#talking about like. fucking street cleaners and how you have to watch out for them. HOW is the video about the kids being hit and killed

[pepprs]

like it’s VERY very important to not text and drive. and i understand how dangerous it is to do that and to be distracted at all in any way for any amount of time on the road. i know it’s important to learn about these stories and bear witness to them. but i just think. like idk. watching multiple of them every day for 10 days (with a two day break halfway through for the weekend) is realy… like idk. i think after seeing a couple you can get the point. i don’t want to sound dismissive or lackadaisacal and im scared im sounding like that but i just am so freaked out by all of this and witb every new horror they’re showing us it’s scaring me worse.

[qu1cks1lversb1tch]

Aw those best friend hcs were fun! Can you do everyone else at the hotel? Especially Vaggie?

A/N: I absolutely can! I'll make a part 3 or edit this one if I somehow forget someone (it could happen). This is quite the little grouping 🤣 I hope you like it!

Having them as best friend's part two:

Includes: Vaggie, Sir Pentious, Niffty, and Cherri Bomb.

Part One

Vaggie

Her deal is tough love.

As her best friend, you're used to being called an idiot half a dozen times a day.

You'll just be chilling after making some decision or saying something and she'll be like: "Not only are you blind, you're fucking stupid too!" But it wouldn't hold any malice

She's never really been one for gossip, but you can bet that she'll listen to how your day was.

Definitely the friend who would interrogate anyone you show interest in.

If someone says something out of line about you, she's putting them in their place before you can open your mouth to defend yourself.

Vaggie isn't very touchy, but she'll hug you sometimes. Especially if it was something like after the battle and she was just happy you were alive.

She's almost always there to ward off the bad.

Sleepovers! They're never her idea, but she can't say no when you give her those puppy dog eyes.

Really, she's always there for you, but with a sibling dynamic that makes some question if the two of you really tolerate each other at all. You do, but barely lmao.

Sir Pentious

He's a drama king. Sweet, but definitely dramatic.

100% the friend to hold your drink at a party. . . Because he's HOLDING EVERYONE'S DRINK!

If you had to go anywhere, he's sending the Egg Bois with you. They call you 'not master' and it's the cutest thing ever.

Sleepovers would be his idea, no doubt. An offer that couldn't be refused.

He calmly interrogates any potential suitors of yours, and if they seem fine, he might let them go on a date with you.

Will literally cry if you call someone else your best friend. Friend's are okay. But if you called Angel Dust or Charlie your best friend? Immediate tears. "But. . . I thought I wasss your besssst friend." Apologize, right now.

Gives you some new weaponized invention and your favorite Hellish sweet treat every year on your 'death day'. He takes it very seriously.

He's all for the tea, but only if there's 100% truth behind it. Like you witnessed the HOTTEST tea of the month and just went 'Sir P NEEDS to know'.

Everyone mistakes the calmness and caring nature of Sir Pentious as having feelings for you. Common misconception. That's just your slithery best friend.

Y'all take naps together at random because you can. And naps are life.

Niffty

You're almost as chaotic as she is, but you're better at hiding it. Sorry not sorry.

Because of her, everything you own is cleaner than when you got it and you found it disturbing at first, but eventually got used to it.

She climbs you like a tree and uses you to see better in large crowds.

She talks so fast half the time you could barely understand her until it clicked and you could reply.

She's very knife happy. Someone breaks your heart? "STAB! STAB! STAB!" Followed by maniacal giggles and her footsteps down the hall.

She tries new recipes and uses you as the taste tester to see if the others would enjoy it. The answer is usually yes.

Niffty is super blunt. She won't hold back a single thought, even if it could potentially hurt your feelings.

She rarely takes breaks, but when she does, her small frame is usually beside you, watching TV or relaying the latest drama she heard on the streets.

She's a good listener, but once again, she's also blunt.

Every picture of the two of you, she has that same far away look in her eye. Every. Single. One.

Cherri Bomb

She's a bad influence, that much is certain, but no amount of peer pressure could get you to do something you didn't want to do. That's why you're best friends.

She loves partying and dragging you out, but most nights, you stay in, which then in a way, forces her to stay in too.

"[Y/N/N], you bitch, why aren't you dressed? I thought we were going out tonight!" No. No you weren't.

She encourages you to step out of your comfort zone 24/7, because you're in Hell and it could only get so much worse.

She listens, but doesn't really pay attention all that much. There's almost always something else on her mind, but she makes it up to you somehow.

She'd probably push you down the stairs for fun if she felt like it.

Most likely to sing karaoke with you, absolutely plastered in a bar somewhere on the outskirts of the Pride Ring.

If you handed your cup to her to go to the bathroom, she'd probably misunderstand and drink it.

Glares at anyone who looks in your direction, purely because she doesn't trust very many at all.

Would reluctantly agree to a sleepover if you asked, just because you're her main bitch.

[anangelwhodidntfall]

Suffer In Silence: Eddie Munson

Stranger Things Masterlist 

word count: 800

request:  Eddie and y/n are best friends (who secretly love each other but don't want to destroy their friendship so both suffer in silence).

Y/N and Eddie are like two peas in a pod, they were always together and many would assume that they were a couple and it was shocking to them when either one of them said that they weren't a couple. Truth is that both Eddie and Y/N had been in love with each other for the longest time but neither one wanted to risk losing the amazing friendship that they shared so they both suffered in silence much to their friend's dismay.

You were on your way over to Eddies and he currently forming a plan on how he was going to jump scare you this time, scaring you was one of his favorite things to do because sometimes you made it so easy. He saw your car pull into the driveway so he decided to fake sleep on the couch and wait to fake scare you when you least expect it.

"Hey Eddie, I grabbed some snacks and picked up the new nightmare on elm street for us to watch..." You said as you walked into the house but stopped once you saw him asleep.

You shook your head at him as you sat the bags down on the counter and walked over to him and took his shoes off and set them on the floor before walking to his room to grab him and blanket and pillow for him.

"Only you would fall asleep in the most uncomfortable place instead of in your own bed." You muttered as you gently slide the pillow up his head hoping not to disturb him.

"Not to mention you are about to freeze to death." You said covering him and quietly turning on Fast Times At Ridgemont High at a low volume.

Eddie was melting inside at how sweet and caring you were being with him during his "fake sleep" and was almost tempted not to jump scare you anymore. He heard you open and close the fridge before coming into the living room and taking a seat next to him on the couch and resting your arm on his leg as you watched the movie and it made him wish there was more between you two than friendship but sadly that was never gonna happen.

He continued fake sleeping for at least thirty more minutes until he decided enough was enough and waited until you had your drink in your hand to scare you. But what he wasn't expecting was to reach over and brush some of the curls out of his face.

"Boo!" He said opening his eyes and making you jump back with a scream and drop your glass onto the floor in the process.

"God damn it! Eddie don't fucking do that!" You said slapping his chest as he laughed.

"Oh c'mon you know it was funny. sweetheart." He said sitting up.

"No, it wasn't because now I have spilled coffee all over your uncle's rug, which he's gonna kill me for." You said picking up the glass and heading to the kitchen.

"Ehh it'll be alright. But let's talk about how sentimental you were being towards me?" He said getting up and following you into the kitchen.

"I was just trying to be a good friend and make sure you were comfortable." You said as you reached under the sink for some carpet cleaner.

"Sure you were. But what about you reaching over and brushing my curls out of my face?" He asked you.

"Eds I know you don't like it when your hair touches your  face, so I was trying to help you sleep which you clearly weren't doing in the first place." You said rolling your eyes as you walked into the living room and began cleaning up the stain from earlier.

"Look I know I gave you shit about it, but I did really enjoy you taking care of me even if I was faking it, so thank you seriously." He said after a few minutes noticing how quiet you had been.

"Your welcome Eds." You said giving him a small smile before heading back into the kitchen.

"So did I hear you right that you had snacks and the new nightmare on elm street?" He asked you.

"I did. I figured could have one of our movie nights unless you want to do something else?" You said taking a seat on the couch.

"There's nothing else I rather do sweetheart." He said popping in the movie as you set your assortment of snacks and drinks on the table in front of you guys.

As you two were watching the movie, Eddie thought about earlier and how much he enjoyed you taking care of him, and made sure to fall asleep around you more often especially now that he knew what kind of treatment he got.

[comfy-whumpee]

Tyler

Implied past abuse, homophobia and alcohol. BBU.

If you’re just here for the epistolary material, scroll to the end! Preceding piece: Everyone.

“See you later, Phil.”

The last person left the office. It was Friday night, and Roman had gone home with Dillon, Joel and Phil had finished up, and Tyler was left working late with Charlie on this stupid urgent Christmas thing. The world outside the windows was a dark void, speckled by street lights. The office was weirdly quiet without Roman washing up or pottering around tidying. Hell, if they stayed late enough the cleaner would show up.

Charlie had been quiet all week. Roman was fucking limping from his stress. They needed to make sure everything was sorted before they closed and all took the week off. Charlie didn’t want to be fixing shit while he was having Christmas with his girlfriend.

Tyler would probably go visit his mom. She got lonely at this time of year. Maybe he’d be able to take Ro, as well. Give him a proper holiday. Introduce him…

“Let’s stop there,” Charlie said, leaning back and running a hand through his flattened quiff, as if trying to coax more life into it. He always over-oiled his hair to keep it in shape. Shaking his hand now would feel greasy.

Tyler closed his notebook gladly, dropping his pen on top. Most of their clients wouldn’t be doing business during the festive period, but they also didn’t want the app to break. It was their first time closing the office for a week; last year they’d barely taken seven days off between them. Planning around the issue before it happened was how Charlie liked to do things, but it was a headache.

“I wanted to talk to you about Roman,” Charlie said.

His voice was low and calm, or it sounded calm. Tyler knew Charlie never let everything out at once. He built up to it. When he called Roman into the office, he started off venting, and only smacked him around after he’d worked himself up. It was cathartic, he said.

“We all know you’re gay.”

The statement was so fucking far out of left field that Tyler almost laughed. “What the fuck?”

“Nobody cares. Roman turns you on. Whatever. But we’ve all seen how you’re looking at him these days. Coming in early to hang out with him. Giving him hugs.”

Tyler sat very still, feeling his body start to burn. “Shut up,” he protested, but his voice had fled. His face was on fire. His blood was pounding.

“I’m trying to be nice,” Charlie snapped back. His eyes were dark, so dark. He was furious. Tyler knew it. It beat in his pulse. Like watching his dad neck a bottle of beer. “I’m trying to be nice,” Charlie repeated, voice calmer but harder. “I heard you talk bullshit about freeing him. Taking him away with you.”

He listened to them. When did he find out? Had he snuck in one morning to eavesdrop? Was there a day they didn’t hear the door?

“I haven’t told the others. I don’t need the hassle. But this is your one fucking warning, alright?”

Charlie still sounded so calm. He wasn’t calm. He couldn’t be. Tyler watched his hands, folded on the table in front of him. They’d move. Any second now. They’d throw the first punch.

“You stood there and planned to steal the most expensive company property we have. Over some fucking scratches on his hand. If I see you doing any of that shit again, treating him like your little boyfriend, having your breakfast dates and whatever, you’re out of this goddamn company. Alright?”

Tyler watched. Charlie’s hands didn’t move. His engagement ring would sting harder than the punch. Light shone off it.

His father had always said he had to be a man, and take his hits like one. Failed on both counts. The old man would have an aneurysm to know Tyler was a pet-liberating queer.

“Alright?” Charlie repeated. Anger pressing up against the word, threatening to break through.

“Alright,” Tyler repeated back mechanically.

“He’s not going home with you anymore. I see you taking him off this property, I call the cops. You don’t talk to him or get alone with him. Stop being such a fucking moron.”

“Alright.”

Charlie sighed. “Alright. Go home and download Grindr or something. Get outta here.”

Tyler got up feeling like every muscle was hardened clay. He picked up his notebook and pen. He walked to his desk, scooped up his bag and jacket, and left the office to walk to his car.

Charlie had been quiet all week. Charlie had been beating Roman every day. Had screamed at him, red in the face, embarrassing to watch. He’d stopped apologising after. Stopped feeling guilty.

Tyler hadn’t noticed. Still stupid. Still slow.

He’d have to stop talking to the lawyer. She’d want him to push on, be a whistleblower or some shit. Throw everything away to take these guys to court for an outcome Roman didn’t even fucking want.

What was the point?

They knew. They knew everything he’d tried to keep secret. We all know you’re gay.

He hadn’t. Not until he’d started getting close to Roman.

Tyler drove on autopilot, gaze skittering across the road and back again for hazards without consciously processing it. It was only when he passed a billboard with two dressed-up pets, blown up larger than life under the electric lights, that the dam broke.

Make a positive change this season.

Humiliation and anger took over, and the tears rushed up. He pulled over and cried like a child, alone in his car, three days before Christmas.

-

@neuro-whump​​, @rosesareviolentlyread​​, @mylifeisonthebookshelf​, @pumpkin-spice-whump​, @whumpsday​ @kira-the-whump-enthusiast​, @firewheeesky​, @why-not-ask-me-a-better-question​

[nicetrynicetry]

157

Monday I wake up late and A tells me I was talking in my sleep. “Do you just want me to leave?”, I said, apparently. A says he tried to have a back and forth with me but quickly learned I was not conscious. I don’t tell him I dreamt I was a hermaphrodite. I walk out to the kitchen to get coffee half naked and walk back in to the bedroom when I see A’s cleaner. A does a zoom with the NY Times and then goes to a vampire weekend music video shoot and I go to get coffee from Intelligentsia, coconut water from Erewhon, and walk for as long as I can in the sun before calling a car to take me to the Museum Of Death. I am marching up a depressing avenue when I hear my own name screamed from a parked car. It is C, idling and panicking, and we are both gasping at how eerie it is to run into each other on a random street in such a large city. Our friendship, as has been documented here, has been on the rocks for a year, but I get in the car to watch her make a decision about which Urgent Care clinic to seek medical testing in. J says he is running late to meet me at the Museum Of Death, so I spend the latter part of the morning finding C somewhere safe to heal what ails her, rapping on the plastic screen that separates sick people from the Urgent Care receptionists, and shitting my brains out at a Thai restaurant as I mentioned in my previous entry. C is called in and I leave her to it, wondering if this was the catastrophe we needed to bring us together again. I take a car to the museum and J meets me after parking his Jeep and we spend close to two hours looking at pictures of decapitated and maimed and otherwise-murdered bodies from the last 100 years. There is a strict no-photos policy that feels entirely justified, given this collection puts even the most depraved Reddit thread to shame in terms of gore. I watch a video on how to perform an autopsy and how to embalm a body. I see Sharon Tate’s maimed face and chest and the guitar Charles Manson played in prison with a broken D string. I see the rape of Nanking and books on cannibalism and people’s crotches where the genitals have been sawn off and taxidermied chihuahuas and Auschwitz stuff and a wanted poster for Andrew Cunanan. Even the toilets have a bulletin board of recent deaths, printed cheaply onto white paper. “Death is everywhere”, says the sandwich board at the entrance and exit, and it’s not wrong. We buy t shirts from the gift shop and I talk about sobriety with the retail assistant and he says he likes working at the museum because it reminds him that he’s not dead

J and I go to eat at Sqirl and I see a stupidly handsome man in a wheelchair pass our table. He wheels past several times and stares at me and J asks if I’ve ever had sex with someone in a wheelchair and I say no and he says his friend had sex with someone without arms or legs. We go to Hauser and Wirth and listen to Lana Del Ray, as is our custom when driving together in LA. An ex colleague of J’s lets us in and turns the Jason Rhoades video on for us, an hour long interview with Rhoades when he was still alive talking about the experience of driving in LA. He is driving in the video, nerding out about how different cars were built and why he likes them. Four of his cars are in the gallery, ephemera on their seats. J’s ex colleague says the party line is that Rhoades died of heart complications but that he actually killed himself. We are led up to see a Paul McCarthy sculpture of a gnome. We see the chefs at Hauser and Wirth’s restaurant preparing for the evening’s dinner singing along to Adele

We drive to Erewhon and get a Hailey Bieber sundae which I make the mistake of googling the calorie content of later. I figure it’s important to master dessert and dessert-adjacent foodstuffs, and the only way to do so is to eat them. Eating disorder recovery 101. Thank you, Hailey Bieber, but also Fuck You. I leave J to prepare for his Madonna concert and I walk home and watch a video on YouTube about a woman whose skin fell apart after B-12 shots she didn’t need. She speaks briefly on the dangers of those IV drips you can get in gyms in the US now that are totally unregulated and how every now and then people die from them and I think of my mother telling me, when I got to LA sick, to promise her I wouldn’t get one of those IVs. “And no B-12 shots”, she wrote

A eventually returns, exasperated by how disorganised the video shoot was. I tell him it’s a miracle anything ever gets made. He lies on the bed and we FaceTime with A (other A) and make a dinner plan. I pick a restaurant that I know R eats at regularly but hope in my heart that Monday night is one night he chooses not to go there. A (other A) arrives before us and says that 1. The outdoor seating is too cold and 2. That R is in fact at the bar, waiting on a date. We reroute to sushi at Hama and wait patiently for a table to open up. I eat too much ginger and immediately get a stomach ache. It’s not what I imagined for my last night in the city, but it is what I get. Plus A and A are the only people I would want to spend it with. I smoke outside afterwards and A goes to kiss me and I tell him my breath is gross and he kisses me anyway while I pinch his nose shut

[holland-westbrook]

EXHIBIT A

Conversation between Amalthea Myron (deceased) and Holland Westbrook

MS. MYRON: Holland, you are a fucking killer. Maybe you haven’t  struck Francis yourself, but you did much, much worse to him. And I didn’t have a choice, because you’re clearly insane and you almost killed me too, right now. Wren didn’t mean to! Wren was defending your girlfriend! But you coldbloodedly burned him, and I’ll never forget that smell or how fucking remorseless and crazy you are.

EXHIBIT B

Conversation between Holland Westbrook, Aspen Sawyer (deceased), and Wren Challis (deceased)

MS. WESTBROOK: She told the cameras everything. About what we did to Francis. About how you killed him, Wren, how we all helped hide the fucking body. She said it in front of everyone, and now everyone knows.

EXHIBIT C

Conversation between Amalthea Myron (deceased) and Nico Wylin (deceased)

MS. MYRON: Don’t kill me! She [Ms. Westbrook] is lying, she has been lying all along! She is a murderer. Trust me. I know you have no reason— You have to trust me! I’ve seen her cut off a whole human being – about your size actually. I’ve seen her throw his flesh and bones into acid without flinching. I’ve seen her kill and maim the corpse, and not feel anything. She’s ruthless and crazy, and whatever she told you, she will end up killing you too. No remorse. I swear! I’m not here to bother you. I am unarmed and weak.

MR. WYLIN: What’s happening? Are you being chased? Who are you talking about?

MS. MYRON: I don’t want to say something you could kill me for, but you should stay away from Holland. She is dangerous. She had killed somebody – we all… I didn’t, but we all were there. Wren and Holland killed a man from the Capitol, and Aspen and I had to help them cover it up. Holland chopped him into pieces. She didn’t even flinch.

MR. WYLIN: She’s trying to kill you? I— Tell me what happened. Tell me why.

Written testimony prepared by Lisa Featherpond, Avox to Mr. Lightbelle for 20 years

Q: You work as a Peacekeeper at the Tribute Tower, correct?

A: That’s correct.

Q: And you were there on the morning of the launch of the Arena.

A: Yes.

Q: Can you tell me what you saw just before dawn, and where you were?

A: Yeah I was guarding the doors. The doors on the side, you know, away from the new Gamemaker tower. It’s a boring job. I sit on this little stool and usually I have a book with me. I was reading that evening thinking nothing would really happen, when I got this weird feeling. I felt like maybe there was somethin’ down the hall. So I get up and I go over there, I got my flashlight and everything. There’s nothing there. But when I’m maybe ten or twenty feet away from the door, I hear this click. You know the click of the door opening. And I turn around real fast, and turn the flashlight and everything, and this figure comes through the hall, quick as anything. I can’t see her. Or them. And I run to follow, but you know, when I get out into the next hallway, there’s nobody there. There’s a bunch of doors and stairs there, you know if you’ve been there, so I try a few of ‘em but I guess I just chose the wrong one. But the thing is when I go back to the door, the one to the outside, I see a little bit of blood on the handle.

Q: And you suspect that this was one of the tributes coming through the door?

A: Yeah I bet anything it was that Holland.

DEFENDANT: Objection! Speculation.

JUDGE: Objection sustained.

Q: Can you tell me about the morning of the 23rd?

A: 23rd?

Q: The 23rd of July. The launch of the Games.

A: Right, yeah. So basically I’m out there doing my usual rounds. I got the truck, the guys with me. It’s a busy morning on the launch, there’s always a lot to clean up in the streets. So we got the street cleaner coming through and then my truck.

Q: And your truck is…

A: Garbage truck.

Q: Continue.

A: So we’re doing the usual. Emptying the big dumpsters out in the mansion district in the east. It’s a big day like I said but everyone wants to get it done to watch the launch later. So like I said we’re kinda rushing it. One of the dumpsters doesn’t get quite grabbed onto right, by the arms of the truck, you know? So it dumps the stuff, but not all the way into the truck. Some bags fall into the street. So then it’s my job to go get ‘em and throw ‘em in the back of the truck. I do that, but then I notice one of the bags is leaking. It’s leaking red. It’s blood. So I open it up.

Q: And what was in the bag?

A: It was a head, sir.

Q: Whose head?

A: Francis Lightbelle’s head, sir.

Q: Can you tell us who you are and what you do?

A: I’m a detective with the eastern Peacekeeping precinct of the Capitol. I specialize in murder cases.

Q: Tell us about the scene on the morning of the 23rd at Mr. Lightbelle’s house.

A: Well, it was a pretty shabby job those girls did.

DEFENDANT: Objection. Speculation.

JUDGE: Sustained.

A: Fine, it was a shabby job someone did.

Q: And why do you say that?

A: Because they did clean up the blood, most of it. But not all of it. There were traces of it all over the place. They didn’t put back the saw that she — that they used to cut up the body, or they didn’t put it back in the right place. And there was DNA all over that, and the room, and the limo.

Q: And that DNA was—

A: It was Westbrook, Myron, Sawyer, and Challis.

Q: And the saw?

A: That was all Westbrook. Thing was lit up all over with her fingerprints.

Q: But the cause of death was?

A: Cause of death was blunt force trauma. Wasn’t the saw that killed him. It was the saw that cut him up into pieces.

Q: And the murder weapon?

A: Had to be the statue. Little flecks of blood on that too, and it matched the injuries. Challis’s DNA, mostly, on that thing, which lines up with what the girls said, you know, in the Arena.

[binunus]

sex with bin x eunwoo (m)

a/n THIS WHOLE ALBUM??? IS SO GOOD??? LITERALLY WHAT THE FUCK !!!

also im so so sorry that i keep disappearing, every time I think I have a break in school, my professors keep going like sike here’s a new assignment and group presentation 🤡, but I swear I’m still working on all the requests, it’s just a real slow progression this time 😔

but thank you all so much for being really patient with me and my works, i legit wanna cry when I think about how sweet all you loves are ❤️

→ genre: smut

→ tw: threesome, unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it lovies) dom!binwoo, brat!reader, light bondage?? anal, eiffel tower, oral (f and m receiving), fingering (f and m receiving), ~choking~ bc it’s me, squirting, v-voyeurism??

