about ‘needing a fill in for cogworth’ ‘went home sick’. Sauntering up with his script, EJ’s vision goes spotted as he gets up from the bleachers. But as soon as it comes it’s gone.

He just needs to get through this rehearsal, then he can; go home, finish his debate speech, go over the plays for Friday’s waterpolo match, study for tomorrow’s maths assessment, start his exam notes, memorise his lines, work on his college applications, and maybe even get some sleep.

Joining the cast he tries to hide in the back corner. Following the basic blocking directions seemed harder than usual, his head had began to pound and fatigue hit him like a wave.

However he continued on, sluggish but present helping them to finish blocking the scene.

Walking back to his place on the bleachers EJ trips over his own feet. Catching himself before a big splat on the floor he is able to avoid the attention of his cast mates. Well mostly.

“EJ are you ok?”

EJ didn’t need to look up to know that his cousin had definitely seen his little trip.

“Yep fine”

“Ok try again but this time make it the truth”

Ashlyn was caring but firm, she definitely wasn’t going to brush it off. EJ could feel his facade fading under her concerned gaze. His voice drops low.

“I-i just don’t know... Ash, I’m trying-“

“ON TO THE NEXT SCENE Gaston and Le Fou, I need you boys to start down stage right”

EJ got up slowly, subtly steadying himself against a chair not to lose balance.

“Nevermind it’ll be fine”

EJ walks off, with that any vulnerablity on face vanishing, leaving Ashlyn’s stomach to churn in a pool of worry.

Being an after school rehearsal, most of the cast heads off after they start rehearsing the next scene as it only has Gaston and Le Fou. Leaving the rehearsal room with just Miss Jenn, Big Red, EJ, Ashlyn and Gina (the latter two who were waiting on the senior for a ride home).

EJ and Big Red slowly work through the dialogue, the scene is about as smooth as a clunky old railway track. After running it twice EJ feels like his words are melding into one. But pushing through, based off his poor entrenched habits, EJ made it through another run through of the scene.

“Um can we take a five?”

Miss Jenn looks at the senior perplexed, he’s never asked for a five. Ever.

“EJ honey is everything ok?”

“Hm, yeah just need a sec”

EJ’s exhausation catches up with him, the light seems to highlight the bags under his eyes. He drops onto the bleachers, resting his head in his hands he closes his eyes for a second.

“Miss Jenn, EJ doesn’t look so good maybe you guys should wrap this up for today-”

“Ash I’m-“

“No. You look exhausted! You barely have the energy to stand up for 10 minutes”

Ashlyn moves to grab him his drink bottle but runs into his iced coffee and Oreo packet first. She flinches. Her cousin never drinks coffee unless he purely needs the caffeine.

EJ freezes she moment he realises she’s seen it.

“When was the last time you slept?!”

All eyes are on him.

“James” His head snapped up. But he couldn’t look his cousin in the eye. Because then she’d see his eyes are glassy with unshed tears. His overwhelmed thoughts race through his mind.

“Ok I think we’ll pick this up next rehearsal, please be safe getting home and get some rest”

The four students start to pack up their bags, Ashlyn asking her boyfriend to give them all a lift. Turning to her cousin, helps him finish packing his stuff.

“You can stay in the guest room, we’re having lasagna tonight”

EJ too tired to protest, walks past his Jeep in the parking lot to get in a smaller orange bug car. He’ll have to come back for it tomorrow because there’s no way he could drive safely in his tired state.

The car ride home was eerily quiet, Ashlyn day in the passenger seat next to Big Red. He drove to Ashlyn’s house like a routine he knew by heart. Gina keep flicking worried glances at EJ but the senior didn’t even notice, having closed his eyes and resting against the window the moment he entered the car.

“Thanks for the ride Biggie”

Gina gentley nudged EJ and his eyes were open in an instant.

“Thanks Red” He mumbled as he got out of the car.

“No worries, take care guys”

As the orange car was disappearing into the distance, Ashlyn unlocked the front door. Gina and EJ follow her into the house.

“James lets go the living room”

EJ follows Ashlyn to the couch, and Gina continues past to grab a drink of water from the kitchen.

“What’s going on?”

Ashlyn puts a hand on his shoulder and gently squeezes it, grounding him and reminding him that she’s here to listen. He looks at the faded colourful rug and his words begin to vomit out softly.

“I’m just trying to get it all done ...and um.. for weeks I just never seem to have enough time, and I still have to do my study notes and finish my assessment and college apps tonight... but I’m just so tired...”

His voice cracks and the wall behind his eyes begin to break.

“I have to stay up so late, to get everything I have to all done...and then polo practice at the crack of dawn... i don’t know.. I just can’t... let anyone down..”

