#then will tries to give mike away to a future without him because he thinks itll make mike happy

[moonmeg]

A little addition to "Curious"

“D’aw and yet here ye are unable to live wi’out me”

Robyn rolled his eyes as a smile began tugging on the corners of his mouth. There was some truth to it. Micah was his best friend, the person he’d trust with his life and imagining a life without those red curls, trilled Rs and filthy tongue was impossible. At the very least, Robyn thought, it would be a rather unhappy life without Micah.

As he stared at the ceiling of the barn the thoughts came rushing back. Endless trains of thoughts pulling him from one question to the next. That was nothing new. His mind was always restless and always made it difficult for him to concentrate on something fully for a longer amount of time. It’s been this way since his childhood but this train of thoughts was different somehow. Vivan’s words didn’t let him go. Who was his “somebody else”? What does Vivian know that he doesn’t? And instead of sitting and thinking of who it is, all his thoughts could be stilled with a little glimpse into a crystal ball. The solution is right there. And Robyn certainly didn’t care much for rules. He could ask someone else to take a look but…

Micah was right. Oracle magic is not to be underestimated and knowing your future may be more dangerous than one might think at first. And what if he does suddenly know who he’s going to be with? Wouldn’t it feel forced? Like it didn’t naturally develop but because “it must happen”. That would affect the whole relationship, no? Isn’t that the nice part about romance? That you yourself don’t know what will happen. That your unknowing will make the little things and the firsts of a relationship so much more meaningful? Even the kiss with Vivian has a meaning now that it wouldn’t have had in a case of knowing how she felt and that she will kiss him.

A bunch of hay suddenly poking his face ripped him out of his deep thoughts.

“Ey!”, he exclaimed disgusted. “Ew, Mike, what the heck?!”

“Oh, sorry, was that not the wheelbarrow? Oopsies.”, Micah grinned.

“You bastard-”, Robyn started grinning himself and stood up from the hay seat, gently pushing Eilidh’s (the unicorn) head off his laps, “-I’m gonna kick your ass.”

“Come and try, Shorty.”

“Alright that’s it!”

Robyn picked up small piles of hay and threw them at Micah, who dodged them without throwing anything back. Laughing and with another pile in his hands, Robyn approached Micah. The freckled boy however, held out the pitchfork to his attacker.

“Put the pitchfork down.”, Robyn halted smiling.

“Put the hay down.”, Micah replied, “Then we’ll talk ‘bouta pitchfork.”

“You’re a very unfair opponent, good Sir. You attacked me first! Now you’re using weapons I don’t have. Make it fair. Hay against hay.”

“Only if there’s ceasefire while I put it away.”

“You have my word.”

A moment of delay. Nothing happened as they both smirked at each other. Micah placed the tool on the ground and kicked it behind him, never once breaking the eye contact with the brunet.

“Good.”, Robyn tried to suppress his smile and be fully in the role of a dueling opponent, who would ensure to be on the winning side, “Now eat hay!”.

Micah dodged the hay attacks once again, still not throwing anything back. He instead attempted to flee, running around in the barn with Robyn right behind him. Both laughing heartily in this game of chase. Robyn chased after Micah for a good minute until Micah’s reflexes were too slow and gave Robyn the opportunity to pin him to the wooden wall by the shoulders.

“Where to now, Freckles?”, he smirked up at Micah.

Micah smiled, panting and catching his breath, trying to still his heart beat along with it.

“Alright, alright!”, he laughed, “I surrender.”.

Robyn didn’t give a response. He tried to catch his own breath and only managed to stare at Micah. Stare at his face as if he’s never seen the light brown freckles all over it or the reddish brown of his eyebrows and eyelashes. As if he looked at those golden eyes for the first time and as if he first notices the chunks of red hair falling into that pale face. As if this was the first time he noticed how beautiful all those traits were together. His breath calmed.

“Rob? Ye- uh… ye can let me go now.”.

Robyn blinked rapidly a few times and pulled himself out of his thoughts.

“Oh, yes, right. Sorry.”, he let go of Micah’s shoulders and backed away, “I uh.. I spaced out for a little there.”.

Micah chuckled. “I noticed. It’s alright.”.

The redhead looked around the hay-covered barn with a long uttered “Well”.

“We better get this cleaned up again before ma dad notices.”, he rubbed his neck.

“Yeeeaah”, Robyn chuckled, “Sorry about that too.”.

“Nonsense, I got myself into this literal mess. It was fun though.”, Micah turned and smiled at Robyn.

“It was.”.

Robyn picked up a broom from the corner of the barn. He better forget about whatever that intense stare of him just was. He wasn’t staring in that sense.

Right?

Micah was attractive to him. But that’s nothing new.

There wasn’t more to it.

…

Right?

[angelwithnightmares]

19 minutes and 17 seconds of reasons why I love Byler so much.

Songs:

“Hearing” by Sleeping at Last

“Holland” by Novo Amor

“Wait” by M83

“Turning Page” by Sleeping at Last

“Complex” by Katie Gregson-MacLeod

The reasons:

1. Will can’t lie to Mike, not even small white lies

2. Their relationship is in focus right from the very start

3. Mike is always the one in focus when it’s about Will

4. Mike feels like he’s the only one who cares about Will

5. When Will’s fake body was found, Mike’s reaction was in focus

6. Mike never stopped believing that Will was alive

7. Mike recognizes Will’s voice instantly

8. When they first met El in the woods, Mike’s first thought was “That’s not Will”

9. ”And we kissed, as though nothing could fall. And the shame was on the other side.”

10. Mike stood up to the bullies when they made homophobic jokes about Will

11. Mike’s father can’t think of him being with a girl

12. Mike’s mother knows and accepts him

13. Mike saves all of Will’s drawings in a binder

14. He even caresses them

15. When Will came back, Mike laid his head on Will’s chest to hear his heart beating

16. Mike and Will is in their happiest state while playing DnD together

17. Mike is the only one who notices Will going away

18. He is also the one who snaps him out of his trance

19. More than once

20. Mike’s voice is softer towards Will than to any other person, aka “The Will voice”

21. Mike immediately notice changes in Will’s behavior

22. Will always screams for Mike when he’s in danger or lost

23. And when he’s hurt

24. Mike says he’s gonna take Will home

25. and he takes him to his basement

26. Will feels like Mike is the only one who understands him

27. When Will listed all the people who like to “baby” him, he doesn’t mention Mike

28. “Only love makes you that crazy”

29. They said they’d go crazy together

30. Mike wants to be a writer, and Will wants to be a comic-book artist (perfect match)

31. Mike worries about Will and insists to be there for him

32. Mike is always the first person next to Will when something happens to him

33. He also sees himself as Will’s personal protector

34. He never left Will’s side when he was possessed

35. Mike slept in an uncomfortable hospital chair to make sure Will was never alone, even though he was possessed

36. Will still rememberers Mike

37. Mike wants to protect Will and be his shield

38. Mike held Will’s hand to give him comfort

39. The hand that Mike held was the only part of Will’s body that wasn’t possessed that wasn’t possessed was the hand Mike held, and this way Will could communicate with them

40. The thumb touch

41. Mike remembered the first day he met Will in detail, even though they were only 5 years old

42. Mike never smiles in pictures, unless Will is there with him

43. Mike’s reaction to Will dancing with a girl on the Snow Ball

44. Will is the best thing that ever happened to Mike

45. They both blush when they’re at the movies together

46. They’re looking at each other’s lips

47. More than once. Mike even got distracted by it

48. Will says he’s not gonna fall in love

49. But he’s already fallen

50. Will smiles when El breaks up with Mike

51. Mike doesn’t seem heartbroken by the break up

52. When Will is upset with Mike he immediately tries to make everything okay again

53. The projection: ”It’s not my fault you don’t like girls”

54. Will admitted he wanted to spend the rest of his life playing games with Mike

55. Twice. He can’t see a future without Mike

56. Will destroys Castle Byers because of Mike’s hurtful words

57. Mike immediately bikes through Hawkins in the thunder storm to apologize and make things right again with Will

58. Mike walked through the dark forest in the rain calling for Will because he was scared something had happened to him again

59. Will donated his DnD game because the game meant nothing without Mike

60. Will promised he won’t join another party

61. Their shared smile

62. Their heartfelt goodbye

63. Hopper’s speech is heavily Mike-coded

64. When Will left, Mike got depressed and stayed in his basement for weeks

65. “Will is painting a lot for someone he likes, maybe it is a girl?” El writes in a letter to Mike

66. When they meet again it’s suddenly very awkward (from Mike’s side) he also immediately asks about the painting

67. Mike is suddenly acting jealous, “ignoring” Will and they share and avoid awkward eye contact

68. Mike asks El if their friends is gonna be where they’re going, and he reacts when Will says “Angela”, so he tries to make Will jealous by kissing El on the temple

69. And he succeeds

70. Will is angry at El for lying to Mike for months and he thinks Mike deserves better

71. Mike thinks Will has sabotaged the whole day because he barely talks to him, rolling his eyes and moping

72. They both feel hurt for not reaching out more, even though Mike actually tried to call Will a bunch of times according to Dustin

73. “We’re friends, we’re friends”, “We used to be BEST friends”

74. Mike thinks home isn’t the same without Will

75. He also admitted that he felt like he had lost Will

76. SCRIPT: “This intimate moment got shattered-“

77. They always gets interrupted when they’re having a moment

78. Mike gets nervous every time Will is close to him or accidentally touches him

79. The flirting, pining & staring

80. Will wants to confess but is afraid Mike won’t like the truth

81. Mike nods. He.. understand what he means?

82. Mike can’t say or write “I love you” to El

83. Mike feels like they can’t come back from that

84. Will’s painting was for Mike

85. Mike’s face drops when Will said the painting was from El

86. He was actually talking about his own feelings for Mike, and how he sees him, with El’s name as a shield because he wanted to reassure him

87. Mike is Will’s heart, he’s making him feel like he’s not a mistake and that he’s better for being different. He don’t want to lose him

88. Will cries in the van because he’s in love with his best friend and don’t know how to tell him, this was the first time he ever lied to Mike

89. The look on Mike’s face when he spots Will after his reunion with El

90. Will thinks Mike and El is happily and in love (from his PoV)

91. When in reality, they really aren’t

92. Will’s brother knows and accepts him

93. Will reminds Mike that he’s the heart, pushing him into confessing his love to save El

94. She doesn’t believe him, but Will does

95. Mike and El are barely talking after the monologue

96. Will tells Mike about Vecna and Mike reassures him (in the most beautiful light we’ve ever seen in the show)

97. Mike is always by Will’s side for the rest of the last episode, foreshadowing the arc of season 5

98. The last shot of season 4 is them paralleling the other canon couples of the show

99. Will is Mike’s light

100. Mike is Will’s light

101. They are perfect together.

[potentialheartofdarkness]

It didn’t take long for Steve to realize he was in love with Eddie. He’d heard Dustin rant about him for months, helped save him from the population of Hawkins and deaths door. None of that mattered really, not to Steve.

To Steve that was normal, risking his life and saving everyone else’s without thinking of the cost. Without thinking of the risk, or that he mattered to other people. He’d never felt like he truly mattered in anyones life, so to him it was normal to just risk everything.

What mattered was the shy way Eddie would glance at him and quickly glance away before teasing him. The way he’d gently run his thumb over the back of his hand when Steve was having a bad day. The way Eddie would call Steve first when he needed to make sure he was alive or when the lights flickered.

What mattered was that Eddie never once made him feel stupid, never once acted like his ideas were bad. He never once let Steve talk badly of himself, yet was shocked every time Steve did the same. His cheeks turning a delicate pink. His face curling into joy as they’d sit in the back his van and argue over music tastes or talk about dnd. Steve would pick up things here and there and that’s all Eddie would think about for a week.

What mattered to Steve was that Eddie let him be himself, let him figure out who he was outside of monster hunting. Finding his music taste, what he wanted out of life, where he was going, shedding the Harrington name and lifestyle. Eddie didn’t judge him when he admitted (begrudgingly) that sometimes he couldn’t hear all that well and that his vision was going. He just went with him to get glasses, slid them on his face and called him “pretty boy” as he did so. He went with him to get his hearing tested too, and told the kids that they might have to repeat themselves and not to give Steve a hard time. If any of them tried Eddie was there gently chiding them.

It only mattered to Steve that Eddie took time understanding each of the kids he didn’t know that well. He spent time with Max, El, and Will, spent time figuring out what bothers them and what they like. He’d speak to El in a softer voice sometimes, like he was afraid to scare her. He’d teach her words that he learnt from Lord Of The Rings and she’d add that to her vocabulary for the next week. He’d treat Max like a little sister, protective of her but also gently ragging on her like he did Dustin. It didn’t matter that she couldn’t see anymore because he’d always be bounding around and dramatically describing everything. With Will it was hushed talks and plans for future campaigns, it was talking about being gay in Hawkins and the dangers but also joys that come from that. It was the whispered bad advice to get Mike Wheeler’s hand in marriage. (A statement that had Will red in the face and sputtering protests for hours)

It was the way he could always tell something was wrong with Steve and would give him space to talk about it on his own. The way he’d team up with Robin and get on Steve’s nerves and his eyes would crinkle when he laughed. The way he’d sling his arm around Steve’s shoulders and whisper flirty, teasing words in his good ear but be gone as quickly as he appeared. The way his trailer became like a second home to Steve, and Uncle Wayne became like a second father to him. (Hopper being the first of course)

So it didn’t take long for Steve to realize that he was in love with Eddie, after hours of watching him. Observing how he interacted with those closest to Steve, how he’d glance back and throw Steve a wink from time to time. How he always found his way back to Steve’s side. How they’d wake up together, a tangle of limbs and neither would really want to move but they were just friends. Just friends and that’s all they continued to be. Steve wanted nothing more than to sweep him up and bury him in kisses, in soft touches and sweet words. He wanted it, wished for it even, but he was afraid. Afraid that he’d say it and Eddie would walk out of his life just like everyone else had. Eddie could break him worse than Nancy, losing him would leave Steve in a place where he never truly felt whole again. Eddie, who stood in front of him now with Will in a headlock and kicking at Mike trying to free him, laughed his loud, contagious laugh. He shot Steve the most devastating smile, and Steve couldn’t help but smile back, heart banging in his chest painfully and fighting the urge to pull Eddie close to him.

Steve just wished, one day he’d get the courage to tell him.

[undreaming-fanfiction]

With This Ring (12)

Chapter 11 here, Ao3 here

Nancy Wheeler was staring at her reflection in the mirror. She hated what she was seeing.

She was pale from the lack of sleep and worry, no matter how much her mother tried with the makeup. Her eyes looked smaller, drowned by the dark circles. Her hair was tamed to the point that it was almost unrecognizable, her prized curls were straightened and pulled into a neat wedding bun. And most of all, she’d always hated wearing white. 

Months ago, she hoped that the dress would stay in the closet forever, unlike her (if she decided to be naively optimistic about her future). Yesterday, she thought the worst thing that could happen was being forced to marry one of her best friends. And today…

She scowled as she recalled their plans, now shattered. They had almost made it. Even if she had married Steve, they could have gotten divorced afterwards. Or maybe not - not as long as they’d stayed in Hawkins. But the world was wide. They could have moved. Robin could have come with them. They could have kept up the facade until they had room to breathe. 

But that wasn’t what she wanted. 

Did she regret not marrying Steve for the sake of convenience, as another ruse, another mask? She’d had too many hours to think about it, after Robin was dragged out of the room and Nancy’s fate was decided without her. She considered all the options, all the steps she took, and…no. She wouldn’t have changed anything. Because Steve wasn’t just her ex, he was her friend. He was someone who kept swallowing down his own pain and shielded her from everyone’s judgment so she could be herself for a few brief moments. It would have been so unfair to him. Nancy couldn’t do that. 

And now he was missing. Her mind was supplying the worst scenarios possible - Steve got assaulted and left somewhere. Steve got injured and he’s waiting for help. Steve fell into the quarry and drowned. Nancy was aware she had a pessimistic mindset, but after Barb, she would never take someone’s living, breathing presence for granted. And apart from that one moment of desperation, deep down she knew one thing - Steve would have never abandoned her and Robin. 