→ word count: 3.3k _________________________________

oh good fucking lord

I don’t even know where to start

just the thought of getting dicked down by these two immaculate men??? at the same time??? i would sell my soul

and just binwoo are literally my biases?? im still going back and forth between them (even though I think bin is the top)

alright so how does this little thing even start

this is a non-idol au, lowkey this request is giving me frat boy vibes oops i said it

bin and eunwoo are close, they’re best buds

they have fucked the same guy/girl before, but never at the same time

they just have the same taste in people wink wonk

sidenote: bin and eunwoo as bi kings??? so much power fuck

so you are a mutual friend

you met them both in college and have stayed friends since then

but relationships aren’t for you (not yet at least)

the streets™ are still your companion

yes you have fucked both bin and eunwoo before in college, eunwoo once when you were junior, and bin a couple times throughout senior year

you don’t talk to them often, but if something comes up on your feed or a monumental event happens to any one of you, of course you’d spike up some conversation

so you’re coming back in town for a week or so, visiting old friends and family

and bin hits you up like “hey, I saw that you were in town! we should get some dinner and catch up!”

and you were not about to say no to that, bin was a good part of your college years! it would be nice to hang out with him again

alright you weren’t expecting to get action from this dinner – it popped in your mind, yes, but it wasn’t the ulterior motive

but did you try to dress up a little to impress moon bin?? maybe so

and shit, when he showed up to the restaurant looking like a whole ass man?? 

like did his biceps look more appetizing than the food you were being served? a little bit

conversation was exchanged very easily, you and bin were always a bit flirty with each other, ever since college, but you both knew it never meant anything beyond sex

and so when he asked if you were dating anyone, you knew this was the invitation, and were you going to accept it?? 100%, you haven’t had sex in a while because of your job

and so you find yourself back in bin’s apartment

bin: hm? I guess eunwoo’s not home from work yet

you: eunwoo? as in cha eunwoo? you guys still live together?

bin: yeah, we like living together, rent was cheaper that way, and this place is equidistant from both of our work places...is that a problem??

you: no, I mean it makes sense, just...what if eunwoo comes back while we’re in the middle of fucking...wouldn’t that be weird?

bin shrugging: you’ve had sex with eunwoo in college too, and it’s not like he hasn’t seen me naked before either. who knows he might even wanna join?

he said that as a joke alright

but as soon as he mentioned it, your eyes dilated a bit

bin noticed immediately and he caged you against the wall, a little smirk playing on his lips

bin: you seem to like that idea, y/n. hm? you wanna get fucked by both me and eunwoo? didn’t know you were into threesomes

your cheeks are flushing, you felt seen: would you feel weird if he joined? you guys are friends and roommates

bin shaking his head: me and eunwoo have talked about it before, and honestly this seems like the perfect opportunity. we’re all friends here.

you being nervous a little bit bc a threesome?? with both bin and eunwoo?? those two 6 foot attractive men??

you tried a threesome before bc you were curious, but it wasn’t the best hookup experience

you: should we...? wait for him??

your cheeks are flushed a little, like how were you supposed to go about this

bin smiles bc you look a bit cute right now being all shy and he just pinches your cheek

bin: you got cuter since we graduated y/n

you: shut the fuck up bin, don’t make me tie you up again

bin smirks and his hand moves from your cheek to fully grasp at your neck, he squeezes your throat as he pushes you so that your back collided with the wall: baby, if anyone’s getting tied up tonight, it’s gonna be you

and god if you weren’t horny before, you definitely are now, especially with the way bin was cutting off your airflow??? your head was spinning in the best kind of way

bin slotting his thigh in between your legs as he just crashes his lips onto yours

and he’s still choking you when he literally shoves his tongue down your throat, you have to grab onto his broad shoulders just to steady yourself

making out with bin is so hot

he picks you up by your ass and you wrap your legs around his waist, you both are still making out as he leads you to the couch

you’re straddling him oh lord have mercy

you in between kisses: why don’t we go to your room? what, is it messy?

you moan as he spanks your ass at the quip: we’re gonna need to do something about that smart mouth of yours baby...and we’re here to give eunwoo a little show when he comes home. Why, you need a bed? pillow princess? last time I remember, you were fine getting fucked in the maintenance room.

you two go back to kissing, bin’s hands were gripping at your waist now, lifting up the bottom of your shirt so that you could take it off

never in your life have you been so happy to wear a skirt, you could feel the outline of his bulge against your underwear, the fabric of his jeans giving you just enough friction

and when you start grinding on him, he grunts into your mouth and bites on your lower lip

and fuck when bin removes his shirt? he was always built in college but the definition of his muscles now?? you were literally drooling

you: holy shit bin, isn’t your job in business? where do you find the time to workout?

he’s kissing your neck now: you can always find time to workout y/n, just make it part of your daily routine

exercise evangelist moonbin™

you’re tilting your head to the side giving him more access, bin’s sucking hickeys into your neck and it just feels so good

your neck’s a sensitive spot, if you couldn’t tell

and bin knows that so he’s paying extra attention to your neck, you don’t even notice when his hands go around your torso to unclasp your bra

the two of you are literally just topless on his couch, making out and feeling each other up, when lo and behold, eunwoo comes home

his eyes go wide and he immediately covers his face: jesus christ bin, go to your fucking room

bin starts laughing, you know his laugh where his eyes literally crinkle and he smiles so wide and his laugh increases in pitch, that one

you can’t help but laugh too, you thought you would be embarrassed, but this is a bit funny

you: you don’t have to cover your eyes eunwoo, it’s not like you haven’t seen any of this before

eunwoo: oh shit, hey y/n, didn’t know you were coming over?? well...uh if you guys aren’t gonna go to bin’s room, I’m going to mine and just let me know when you’re done

bin: you sure you wanna go to your room? y/n wants you to join us

eunwoo’s blushing a little bit (he’s not covering his face anymore) when you two meet eyes: are you sure y/n?

you get a bit shy again bc shit, eunwoo in a suit coming from work with silver-blue hair? sexy

you: yeah...if you want to, me and bin are cool with it.

bin’s back to kissing your neck as you basically watch eunwoo remove his jacket and tie

and oof him unbuttoning his dress shirt? y’all he’s a tease, they both are

bin: let’s take this back to my room

eunwoo: we can go to mine, it’s cleaner and my bed’s bigger

you: i knew it

bin bites your shoulder and you let out a mix between a yelp of pain and a moan

bin: eunwoo get your ropes, we need to teach y/n a lesson on being bratty

eunwoo chuckling as he leads the way to his bedroom

bin already made himself comfortable on eunwoo’s bed, and you’re standing to the side making conversation as eunwoo looks through his closet for the ropes lol

as soon as eunwoo finds it, there’s a dark change in his eyes and he smirks at you: why don’t you join binnie on the bed, y/n?

your stomach turns in excitement, eunwoo tosses the ropes to bin and he puts a hand on your back as he leads you to his bed, and before you could get on by yourself, eunwoo just tugs your skirt down making you gasp

you lie down and bin grins as he binds your wrists to eunwoo’s headboard, usually you would put up a little fight when you get tied up, but you just stayed silent, you were anticipating what would happen next

bin: you’re being oddly obedient y/n

you’re a brat okay, but in the past when you and bin used to hook up, your brattiness increased by like 100%, like you’re extra bratty with bin for some reason

~it is what it is~

maybe it’s because eunwoo’s here too that your bratty side has suppressed a bit

bin and eunwoo both start removing all their clothes and you’re like shit eunwoo’s built too

bin settles in between your legs and eunwoo leans in and starts kissing you

and mmm eunwoo’s good at making out like he legit be taking your breath away and then you start feeling bin take off your soaked panties and he just goes right in

you literally moan into eunwoo’s mouth and your hands are straining against the ropes bc you just want to hold onto something !!

eunwoo feeling up your breasts and tweaking your nipples while bin is sucking on your clit and probing his tongue in and out your entrance??? euphoric

you’re literally feeling so many sensations right now and it’s just foreplay woo

and then the edging starts

bin??? hella good at eating out, oof what that mouth do

and with the added stimulation from eunwoo kissing your neck and pulling at your nips, you’re reaching your orgasm faster than anticipated

and suddenly they’re both off you

you: what the fuck?

you’re like gasping and glaring at the both of them and they just give you smug looks

bin: I don’t know if you deserve to cum just yet, y/n. right, eunwoo?

eunwoo chuckling as he nods and flicks at your nipple: binnie told me that you like talking back, hmmm that won’t work with both of us here y/n

your submissiveness kicking in and you’re whining: i won’t talk back, I promise

bin: I don’t know if I believe you y/n

and then they switch places and now bin’s making out with you again and eunwoo’s face to face with your cunt and he just shoves two fingers in your entrance and starts scissoring you

and right as you’re about to cum, they pull away again

this goes on at least two more times, you’re literally so frustrated tears are pooling in your eyes and you’re whining hard as hell, your wrists already aching from the ropes 

eunwoo: do you want us to untie you, y/n?

you nodding as you’re sniffling back the tears

aww they feel bad so eunwoo unties the ropes and he’s like gently rubbing at your wrists

bin wiping your tears away as he pinches at your cheek again

bin: you okay, y/n?

you: I’m so close, please

bin: alright baby, who do you want first, hm?

you honestly didn’t know, you had no preference, you just wanted to get railed

eunwoo: why not both?

your eyes go wide a little bit, your ass isn’t even prepped

bin sensing your hesitation and he just puts a hand on your waist: if you don’t want to--

you: no, i want to...I’m just...my ass isn’t ready...

eunwoo laughing cutely as he pats your thigh: we’ll prep you baby, don’t worry

you start by going on all fours, bin enters you first from behind and the groan he lets out bc you’re just so tight wow 

he literally has to restrain himself from just ramming into you, your walls just fit so snugly around him, his nails were digging into the skin of your waist

you open your mouth in a moan at the stretch and in that moment, eunwoo shoves his cock down your throat you literally gag

for reference, they’re both above average, no surprise there, I’d say both around 8 in., but bin’s girthier for sure

and so bin’s fucking your cunt while eunwoo’s fucking your mouth

simultaneously, eunwoo tugs at your hair and bin sneaks a finger down to gather some juices from your pussy before probing at your asshole

bin’s prepping you real well mmmmm

he’s literally fingering your ass while he’s pounding into you, the tip of his cock hitting so deep in your cervix

on the other hand you’re so focused on sucking eunwoo off, you take him as deep in your throat as you could, letting your jaw slack as he just thrusted in your mouth

and also the vibrations of your moans around his cock every time bin hits deep in you???

eunwoo swears he almost busts a nut when your hands reach up to play with his balls

he’s panting as he pulls your mouth off his cock: I need to be inside you before I cum

and then he’s lying down on his back and you start to ride eunwoo, and then bin lines his cock up at your other hole and you start to tense

eunwoo bringing you into a kiss to try and distract you from the pain your asshole’s about to feel

and you start hissing as bin starts to push in, you’re clenching so hard around eunwoo and tugging tightly at the ends of his hair

eunwoo starts making circles on your clit so that you could relax a bit to make it easier for bin to enter your back hole

and then the three of you just stay still for a bit when bin finally bottoms out, you’re still trying to get used to feeling stuffed full, you haven’t been fucked in so long and now you’re getting railed by two cocks??

the two of them are both saying sweet things to calm you down and distract you from the pain

and it’s cute, you know from your respective past hookup experiences with them that they’re really good at sensing discomfort or pain and would always tend to your needs

oof baby but as soon as you give the okay for both of them to move

it’s like you’re taken to another dimension holy shit

they both hit so deep, you swear to god their cocks have to be touching or something, or maybe at least reaching your intestines

when people say rearrange your guts, it definitely must have been this

you’re trying to set a pace on top of eunwoo, but bin thrusting from behind literally makes your knees go weak until eunwoo just lifts his hips and takes over, matching bin’s speed

and imagine this: bin pulling your hair, making your head tilt back and eunwoo just reaches up and covers your neck with his hand before he squeezes at your throat

your eyes are literally rolling into the back of your head, you have never felt this good ever in your life

your head’s spinning again, and you know all three of you are reaching the tipping point pretty soon, your stomach is churning, making you clench hard around both eunwoo and bin

eunwoo biting his lip as he groans, his grip tightening just a bit more around your neck

bin’s still yanking your hair back and he starts spanking your ass, he’s moaning as well

you literally scream, throat feeling raw, as you cum, you have never orgasmed so hard before, your body was convulsing around both of them and you just collapse on top of eunwoo

you’re vision literally sees white and your ears are ringing as they both cum in you

you black out for a little bit

eunwoo and bin: o_o holy fuck

the two of them start panicking like...did they just fuck you dead?? put you in a coma??

okay but just imagine eunwoo and bin bickering with each other about what to do like

bin: do we call 119???

eunwoo: what do we say? we fucked our friend into a coma?

it’s okay because you regain consciousness soon enough and both boys let out the biggest sigh of relief

you: ...what happened?

eunwoo: you passed out for a bit there y/n

you start giggling, much to their surprise, and you try to sit up

bin: ...are you okay y/n?

you: yeah, I can’t believe I blacked out because you guys fucked me so well, that’s pretty hot not gonna lie

eunwoo goes into the kitchen real quick to get you some water and bin sits down next to you

you thank eunwoo when he hands you the glass and he sits across from you and bin

the two roommates exchange a look and just high-five each other

you roll your eyes as they just laugh at each other...ugh boys

bin teasing you: I’ve never seen you so submissive y/n

eunwoo joining in: yeah, didn’t know you could squirt as well

you almost spit out the water: i-huh? no way

eunwoo: yeah, my stomach was soaked, I wiped it off when you were out

your face flushes, you’ve never squirted before

bin: don’t be embarrassed! it was hot, y/n, really

the three of you then just jump into a casual conversation about college, keep in mind you’re all still naked

and then you feel the cum just like in both your holes and it’s just uncomfortably sticky

you: uh...do you guys mind if I shower? my pussy feels gross right now

bin, with a glint in his eyes: I can clean that up for you, baby

before you know it, bin’s eating you out again -- to be more specific, he’s literally licking the mixture of yours and eunwoo’s cum from your cunt

that’s sexy...

you make eye contact with eunwoo and he’s just smirking as he sits back and watches you two, no intention on joining yet

alright but you had no idea if you could take another round right now, the first one literally made you pass out

so after bin makes you cum again, you tap out for the night

the three of you shower -- separately -- and then regroup in the living room to just chat and chill

the two insist you sleep over for the night since it’s past midnight by now

were there also hints of a round two in the morning?? maybe

you sleep in one of eunwoo’s shirts, but end up sleeping next to bin bc he’s whiny and likes cuddling

you three fuck again in the morning oops until eunwoo had to leave for work

then you and bin fuck again afterwards

happy threesome

happy comeback :)

4-5-21

[inkmemes]

this  country  (  2017  -  2020  )  sentence  starters ↪  taken  from  the  bbc  mockumentary.  trigger  warning  for  mentions  of  religion,  death,  sex.  alter  as  you  see  fit  ♡

“i like the underdog.”

“don't be a fucking dick.”

“everyone comes together on days like today and just forgets their utter hatred of each other.”

“everyone who's anyone's going to be there and there are people from my past that would love to see me slain.”

“there's a tea rooms there and under the counter they've got a panic button and if i take one step inside, they can press that. the police will be there in three minutes.”

"he whatsapped me the other day asking us to go laser quest with him and i ... well, i clicked on it by accident, didn't i? so he knows i've seen it."

"i mean, i get it, but it's not making me feel nothing."

“it's baffling. i'm baffled by the entire situation, if i'm honest.”

“what the actual fuck? what the actual fuck? you have fucking lost your head, mate. you have lost your fucking head.”

“when i get hold of you, i swear to god i will fucking deck you.”

"someone's just been throwing plums at my house. i'm going to kill them. i can't believe it. i can't believe it. all over this. plumming on here, plumming on that. plum on the sofa, look! there's nothing left that hasn't been plummed."

“i've had a target on my back since the day i was born.”

“thank you very much, enjoy your free potatoes.”

“do you know how small your brain is?”

“hogwarts is that way, dumbledore.”

“he used to say i looked like the puppet off the dolmio advert.”

“there's a kid crying over there. do you want me to...? i can tell him to shut the fuck up if you want?”

“he genuinely looked like a moomin.”

“on my first day of karate club, karate master goes to me, [name], i don't know why you're here because i can't teach you anything. if anything, you should be teaching me." and just gave me his black belt.”

“you know that little old blind man? yeah, when i was punching him in his face, the lens from his glasses broke and cut my knuckle.”

“some things are just best left in the past, where they belong.”

“what's the point in knocking if you're just going to walk in anyway?”

“it was a miscarriage of justice though, cos what people forget is 12 out of them 20 hostages actually found it funny.”

“i lied so much i still don't know what's real life and what's plain lies.”

“i'm so glad you're out of that lying phase.”

“he likes to be the only person on the road, so whenever he sees a car coming the other way he just pulls over.”

“nasa went through hundreds of them in the '60s. and now every time i see a really bright star in the sky i can't wish on it, cos in my head i'm thinking, ‘that's probably just a spacecraft with some monkey bones in it.’”

“you absolute traitor. that's my cheese - it's my fucking house!”

“don't you dare eat that cheese. you eat that and i will smash this. i promise you, i will smash you with this.”

“fuck! you switched them!”

“yeah, i can see it's fucking burnt, sherlock.”

“i honestly am ashamed to know him, sometimes.”

“if you knock on someone's door, don't take no for an answer. get into their house. if they say, ‘leave my house’, stay. and if they say, ‘i'm going to call the police’, you walk upstairs and see if there's anybody else upstairs to sell to.”

“she looks like uncle fester.”

“right. i'm going to piss in their flowers, then.”

“you really need to go home. your mum's called the police and everything.”

“you're also fired from being my best mate, by the way.”

“in business, there will always be setbacks. i don't drink my own juice, fray bentos doesn't eat his own pies. but that's business.”

“do you know what, i don't actually want to play this any more, because it is actually very, very boring.”

“i'm ashamed of myself, that's not usually me, so don't get the wrong impression.”

“i genuinely think one of them fancies me as well.”

“it's fate her moving across the street.”

“the problem with finding a girlfriend in the village is that most of the girls you meet round here are old-age pensioners.”

“yeah, i am looking for a relationship, but thing is i've just got so many trust issues, yeah, with being fucked over massive in the past, so no matter how much i get close to someone now i'm thinking in the back of my head, ‘shit, am i going to get fucked over?’ because i've been fucked over in the past massively. my last relationship proper fucked me up.”

“i went through a really dark phase. listening to papa roach and just blowing everything up with them little french bangers.”

“shut up, you don't know what you're talking about!”

“i don't like the man. i know he's my uncle, but i don't like him.”

“it's just malicious lies, that's all it is.”

“i'm not saying i've got a cruel heart, but if she ain't willing to take me as i am rather than the monster i've become, then she can literally just jog on back to sea with all the other fish cos i don't care.”

“what do you look for in a boyfriend?”

“the key to dating, yeah, is the two rs and the three ts. 'respect, rapport, and talking, talking, talking.' don't ever let that ball hit the ground. good relationships are built on great conversation.”

“on a date, you've got to tell them all the interesting stuff about you, because that's what they'll be interested in.”

“he said to me, he goes, ‘you can't smoke on here.’ i said, ‘i'm not smoking, i'm vaping.’ the look on his face when i said that. i don't think he knew what vaping… what a vape is.”

“you would make me the happiest mouse if you say yes and become my spouse.”

“here's a tip, [name], next time you take a chick out on a date, don't bore her to tears.”

“roses are red, violets are blue, i've got five fingers, the third one's for you.”

“get out of my way, pipe cleaner.”

“[name] phoned me the other day at three in the morning saying, ‘come quick,

there's a hedgehog in the garden that looks exactly like grandad.’ so i got up, i got dressed and i ran over to [name]'s as fast as i could and then i just stopped in the middle of the street at three in the morning and thought, ‘what the fuck am i doing with my life?’

“you're joking me? because if you are joking me, that is massively harsh.”

“oh, let me get a song up on youtube. you're going to absolutely love this, [name]. here we go… listen to this. oh, for fuck's sake, advert.”

“let's go down the pub and get shitfaced.”

“where do i see myself in five years? well, me and [name] will have a flat in the middle of the village and all of our furniture will be inflatable and we'll have cable and it will pay for itself, because we're going to use the spare room to breed quails, because their eggs are worth fucking shitloads.”

“is this about the calippo, still? because you offered to buy me that.”

“if he wants to go, good luck to him, i say. i reckon he thinks that i can't live without him, which is a laugh, because he went a whole weekend away once and i got on all right. i just ended up following this cat around the village.”

“i've got to do what's right for me, at the end of the day, instead of worrying about other people.”

“how about you say sorry? sorry for the massive knife that's hanging out the back of my back because of you.”

“oh, and while you're stabbing me in the back, feel free to bend down and kiss my arse.”

“can i just ask you an honest question? why would you want to leave the village when we've got a pub and a shop?”

“i think you don't know how lucky we have it to be doing nothing with our lives, like. we're all going to die, anyway, so what's the point in doing anything?”

“i want ownership of the words fucknut and dickmilk.”

“i had this come through the post. and i've got a few concerns about it. firstly, this guy on the front looks really arrogant. not the sort of guy i was expecting, if i'm honest.”

“this is starting to stress me out a little bit.”

“why are you trying to stress me out? you know i'm already stressed out as it is.”

“the bloke that used to live in there, right, kept hearing strange noises coming out of his attic at night. and he'd go to the fridge and find that food was missing from the fridge. so he thought, ‘i'm just going to go up to the attic and check this out.’ and he found an entire family of peruvian panpipe buskers just living up there. and he thought ‘i'm just going to leave them to it, ‘cos they're not really doing me any harm.’ and then, a few years later, he thought, "well, i'll just go up to the attic to check on them. ‘see if they're all right.’ and it turned out they'd all died of asbestos poisoning. yeah, he doesn't live here any more.”

“some people will always be scared of me, and i can't change that, no matter how nice i am. but there's a balance to be had between being nice and being feared.”

“don't really like catching up. it's not my thing.”

“i just watched this video of this girl doing a random act of kindness on youtube. she basically paid for this old man's shopping at the till. and this old man was, like, about 90 years old. and he's so fucking old, like, you could see through his skin. and he just starts bawling his eyes out. he's like, ‘you're fucking joking me, this ain't fucking real life.’ i just thought... i want to make someone feel like that. ‘cos that's... i really… that's what i want to do.”

“i'm not dead. just can't be arsed to text her sometimes.”

“you know, correct me if i'm wrong, but four texts a day is complete madness. no-one can keep up with that.”

“i am doing kind things selfishly.”

“i was at midnight mass one year, right, someone got tipped off i was there. as i was coming out the church, someone tries to shoot me with a crossbow.”

“well, i haven't seen the film, have i? that's why i came here - to watch the fucking film - like a normal human being.”

“i've made an effort by coming here tonight. i didn't want to come.”

“i had to wheel him here from his house in an asda trolley, cos he was just too heartbroken to move.”

“sometimes you don't know what you got until you ain't got it any more. like blockbuster's. i just took 'em for granted - and then, one day, gone, and you spend ages trying to figure out what went wrong, and then you realise it was your fault all along.”

“i thought you said you wanted to fix things.”

“she wanted it to go that way, and it just wasn't gonna go that way. she even got me thinking that they'd get back together… ..but that's manipula.... manipulative people... do that. and he's better off without her.”

“that wasn't much to write home about.”

“it's fucking dead, isn't it?”

“basically, somebody's been sending me threatening letters, and i don't know who's doing it - and i am concerned, because my peripheral vision is poor, so, if somebody attacks me from the sides or snipes at me from an upstairs window, i am fucked - but my hearing is excellent, see? so i just need to spend a few days inside honing my sonar, and i'll be fine then.”

“if you don't like the work, the circus is in town and they're always looking for clowns.”

“his soul is just going to crumble to dust.”

“this really is not a good situation for me. a physical threat is something that i can deal with, but a sexual thing is not my area of expertise.”

“just really fucked in the head, mate.”

“what have i done? i haven't done anything wrong.”

“do you know how sad that is? that is so, actually, sad. that makes me sad for you, that you can't take a joke.”

“i think i just got a bit carried away with the whole thing.”

“your finger's going up my arsehole, mate.”

“i'll hold the back of your head, so you don't bash yourself.”

“when i lie in future, i don't want a massive lecture on how bad lying is, cos deep down, you're the worst of us all, mate.”

“i'd quite like a coke.”

“it's going to be like gluing a breadstick back together, because… like, as if a breadstick's been in a blender and it's all… ...the pieces smashed up.”

“like, this one time i started a fight club in the village hall, and i got a black eye from beating myself up. but it made my enemies think, ‘fuck, if she can do that to herself, what the fuck can she do to me?’”