Ashlyn pulls EJ in tightly. His body wracked with sobs, her heart breaks as she hasn’t seen him like this in a long time. Gina initially freezes entering the room just as the senior had begun to cry but soon shifts over beside them engulfing them both in a hug.

Grabbing some tissues and a sip of water he’s able to stop his crying but his tense shoulders give away his overwhelmed mind.

“it will be ok, we’ll work this out. Everyone else will understand if everything is not done right now. You’ve got to take better care of yourself, what matters is if you are ok”

Gina nods in agreeance with Ashlyn as she comforts EJ.

“But for now you need to take a break, just have a quick nap before dinner in the guest room-“

“But I have to-“

“No James you need a rest, all this stuff can come later”

He sluggishly gets up heading for the guest room mumbling a “thanks Ash” as he retreats to his long awaited rest.

After he closes the door, Ashlyn lets out the breath she had been holding. She was convinced they would have to put up more of a fight to get him to go to sleep, but the fact that they didn’t was almost more concerning.

“He did seem a little bit off earlier in the week but yeah I had no idea that this was under the surface”

Gina says to break the silence created by her and Ashlyn’s shocked worry.

“Yeah he’s always been pretty good at bottling this stuff up, definitely a Caswell skill”

Ashlyn starts to pick up the tissues heading to the bin in the kitchen. Both the girls enter the kitchen to finish heating up the leftover lasagna they made yesterday.

While cooking the veggies the girls trade stories of earlier in the day and discuss the spotting of Miss Jenn and Mr Mazzarra at Sliced on Valentine’s. Just as they’re plating up, EJ reappears. He looks somewhat disheveled, wearing sweats and his usually spiked hair is messy like a 2012 Bieber hairstyle. His contacts are long gone being traded for his wide framed glasses.

“Feeling any better?”

Bringing the plates to the table they all sit in their usual seats.

“Yeah a little...thanks guys this looks amazing”

As if on cue his stomach grumbles with excitement and they dig into the food. The three teens continue to tell stories of their day. Although exhausted, a goofy smile makes its way onto EJ’s face while telling the girls about his classmate in English that tried justify his argument quoting spark notes, instead of the actual book.

Once they’re finished, EJ stacks and clears away the plates. Grabbing her laptop, Ashlyn creates a new copy of one of her old timetables modified with all EJ’s stuff. After cleaning the dishes, EJ plops down beside her and together they start to work out.

Half an hour and a warm hot chocolate later, they manage to finish a schedule that looks like it fit a bit of time for everything while keeping a heathy amount of rest time.

“Thank you so much Ash... I really appreciate it”

Ashlyn smiles back at her cousin.

“Just promise me you’ll take care of yourself, or at least you’ll let me know if you need help”

EJ engulfs her in a hug.

“Yeah I will, thanks”

As they both move to join Gina in the lounge room, EJ grabs his laptop to start completing his speech. Flopping down onto the couch, the tv is turned onto a Brooklyn Nine Nine halloween heist episode.

Taking EJs laptop at 9:30, the older boy fell asleep within an instant. Keeping to his promise, he followed the schedule he made with Ashlyn (most of the time at least) and finally learnt how to ask for help when he realised he couldn’t do it alone. And when he asked for help, Ashlyn and Gina were always there with an extra mug of hot chocolate.

Thanks for reading! I’m open to write prompts or suggestions

(...Also if anyone can think of any better names for this please comment because all my thoughts were low key trash😂)

[yesmooshoe]

6) (i) from the AU list for ironhusbands? 👀💖

You’ve got a date tonight and you asked for advice on what to wear but I’m so in love with you and damn you look good in the outfit I picked out for you.

“Rhodey Rhodey Rhodey! I need help!” Tony cried out as he burst through the front door of their drafty apartment.

Rhodey’s head shot up to look at him, but he didn’t move from the nest he’d created on their couch. He was wrapped in several blankets with a few large stacks of books and notebooks surrounding him. Mid-Terms started next week, and he had a lot of material to get through.

As Tony stumbled over some of Rhodey’s books on his way into the living room, he finally noticed all of the shopping bags that Tony was carrying.

“Did you get a haircut?” Rhodey asked, seeing that his friend’s usually unkempt hair was freshly trimmed and styled.

“Yeah, and I got a bunch of new clothes. I have a date! An actual date! And all of my clothes are trash and I’ve got no idea what to wear so I went to the mall and just like bought everything that looked cool because I just really want her to think I’m cool.” Tony rambled as he dropped the bags to the floor and started tearing through them.

“Wait, hold up. You have a what?”