She went to her father and pleaded to let her look for him. She was even ready to make a false promise to go ahead with the wedding the next day, only to reject Steve at the altar to give him his freedom back. But instead of taking her concerns seriously, Ted Wheeler just told her to wait. She’d waited. And then, worried sick about Steve, she made a mistake that would cost her everything. 

Or maybe not. 

Nancy Wheeler always paid her debts and fixed her messes. Her future, her freedom, it meant nothing if she abandoned the ones she loved. Refusing the marriage would end up with her being held at home until she changed her mind. All while Steve was losing precious time.

She turned away from the mirror and adjusted her veil one last time. “I’m ready.” 

Karen Wheeler stood in the doorway, barely containing her misery. She had to wear waterproof mascara so the angry tears wouldn’t win. “I’m so sorry, Nancy,” she whispered. “I hoped this would be a good day for you. Maybe one day, when…you know. When it could happen.” 

“I know, mom. And thank you for trying.” Nancy wrapped her hands around her mother’s waist, pulling her into a hug. 

Karen held her close, careful not to smudge her lipstick on the white dress. “I should have tried harder. How could I let it get this far? Let me to talk to dad, give him an ultimatum, something-”

“Don’t. Mike and Holly…they should be kept out of this. They don’t deserve to have their home ruined because of me.” She pulled back and wiped away the wetness on her mother’s cheek. “It’s not over, mom. It’s just a setback. I can’t say I have a plan, but…I think that if I have to go down, I’d like to do it fighting.” 

Karen smiled at her with pride that Nancy didn’t feel she deserved. “That’s my girl. And if you need a distraction, maybe to set someone on fire…I still have that lighter.” They laughed together, a brief moment of levity before what felt like the end of Nancy’s life. “I’ll follow your lead. You’re so brave.”

Nancy returned the smile and walked out of the door, determined to see it through. 

She would wear the white wedding dress she hated. 

She would walk down the aisle, give her father what he wanted…for now. 

And then she’d break free and find Steve. Maybe talk to Chief Hopper about being forced into a marriage. He seemed like a reasonable man. And if everything else failed, she could always run away and find her mom and siblings when they were older. 

Mike was arguing with their father downstairs, almost shouting. “I object!” 

Ted Wheeler decided to, as was his usual approach, disregard any part of reality he found inconvenient. Like his son. “Mike, you can only say that during the ceremony. And if you know what’s good for you and your sister, you won’t even think the word.” 

“But she was supposed to marry Steve!” Mike sounded incredulous. In Nancy’s mind, he was still so young. He was supposed to be playing Dungeons and Dragons, meet with his friends and ride bikes all over Hawkins, maybe get his first girlfriend. He should not be losing his mind over Nancy’s doomed wedding. “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like Steve, but sometimes he’s at least a bit cool! And he likes Nancy. Jason never even spoke to her. How can that be good?” 

Ted’s bored gaze found his daughter frozen on the stairs, listening. He turned to her and gestured to move closer. “Would you like to comment on that, Nancy?” 

She shook her head. When she finally reached Mike, she squeezed his shoulder. “It’s okay, Mike. It’s all going to end well.” 

It took only seconds for the doorbell to ring. For the neighbors to gather, to congratulate her, accompany her to the church. 

“Here comes the bride,” she whispered and left her childhood home.

Chapter 13 here

[sunflowerharrington]

I’m finally sending you my request!

I would probably want a fluffy to smutty Eddie x plus size reader fic. Based on “Do I wanna know?” By Arctic Monkeys.

Like her and Eddie are bffs and she has had a crush on him for what feels like forever, they tease each other and stuff but he never picks up the hints. The whole gang goes to the lake for a day and the reader is super nervous to show up in her swimsuit because she’s bigger and doesn’t want Eddie to think she’s gross. When he sees her he realizes the feelings he’s had for a very long time. They eventually go back to his place to change and they both end up confessing to each other. That’s just my idea but you can change it however you want to fit the song better if you like. 💕

Do I Wanna Know If This Feeling Flows Both Ways? - EM X PlusSize!GN!Reader

pairing: eddie munson x plus-size!gn!reader.

warnings: male masturbation, perv!eddie, friends to lovers, p in v sex, eddie’s wild thoughts, eddie’s pov, obsessions, borderline yandere!eddie, jealousy, anger, low self esteem, body issues, lack of self love, fluff and smut, mention of heather holloway and billy hargrove’s deaths, reader is wearing a bathing suit but this can be read as swim shorts too if you like, slight breeding kink (i think that’s it).

notes: i tried my best, babes, i really did. i don’t feel as though this is the best representation because i myself am not plus sized, so if this is bad i’m sorry, i just wanted to write this for you. poc friendly also :) enjoy! if you want you can listen to ‘do i wanna know’ by arctic monkeys!

side note: not proofread or edited, sorry if there’s spelling or grammar mistakes :( also, i couldn’t help myself from switching the pov and the crush to eddie, i hope you still like it baby!

word count: 1541

taglist: @jonathansonlysweetheart @steveslittlesunflower @thisishellfire @friendly-neighborhood-ghoul @hellfirehaley @fxllfaiiry @fleurfairie @liviawritesthings @myobmaya @thefreakofhawkins86 @lxvecakes @creneal @corrodedhawkins @wzrlds @sympathyforher @quickiesgirl @eddiebillysteve @taecube @eddies-bat (i hope i got everyone!) dm comment or ask me to be added or taken off for future updates! 🖤

There’s this story that brings you on the journey of young love. It’s like stepping out from a dark place and into the sun on a hot summer’s day, where the light is so bright and hot that your eyes ache and you’re blinded, where you panic, afraid you’ll never see the sun again. That’s what it was like when Eddie Munson fell in love. And he would always see the sun, as you were his sun, and he’d never let you go as long as you both lived.

He wanted you forever, he wanted to be yours forever. Whether that was as a friend, a best friend, or something more, he didn’t really mind. He just wanted you to stay in his life. Which was why on the day before you left for your vacation to California that you were going on with Chrissy, Robin, Nancy, Max, Erica and El, Eddie decided to ask the gang to meet him down by Lover’s Lake for a cool off from the hot sun. And everyone showed up, with Dustin complaining the entire time about the heat, with Steve telling him to stop whining.

Eddie loved their brotherly relationship, and he also loved the way Steve took in Max as one of his own without any questions, filling the big brother spot she never had. Eddie aspired to have that kind of relationship with someone, which is why he jumped at his first chance, taking Will under his wing, showing him the ins and outs of D&D and highschool romances—even though Eddie was never in a relationship before. But he swore by the fact that single people give better relationship advice than those in relationships… And he also helped Will figure out his feelings for Mike, so it was heartwarming to see that after Will confessed, Mike didn’t run away, he didn’t pull away. In fact, they got even closer.

Eddie wanted to be that close with you. And this “pool party” was the perfect way to do so. He even thought about fake-drowning so you’d save him, knowing you worked as a lifeguard at the swimming pool after Heather Holloway and Billy Hargrove went missing… Or so he thought. But Dustin and the others hadn’t told him the ins and outs of the Starcourt Tragedy just yet. They didn’t need to ruin his summer even more than you already had. You’d ruined him. You’d ruined Edward Wayne Munson, and you didn’t even know it. Standing on the wooden pathway around the edge of the lake next to Chrissy, ready to jump in, in your red lifeguard bathing suit—his favorite color, the reason why he hung out at the pool, just to see you in it, with your black bathing suit cover-up and your black and white flip flops—that he loved a lot.

But not as much as he loved you. Oh, he loved you so much. He’d do anything for you, including things from moving mountains to human sacrifice. You were his goddess, sent down from heaven to guide him through his highschool years, helping him to finally graduate in the summer of ‘86, and now helping him to finish his mechanics apprenticeship so he could get a job at the local garage. He hoped your car would break down a lot so he could fix it for you and impress you with his skilled fingers—while fixing your car, obviously, get your mind out of the gutter—instead of his swimming skills, or lack thereof.

He lay on his stomach next to Lucas, who’d been writing something down in a notebook, humming a Kate Bush song to himself. It sounded like Babooshka, and he had Max’s headphones on, so it must have been. Lucas was drawing a love heart with his and Max’s initials inside, and there was a poem beneath. As Eddie read the poem, his thoughts drifted back to you, the sound of your giggles filling his ears as Nancy splashed water at you and Steve playfully pulled you under the water with his arms… around… your… waist…

Fuck. No, this could not be happening. Eddie needed to be the one doing that. He needed to be the one with his hands around your waist, with his legs tangled with yours, with his hands around your— Woah, slow down there buddy.

Eddie rolled his eyes, he’d have to somehow slip away to sort out his growing erection somehow. Do you see what you do to him? He excused himself to the bathroom, stalking away from the group, into Reefer Rick’s cabin and into one of the rooms furthest away from where the group were situated. He sighed contentedly, working his balled fist over the shaft of his throbbing cock, the sensations of his hand squeezing over the sensitive nerves in his tip sending shivers of pleasure up his spine.

From where he was standing he had a clear view of you outside the window, the bathing suit hugging your full hips and your thick thighs he’d love to have his face between. He’d do anything for it. A small whimper left his throat as he fucked his fist faster, cursing your name under his breath, spreading his precum over the length of his dick.

“Fuck,” he mumbled under his breath, his hips bucking against his hand, whining and moaning as he kept his wide eyes full of undeniable lust on you. “Love fucking this pretty pussy, baby. My pretty pussy—fuck, baby, you’re so fucking tight, oh my God! Wanna have sex with you for real, sweetheart. Gonna cum in you again and again until you’re so full and round you look pregnant, baby—shit, fucking shit, oh shit— gonna- gonna make you mine.”

Eddie’s labored breathing turned into lewd gasps as his wrist flicking sped up, fucking himself through his high, his eyes squeezing shut, though the image of you bent over to pick up a bottle of sunscreen was still plastered in his mind. He wanted that image tatted on the inside of his eyelids.

His mouth dropped open and his thighs tensed, his chest rising and falling rapidly at the same time as his heavy breathing. One, two, three strokes until he let out a loud cry of your name, alerting you unbeknownst to him. He didn’t hear the door flinging open behind him as he came, thick ropes of cum dripping down his hand.

“Fuck, princess,” he chuckled. “Look at what your pretty ass made me do.”

He barely felt the arms wrapping around his waist until somebody rested their head against his back, against the area between his shoulder blades. His breath hitched in his chest when he recognized the color of nail polish you were wearing outside. You knew he only called you his princess, his sweetheart, his.

“Hi, Eds,” you murmured, your voice muffled against his skin, running your fingertips up and down his stomach, not realizing what had just happened, or just choosing to ignore it. “Had to come in for some shade, it’s too hot outside.”

“That’s because you were outside sweetheart. You’re gonna cause global warming,” he said, turning around after he’d shoved his softened dick back into his swim shorts, knowing that you hadn’t seen it because if you had, he knew his sweetheart would be freaking out. And he didn’t want that.

He wrapped his arms around your shoulders and pulled you close, discreetly sniffing your hair as he kissed the top of your forehead by your hairline. One thing Eddie didn’t know was how long it took Chrissy and Robin to convince you to go to the lake, practically dragging you out of your house and into Steve’s car. They promised nobody would think anything different of you, but that was so easy for them to say. Itty bitty bodies and tiny waists, but that’s not what Eddie liked. No, no. He loved your body the most.

He wanted to worship you as if you were a Goddess. Which you were, especially to him. He wanted to squeeze and kiss every inch of your body, and he wanted to suck hickeys into those deliciously curvy hips of yours and your neck. Oh, he wanted to cover your neck in hickeys, a few in the shape of an ‘E’ on the right side of your neck, and an ‘M’ on the left side of your neck. He wanted to mark you as his. And he wanted to do it now.

So that’s how he found himself on top of you as you whined beneath him, his shirt covering your body as he made sweet love to you, whispering words of affection to you as he chased both of your highs. He confessed he loved you as he came, seeing stars and angels dancing and fluttering around in his mind as thick ropes of cum landed on your breasts and stomach, seeping into his Black Sabbath shirt, joking that he’d never wash his sheets again after your cum began seeping into the sheets and the mattress.

You thought he was kidding, but he wasn’t, as you saw when you landed on the mattress after jumping back into the overworld after defeating Vecna in the Upside Down with your Eddie by your side.

feedback, likes, comments and reblogs are always appreciated! they let me know that you want me to keep writing!

[andiwriteordie]

Okay which stranger things ship do you see as “champagne problems”?

Bc i can’t stop applying it to the ships.

Lumax, from max’s pov, but they work their shit out later. Stancy, from nancy’s pov, but there were never SUPPOSED to be. Joyce/Bob, from Joyce’s pov, except she almost felt ready to take that extended hand… and then he was taken from her. Jopper, from both their povs depending on the time, because i feel like season 3 joyce is in a better place with HERSELF but grieving, and hopper views himself as a curse but he isn’t the one doing the rejecting. Chrissy/Jason, if Chrissy’d gotten to live, except we’re all cheering for her inwardly even tho she’s sad ab it at first.

& “right where you left me”???? Idkidkidk my brain just keeps saying look look look—first it goes lumax from lucas’ pov, then it goes nancy & barb (espec. season2 nance) & obvi byler i could see interpretations for either pov but mike jsut—works so much better for him post season 3 idk. El & her dad… el & henry.

Basically—talk to me ab tswift song associations w/ stranger things bc i can’t get them out of my head 😓

OOH A TAYLOR SWIFT X STRANGER THINGS ASK MY FAVORITE.

every single one of those couples absolutely fits champagne problems, for all the reasons you just listed! i don't think there's necessarily one couple who fits this story the best, since the song does ends with the couple being broken up and the narrator experiencing at least a little bit of regret (as shown in her self-deprecation through the song).

i think of every couple, lumax probably fits this the best? especially with s4 max's mental health struggles being such a large part of why they broke up. it doesn't seem like a far reach for me to imagine those two in a future where max is still struggling with her mental health and does choose to break things off with lucas again, simply because of what happened with the upside down and also honestly max doesn't have the best home life and has grown up learning defense mechanisms that make her more prone to try and run away (see her dumping lucas a lot in the in between of s2-s3 and ofc the pre s4 break up) rather than deal with those problems head on. not trying to drag max because she is my girl and i love her with everything i am, but i think that's just part of how she's grown up and how she tries to protect herself.

that said, i don't think lucas would ever give up on her. s4 shows us that and shows us how he is trying to reach out to her and believes he should've done more. so, i think where they diverge from champagne problems' narrative is that the narrator's love interest isn't going to find someone new. instead, that love interest is going to keep working and keep holding on, because the love is real between them, even in spite of the mental health issues and such!

also again, agree with your rwylm analyses! but my first gut instinct though with this song is to think about will, actually! rwylm tells us a story about a narrator who was blind-sided by the loss of this relationship and then ends up staying "frozen" and stuck in that past, unable to move on from it. obviously, like i just said the song is in the context of a relationship, but pulling back a little bit more, i think the theme of it can fit will in general. will's trauma has left him frozen and stuck in a sense. everybody moves on, but will... will stays there. his childhood was robbed from him first with the kidnapping then with the possession, and we see how in s3 he is so desperately trying to hold onto that childhood while everyone else moves on without him.

digging deeper into the byler implications here, obviously this happens in tandem with the break in will and mike's friendship, where will again feels stuck because of his ud related experiences but also because of his sexuality, but mike? mike's moving on. he's found a beautiful girl who is a superhero, and he obviously loves her and cares about her. i mean come on. "if our love died young, i can't bear witness" screams the rain fight to me, and that image just hurt me very deeply ok.

"you left me no choice but to stay here forever" has a twofold meaning then. it's directed at both henry (the abuser who robbed will of his childhood) but also then at mike (the boy who will loves who has seemingly moved on past the need for will).

and uh... yep. i could go into more detail probably, but that's a little summary of my thoughts!

