Ok hear me out. Reader and Zuko go on a run for supplies .Reader makes a mistakes and almost gets seriously hurt/ near death experience. Zuko gets pissed at reader, maybe yells at her. Reader laughs it off and acts like she doesn’t gaf. Zuko later finds reader all shaken up and crying by herself. Love if you don’t, love if you do!
a/n: ty for requesting and hope you enjoy anon !
summary: zuko apologizes and receives something in return
What was meant to be a simple trip into town for supplies had quickly turned into a disaster, and Zuko believed it was your recklessness to blame.
You’d been too preoccupied in admiring a local merchant’s vast collection of sea shells to notice the Fire Nation soldier creeping up behind you, and if not for Zuko shoving you out of the way to take on the man himself you surely would have been burnt alive. Your failure to stay aware of your surroundings and lackadaisical attitude had almost gotten you killed, and the Prince made sure to point this out to you afterward.
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?!” He scolds you after dragging you out of the marketplace by the arm and back towards camp.
“I was looking at shells, actually, before you so rudely interrupted,” you correct with an impatient roll of your eyes, but the act only seems to annoy him further.
“This isn’t a game, y/n! We didn’t come here to mess around, we came to quickly get more food and go, and we couldn’t even do that because you were too busy looking at stupid shells to notice your surroundings! You could have been hurt or worse!”
“Relax, ‘your highness,’” you dismiss him defensively, harshly yanking your arm away from his grasp. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not dead. I’m fine. You need to stop overreacting and leave me alone!”
Zuko watches with a scowl as you stomp away from him and towards your tent, ignoring the quizzical looks your friends send your way as you shut the flaps closed.
“What’s her problem?” Toph asks with a raised brow from her spot beside the campfire.
“What did you do?” Katara snaps at the boy with an accusatory glare.
“I didn’t do anything!” Zuko exclaims defensively. “As a matter of fact, I just saved her life and now she’s mad at me!”
“Saved her life? What happened out there?” Aang questions with a worried frown. “Was anyone hurt?”
“A Fire Nation soldier snuck up on her while she was distracted and was about to strike before I pushed y/n out of the way and fought him myself.”
“So… what you’re saying is you guys didn’t get any food?” Sokka notes dejectedly only to receive a scolding smack upside the head from his sister.
“If you saved her life, then why is she so upset?”
“I may have been a bit harsh with her after,” Zuko admits reluctantly, awkwardly grasping at the back of his neck. “I didn’t mean to snap at her, but I was just frustrated that she wasn’t taking her own safety seriously.”
“Look, that’s just how y/n is sometimes. She’s too trusting of her surroundings sometimes, but you have to gently remind her to be careful,” Sokka explains to his friend. “Maybe if you hadn’t yelled at her she would have taken you seriously.”
“Just give her some time to cool off and apologize later,” Katara advises the fire bender. “She just needs her space.”
Frustrated, Zuko lets out a long sigh before ultimately relenting. Katara is right. He just needs to give you some space to process before bothering you again.
By nightfall the moon has risen in the sky and the rest of your group has called it a day, retreating to their tents to sleep and rest for whatever tomorrow may bring. You still haven’t set foot out of yours since Zuko yelled at you, and the Prince has spent the better half of his day groveling outside waiting for you to emerge. He’s beginning to grow impatient, but he’s also extremely worried. You missed dinner, and no one has been able to get you to come out.
Deciding enough is enough, Zuko takes it upon himself to barge into your tent and check on you. Better you be mad at him for invading your space without permission than for something to be wrong with you without anyone knowing.
When he enters your tent the last thing he expects to find is your figure curled up in your sleeping bag crying. Your body trembles under the blankets and your quiet sniffles are the only sound in the space. If you notice his presence you don’t acknowledge it, and Zuko hesitates before carefully sitting himself beside you.
“Y/n?” He calls out softly, gently pulling the covers back to get a look at your face. Water marks line across your cheeks from tears that had managed to dry off your skin, and it takes you a moment to finally meet his gaze.
“I’m sorry for making you mad,” you whisper meekly, voice cracking with effort after hours of minimal use.
“No, you don’t have to apologize. I should be apologizing for how I acted,” he assures you sincerely, carefully wiping away your remaining tears. “I shouldn’t have snapped at you. I was just worried about your safety- I’m not sure what I would have done if something bad had happened to you.”
“You really mean that?” You sniffle, looking up at him with doubt clear in your eyes.