“i'm absolutely 1,000% sure i've broken it in two places.”

“i knew this day would come.”

“i should be in tk maxx, getting the bargains that i deserve.”

“unlike you, [name], i'm not a fashion disaster.”

“i'm still warm in my grave, and she's sucking off the pallbearer.”

“you know, it took me ten years to get over [name], and i only went out with her for half a day.”

“i swear to god, if i see him here again, i swear to god, i will have no hesitation in just going up to him and just planting one on his face.”

“right, then keep your nose out of my business, yeah? nosy old cock-womble.”

“[name]’s attitude to me is puzzling. if i walk past her in the street

and say hi, she'll tell me to fuck off. yet every year, she sends me a really sweet, nice christmas card. you know, there's just no consistency there.”

“he's good-looking up close, isn't he?”

“don't show me any weakness, because i will take advantage.”

“no, put the brick down, you fucking psychopath.”

“when i asked him, he just said, ‘come to my office now,’ which means we're in the fucking shit, cos we're always in fucking shit.”

“i shouldn't be paying you at all.”

“i've always had a son. i talk about him all the time.”

“he's my son. he's not my dog.”

“it reminds me of the wicker man. i don't really know why.”

“i just find it weird how you can be so close to someone and they can be such a big part of your life, and then the next minute, you're just sort of strangers in the night.”

“i don't want the emotional implications.”

“well, about five years ago, i sold my birthday to my mum for about 200 quid, which means my mum's legally entitled now to never celebrate my birthday ever again for the rest of my life. not even, like, a happy birthday cup of tea, or a moonpig card, nothing - which is the worst decision i ever made in my entire life.”

“he deserves that anyway, because he's been sexting my nan, so…”

“what's this surprise? cos i need to know whether it's going to be worth this walk.”

“i always see them banners above the motorway, and i always thought, ‘who the fuck does them?’ well, now i know. people like me.”

“did you know you can't get stung by a stinging nettle if you grab the leaf top and bottom, like that? it's only when you touch it on the sides, it stings. agh, actually, that stung, then.”

“pez dispenser, they're cursed. they are, i'm not even joking. honestly, when i had one of them, i had the worst bout of bad luck i ever had in my life.”

“i swear down, it's a short cut. it might be a pleasant walk, we might enjoy it.”

“i'm not scared of the fox twins. i'd just like to sit them down and ask 'em plainly, ‘look, guys, what is going on? ‘cos this has just gotten completely out of hand now. you know, stop walking on your knuckles, stand up straight, be the best version of you that you can be. get a job, even. there's a trolley boy who works at tesco's, you know, who may as well have been raised by wolves. if he can get a job, you guys can walk it.’”

“yes, there has been talk of strange goings-on in the woods, ghost sightings and the like. but… ...they're never from particularly reliable sources.”

“i live with a ghost. there's a ghost in that house. he's like a civil war cavalier, with all the hair and the hat and all that. and every time i walk into the living room, he doffs his cap. and on his shoulder, he's got this crow that barks at me. it means i spend less time in the house, really. not because of him, because he's-he's quite peaceable. but the crow is malevolent. and i'm not having that. i can't share my house with a malevolent bird.”

“that's haunted as fuck.”

“am i going mad here, or does that, to you, look like that's where just ghost will hang out all the time?”

“look at him, little red riding twat.”

“if he's got an attitude with me, i swear to god, i'll just grab the steering wheel and drive us all into a wall.”

“it's a bit annoying, actually. cos this is not the first or the second time i've had to tell you, really, is it?”

“his sparkle has just gone.”

“you know my dad actually wrote the song wonderwall on the back of a beer mat in the space of ten minutes, don't you?”

“i've just got a tiny, tiny, tiny little favour to ask you.”

“when i think of [name], i think of someone who is very loyal. and very, very stupid. sort of more stupid than loyal. sort of 70% stupid, 30% loyal, probably. because she's very loyal. but extremely stupid.”

“do you know what? i actually don't think he loves you at all and i don't think he's ever loved you.”

“all right, that's harsh and unnecessary, but fine.”

“frankly, she is behaving like the antichrist.”

“i literally just got here.”

“you are such an unemotional slab of ham, [name].”

“i've got so much shit on that man you would not believe.”

“there's something in my eye.”

“i just can't quit him, you know?”

“yeah, we might have a fiery relationship,  but when we're together, it's just… it's just pure chemistry, isn't it?”

“i'm not proud of it, believe me. but at the end of the day, i'm a very vindictive person, you know? it is what makes me me.”

“i basically went out and bought an alpaca off gumtree for £500. of all the mistakes i've made in my life, that was possibly the largest. definitely the physically largest.”

“yeah, i really don't wanna talk about that.”

“her only loyalty is to herself, staffies, and the tv channel dave… ...which, in my opinion, is a tv channel made by knuckle-draggers for knuckle-draggers.”

“i can't move on till i've seeked revenge, unfortunately.”

“if that was in france, that would be fine, but we're not in france.”

“the only thing we had in common, really, was stealing, and that was more my thing that i got him onto. but it just goes to show, you know, some friendships last and some friendships don't, but that's just the way it is.”

“you know it was me that got you sacked, don't you?”

“the thing i learnt about friendship is, you gotta accept each other's flaws, no matter how toxic they may be.”

“shit-stirring from beyond the grave.”

[xx-narcissa]

Can’t Wait Any Longer

warnings: kidnapping, poisoning, noncon

a/n: i wasn’t comfortable with full on smut right now, i’m still easing into it. but i hope that this was written to your liking!

pairing: Natasha Romanoff x Female!Avenger!Reader

request: “We can have dark! r x nat where r is an avenger and is in love with nat but nat never pays attention to her, so r decides to kidnap her maybe with some smut only if you feel comfortable.”

Masterlist

(not my gif)

Your blood boiled as you watched the scene in front of you. Bruce kissing her hand in front of everybody with no shame. He should be ashamed. That was your hand to kiss and he was just all on it! And she let him. Giggling and blushing like a middle school girl getting a love note from her crush.

“Aw. Young love.” Tony chuckled and took a big sip of his beer. You wanted to smack the glass bottle out of his hands for that comment. “Better enjoy it while it lasts, Bruce.”

Yeah. He better enjoy it. Because you’re going to make it your mission to take her back. Although you never really had her in the first place. But she’s yours. Bruce doesn’t deserve her. Nobody deserves her. Because they could never give her what you can. They could never love her like you do. She just doesn’t see that. Always brushing you off to the side.

It was a mission in Canada, so naturally it was pretty cold. And seeing as it was the middle of January, it was very cold. You offered her your jacket. “No, you keep it. I’m fine.” Even when you insisted, she turned you down. Yet later you see her casually sporting Steve’s jacket. What’s up with that? You wanted to confront her. What did his jacket have that yours didn’t? But Wanda assured you it wasn’t a big deal. And that’s not even the only time she’s done something like that. You and her were in the kitchen after a mission, and she complained about her shoulders being sore. So you offered to massage them, claiming you know a really good way to relieve tension. You didn’t. But it was just an excuse to be able to feel her. She turned you down. Then later she’s bragging to Wanda about how good Tony is at massages. What was so special about him? Nothing! But it seemed like Natasha would stop at nothing to push you away.

You don’t even know what you did to deserve that kind of treatment. Sure, you flirt with her a lot. But it’s never to a creepy extent. Just casual compliments and offering to do her favors. If she wasn’t into you, she could just turn you down using her words and then maybe you’d back off. But instead she was playing hard to get.

And that only made you want her more.

-=-

There was a mission today. A two person mission. You and Natasha. This would be a perfect chance for the two of you to get closer. It’s a week long stakeout. Usually you don’t like stakeouts, since you feel it’s a waste of your powers. You can literally summon fire with your hands and not get burnt and they want you to watch a building? How boring. But since it’s with Natasha, you won’t complain. Alone time with her is a reward in its own. And it gives you a chance to finally execute the plan you’ve been working on for weeks.

“Guess this is where we’re staying for the next week.” You sighed as the two of you entered the little apartment. The wallpaper was moldy and peeling, there were roaches crawling around, and it smelled like 50 diseased rats died in there.

She gagged and put her bag on top of the counter. “Well let’s just try to get this done quickly, so that we don’t have to spend any extra time here. It’s disgusting.”

Nodding in agreement, you continued to explore the apartment. There was only one bedroom with only one bed, so you made a mental note to let her sleep there, since it looked cleaner than the couch. The shower was just as disgusting as the main room, but you brought shower shoes so you could live with it. After your quick tour, you met back up with Natasha in the main room, where she was going through her bag.

“I’ll take the couch. You can have the bed.” You offered and sat down on the counter.

“Are you sure? That’s nice but I don’t want to take it all for myself. We could alternate if you want.”

“No, it’s fine. And trust me, the bed is way cleaner so if I were you I’d just take it.” You snapped. She flinched, and you knew you took it a bit too far. It’s just annoying when she constantly declines your offers when you’re just trying to be nice and make her comfortable. “Sorry. Just…yeah. You take the bed, I’ll go check the perimeter and see if there’s anything to eat nearby.”

After your perimeter check you picked up some sandwiches at the small subway they had down the street and brought them back up to the apartment. “Thanks, I’m starving.” She sighed happily when you walked in with food. To be honest, being back in that nasty apartment killed your appetite a bit, but you hadn’t eaten all day so you sucked it up and ate.

The two of you ate and got to talk a bit, getting to know each other some more. Well, she got to know you. But you already knew plenty about her. You’re just a good listener like that. The most important thing was that she was starting to trust you more, which would be a key part in putting your plan into motion.

Once you guys finished your mission and got all the information you needed, you still had a day to spare. So you decided you’d stay and just not tell them you were done yet, so you can get a little vacation, even if it is in a dingy, dirty apartment. It was your last morning there, so you wanted to surprise Natasha with some homemade breakfast. Special recipe.

“Good morning! You want pancakes?” She thought for a second before nodding. Great, she took the offer with none of her usual resistance. You placed some pancakes on a plate and gave her a glass of orange juice. “Tell me if you like it.” You smiled and sat down next to her to watch her eat. She ate the first bite cautiously, then ate the rest rather quickly.

After drinking all the juice, she slammed the cup onto the table. “Those were the best pancakes I’ve ever had.”

“Well, you know, I could always make you more.” You smiled and ran your fingers up her arm. And she smiled back. That’s a win in your eyes.

“I think I’ll have to take you up on that offer. But I’m pretty full right now. So, if you don’t mind, I’m going to go take a quick nap.”

You waved her off and then put the dishes in the sink. Everything was falling into place and you couldn’t be happier.

-=-

When her eyes opened, she didn’t know what was going on or where she was. It seemed like some abandoned factory by the looks of it. Her clothes didn’t belong to her. And she couldn’t even get up to look around, seeing as she was tied up on the floor.

In the shadows, she saw something moving. Maybe it would be her captor. And she could kick their ass and escape.

“Oh, you’re up! Great.” Her heart and her mouth dropped at the voice. “Sorry about the location. Couldn’t find anywhere comfortable on such short notice.”

She looked up at you with tears forming in her eyes. “What’s going on, why are you doing this? Are you being brainwashed or something?”

You laughed at her stupid questions. “What ever do you mean? This is all me, Natasha. I’m sorry to have to do this, but you brought it onto yourself. You could’ve had this.” You motioned towards yourself and got closer to her. “But no. You wanted to toy with me. Play hard to get. Pretend you don’t want me and then flirt with everyone else right in front of my face. Well I’m done playing those games. So no more playful flirting. I’m taking what’s mine.”

“You’re sick. I swear, I’m not to get out of here and then I’m going to kill you! Slowly and painfully.” She screamed and squirmed around in her restraints.

All her struggling was amusing to you. It gave you a good laugh. “I know you’re a trained assassin, but it’s not like you have superpowers. Without a gun you really pose no threat to me. Hell, if I’m not careful I could kill you right now.” Your hands ignited, displaying your pyrokinesis, just in case she had forgotten that you could burn her to a crisp whenever you would like.

It worked, because she shut up. She looked down at the ground in silence, tears rolling down her cheeks. “Oh, cheer up. Once your spirit is broken down enough and I know you won’t try anything funny, I’ll untie you and we can leave and live a happy life together. I might hurt you, but it’s just because I love you. I love you so much and it hurts me when you flirt with other people. So once you’re as loyal as I am, then we’ll get out of this smelly place. Okay?”

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t do anything. That angered you. So you slapped her in her face. The force being enough to topple her over. And that wasn’t even the hardest you could’ve hit her. “Answer me, bitch!” You yelled and got close to her face, probably getting some spit on her but you didn’t care. “Do you understand me?”

She nodded frantically and tried to move away from you. So you let her squirm for a second before pulling her back. Seeing the Black Widow shaking in fear really turned you on. You needed to see her. To feel her.

“You know, you should thank me. I changed your clothes and I didn’t even touch you down there. I restrained myself.” You grabbed her hips and dug your nails into them, pulling her closer. “Mainly because I want to hear you when I fuck you. I want to see what your pretty little face looks like when you’re all filled up. But also because I’m decent. So, yeah, you’re welcome.”

You closed the gap between you two and your lips collided with hers. For you it was heaven. It was erotic and steamy and everything you’ve ever wished for. But for her it was a completely different story. It was hell. Sloppy, painful, and lacking any true feelings. Even if she wasn’t kissing you back, you still enjoyed yourself. Your hands went underneath the shirt you gave her, cupping her braless breasts. She involuntarily leaned into your touch, moaning softly, allowing you to slide your tongue into her. Your hand slid down, cupping her heat through her panties, feeling the wetness of her arousal. “See? You’re enjoying yourself,” You pulled away from the kiss to say. You kissed down her neck, biting and leaving marks. She hated how her body betrayed her and got turned on. But there wasn’t anything she could do about it. You were in control.

And she hated the feeling of emptiness she felt when you stopped and stood back up, leaving her still on the ground. “Yeah. We’re gonna have so much fun. Not yet, but soon. Until then, I’ll be back. I’m going to go get some food. You stay here.” You laughed at your own sentence, “Get it? It’s funny ‘cause you can’t go anywhere!” You continued to laugh until you had left the warehouse, leaving her alone and confused.

You were gone for probably two hours. But to Natasha it felt like days. The whole time she was looking for a way out, yet there was nothing. You were thorough with this place, making sure there wasn’t anything sharp she could reach to cut the rope, or anything she could climb on to get out through one of the windows.

When you came back, Natasha was curled into a ball silently crying. “Cheer up. I got you some food from this nice ramen place. Maybe I can take you there one day.” You put the food down on the floor in front of her and even gave her some water.

“You know, they’re going to wonder why I never came back. And then they’re going to find me and kill you! Pervert!” She spat. Instead of arguing back like she wanted you to, you laughed and walked away, leaving her alone to eat. The rest of the day she sat there thinking about how alone and scared she was. She didn’t know if she’d ever see her family again.

You won. This time.

[insomniamamma]

“Surf City Goodness”: Ezra x F!reader w/Cee

A/n: This is the same AU as “Ferris Wheels Are for Old People” and “Liminal” but you don’t have to read those to read this one. Ezra loses his arm in an automobile accident which kills his brother, Damon and orphans his niece, Cee. Reader lives across the street from Ezra and they’ve been friendly for sometime but now it’s something more. Set after  “Ferris Wheels Are For Old People” This is for @autumnleaves1991-blog​ and @clydesducktape​ ‘s Writer Wednesday.

Warnings: Language. Mentions of sex. Mentions of drug abuse.  Mentions of traumatic injury/surgical scars. Mentions of Reader’s ex.  Cee needs her own warning, but mostly this is just fluff. Ez and Cee and Reader enjoy a trip to the beach. I will include some songs from Cee’s playlist at the end.

          Iggy Pop's voice warbles out of the speakers. "I wanna go to the beach, I don't care if it's decadent, I don't know where my spirit went, but that's alright..."          "This seems a bit bleak, Birdie," says Ezra.          "Quit your griping, you'll get your surf city goodness soon enough," says Cee and grins. Part of the deal they've worked out is that Cee gets to pick the music for any road trip longer than two hours, otherwise it's NPR until the signal fades and then whatever classic rock they can pick up. The three of you are crammed in the cab of Ezra's battered Ford Ranger. Cee is the smallest so she sits in the middle. The truck's bed is full of gear, air mattresses and sleeping bags and towels, a cooler filled with food and another filled with beer. I don't know what conditions we'll find exactly, Ez told you, We haven't been back here in some time.          "If there's spiders I'm sleeping in the truck," you said and Ezra smiled, and pressed his remaining hand over his heart.          "Never fear, Sunshine, I will protect your from our arachnid friends."

         "Hey Sunshine!" Ezra calls from his front porch. You look up from your laptop to see Ezra and Cee laden with grocery bags.          "Hey, Ez, you need a hand?" He smirks. This is an old joke between the two of you. When Ezra first came home, with Cee and without his arm, they were unloading Cee and Damon's things, bags and boxes and you, without thought had asked if he needed a hand, it just came out and you'd clapped your hands to your mouth, and then spluttered, I'm so sorry I didn't mean--and Ezra laughed, of course I need a hand. I'm down to just the one.          "Always," he says. You loop the plastic bags over your arms, sweating packages laden with ground beef and bratwursts and chicken thighs.          "You all having a party?"          "We're going to the beach," says Cee. "You should come with us. It'll be fun."            "Jesus, Cee," he mutters and then collects himself and smiles, "I had meant to ask you before this one jumped the gun-"          "It's fine. Really."          "You still working remotely?" asks Ezra.          "For now. There's some talk about keeping my department remote."          "Good thing or bad thing?"          "Good thing," you say, "I like working in my pajamas."          "Good thing because you could come with us," says Ezra.          "Ez--"          "I'm dead serious," he says, "Cee's got a four day weekend. We've got decent internet. Damon saw to that before...well, before. Mind you, this will probably be something of a working vacation. Ma's house has stood empty sometime. Damon used to keep it up but..." Ezra trails off. It's a small town. Damon's drug problems were more or less public knowledge. You think of the files you still need to edit, but for once you're ahead of the game. None of that is due until midway through next week. You've got some wiggle room if things go south.          "Yeah? Yeah, fuck it. I'm coming with." Ezra smiles wide, revealing his dimples. And that's how you end up in the cab of Ezra's beat-to-shit truck listening to Cee's fun and somewhat baffling playlist.

         "Talk to me, baby,I'm goin' blind from this sweet, sweet craving, whoa-oh, Let's lose our minds and go fucking crazy, I-I-I-I-I keep on hopin' we'll eat cake by the ocean..."          "Is this a parody?" Asks Ezra, "Like a Weird Al Yankovic thing?"          "No," says Cee, "It's an actual song. One of the Jonas brothers did it."          "Someone greenlit and recorded this on purpose."          "Yep."          "A song. About eating cake on a beach." Cee gives you a sly look.          "It's a metaphor, Ez," she says, "They're eating something but it's not cake." You have to hold in a laugh, watching the gears in Ezra's brain grind, watching his eyes go big.          "Ohmygod! Cee!" Cee cackles and you snort laughter. "You are fifteen years old! You are a minor child! You should not be going there! You should not even know that there exists!" Ezra's cheeks go red. Cee is wheezing, eyes screwed shut with laughter, her own cheeks flaming, "You. Should see. Your face," she says.          "It's not funny!"          "Oh, it's funny," you say, "She got you good."          "Come on, Ez," says Cee, "You think I can't recognize a poorly veiled sexual reference when I hear one? It doesn't take a genius--"          "You are a terror," says Ezra, and Cee grins, proud of the title, "And you--" he arcs and eyebrow in your direction--"Are not helping matters." You give him your brightest smile.          "What can I say? I thought it was just a song about some goofballs eating cake by the ocean." He huffs, but you can see the smirk creeping up his cheek as he drives.

         The house at the end of the driveway is small, a cottage really, single storied and built up on stilts like the others around it, painted a faded robin's egg blue with white trim. The garage is underneath the house, room enough for one car and next to it is a room built to shelter the water heater and plumbing. A wooden staircase snakes up to a deck that wraps the entire structure. Sea grass sprouts in clumps from the sand. It's hot inside, a stale heat, and the first thing you do is open all the windows.          "I think there's a couple box fans in the storage space," says Ezra, "I'll go fetch them."          The back deck overlooks the ocean, pale expanse of sand and the gentle lap of blue-green sea, a wooden staircase reaches down to the sand below. The day is bright and hot and shot through with high cirrus clouds. You and Ezra have stripped the sheets from the beds and popped them in the washer, loaded the dishwasher, put fans in the windows.          "This is cleaner than I expected," says Ezra, "Maybe Damon cared more than I gave him credit for." Ezra's face clouds. You take his hand, squeeze his fingers in yours. You know little about Damon other than the town gossip and what Ezra himself has told you. You don't understand the convolutions of their relationship, you just know that Damon is a slow-healing wound, and that it does Ezra no good to pick at it. You tug at him.          "C'mon. Let's get changed. Cee's already got her suit on."

         "Turn around, Birdie, let me get your back." Cee rolls her eyes but does as she's asked. Ezra sprays sunscreen across her bony shoulders and rubs it in.          "I found a boogie board under the deck," says Cee, "And some toys from when I was real small. I found those floaty things you all used to put on my arms, remember those?"          "I do," says Ezra, "Damon chucked you into the surf without so much as a by-your-leave. It scared the hell out of Ma but you laughed like it was the funniest thing in the world. You're good to go, Little Bird."          "Thanks, Ez." And she's down the stairs, heading towards the surf.          "Your turn, Sunshine," he says and you turn your back to him. He presses a kiss against the juncture of your neck and shoulder, that one place that makes you squirm and shiver, right on the line between erogenous and ticklish.          "Menace--" you say and then squawk when the cold spray hits you, soothed by the passage of his calloused palm across your shoulders, gently gripping the nape of your neck, and you lean back against him briefly, relishing his solidity, his warmth, his hand rests lightly on your hip.          "Let me get your back," you say. Ezra turns his back to you and shucks out of his t-shirt. He's already ditched his prosthetic arm. Don't know how seaworthy it is, he'd said, as expensive as it was I don't care to find out. You shake the can of sunscreen and blast him with it.          "Christ! That's cold!"          "We gotta make sure Cee reapplies after a couple hours," you say, smoothing your hands over his broad back, relishing the slide of his tanned skin beneath your palms, "She'll burn to a crisp otherwise." You press your fingers into the tight muscles of his neck and he makes a contented sound like a purr in his chest.          "You're always so tense right here," you say and dig your fingers in, feeling the thrumming muscles loosen somewhat under your touch. Ezra leans back into you as you did to him moments ago, your arms snake around his shoulders, tuck your face against the side of his neck. This thing with you and Ezra is soft and languid and you're not sure how to define it. This is not the fevered, clawed territory of young lovers, the sort of push and pull you had with your ex, the idea that love had to keep proving itself somehow. With Ezra there is nothing to prove. He seems content to ride this gentle wave, to let things play out in their own time.          "Turn around," you murmur against his skin, "Not done with you yet."          "Now, I am perfectly capable of applying--" he starts, but you see his eyes drop, and know it for what it is. You've known Ezra for a while. The two of you were always friendly, since you moved in across the street from him. Ezra before was even more exuberant, had a swagger about him, confidence in his own skin that is only just now trying starting to return. Ezra before would preen under your gaze if he caught you looking at him while he repainted his deck or put down mulch in his garden, Ezra now shrinks from your eyes. You can see the self-doubt seep in. The worry about his scars, that the loss of his arm makes him less, somehow.          "I know," you say, "Maybe I just want an excuse to get handsy." He arcs an eyebrow at you, that brief flash of doubt replaced with his more familiar smug smirk.          "Well, have at it, by all means," he says. You spray him with the sunscreen and start rubbing it in, smoothing over his freckled shoulders, down his upper arms, mindful of the tender skin at the end of his stump, the dips of his clavicles, his broad chest, littered in angry pink scars that shout in contrast to the rest of his skin. Punched indentations along his ribs where they'd stuck in tubes to drain the air and blood out of his collapsed lungs. You work your way down along his soft belly and back up his sides, a hissed intake of breathe and you stop.          "Does that hurt?"          "Nah. Tickles."          "Mmm-hmmm. I'll have to remember that so I can use it to my advantage later."          "Oh and I'm the menace," he says, his arm curls low around your hip, pulling you nearly flush with him, and you complete the motion, wrapping your arms around him and pulling him tight against you, your chin notched over his shoulder. Cee is creeping up the stairs with a battered plastic bucket in her hands. She shoots you a grin and you know exactly what she has in mind. You back up a little, cup Ezra's stubbled cheeks in your hands and kiss the tip of his nose.          "Surprise," you say and take a big step back. There's just time enough for that little furrow to start between his brows and then Cee dowses him, a whole bucket of seawater poured directly over his head. He splutters. His eyes go big and round. Cee is doubled over laughing.          "Oh," he says, blinking salt water out of his eyes, "Oh that's it. Today's the day, Cee! I am going to drown you!"          "Gotta catch me first, old man!" says Cee and pelts down the beach. You run after them, their bright laughter peals through the warm summer air. Ezra grabs Cee and dunks her into an oncoming wave. She emerges splashing great fans into Ezra's face.          "It is only proper that I took my vengeance," says Ezra, holding his hands out to deflect the spray.          "I don't think the Geneva conventions apply here, you douche-canoe," says Cee.          "Oi! That language--" This is your opening. You grab Ezra around his waist and push off backward into the oncoming wave, pulling him down with you. The two of you come back up, coughing and laughing, arms slung around each other. There's no shadow in Ezra's eyes now, you press your lips to his, the waves roll over you, the tide dragging at your bodies while you and him remain still. Press of your lips to his, your tongue licks out and tastes salt on his lips and he opens for you, his hand cupping the back of your head, guiding you against him, his tongue stroking against yours, no battle for dominance, this, just the plush heat of his mouth, the heave of your chests when you finally break apart, waist deep in the ocean.          "I--" says Ezra and Cee's splash hits at face level.          "Gotcha!" she crows, and starts running.          "You miserable little rat!" He hollers, chasing her through the surf. You stand hip deep in the water and laugh. You're not sure what you and Ezra are to each other. Lovers? Friends? Family? Whatever it this is, it feels right and good. It feels like being home.