[principiumindividuationis777]

"Toll Road Ahead" (Noir/Crime Fiction)

[If anyone likes this story and thinks maybe they could illustrate it, I would give full credit]

"Toll Road Ahead"

Chapter I

Larry Shaughnessy drove a prison van in New York City, just as the town was descending into an abyss from which it would never really recover, and Shaughnessy knew it better than anyone. Who knew better than a man who drove prisoners to the State of New York's worst prisons?

The year was 1968. It was too cold for hippies. This day, rain was falling, but many days it was snow. Heaven help the people without homes. Larry would put away some of the ones who put them there: The dealers, but he got more than his share of the addicts too, sad cases, no easy answers.

Of course, life was never easy for Shaughnessy. Born in 1929 in the rural parts of County Galway, Ireland (then a Dominion of the United Kingdom), his family had the unfortunate timing of moving to the USA, to Boston, Massachusetts, specifically, in the depths of the Great Depression, which, Larry contended, was "inflicted" by New York City on Boston.

Shaughnessy tried to remember his childhood, even as he heard the curses of the men he was driving to a bitter destination. Larry's father could never control his drinking, and his mother, angry at her husband, Larry's father, treated her son with contempt. He could never forget the day she locked him in the basement, yelling, "You should have been a girl!"

To prove himself, Larry almost ended up, in his early years, much like the men he would later send to prison, bitter at the world, fighting and drinking, though he had sworn off alcohol for good in 1953, when he married.

In Marriage, Larry hoped, he would find stability. A bit of Freud would have done him some good, though, as he married a woman not unlike his mother, a woman with deep psychological problems caused, in turn, by her father, leading her to run off with another man within a year, and the Catholic Church annulled the Marriage, as no Marriage.

It was then, in the winter of 1954, that he moved to New York City, not because he hoped for a brighter future there, but simply to escape. Was it all a mistake, he wondered? Could he go back, maybe even to Ireland?

Chapter II

Shaughnessy had no friends of the human kind, nor, in his view of mankind, did he want any. Criminals, of course, and the liberal-minded, hated him, seeing him as a tool of oppression. His boss was almost as bad as the criminals, forever berating him for minor matters, simultaneously telling him to make deadlines and to drive more slowly and cautiously, mutually exclusive goals.

What few friends he had were in Boston, but they had moved on by now. Most of the time, his unwanted company was the criminal population, in the current instance, two addicts who had resorted to armed robbery: One, named Carl, was cursing with rage at Shaughnessy, trying to spit at him, and doing likewise towards the other convict, called Mike, but Mike was weeping and trembling, evidently suffering withdrawal symptoms.

For all the trouble that such men gave him, Shaughnessy understood their desire to escape. Out of the wagon and into the rain they went, shackled and guarded, before an ominous structure of tons of metal and concrete, their home for some years.

At the end of a long shift, he shuffled slowly into his overpriced apartment, high above the zoo of a city. Another thorn in Larry's side was the landlord, Billy Macklin, who treated his tenants, Larry thought, with rather less respect than Larry treated his pet parrot, whom he considered his only friend: "Mirror", Larry called him.

It would be easier to sleep with his old boozing ways, he thought, but then, he did not want to end up like his dad, so fifteen years on, he kept his pledge.

"Evicted! Out on the street!" said Mirror the parrot, repeating something he heard from Macklin to one of Larry's unfortunate neighbors. Under Macklin's terms, Shaughnessy had to pay extra rent to have his parrot, which, of course, meant more hours of work.

Chapter III

Morning: The time Larry Shaughnessy loathed the most. Every morning, Shaughnessy wondered why he bothered. He was still with the Church, but part of him did not believe, or had trouble believing, that human beings were somehow special beings. Better to be a simple creature like Mirror, he often thought.

Today was an eventful one at work: Jerry "Wolfman" Steppe, snarling and biting, was thrown with great difficulty, requiring seven or eight burly guards for the task, into the van. Shaughnessy did not read the papers, believing them full of lies, but even he knew who Steppe was: A burglar by trade, his savage, animalistic attacks on residents made him the talk of New York, no easy matter considering the mayhem and greed that were the norm.

The van started towards its destination, but somehow, Steppe had gotten loose, and, with a razor blade, offed two of the guards on the spot, knocked out a third with a well-placed right hand, and the fourth found a way to hurl himself from a moving vehicle, sustaining injuries but more fearful of Wolfman than of the rough landing.

Shaughnessy could have stopped the vehicle, but instead, to try to prevent Steppe from escaping, he drove faster and weaved side to side. Jerry Steppe, however, changed his demeanor entirely, suddenly becoming quite rational.

"I'm not mad, you know," said Steppe.

Shaughnessy gave no answer.

"We, my friends and I, are building up a little gang in Boston, and you would be a fine addition. We could get you a position like this in Massachusetts, and you could let one of us 'accidentally' escape now and then, for generous consideration in your pocket."

Chapter IV

Jerry Steppe was retried on a procedural technicality, and in the retrial, acquitted, but before this, after a day even more hectic than usual, Shaughnessy, having gotten Steppe to his appointed destination, trudged up the stairs to his apartment, utterly exhausted.

The next day was Saturday, but Larry had no plans. He spoke to his parrot, having no other company: For over a decade, every telephone call he had made had been part of his work.

"Some gang wants me in Boston. I want to go to Boston, maybe, but not as a criminal."

"Boston…" was Mirror's only reply.

"I won't take the offer, but maybe this is a sign, if there even are signs, to go back."

Larry thought about pretending to take the offer, as a way of securing the arrest of these Boston gangsters, but then, Shaughnessy did not trust Hoover or the FBI either, and their cooperation would be essential, of course, in any such scheme.

Just then, a newspaper was thrust under Larry's door. Though he had ordered nothing of the kind, his eye caught the headline, and he read of a corruption scandal, the taking of bribes among some fellow prison van drivers in New York, much like the arrangement suggested by Steppe, evidently part of a network all over the Northeast.

"Oh, that's just great… now these press vultures will make us all out to be crooked, and my boss will fire some innocent drivers just for window dressing."

"Window…" mimicked Mirror.

Chapter V

Larry Shaughnessy spent most of the weekend sleeping, tired from the week and having nothing better to do. The next weekend, though, after another week of much the same mayhem, he approached Kevin Welden, a private detective who wanted, for his own purposes, to gain information on the Irish mob in the Northeast. Together, Shaughnessy and Welden hatched a plan to infiltrate the Irish mob in Boston.

By the end of 1968, Shaughnessy very cheerfully quit his New York job, instead accepting the Massachusetts position arranged for him by the Irish gangsters forming a presence in Boston. The only trace of his New York life Shaughnessy took with him was Mirror the parrot.

John "Shemp" Doolin, so nicknamed for his resemblance to the comedian, was Shaughnessy's contact with the rising Irish mob. The first escape from a prison van was to be arranged in two weeks, Doolin explained, and Shaughnessy was to receive $10,000 for every member of the outfit whose freedom he arranged.

Contacting Welden, he soon discovered, however, that it was never Welden's intention to report the matter to the police, but rather, Kevin Welden was playing the oh-so-dangerous game of blackmailing a criminal syndicate.

Shaughnessy's already weak faith in humanity declined yet more when he discovered that Marky Morris, a friend of his from childhood, now sold narcotics in Boston, but was being shaken down for a percentage of his money by Shemp Doolin.

Larry had burned his bridges in New York, and now, he had either to go through with helping criminals escape or leave Boston. That left only one idea in Shaughnessy's mind: Return to Ireland.

Chapter VI

By February of 1969, Larry was back in County Galway for the first time since he was four. He vaguely remembered the beautiful scenery, and let Mirror, his parrot, fly around in his new country.

After a few months, Shaughnessy managed to convince the Republic of Ireland's government to let him drive a prison vehicle, just as he had in New York City and in Boston.

Late in 1969, however, the Ulster Volunteer Force, loyalists amidst Northern Ireland's Troubles, set off explosives in several locations in Dublin. Shaughnessy would, from one of these explosions, spend the rest of his life with a wooden peg for a left leg.

As he lay in hospital, Larry, wishing Mirror were allowed in the hospital, was approached by the Irish Republican Army, who, because he was the victim of a UVF attack, assumed that Shaughnessy would join their cause, and visited the hospital, pretending to staff to be relatives, to make him an offer not unlike that made by Wolfman Steppe, this time suggesting that he move to Northern Ireland, drive prison vans there, then release IRA.

People were no better in Ireland, thought Larry. Everywhere, people were bad.

Chapter VII

In early 1970, Shaughnessy, noting that the criminals in Ireland were rather tame compared to those in New York, was approached at his home by three men, with distinctly Cockney accents.

"We got work for you, Shaughnessy. We 'ave our own ways of knowing about the underworld, you understand, and 'ow you kept Wolfman in the lorry with your driving was impressive. If you could do that, you could drive for us."

"Drive for you where?"

"We have something planned. Let's say all the best art in London, best by price I mean, is going missing soon. Make the Great Train Robbery look like beggary. We three, me and Dicey and Moore, we 'ave all it planned out 'cept for the driver. That's where you fit in. I know, Irishman, you don't want to give up a respectable reputation, so instead of 25 percent, 'ow about 40, then it's 20 three ways for the rest of us? We couldn't do without the driver, after all."

Shaughnessy looked hard at them, and his peculiar response was, "Give my regards to the Queen."

Having closed the door in the men's faces, Larry, drifting off to sleep, mumbled to Mirror that he thought these men were "British agents or police" suspicious of him because the IRA approached him.

"Why would they know so much about a one-legged man's luck in New York? They're James Bond faking that Mary Poppins talk."

"Poppins…" picked up Mirror.

Chapter VIII

For the next few months, even as he drove prison transport, Shaughnessy believed he was being followed. By which side, he wondered? If those supposed thieves were British agents, the IRA might suspect him of being a traitor to their cause, as they would see it, while the British might be still after him. Then again, maybe someone was trying to help a prisoner escape for some other reason.

Though his boss, Ehan Barsky, told Shaughnessy that he was paranoid and offered to refer him to a psychologist, Shaughnessy knew better. He had, by now, even the license number of the same vehicle he had seen three times in a week, going the same route as he was. Barsky said it was probably just someone who took the same route.

"They were three different routes to three different prisons, Mr. Barsky."

After a day of hauling in some rather violent men, Shaughnessy once again found a newspaper had been slipped under his door, just as in New York, without him asking for it. He laughed ruefully at the lead article.

If the paper was right, a massive London art robbery had occurred. Not only that, but it was thought that it was tied to the IRA and some "ordinary thieves from Boston in the States". The only part Larry had right was that the men were pretending to be British.

That evening, the ever reclusive Shaughnessy, now having a fair idea who was following him, read Schopenhauer while listening to an old record of Joe Meek's "Telstar".

Chapter IX

A rare day off, though stuck in Dublin, not in Galway, thought Shaughnessy. With just the one leg, he felt that his good leg, the right one, needed the circulation of walks, but his mind wandered and he wandered into a side of Dublin he had not seen, which reminded him almost of New York.

Shaughnessy thought his eyes deceived him, but no, there was a man of six foot two on the corner of the street, in a woman's dress, accosting motorists. Reminded too much of New York, he turned back on the same street, only to encounter a middle-aged woman screaming at him.

"You're trying to steal my girls. Nobody takes 'em on this street but me, Joe!"

This woman, dressed rather like an unkempt harlequin, and with pupils looking all wrong, kicked Larry in the leg, but in the wooden one, which was concealed. The thud of the fake leg evidently frightened her, because off she ran, perhaps still looking for "Joe".

That one ugly street brought Shaughnessy up to date: Dublin was becoming like every other city. Providence, Shaughnessy thought, had forsaken Dublin as New York was forsaken long ago. He wanted to live in rural Ireland, the better part, he thought, not in this. If he was to be followed about and encounter these types even on leave, he might as well move back to America, then retire to County Galway.

Thus, by 1971, Larry Shaughnessy was back in Boston, but with the strong sense, once again, that his travels from Dublin to New York Boston had been monitored each step of the way.

"I know too much about some secret doings. It all started with Wolfman," Larry said to Mirror, before mumbling and falling asleep.

"Wolfman…" the parrot replied, before mimicking Larry's snoring.

Chapter X

By this time, Shemp Doolin had taken over the Boston outfit that had once approached Larry Shaughnessy, and tired of being followed, Shaughnessy, with no family and nothing to lose, decided to risk it all and confront Doolin.

He had several rough encounters with Doolin's underlings, one of which required Larry to bring back his considerable boxing skills, learned, not in rings, but in the forties on these same streets. An uppercut, and down went some nameless muscle, but this seemed to impress the Irish mob in a positive way. Now, contrary to what Shaughnessy expected, Doolin wanted to welcome back Larry to their old city.

"You're been doing well for yourself, Mr. Doolin."

"Please, call me Shemp," replied Doolin, leaning back in a plush office.

"I know you arranged the heist in London. I'll bet it was you who put those papers under the door, first to convince me to join you, tell me the prison van business had no future, then to show me I was wrong about those guys working for Britain, right?"

"Smart as well as tough. You're our kind of man, Larry. Look, I know that Wolfman put a lot of people off. We needed him to make a name for ourselves, but then, well, he got too… gruesome for us."

"Took him out, eh?" asked Shaughnessy.

"As he would have done to us."

"I suppose you gave most of that art money to the IRA, right?"

"Better than 80 percent," replied Shemp.

"Then I want 10 percent of it, since you still have that much."

Doolin thought over the matter, rubbing his hand against his not quite shaven face.

"I like you, Larry, and you're Irish, but you gotta do one job for us, and on my word, the boys will stop following you."

"I won't do the dirty stuff. You know that."

"Yeah. Of course not," Shemp continued, "But you wouldn't mind ridding a neighborhood of a guy that deals to kids, would you?"

"I won't go as far as murder, if that's what you mean," replied Shaughnessy.

"No need to… two in the legs and he'll leave Boston."

"And go to New York, I suppose?"

"The big rotten apple, yeah," Shemp agreed.

Larry Shaughnessy asked around, and yes, the man whose photograph Doolin gave him, one Harvey Beckham, did indeed deal to kids, among his other hateful deeds. Shaughnessy did not like working with criminals, but then, he was doing Boston a favor, and once the deed was done, Beckham, having recovered physically, went to New York, as the Irish predicted.

One obstacle faced Shaughnessy is his escape, however: A toll booth. He had been so focused on the unusual assignment that he had forgotten his wallet, and in the circumstances, did not want authorities to take too much interest in him. Taking a deep breath, Larry thought it over, and realized that he had a car on loan from gangsters. Maybe they stashed money in the car, and sure enough, there was a $100 bill under the back seat.

Looked at rather strangely by the woman at the booth, she nevertheless found change for the hundred. The next day, being no thief, Larry gave $100, this time in tens, to Shemp Doolin, recounting his close call on the toll road.

Epilogue: Larry Shaughnessy, now affluent, moved to a cottage in rural County Galway, in early retirement, taking Mirror the parrot with him, of course. Hoping Mirror would outlive him, Larry found a worthy neighbor, he considered, who would take care of Mirror, according to the terms of Larry Shaughnessy's will and testament, if the bird did outlive him.

[donghuamuqing]

“Control yourself

Take only what you need from it”

[drabblesaf]

Movie Night Frustration - Steve Harrington Smut

REQUESTED: Nope. I haven’t written for quite a while, and I had a sudden inspiration strike last night (especially after S4 P1 dropped).

WARNINGS: Oral (both receiving), “sir” kink - MINORS DNI PLEASE

SUMMARY: You and Steve are on the night shift at the video store - you’re trying to do work and catch up on the week’s missed jobs, but Steve gets bored easily and needs something more than videos to entertain him. 

NOTES: Uh, hey. So, I’m kind of back? 

Maybe. I’m not sure yet. I’ve been really busy with uni for the past few years (in case you couldn’t tell from my utter lack of posting here) and now I’ve finished everything, I wanted to try and get back into my writing.

May be a bit rusty, so bare with me. I had inspo strike from the new season of Stranger Things, so here we are.

Hope you enjoy guys <3

Working the night shift at the Family Video Store was not how I originally planned on spending this evening. Sure, the pay was good for night shift, I couldn’t fault that. And any of the stock of candy we had left over was pretty much free rein until the next day’s batch came in - even more so once we hit the end of the week and needed to start clearing everything out. Those two things were no problem to me at all. The problem? Steve Harrington.