“A date!” Tony said with a big smile.

“With who?” Rhodey asked as he closed his book, realizing that this was going to be a thing. Tony didn’t date. If he wasn’t at the apartment he was either at class or in the robotics lab, and he didn’t really have any other friends.

Until this year, at least. Tony was 17 and finally the same age as some of his fellow classmates, so Rhodey had noticed him being a bit more social. Still, Rhodey felt very protective, and while he’d never admit it out loud, he kind of missed having Tony all to himself.

“Uh, Amy Lin? She’s a freshman! And she’s on the robotics team and she’s just super cool and smart and we were sitting outside today and she was like 'hey do you want to go out sometime?' and I was like 'what do you mean, we're already outside.' and then she laughed and was like 'no like...go out. On a date.' and I just felt like such an idiot and I didn't know what to say but eventually I managed to say yes I think and well now we're going on a date! And I have no idea what to wear, you gotta help me. Everything I own is ripped or has burn holes from welding or is covered in grease and who knows what else and I just want to look good."

Rhodey resisted the urge to tell him that he'd look good in a paper bag, and did his best to swallow his own jealousy before he started helping him look through the bags.

The crush on Tony was very new. 

Two years ago Tony had just been this quiet, nerdy kid who didn't know how to do his own laundry and was afraid of his own shadow. This year though? This year he was just different. Over the Summer he'd grown a few more inches, gotten his braces off, discovered contact lenses, and overall just came off as more mature and confident. Rhodey's jaw had literally dropped when he saw him for the first time at the beginning of the semester, and ever since then he'd been struggling with a lot of feelings.

"Uhh, ok. Well first of all, where are you going?" Rhodey asked as he pulled out item after item, which ranged from a leather jacket to a tuxedo, so he wasn't sure what the vibe was going to be.

"Bowling."

Rhodey just laughed. "You bought a brand new tuxedo to go bowling? Is that what you rich white people do?"

"I...I mean, I don't know. She mentioned maybe getting dinner at one point and I think I just panicked like what if she wanted to go somewhere fancy instead of bowling and all of a sudden and I just started grabbing everything I could possibly need." Tony explained, sounding a bit exasperated.

"Dude, take a deep breath. It's going to be ok."

"I know I just...I want to do everything right. I want her to like me, ya know?"

"She will! She already does. She asked you out, didn't she?"

"Yeah but...I don't know. I don't know what to do. I'm just not used to this. People liking me. I’ve always been so much younger than everyone at school and no one ever talked to me and I always just feel like I missed out on learning how to be a normal teenager. I don’t know how to date." Tony admitted, being way more candid about his feelings than Rhodey was used to.

"You don’t have to worry about that anymore. Just go out and have fun. Be yourself."

"I’m just afraid she’s going to see what a huge nerd I am and change her mind."

“You guys are on the robotics team. You’re both nerds. It’ll be fine.

“I just - 

“Tony.” Rhodey Interrupted. He hated when Tony got like this, and something in him just snapped. “Stop being so down on yourself. You’re funny and smart and sweet and you tell great stories and you’re so enthusiastic about your work and about learning new things so that you can change the world. You’re incredible. And I’m sorry that no one in your life has ever told you that before, but it’s all true and if she sees what I see then...then she’ll love you, ok?”

Tony was just staring at him like a deer in headlights, and Rhodey immediately knew that he’d said way too much. He just hated when Tony got like this, and he wanted him to just see how great he actually was. 

“Rhodey I…” Tony started, clearly unsure of what to say in response to that, and Rhodey’s stomach just dropped. Had he completely fucked this up? Had he made everything weird? There was nothing weird about telling your friend that you love him, right? Even if you did happen to have a huge crush on that friend? 

They were both silent for what felt like forever, though in reality it was only a few seconds.

“You’ll be fine. Anyway. So when is this date?”

Tony glanced down at his watch. “I’m supposed to meet her in 45 minutes.”

“Well, then we’d better get to work.” Rhodey said as he stood up and grabbed an armload of clothes.

They made quick work of it, just putting Tony in jeans, a red t-shirt, the leather jacket, and a fresh pair of Chuck Taylors. They were a little quiet at first, but soon they found their way back to the joking and teasing they were used to. As Tony stood in the hallway trying to fix his hair the way the lady at the hair salon had told him too, Rhodey just stood back and admired his work. There was nothing spectacular about the clothes, but they were new and clean and fit him well. And the leather jacket was driving Rhodey crazy. As he watched Tony from behind, he wanted nothing more than to grab him, pin him against the wall, and have his way with him.

There were a million reasons why he shouldn’t do that, especially since he was literally about to leave to go on a date with someone else. With a girl.