“Of course I do. I know it probably didn’t seem that way when I was yelling at you, but I’ve come to care a lot for you, and I’d hate to see you get hurt.”
“I didn’t know…” you murmur quietly as you carefully sit up from your sleeping bag to reach eye level with the Prince. “I always figured you just saw me as some annoying girl you had to babysit.”
“Well, maybe at first,” he admits with a sheepish chuckle only to immediately stop when he catches your unamused glare, “but now I look forward to being sent to the market with you. I enjoy your company even if it means having to be more vigilant of our surroundings on your behalf. Can you just promise me that next time you’ll be a little more careful?”
“I promise,” you nod earnestly and, much to Zuko’s surprise, pull him in for a tight hug. He stiffens at first, unsure how to react to the close contact, but eventually he’s able to allow himself a chance to enjoy your warmth and reciprocate your embrace.
Only you could have the grumpy Prince wrapped so tightly around your finger.
| zuko tags: @ilovespideyyy @yiyibetch @eridanuswave @lammello @a-monsters-love @taeeemin @livelaughlovekuni @lovialy
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Roommates? (Melissa Schemmenti x f!Reader)
Synopsis: You move into Mel's spare room
Words: 3.6k
Warnings: praise kink if you squint, swearing, mentions of alcohol
AN: Written after 3x07.
You groaned as you dropped into your seat in the break room, not hungry for the lunch you’d packed for yourself. Burying your head in your hands, you did your best to try not to think about the email you’d just received. It was hard when your stress was becoming all encompassing after weeks of it.
“What going on with you?”
You groaned again, even when you felt the brush of an arm against yours. The floral scent you’d grown accustomed to over the last few years wafted towards you. Melissa. Your closest friend at the school, and the person you’d been pining after for so long you’d lost any self respect you might have had.
“That place I was going to move into fell through,” you said, “I feel like I’ve seen every spare room in this city and there is no where to live.”
You peeked at her from between your fingers, hating to sound so whiny but knowing that your stress levels had reached breaking point. She was looking at you with a raised eyebrow and an incredulous look. You sighed, sitting up properly under her watchful gaze.
“You know Jacob’s looking for a place too,” Gregory said from the other table.
“I know,” you groaned, “he suggested we look for a place together and I can’t commit to living and working with that man. He once tried to rap at me about the Martin Luther King Jr and I can’t have that in my home.”
“I get that,” Gregory replied, “why are you even looking for a new place to live? Your place is nice.”
“My roommate keeps watching me when I sleep. Sometimes I wake up and she’s standing at the end of my bed just staring at me. It freaks me out.”
“Well hey, I’m thinking of renting out my spare room. Would you be interested, hon?”
You hadn’t expected Melissa to say that.
“Really?”
She gave you one of those small smiles that you’d never seen her give another person. Your heart fluttered and you found your cheeks heating up.
“Really,” she said, “you can pay rent, right?”
“Yeah, of course,” you replied.
“You can move in this weekend,” she said.
Come Saturday, your things were in boxes and bags, and you had a spring in your step. You were humming to yourself as you packed up your car, your entire life filling the seats and the trunk. You took one last look at the building, sighed, then got in your car and drove to the next chapter of your life.
It wasn’t until you were standing in front of the door that the reality of what you were about to do crashed into you. Living with Melissa. Being in her space all the time. Existing in close proximity. She was going to see you first thing in the morning. You were going to see her late at night.
Your crush was going to either get so much worse or dissipate when you saw all of her annoying habits.
The door opened before you could knock, revealing the red head who starred in so many of your dreams. You blinked, rearing back, not having expected her to suddenly appear. Her lips quirked up, hand snapping out to grasp you around the elbow before you could fall backwards.
“Were you planning on knocking or do you wanna live on my front step?” she asked.
“ I was… just about to… can you help with my boxes?” you asked instead, switching tracks without having to explain yourself.
“Sure, hon,” she chuckled, slipping past you.
Watching her lift your heavy boxes set off something primal in you. You followed behind her, your own arms full of your stuff. She led you up the stairs and into her spare bedroom, placing the boxes down on the made up bed.
“Well, here you are. Bed, dresser, the bathroom is down the hall. You can have a a shelf in the fridge. Your key is just there. Let me know if you need anything else,” she said.
“Thanks.”
“Do you need help with the rest of your stuff?” she asked.
“Only if you want to. I can do it myself. It’s no bother.” You had no idea why you were saying no. You felt flustered. You always felt a bit flustered around her.