Steve had changed a lot since his time at Hawkins High. No longer a complete fucking asshat, he’d actually matured into a guy who gave somewhat of a shit. Shocking for the King of Hawkins to have such a redemption arc behind him. Maybe it was the fact he kept hanging out with the kids from sophomore year, Dustin, Mike and Lucas. Maybe it’s because my coworker Robin had actually knocked some sense into his pretty little head. Or maybe…just maybe, Steve was actually thinking seriously about his future and realising that he couldn’t be a dick forever.

Whatever it was, it still didn’t seem to occur to him that he could do his job without picking up chicks at the store - although maybe that was the same case for me too with guys. Somehow, Hawkins still had enough of a single male population that seemed to want to try their luck with the cute girls behind the movie counter, which always ended in Robin giving a heavy eyeroll and me gaining some dude’s home phone number or a reminder that they’d “pick me up at whatever time and we could go find a place to get away from it all”…which would almost always end in them wanting to go to Lovers Lake or Skull Rock, and Steve or Robin covering for me while I camped out in the staff room.

Surprisingly enough, this often worked quite well - I guess the boys were intimidated by my coworkers enough to eventually skulk out of the store, never to return again. This tactic didn’t work on the girls though, but then again, Harrington never seemed to have enough game to be able to woo them. Which is where he was stuck on this particular evening, moping as he stood next to the counter counting out the change in the register. “What’s got you so down in the dumps?” I said, staring at him from across one of the aisles, brush in hand.

“I’m losing my spark, Y/N. Losing my magic touch,” he sighed, idly playing with a cent in his hands.

“What makes you say that?”

“Have you seen the chicks that come in here? None of them are interested in me offering to take them to see the latest films in the cinema. Not a single one.”

“Have you tried just being yourself and not putting the charm offensive on all the time?” I asked, crouching down to remove the DVDs from the bottom shelf so they could get wiped down (those ones in particular always seemed to get some sort of sticky residue on them, and we could never quite explain why).

“Girls don’t like me “being myself”, (Y/N). Unless myself is King Steve, they don’t want to know me.”

“That’s not true, and you know it, Harrington,” I sighed, shaking my head as I carried the DVDs over to the desk, where he was now stood with his head in his hands. I reached over and ruffled his hair slightly, causing him to look up and give me a playful glare.

“Hey, leave the hair out of this,” he chuckled, poking his tongue out at me, before pausing and flicking his tongue over his bottom lip. He did this from time to time, but this time something felt…different. “(Y/N), what do you mean, I know it?” His brown eyes bore into my own, and I felt a shift, as if the world had just had a mass earthquake.

“You should be able to guess, Steve - you’re smart enough after all”, I said, voice wavering slightly. I wasn’t wrong, Steve was in fact very smart - after Nancy and him had split up, he actually put in a decent amount of effort to get his grades back up so he could get through sophomore year without too many issues, which - much to his surprise - he did very well, passing the year with 85% overall. And despite his general act as the King of Hawkins High, he could pick up on social cues well and did try to keep people around him who weren’t…douchebags, for lack of a better term.

He stared at me, raising an eyebrow, and I turned away quickly, busying myself with sweeping the dust off the (now free) bottom shelf. In a sense, there was definitely something that had shifted in the air between us, and it had been something I had been reckoning with for a while now. I’m not sure what it was, but there had definitely been moments between Steve and I that had left me questioning what his motives were every damn time. Did he want something to happen as much as I did?

The night wore on, and we were both beginning to get tired of doing all the chores that needed to be done over the night shift, especially closing up shop. We closed up early on the weekends, purely because most people were out partying or had already decided on what films they wanted for the evening - there wasn’t much chance of any late buyers coming in at the last minute unless it was Valentines Day. I occupied myself with finishing up rearranging the movies on the shelves, while Steve scribbled away in the notebook we had for accounting. “Hey, (Y/N), could you give me a hand? Just want to make sure I have everything accounted for in this, and that I did the math correctly,” he said, and I stood up from the final shelf, dusting my hands off on my jeans.

“Sure, I can do that. Final shelf is good to go, by the way,” I said, walking over to him. I could feel his eyes burning into me as I walked over, shedding my over-fleece that I wore as uniform (since the shop was closed now, there wasn’t much point in keeping it on). I chucked it under the till and pulled up a stool next to Steve, running over the numbers and trying to do quick calculations in my mind. All the while though, I could feel his presence right next to me, as if he was wanting to do or say something. After about 5 minutes of thinking over the sums, I nodded. “All clear, everything’s good to go,” I said, looking up at him. He swallowed slightly, his tongue flicking over his lips again as his eyes moved over my face.

The air got thicker all of a sudden, and it felt like something could happen any moment. “Uh, (Y/N), have you…” he started, and I paused, dropping the pencil to the table in front. He shook his head, mumbling a quick “Fuck it,” before crashing his lips onto mine. The kiss was needy, feverish - almost like it was something he depended on, like a lifeline. His lips and mine moved effortlessly against one another, tongues darting in and out and battling out in a war of dominance. His hands began roaming over my body, holding me steady on the stool as the exploration took place. This was a side I hadn’t expected from him, but I let it happen, moving my hands up to his hair as I did so. 

His lips began moving down from mine to my jaw, trailing their way down to the collar of my shirt - this caused him to pause momentarily, both of us gasping for air as he looked at me, moving a hand up to caress my face gently. I nodded, giving him the permission he sought to take my shirt off, leaving me in my bra and jeans. He resumed his prior actions, lips trailing down my collarbone to one breast, then another. Each of them had kisses pressed to them, before the bra itself was gently pulled down and his lips attached themselves to each nipple, sucking and biting on each one and causing small whimpers to fall from my mouth.

This only seemed to spur him on, and made him suck each nipple more feverishly as if it was his lifeline. Soon after, he realised other areas needed attention too, and his kisses moved further and further down my body until they hovered just above the waistband of my jeans. He looked up at me, and I nodded. “Please, Steve,” I mumbled quietly, and he licked his lips again, turning his attention to the button on my jeans, which he popped open deftly before helping me shimmy the material off my hips. 

He gave a few tentative kisses over my panties, causing some light moans to fall from my mouth, before that material was removed too and nothing was in the way of his tongue. He kissed the area lightly, before licking at it, causing my hips to raise up sharply to meet his mouth, and my hand to fall into his hair. Every single action he made had my body feeling like it was on fire, and very quickly I could feel myself reaching the high I was craving. He was licking and sucking at the area as if it was his entire life force, and it was very quickly getting me to where I needed to be. “Steve, fuck!” I whimpered, my hands tugging at his hair as he moved quicker, bringing a finger into play as well and curling it up right where I needed it. That was enough to bring me over the edge, causing me to scream and gasp as I met the high he’d been trying to elicit from me for so long. He kept lapping at my arousal as wave after wave of pleasure ran through my body, causing me to tremble at every slight touch he created.

After a while I calmed down enough and the room stabilised for a short while, for me to begin to realise that Steve was unbuckling his belt and beginning to remove his jeans. Shakily, I stood up, placing my hands over his and hoping he understood that I wanted to help him. He looked at me as I did this, and said quietly, “You don’t have to, y’know.”

“I want to.” He thought about this for a second and then nodded, allowing me access to the button on his jeans completely. I carefully popped it open, taking my time with the zipper - I wanted to at least try to savour this moment before it went away and we were forced into that pit of realisation of what we were doing with each other. He sighed slightly, bucking his hips up as I pulled his jeans down, looking face to face at his hard-on restrained by his boxers. It was straining to be let out against the cotton, and I could only oblige, causing a hiss to fall from his lips as he was exposed to the air of the store.

I expected him to be packing down there - he was “The King” of Hawkins High, after all - but I didn’t expect him to be bigger than I thought. I cautiously grasped at his cock, causing him to let out a jagged moan and his hand to fall over mine. “Fucking hell, (Y/N). Do you know how much I’ve imagined this scenario?” He grunted, helping to move my hand along his length.

“No, but I could probably guess,” I snarked back, before diverting my attention back to the matter in hand…quite literally. Tentatively, I poked my tongue out and licked a stripe up one of the protruding veins on his member, causing him to groan loudly, the noise only encouraging me further. I licked a few more times before turning my attention to his head, eliciting a louder moan from his lips, followed by several curses. 

“Fuck, so pretty…you’re doing so good sweetheart,” he sighed, hand falling away from mine and slowly coming back up to push my hair out my face, causing me to look up at him as he did so. His lips were slightly parted, and he was looking down at me through his eyelashes, eyes flickering as I looked up with his cock in my mouth. “Shit…so good, fuck. You’re killing me, doll.”

This was the only motivation I needed to keep on with what I was doing, and so I took him further into my mouth, bobbing my head up and down vigorously. It was difficult to keep this up for too long at a time though, purely because he was so damn big - but Steve seemed fine with anything I did as long as I was giving his dick enough attention. Soon, he began to twitch slightly in my mouth, his moans getting louder and his breathing quickening, to which he quickly pulled me off of him with a satisfying pop! He stood up over me kneeling on the floor, jerking his cock vigorously. “Where do you want it angel? Want me to cum in your mouth like the good slut you are? Say it, come on. Tell me, baby.”

“Please cum in my mouth, I’ll take it all in,” I whined - this act alone only served to encourage Steve further. 

“Want you to beg for it properly,” he muttered under his breath, and it took a moment before the gears finally clicked in my head.

“Please, Sir. I want to swallow your cum like the good princess I am for you,” I moaned, feeling myself begin to dampen again. This seemed to work, as barely a minute later the man above me was moaning loudly himself as he reached his own climax, the hot spurts of cum streaming down my throat. As soon as he had finished, I swallowed, opening my mouth to show him that nothing remained in there.

We took a moment to both catch our breath from the experience, and he was the first one to speak. “I think I’ve got my magic touch back, but do you wanna test that theory back at my place?”

“You’re on, Harrington.”

“Hey, that’s Sir to you, princess.”

[hopeintheashes]

@mellaithwen tagged me last week to share my top 5(ish) favorite things I've written... thank you! <3

For 9-1-1, I'll go with:

Home series

Warmth - the first thing I ever wrote for 9-1-1. Without the positive response I got to that one, I probably wouldn't have written anything else! It was meant to be a one-off, but led to the rest of the series... Hazards - straight-up sickfic and Buckley-Diaz family feels Home (Show Me Where the Light Is) - at the end of Hazards, I said, "I think I might write a quarantine fic, stay tuned..." and it turned out to be 26K of catharsis for the preceding 18 months (completed in September 2021). I'm pretty proud of it. :-)

First Best

This one is a year old this week, but it feels much farther away in time. A story I felt compelled to write but one that I was scared about how other people would receive. Answer: With a couple of outliers (who seemed to be reading a different story than the one I'd written), very well!

sharp glass when you break

There's stuff in here that I'd never said to anyone before I wrote it in this fic. Writing this fucked me up. But mostly in a cathartic way.

not like it hurts much anymore

This story - in the broader sense - has a happy ending. It's just that the 2700 words of this fic fall in the messy, unresolved middle, because all our characters have to work with is their present and their past, and there's no guarantee that the future could be better, so it feels safer not to disrupt the status quo.

And, from other fandoms:

Maps (Criminal Minds) casefic, sickfic, hurt/comfort, angst; JJ pov, looking mostly at Reid

In my opinion: The best thing I've ever written. I know people are unlikely to go read 10k for a show they don't watch, so here's an excerpt I'm particularly proud of instead:

She tries to watch without watching, to let him have some space. His arms slowly tighten across his chest, fingertips grazing the spot where Luke’s hand had been. Eyes far away like Penelope’s are, sometimes, when she’s staring off with words dying on her lips, like the right incantations could bring back the past. Some people have a gravity like the sun, and the way they burn blinds and wounds, the collateral damage of incandescent love. To lose them is to be knocked out of orbit. Untethered. That’s what he’s been since Morgan left. It’s threatening to bring her to her knees, right there on the dull, dun carpet of the conference room floor. She wants to channel her helpless, formless anger into something tangible, to give it a hilt and a whetted edge, to find the center of their pain. To sink her weapon into the secret soft places that only long friendship can reveal. She swallows her guilt and tries to direct her anger where it really belongs. Maps and photos and coordinates and timelines. Nebulous unsubs whose unarmored bellies are still protected by the dark.

Stay (Suits/White Collar; Mike/Neal)

Sometimes, you just want to write 8.5k of sickfic with some smut for a pairing so niche you're not sure anyone else will even read it. A surprising number of people have! I love it, and I'd love for more people to check it out.

Tagging: @renecdote and @buckupbuttercup and anyone who hasn't been tagged yet!

[folklorelise]

Please don’t go out with someone else.

Synopsis: How did squad leader mom met the captain and how they got together.

MASTERLIST; ASK (request or anything else)

Your brother and Wylan, your childhood friend, always wanted to join the training corps. As you were only a year younger than them, you grew up with them constantly talking about joining the military – naturally, you wanted to join the military too. Your parents tried to talk the three of you out of this, but it was useless. Wylan always wanted to see what was outside the walls, therefore he knew he wanted to join the survey corps. Your brother tried to talk him out of this, but Wylan was stubborn.

When you finally reached the appropriate age to join the survey corps, you were beyond excited. Your brother and Wylan both waited another year so you could all join together.

“This is going to be so fun!” Wylan shouted the first day.

Out of the three of you, your brother was the best one – he was a great fighter, he was great with the gear and he was very obedient as well. Wylan was doing great – nothing exceptional but he could easily make into the top ten.

“At this rate, I’m sure the three of us will end up in the top ten and you know what that means?” your brother asked, “we could all move inside of wall Sina, and have a nice and peaceful life.”

“I don’t want to be part of the military police.” Wylan stated, “I’m joining the survey corps, no matter what happens.”

“Why would you do this?” your brother yelled. “Wylan, I didn’t want to bring this up but your parents –.”

“Yes, I know what happened to them.” Wylan argued. “I know they sacrificed themselves outside, they were both soldiers and having a kid was clearly a bad choice. That doesn’t mean I won’t join the survey corps too.” Wylan paused a second, “You think I’m stupid for wanting this.”

“No. It’s just that I want to grow old with you beside me.” your brother admitted. “And with you being in the survey corps, that won’t be possible.”

“I could visit –.” Wylan started.

“That won’t be possible because you might die outside!” your brother then looked at you, “you’re coming with me, right?”

“I might no be able to do that. None of us will if we’re not in the top ten.” you hesitated.

That night, before going to bed, Jesper, your brother, pulled you on the side so he could talk to you alone.

“Don’t mess up with tests tomorrow.” he told you.

“What?”

“I know you’re capable of doing the bare minimum, so you won’t have to choose. If you want to join the survey corps too, I…” he took a deep breath, “please take care of Wylan for me.”

“You could come with us.” you suggested. “You’re amazing, better than anyone else here, so why don’t you want to?”

“I don’t want to. I don’t want to know what it feels like to be in front of a titan and knowing that they’ll eat me when I can be safe inside.” Jesper worried.

“Please go talk to Wylan, I don’t want you two to fight. You’re both choosing different paths and you know, it’s ok.”

“Yeah. I should apologise.”

“Also, I will try my best to keep him safe outside.”

“Thank you.” Jesper smiled before leaving.

Without surprise, Jesper ended up being ranked first while you were third and Wylan fourth. Amongst the top ten, there was only you and Wylan who did not choose the military police. Before leaving, Jesper came to see you both to tell you goodbye.

“I’m going to miss you.”  Wylan told Jesper.

“I’m going to miss you too.” Jesper held Wylan’s hand tightly.

“Great,” you added smiling, “I mean, great to know I’ll be missed too.”

“I’m going to miss you too.” your brother smiled before hugging you.

“Yeah, anyway I’ll leave first because I feel like a third wheel here. I’ll see you later.”

When you finally arrived at the survey corps headquarters, you had a few hours to clean your clothes into your dorm before meeting everyone else on the training grounds to meet your future squad leader. You were beyond relieved when you found out Wylan and you were in the same squad because making friends was not your specialty.