“How do I look?” Tony asked, spinning around and giving him a big smile.

“Great.” Rhodey replied simply, resisting the urge to say hot. He didn’t want to make anything else weird.

Tony seemed unsure, but looked at his watch again and took a deep breath. “Right. Well, I gotta go. Thank you. For everything. Don’t study too hard, all right?” He said with a little smile before taking one more look at himself in the mirror and then heading out.

Rhodey tried to focus on studying after that, but he just couldn’t. He was jealous, he was embarrassed, and most of all he was horny. He took care of the latter problem a few minutes after Tony left, but after that he just laid on his bed and started at a crack in the ceiling while a million thoughts raced through his head.

This crush on Tony was stupid. Tony obviously wasn’t gay, right? And being gay in the Air Force sounded like a not-so-great idea anyway, so Rhodey really had to work on resisting these crushes if he ever wanted the chance to fly. Still, he couldn’t get that image of Tony in the leather jacket out of his mind, nor could he get over how jealous he felt. 

He figured that the best way to get over it was to distract himself, so he got up, took a cold shower, ate some dinner, and settled in back on the couch to watch TV and wait for Tony to get home. Despite the jealousy, he wanted to hear about the date and how it went. He just wanted Tony to be happy, and if dating Amy made him happy, then he’d do his best to be enthusiastic about it. At least on the surface.

Not long after Rhodey settled on the couch Tony came home and immediately plopped down next to him.

“Hey, you’re home early. How’d it go?” Rhodey asked, genuinely shocked that he was home. It hadn’t even been two hours, and he was just glad that he hadn’t decided to jerk off again.

“Yeah, it was fine. I mean, I had fun. We bowled and had some pizza and then sketched up an idea on a napkin for a bowling robot that we might try to build next week.” Tony said as he stared at the floor while fidgeting around with his zipper. “And then like, we were in the arcade part. Playing pinball. And she kissed me.”

“Well hey! That’s good, right?”

“I don’t know. It was weird. I mean, I’ve never kissed anyone before so I’ve not got much to compare it too. But like, it was like kissing my sister. If I had a sister, I guess. I don’t know. Just didn’t do much for me.” Tony admitted quietly, and Rhodey had no idea how to respond to that. Luckily, Tony kept talking. “And then it was a little awkward and she said that she didn’t feel like bowling anymore so we turned in our shoes and then she said that she thought that maybe we should just be friends.”

“Oh. Well shit, that sucks man, I’m sorry. But this is only your first date, there are plenty of other girls out there! There’s even at least 1 more on the robotics team, right? I’m sure you’ll find someone that makes you feel that spark.” Rhodey said as he put his hand on Tony’s shoulder. He just didn’t want him getting too down on himself.

Tony just looked up at him and smiled, and it was a look that Rhodey would have to file away to use later. “Thanks. Yeah, it’s fine. She still wants to be friends, so that’s good. Friends are good. I’m gonna go change, ok?”

“Sure.”

Tony stood up to head to his room, but then stopped and hesitated for a moment.

“Tony? You all right?” Rhodey asked as Tony turned to look at him. He was quiet for a moment, like he was searching for what to say.

“Are you doing anything Friday night?” Tony finally asked.

“No.” Rhodey answered, confused.

“Do you - would you be interested in like - going out?”

“W-what?” Rhodey stuttered out as his heart started pounding. This wasn’t actually happening, was it?

“Go out? Like...on a date? I guess? Unless I read that whole situation earlier wrong.”

“I…” Rhodey just trailed off, completely taken by surprise by all of this. “Um. A date?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh. Uh...ok. Yeah. We can do that, if you’re sure.”

Tony nodded. “I’m sure. Been thinking about it all night.”

“Oh.”

“Ok, so. It’s a date, yeah? Dinner? Movie? I don’t know, that’s what people do, right?” Tony said as he shoved his hands deep into his jacket pockets.

“We’ll figure something out.”

Tony nodded again and turned to head to his room.

“Hey, Tony?” Rhodey called out after him, causing Tony to stop and turn to him. “Whatever we do, promise me you’ll wear the leather jacket.” Rhodey said with a confident little smile, finally regaining a bit of composure.

A huge grin spread across Tony’s face, like he was finally relaxing too. “All right.”

Rhodey was terrified, but also so excited that he couldn’t imagine focusing on his notes anymore. After Tony disappeared Rhodey ran straight to his room and to his closet, desperately looking through all of his clothing. Nothing seemed good enough, so he figured he’d have to take a trip to the mall himself tomorrow. He wasn’t sure he could look as good as Tony did in the leather, but he could certainly try.