A/n: Here is a sampling of Cee’s beach trip playlist:

“I Want To Go To The Beach” by Iggy Pop

“Telstar” by The Tornados

“Cake By The Ocean” by DNCE

“Rockaway Beach” by The Ramones

“Misirlou” by Dick Dale and his Del-Tones

[acecorvid]

Hurts Me To Watch You Fading [Spideypool Fic]

Was going through the prompts that have been in my inbox for AGES when I got a sudden burst of inspiration to write my boys again. So even though it’s been *looks at watch* nearly two years fuck since I’ve written fanfic... here’s some hurt/comfort for y’all (or if you’d rather read on ao3)

Anon asks: Hi! I just read your fic with peter being super adorable in his deadpool hoodie and saw you're taking prompts. Seeing as you're asexual (like me!) I was wondering if you would write asexual peter having to explain to wade that he doesn't initiate sex because it's just not something he really thinks about much and not because of how wade looks

(Content warning for Wade being self-conscious about his body/scars)

Somehow Wade always found his way to Peter’s dorm room at the end of a long hard day of work. Which for Wade meant an early morning raid ending with several dead bodies, including his own a few times, but by the end Wade was in one piece and his suit was in less pieces and all the bad guys were dead. Next he needed to get all the blood out of his suit earning him another blank look of disappointment from his local definitely-not-a-front dry cleaners. They never questioned his circumstances and he didn’t much care what they got up to as long as people weren’t dying, leaving them with a silent, mutually beneficial relationship. 

Now he was in Parker’s dorm wearing comfy jeans and a hoodie that mostly covered his face if he lowered his head, something he did quite often. He didn’t entirely mind his appearance anymore, having gotten used to freaking himself out in mirrors the past few years. But it was other people’s reactions that made him feel like crap. The looks of disgust strangers gave him as he passed, the people who grabbed their kids and moved to the other side of the street, the ones who laughed at and mocked him hit a little too close to his time being experimented on. Sure he could easily use humor more efficiently than the assholes who mocked him to put them in their place but humor as a defense mechanism only went so far and the hurt still went deep. 

What was getting to him lately was his relationship with Peter. They had officially started dating several months ago, even if they had been flirting heavily on the random patrols as Spider-Man and Deadpool. But then Peter told him his secret identity and kissed him through his mask so tenderly and Wade didn’t think he could be more in love. Except they hadn’t gotten much further than tender kisses or cuddles. Not that Wade minded, it was comforting to be held the way Peter held him. He’d never had someone who he could truly let his guard down around, who was okay with him being soft and quiet. 

But every time they started to makeout, to get to the hot and heavy stuff, Peter would carefully untangle them, change the subject, shy away from any skin being shown, and they would watch cartoons or get food or anything other than being that kind of intimate with Wade. 

Not that he minded at first, Peter was a shy dude. He wasn’t like so many college guys who partied all the time and hooked up with whoever. He was a shy nerd and he was a superhero on the downlow, of course he wouldn’t have time for that but he also didn’t have any interest in it either. But Wade was starting to feel like Peter didn’t have any interest in him. 

Staring at himself in Peter’s mirror sans mask told him exactly why someone would have no interest in getting hot and heavy and naked with him. He’s had that many times. Flirting with a girl at the supermarket only for her to freakout once he peeled his mask up, hitting on a guy in a dark bar only for him to be disgusted once they moved into the light. It was a common occurrence for him. He thought Peter would be different. He was different. He didn’t shy away when Wade took his mask off and kissed him, but maybe he was good at faking it? Maybe he could deal with his face but the rest of his body was too much. His skin was rough and patchy, awful to look at and even less appealing to touch. 

He rubbed his hand over his face and head, shaking off his hood to get a good look at the mess he usually hid from most people. Everyone had their limits. Perhaps this was Parker’s. 

The key in the door alerted Wade to Peter’s return. Quickly he pulled his hood back up and retreated to the bed, ducking his head just as Peter walked in through the door. He looked somewhat surprised, but he relaxed immediately. 

“Hey,” Peter said softly. A smile tugged at his lips as he closed the door gently behind him. 

He seemed pleased to see Wade. Genuinely content with having him in his room. Nothing was matching up in Wade’s mind. 

“Hey Peter…” Wade started but trailed off before he could ask the question. He hated being in this position. He wished he could know the truth. For Peter to tell him he was disgusted by his wrecked body without prompting so he could crawl back to his old life and forget about this magical interlude. 

But Peter being Peter, he noticed something was off immediately. “What’s wrong? You almost never call me Peter, did something happen?”

He was closer now, trying to get a good look at Wade’s face but Wade angled his face away. That got him a sigh but Peter respected his boundaries and stepped away, leaning against the wall instead. 

“Do you want to talk to me about it?”

Wade shook his head, nodded, and then shook his head again. Screw Peter for being such a good guy, a respectful person, such a sweetheart. It was ruining what his brain was hooked on as the clear truth. Maybe Peter wasn’t disgusted with him but what else could it be?

“I’m not really pleasant to look at, huh?” Wade said instead, unable to confront Peter directly.

Peter pushed off the wall but stopped himself from coming closer. “Did someone say that to you?”

He sounded angry, on Wade’s behalf. Once again messing with Wade’s doubts. 

“All the time, but that’s not-” Wade chewed his lip, took a deep breath, and took the plunge. 

He took his mask off, revealing his unmasked face and head. Peter didn’t flinch, didn’t look away. He was frowning a bit but not at Wade’s appearance it seemed. It wasn’t as though this was the first time Peter saw his face but it wasn’t a common thing between them. Wade preferred to simply roll up his mask most of the time for their kisses, not wanting to feel too self-conscious. 

“Do you- are you-” Wade hated this feeling, wishing he could go back to witty one-liners and existential statements that bewildered those around him. Feelings did terrible things to his dialogue. “I know I look like ground up hamburger meat, Petey. I’m a big boy, you can tell me the truth if you think I’m too gross.”

Wade was aiming for humor, swerved into something a little more bitter, and he cursed himself for putting that hurt look on Peter’s face. 

“Wade I don’t think-” Peter started, he furrowed his brows and moved closer but slowly, as though Wade would run away if he was startled. Not a bad call. Wade was pretty close to bolting actually. But Peter crept close, slowly, and stopped a few paces away. Wade wanted him to come closer, stand right between his legs on the bed so Wade could pull him in close and hold him until he wasn’t upset. But he ruined that. 

“We don’t do anything more than kissing. You never want to- I get it,” Wade laughed, tugging on his hoodie. “It’s not pretty under here Pete, no one ever wants to look at it. It won’t kill me if you tell me you don’t want to see it or touch me.” He wasn’t lying. It would hurt like hell but nothing could kill him. Unpleasant side-effects of looking the way he did.

Peter surprised him by doing exactly what Wade wanted. He moved closer, slotting himself between Wade’s legs and putting his hands on Wade’s shoulders to get him to look up. 

“I’m such an idiot,” Peter mumbled, sounding mad at himself. Probably for not being able to hide his disgust, for making Wade realize exactly what was going on. Now he’d have to let Wade down. That’s simply the way the world worked for guys like him. 

“I should have told you a while ago but, I dunno, I was scared I guess?”

Here it comes, Wade closed his eyes to brace himself for the impact. 

“I don’t initiate anything more because I’m asexual. I don’t really, I dunno, have a lot of interest in sex? I mean maybe I could be if we talked about it but it’s never really on my mind. It’s got nothing to do with how you look, Wade. I like how you look just fine. I think you’re pretty cute, that’s part of why I’m dating you. Also your muscles are amazing, the general aesthetic of your body and you lifting me up? That’s about as close to sexual attraction as I’ve ever come.”

Wade felt his world tilt and it was entirely unexpected. “Wait you’re-” All of Wade’s otherworldly knowledge hadn’t prepared him for that possibility. That almost never happened. 

Peter leaned down, bringing both his hands to cup Wade’s cheeks. “You’re not disgusting, Wade. And anyone who says that will get their mouth webbed shut.”

Wade nuzzled into Peter’s hand, “That’s not the best use of superhero powers.”

“I’m defending the innocent, hush it’s the perfect use of my powers.”

“Innocent?” Wade arched his brow, staring up at his boyfriend who actually wanted him.

“Okay, well… maybe not innocent in the traditional sense but you look the way you do because you survived, you fought through hell and you got out, and that’s pretty damn attractive.”

Wade wrapped his arms around Peter’s waist, pulling him in closer. Peter laughed, leaning in to kiss him soundly on the lips. “So, opening to talking about it?”

“Should have known you’d have a one track mind,” Peter huffed into the kiss. “Sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I never wanted to make you feel like I wasn’t interested in you.”

Peter straddled Wade’s lap so they could cuddle more properly. His arms were around Wade’s back, holding him close like he always did then they were together. Holding him like something precious, like Peter was as surprised as Wade was that he could have something this tender. 

“It’s okay. I did it to myself mostly. One track mind remember?”

“Are you um- are you okay with me being-?”

“Huh? Yeah of course I am. If you never want to have sex, also fine. I love you for more than how you look in spandex, Petey.” Wade pressed soft kisses along Peter’s shoulder to reassure him. He didn’t want to let this go, not when he thought it was going to be pulled out from under him just moments ago. 

“I love you, too.” Peter whispered into Wade’s ear, his hands gripping his hoodie tighter. 

It wasn’t exactly how Wade meant to tell him that, but with Peter whispering it back, not giving him a second to doubt himself, he was content with his slip up. 

"You do look incredible in spandex, though." Wade grinned against Peter's neck.

Peter leaned into the touch, his voice taking on a more mischievous quality. "Oh I know, Wade. I know."

[tuanhood]

hypnotic | part one

paring: vampire!im jaebeom x reader

genre: angst, eventual smut (part two), vampire au

warnings: language, cringey vampire cliches i’m sure

word count: 9,800+

summary: jaebeom has been waiting 200 years to find his mate - the one who can break his trance and isn’t affected by his hypnotic abilities. You don’t seem to be that person, but he just can’t seem to get you out of his mind… why? 

a/n: hello guys! so i originally had this planned to post tomorrow (the 30th) but it was so long i decided to split it up and post one part today and the other part on the 31st! This first part is mostly Jaebeom and not a lot of Y/N but SO BE IT. This is also my first time writing in the genre of vampire/fantasy loL so please forgive me because it’ll probably be cringe and not make sense. if that’s the case lol drop me a message!! also vampire jaebeom was requested FOREVER ago. so here it is practically 3 decades later. and i attempted to make a banner. if someone can make me a better one it’s v much WELCOME.

part two

Knock Knock Knock 

He wished he could just pretend like he was asleep. He wished he could use that as an excuse to not answer the door, but based on the very strong feeling he was getting from who was behind it – that wouldn’t work. 

“I know you’re in there! Just answer the damn door Jaebeom!”

Jaebeom rolled his eyes, leave it to Bambam to be at his front door before the day even had a chance to truly begin. Before letting him in, he went through all the possible things or excuses he could use to get out of whatever his younger friend had in mind.

“Is your vintage YSL here or is it still at the dry cleaners?” Bambam asked, pushing past Jaebeom as soon as he has the door partway open.

Gruffly, Jaebeom turned back into his apartment to Bambam already halfway to his bedroom – no doubt to look through his closet, “What are you doing here Bam?” 

“What does it look like? I’m here for the vintage YSL asshole!” 

He’s learned by now that it’s better to let him do his thing – whatever that may mean. So instead of following Bambam, he plopped down onto the same couch he’s had for nearly 15 years. “You know when I first bought that shirt it wasn’t considered vintage!”

Jaebeom waited for a response, but instead, he was met with silence. After a few moments – many of them thinking about how maybe it was time to replace the couch – he felt his “vintage” YSL button-down hit him in the face. 

He groaned; the impact was surely going to create wrinkles in the material he tried to keep in pristine condition. It was ironic since he was often heard making fun of how much Bambam cared about clothes, but Jaebeom liked to keep his things nice. “Bam I just got it back from getting cleaned a couple of days ago.”

“Put it on.” 

The tone of his friend’s voice seemed rather impatient. If he had closed his eyes, Jaebeom would have thought he was talking to Jinyoung or even himself. 

“Why do I need to put it on? It’s 8 in the morning; where are we going?”

“Um excuse me? Did you forget what day it was? Now come on, we’re meeting Jinyoung at that new café down the street in fifteen.”

He furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, trying to picture the café on the mental map he keeps in his mind, “the one that used to be a video store in the 90s?”

Bambam made his way into the living room, picking up a few glasses that rested on the coffee table Jaebeom’s feet were on top of, and marched over to the small kitchen. Jaebeom has lived in this apartment more years than he’d like to admit, especially because enough time had passed that the neighbors he had were clearly aging and he just stayed 26. The thought of moving somewhere new often enters his mind, but with this place, he just can’t bring it in himself to go quite yet. It’s almost as though something is tying him to this city, this place – like he’s waiting for something.

“Yes, and a speakeasy in the 20s both of which are not important right now because we live in the 21st century Jaebeom. Now come on, Jinyoung’s waiting – that asshole is always early.” 

He heard Bambam mumble something along the lines of known him 100 years, would it kill him to just be on time for once, as he furiously dropped the glasses on the kitchen counter.

“Do I have to go?” 

Bambam paused his motions of putting Jaebeom’s dirty dishes into the sink to stare the older vampire down, “Jaebeom you only turn 200 once.” 

He scoffed in response, “Jesus don’t remind me.”

“We have to make a whole day of it! So please just put the shirt on, because I want you looking presentable,” he stopped in the middle of his sentence, suddenly wiggling his eyebrows, “you never know what could happen.” The final word is drawn out, almost sing-song like and it drives Jaebeom up the wall because he knows exactly what Bambam is referencing.

For Jaebeom and those like Jaebeom, they didn’t consider the day they were born as their birthday, but instead as the day they turned. There was no point in celebrating their birth anymore as they were no longer alive. However, at this point after 200 birthdays, – alive and dead combined - Jaebeom was beginning to believe that there was no point to those either. He always knew being immortal was a curse but day by day that idea was only solidifying itself in his mind.  

Jaebeom let out a gruff breath which only made Bambam look up from the fork he was scrubbing, “Bam I don’t know what you think is going to happen today… but it certainly isn’t that.” 

The “that” he was referencing was one of the main factors that as of late had made him feel like living forever was indeed a waste. It was the thing that was supposed to make him feel “complete.” According to old texts and traditional vampire folklore, he was now walking around half full, but once he met his mate, he would become whole. At first, he didn’t believe the tale. He had gotten by so far without a mate that the idea of him not being complete made him laugh. But watching both Bambam and Jinyoung find their mates – Bambam 70 years ago and Jinyoung 16 years ago – made him finally acknowledge and reflect on the piece of himself he was missing. 

And fuck he was lonely. 

Bambam chuckled at him as if being in on his own personal joke. His friend was strange like that sometimes, “just put the shirt on Jaebeom.” 

By the time he’s had the shirt on and Bambam has somehow convinced him to let him wear his Rolex he got as a gift from his friend Jackson in 1920, Jaebeom feels mentally prepared to leave the house and embark on this dreadful day. The reminder that he has now been around for 200 years and still is not whole.

“Finally,” Jinyoung sighed when Jaebeom and Bambam finally reached the café down the street, “I’ve been waiting 20 minutes.” 

A disgruntled Bambam checks his watch, “well if you don’t want to wait every single time, don’t be so fucking early,” he promptly turned to Jaebeom to share his grief regarding their friend, “you think he would learn after all this time.” 

“Let’s just go order,” Jaebeom shrugged, not caring to be in another disagreement between his longer than life friends.

“Be honest you’re early on purpose just so it gives you something to complain about and a reason to make us feel bad!” 

Jinyoung ignored Bambam’s theory, replying to the oldest, “no need. I already ordered for the three of us. It’s a special day, the birthday boy doesn’t need to pay,” he glanced at Bambam, “you on the other hand…” 

The two new arrivals, flop down into the sofa chairs on either side of Jinyoung, along of them situated to make a half-circle in front of a low coffee table. The three of them had somehow stuck into this… pattern. Years of friendship that contained years of Bambam/Jinyoung squabbles that Jaebeom would often have to mediate. Patterns were nice, but sometimes they would get old – especially after so long. 

As the two of them argue over whether or not Bambam should pay Jinyoung back for a simple iced Americano because Bam swears he got the drinks the last two times, Jaebeom looks over to the counter where the baristas work on – no doubt – the plethora of orders they have. The factor of the café being new has certainly been the cause of the popularity and amount of people in the shop. He can’t help but feel bad for the individuals working on the drinks – three years ago he had been one of them for roughly 18 months and knew that it wasn’t as easy as it appeared to be. 

In retrospect, Jaebeom didn’t have to work. He had so much time to learn and understand what it meant to be financially responsible. Not only that, but he’s literally had hundreds of years to save. Plus, his early investments in companies ended up landing him some pretty substantial and valuable shares. Jaebeom was sitting on quite the pretty penny. 

“Wow your portfolio is remarkable… I’ve never seen one like it,” his latest financial advisor had said to him in complete awe, “I mean an early investor in Amazon? Apple? Mastercard?” 

Jaebeom had laughed nervously, “What can I say? My grandpa had good intuition, I guess.” 

Money aside, he had wanted something to do with his time – hence his barista job. It was fun, but like most things, Jaebeom just grew tired of it and as he watched the girl working the espresso machine let out an exhausted breath, he realized that he wasn’t missing it. 

Jaebeom has become good at studying people. It was something he still wasn’t sure of whether it was a vampire thing or just something he had picked up over time. Watching the girl at the machine, her hair is in a low bun, a few strands falling in front of her face. It’s clear with the way the hair tie is situated, that the hairstyle was once a bit neater, tighter, and sat at the middle or even top of her head. However, the now fallen placement and slight disarray signal how busy she’s been working and how fried she must be feeling. 

He looks to the string bracelet on her wrist, visible from far away enough for Jaebeom to conclude that she must have someone in her life deemed important to wear one of those “friendship” bracelets. He never saw the point, but humans were strange creatures, despite him once being one. 

Jaebeom’s breath hitches when he catches sight of the delicately drawn tattoo on her wrist near the bracelet. It’s of lavender and it immediately reminds him of his mother who had loved exploring the lavender field that had been near his home when he was a child. Despite all the time that has passed since he lost his mother, the pain that aches inside of Jaebeom when he thinks of her isn’t any less. 

His thoughts are interrupted by the call at the coffee bar, “Order for Jinyoung.” 

The call comes from the overworked girl he had been studying and Jaebeom wants more than anything to stand up and retrieve their orders. He finds a weird want to hear what her laugh sounds like. Maybe he could say something or strike up a conversation that would-

“What are you doing?” It takes Jaebeom a moment to notice that he has partially stood up from his chair as if he’s about to go somewhere. Cluelessly, he replied, “going to get the drinks.”

The youngest shook his head, “No way! Birthday boys don’t get their drinks, they don’t lift a finger.” 

He knew Bambam was one to take birthdays seriously, but this was beginning to feel like it was going the extra mile too many. 

“I’ll get it.” 

Jaebeom watched Bambam get up to retrieve the drinks. He expects him to just grab the drinks and return to the table, but instead, Bambam says something to the girl. Arching his neck to the side, he tries to make a clear path to eavesdrop on what’s being said, hearing being one of the benefits of turning. Unfortunately, the café is too loud for him to focus on the conversation and he’s defeated by the fact that he’ll have to stay in the dark.

The girl laughs loudly at something Bambam said and Jaebeom can’t help but feel mixed about it. On one hand, he got his wish – hearing her laugh – but on the other hand, he wasn’t the cause of it. For some reason it makes him bring his clench and unclench his fists which rest on the arms of the sofa chair. Jinyoung takes notice.

Jaebeom quickly looks down at his lap when he senses that Bambam is returning to where they’re sat, not wanting to give away that he had been staring. First, he places Jinyoung’s and his drink on the table, soon turning back around to go back and fetch the last drink – Jaebeom’s. 

When he comes back, Jaebeom looks up to see a large grin spread across the youngest’s face. He has that look again – the one as if he knows a joke Jaebeom doesn’t. 

The latter nodded his head in thanks for getting the drinks as he inspects his green tea on the table. Just as he’s about to pick up the mug, he’s stopped in his tracks by an announcement coming from the coffee bar. 

“Hello everyone! Sorry for the interruption, but I’ve been told that we have a birthday here today,” you said. Giving announcements wasn’t your strong suit, but you figured now that you were an actual owner of something, you were going to get over your shyness. But you didn’t think it was going to be that often that a tall, skinny and pale boy with a Rolex on his wrist would be asking you to get your coffee shop to sing happy birthday for his friend. Even when you were a barista working for someone else no one had made such a request. This was a café after all, not an Applebee’s.

Jaebeom wished more than anything that he could sink into his seat and just disappear. If only that cliché that vampires turned into bats were true, then he could just fly away at a moment’s notice. Leave it to Bambam to torture him like this. It wasn’t intentional of course, but it certainly felt like it to Jaebeom. 

It was especially tragic to him because the girl he had been studying was the one leading the entire café in singing “Happy Birthday.” He did his best to avoid looking at her, feeling like his entire body was heating up in embarrassment even though he couldn't heat up. 

You on the other hand felt a little insulted by the birthday boy’s lack of eye contact. You hadn’t even managed to get a good look at him before you started singing and now it was not possible with the way that he was looking down at the ground, his long hair falling in front of his face, concealing itself to you. It wasn’t difficult to conclude that he felt awkward about a bunch of strangers he had never met singing him happy birthday, you had felt the same whenever your friends tried to ambush you on your birthday… but you at least looked up and acknowledged the presence of the people singing. A tight smile from this guy would even be happily accepted. 

When the song is over and the claps that follow finally subside, he looks up to see the café back at its previous state of normalcy, not a single person looking at him anymore. Jaebeom lets out a sigh of relief. 

“You could at least act like you liked it,” Bambam huffed in annoyance. He wished Jaebeom could appreciate the idea of birthdays like he did. 

“I really didn’t need to be the center of attention today Bam.” 