“Hi, I’m Erwin. I’m your squad leader.”

“You’re really young.” you commented which resulted in Wylan punching you softly.

“I’m sorry, sir.” Wylan apologised.

“No, it’s fine. I worked hard for this post and I am proud of it.”

Later that day, you both met Hange.

“Really nice to meet you. I heard you two ranked top ten.” Hange said. “You won’t regret your choice, I’m sure it’ll be fun!”

“I’m Wylan, and this is Y/N.”

That night, you all drank and ate together – that is how you became friend with Hange, Mike, Erwin – your squad leader – and many other comrades.

Your first expedition took place a month after your arrival – it started great. There were only a few titans. Unfortunately, after a few days, it started to rain. At first, it was fine but when it turned out to be an enormous storm – it started to worry everyone.  

The order was to stay close to each other so no one would get lost. When the storm finally calmed down – you looked around and noticed a lot of missing people.

“Where – Where’s Wylan?” you asked loudly.

“Y/N,” Erwin held you back, “he might be with another squad somewhere else.”

“No,” you mumbled panicked, “he – he was just behind me. He should be here too!”

You walked away and sat down somewhere calm, hoping for Wylan to show up. The remaining squads arrived one after the another, each one missing some of their soldiers.

“Y/N, the commander arrived,” Hange said quietly, “let’s go.”

The expedition just started which meant that it had to continue. A few hours passed, and as you followed Erwin on your horse you noticed a few bodies sitting under a tree on your left.

“Squad leader Erwin,” you hesitated, “look.” you pointed at where the bodies were.

Erwin and the rest of the squad run to them. You pushed them aside when you saw Wylan was one of the injured soldiers.

“Wylan!” you sobbed, “Hey, it’s me.”

“Hey.” Wylan choked, “I’m… glad… you’re alive.”

“You are too.” you cried.

“I’m sor–.”

“No, it’s ok, we’re going to be fine.” you tried to hold your tears back.

“Tell him… I love him…” Wylan took a deep breath, “ok?”

“Ok. I’m sure he knows and that he loves you very much too.”

“Good.” Wylan smiled weakly, “thank you… for coming back...”

You stayed with Wylan until he passed away – then, the soldiers’ bodies were all put in the cart and as the cart went back inside the walls, you had to continue.

When the expedition finally ended, you headed straight to Wylan dorm so you could clean his clothes and other belongings. You sent a letter to your family and Jesper so they could come for the funeral the survey corps organised for all the loses.

“I’m so sorry.” you cried when you saw Jesper again. “When I – he was…”

“It’s ok.” Jesper hugged you. “It’s ok.” he repeated.

Your parents brought flowers with them – in front of Wylan tomb, there were only the four of you.

“I’m going to bring his things.” you said, “can you guys help me?” you asked your parents so Jesper could have some privacy with Wylan.

You had put everything in a small bag, except for Wylan cloak which you decided to keep. Everything else was giving to Jesper. Before leaving, Jesper spent some time with you in your empty dorm.

“Did you… did he said anything before…”

“He told me to tell you that he loves you.” you whispered.

You both stayed together, in complete silence before he got up and had to leave. You reluctantly walked to the mess hall for dinner and sat with Hange. They smiled at you and you both ate in silence too – no one really wanted to talk.

Years went by and at the age of twenty-four, you became a squad leader. Hange had been promoted a few years before you – everything was going great. Then, one day, Erwin brought in three new recruits from the Underground. After commander Shadis put them in Flagon’s squad, you left with Hange et Erwin.

“What did you do?” you asked Erwin once you three were alone. “Why would you bring three thugs from the underground here?”

“They could be an asset to the survey corps. You should go and see them fight.”

“They have zero experience; they had no training. Just look at how disrespectful they are!”

“They are better than some of us at using the gear with no training.” Erwin corrected you.

“We’ll pay them a visit later.” Hange said.

“Great.” Erwin smiled before leaving.

“I don’t want to.” you told Hange.

“Oh, come on, please come with me!”

On their first day of training, you and Hange joined Flagon. You were all talking waiting for them to arrive, but after ten minutes of waiting, you volunteered to go and look for them. The first place you went for was the changing room with all the gear you used.

“You’re late.” you stated when you saw Isabel still with her gear undone.

“Sorry.”

“Well, hurry. Also, where are your two other friends?” you asked, “doesn’t matter, I’ll go look for them.”

“Wait.” Isabel stopped you, “This gear is a little different from what we used. I don’t know how to put it on correctly, no one told me.”

You turned around and slowly walked to her and explained to her how to put it on easily and quickly. When Isabel was done, you both walked out, and her friends were waiting for her outside.

“Next time try to be on time.” you told them when you walked out.

“Sorry miss.” Furlan apologised.

“It’s squad leader Y/N.” you corrected him harshly.

When you joined Flagon, he was fuming – screaming that they were irresponsible for making him wait that long and that they should just go back to where they came. When they started to kill the wooden titans, you were all speechless.

“Oh my!” you shouted impressed, “Erwin was right.”

“I wouldn’t have mind having them with me.” Hange stated impressed as well. “Flagon, you’re lucky as hell.”

Flagon ignored you and left to talk to them while you and Hange were talking about how good they were.

“Levi’s the most impressive right?” Hange said.

“Hell yeah!” you agreed. “Now I just want to see them in front of real titans. Act cool.” you told Hange when you saw them coming back.

“You were awesome!” Hange shouted, “Even more because you didn’t receive any training. Right Y/N.”

“You were great, yeah.” you commented calmly.

The next expedition was announced a few days later – it would take place in a month and half. Isabel and you became quite close since you were in charge of teaching them how to ride the horses – Flagon traded with you. While you would do his work, he will do some of your paperwork.

Furlan was polite and nice – he was making a lot of effort to blend in like Isabel. The only one who did not try was Levi. You tried to talk to him multiple times, but he would never answer you.

“Oh right,” you said before they would leave, “this weekend you’re allowed to leave the headquarters so you can visit family or just walk around the market. If you don’t want to leave, I can bring things for you if you’d like.”

“Can you bring back some of the cake you had last time?” Isabel asked referring to the cake your mom had baked.

“I’d like that too.” Furlan smiled.

“Sure, I’ll send a letter to my mom. What about you Levi?”

“Bring me some tea. And not the one you have here because it’s disgusting.” Levi said.

“Tea? Ok, I can do that.” you smiled, “you know it’s the first time you ever said anything to me.” you laughed before leaving.

You went back to your room to write your letter asking your mother to bake some cake and gather some tea leaves. While you were in your room, the trio went to their usual spot in the roof.

“I like Y/N,” Isabel started, “she’s nice.”

“Weirdly nice to us,” Levi said, “you didn’t tell her anything right?”

“I didn’t!”

“I don’t understand why she is that nice though.” Furlan added. “She didn’t seem to like us at first.”

“She changed her mind, she got to know us better –.” Isabel defended you.

“We’re leaving soon so it doesn’t matter.” Levi said.

Two years ago, your parents had the chance to move inside of wall Sina thanks to their business growing. You left Friday night to your parent’s house. Jesper was the one who came to take you home.

Saturday morning, Levi found it odd that you were with them – because you would always greet them in the morning. They did not know that you left earlier the day before. Hange and Erwin noticed how Levi was looking around and staring at every new person entering the mess hall.

“You should go and tell him that she’s not here.” Hange told Erwin.

“You go.” Erwin said.

“Fine.” Hange went to their table. “Hi. I noticed how you were looking for Y/N… I think.” Hange told Levi.

“I wasn’t.”

“Oh, then never mind.”

“But now that you’re here, where is she?” Levi asked.

“She went home last night. She’ll be back in three days. No need to worry.”

“I wasn’t.”

Levi hated himself for missing you – he tried to convince himself that he wanted to see you because you promised him tea, but deep down, he missed your calm and joyful presence. You had a lot of baskets full of food your mother prepared which meant your brother had to come and help with it.

“Where is there a short man glaring at me like that?” Jesper told when you left the carriage.

“What?” you asked him confused.

Jesper discreetly nodded towards Levi.

“I don’t know.” you said.

“Well, I’m leaving you here.” Jesper said going back into the carriage. “You’re good, right?”

“Yes, I’ll see you soon, bye!” you hugged him one last time before he left.

There were in total five big baskets of food – you tried to take them all at once for more efficiency, but it was a failure. Levi from behind took three of them seeing you struggling.

“Thank you.” you smiled, “we should just put them in my room.”

You walked in silence to your room and once Levi put everything on your desk – he started to leave but you stopped him by grabbing his sleeve.

“You forgot your tea.” you let go of his sleeve. “Oh, I also brought you this tea set, because the one we have here is really old.” you explained as you gave him an entire basket. “There’s also Furlan and Isabel’s food in there.”

“Thank you.” Levi whispered before leaving.

Two days after you came back, Levi stormed in your room at night as you were ready to go to bed. When Levi saw you in a simple tee shirt and some short, he immediately left your room. You slowly opened your door only to find Levi still outside of your room.

“Are you ok?” you asked worried.

“Yes.” Levi blushed slightly. “Your mother, I don’t know how she organised her tea. I need your help.”

“Oh, okay,” you nodded, “let’s go then.” you closed your door.

“Are you not going to put on more clothes?” Levi asked you, “because it’s cold.”

When you noticed how Levi still would not look into your eyes, you decided it would be better to put on a long jacket.

You followed him to the kitchen, where he had prepared two cups and some water and every tea flavour your mother had packed.

“Each colour of bags represents a flavour,” you explained, “Mh, I thought she wrote on it which flavour it was, but I think with time she just stopped writing it – because she knew. What flavour you want to drink now?”

“You choose.”

“I like green tea, but it’s late in the night now so we should try something else. Like chamomile.” you thought.

Levi poured hot water into the teapot and you waited five minutes before pouring some into the cups. You sat in front of each other at the nearest table to the kitchen and drank in silence.

“Why are you staring at me?” Levi asked drinking his tea.

“I always like to look at pretty flowers and pretty things in general,” you said which made Levi raise his eyebrows, “that’s why I was staring at you.” you completed your sentence smiling.

Levi felt his cheeks getting hotter – he was speechless. No one ever before complimented him, ever so that was new. Meaning, he did not know how to answer.

“Are you okay?” you asked him, “you’re really red. Oh no, is it because of the tea?” you reached out your hands to touch his face. “Are you having a fever?” you worried.

“No, I’m fine.” Levi took your hands and put them on the table but did not let go of them. “Your hands are soft.” Levi said.

“Your hands are warm.” you smiled squeezing his hands softly.

You were both looking at each other when suddenly the door opened on Isabel and Furlan which made Levi back away from you.

“Oh, sorry.” Isabel said, “did we interrupt something?”

“No.” Levi said. “I’ll meet you in ten minutes.”

“Ok.” Furlan left with Isabel.

“You can go, I’ll clean this up.” Levi started to gather the cups and teapot.

“Ok, I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

Neither you nor Levi slept that night – it was not unusual for Levi, but for you it was. You could not stop thinking about what happened before Isabel and Furlan came in and neither could Levi.

After that, Levi would often make small talk with you when you were alone. He would often call you to drink tea with him before you went to bed. Then, a few days before their first expedition, Levi started to avoid you more and more which you did not find odd – it might be stress about the expedition. You were busy with your squad and paperwork. The day of the expedition, you went to see Levi because it had been a while.

“I’ll probably see you during the expedition though, but I wanted to see you before leaving. Good luck out there even though I know you don’t need it.”

Your squad was next to Hange’s and the expedition started. The few years after Wylan’s passing, every time it rained during an expedition you would start to panic and not be as useful as you would usually be. Surprisingly, the survey corps never experienced another storm during an expedition – it always happened before or after it. Therefore, when it started to rain heavily you started to be worried.

“Y/N,” Hange called you, “it’s ok.”

“Yeah.” you whispered, “no one walk away from me.” you ordered to your squad.

As the storm started, Hange’s squad and yours took shelter on high trees leaving your horses under you.

“Are you ok?” Hange asked you.

“Yes. It’s going to calm down soon, and it’ll be good.”

When the storm calmed down, Erwin’s squad passed on your way, so you joined them. After assuring him that no one was injured, you continued to ride on your horse. Erwin, Hange and you were leading the way, but very soon you stopped when you noticed all the blood on the ground.

“Wha – what happened?” you trembled. “Wh – who’s squad…” you got off your horse.

“That’s… the steam from the fallen titans.” Erwin said. “Are there any survivors out there?” Erwin yelled.

When you all approached the steam, you found Levi on his knees next to someone’s head which made you look away.

“Are you the only one left?” Erwin asked, “The corpses of these titans… you did this alone…?”

Levi stared at Erwin before tackling Erwin down of his horse. Mike, Hange and you took out your blades ready to defend Erwin, but he ordered us to stay back. Levi put his blade next to Erwin’s neck before speaking.

“Erwin, I’m going to kill you, you bastard. That’s why I’m here.”

Erwin showed Levi the envelope he kept on him and explained to him what happened.

“Why did you bring us into the corps?”

“Your military prowess…” Erwin started, “And to use you as partners to throw off Lovof…but now, it’s all over.”

Levi pushed on his blade, but Erwin stopped it with his hand.

“Who’s the one that killed my subordinates, your friends. Was it me? Was it you? Do you think that if you had come to attack me together that the two of them would have made it out alive?” Erwin asked, “No! It was the titans!”

Everyone else listened to Erwin’s speech including Levi.

“Fight with the survey corps Levi. Humanity needs your skill!”

The end of that expedition came sooner than you thought. You made sure that your squad members were doing ok then you went back to your room to clean up. You made sure to write a letter to your brother first so he would know that you were still alive and then you decided to go check on Levi.

“Levi?” you knocked on his door, but no one answered. “If you need to talk, I’m here.”

For the next few days, Levi rarely went out of his room. Furlan and him were the only ones sleeping there – meaning no one could bother him. A week after the end of the expedition, Levi came to your room one night.

“Levi.” you put your book down.

“You said… I could talk to you.”

“Of course, you can.” you sat on your bed. “I’m sorry for your loss.” you added as you saw Levi pacing around your room.

“I can’t…I don’t know what to do.” Levi sat next to you. “Whenever someone knocks on my door, I keep hoping it would be one of them.”

“I know…” you paused, “after that, you’ll feel anger.” you hesitated, “Then comes the guilt, thinking what if I was quicker or what if I made a different choice… maybe I could’ve helped. After that, you’ll feel sad. Eventually, it won’t hurt as much as it used to, to talk about them. It’ll get better.”

“How do you know it will get better?”

“It is terrible, but this probably won’t be your last loss. And I –… I lost my best friend a long time ago. It was our first expedition too…”

Levi and you were lying on your bed in silence.

“I can’t sleep.” Levi admitted. “It’s getting lonely in that room.”

“I can stay with you if you want.” you yawned.

“Sorry, I’m keeping you from sleeping – I’ll go.” Levi stood up but you held his hand.

“You can stay here. I don’t mind.” you looked at Levi.

You moved on the inner side of your bed so Levi could lay next to you. Levi did not let go of your hand when he laid down on your bed.

“Goodnight Levi.” you said before falling asleep very quickly.

“Goodnight Y/N.” Levi whispered looking at you.

Levi found himself getting sleepier and when he closed his eyes – for the first time in a long time – he fell asleep without any difficulty. In the middle of the night, you woke up feeling thirsty and noticed that Levi was sleeping. He was still holding your hand which made it impossible for you to get up.

You always have a glass of water ready next to your bed, but you were on the wrong side of the bed. You got up and tried not to wake Levi up or letting go of his hand and drank your water. When you went back to bed, Levi finally let go of your hand and turned on his side – his back against you. You took a deep breath before wrapping your arms around Levi.

Levi was the first one to wake up. You were clinging tightly around Levi which made it impossible for him to move without waking you up.

“Mh, morning.” you mumbled when you woke up.

“Morning.”

“Did you sleep well?” you asked still holding onto Levi.

“Yes, thanks to you.”

“We could do this every night…” you said. “if you want, because…” your cheeks started to heat up.

“Yeah.” Levi breathed.