“Come on, hon,” she said, giving you an indulgent smile, “the sooner we start the sooner we’ll be done.”
She left you alone after pttling the last of the boxes into your room, leaving you to unpack and settle in. Sorting your clothes into colours helped to ease your thoughts, the mindless work turning your head empty. It calmed you, getting your life in order so you could get your thoughts in order.
It wasn’t going to be so bad living with Melissa. She was being nice to you which was more than Jacob or Janine had been able to say after their cooking lesson with her. Accommodating was the word. She was almost going out of her way to be nice.
And most importantly you could keep your crush to yourself without ruining it all.
That night, she made dinner, offering you some and then curled up on the couch with a glass of wine. You were hesitant about joining her, hovering until she rolled her eyes and tugged you to sit beside her.
But it was easy to fall into a routine with her. Surprisingly easy. So easy that you didn’t even notice until a few weeks in.
Sitting at the table on a Wednesday night, doing the puzzle you’d started over the weekend, you listened to her hum in the kitchen. Something was bubbling on the stove top, the smell mouth watering. You looked up as fingers pushed a piece towards you.
“Thanks,” you said, looking up at her.
She was already smiling at you and you couldn’t help but smile back. It was an instinctual response. You couldn’t help it when it came to Mel.
“You hungry?” she asked.
“Always,” you replied, knowing it was the answer she wanted.
“C’mon then, hon, make some room. Can’t have you starving before you finish that patch of sky,” she said.
“You’re teasing but I saw you get excited when you finished the boat,” you said, clearing your pieces away from one end of the table.
Sitting across from her, the lights soft and warm, there was always something a little romantic to the feeling. Of course, you were sure it was all in your head but you couldn’t help but enjoy it, just a little, more than you should. She would look at you, those twinkling green eyes making you flush, and her smile had butterflies erupting in your stomach.
Still, every night felt like domestic bliss. Coming home with her, in the bubble of her house, the quiet night pressing in on the window, it was the kind of life you hadn’t known you’d been missing.
“You’re a goddess in the kitchen,” you said.
She’d waited for you to try her food, just as she always did before beginning to eat her own meal. Her foot brushed against yours under the table, making you jump. She chuckled, doing it again and you felt your cheeks heat and your heart stumble over itself.
Some days it almost felt like she was flirting with you.
“You’re sweet, hon,” she said.
You found your foot brushing against hers again, emboldened by her bashful response. Those green eyes flicked up to you, something twinkling in their depths. You weren’t sure how you looked but you were worried you’d shown your hand to her.
Dropping your foot back to the floor, you averted your gaze down to the plate of pasta she’d laid down in front of you. Her foot nudged yours before resting against it, length to length, the warmth of her skin seeping into yours.
She kept silent the rest of the meal, following your lead. You weren’t sure you could say anything, not with her foot against yours. Certainly not if she was watching you.
You remained silent as you cleared the table once she was done. Standing shoulder to shoulder at the sink, you did the washing up together, working in companionable tandem. You were so in tune with one another after living together for those few weeks, working together came without flaws.
“Are you gonna be watching our show tonight?” she asked into the silence.
You didn’t say no.
Sitting beside her on the sofa had always been trouble for you. Shoulder to shoulder, lit by nothing but the flickering screen, sharing a bowl of popcorn until your hands brushed together, it had always been a specific type of torture for you. The air always felt electric to you, and you knew it didn’t for her.
Except this night her head fell to your shoulder and her body curled towards yours. You froze until she admonished you, doing your best to relax your muscles. And there you stayed until she went to bed, feeling as if you had entered some kind of parallel universe.
Thursday night you’d put the entire odd experience behind you. She hadn’t mentioned it over breakfast or on the car ride over to school. On the ride back home she’d sung along to the radio, keeping her hands and feet to herself. You’d thought it was done. You thought you wouldn’t be tortured anymore.
But after you’d changed out of your school clothes and into something more comfortable, a knock sounded on your door. Opening the door, you found her in the hall, wet hair clinging to the skin of her neck, a towel wrapped around her body. You stumbled back a step, blinking at the vision before you.
“Um…” was all you managed to say.
“Have you seen my Eagles hoodie?” she asked.
“No,” you replied faintly, doing your best to not let your eyes wander further south than her chin.
“You sure? Because I can’t find it,” she said.
“Did you check in the washing?” you asked, hoping that would send her away.