“But it’s your bir-” Bambam begins to explain, but Jaebeom abruptly cuts him off, not wanting to hear his reasoning for today’s antics, yet again. The day hadn’t even started.

“My birthday, I know. Thanks for reminding me.” 

Jinyoung clears his throat and plays with the spoon that came with his Flat White. Just as Jaebeom is the mediator for Bambam and Jinyoung, sometimes Jinyoung has to be the mediator for Jaebeom and Bambam. Essentially the commonality in the disagreements of their trio friendship is Bambam and currently, Jinyoung feels as though he should route the conversation elsewhere.

“What else is in the cards for tonight then boys?” 

It’s then based on the look on Jaebeom’s face, that Jinyoung thinks that maybe talking about the plans for tonight – on Jaebeom’s birthday – isn’t re-routing the conversation. Especially since it’s Bambam’s whose eyes light up and is the one to reply to him.

“Obviously we’re going out tonight,” Bambam paused and turned to Jaebeom, wagging his finger in the latter’s face, “there’s no way you’re getting out of this. I’m not taking no for an answer this time.”

Jaebeom rolled his eyes and didn’t respond as he knew he didn’t have a choice in the matter. He had rejected Bambam’s invitations to go out consistently for the last 6 months and on his birthday of all days, Bam was going to force him out of the house just as he had done this morning to come to the café.

He looks back to the front counter, his eyes searching for the barista who has now suddenly disappeared. A frown begins to make itself known on his face, feeling a bit disappointed by the fact that she may have left already or gone elsewhere, but soon she’s popping up from behind the counter, no doubt getting something from the cabinets below. Jaebeom feels relief. 

“What did you say to her?” he asked suddenly looking back at Bambam.

He cocked his head to the side, confused, “What did I say to who?” 

“The barista behind the counter.” 

His friend nodded his head slowly, suddenly realizing what Jaebeom means. A smirk appears on his face, “nothing much… Just how it was your birthday and it would be really good if we could all embarrass you by singing about it. She’s not a barista, by the way, she owns the place. Kinda backward thinking there Jae. It’s the 21st century, women can own things now, they can vote.” 

“I know that,” Jaebeom hissed. 

Bambam puts up his hands in defeat, “I’m just making sure.” 

“Don’t you know her?” Jinyoung asked, “isn’t that why we came here?” 

Jaebeom’s interests are perked. It’s not often that the three of them meet new people. It’s not like there’s a huge point to it. The last new person the three of them met was Mark – also a vampire – a bartender at their favorite club in the city, but that was in 2007. 

He waits for Bambam’s explanation as to how he knows this girl and why they came here specifically beside it just being near Jaebeom’s apartment. 

Waving his hand nonchalantly, the Thai boy gives his answer, “I don’t really know her. Minji does. Met her in some kind of class, I think. SoulCycle? Pilates? Zumba? I don’t know. I can’t keep up with her and her activities these days.” 

Minji is Bambam’s mate. He had turned her only a month after they met. 

Jaebeom’s not sure what he would do if he met his mate. He doesn’t know if he would want to subject them to turning and living the same kind of life as him, but he also doesn’t know if he could continue life alone after meeting his mate. If he ever meets them.

“Why the curiosity?” Jinyoung asked, for once finding it hard to remain stone-faced. Even his usual chill, non-revealing demeanor seems to fade away when it appears that his older friend might be attracted to someone. 

Jaebeom simply shrugged, “it’s nothing…” 

“What do you think? Could she be the one?” Bambam asked teasingly, pointing to the girl behind the counter. 

Jinyoung rolled his eyes almost immediately at the younger boy, “if you’re going to keep bothering him about it, don’t make it so obvious idiot.” 

Jaebeom had been alive – or more like undead – for 200 years and more than half of that time he had to listen to this same conversation from his friends over and over again. His patience was wearing thin and 180 years later, he was tired of their pestering. 

He leaned forward slowly and grabbed his green tea off the table, making sure to visibly flinch at the heat of the drink, Bambam, and Jinyoung chuckling at his reaction. Out of the three of them, Jaebeom certainly had the most practice when it came to “putting on a show” for the humans and “acting” the most human. Taking a sip, he looked back at the girl behind the counter. 

The youngest vampire had spent many of their outings and conversations hypothesizing who Jaebeom’s mate could be. Despite being the oldest of the three, Jaebeom was the only one left who still hadn’t found his mate and he was beginning to feel hopeless. Typically, Bambam pointed out any human girl as a candidate – all of them of course ended up not being his mate. Therefore, Jaebeom didn’t pay attention to his picks anymore, but he had to admit… He did get a strange feeling from the girl behind the counter. 

Jaebeom looked to you, hoping to catch your gaze as you quickly made the coffee orders for the few people waiting to the side of the cash register. Just when he was about to give up and focus his attention back on his friends, you tore your concentration away from the drink in your hand and looked up at him from across the cafe. 

Jaebeom focused his gaze deep onto you with his eyes – testing, checking, and trialing your focus. You didn’t look away, instead, you trained your eyes deeply into his and stared at him until finally, it was Jaebeom who broke the contact. 

He shook his head at his friends, disappointed by your inability to break the trance and ultimately confused at the feeling he still got from you despite that. 

Jaebeom took another sip of the tea, “it’s not her.” 

“Did you have to debate that Uber driver on the Twilight franchise?” Jinyoung groaned at Bambam as soon as they’re out of the car. 

The entire twenty-minute ride, he had got into a heated discussion with their driver on how Twilight was not “true” or realistic to most actual vampire folklore. It had been an excruciating thing to listen to. 

“Got to stand up for our kind dude.” 

“Okay, but what happens when she starts asking how you know all these things or why you’re so interested in vampire stuff?” Jinyoung tended to always be right. This wasn’t an exception.

Brushing off his pants, Bambam gives him a nonchalant wave, “chill out man. Everyone loves vampire stuff.” 

“Maybe in 2008,” Jaebeom said just barely loud enough for his friends to hear them. The two of them laughed, Bambam shoving him playfully on the shoulder, “Birthday boy getting funny on us.” 

“I was always funny,” Jaebeom deadpanned. 

“Funny and looking good tonight. Let’s get you laid, shall we?” 

After a day that was jampacked full of various activities planned by his youngest friend, the last thing Jaebeom wanted to do was spend extra energy on trying to get some girl to come home with him tonight. Besides, he wasn’t that guy anymore. 

Jinyoung scoffed, “he doesn’t need to get laid tonight.”

“Yes, he does! Jaebeom how long has it been?” 

This time it’s Jinyoung that shoves Bambam’s shoulder – except it’s not all that playful. 

“Fine don’t answer that, but I’m just saying there will be quite a few girls here that you can have your pick of, despite your plain outfit.” 

Jaebeom looked at the clothes he had changed into when Bambam spared him a sliver of time to go back home to digress and feed his cats. The latter had wanted him to borrow clothes of his, but instead, Jaebeom decided on pulling pieces from his closet that felt more like him, less like Bambam. A plain pair of ripped jeans, an oversized black shirt that he had bought at a shop from his trip to London last year, and his mother’s necklace that often wasn’t missing from its spot around his neck.

Bambam’s earlier critique was that he was dressed too basic and that no girls would bat an eye at him. Girls don’t like plain guys, he had said. The comment makes Jaebeom wonder about you and whether you’d fall under the category of not liking “plain” guys. 

He bites the inside of his cheek. It was probably the eighth time he had made himself do it today. Jaebeom had found his mind often drifting to you throughout the day for some unexplainable reason. During their walk in the park, he wondered if you would take strolls during your breaks from the café or when Bambam forced him to go paint pottery for an hour and a half he thought about what you would paint. It frustrated him because he hadn’t even spoken to you – not a word and yet you were clearly on his mind for one reason or another. It wasn’t even like you were his mate. He had tried to see if you were unaffected by his trance, his hypnotic capabilities, but you had just stared at him completely fixated just as everyone else was. 

Jaebeom was not going to think about you any longer. He was already planning on avoiding your café. 

“We’re on the list,” Bambam tells the bouncer when they arrive at the entrance of the club. He scans the list and motions his head towards the direction of the door to signal to the three of them to go on ahead. There’s a bit of a whine coming from the people waiting in line which admittedly so makes Jaebeom feel a little guilty, but Bambam ensures him it’s fine, “why have a friend who works at a club if we can’t use him for the perks?” 

“Why does he keep bartending again?” As soon as the question is out of Jaebeom’s mouth he realizes it was a stupid thing to ask since the answer is apparent. 

Bambam laughed at him, giving his long – irreplaceable he’d like to remind everyone – leather coat to the person at the front of the club. Jaebeom swears he hears him tell the coat check guy the “proper” way to put it on a hanger. 

“Obviously for the girls Jaebeom.” 

Mark’s mate – Hana had passed on a long time ago. Jaebeom had never got the chance to meet her, only hears about her in passing from some stories that Mark has told the three of them. He hadn’t turned her. Jaebeom’s never asked why. 

“Girls… of course.” 

He can’t help but think about how Mark must feel inside. Although Jaebeom doesn’t know him as well as he knows Bambam and Jinyoung, whenever he’s with the older boy he’s always got a smile on his face. Often quiet, but he’s always got certain energy bouncing off of him that would indeed make him popular with women. However, if what they say about mates is true, would that mean that a piece of Mark was now missing? Did he feel like he was less of a person? Jaebeom felt like that sometimes and he hadn’t even met his mate yet. Mark had his, but now he didn’t. 

“Drinks?” Jinyoung asked the two of them and Jaebeom is partly surprised. Out of the three of them, Bambam was the one who was the most comfortable in a club or even bar setting. He figures that Jinyoung must be using his birthday as an excuse to cut loose and become someone else for the night.

Bambam instantly nodded his head at Jinyoung’s suggestion and Jaebeom finds himself trailing behind the two of them as they make their way over to Mark at the bar who is throwing his head back at something the girl across the bar is saying. Judging on Jaebeom’s intuition – it’s a bit fake and overplayed, but you got to do what you got to do.

“My man!” Bambam yelled over the music, leaning against the counter in a way to make sure he doesn’t get the elbows of his long sleeve turtleneck wet. Mark in response, turned to them and smiled, then routing his attention back to the girl, giving her an apologetic smile. Her half-smile says everything Jaebeom could need to know – this girl would not be going home with Mark after his shift tonight. 

“What can I get you guys tonight,” Mark turned to Jaebeom and the latter can barely make out his sharp canines in the dark club, “birthday boy you want anything special?” 

Before Jaebeom can reply that he wants to be at home, Bambam answers for him.

“Could we maybe get something that’s off the menu?” He wiggled his eyebrows at Mark who gave him a shit-eating grin, knowing immediately what he was talking about. 

“Off the menu” meant Mark’s secret stash of O negative underneath the counter. While alcohol had the same effect on them that it had on the average humans, adding a bit of blood just made a little bit better. Okay… it made it a lot better. 

“Three negronis coming right up,” Mark winked to give a little signal that these would most likely not be as well composed or put together as a negroni, but due to them being in public, he couldn’t necessarily announce a shit ton of alcohol mixed with human blood was going to be served up to them. 

“How has your birthday been Jae?” Mark asked as he was in the middle of placing three glasses onto the countertop in between them.

It was difficult to explain since to Jaebeom it had just been another day except for a little bit more excruciating. The celebration of another year “older” filled him with thoughts of how much time has passed, whether he’s done anything truly important and why he still hasn’t found the person who is meant to complete him… but like he said only a little more excruciating than any other day. 

Jaebeom shrugged in response, “Bam planned a lot and for the most part, it was…” he paused for a moment, wondering if he should say how he felt – numb, lost, and wishing the day would come to an end as if tomorrow won’t bring the same thoughts or problems. But as he looked at his friends who had tried so hard today to make him happy and celebrate, he decided to guard them against the ultimate truth, “for the most part it was fun – really good. I mean besides the singing at the café of course.” He throws in the last part to at least have some kind of believability to his story. 

He notices Mark’s eyebrows lift out of curiosity as his concentration focuses on measuring out each part of the drinks, “An entire café sang you happy birthday? Damn, I don’t think I could ever get through that, so I can only imagine how you feel.” 

“That was Bam’s idea,” Jinyoung muttered. 

Once again, Bambam does his nonchalant waving of the hand, “it wasn’t that bad. I mean okay, maybe it was… But Jaebeom was obsessed with the girl who led it.” 

Jaebeom suddenly feels like he wants to put duct tape over his friend’s mouth. 

“I was not obsessed with her! I don’t even know her!” Jaebeom for some reason felt the need to defend himself, which was probably the worst option. Him getting defensive was usually a tell-tale sign for his friends being right on whatever they were confronting him with. 

Bambam scoffed, bringing gliding his drink across the bar to be directly in front of him once Mark has poured it neatly into the short glass, “I noticed you staring at her before I went to get the drinks. That’s why I asked her to do it in the first place.” 

“So, she doesn’t know Minji?” Jinyoung questioned. 

The youngest takes his first sip and immediately lets out a hissing noise, signaling to Mark that it’s both strong and good. “No, she does, but Jaebeom’s weird staring only made it that much better.” 

Mark pushed the other two glasses towards Jinyoung and Jaebeom, “Was she your…” he drifted off, almost as though he was finding it physically difficult to get the word out. Jaebeom can’t help but feel the want to reach his hand out towards Mark and place it comfortingly on his shoulder, but his group of friends don’t do that. Instead, he saves him the trouble by answering back right away, not forcing him to say it.

“No, she wasn’t.” 

The bartender nodded slowly, suddenly avoiding his gaze from the three familiar boys across the bar from him, “That’s uh… too bad that she wasn’t able to break the trance. Sorry, Jaebeom.” 

He knows that Mark is just trying to be nice, especially when they’re on a subject that he clearly can’t and doesn’t want to talk about, but the attempt to be comforting makes Jaebeom nauseous. 

“Well maybe he’ll find her here tonight,” Jinyoung quipped, placing a hand on Jaebeom’s back. Sometimes the latter swore that his friends treated him he had just found out he had a terminal illness. 

“I sincerely doubt it,” Jaebeom commented gruffly. 

There’s a sound from the other side of the bar from a customer who seems fed up with the conversation being had between the four of them – distracting Mark from serving anyone else. He gives a signal to them to notify them that he’ll be there in a second. “Well… come to me if you guys need more drinks.  It’s on me tonight.” 

“Thanks, man,” Jaebeom tells him honestly because he might need a couple more drinks before he gets to the state of wanting to be in this room.

Mark said a final word of “see you guys later” and heads to the other end of the bar to help customers who have been waiting. Grabbing their drinks, Jaebeom, Jinyoung, and Bambam turn around to depart the bar, to find somewhere to sit for a bit before the drinks truly begin to hit them.  

With his drink in hand, Jaebeom took a sip and reveled in the perfect balance of alcohol to burn his throat and blood to soothe it. The drink was probably the most relaxing part of his day thus far and as he looked out at the crowd, he could already tell that maybe the mixture was going to his head due to his sudden thinking that this place wasn’t all that bad.

Despite not being a club guy, if he were to go out, Jaebeom would always choose this club that Mark works out. To put it simply – it was vampire friendly. With Mark behind the counter and his “secret” supply free-flowing, it became a notoriously known place for vampires in town. If he had to guess, the attendance on an average night was probably evenly split 50/50, humans and vampires.

The humans weren’t aware of the vampires of course – for the most part.

Jaebeom cleared his throat once they’ve found a booth to sit in, “so… Bam what do you know about that girl?” 

Both Jinyoung and Bambam exchange glances before looking back at the birthday boy. The latter tried his best to conceal the smile on his face, “not much… just that she owns the café, knows Minji, and is very single.” 

For some reason, Jaebeom’s stomach does a little flip, but he wishes it wouldn’t. “S-So?” Through his stutter, he tries to remain as confident as possible, but his friends see right through his façade.

Jinyoung leaned forward until his elbows rest on the top of his thighs, “Jaebeom you can be honest with us… Why the sudden fascination with this girl? Are you sure she didn’t break the trance? Just with the way that you’re acting…” Jinyoung drifted off, not bothering to finish his final sentence, but once again looking at Bambam. It makes Jaebeom lean forward in his seat as well. 

“With the way, I’m acting? I’m completely normal. I’m fine. She didn’t break the trance and now I’m just curious about her as curious as anyone would be about someone they meet.” 

There’s the silence between the three of them until Bambam speaks up, “You didn’t meet her though.” 

It dawns on Jaebeom that he didn’t even speak to you and he wonders why does it feel like he did. Why did it feel like he knew you but didn’t at the same time? Why haven’t his mind and body been cooperating with him since this morning at the café? 

Just with the way that you’re acting…

The way he was acting? What did that mean? Was the way he was acting mean something specific? 

He feels like he blinks and thirty minutes go by. And in that past thirty minutes, Jaebeom had somehow managed to drink 6 of Mark’s “negronis.” He felt like his head was beginning to get dizzy. It wasn’t often that Jaebeom found himself drunk on the verge of drunkenness due to alcohol not affecting him as much as humans. To even remotely get to that state, he had to drink a lot and it had to be strong. 

“You feeling it Jaebeom?” Through the darkness and the haze of the alcohol, Jaebeom could barely make out the hint of the smile playing on Jinyoung’s face. He had switched to a glass of wine at some point while Jaebeom was binge drinking which had to be the most Jinyoung thing ever. Who drinks a glass of wine in a dark, sweaty club? 

He’s afraid to answer him verbally which would give his friend an obvious sign of how he was feeling. So instead he just shrugged – as usual. 

“Dude let’s get out there!” The youngest shouted, motioning his hands to the middle of the club, “dance… maybe find you a girl?” 

Jaebeom watched the people pressing up against each other on the dancefloor, moving their bodies, and drinking like their lives depended on it. He wondered if he wanted to be a part of that. Everyone out there was so full of life and vigor… he just wasn’t. He also didn’t know if he was that drunk, but bless Bambam because he didn’t need alcohol to be out there. 

For what feels like the millionth time, his mind drifted to you. Was this your kind of place? Would you come here? If you did would you come alone? With friends? Someone else? You didn’t seem like the type of person who would like this place. You seemed more like him – the observant, calm, inquisitive type who would much rather be at home with a book than at a party. 

Then for a moment, he can picture it. It’s almost like he’s in a trance – an image of you curled up on a couch – his couch – under a large white cable knit blanket fills his mind. Rather than reading, your painting with watercolors – the kind that seems to be in every elementary school classroom – and he hears a voice out of view. His voice.

“Painting really?”  

Jaebeom sees you glance up from your painting to look at him, smiling.

“Looks like I’m gonna have a lot of time on my hands so… might as well get good at something.” 

Jaebeom hears himself laugh, “Okay but watercolors?” 

He feels like he’s going to pass out when he finally hears it – your laugh. 

“Let the artist work Im Jaebeom! She needs to get good enough to live off auction house money once her paintings get sold! Shh!” Despite your words, you smiled and suddenly moved the tools away from you onto the coffee table. You lifted half the blanket off of you and patted the space of the couch beside you, “you know I can’t say no when you give me that face. Come here.”

And just like that, the vision is gone. Jaebeom feels confused because it didn’t feel like a dream or fantasy, but it felt real… it felt like a memory. 

“Hello, Earth to Jaebeom?” 

Right… dancing. Maybe dancing would help him forget whatever game his mind was playing on him.

“Yeah let’s fucking go.” 

Another instance occurs where Jaebeom blinks and everything moves so fast. Suddenly he’s no longer sat at the table with Bambam and Jinyoung, but instead in the middle of that mess on the dancefloor with everyone else. He almost feels like one of them. He almost feels human again. But as soon as that feeling washes over him, it quickly dissipates. 

He knows it must be the drinks doing all the work, because otherwise, he would have never found himself in the middle of all these people, thinking that dancing is a good idea. Dancing had never done anything remotely good for him before, so why now? To help forget? Was it going to help him do that? 

“I swear it’s like he’s not even here.” 

Jaebeom tuned back into the moment, and it’s when he realizes that Jinyoung and Bambam have been trying to get his attention this entire time.

“Sorry I was just- the alcohol you know…” He says it so quietly that he knows his friends won’t be able to hear him over the music and the millions of conversations happening around them. But he thinks that maybe it’s better that way and that it truly doesn’t matter what he says.

Jinyoung comes closer to Jaebeom, until his mouth is right next to his ear, “we were just asking if there’s anyone that you’re interested in.” 

They’re still on this idea? Jaebeom asked himself. 

Even in his drunken state, he didn’t think that finding some random girl to fuck was going to help with the emptiness he’s been feeling lately, but for the first time since getting up and onto the dance floor he takes in the people around him. As depressing as it was to observe, most people were here with someone else. 

It’s then his gaze falls onto a couple that stands far on the left side of the floor, behind where Jinyoung is standing. The two of them have their fronts pressed up against each other, dancing so closely with arms exploring one another’s bodies. The female has her head resting on the male’s shoulder as if she’s too exhausted to keep going, but can’t dare to part with him. It’s like they’re part of each other and any distance would cause them to lose all sense of themselves.

The girl lifts her head off the male’s shoulder and gives him this look that makes Jaebeom’s heart – if it was still beating – ache. She says something to him and he nodded happily in response. Even through the dim lights and large crowd, Jaebeom could see the sharp teeth inside her mouth.

She placed her head back against his shoulder, this time, however, the male had his head angled back, stretching out his neck. The girl moves in closer until her mouth just ghosts over the skin, breathing on it until the boy shuts his eyes awaiting the sting and pleasure that will come next.

Biting down against his flesh, breaking skin, the girl drinks from her partner. Even though he’s at a distance from them, Jaebeom can tell by the look on the man’s face that he’s enjoying being fed on and that it certainly isn’t his first time. 

He feels like his eyes are frozen on the couple. It’s been so long since he fed off someone instead of the stuff that he gets from his connection at the hospital. Jaebeom tries not to think about the way his fingertips tingle and his throat dries up at the thought of drinking from a warm body. The alcohol has only dehydrated him and made him feel even more thirsty – he’s afraid that going back to the bar and asking Mark for a glass of O negative exclusively isn’t going to make that go away. 

After a moment or two, the girl removes her mouth from the boy’s neck and drags her tongue over the spot where she had drawn blood from, ultimately covering the wound and signaling that she was done drinking. 

He thinks of how risky it is to do that at a place like this. Although half of the people around them also take part in the activity of drinking blooding and granted most of them aren’t paying attention to those around them – there are still unsuspecting humans everywhere. If one wrong person were to see then that could be it for this club being a haven for the vampire community in the city and that would probably be… it for vampires in this city in general. 

But who was he kidding? He was being a hypocrite because he’s for sure done the same thing. 

You’ve once again entered his mind. However, this time it isn’t an image, picture, or vision that occupies his thoughts, but instead just the idea of how you would react to who he is, what he really is. Throughout his time that he’s been undead he’s only done the “reveal” to a handful of people and even then, it took him a long time to get there. Well except for one person who ultimately was a mistake and his friends hadn’t hesitated to let him know.

With you, Jaebeom felt that you wouldn’t be the kind of person to judge him instantly based on what he was. You would be shocked of course, maybe even scared, but you wouldn’t let that cloud your judgment. You wouldn’t let yourself reject something just because it was unfamiliar. 

What the fuck was he on about? 

It must be the alcohol doing this to him. He would have to thank Mark for making them strong this time around, but also make a mental note to never let this happen again. Jaebeom was already a deeper thinker, but this was getting out of hand.

There’s a sudden grasp of Jaebeom’s elbow and he feels himself jump at the sudden touch. His eyebrows furrowed when he realized it wasn’t one of his friends considering Bambam and Jinyoung were both dancing over to his right side. 

When he turned around to greet the person who had grabbed him, he was disappointed, surprised, and annoyed all in one. It was the last person he had expected to see her, except not really because it made perfect sense. 

“Jaebeom… hi.” Ara smiled shyly at him, tucking a string of hair behind her ear and slightly looking down at the ground. He wants to groan because he knows she’s doing this because he had once mentioned that he thought it was hot when she looked innocent. He shouldn’t have ever said that.

He’s not sure what to say, because what are you supposed to say to someone you’ve been trying to avoid for the past year and a half? Jaebeom had said everything he had wanted to say to her. 