After a few minutes of staying in bed, you both got up and brushed your teeth and changed into new clothes. You arrived together in the mess hall and when you saw Levi going to eat alone, you held his shirt back.

“Come eat with us.” you pointed at your usual table with Hange, Mike and Erwin.

“No, it’s fine.”

“They don’t mind.” you looked at your friends, “right?”

“We don’t.” Erwin smiled.

You sat next to Levi and while he ate in silence, you were chatting with everyone. Your friends noticed how Levi and you became a lot closer since that day:

-          Levi would often finish eating first, instead of leaving he waited for you to finish eating.

-          You would always come in together in the morning.

-          You would always leave together at night.

-          According to Mike, Levi smelled like you – logic since he slept in your room with you.

“Are they together?” Hange once asked.

“They have to be.” Nanaba said. “Right?”

“Should we ask them?” Hange said.

“You ask them.” Mike suggested.

“No thanks. Oh, here they come,” Hange said, “act natural.”

Everyone suspected you two to be together, but neither Levi nor you said anything about it. Levi and you both had feelings for each other, but no one was brave enough to make the first step. You acted like a couple without really being one.

Two months after this, Jesper paid you a visit which made Levi confused. He did not know Jesper was your brother meaning he thought you were going on a date with someone. At night when you came back, Levi took you to your room.

“I like you.” Levi suddenly admitted. “Please don’t go out with someone else.”

“I – I like you too. A lot.” you smiled.

“So… who was that man?”

“Jesper? He’s my brother!”

“Oh.” Levi looked away embarrassed.

“So, are we a couple now?”

“I’d like that.”

“Me too.”

—————

Bonus about how people found out about it — Hange saw your two like this:

[calpalirwin]

Let The Walls Break Down

Summary: Calum gets over his skepticism

Word Count: 2.7k

And away, and away we go!

__

“It’s almost impossible. Love sucks. Don’t try it. It’s a scam.”

That had been Calum’s general thoughts on relationships since the two of you called it quits. The “almost” bit was in admittance that 1.) your relationship had been amicable from start to finish, in fact the two of you were still close with each other, and 2.) he knew love worked for some people, however he didn’t view himself as one of those some.

Being close to Calum post breakup meant you had a front row seat to the man’s brief stints at romance, which was a nice way of saying “endless stream of one night stands.” The flip side was he had a front row seat to your own count of nameless men. While in the beginning, the others in your friend group joked in hushed tones that it was an act on both your parts to stir up jealousy, the longer it went on without any animosity building up between you and Calum, the more the whispers died down until they disappeared all together. Because the simple truth was that the one night stands were just about sex. After all, you and Calum had learned together that the two of you were too busy for anything more than casual sex. A lesson both of you considered well-learned until Michael got engaged and flipped everything into a new perspective.

“It’s not that I don’t believe in love,” you said after Crystal recounted all the details and you stopped squealing in excitement for her. “I mean, anyone who sees you and Michael has to believe it’s real.”

“Aw, Y/N,” Crystal blushed shyly.

You laughed, “I’m serious. You and Michael. Luke and Sierra. Ashton and Kaykay. I’m surrounded with reasons to believe love exists. The real ‘can’t imagine my life without you’ kind of love. But for me?” You waved a hand dismissively. “Pfft, nah.”

“Because you don’t believe he’s out there for you, or because you already had him and the timing was wrong?” she pressed suggestively.

You rolled your eyes. Right person, wrong time was the excuse you had given when asked when you and Calum split, because to you, it was the closest thing to the truth. “Okay…” you started slowly. “Of course I loved Cal. And I still love him now. But when we were together… We were kids who were focused on our careers. And we’re still those career-driven kids. Understanding the balance between professional life and personal life without feeling like we’re sacrificing a piece of it for another was something Cal and I will never master. We tried. I thought if I could find that balance with anyone, it would be with him. But it wasn’t. And that’s okay. I’m fulfilled in other ways.”

“But…” Crystal kept trying to press.

“But nothing,” you laughed. “I’m happy with my life the way it is, Crys. And beyond happy for you and Michael. You’re getting married!”

~~~

Across town in a celebration of their own, Calum was under similar fire. “Happy for ya, mate,” Calum said, clapping Michael on the shoulder.

“Thanks, Cal,” Michael beamed. “I think I’m still in shock from all of it.”

“I think that’s probably a natural feeling,” Ashton told him, playing the voice of reason. “It’s an exciting change that pulls things into sharper focus.”

“Yeah, like all I wanna do now is tell Sierra how much I love her,” Luke put in.

“Oh, you fuckin’ sap,” Calum laughed.

“Just because you’ve never been in love…”

“I have too!” Calum defended.

“Oh, really? Who?”

“Y/N, idiot…” Ashton told Luke with a roll of his eyes.

Luke nodded in a “Oh, yeah!” fashion, before going on, “Is she the only girl you ever loved?”

“Yep.”

“So why aren’t you still with her?”

Calum shrugged. “Timing was off. And we haven’t changed. So why would the timing have suddenly changed?” The question was rhetorical, without the slightest hint of hurt. A simple fact of life, nothing less, nothing more. A fact Calum had made peace with long before.

“So what? You’re fine with the greatest love of your life being over 2 years ago?” they questioned anyway.

He shrugged again. “Have been for a while, in case ya haven’t noticed. And no,” he raised a hand, cutting off any protest, “this isn’t a bitter, ‘oh convince me otherwise’ deal. Y/N and I are both more than happy with the lives we’re living.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I talk with her, and I trust she’s telling me the truth…”

“Alright, alright,” Ashton was willing to let the conversation rest, but he had one last question. “Is there any part of you that would want to try again with Y/N?”

A third and final shrug. “I mean, she was the only one I ever saw a future with aside from the band.”

“That has to mean something, Cal. C’mon. If there was ever a time to give love a chance, it’s now.”

~~~

While Calum’s head raced with his friends' words of encouragement, if he could call it that, yours raced with thoughts of feeling like you somehow failed in life. Sure, your career was everything you wanted it to be and more. You wouldn’t trade a single moment of your life for anything else. But now that your friends were clearly doing more than simple dating, the doubt started to trickle in. Would it be nice to share a life with someone? Absolutely. But not at the risk of your own independence. And the only person who had ever proven that you could maybe have the best of both worlds was Calum. And even that hadn’t worked. But maybe there was something to Crystal’s words about it being a case of bad timing. Maybe it was worth another try.

So that’s where you found yourself, sitting on the edge of your bed, sharing at Calum’s contact, finger hovering over the call icon, trying to figure out where and how to start again with the man. And then your phone was buzzing in your hand, and you gasped. Had you accidentally hit the call button?! No. Calum was calling you. Confused, you hit accept. “Hey, Cal. What’s up?”

“Not much. Just had a quick question for ya.”

“Well I might have a quick answer for ya.”

You heard his soft chuckle and then a brief pause as he cleared his throat, and you knew he was pushing a hand through his hair, stemming whatever nerves this “question” was creating. “You got any dinner plans for Friday?”

“No. Why?”

“There’s this new place I’ve been wanting a try, and you know how I am about eating out alone. And it’s been a minute since just the two of us hung out. So I’ll pick you up at 7?”

You gave a small laugh at the rushed excuse, wondering what he was really up to. “Sure thing, Cal.”

“Cool. Oh, and uh, dress in something nice-ish? The restaurant’s kinda uppity.”