“I thought you mighta borrowed it,” she said, lips tipping up into a small smirk, “you always seem to like it when I wear it. Can’t keep your hands off me.”
You felt your cheeks heat even further, deeper, almost uncomfortably. You looked down at your feet, terrified to be caught staring at her. You didn’t need to come across as a creep to her, ruining your friendship completely and irrevocably.
“I’m just teasing, hon,” she said, shoving your shoulder, “it’s probably in the wash.”
You were left staring at her retreating back as she left you be with your swirling thoughts and thundering heart, breathless from the image of all that skin on display. You were slow to close your door, leaning back against it as you breathed out a long sigh. Pressing a hand to your chest, you could feel the beating of your heart against your skin, practically bursting from your body.
The after image of her in the towel stayed in your mind until you could bring yourself to venture downstairs.
She was standing at the hob, stirring something on the stove, dressed in the familiar grey hoodie she’d been looking for. You blinked then stepped further in. She turned, smiling at you over her shoulder.
“Wanna help me out here?” she asked, seeming not bothered by the interaction upstairs.
“Sure,” you said, wanting to move past it too. Clearly, it hadn’t effected her the way it had effected you.
“Can you keep stirring this for me? I gotta start on the chopping,” she said.
“Sure,” you said again.
Your fingers brushed over hers as you took the wooden spoon from her. She paused a moment, eyes roving over your face. You held your breath, frozen, waiting, wondering what she was thinking.
“Keep stirring, hon,” she whispered, hand guiding yours, the skin of her palm warm against yours.
Slipping away, you kept your eyes on the pot, not wanting her to see the way you were beginning to come undone. One day you could brush off as weird, two made you wonder what was going on.
A warm hand landed on your hip, practically burning through the fabric of your leggings. A soft chin rested on your shoulder, looking over you as you continued stirring. You didn’t know what to do but keep stirring. If you focused on the warmth and the soft body brushing against your back you might melt into a puddle of goo.
“Good job, hon,” she murmured, lips brushing your earlobe.
A small squeak came from your parted lips and her throaty chuckle only made you feel as if you were crumbling in her arms. Those hands on your hips gently pushed you out of the way, fingers plucking the spoon from your hand.
“Go on, go finish that patch of sky. I can finish up here,” she said, sounding as if she had no idea the turmoil she was causing you.
You simply nodded and wandered back to the dining table. You sat, staring at the pieces, trying to reel your thoughts back in. A finger absently ran along the sides of the puzzle, feeling the gaps for the missing pieces. It wasn’t that Melissa wasn’t tactile, sometimes she could be, but this whole thing was something more. A step further.
A little closer to the kind of relationship you wanted with her.
That night she curled up against you again, cheek resting on your shoulder in the flickering light of the tv, hand resting on the thigh hers was resting against. You spent the entire time holding your breath until she slipped away to her room.
Friday left you on tenterhooks. Once again she was normal right up until your return home after a day at school. You were considering retreating into your room and not emerging for the rest of the night. It felt as if she was playing a game with you and you hadn’t been informed of the rules.
And yet you kind of revelled in the attention, if only because it might be your only chance to pretend she wanted you the way you wanted her.
You weren’t given the chance to make the choice for yourself.
A knock on the sounded on your bedroom door once again. You flung on a shirt, covering up as best you could while in the middle of changing out of your work clothes. Pulling open the door, you looked down, finding yourself in one of the lacy camisoles you’d been trying on last weekend when going out with friends for a drink. You squeezed your eyes shut for a moment, trying to contain the groan you wanted to release. When you opened your eyes it was to find a smirk and sparkling green eyes turned in your direction.
“I was coming to offer you a glass of wine but it looks like you might be going out,” she said.
Her eyes swept down your body and if you were a betting person, you thought her gaze might have lingered on the cleavage on display. You found your back arching, just a moment, until her eyes swept back to yours and her smirk only deepened.
“Come on down, hon. You ain’t going anywhere in those sweat pants,” she said.
“I’ll take that wine,” you said, needing to drown your embarrassment in something.
You trailed behind her down the stairs into the kitchen. It truly was the heart of the home in Melissa’s house. You hoisted yourself onto a bench as she poured the wine. As she’d pointed out, there was no chance you were about to head out in the sweats you were wearing, even if the lacy cami on the top was more dressed up than was normal for slouching around the house on a Friday night.