At one point in his life, he had been stupid. He had been stupid and he had abused the power that had been bestowed upon him since the day he had been turned. Perhaps one would assume that he’d been foolish with his ability just at the start – 100, maybe even 150 years ago. Instead, Jaebeom had gone through a rough patch about a year or two ago. 

The overwhelming pressure of finding his mate had started to get to him again. All he needed was someone, anyone to break the hypnotic trance and that was it. A task that seemed so simple, yet never came. So, Jaebeom had used hypnotism to his advantage, getting as many girls as he could in his bed in the shortest amount of time possible. He wasn’t proud of it and it was something he would constantly regret as long as he was ali- around. 

One of those girls… had been Ara. 

Jaebeom felt relieved when she didn’t wait for him to answer back at her greeting, “How are you? I-It’s your birthday, right? How old are you turning again? 27?” She winked immediately after her question and he wants to roll his eyes.

She was the mistake by the way. The mistake that knew about who he was. 

He doesn’t even remember how it happened, how his secret slipped, or what the circumstances of her finding out was. Part of him thinks he was just horny, thirsty, and weak, but she found out and she… loved it. 

Weirdly enough, Ara loved the idea of him being a vampire and his “lifestyle” which at first Jaebeom didn’t think too much about. He thought okay she’s taking this extremely well… better than anyone else I’ve ever told, but whatever, but then it became strange. 

She was what those in the vampire community call a “vampire fetishizer.”

He coughed awkwardly, his gaze wandering over to Jinyoung and Bambam, hoping they would catch sight of him stuck with Ara and come rescue him. Jaebeom wasn’t that lucky though, not even on his birthday, “Yeah… 27.” 

Jaebeom can’t help but look at her neck. It’s fully on display and it was clear that Ara had come here to find someone to feed on her. He had been the one to show Ara this place before he had been clued into her little… vampire obsession. 

“Well did the birthday boy get everything he wants today?” She smiled and gave Jaebeom those eyes. He feels his cock twitch in his pants and he realizes he has to keep himself in check because he’s not that weak tonight… right? 

His eyes flash to her neck again and Jaebeom feels his throat get even drier. He was so thirsty and he knows Ara would be so willing. 

No Jaebeom… No. 

“I-I uh yeah… you know got- yeah today’s been good,” he stuttered awkwardly, bringing his tongue out to wet his dry lips. Judging on the look on Ara’s face, she’s taken the action the wrong way. 

“You look thirsty Jaebeom… do you want a drink?” 

He knows what she means and Jaebeom swallows hard in an attempt to distract himself, to remind himself that he’s not that thirsty. He doesn’t need it that bad.

“I-I think I am.” 

The words come out faster than his brain can process to stop them and the part of Jaebeom that’s coherent, sharp, and aware wants to punch the weak and drunk Jaebeom in the face. 

Without a word, Ara turned from Jaebeom and began walking to one of the exits at the side of the club. He feels like he’s the one in a trance, mindlessly following her through the people, not even hearing Jinyoung and Bambam calling out to him. The only thing that Jaebeom makes note of as he follows her is Mark’s face behind the bar, giving him a tight smile. It almost stops Jaebeom. Almost. 

When they finally get outside through the exit door, they find themselves in a small alley between the club and a dry cleaner. 

Jaebeom doesn’t even get a moment to think before Ara is pushing him against the wall of the dry cleaner, her hands roaming up and down his body, her lips going to his own. They’re pressed up against each other so closely that he recalls the couple he had watched earlier. He feels sick comparing this moment now to the two of them. 

“Fuck I missed you so much,” Ara sighed seductively into this ear, making Jaebeom’s stomach churn further at her clear longing for him. Well not him, but the vampire part of him.

“Please, I need it,” she mewled. At her words, he almost puts a stop to this whole thing and has to question whether this is the right thing to do. Jaebeom wonders if this is old Jaebeom behavior – the one that just used women and threw them away later like toys, but then he remembers that this is Ara. She’s using him as well. 

It’s almost as though that old, cocky, snide Jaebeom appears out of nowhere as he says his next words and brings himself closer to her neck, “do you really need it?” 

“Yes, Jaebeom I do, please.” Ara already sounds so desperate and he’s barely done anything. He can’t help but smirk at her reaction.

“Then I guess I better give it to you then.” 

He’s about to do it. He’s about to bite down and finally relieve his thirst, his craving, but then he looks to the side of the alley – towards the street. He feels like he’s seeing things again like he’s in the middle of a hallucination or mirage. That thought is pushed away when he locks eyes with you. 

“Don’t mind me,” you placed your hands up in front of yourself, to show him you’re not eavesdropping. Your action frustrated you because it would have been much better to say nothing, but you felt yourself panic. The prolonged eye contact with him while he’s just seconds away from pressing down – bitting down? – on the girl’s next for some reason pushed you into defensive mode. Not to mention his eyes… his eyes were – red? 

The girl hadn’t noticed you; you aren’t even sure if she heard you, but she certainly noticed Jaebeom’s stare fixated on you. When she faces you, she wears an unpleasant sneer, clearly annoyed by your interruption of whatever this was. 

“Can you go?” She said, the agitation in her voice more than apparent. 

Rather than immediately leave the scene, you continued to stare at Jaebeom. It’s difficult to say why you decided to walk this specific way home despite it being so late and dark out, but for some reason, you couldn’t help but be pulled in this direction. You weren’t someone who believed in signs or fate, but it felt so wrong to go any other way tonight. That was another thing, you felt this kink in your neck that practically forced you or taunted you into looking down the alley between this dry cleaners and club. It was yet another thing about today that felt unexplainable to you as you certainly weren’t expecting the birthday boy from the café today to be in a compromising position with some girl. 

After a moment of more uncomfortable staring – something else that had happened at the café today with him – Jaebeom breaks your gaze and looks down at his feet. The eye roll and acrid look on the girl’s face don’t go unnoticed by you. 

You shouldn’t be here. 

“S-Sorry. I’ll just get going then,” you concluded, unsure why you felt an uncomfortable sickness spread throughout the entirety of your body. 

You barely knew this guy – all you really knew was that today was his birthday and that he was friends with Minji’s boyfriend. Basically nothing. Yet now and even earlier back at the café you had felt this weird sensation within yourself. Not even when you looked at him, but just being in the same presence. It had been so hard to focus on making coffee today when he was seated across the room. Every part of your body just wanted to get closer, gravitate towards him. It was fucking weird… and scary. 

The girl nodded as if to signal “yeah about time,” at the announcement of your departure. Jaebeom on the other hand, still had his eyes glued to the ground as if looking at you once again will cause him some kind of pain.

Just as you’re about to continue your trip back home, you stop yourself and look back at the couple in the alley. 

“Happy birthday by the way…” you paused wondering if it would be weird to say his name considering he doesn’t even know yours, but you shove the thought out of your mind, “Jaebeom…”    

Hearing you say his name causes that tingling feeling in his fingertips to come back and his entire mind is sent into a frenzy. He feels too awkward, too shy to look at you again, but a sudden thought washed over him. What if earlier was a mistake? What if you are his mate? With the way he was currently feeling just at you saying his name, the visions he had in the club and the nonstop place you know had in his mind, it was difficult to believe that you weren’t his mate. 

Bambam and Jinyoung had found it difficult to explain to him what it felt like to find your mate, but surely what he felt right now wasn’t normal behavior or feelings. Unless he was a psychopath. 

Tightly shutting his eyes and drawing together all his strength, Jaebeom aims to try once again to see if you can break the hypnotic trance, unaffected by his abilities. However, as soon as he’s finally ready, head turned up to face you – you’re gone. You didn’t wait for him to respond to the happy birthday message. Instead, you simply left not wanting to be a burden or troublesome to whatever it was those two were doing in that alley. 

“Thank fucking god, let’s get back to it,” Ara concluded with a final roll of her eyes, gripping Jaebeom’s shoulders to get him close to her once again. He stares at her neck, but this time he doesn’t feel anything. He no longer feels thirsty and his appetite is gone. 

Jaebeom shrugs her off slightly. The encounter with you has caused him to wake up and realize what a bad idea it would be to do this right now. He hopes that Ara won’t put up a fight – he doesn’t want to have to hypnotize her if he doesn’t need to. 

At his actions, Ara takes a step away in disbelief, as if she actually can’t believe that Jaebeom is changing his mind and no longer wants her, “are you serious?” 

He doesn’t say anything but instead avoids eye contact with her just as he had done for you. 

Snorting, she glared at him, “Fine. Whatever. I don’t fucking care. I can find someone else to feed off of me. Yours never felt that good anyway. Asshole.”

Just like that, she’s out of his life once again and Jaebeom can’t help but feel thankful. He should have never been weak enough to be dragged out by here anyway. He had just been consumed by thoughts of you, alcohol, and the couple on the dancefloor. Then again, not coming out here would have robbed him of the opportunity of seeing you again and finding out that you actually knew his name. 

That’s when it dawned on him. 

Fuck… how much had you seen? What did you see? 

Jaebeom realized that he might have some explaining to do

[wouldpollyapprove]

Coal Miner’s Daughter

Request: Can you do Tommy with number 4 from the fluff list?????

Requested by Anonymous

Thomas Shelby x Reader

Word Count: 2.8k

Warnings: Language

A/N: I enjoyed writing this so much and I think I’m gonna at least do a second part. I can’t tell you when that’ll be out, I have to first find time to write it. I also didn’t expect this to turn out this long as I’ve been suffuring from writer’s block. Thinking about it now, I think it’s because I wasn’t inspired by the prompt I was given.

Masterlist

Recently moving to Small Heath, Y/n knew nothing but the fact that everything she owned would be covered in dust and soot. The fact left her unfazed, being a coal miner’s daughter and all meant that she knew no life without either. But this place was cleaner than the Welsh village she’d come from that was covered in layers upon layers of the black material. With the life given to her, she also knew little of what went on in the larger cities both in Wales and England. And that meant, she knew nothing of Mr. Thomas Shelby. 

At least, no until she spilled her drink on him.

“Fuck,” the man shouted as the chilled liquor soaked through his waistcoat. Hands raised, he backed away from the puddle that collected beneath him, the whiskey in his glass splashing onto his fingers. His eyes meet that of what he could only describe as a terrified deer, wide-eyed and doe-like.

Sucking in a breath, Y/n set down her empty glass, cursing herself for not paying attention. “I’m so sorry,” she apologized and reached for a handkerchief that was tucked away in her purse. “Here let me.” Y/n dabbed the clothe over a few areas to suck some of the moisture out. 

“Just-” He removed her hand from his chest. “-go somewhere else.” Though, it was clear her intentions were good, having gin thrown at him put him in a rather grumpy mood.

Nodding, Y/n scurried past the man, his stern tone told her it wouldn’t be delightful to cross him. With an empty glass, she slid into the where her neighbors sat, the ones who invited her to the Garrison in the first place. After she’d told them that she’d never been to a proper pub, they shared a single glance and then declared that they would take her out for around. Seeing as how her portion of the round ended up on a random man, Y/n wasn’t enjoying herself.

Marie shook her head when Y/n slide in next to her brother, Will. “Can’t believe you spilled gin all over Thomas Shelby and he let you live,” she snickered, a finger tracing the rim of the mug in front of her. 

Eyes wide in confusion, Y/n hoped someone would explain who she was talking about. Had she known such a simple accident could result in her death, perhaps she would have reconsidered moving to Birmingham. When no one caught on, she asked, “What do you mean?”

“Christ, you are as innocent and naive as they come, aren’t ya?” Will rolled his eyes, downing the last of his whiskey. He sighed, setting the glass down when he caught the hurt and confusion in her eyes. “That man-” A finger pointed at the slender man that could be seen in the pub’s private room. Even from such a distance, Y/n couldn’t help but notice the sparkle of his ice-blue eyes under the light. “-is Thomas Shelby. Very long story short: he’s a businessman and gangster. Guts men like they’re fish and blinds them like their bastards. He’s not one to trifle with. Or lay in bed with.”

Face paling at his words, Y/n couldn’t believe she hadn’t been warned about the man before. Where she came from, the only people you had to worry about were the drunks. There were no gangsters in Aberfan, it was simply unheard of. You had the occasional thief, usually children who were left to starve when their fathers died in the mines and their mothers who couldn’t find work, and perhaps a murderer or two if a man was caught in the wrong bed. But it was never anything like what the people of Birmingham had to deal with. “Should I be worried?”

The woman across from her laughed, “No, dear. The worst he’d do to you is charge you for a new waistcoat.”

An hour or so later, Will let out a sigh and stretched his arms over his head. “I’m beat, think I’m gonna head home,” he said before shuffling out of the booth. Marie nodded in agreement, but she would agree to anything since she had finished off her sixth glass of wine. Y/n watched them stand and throw on their coats to protect themselves from the brutal Birmingham wind. “You coming?” Will asked, throwing a few coins on the table. 

Glancing at the glass that laid abandoned in front of her, barely touched after being refilled, she couldn’t find a reason to go home. Y/n didn’t want to spend another night in her apartment, too big for one person, all alone. Watch the shadows play tricks on her, make her feel safe one minute but let her believe she was in danger the next. At the same time, there was no reason for her to stay in the pub. Her glass would never empty and she would do nothing but feel sorry for herself, sorry that she couldn’t be more like everyone else. 

“I think I’m going to stay a little longer,” she finally said.

Marie raised a brow, “Are you sure ya wanna do that?” Y/n simply nodded and watched the pair slipped out the door.

Once they disappeared behind the wooden doors, Y/n started to regret her decision. It wasn’t too late to run after them, but her brain was telling her otherwise. In a room full of people who had known each other for years, seen each other on the street since they were children, she felt out of place. If she stood, Y/n feared a spotlight would be put on her, following her all the way to the door. But then, when would she leave? There would be no good time to slip past those in her way and run to the comfort and silence of the outside world if she feared the eyes that would be on her. 

Before her anxiety could bury her any deeper, someone slid into the booth. Bringing her eyes up from her glass, Y/n met the eyes of a thick, red-haired man. He looked like every other man that worked in the factories and the look in his eyes told her he didn’t care for a thing she had to say. “Here alone?”

Y/n hesitantly nodded. But as soon as she caught his reaction, she knew it would have been better to lie, say she was here with anyone to get him to find a new place to sit.

“Such a shame. A pretty girl like you, here all by yourself,” he commented, eyes scanning her body. “If you want, we could go back to my place.”

She smiled, “I would rather stay here and finish my drink. You can go home if you’d like.” Over the rim of her glass, she could see he wasn’t pleased and as the liquid stung her throat, she knew he wouldn’t leave willingly. 

“Or I could wait for you to finish.”

Closing her eyes, Y/n couldn’t understand how she had become lucky enough to not only spill her drink on a gangster but also have to put up with a bastard in the same night. How hard was it for the man to see she was uncomfortable? Did the loss of color in her cheeks not give it away? “I don’t mean to be rude, but I don’t want to go home with you.”

The man scuffed, obvious it was rare for women to pass him by. “What are you a prude? Women don’t come sit in pubs alone unless they want to leave with someone.”

Obviously, women in Birmingham took up much different social lives than those in Aberfan. If Y/n were back home, no one would question her being in a pub alone. No one would assume she was there for any reason other than to drink. Small Heath, Birmingham wasn’t the same and she was a fool to believe there wouldn’t be a little culture shock. 

“I-” she started before a shadow was cast over the table. Glancing up, Y/n wasn’t sure if she should be relieved to see Thomas Shelby standing in front of the booth. There was a dangerous look in his eyes when Thomas glared at the man across from her. Y/n found it odd, the man was her problem not his, so why wasn’t he enjoying himself in the little room that seemed to be set aside just for his enjoyment.

“This man bothering you?” he asked Y/n, eyes set on the man across from her. Before she could even nod, the man swallowed, skin turning a dangerous white. 

Shuffling out of the booth, the man stammered, “Sorry, so sorry, Mr. Shelby. I-I’ll just go then.” And like that, he was gone, almost as if he’d never been there to begin with. 

Watching him flee through the door, Y/n slide out of the booth, the eyes of her savior never leaving her. Standing next to him, she wrung her hands together, trying to find the courage to look him in the eye. Mr. Shelby was a tall man that held himself with a deadly sort of confidence that entered the room way before he even made an appearance. He looked like the man that was hard to please and easy to anger. 

Grabbing her coat off the back of her seat, Thomas handed it to her, “You alright?” 

His voice was soft, much different than she expected it to be when he wasn’t angry. “Yes, yes, thank you,” she finally managed, quickly glancing at his face that had softened since she’d spilled her drink all over him. “I think I’ll go home now, don’t want to bother you any more than I already have.”

“It’s no bother and I’d feel much better if you let me walk you home,” he waved her comment off and waited for his offer to be accepted.

Believing it rude to turn him down, a man like him probably wasn’t used to that, Y/n nodded, “If you want to, I suppose.”

With that, Thomas led her out of the pub, the cold air biting her cheeks as they walked out into the empty street. Stuffing her hands in her pocket, Y/n let her eyes wander around the buildings they passed. The brick structures, though not tall, were much larger than the ones she had grown up around. They were giants, looming over the pair as they passed, silence filling the air between them.

Thomas was the first break to the silence, his voice echoing down the street. “What’s your name?”

“Y/n,” she replied, eyes meeting anything but his own. 

It was silly to be nervous, she could tell he was making an effort. His voice was softer, a gentle touch to it that warmed her heart, and his demeanor was kind, almost loving. The glow from the few lights they passed drown his features in gold, making the man look angelic. In this light, Thomas Shelby didn’t look like a man that could pull the trigger and have blood on his hands. Instead, he looked like a man in love with the world, a poet or a painter. One that found beauty in almost everything. It made Y/n wonder if that’s what he looked like before he had turned to violence. 

“That’s a lovely name,” he mused, searching his pocket for something. With ease, he pulled out a cigarette canister and put one of the thin sticks between his mouth before passing it over to his company. 

“I don’t smoke,” Y/n shook her head as the cigarettes were placed back in Thomas’s pocket.

He nodded, striking a match. “Name’s Tommy,” he informed her once his cigarette was lit and he’d taken a drag, the match forgotten on the cobblestone behind them. “Am I correct in assuming you already know who I am?”

“I just know your name, not much else.” Y/n spared a quick glance at him, his eyes were following her every move, but she didn’t feel like prey with his graze upon her. In his presence, she felt safe, that could have been because he was a gangster or it could have been something she couldn’t put her finger on.

Taking a drag, Tommy glanced up at the night sky. It was a cloudless night, he knew it would be cold. When his mother was alive, she always grew a small garden and made sure to cover her plants when clouds disappeared from the sky come nightfall. “Starry nights are dangerous,” she’d say. “Not only are men fools when the sky is clear, but it’s anything but warm.” If his mother was right, he would wake up to a blanket of frost covering the plants at Arrow House. “You’re not from Birmingham, are you?”

Y/n shook her head, fiddling with the buttons of her coat. “Is it that obvious? But no, I’m not. I’m not from a place that’s anything like this,” she laughed, wondering why she ever chose to move to such a large city. 

“Where are you from then?” Tommy inquired, lips turning up in a small smile when he saw her eyes light up.

“Aberfan. It’s a coal mining village in Wales, dirty place but every lively,” she told him. “Small, everyone knows everybody and when you look past the soot and dirt, it’s very colorful and green. Beautiful, really.”

A big smile broke out on Tommy’s face, matching Y/n’s, it was out of character for him, but her smile was so God damn infectious. There were few people who talked of their home like that, especially considering she came from a mining town. Those mines were death traps for the men that entered, everyone was aware they may not see the light of day, but yet they went down because they needed the money. Knowing, that despite the death, Y/n saw beauty in the place she was raised made Tommy rethink how he viewed the city around him.

He couldn’t speak about the whole of Birmingham, only spending the majority of his life in Small Heath, but once he’d seen stacks of bills, the streets around him had become nothing but filth. Watery Lane was then a just a place for the poor to become poorer and where dreams came to die. There was nothing appealing about the dirt-covered streets but maybe there could be. If Tommy could only view his home under a different light, perhaps he could see the same type of beauty that Y/n did when Aberfan crossed her mind.

Tommy watched the smoke from his cigarette float through the cold air, his breath alongside it. “You miss it then?” The woman beside him shrugged. “You don’t?”

“I’ll always long for it,” she explained, finding herself to grow more comfortable around him. “But I know there’s more to the world than some quaint little mining village in Wales. As long as it’s in my heart, I do believe I’ll be fine.”

Letting her words sink in, Tommy came to a stop beside her at the steps of a front door, which no doubt lead to her apartment. How she felt about Aberfan was how he once felt about Small Heath when he was shipped over to France. The young man that went off to war believed that as long as he kept his home in his heart, it would be as if he never left. The man, a few years older, that returned from the tunnels no longer believed that, no matter how much he wished he did. “This your place,” he motioned to the front door, earning a nod from her. 

“Thank you for walking me home, you didn’t have to,” Y/n found herself smiling at the man as she climbed a few of the steps.

Taking off his cap, Tommy held it between his hands, the anxiety of a schoolboy coursing through his veins. “No need to thank me, I enjoyed your company.” There was a pause as Y/n climbed the rest of the steps, her hand hovering over the door handle. “And I was wondering if I could possibly see you again?”

Y/n didn’t give herself time to stop and question why a man that could drown in his fortune would want to spend time with a coal miner’s daughter. She was dirt and grim, while he was clean and polished, it just didn’t add up. But Y/n didn’t care as heat spread across her cheeks. “I’d like that very much, Tommy.”

“My Friday’s free, if that works for you then perhaps 7 o’clock,” he smiled up at her. 

She nodded, “That works for me. Good night, Tommy.” Y/n opened the door, but not before he said, “Good night, Y/n.”

Watching her slip through the door, Tommy stood there, hearing her feet on the floorboards. He didn’t know what was so appealing about the woman, she seemed shy, one to keep to herself, the total opposite of him. But he couldn’t just see her once and let her slip into the night, no, he simply couldn’t do that.

*~~*~~* Let me know if you would like to be added to any of the tag lists and feed back is always appreciated.

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[artyblogs]

Mean It When You Swing It

Read on AO3

Summary: For @caruliaweek. Prompt: Confession. After two years, Carmen arrives at Julia’s doorstep with a bouquet of red roses. She finds a nightmare instead. Tensions ensue.

---

The first bouquet was a prank on Carmen. Carmen wanted to do something nice for Julia, to thank her for her infinite patience, for blindly doing what Carmen asked without protest, and for doing so without prying. Carmen wanted to do something nice for Julia, and people give flowers to each other, right? They are given to performers after their shows, and to graduates after their ceremonies, and to the sick so that they might feel better. They are given to parents and children and friends and partners. They are given in grief, and they are given in thanks, and they are given in affection.

There was a florist down the street from Julia’s flat, so there Carmen went.

“Whatever they are, they have to be red,” Carmen murmured as she regarded the dizzying collection. There were so many different shapes and sizes, in so many hues, and it was making for a more complicated task than she first thought. In her ear, the sounds of Player’s constant keystrokes blend into the background when he speaks (he once explained something about microphone settings and sound engineering, but most of it went over Carmen’s head).

“How about red roses? Nine of them?” And even through the mic, she could tell that he was smiling.

“Only nine? Okay,” Carmen said and she asked the florist for a bundle.

“Wait, really?” Player almost shrieked, but his sound settings came through yet again to normalize the volume.

“What’s wrong?”

“Uh, nothing.”

And that was that. It was only after the artifacts were set in front of Julia’s door, and after the doorbell was rung, and while they were on the plane out of Poitiers, that Ivy gently took Carmen’s elbow, steered her out of Zack’s earshot, and asked if Carmen meant to leave red roses for Julia.

“Flowers are flowers are flowers, right? Should I have left different ones?” Carmen asked.

Ivy’s mouth formed and ‘o’ and her green eyes grew wide with dismay. “Oh my god, you really don’t know.”

“Know what?”

Ivy clenched her jaw and scowled. She reached into her pocket, took out a small padded case, and unzipped it to reveal her Team Red earpiece. She plugged this into her ear, stood hands akimbo, and glared at Carmen’s left earring.