Another small laugh. “Alright, Cal. See you Friday then.”

~~~

“It’s just dinner. It’s just Cal,” you told your reflection as you finished getting ready. “Nothing you haven’t done a million times before,” you kept trying to calm the butterflies in the pit of your stomach. While you had a pretty good idea on what this dinner really was, you didn’t want to get your hopes up that Calum was having the same change of heart that you’d been having. The man really did hate eating alone at restaurants, and if the place was as upscale as he had told you, then it made sense that he’d rather bring you along than Ashton. And he had been right about it being a good while since it was just the two of you spending time together rather than a larger group outing.

But when Calum knocked on your door rather than texting that he was in your driveway, you couldn’t stop the blush coloring your cheeks. And when you opened the door to reveal the man on the other side, dressed sharply with a bouquet of your favorite flowers in his hand, you felt your heart skip a beat. “Oh, Cal,” you breathed. “You didn’t have to do that,” you told him, taking the flowers and moving to put them in a vase of water.

“It’s how you deserve to be treated,” he said simply with a shrug as he leaned against your doorway.

“You’re too sweet to me, Hood,” you teased lightly. “Ready?”

“After you.”

When he went as far as to get the car door for you, you had to laugh. “Okay, Hood. What gives?”

“I told you. I’m treating you the way you deserve to be treated.”

“Nah, there’s more. I can tell. C’mon. Spill it,” you pressed when he got in the driver’s seat. “Flowers. Getting the door. Dinner at a place that requires me to dress like this. You’re up to something.”

“You look stunning, by the way,” he said, reaching over to give your thigh a squeeze.

“Calum Thomas Hood.”

He sighed. “We were good, right? Like when we were together? It’s not my memory playing tricks on me?”

“You were the best boyfriend I ever had,” you answered honestly.

He nodded. “Okay. You’re not allowed to make fun of me. But since Mike got engaged, it’s gotten to me a bit. Almost like I’m missing out on something, but it’s weird because my life is already everything I want it to be. So what could I possibly be missing out on, you know?”

“Why would I make fun of you for that?”

“Because it’s a stupid ass reason to take you on a date.”

“Oh, is that what this is? I hadn’t noticed.”

“Ha-ha,” he deadpanned. “Look, I guess what I’m saying is, recent events made me reevaluate things in my life. And I think I’m in a better position than I was a few years ago to be a real partner to someone. And even when I wasn’t that person, you were the only one I could see myself becoming that person for. So… if you’re up for it, I’d really like for us to try again.”

Underneath the streetlight casting him in a soft reddish hue, he turned his head slightly to look over at you, brown eyes hopeful and solemn. When the light turned green, he turned his attention back to the road, but kept stealing glances over at you, still waiting for your response.

“I guess it’s only fair to let you know that I’ve been thinking the same thing.”

The corner of his mouth curved up in a smile. “Really?”

“Really,” you said with a soft smile and a small nod of your head. “I was actually hoping this was more on the date side than the friends grabbing a bite to eat side.”

“Good, because this is definitely a date.”

“Good,” you nodded again before leaning across the center console to press a kiss to his cheek, grinning as warmth spread across his face.

~3 Years Later~

You startled awake at a phone ringing nearby, a tangled mess of limbs and bedsheets. “Mmm?” Calum rasped, voice heavy with sleep as he answered the phone, followed by a quick, “Whoa, mate, stop yelling. You did what now?” There was a small pause as whoever was on the other end of the conversation spoke in a rapid flurry that you couldn’t decipher. “You did?!” Calum clarified whatever the news was, sitting up straight in bed, your head falling from his chest to his lap.

“Ow…” you giggled, shifting to sit up against the headboard like Calum was.

“Sorry,” Calum mouthed, listening intently to whoever he was still talking to, raising a finger for you to give him a minute when you raised an eyebrow in silent question. “That’s fuckin’ great, Luke! Congrats to the both of you. Lemme know what the plans are for celebrating and give Sierra a hug from me in the meantime, yeah? Alright. Talk to ya later, mate. Bye.”

“Well?” you demanded.

“Luke and Sierra are getting married. Or he proposed anyway, and she said yes.”

“Oh, that’s great!”

“Yeah, I’m really happy for them. Wow… first Mike, now Luke. We really aren’t the same kids we used to be, are we?”

“I think in some respect you guys still are. You still cling to those roots of who you used to be, the things that shaped you into the people you are now. But you guys are also growing up, too. It happens, Cal.”

“Yeah, no, I just… Wow. It’s not something I really pay much attention to, us growing up, until something like this happens.”

“The last time one of your band members got engaged, you got a case of feeling like you weren’t measuring up somehow. You’re not feeling that way now, are you?”

“No. Not at all. In fact… Luke said something when Mike told us he got engaged. That he wanted to go tell Sierra how much he loved her.”

“Aw, that’s really sweet.”

“Yeah, and at the time I made fun of him for it. But… I dunno… I get it. This type of shit really shifts things into perspective.”

“I mean, yeah. Last time it resulted in both of us thinking we should try being an ‘us’ again. What’s the perspective shifting to this time? You’re not gonna go out, and buy a ring, are you?”

“No, I already have one in my sock drawer.”

You choked. “What?”

He climbed out of bed with a laugh, making his way to the dresser and rummaging around in one of the top drawers. Then, something small was soaring through the air as he tossed whatever it was onto the bed towards you. “Told ya,” he said simply, as you grabbed the small box, popping the lid to find a ring inside.

“How long have you had this?” you asked, your voice a small whisper.

“Uh… 2016 I think,” he said as he rejoined you in bed.

“So, since the first time we dated?”

“Yep.”

“Calum!”

“What?” he laughed. “I told you our entire relationship, both then and now, that you’re the only person I see a future with. Did you think I was lying?”

“No! I- I just didn’t know you went so far as to get a ring, and keep it for 5 bloody years.”

“Well, it would have been a little weird if you had it all these years, considering… ya know.”

You laughed in a mix of disbelief and shock. “You are absolutely crazy.”

“I’m not actually proposing, you know that, yeah? I mean, yes, the ring is yours. But only if you want it to be. I love the life we have together, more so than I thought I could love any other version of my life. I never feel like I’m stuck in place, or missing something when I’m with you. I’ll be just as happy if you never wear that ring, as I would if you wore it every day for the rest of your life. You, me, Duke, and music is all I’m ever gonna need in life. I’ve known it since the first time I said I love you. Even in those years we thought chasing our careers was more important, you were still the only person I’ve ever been in love with.”

“Calum…” you breathed, your lip trembling.

“Shh, if you want the whole deal of the proposal and the picture perfect wedding, I’ll give that to you gladly. That’s what the ring’s for. But if you’re content with what we have now, this will always be enough for me, and that’s a promise.”

“I don’t want a proposal only because Luke and Sierra made you extra sentimental. I don’t want to take their moment away from them either.”

“That ring has been yours far longer than any extra sentiment our friends getting engaged could stir up, but I get what you’re saying. If/when you want it, say the word.”

“Ask me again in a year,” you decided. “And I mean really ask me. The whole deal.”

“I can’t fuckin’ wait,” he murmured as his lips crashed into yours, his hands cupping your face. “I’m so in love with you. Always have been. Always will be.”

__

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[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

There's this sort of trope I've noticed in a lot of Twilight fanfiction where the Cullens do not return as quickly as they did in canon during New Moon and somehow inexplicably run into Bella years later, when she's in her early-to-mid twenties and I was wondering how you think this would go? In my head the Cullens would skedaddle the second they got a whiff of Bella, but suspending disbelief there I always have a hard time buying it whenever older Bella ends up back together with Edward.

I think it depends on the Cullen in question, or, if it’s all the Cullens together.

The Yoko Ono Effect

To be honest, if the Cullens had stayed away in New Moon, I don’t think they would have made it as a singular unit to five-ten years down the road. The cracks were already to show even a few months in.

This isn’t to say Bella is responsible for the collapse of the Cullens, I believe they’re doomed anyway, but she serves as a catalyst.

After leaving Forks in New Moon the Cullens immediately begin drifting apart.

Edward is despondent and depressed, within a few weeks leaves the coven, and travels down the continent until he reaches Rio where he stays for months. Note, Edward knew by the time he hit Rio that he had long since lost Victoria’s trail (for the record, he lost her in Mexico) but I think it’s very telling he does not return to the coven.

I don’t think Edward was ever coming back.

This puts a significant strain on Emse, as Edward is far and away her favorite child, and she’s noted as being anxious and severely unhappy with Edward’s disappearance. In time, I believe this would lead to the collapse of Esme and Carlisle’s dumpster fire marriage (which at this point only survives on denial and miscommunication).

Alice and Jasper leave the group to both a) get out of dodge b) investigate Alice’s past. While they do later return things are... awkward.

Rosalie desperately tries to keep the family together, tells Edward the bad news to a) be the only one with the balls to tell him and b) hopefully get him to come back to the family. This, obviously, doesn’t work.

I think without Bella’s suicide attempt the coven would have broken apart probably within the year. Rosalie desperately would have tried to keep them together, but Esme would crack and go to be with Edward, Carlisle would let her go, Alice and Jasper would probably keep their heads down and go on extended honeymoons, and eventually they all realize there’s just nothing to go back to. 

They go their separate ways.

The Cullens Are Still Cullening

But lets pretend that things work out.

Edward gets tired of being depressed in Rio and comes back to... be depressed with the family. To be honest, I don’t think he’d get over this. Edward was severely depressed before Bella.

He was very contemptuous not only of his own family but of humanity in general. Yes, he has this very strange idolation of humanity but he also views them as inherently beneath him and lesser. High school is his purgatory where he listens to the mundane thoughts of mundane mayfly humans.

He outright despises Jasper and Rosalie and even Carlisle, who he adores, he often views as something of a fool in great need of Edward’s personal protection.

Edward has lost all passion in life, even in his hobbies like music, and is slowly but surely spiraling down into a place where he can never recover. His obsession with Bella, while far from a good thing, brings light back into his life.

This is an Edward who gave that all up and willingly returns back to what he used to be. And I think that would destroy something in him. Frankly, I think it’d leave him in an even worse place than canon.

So, if the Cullens run into a now adult Bella...

Well, it’d be a clusterfuck.

Edward will be very conflicted as he tried to leave for Bella’s own good but now she’s done exactly what he wanted. She grew up and got over him, Edward presumably means nothing to her now.

Worse, there is now such a gap between them. Edward is physically much younger than she is now, he poses as a high school student while she’s an adult. Bella’s fears were warranted, she’s too old for him now, and in many ways has outgrown him.

If Bella’s in any sort of relationship with anyone, I think Edward would flip his lid, and murder her significant other. As he often fantasized murdering Mike as well as her nameless future husband. If she’s single...

I think with enough time, distance, and therapy Bella would be able to make significant strides towards a healthier mindset. She’d get over her depression and in turn over Edward. She might be angry at him for a while but in time would likely decide that he had left her for what were immature but noble reasons.

What they had was nice, but the relationship was never going to last. Even when she was a teenager, she knew this, which was why she so desperately wanted to be a vampire.

She likely might talk to him to find closure, but I imagine a more mature Bella realizes they know nothing about each other. She’s had so much time in her life now without him and he’s so different from what she remembered, younger. There’s no way to start a relationship, more, Edward himself realized it was never going to work.

I imagine Edward doesn’t take this well either. For all that Edward says he wants certain things, really, he does an impressive job making sure Bella never ran from him. Bella legitimately not being interested in him would destroy him and... likely lead to him devouring Bella eventually.

After all, Alice had predicted that Edward would not be able to stay away and that, ultimately, there are only two futures for Bella: death or vampire.

Edward Comes Back Alone

Alice had predicted that Edward would not be able to keep his distance from Bella. He tries twice. Once, in Twilight, when Alice first announces that Edward is in love with Bella and she will become a vampire. The second time is New Moon.

The first, he cracks in a week. It just doesn’t work out and Edward has a minature crisis over it and tells himself it’s fine because he has to protect her from spiders therefore he has to be in her life AND THIS IS FINE.

The second, he notes that he’s dangerously close to cracking and Alice predicted he couldn’t do it. He makes it six months, but does confess to Bella he often considered finding her again and watching her life from the shadows in Rio.

So, I highly doubt that Edward would make it to five or ten years or that he’d make it with the Cullens. He probably comes back alone by the time Bella’s senior year starts, and intends to watch her from the shadows.

Now, given the plot of Twilight, he realizes that nothing’s working out. Bella’s not free from the supernatural, as her best friend/potential new love interest is a werewolf who might maul her any second now. She’s being hunted by Victoria and everything’s spiralling out of control.

So, Edward probably gives up the charade fast and comes back to get Jake out of the picture and be very upset with Bella for ruining his plan. Bella’s just glad Edward is back. Given Edward probably calls the entire family back, who likely have nothing to say to this nonsense, things proceed pretty much as in canon.

Jasper Runs Across Bella

Considering the last time he saw her, Jasper would run like the hounds of hell are on his heels. This is a world in which he never sees much of Bella after the birthday incident and, as a result, is still mired in guilt. He can’t imagine Bella’s reaction upon seeing him in the wild nor does he want to.

Rosalie Runs Across Bella

Rosalie likely makes no contact. She probably views Bella with bitterness, sees her as the reason for the collapse of her family, and never understood Bella’s appeal in the first place. However, for all Rosalie’s bitterness, she wouldn’t take it out on Bella mostly because there’s nothing to say.

She’d just choose to be distantly happy for Bella that she got to live her human life and glad she adjusted well.

Emmett Runs Across Bella

Emmett and Bella don’t actually know each other that well, Emmett certainly has no personal connection with her. He wouldn’t make contact because it’d be awkward and would piss off Rose.

Alice Runs Across Bella

Alice doesn’t agree with Edward, but she’s also proving a point to him and ultimately values Edward far more than she does Bella. She’ll abide by his rules and not speak to Bella. Also, she sees that if she tries, there’s no way the conversation goes well as Alice would have to explain why she never answered any emails.

Best to avoid that.

Esme Runs Across Bella

Esme values Edward over everything, and while she perhaps thinks that Bella could fix Edward’s desperate unhappiness I think she’d acknowledge that Edward also doesn’t want to see her. She’d snoop from afar but ultimately, I don’t think she’d make contact.

If she did, it’d be with the sole purpose of matchmaking the adult Bella with Edward, which would lead to disaster.

Carlisle Runs Across Bella

Carlisle I think actually would talk to her, to offer up some explanation of what happened and how they got where they are. He and Bella would likely talk about vampires, the Cullen way of life, etc. and ultimately go their separate ways.

He’d try to give closure if she wants it but nothing more than that.

Though if he thinks Bella doesn’t want to talk/see him or any Cullen, he’d likely also make himself scarce.

Some Thoughts On Fanfiction

But that’s not why people are writing these types of stories, and, really while I can give my depressing takes on Twilight I think it’s fair to note that people write these fics for significantly different reasons.

[mypoisonedvine]

Love, Theoretically | Sebastian Stan x reader (Chapter 7)

(chapter 1) (chapter 2) (chapter 3) (chapter 4) (chapter 5) (chapter 6)

series summary: having lost your husband, sister, and best friend all to the same extramarital affair, you ran away to a secluded villa in the Hungarian countryside to write and get a little time away from the life you’d left behind.  you were only looking for peace and perhaps some inspiration for your novel, but instead you found an unlikely connection with the immigrant repairman-- even though the two of you don’t speak the same language.

word count: almost 3k?

warnings: slight breeding kink (but only if you speak romanian aksjghakgjhg), angst, violence (in the form of a fistfight, which the reader isn’t involved in)

Just as you always did, you woke up to sunlight streaming in through the lace curtains, and a cool breeze blowing by.  What was peculiar was Sebastian next to you, sleeping peacefully as his chest rose and fell with relaxed breaths.  You let yourself watch him for a moment before you decided to try to sneak out for a cup of coffee.  Problem was, the bed was sort of creaky and it was very difficult to move without making sound.  Your plan was to move as slowly as possible, keeping your weight evenly distributed over the mattress, and it worked rather well— right until the last second, of course, when a loud shift of the boxsprings beneath you made Sebastian stir and blink open his eyes.

You were about to apologize for waking him, but he grinned and slipped his arms around you, bringing you back to where you started and surrounding your body with his warm, muscular form.

“Bună dimineata,” he hummed as he pulled you closer, his voice even deeper and more gravelly than normal.

“Bună dimineata,” you did your best to repeat it back, making him smile even though your pronunciation wasn’t great.  “Good morning.”

“Good morning,” he replied softly, heavily accented and clearly more a recreation of the sounds you’d made than real English, but still intelligible and so painfully adorable as well.  “A fost uimitor aseară.”

“Last night…” you began, but you didn’t even know where to begin.  What could you possibly say about that?  Would it even matter, if he can’t understand it.  “God, you’re fucking amazing,” you blurted out with a soft laugh.

“Sa o facem din nou,” he growled as he pulled you closer and kissed you, slipping his tongue into your mouth instantly.  A more self-conscious you— as in, you yesterday— would’ve worried about morning breath, but you now couldn’t taste anything but him and couldn’t feel anything but his lips on yours and couldn’t do anything but weave your fingers into his hair.

You moaned when his kisses trailed down your neck, and you wanted nothing more than to melt into his body one more time, but you had other things to attend to.

“I need to get up,” you announced as you tried to escape from his grasp, but he held you tighter and brushed his lips over your shoulder.

“Nu, nu, nu te dice,” he cooed, making you laugh and squirm.  “Stai in pat, fă dragoste cu mine toata ziuă.”

“I have to get up, I’ll be right back,” you tried to explain but he stayed ever vigilant as he held you tight and licked over the shell of your ear.  Finally you managed to get him to stop, as much as you didn’t really want him to, allowing you to slip out from under the covers and find your robe where it had been discarded on the floor.  

He watched you as you crossed the room and popped into the bathroom for your bag, pulling your birth control pack out of it and using a handful of tap water to wash down your morning pill.  “Ah,” Sebastian seemed to have a realization from the bed, and you giggled.

“Told you it was important,” you grinned.

“Probabil cel mai bine să nu ai un copil cu un străin,” he nodded, “dar nu sunt sigur că m-ar fi deranjat atât de mult dacă te-aș fi însărcinat.”

Following suit, he stretched briefly before getting out of bed and searching for his discarded jeans and boxers.  You made no effort to hide your ogling as you watched his cock swing between his legs.  Even soft it was thick enough that you couldn’t figure how it ever fit inside you (the delightful soreness between your legs reminded you that it was no easy feat).  He took note of your staring and grinned devilishly, leaning against the wall to give you a better look.  “Îți place ce vezi?” he purred.

“Should’ve known this would all go straight to your ego,” you chuckled.  “I’m gonna go downstairs for some coffee.  Do you want some?  Cafea?”

“Da,” he nodded, as he slipped his clothes back on, “mulțumesc.”  Funny how his idea of getting dressed still left him half-naked.

Foolishly, you expected him to let you pass, since you were both going to benefit from your trip to the kitchen; but of course he had to slip his arms around you from behind and give you just one more embrace, making you sigh and relax your head back against his shoulder.  He kissed the top of your head and you hummed happily, letting your eyes open to look up at him before taking a moment to look out the window you happened to be standing right beside.

You were just hoping to appreciate the countryside scenery, meaning that you were rather shocked and confused to see a car pulling up.  When it stopped and the driver stepped out, your eyes went wide and your back suddenly straightened itself.

“...Michael?” you gasped.  You wrenched yourself out of Sebastian’s grasp and started to run down the stairs.  He called after you but you ignored it.

Barreling down the stairs and out the door, you found your husband walking up the driveway.

“Honey,” he frowned when he saw you, “I’ve been trying to find you since you left— what the hell is going on?  Why are you wearing a robe?”

“It’s hardly nine in the morning,” you defended before you realized there were much bigger topics at hand: “Michael, what are you doing here?” you asked, after a few seconds of confused stuttering.

“I’m taking you home!” he replied, as if it were obvious.

“Oh my god,” you groaned, “don’t play stupid.  Do you think I’ve been here against my will, or by accident or something?”

“No, I saw your letter,” he sighed.

“And you saw the part where I said not to look for me, and that all future communication would come through my lawyer?”

“You’re my wife,” he replied coldly, “I think I’m within my rights to talk to you directly.”