When she turned back around, her eyes seemed to light up. She sauntered towards you, both hands holding glasses of red wine. Offering you one, she drew closer. You took a deep drink, needing it more and more as she took another step closer to you. Her thumb came up, running along your lower lip, wiping away a drop of wine before she sucked it into her mouth, maintaining eye contact with you.
“Mel.” You felt as if you’d woken up into a dream, breathless and unsure of what you could do.
“Yes, hon?” Her voice had turned so husky you weren’t sure you were existing in real life anymore.
When you didn’t reply she took one last step forward, right between your thighs. One hand ran up your leg making fire lick through your veins and your cheeks heat under her gaze. Her lips ticked up into a smirk again, seeming to enjoy the trouble you were having at forming a sentence.
“What are you doing?” you finally managed to get out in a whisper.
“Aren’t you enjoying it?” she asked.
“I don’t…” It came out strangled, “Mel, please.”
“I’m trying to seduce you, hon,” she said, “is it working?”
You nodded, not sure you were capable of forming words. Just the thought she was trying to seduce was enough to send you into a coma. You hadn’t thought she would ever look at you the way you looked at her.
“C’mon, hon. You can do better than that. Say it.”
“It’s working,” you whispered, not sure you could deny her anything in this moment.
“Good girl.”
She drew ever closer, breath ghosting over your lips. You froze, eyes fluttering shut, waiting to see what she was going to do. A brush of lips, a soft sigh, fingers clenching around your thigh. You barely had the chance to enjoy it before she was stepping back from you. The whimper that came from you was embarrassing but the look on her face when you opened your eyes was smug.
“Mel,” you said again, not sure there were any words other than her anymore.
“Do you know the hell you’ve put me through since moving in? You’re so fucking hot and I don’t think you even know it. You’re the exact woman my Nonna warned my cousin Vinny about,” she said, almost groaning.
“I haven’t been doing anything,” you said, addressing the only thing you could.
“Parading around in your tight leggings and these little tops and those fucking shorts in the morning. And when you’re thinking about something your tongue pokes out and then all I can think about is reaching over and kissing you. Also did you know you hum to yourself when you think no one’s around. Fuck, when I see you in the kitchen humming and dancing I just want to pin you to the closest surface and fuck you until you can’t do anything but say my name.”
You weren’t sure you had a good response.
“Yeah but you wear tight trousers pretty much every day at work,” was your only come back.
“But you weren’t looking at me in them and thinking what it would feel like to have my legs wrapped around you,” she replied as if it was the most natural answer in the world.
“I fucking was,” you snapped, at the end of your rope. She’d been playing with you long enough, “christ sake, Mel. I’ve been thinking about you since the first time we met. You’re literally the most gorgeous person I’ve ever seen. I didn’t think you were interested.”
“Hon, I let you move into my house. What part of that says I’m not interested?” she demanded.
“I don’t know,” you said, sounding angrier than you expected, “you might have just been trying to be a good friend.”
“Then let me be very clear.” She took a step back between your legs again, “I am very interested in you.”
You legs tightened around her hips, holding her in place as you lent forward. Your lips ghosted over hers and you were surprised by the noise that came from her. It was whiny and needy and she was straining towards you. You chuckled, drawing back.
“If you plan on seducing me, I expect to be wined and dined,” you said, “no more fooling around until you put some effort in and prove I’m worth it.”
“You fucking brat,” she laughed, a hand curling around the back of your neck to pull you closer.
She kissed you deeply, tongue licking into your mouth, sending your thoughts spiralling away from you. Your knees tightened on her hips, your hands cupping her cheeks, indulging her for long enough to let her think she’d gotten her way. You nipped at her lower lip before drawing away.
“Wining and dining, Mel. I’m not some common whore,” you said, “I deserve romance.”
“There’s your wine,” she said, shoving the glass back into your hands, “I’ll make a start on dinner.”
You bit down on your lip, watching her slam down a knife on the cutting board, grumbling under her breath, trying to hold in a grin. The glare she gave you broke the flood gates as giggles tumbled from your lips.
“You keep on like this and I’ll stop seducing you,” she threatened.
“You stop and I’ll wear those shorts you like all weekend,” you retaliated.
You caught her arm, drawing her in for another kiss, just enough to remind her what was waiting. She softened, gently squeezing your leg before going back to cooking. You watched her, finding yourself falling more and more for her, the anticipation delicious, the woman beautiful.
And maybe moving into her home was the best thing to ever happen to you.
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