“Player,” she growled out. Carmen had never seen her so mad before; not even at Zack. And Player made a high-pitched squealing sound that she’d never heard him make before either.

“I didn’t think she’d actually do it!”

“God-fucking-dammit, Player! You know that Carmen doesn’t know about this kind of shit.”

“I’m sorry. But can you honestly tell me that red roses were the wrong move to make?”

“Do not try to worm out of this.”

“What do they mean?” Carmen asked. Ivy froze. Player too, fell silent. There was nothing but the drone of the plane engines around them.

“What do red roses mean?” Carmen asked again.

Ivy told her. And then she returned to Zack to give Carmen some time, and Player went radio silent for the same reason, and Carmen remained in the back of the plane, thinking.

Did she mean to give red roses to Julia?

---

Today, Carmen picks up a similar bouquet and signs the card with her name—her real name—and her hands take on an unnatural tremor. She flattens them against the counter, slapping the pen down in the process, and tries to distract herself by watching the florist tie a ribbon around the bouquet. They pull the free ends of the ribbon against the back of the shears to make them curl, then present the flowers to Carmen with a wink.

“Thanks,” Carmen says, weighing the flowers in her arms. Is this only nine roses? It seems heavier than she remembers.

“Good luck.” The florist takes the card and carefully tucks it into the tiny plastic trident bundled with the roses, then waves Carmen away with a smile. Carmen turns and continues down the street.

Carmen used to think she knew what love was. That at least Coach Brunt loved her the way a mother would love a daughter. She knows now that she didn’t. It was the kind of love that one has for a stuffed toy, or a limb, or a tool. She was beloved only because she belonged to VILE and did as she was told.

While she suspected that it wasn’t really love, she didn’t have confirmation of it until she met Carlotta Valdez. She believed that the woman who had captured her father’s heart had to be remarkable and she was right.

Her father gave her mother red roses. Usually a single rose, and sometimes a dozen of them at a time, but Carlotta preferred the single roses. She would tell Carmen how Dexter would break into some poor neighbors’ garden with a pair of shears in his back pocket, and how he would methodically choose the right one.

The neighbors entered their roses into competitions, so they soon learned to get dogs and guns. But Dexter never failed to get a rose. Not only because he was that good, but because he liked to see the look on Carlotta’s face when he presented them to her, and because he knew that no matter how beautiful the rose was, that Carlotta would always be lovelier.

Could Carmen love someone like that? The idea is…well. To be honest, she’s still not sure what love is and what love looks like, but she feels signs of it when she thinks of Player, and Ivy and Zack, and Shadowsan. She feels signs of it when she thinks of Carlotta. She likes to think she could. That she’s capable of it.

Could Carmen love Julia like that?

She would like to try.

Carmen carefully shifts the bouquet in her arms and crosses the street. Julia moved back to Oxford about six months after the raid on VILE headquarters. According to Player, most of VILE were round up by then, and the remaining work that ACME could scrounge up didn’t have anything to do with historical artifacts, so Julia had run out of reasons to stay.

Does Julia still drink tea? Does she still wax poetic about Older Futhark and Coptic?

Is she happy?

The apartment complex is really a collection of handsome brownstones that surround a small courtyard. There’s a barbecue pit set in concrete, and a swingset almost hidden amongst some trees. Two children make a circuit on their bikes, and a woman watches them while she idly pushes a toddler on a swing. Carmen avoids them as best she can and reaches Julia’s door. Music comes from inside; the radio, judging from the overlay of a DJ’s commentary. Carmen reaches up to press the doorbell and hesitates.

Two years and no word. No call, no text. Not even a letter. Two years.

Carmen takes a deep, steadying breath. It is unfortunate, but she had always intended to talk to Julia. Sooner than now, yes, but she did want to talk. She just…lost track of time getting to know her mother. To tell the truth, two years is not enough, but they have the rest of their lives. If Carmen didn’t come to see Julia now, then when would she stop by? In three years? Five?

Yes, it’s been two years, but Carmen is here now. She reaches up and presses the doorbell. There’s a muted chime from within, and a vague shout and footsteps, before the door is pulled open to reveal Julia.

“Hello?” Julia says, her eyes and face bright as if recovering from a bit of laughter, but her smile fades when she sees who it is. Her other hand comes up to cover her mouth.

“Carmen?”

“Hey, Jules,” Carmen says. The both of them stay like that for a moment, letting the music wash around them. The smell of roasted meat wafts around them too, as if Julia were interrupted in the middle of cooking dinner.

Julia’s dark hair is shaggy and ruffled. Carmen doesn’t remember if it’s always been that length, and she just carefully brushed it down for work, or if she’s growing it out. It looks good on her regardless, but then again, Julia could make anything look good.

“Who is it? Is it a package?” An alto voice sounds from within the flat. From the kitchen, wiping their hands on a rag, comes someone wearing an apron over their lean frame. Their dark, medium-length hair is tied back to keep it out of the way. At the sight of Carmen, they go very still, their brown hands still tangled in the kitchen rag.

It’s as if an ice cube has been dropped into Carmen’s stomach.

Julia looks nervously between the two of them. “Mars, this is Carmen, an old friend of mine. Carmen, this is my significant other, Mars Dakila.”

“I know,” Carmen says.

The first time Carmen saw Mars, she was sixteen on VILE Island. Back then, Mars Dakila was Cricket Bat. They arrived at the island and were shut away with the faculty for about an hour before they left with the Cleaners. The students of that year said that Cricket Bat wasn’t a thief at all, and Carmen had wondered why they were affiliated with VILE in the first place if they weren’t a thief.

She got her answer later, after Ivy and Zack had joined her crew. Sharkhead Eddie’s gang had taken over Darryl’s Donut Hole after all, and Carmen meant to break into the vault housed within and burn all of the counterfeit money. When she broke in, however, she found bodies instead. About five men were slaughtered, the dark blood pooling on the white vinyl, and she followed that trail of death to the vault, where Sharkhead Eddie gurgled wetly as he bled out on the floor. Cricket Bat stood over him in their spattered suit, with stained bolo knives in their hands, and dispassionately watched him die.

There was a newspaper article afterwards. The cops said that it was a mob battle, and Carmen supposed that in a way, it was, because the conflicts between VILE and the rest of the East Coast criminal gangs stopped after that.

Now, Cricket Bat, sorry, Mars is a scant seven feet away from Carmen—from Julia—and wiping their hands as if they’ll ever be clean. Julia steps between them, and Carmen blinks. She looks up at Carmen with a half-hard, half-pleading expression and the cold in Carmen’s stomach spreads through the rest of her body.

“We’ve met before,” Carmen says.

“In a different life. Do you want to stay for dinner?” Mars asks. Julia’s eyes widen as she tries to stammer something out.

“I’ll set another plate,” Mars says, and they disappear into the kitchen. Carmen watches them go, and when she’s certain that they’re out of earshot, she leans in towards Julia.

“Jules,” she whispers.

“Yes, I know. But they’ve changed,” Julia whispers back.

Carmen doubts that very much, but Julia continues.

“I swear they’ve changed. If you stay for dinner, you’ll see. Carmen, please.”

“Fine.” Not to see proof of this miraculous turnaround, but to get to the bottom of whatever the hell this is. Something is going on, and Carmen is going to save Julia from it if it’s the last thing she does. She straightens up and takes another deep breath. Julia slumps with relief.

“These are for you.” Carmen holds out the bouquet, and Julia’s eyes flicker with…sadness? Pain? She takes the flowers and cradles them against her chest, then gives Carmen a soft smile.

“Thank you. Would you like to come in?”

Julia moves to let Carmen inside, and goes into the kitchen. Carmen slips her converses off and sets them next to a shoe rack just inside the door. Julia’s heels and flats are there, neatly lined up, but there are also sneakers and brogues that do not belong to Julia. The hooks on the wall above carry two coats and two sets of keys. Carmen ventures in further, her horror growing by the second. Between the front door and the kitchen is enough room for a small dining table, and opposite the table is the living room. In the living room, on the wall above the sofa, is a collection of framed photographs. Carmen recognizes a couple pictures from Julia’s office in Oxford. There are also other people that have Julia’s eyes, or her nose. There is also a picture of Julia and Mars.

It’s a candid shot, judging from the blurriness and the tilt of the camera. Julia’s glasses are askew and she’s laughing. Mars, their face mostly hidden behind Julia’s, presses a kiss to her cheek. Carmen’s stomach lurches dangerously.

CLICK. The music stops as the radio is turned off.

“I’ll just get another bottle from the corner store, Babe,” Mars says as they head towards the door. They pull off the apron and toss it over the back of one of the kitchen chairs. Julia follows them, carrying a vase with the roses.

“I’m not sure that wine will ease this situation at all,” Julia says.

“We won’t know unless we try.” Mars slips on a pair of trainers, takes one of the sets of keys and turns to give Julia a quick kiss. “Be back soon.”

And with that, Mars leaves, shutting the door behind them. There’s an awful silence. Julia nods her head, like she’s psyching herself up, and turns to face Carmen. Her cheeks are pink.

This cannot be real. This…no. This is a sick joke. A prank. Ha ha. Carmen numbly watches as Julia sets the vase on a deep windowsill next to an old Skyflakes tin with a bunch of succulents planted in it. She beckons to Carmen, then returns to the kitchen. Somehow, Carmen finds the strength to follow her.

The kitchen is an organized mess, as most kitchens are while they’re being used. There is a bowl of mashed potatoes, a tray of roasted broccoli, and rack with two steaks. The sink is piled high with utensils. Julia takes a covered baking pan from the fridge. She uses a pair of tongs to take a steak from it and the places it in a skillet on the stove, where it starts sizzling. Julia puts the pan back in the fridge, sets the tongs off to the side, and looks at Carmen expectantly.

“Is ‘Mars Dakila’ even their real name?” Carmen asks.

“It’s their real name now,” Julia says. She turns the overhead fan on and returns to the skillet. There’s sauce in it too, and she tilts the skillet a little so that it all gathers to one side. Julia takes a spoon and begins scooping the sauce over the steak bit by bit, making sure to baste the entire thing.

“Does Player know?” Carmen asks.

“No,” Julia says.

“Do Ivy and Zack know?”

���No. And they don’t need to know.”

“Listen, Jules. I don’t know what they told you, but I know for a fact that they’re VILE. Faculty sent the Cleaners to clean, but they sent Cricket Bat to make messes. I….” Carmen pulls her hands down her face. “They’re dangerous, Jules!”

“Perhaps that was true two years ago, but they teach escrima at a local gym now. They’re reformed.” Julia picks the tongs back up and flips the steak, then continues scooping sauce. Carmen cannot believe what she is hearing.

“How long have they been conning you?” Carmen asks. Julia gives her a sidelong glance.

“They’re not conning me.”

“How long, Jules?”

Julia sighs through her nose. “We celebrated our one year about two months ago. Does that sound like a con to you?”

“Some cons go on for like seven years.” Carmen fights through a rising tide of guilt and desperation. Oh she is a fool. How could she possibly think she could go to Argentina for two whole years and expect everything to be fine? What an idiot she is! What a moron! And now Julia is completely blind to the danger she is mired in.

“It isn’t a con, Carmen,” Julia insists. She picks the tongs up one last time and uses it to prop the steak up on its side against the pan. She holds it upright and moves it a little every now and then to finish the sear.

Carmen could just…leave with Julia. She could just throw her over her shoulder and take her somewhere safe.

Julia sets the steak on the rack along with the others, then turns off the stove and the fan. She leans against the counter, her head hanging in defeat. “Carmen, why did you come back?” She asks in a hushed voice.

“What?”

“I mean, why now? Just as I was starting to…. I was finally….” Julia raises her head and Carmen doesn’t think she’s ever been the target of such longing. Unbidden, Carmen steps closer, and Julia’s eyebrows scrunch together as she continues to gaze up at her. Julia’s hand comes up as if to touch her arm, but she falters and it drops away.

“Jules,” Carmen breathes.

“You disappeared. I wasn’t surprised because that’s what you do, but then you stayed disappeared and I….” Julia drops her gaze. “You deserved to rest. You deserved to meet your mother in peace.”

She says the last part in near monotone, as if by rote.

“And I wouldn’t have been able to do that if it weren’t for you. I should’ve thanked you when I got that file. I should’ve thanked you sooner,” Carmen says. Julia’s cheeks turn pink.

“That wasn’t me.”

“I know it was you, Jules. Thank you for finding her.”

Julia waves it away, her blush spreading to her ears, but she asks, “is she nice, at least?”

“She’s wonderful.”

A bittersweet smile spreads over Julia’s face. “Good.”

Come with me, Carmen wants to ask. Julia could meet her mother and see for herself. But the front door opens, and Mars returns with a paper bag in hand. They slip their shoes off and put the keys back on the hook. Julia steps away so fast, it’s as if she’s scalded herself. She skirts around Carmen and goes to Mars. Carmen resists the urge to take her arm.

“I know you don’t like super dry wines, so I got a merlot,” Mars says. Their brown eyes light up when Julia comes near, and they hold the paper bag out to her.

Julia takes the bag and rucks it down to read the label on the bottle. “Not bad.”

“See? I know what I’m doing.” Mars kisses her cheek and—to Carmen’s dismay—Julia returns it. She does it absently, out of habit, before she catches herself and freezes. But Mars is already stepping around her and towards the kitchen.

“Was there enough sauce left for a third steak?” They ask.

“I managed it all right,” Julia says.

“Cool.” Mars comes to a stop just out of arm’s reach and tilt their head as they regard Carmen. “Sandiego.”

Carmen’s last name hasn’t been Sandiego in a long time, but she’s not telling them that. “Dakila.”

Behind Mars, Julia shies away as if witnessing an impending car crash.

“Would it be better if I ate with a butter knife instead of a regular steak knife?” Mars asks.

“You could make a plastic knife dangerous, Dakila.”

Julia gasps. “Carmen!”

Mars grins at Julia over their shoulder. “It’s okay, Julia. I’ll eat kamayan style if I have to.”

The name rolls so easily through Mars’ mouth with such familiarity and with such affection that Carmen must resist the urge to tackle them to the floor. Somehow, she unsticks her feet and moves out of the way.

---

The dining table is a small, rustic thing covered in scuffs and dents. To save on space, one end of the rectangle has been pushed against the wall. Julia sits at the remaining short side, and Carmen and Mars sit opposite each other.

While Carmen has never eaten dinner while within three feet of a serial killer, she has had worse evenings before. At least the food is good.

“But because I’m taking more classes than usual, my advisor expects me to graduate in three years, not four,” Julia is in the middle of saying. “I honestly didn’t think that I was taking that heavy a course load.”

“‘Doctor Argent,’” Carmen says, testing out the title. Julia ducks, her face going pink again. “It sounds nice.”

“My students already call me that, even though I tell them not to.”

“You still teach?”

“All phd candidates do. Just the introduction courses though, so it’s just the basics.”

“But you still love it.”

“I do.” Julia beams. “You know, I wouldn’t be able to do all of this in the first place if Mars wasn’t around. They take care of everything.”

“Do they?”

Mars has been mostly quiet all through dinner. They have a knife and fork after all, but they take care to keep their hands above the table, and to move deliberately and slowly. Once in a while, they’ll smile at something Julia says, as if sharing a private joke, or they’ll answer in short sentences, but that’s about it.

“Well, they do most of the cooking and the cleaning because they happen to like cooking and they happen to be rather fastidious,” Julia says.

“It’s the strangest sugaring arrangement I’ve ever been in. I’ve never paid anyone with chores before,” Mars says. Julia gasps and swats their arm, making them squawk.

“You absolute scoundrel! Don’t say that when we both know how whipped you are.”

Mars laughs. They laugh and their eyes light up again. “True! You’re probably the only person on the surface of this planet who could make me do anything.”

Carmen’s insides twist horribly.

After dinner, Carmen helps Julia clear the table and put the leftovers away. Julia ties the garbage bag shut with a double knot and tugs it free of the bin. Mars steps up to the sink and Julia tsks.

“Oh Mars, I’ll take care of those; you did most of the cooking.”

But Mars lathers the sponge and starts washing the dishes anyway. “It’s okay, Babe, I’ve got it.”

“I’ll help them,” Carmen says. Mars glances at her from the corner of their eyes.

“Really? Okay.”

Carmen takes a kitchen towel and stands at the dish rack next to Mars. Julia stares at them.

“You can’t be serious,” Julia half-whispers to herself, then louder, “Behave! Both of you.”

“Of course, Babe,” Mars says.

“I mean it,” Julia says, glaring at them both. “I will not come back to a dead body, understand?”

Mars smiles at her. “Yes, Julia.”

“Sure thing, Jules,” Carmen says.

This seems to mollify her, and she leaves to toss the garbage in the complex dumpster. Mars and Carmen wash and dry the dishes in silence. They pass the pans and the dishes first, and also the cutting board.

“You’re using Jules to escape ACME,” Carmen says. Mars’ eyes flicker, but they continue to wash.

“It certainly started that way, but then they stopped being a threat and I kinda…stuck around. Julia’s a remarkable woman.”

“Does she know how many people you’ve killed?”

“I don’t do that anymore; I promised her I wouldn’t,” Mars says as they place the trays and glasses into the rack.

“Oh, like that’s enough to stop you from killing again.”

“Be as skeptical as you want; I don’t care what you think. What matters is that Julia believes me.”

“What kind of sob story did you tell her to get her to trust you?” Carmen asks.

Mars shakes their head and starts cleaning the utensils. “I can’t believe this,” they mutter under their breath.

“Jules deserves better than to be swindled….”

“No, you know what, Sandiego? You just left her. You left. You wanted a fresh start and you got a fresh start and when you got it, you decided that there was no room in it for Julia. You decided that.”

By miracle, Carmen manages to not drop anything despite the shaking of her hands. Who the hell does Cricket Bat think they are to talk to her like this? As if she doesn’t care about Julia. Like she isn’t terrified that one day, she’s going to find out that Julia’s dead because Mars got tired of her, or didn’t need her anymore.

Because no matter what Mars says, they must be pulling a con. They have to be. They would never admit it, and if they passionately exclaim how much they ‘love’ Julia and it happens to sound genuine, then either they’re a very good actor, or they’re starting to buy their own con.

“How long did you expect Julia to wait around for you? Five years? Ten? Assuming you came back at all,” Mars continues.

“If Jules wants to be with someone else, fine. She deserves to be happy. But not with you. You’re a murderer,” Carmen says.

Mars glances at the vase of roses in the windowsill. “Maybe Julia shouldn’t take advice on her love life from you. Gotta say, green is an awful color on you, Sandiego.”

Carmen’s hands freeze above the utensils drawer. Everything else has been put away except one final steak knife. She holds the handle loosely between three fingers, and with one movement, she could just let go. She could drop the knife into the drawer.

Drop the knife, Carmen. Julia has been gone for several minutes now, so she’ll be back at any moment.

Drop the knife.

Beside her, Mars stands before a bare sink, hands empty except for a dishrag that they wind around their forearm in preparation.

“Mean it when you swing it, Sandiego.”

[idga-buck]

Some and Others, 3/?

Earth’s mightiest heroes save the city again, but that’s never the end of the story.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Word Count: 4,301

Content: canon typical violence, death, destruction, swearing

Bucky was going to call. He just didn’t. He was surprised you hadn’t and overwhelmingly disappointed that it meant if he was going to apologize, it was a conversation he’d have to initiate himself. It could wait though. Just a little longer while he figured out what he wanted to say.

A week later, the Post ran a story about the same gossip site that had leaked your photo of him being shut down after many of their stories and photos were found to be fake. A rarity for the world of journalism these days, Sam noted casually as they stopped at a newspaper cart. Bucky bought a couple candy bars and watched the man with the thick black mustache and the gold chain slip copies of the article in front of a few of his worst sellers. Could he actually be that lucky? It was an easy out after a week of dodging questions and trying to remind the world to stay out of his business.

“So that photo of you? The secret girlfriend?” Sam waited for Bucky to respond, but when the centenarian opted to buy a Pay Day instead, he watched closer. Bucky hated that. Sam said he had a staring problem, but Sam was the one with x-Ray vision. He could read people, read a room, read Steve’s body language from across a battlefield and adjust his position without being told. As annoyed as Bucky acted when paired up with Sam Wilson, he was one of the few people in this century that Bucky Barnes respected. Truly. Except for that moment on a street corner when brown eyes were scanning his complete lack of guts and deciding what was worth commenting on.

“Yeah,” Bucky ripped open the wrapper a little too aggressively and responded with peanuts between his teeth. “It wasn’t real.”

Sam nodded and stuffed his hands in his pockets while Bucky stuffed his face. “I don’t know how you land the fake girlfriend story, when I’m right here,” they started walking away from the stand while Sam jabbered on. “And lookin’ as fine as I do? Come on, man,” he danced ahead of Bucky a few steps, forcing him to look up. “You know this would make a better story.”

Before Bucky could say anything, a loud crash echoed between the buildings. Nothing was visible from their block, but both men, trained for combat, were instantly on alert.

“That for us?” Sam asked, eyeing the busy intersection.

“No,” said Bucky, a clipped tone in his voice as he shook his head and started walking again.

Another crash, this time accompanied by the faint human noises that usually follow tragedy.

“You sure about that?” Sam’s eyebrow shot up.

Sirens from every kind emergency response vehicle blared in the distance, growing louder then quieter again as they wove their way through the streets, changing directions to avoid traffic.

Bucky pointed at a passing fire truck, waiting until it had turned down another street before speaking. “See? They got it.”

Then Sam’s phone rang and Bucky swore, planting his hands on his hips while whoever was on the other line confirmed that the emergency growing in the distance was in fact for them. Sam placed the call on speaker and gave their current location. Stark’s voice was muffled and metallic, the way it usually was while calling from inside his fancy helmet, but he told them to stay put as he did a fly by with Sam’s equipment.

“Tell the Tin Man he’s got a special delivery,” Tony informed them from somewhere overhead.

“They're your wings,” Bucky grumbled, looking up from the ground as the familiar glare of Iron Man’s thrusters came into view. “And your robot.”

“First of all,” Sam informed him. “Red Wing isn’t a robot. He’s a drone.”

“It,” Bucky corrected, “is a robot.”

“I’m gonna tell him you said that,” said Sam before pointing up to where Iron Man had doubled back to get a better angle. “And… unlike some of us present, my body is exactly as God created it, flesh and bone.”

“Pop up, deep center,” Tony’s voice rang out obnoxiously through Sam’s phone once more.

Bucky watched a black bundle falling from the sky, trying to position himself under it and pushing more than one pedestrian out of his way to do so. “Actually, I was a catcher back in ‘32.”

“THEN CATCH!” Sam hollered just before the EXO Falcon gear landed square in Bucky’s chest, forcing him off his feet and onto his ass, skidding to a stop on a sidewalk while the people around them scattered, gasping and grabbing at their phones to take pictures of the two Avengers. Bucky laid flat on his back, both arms still wrapped around the bundle, and took a deep breath when Sam stood over his head, arms shooting out to his sides as he yelled “SAFE!”

Bucky groaned and tossed the black bag up into Sam’s arms, hard enough to make him stumble but not enough to knock him down. “Should have said ‘out.’” Bucky grumbled and Sam chuckled as he dug through the bag for his equipment. “Safe makes it sound like I-”

“You really wanna argue about baseball right now,” Sam laughed, securing his wings over his torso and releasing them both with a flash as if stretching before a fight. “Or are we gonna go save the world?” Bucky didn’t answer, just took off running in the direction of the screams. “That’s what I’m talking about,” said Sam to himself, shooting up into the air.

…

Robots. Drones. Whatever they, Bucky Barnes has decided that he hates them.

Fighting Nazis was easy. Not physically. Not when your gun isn’t really yours and the food sucks and you’re almost as worried about losing your toes as you are losing your team. But it made sense. These men in their wool coats wanted innocent deaths. Something in Bucky that had been there all along was born anew in the war. He was a protector. Of his sisters, of Steve, of his country. It made sense.

Nothing about Hydra made sense and the therapist he stopped seeing told him it was okay to think about those years differently than the rest. So he did.

When T’challa presented him with a black vibranium canon for his left side, the enemy was otherworldly. Literally. They didn’t bleed like men. They made horrible screeching noises when they died, but even that was different from me. They rode disgusting creatures with teeth that could have scratched his arm if he’d let them get close enough. They were invaders, their leader sought destruction on an even greater scale than the War. Bucky was a protector again, protector of Earth, of life in the universe. An unimaginable title for the boy he’d been, sitting in front of the radio with his family and marveling at the president's voice. It’s not like he was eager to do it again, but space invaders whose goal was universal genocide would be met with the business end of Bucky’s favorite rifle.

Fighting robots, however, was fucked up.

Bucky was still processing his new life, still getting used to the idea that people carried plastic cards in their wallets and could pull money out of the walls with just a few buttons. There were movie theaters with screens two stories high. Cars plugged into the sides of hotels. The cell phone in his pocket was overwhelming as is. In a few minutes, he could buy all the clothes he’d ever need, pay for dinner, and talk to people across the country. It was baffling.

All this technology, all this progress, and of course there were people who weaponized it. Bucky hated that. He remembered science fairs, remembered Howard Stark’s big promises. There was so much hope in him as a young man. He’d live to drive a flying car, his children would learn about the world through a holograms in their livingroom, his grandchildren would live on the moon. The possibilities were endless. So much so that people with horrible intentions for the world also believed that the possibilities were endless, forcing Bucky into his current position.

His thighs were wrapped around the base of a machine, arms wound near the top. He threw his shoulders back with all of his might, squeezing his legs in the process, and didn’t stop until the metal gave way. Bucky fell onto the pavement with his own momentum, the enemy in two pieces with wires exposed and frizzling as they died. He dropped the robot and rolled to his side, observing the scene around him. Steve used a cleaner approach and sent his shield flying through the air. Three more bots’ were sliced in two, the last of which was pinned by the shield into the side of a brick building. Sam circled above, with Redwing swooping below to draw laser fire away from bystanders while Wanda tried her best to herd them away, spinning to throw angry red energy at anything that came their direction.

“Sergeant Barnes!” The familiar and overly excited voice of the kid in blue and red spider gear startled Bucky. The kid swung in unexpectedly, decked out and ready to help. Bucky didn’t care that he was probably skipping school to do so and swung his vibranium arm behind him, the metal of another droid crunching under his elbow. “How can I help?”

Bucky squinted, a little dumbfounded at the question. There was a six block radius being overrun with droids, drones, robots- whatever- and people were terrified. “Pick something,” he grunted, taking the robot's head… top part, between his hands and twisting until it gave way and the bottom half dropped powerless to the ground.

Just then the sound of metal screeching pulled both their eyes to a city bus being thrown around like it was weightless, crunching the vehicles nearby, and sending more people into a frenzy as buildings were still evacuating onto the street. “That! Pick that!” Bucky commanded and the kid flew away, attached to a white string like a kite. Two more robots were approaching from the sidewalk, red eyes glowing and ready to fire. Bucky looked around the street for something, anything that he could use before deciding on a minivan. The windows looked clear, driver and passengers already scampering away at the first sign of trouble, so Bucky planted his boot into the back door and kicked. The door caved in and the vehicle flipped onto its side before skidding to a halt on the sidewalk and crushing the robots beneath it.

“Uh! MISTER BARNES, SIR, SARGE-!”

Bucky turned back to look at Peter, propped up on a light pole and leaning so far back his body was almost parallel to the ground. The only thing keeping him upright was the two thick white webs attached to the bus, one at the front and one at the back. It was tipping over dangerously low, trapping a small group of people between the bus and two buildings, one that had smoke billowing out the windows. This was a mess.

Bucky ran through the street, jumping onto the hoods of abandoned cars to avoid weaving between them before leaping off an SUV and rolling back into a run on the sidewalk. A laser struc Peter, knocking him clean off his perch, and the webs supporting the bus went dangerously slack as it started tipping toward the trapped people again. Bucky jumped, wedging himself between the building and the collapsing bus with great effort. His shoulders dug into the brick behind him and his thighs burned as he shoved the bus away from the wall, gritting his teeth as he felt it slowly start to tip away from the ground. The kid was now on the ground somewhere out of sight and Bucky had to hold back from sending the vehicle flying, lest he squash Stark’s favorite spider in the process. The tension in his legs grew as he held it steady, adjusting his feet and shoulders until he felt it wasn’t going anywhere.

“Hey!” He called out to the people below him. “Get out of here, go!”

There were rushed thank yous and lots of tears as the crowd dispersed from their trapped position. But one voice stood out among them and it made Bucky’s heart speed up.

“Bucky?! Oh my god, BUCKY!”

Bucky’s eyes were closed under the strain, but he’d know your voice anywhere. He opened them just in time to see Peter recover and zip off in a new direction. Bucky released his breath and shoved his feet out hard, tipping the bus back. He dropped from the wall and grabbed you as the bus wobbled precariously in both directions before finally falling into traffic and directly onto the roof of an empty red sports car.

Bucky hadn’t realized how tight he was holding you until you said his name again and the word was broken. His arms relaxed a bit, but you made no move to run away… or let go of his jacket. The two of you just stared at each other, breathing heavily, before screaming drew your eyes away. The small crowd of people you’d been stuck with were running away from where you stood, but the two in the back collapsed, their bodies charred and heavy as they hit the ground. You screamed then and Bucky pulled your back into his chest, hugging your stomach as you keeled over. He’d seen so much death in his hundred odd years, it was hard to witness it with these fresh eyes. You weren’t prepared to watch two innocent people’s skin melting under lasers. Hell, neither was Bucky and while you cried in his arms, the smell of burning flesh stung his eyes. He’d never get over that smell, no matter how many world wars he participated in. His face was buried in the back of your head, shushing you as he lifted you up. He took careful backwards steps until you were both hidden in the same alley you’d just been trapped in. Bucky looked up at the burning building and decided he had a minute before you were both in danger here.

“Hey,” he said softly when you went limp against his chest. “Hey now,” he repeated, spinning and almost dropping you when he realized you hadn’t just relaxed… you were unconscious. “Shit,” Bucky dropped to his knees and let your body lean up against his chest, slapping at your cheeks and calling your name to try and wake you up. Half of your face was red with blood from a wound he couldn’t see somewhere in your hair. Break up or no break up, he couldn’t leave you like this. Any other person, he’d run them to safety and double back to continue clearing the streets. But this wasn’t any person. It was the girl he dumped in the middle of a restaurant and had continuously put off calling to explain himself. He hadn’t gotten the chance to clear the air and leaving you to wake up in a few hours in the middle of a destroyed midtown was just too cruel. He did like you and now it felt like he owed you.

Bucky picked you up like a doll and slung you around to his back, crossing your arms over his chest as your legs dangled behind his knees. That wasn’t going to work, he decided after only a few steps. “Can you hold on a little-“ Bucky drifted off as he turned his face to see your face hidden behind him, your forehead limply resting against his shoulder. “Of course not,” he berated himself and stopped to adjust again. This time he stooped, grabbing one of your arms and one of your legs with his hands. You were slung over his shoulders like a backpack, the same way he carried goats in Wakanda, only much easier since you weren’t kicking or screaming and he had two hands with which to wrangle you.

His steady march out of the fray was interrupted once by Wanda. After directing pockets of people to safety, she’d sought out the source of the invasion. Bucky looked around for a safe place to stow your body and found an SUV that was abandoned but still running with the doors unlocked to lay you out across the backseat, carefully tucking your feet in before slamming the door behind him. He liked Wanda, despite not knowing what exactly she was capable of, but liked her a lot less when he found himself immersed in a glowing red forcefield and being lifted into the sky. When he was forced through the large glass window of another building only to look up and find her floating gently through the hole his body had created, she shrugged.

“This way was faster,” she said, Sokovian accent much softer than their first meeting.

“Right,” Bucky groaned, making a mental note of how many Avengers could zip through the air with ease and the odds of being the one she found on the ground.

They raced up the final set of stairs and Bucky ripped the maintenance door to the roof off its hinges. It was unlucky that Bucky and Wanda had been the ones to find the bastard responsible. If it had been Steve, he’d been bound and handed over to the authorities. Tony might have thrown him in armored vehicle and shook him around a bit before demanding answers. Bruce… depending on the day wouldn’t have been much better. Nat would have gotten answers easier than either of them and Sam was easily the most noble of the bunch, so Bucky had no idea what he’d do. The right thing, whatever that was. But Wanda wasn’t particularly fond of people who harmed innocent people. The motivation didn’t much matter to her when the sounds of children crying could be heard in the streets. Bucky didn’t have much grace for people who were smart enough to help, but broken enough to hurt. Like the bastards in Hydra, who healed him, kept him alive, gave him extraordinary strength then weaponized him. Anyone who had this level of technological advancement and chose to bring destruction with it was a waste of air. Wanda hoisted the man up into one of her angry red orbs while Bucky broke the control panel into as many pieces as he could, destroying anyone else’s opportunity to learn from this guy. Neither of them had anticipated this guy to be so well armed. It looked like a pistol, but whatever it fired managed to get through Wanda’s energy field and pierce her shoulder, breaking her focus just enough for him to drop back onto the roof. He took off running to the edge and leapt, but Wanda recovered faster, using her powers to yank him back. Bucky caught him in the air and squeezed, locking the man in a painful hold until he noticed glowing red numbers counting down behind the man’s neck. Shit.

“Bucky!” Wanda pointed at the man’s hands, wrapped threateningly around a plunger that could only mean one thing.

Without a better option, Bucky turned back to edge. He released the man and as he tried to stumble forward, Bucky’s boot landed square against his sacrum, launching the man through the air and into a neighboring building in a ball of fire. Both Avengers watched the corner offices go up in flames, disgust and horror in both their eyes.

“The whole block was evacuated,” Wanda said softly and Bucky nodded. There was a distinct lack of screaming coming from the direction of the building and sirens soon flooded the streets below as first responders made their way into critical areas. From the ledge, both of them watched as the remaining bots dropped to the ground before their team, disengaging en masse. Steve looked up from atop a bodega and saluted the sky in their general direction, lifting the shield as a second acknowledgment before jumping down to the street to start… whatever Captain America does once the threat has been neutralized. The PR and clean up stuff wasn’t Bucky’s scene and he turned away, making it all the way across the roof, still observing the scene below, before remembering that you were somewhere, either still unconscious or just waking up, deeply confused in the back of a stranger’s car.

“You okay?” Bucky asked, wanting to make sure before asking Wanda for any favors.

She pulled her hand away from her shoulder, black nail polish and red blood looking menacing and downright witchy against her pale fingers. “I’ll be alright,” she assured him, eyes already glowing red as she prepared to offer more aid.

Bucky stopped her and nodded over the side of the building. “Gimme a lift?”

She snorted and waved her fingers without looking at him and soon enough, Bucky found himself falling on his ass once again. He needed to work on his dismount if this was going to become a regular pairing. Thankfully or maybe not, you were trying to wake up as Bucky slipped into the driver’s seat and commandeered the vehicle. He turned back to watch you whine in pain as you tried to sit up, before slipping back into sleep when he told you to stay down. You were in and out for most of the drive, which helped Bucky weave up and over curbs to avoid stagnant areas where everyone had abandoned their cars out of fear.

…

You woke up with a headache, exasperated by the bright lights of the emergency room. Bucky could see the moment you came to by the hard squinting that melted into a grimace. You’d had a couple false starts, but when your eyes opened and locked on his, Bucky knew it was the real deal this time. He stood to pull back the curtain and immediately a nurse was shimmying her way into your space, brushing her chest against Bucky’s in the process. He nodded and gave her a tight smile. It had been like that since he walked into the ER with you. Avengers carrying blacked out civilians get a lot of attention, but they also get speedy service. Which is what Bucky told himself when he stuck around once you’d been admitted. You’d get better care if he stayed with you, so he did. Feet propped up on the end of your bed and dropping whenever someone came to run another test. He wasn’t family and didn’t claim to be, so they told him nothing, but nurses managed to smile flirtatiously in between doing their job. In another life, Bucky would have… done something. Anything. He smiled. He was a hundred, not dead, but there was something off putting about receiving these looks when you were asleep right there between hanging curtains in an overrun hospital as ambulances and families started to arrive from the mess he’d just left.

You answered their questions slowly, but correctly. Your name, where you were, what year it is, who the president is. The doctor would be in soon and Bucky took the minute of alone time to scoot the chair they’d brought in for him. You were watching him expectantly as the legs scraped across the floor, just a few inches before he could reach a hand out to yours. You looked down curiously at your hand in Bucky’s.

“They spelled my name wrong,” you murmured and Bucky’s eyes fluttered shut as you lifted your joined hands to observe the little plastic bracelet closer. He shook his head, wanting to apologize, but also hoping you wouldn’t connect the dots that he’d given them your information incorrectly. “Bucky?” He looked up to find your eyes wider than usual, a little more vulnerable than he was used to seeing you and wanted to do something to make you feel better. But like the entirety of your relationship, he had no idea how to do that.

“You’re okay,” he nodded, telling himself as much as he was telling you.

“Thank you,” you squeezed his fingers as your voice shook.

Just then a man in a white coat, pushed back the curtain and Bucky stood reflexively, dropping your hand in the process. He turned back and saw your face fall before crossing your arms over your chest and looking away from him.

“Sergeant Barnes,” the doctor addressed him first.

“Bucky,” he corrected without thinking and turned his body, opening up the room a bit and directing attention back to what mattered. The patient. You.

“Thank you for bringing her in,” the doctor continued, then looked back and forth between the two of you. “We’ve got it from here, if you need to-”

“He can stay,” you piped up. The doctor asked if you were sure, but you were. The doctor nodded, turning fully toward the bed and while that was Bucky’s goal, he now felt completely out of place in the tiny space.

“First things first,” the doctor started. “You and the baby are just fine, so I don’t want you worrying about that at all. Do you have a OB or a-”

Bucky stopped listening at that moment and focused on the roaring ocean in his ears. He looked to the bed where you were listening intently to what the doctor was saying, nodding and shaking your head mechanically. While he stared, you stole a glance in his direction. Your face was blank and he didn’t spend much time trying to read it.

“This sounds personal,” he said, voice flat and vibranium hand already reaching for the curtain at the end of your bed. “Take care.” Without sparing another look, Bucky walked through the busy emergency room with his left hand tucked into his front pocket, making him invisible to anyone who didn’t know he was there.

A/N: Here we go! It’s happening. I’m not sold on the way this ended but it was getting long as is and don’t worry, Bucky will have his chance to make it up to you.

Tags: @fangirl-swagg @learisa

[jaskiersvalley]

Vulture In Lark’s Clothing

As a rule of thumb, Geralt didn’t ask questions. He assessed a contract from purely his own perspective, whether it was worth his time and danger and, if he deemed it valuable, he took it. No questions asked. No prying into who he was protecting, who he was escorting or why. If the money was good, he did it. It was why people liked him so much, employed him despite his less than sociable demeanour. The job got done and he didn’t fuss, even if he got blood and guts in his hair.

His latest contract was a curious one. Pick someone up from prison and escort them to the other side of the country to a hearing. Allegedly he was a witness but Geralt couldn’t care if it was his own hearing. A job was a job.

There have been many people Geralt had met but not a single one had been quite as exasperating as Jaskier. Who the fuck got arrested with only a lute and some fancy clothes to their name? Jaskier. Obviously. But it was neither here nor there. What mattered was that he was constantly making noise. Wherever he went, the lute did too. Even when Geralt threatened to throw it out the car window, Jaskier had just laughed and began composing a ditty about a tumbleweed crossing a country having more of a personality than Geralt.

The thing that made Geralt so good at his job was his ability to just deal with things without a fuss. He’d picked up on the fact they were being followed a while back. It wasn’t anything to be concerned about just yet. Well, he was concerned but he had it in hand. Their tail was keeping their distance, watching and assessing.

“So, our charming friend has been very thorough in his observations,” Jaskier commented out of the blue as they had stopped to get lunch. The ever present lute was leaning against his chair as he picked through a salad, eating all the onion from it.

“Nothing to worry about.” Geralt replied and munched steadily on his burger.

That night they were in a motel, Jaskier in the bed, Geralt on the sofa. When Geralt woke up suddenly, he tried to figure out what had roused him. A peek into the bedroom and Jaskier wasn’t there. Probably gone to the bathroom but checking there revealed an empty room. Scouting through the kitchen and living room, Geralt was ready to grab his guns and track down the idiot who stole him. To do that, he would need information, namely how some schmuck got into the bedroom and abducted Jaskier from under his nose. Pushing the bedroom door open, Geralt blinked. There was Jaskier, curled up in bed and fast asleep. Maybe Geralt was more tired that he’d thought, to have missed the fact Jaskier was there all along. He returned to the sofa and tucked his guns under the cushion, grumbling. Weirdly enough, their tail was gone the next morning.

One problem with Jaskier (well, one of the many) was the fact that he was so soft. Always demanding they stop over night somewhere with a decent bed, getting stroppy when they only bought food from a petrol station, he even went as far as kicking up a fuss when they hadn’t had the chance to shower for three days. How he survived in prison was beyond Geralt. He wouldn’t ask though, that wasn’t his place and asking meant he might actually care. Which he most certainly didn’t.

A spot of trouble happened at one of the restaurants they had stopped off at. A group of idiots had taken quite a dislike to Jaskier singing in the corner while Geralt ordered at the bar. They were closing in on him and Geralt could hear his name being called. To cut a violent story short, the men didn’t end up bothering Jaskier. But the price of that was being barred from the restaurant. From in front of the door they had just been thrown through, Jaskier turned, hands in the air as he cursed them, threatened to write a scathing song and leave a very rude review online. Silently, Geralt wiped the blood from his knuckles and walked towards the car. This job was starting be much more of a hassle than worth.

At least, he thought that until Jaskier turned his flirting to Geralt. It had been common enough for Jaskier to wink and compliment his way through any establishment they set foot in. Praise for the receptionist at the motel, a smile filled with promise to the attendant at the petrol station, he even had the gall to blatantly and appreciatively give the cleaner of the restaurant bathroom once over the one time. As an outsider, Geralt found it charmingly sleazy. But even he couldn’t deny that it was worth the small upgrades he would never have got before.

“You never know who you’re meeting,” Jaskier had reasoned.

The attention Jaskier started paying Geralt was awkward at first. Geralt had no idea what to do. He’d seen Jaskier go through the motions umpteen times before, knew it didn’t mean anything. And yet, he wanted to feel as special as Jaskier suggested he was. Which was just ludicrous, Geralt didn’t need someone’s approval or appreciation. Especially not from an incompetent criminal who got caught. And couldn’t even protect himself from a bunch of idiots at a restaurant. What Geralt missed was the news article about the murder or four men in the town they had just left behind, throats slit.

Whoever Jaskier was, Geralt was starting to realise that he was more important that he thought before. The closer they got to their destination, the more trouble they ran into. Not just people trailing after them now but actual attempts on Jaskier’s life. As if the idiot had actually realised. He merrily strutted through the world as if it was the safest place, strumming his lute and humming. And flirting. Always flirting, even with the pigeons by his feet if the mood took. Yet, Geralt still felt a warmth spreading through him whenever Jaskier smiled at him. It seemed like a special smile, warmer and even more sincere than the ones he gave everyone else. It made Geralt feel alarmingly disarmed in the face of it.

He’d just finished mopping up a trail of people after Jaskier who flounced through little side streets without a worry. This was the reason Geralt liked to wear black clothes, they didn’t show up anywhere near as much blood. Though, to be fair, he did try to just knock people out first. A warning of sorts that if they got near again, he could and would do so much worse.

“Ah! Geralt! I was wondering where you got to.” Jaskier skipped towards him. Actually skipped.

“I had business to take care of.” What he didn’t expect was for Jaskier to push his lute onto his back and stand almost nose to nose with him.

“My wonderful White Wolf, always keeping an eye out for me,” he breathed, eyes flicking to Geralt’s lips. As if Geralt wasn’t paid to keep him alive. It sure as shit wasn’t Geralt doing this out of the goodness of his heart. All thoughts however flew from his mind as Jaskier tugged him in for a kiss. There was a hand in his hair, a tongue in his mouth and a hand drifted over his hip.

The sound of a gun going off was deafening and Geralt froze, eyes opening to see Jaskier, eyes open and staring past Geralt’s head even as they kissed. Pulling away, Geralt looked over his shoulder. There was a body sprawled on the ground, very obviously dead. And Jaskier’s arm was still out, gun in hand.

“I think you missed one,” Jaskier smiled merrily as if he hadn’t just shot someone in a back alley. There was no response to that, Geralt’s brain was a blank static as he tried to realign his opinion or Jaskier with this new information.

“What?” That was going to have to do. It conveyed everything and Jaskier liked to talk anyway.

As expected, Jaskier laughed lightly and tucked the gun he’d slipped from Geralt’s hip back into its holster and patted his cheek fondly. “Well, you’ve been doing such a great job of taking care of the bumps along the road, I didn’t see the need to intervene most of the time.”

The ‘most of the time’ had Geralt’s hackles rising. He was damn good at his job and didn’t need some two-bit idiot claiming to step in to mop up after him. He growled low in his throat, a noise that usually sent most people scattering in fear. However, Jaskier just laughed in his face and called him cute, proceeded to plant another kiss on Geralt’s lips and turned to continue his journey, expecting Geralt to trail after him.

Things didn’t get easier after that. Geralt was trying his best to keep professional and not ask anything about just who Jaskier was. But it wasn’t very professional to fall into bed with Jaskier at any chance he got. Motel bed, bathroom stall, once even in the car, pulled over on the side of the road. It was messy but so damn satisfying.

As always, things went tits up three hours before they got to their destination. There was a car chase that ended with Jaskier hanging out the window of their car and taking alarmingly good potshots at their attackers. They worked in tandem with more ease than Geralt had ever experienced with anyone. While he was on the offensive, Jaskier was restocking in more and more creative ways. He sent a Molotov cocktail of, actually, Geralt didn’t want to think about what he found in the hardware shop to use for that. It exploded, there were screams and they had a window of opportunity to run.

In a way, Geralt almost regretted it. Because while he was loading his guns, Jaskier was hurling hammers, wielding circular saw blades like his personal throwing stars and causing a rather gory mess. At least Geralt managed to wrangle the chainsaw from his grip before he went into a full on fight with that. It was the moment Geralt understood how Jaskier survived prison.

Outside the courtroom, Geralt turned to Jaskier, finally asking the question he had been wanting to all along.

“Who the hell are you?”

It was met with a delighted laugh. “Ever heard of The Bard?” Geralt shook his head. “Little Lark?” Another shake of his head and Jaskier looked both exhilarated and aghast. “The hitman of the century? The singing killer? No?”

“No.” Geralt shook his head.

“In which case,” Jaskier stuck his head out, “I’m Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove.”

“Oh,” Geralt heard that name before. “The one with all the sheep.”

Another light laugh and Jaskier nodded. “The one with all the sheep. Well, thank you for your help in escorting me across the country. I must go, take a plea deal. But be in Blaviken in a year. There’s a dear little cafe there, order me one of their chocolate twists and a cold chocolate for an 11 o’clock date. I’ll meet you there.”

Sure enough, Jaskier took a plea deal, his sentence was reduced from life to twenty-five years. How he thought he’d be in Blaviken a year on, Geralt couldn’t fathom. But once he got the chance, he sat down and did his research, to find out who exactly he had travelled with. And swallowed thickly in fear and awe. Because oh fuck, Jaskier had history and a list of kills longer than Geralt. And those were just the confirmed ones. Fuck.

Despite everything pointing towards the fact that Jaskier was in prison and with no way out, Geralt couldn’t help the small burning ball of hope in his chest. A year after the trial, he made his way to Blaviken. Even wore nicer clothes and brushed his hair - Jaskier had said it was a date after all. It felt a little silly to order for two when there was no chance his date would make it. But still, a coffee and blueberry muffin for himself, and a chocolate twist and cold chocolate for Jaskier.

Settling in the darkest corner of the cafe, Geralt sat back and waited. A shadow fell across his table and he looked up.

“I love the way you just sit in the corner and brood,” a familiar voice greeted him. For the first time in a long while, Geralt smiled.