“You shouldn’t have come here.  I was actually happy before you showed up.”

With perfect timing, Sebastian stepped out the door behind you, looking to you and to Michael, and back.  “Ce se întâmplă?” he asked you.

“Who the fuck is this?!” Michael asked accusingly.

“I’m gonna give you a chance to ask me that again, in a way that doesn’t make it seem like you have any place to judge what I might be doing alone with a man,” you hissed.  “He’s just the groundskeeper, Mike.”

“Then why is he shirtless?” he exclaimed.

“I don’t know!  He… does that a lot!” you exasperatedly shouted back.

“Look, I’m not angry,” Michael sighed.  You laughed bitterly.

“Good, cause you have no right to be.”

“But I think it’s fair if I’m worried about you spending months alone with strange men.”

“Oh, strange, is that the problem?  Strangeness?  Would some more familiarity— perhaps a familial relationship— between you and these men make it easier on you, Mike?”

“Honey, please—”

“Don’t call me that,” you grimaced.

Michael stormed towards you, and you felt Sebastian step closer to you as well, wrapping an arm around you.  Having him by your side made this significantly more awkward, but it made you feel safer, too.

“Hey man, get your hands off my wife,” Michael growled, pointing a finger at Seb.

“He doesn’t speak English,” you rolled your eyes.  

“Well, I’m not sure you do either— otherwise you would realize that we’re still married, and you need to come home.”

“Just because you won’t sign the papers doesn’t mean we’re still together,” you reminded him sternly as shook your head.

“I’ll end it with your sister, is that what you want?”

You laughed, because you were afraid if you didn’t that you would cry.  “Jesus, Michael!  Are you hearing yourself?  This sounds like a greek tragedy, or fucking EastEnders!  Next I’ll be discovering I have an evil twin, and you’ll bang her too!”

He was a lot more offended by that than you expected.  “It was never just sex.  I love her.  But I love you more,” he clarified, suddenly getting serious.

You chuckled weakly, hardly believing what you were hearing.  It’s not that he was ever particularly nice, or romantic or anything, but at some point in his life he had been incredibly intelligent… and now he barely made sense at all.  “Wow, you sure do know how to make a girl feel special.”

He frowned, clearly losing what little cool he’d had at first.  He had always had a bit of a temper.  “For better or for worse, we’re still legally married— damn it, we’ve been together for how long now?  And you’re ready to throw that all away?”

“No, but you were,” you spat back.

“But I wasn’t, and I’m still not.  You’ve gotta hear me out—”

“I don’t have to do anything—”

“No, you’re not listening to me—” he talked over you, again.

“I don’t owe you any more of my time—”

“Damn it, why won’t you just listen!” he growled, grabbing you by the arm suddenly.  Instantly, Sebastian stepped forward and pushed him back.

“Sebastian, it’s okay,” you tried to soothe him.  

“Hey, could you maybe tell your boytoy to keep his filthy hands off me?” Michael demanded at the same time.

“Mai bine ai grijă,” Sebastian hissed, also at the same time.

“I literally can’t,” you answered Michael.  “I told you he doesn’t speak English.”

“Yeah, well, I think some things transcend language,” Michael bit back.  “Tell me something, pal,” he addressed Sebastian, “did you fuck my wife?”

“Sper că nu spui ce cred că ești,” Sebastian shook his head, clearly on the end of his rope.

“Mike, leave him alone,” you demanded, but it came out sounding so much weaker than you meant it to.

“Did you,” Michael pointed to Sebastian, going so far as to poke him in the chest condescendingly, “fuck—” he mimed thrusting his hips, and you grimaced— “my wife?”— finally, he pointed to you.

Sebastian certainly understood that; and, in lieu of an answer, he socked Michael right in the jaw and sent him straight to the ground.

“Oh my god!” you yelped, dashing over to where your husband was crumpled into a ball on the gravel and kneeling beside him.

“What the fuck?!” Michael gurgled, holding his face in shock and pain.

“Are you okay?” you asked anxiously, spinning to look at where Sebastian was standing and looking much too proud of himself, shaking out the hand he’d just hit Michael with.  “Sebastian!” you scolded, making him give you a defensive look.

“Ce?” he shrugged flippantly, though he clearly felt a little guilty when it became obvious that you were irritated with him.

And that was how you ended up here, standing in the living room and tapping your foot quickly, staring at the couch where Michael sat with a bag of ice held to his jaw, Sebastian beside him (though as far away as possible) resting with another on his hand.

“You had no business coming here,” you informed your husband coldly.

“You wouldn’t know about this place if it weren’t for me,” he reminded you.  “Did you think I wouldn’t find you?”

“I thought you wouldn’t care,” you corrected.

His silence was stern, and he gave you one of those looks that used to scare you but now just made loathing and pity sink down in your chest.  It was ambiguous if he was too angry to reply or if he really had no defense.  After all, what reason did you have to believe that he would care about your leaving?

"If you're here to make me rescind the divorce order, it's not going to happen.  I'm not leaving with you.  I'm not forgiving you.  Please just go," you sighed.

"That's not why I came.  None of that is why I'm here," he mumbled.  "I came here…" he straightened up slightly, raising his voice confidently.  "I came here to tell you that I love you.  I need you.  And I want you back."

Now that he was looking right back at you, suddenly you couldn't take it anymore and turned your gaze away again.  

"Whatever you need me to do to fix this, I'll do it.  We'll get through this.  Isn't that what marriage is?  Fighting for each other, struggling together?"  He stood up and approached you, reaching out to rest his hands on your shoulders; you almost flinched when you felt his touch, but resisted the urge, glancing up at his face before looking over at Sebastian whose injured hand was twitching as he looked away with a tight jaw.  "Tell me how to make this right, please."

You tried not to look as Sebastian as you processed Michael's request; similarly, it seemed he was trying not to look at you.  But even if you ignored this new, peculiar romance in your life, your marriage was still broken beyond repair and you couldn't imagine anything that could change that.  "I'm sorry," you finally whispered, watching Michael's face fall, "I don't think there's anything you can do." 

He released you from his grip, less angry than you expected; more somber.  "I want to stay and work this out," he explained.  "Better yet, I want you to come back to London— come back home— so we can be together and discuss everything there.  But I'm only going to ask you one more time before I leave: stay with me.  You don't need to forgive me, or even love me again, at least not yet… just give me a chance to try to earn everything I took for granted."

You'd imagined this moment so many times: cursing him out, making him grovel, kicking him to the curb.  To be completely honest, you'd even imagined potentially taking him back.  But now that you were here and it was, somehow, real, your desire for vengeance was fading along with your desire for reconciliation.  

"I have something I need to give you," you whispered, walking upstairs and going back into your room, getting on your hands and knees to search the floor.  Finally, discarded in a dusty corner with slightly uneven floorboards, you found the ring you'd tossed aside the night before.  Fighting back against the tears welling in your eyes, you picked it up and came downstairs, holding it outward for Michael to take.  

"I'm not taking that back," he refused, shaking his head.  "You keep it for a while longer, until you're sure this is really what you want."

"I'm sure.  I'm moving on.  Take it back," you demanded.  He sighed but reached out and plucked it from between your fingers, pocketing it though still wearing his own golden band.  "Besides, my sister might want it."

He scoffed, turning as he began to walk away.  "You're cold."

"Frozen solid," you agreed.  "Goodbye, Michael… drive safe."

He shook his head and made a sharp exhale as he walked away, nearly slamming the door behind him.  You stared off into space as Sebastian silently watched you; you didn’t want him to see you cry, but it was starting to seem unavoidable as your lip quivered and your eyes grew wide with tears.

“Shhh,” he soothed gently, standing up and stepping forward to pull you into his arms.  “Nu plânge, e în regulă.”

"God, I'm so stupid," you whispered between sobs muffled against his chest.  "I'm so fucking stupid…"

He whispered to you and kissed the top of your head, repeating one thing over and over that you couldn't make out well against the sound of your own crying filling your ears.

But even without knowing what he was saying or what it meant, it made you feel better.

As evening approached, you realized a new predicament had arisen: would Sebastian stay in your room again?  Would you go to his?  Or would you sleep separately, maybe even drift back to just being essentially housemates after a unique one-night stand?

Your questions were answered suddenly when Sebastian suddenly came to the couch and scooped you up into his arms, making you squeal a little before you relaxed and let him carry you to his room.  He all but threw you onto the bed, climbing on top of you and kissing you deeply as you reached up to wrap your arms around his neck.

Already you felt more comfortable with him than you sometimes felt with people you'd known most of your life; you didn't feel self-conscious when he ran his hands over your body, you didn't try to suppress your moans when he kissed your neck for fear of sounding ridiculous— and maybe that was just because it was such a fantastical situation, so unlike yourself and so far from home, that it was easy to feel like a different person with him.

Or maybe it was that you'd spent so long trying to be somebody that people liked, and now you were being yourself for the first time in decades.

You couldn't really be sure.  And since your brain short-circuited every time Sebastian whispered something in your ear that just sounded filthy regardless of what it actually meant, you didn't have the time to think about it.

[homerforsure]

Whumptober No. 5

betrayal / misunderstanding / broken nose

(Hockey AU)

***

He’d always thought the night Jay took the picture would be the worst of it.

Buck’s hands were clutching the rails of Jay’s iron headboard, where Jay had wanted them, where Jay had placed them after stripping Buck of his clothes, saying “Don’t let go.” His slow, sexy, predatory smile was the last thing Buck saw before the silky black blindfold was tied in place. Jay was gone after that, climbing off the bed, telling Buck how good he looked and what he thought he might do and Buck had arched into the words until he was begging to be touched.

“Be patient,” Jay had purred, appeasing Buck with a single finger drawn shiveringly down his thigh. Buck could feel that he’d climbed back onto the bed, but Jay was too far away and he wasn’t teasing; he just wasn’t there. Stretching out longer on the mattress, trying to find him, he’d said, “What’s going on up there?”

Then the flash went off, the bright light cutting through the thin fabric of the blindfold. Jay swore, “Shit. Fuck,” and when Buck let go of the bed with one hand (one hand because maybe he misunderstood, maybe it was fine, maybe he’d laugh and put his hand back and they’d-)to push the tie away, he’d seen Jay, crouched above him with his phone in his hand.

If he’d asked, Buck might even have agreed. He liked posing. He liked having his body appreciated. But Jay’s expression was the alarm of being caught red-handed and Buck knew, knew with a sinking feeling of dread and betrayal, that Jay wasn’t just taking a memento to savor later. He was taking a picture of Rangers center Evan Buckley, naked, smirking, and vulnerable, to use exactly the way those kinds of pictures get used.

Buck forced Jay to delete the photo, made him prove that he’d done it, and then had somehow managed to get himself dressed and down to the street to get a ride without throwing up. His face burned the whole drive home and for half of the night.

And that was the worst of it until five years later. In a new city. When Buck was finally playing the way he’d always known he could. When he was finally earning the respect of his team and the hockey world at large. When he started thinking he might stay. That was when the anonymously authored post was retweeted and reblogged and shared and gleefully discussed on all corners of the hockey internet.

MY WILD NIGHT WITH AN NHL ALL STAR

The Good, the Bad, and the Kinky

His agent’s was the first text he saw when he got done with practice: “Do NOT respond yet. Call me first.”

It had taken another couple messages before Buck realized what he wasn’t supposed to respond to and in the meantime, the texts kept rolling in. Half of them from numbers he didn’t even have saved in his contacts.

“Dude, is that shit true?”

“Are you okay?”

“Do you know who it is?”

“You dog 😜”

“You never told me you were into that 👀”

“Ignore it, Buck.”

“We’re all with you.”

“Fuck that guy.”

“Hey if you need something to take your mind off of it💋💋💋”

“Evan, Mike from the Tribune. If you want to set the record straight, please give me a call.”

From the looks on the faces of his teammates as they tried to pretend they weren’t stealing glances at him, they were getting messages of their own. Hen was the first one to start to approach him with a look of concern, but Buck avoided her, grabbing his bag and sneaking out the door without bothering to hit the stationary bike like usual.

“What the hell did you do to piss this guy off?” Geoff said as soon as he answered Buck’s call. “More importantly, what else does he have on you?”

“Nothing!” Buck answered, nearly merging directly into another car as his hands shook on the steering wheel. “What do I do? How do I fix this?”

“I don’t know, Buckley. None of my other clients get up to shit like this. You need to get yourself a publicist. I’m going to get in touch with Grant and make sure they’re not already shopping you.”

His agent hung up and Buck’s phone continued to buzz and chime all the way back to his apartment.

There were cameras outside which there almost never were. Mostly only hockey fans cared about pictures of hockey players and the press was limited to the arena and their official events. Maybe one or two regular guys who Buck knew by name. It was just his luck that he lived in LA where there were almost more cameras than there were disasters to photograph.

“Buck! Do you know who the author is?”

“Have your teammates seen the post?”

“Are you worried about other former partners coming out with similar stories?”

Buck pushed past them, but the questions followed him inside. His phone didn’t stop. His mentions were a nightmare on every platform. He shut Twitter as soon as he opened it and saw his name in the trending topics. The statements put out by the Kings and Buck’s agent condemning the piece and the interest in it were drowned out by outlet after outlet picking up the post and sharing it out wider and wider.

Can you guess this NHL player by his sexcapades? (Hint: It’s exactly who you think)

Hockey players used to be the humble, hard working gentleman of sports. What happened?

Should the Kings trade Evan Buckley? Can they?

Nash should make Buckley sit for embarrassing the team like this.

Aw, man, don’t do that. Sitting’s a little tough for Buckley right now

🤣

And I thought it couldn’t get worse than the time he fucked that mascot in Carolina

{This post may contain explicit content}

😵‍💫

🤮

Excuse you, Gritty has standards

[98 more posts]

Whether from a latent masochistic streak or just because he didn’t want to look away and find that the story had gotten bigger while he was gone, Buck couldn’t stop refreshing the pages. He read Jay’s words over and over again as his stomach roiled. If it had all been lies, Buck wouldn’t have spent the morning pressed into the corner of his couch, hoodie pulled up over his head like armor. If it had all been lies, he could have made a fiery statement, condemning the mystery author and condemning everyone who thought they had a right to consume and critique another person’s sex life.

There were some lies, of course, but it was true enough that Buck’s heart clenched with it. True enough that he could remember how he felt when it was happening, during the three times they’d been together before the photo. Soft and desired and joyful. There was a part of him that was still exposed to Jay, that always would be, this man with the sharp wit and the sharp smile who got Buck bare, begging and biddable all to make him a joke. As he read the smug asides in the unforgiving narrative, he could hear Jay’s voice in his ear.

The sixth time he read it, there was an addition.

Edit: Ha ha wow this really blew up. Doing an AMA at 6 eastern if you’re looking for more dirty details.

And for the first time, Buck felt the burn of tears in his eyes. Furious. Powerless.

The buzz of his phone started making his skin crawl so he shoved it between the couch cushions and tried not to think about it. He sat with his knees pulled up to his chest and his arms wrapped tightly around, rocking just a little as he felt panic creeping in.

What else could Jay possibly have to say? Would he make up more and more audacious lies as long as he had an audience? Would an NHL team want to touch Buck when he was done?

Were there more pictures?

It was the fourth night, the night that Buck caught Jay. Not the first night with the blindfold. What if? Buck shuddered, sinking lower, deeper into the couch, folding himself tighter and smaller, trying to crush the mounting, hopeless fear. He was there for a long time.

When the gentle knock hit his door, Buck jumped and then crouched tighter into his ball. He didn’t answer. There was no one he could face right now.

The knock came again.

Then the door opened.

Buck was up like a shot, nearly falling over the coffee table as he whirled around toward the intruder. Eddie stood in the doorway, holding up one empty hand and pulling his key out of the door with the other.

“Just me.”

“What are you doing here?” Buck asked, shoving his hands into the pocket of his hoodie to hide the fact that he’d been digging his nails into his palms for the last hour.

“Well, you took off. And you weren’t answering your phone.”

Hot shame flushed across Buck’s skin. Eddie knew. Eddie had seen the article and the articles about the article and the tweets about the articles and been shouted at by the cameras outside and Buck wanted to sink into the floor.

“Notice you didn’t take the hint.”

The attitude in Buck’s response didn’t faze Eddie at all, “Do I ever?”

And that almost made Buck feel like smiling, because no, no he didn’t. He said, “No. But there’s always a first time.”

Eddie came a little further into the apartment and Buck felt crowded. Eddie always seemed to take up so much space around him. Maybe it was just that Buck felt his presence most strongly than anyone else’s. Especially when he was like this: arms crossed, focused, not letting Buck wiggle out of a conversation that he didn’t want to have.

This time was no exception. When Buck turned and went back to the couch, compulsively refreshing the comments on Jay’s post again as he went, Eddie followed right after him.

“I came by to make sure you were okay,” he said and Buck flinched again, hating that Eddie knew. Hating that the team knew.

“I’m fine,” he answered, keeping his eyes down and away from Eddie. “Coach is going to rip me a new one tomorrow, but my agent hasn’t called me to tell me I’m being traded so yet so I guess that’s-”

“Who the fuck said you were being traded?” His voice was loud enough that Buck looked up, surprised to see the intensity of anger in Eddie’s face.

“THN. NHL Network did a round table on it too, but they didn’t think anyone would take me. Oh, then Kirk Davis did a radio interview.”

Everyone had picked up those soundbites. Even through the heavily bleeped broadcast, the future hall-of-famer’s opinion on Buck had been crystal clear. At least that wasn’t new information for Buck. Davis had all but refused to shake Buck’s hand when he first joined the Predators and was a big part of why his tenure there had only lasted until the trade deadline.

“Kirk Davis is a fucking asshole. There’s a reason they never made him captain.”

“He’s not the only one who said it.”

“Then he’s not the only fucking asshole out there.” When he didn’t respond, Eddie came around the couch to stand face to face with him, noticing the open comments page as he did. “Christ, have you been reading that shit all day?”

Somehow it made Buck laugh. “It’s the same shit I’ve been reading for 8 years. Since I got drafted. Buckley’s a distraction to his team. Buckley’s an embarrassment to the game of hockey. Buckley cares more about getting laid and partying than he does about winning. It’s guys like Buckley that hurt the NHL.”

His voice pitched up as he recited the familiar accusations, staring somewhere over Eddie’s shoulder because Eddie already knew all this about him. Eddie was the opposite of Buck in every way. He would never make himself the center of attention. He’d never do anything to make his teammates ashamed to play with him. He’d never be so stupid as to go home with a guy like Jay.

“Buckley’s finally getting what he deserves.” Buck whispered.

“Look at me,” Eddie said. When Buck couldn’t, Eddie reached out, setting a light hand on his shoulder that got tighter when Buck tried to shrug out of the hold. “Hey. Look at me.”

He moved his head into the space where Buck was staring into the middle distance and waited. Until Buck couldn’t help but flick his gaze to meet Eddie’s. Once he did, he found a furious compassion that startled him.

“You don’t deserve this, Buck. You did nothing to deserve this. It is not your fault. Nobody in our room thinks it is. Bobby doesn’t think it is.”

Buck shuddered under the weight of the words. He wanted to pull himself free and he wanted to step in closer, “My agent told me I should own it. Post a couple thirst traps and a middle finger on instagram and just wave it off like another classic Evan Buckley weekend.”

There was a time when he would have. Times when he had. But this wasn’t a ridiculous paparazzi photo outside a bar, it was… It was private. It hurt.

As if reading his mind, Eddie said, “That’s not what this is. Fire him if he wants to make you pretend this is okay.”

“I just keep thinking if I was anyone else. If I was someone good, they’d all go after him and not me. I didn’t even do anything to him, Eddie. I didn’t-”

Before he could finish his sentence, Eddie tugged him forward and his arms were tight around his back. Buck should have tried to fight it, but he couldn’t help but fall against his chest and cling on. “You are someone good,” Eddie said, making Buck’s breath hitch. “And if you weren’t, it wouldn’t matter. It’s wrong. They’re wrong.”

“I shouldn’t have trusted him,” Buck confessed into the soft fabric of Eddie’s shirt. “I was so stupid back then. I just wanted- I wanted him to like me. And I’m still- It still hurts that he didn’t. How fucked up is that? He did this. And I still just wish he liked me.”

One of Eddie’s hands moved up to cradle the back of Buck’s head. They were swaying, just a little, Eddie rocking them gently. “I know,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”

He managed to keep from crying, but Buck couldn’t stop his breath from coming out in soft, stuttering gasps. Couldn’t keep his fingers from digging into Eddie’s back. If he thought about it, he could imagine this post too (Evan Buckley cried like a baby on my shoulder AMA), but Eddie would never do that. The warm heat of him against Buck’s chest was like a blanket hiding him from the world. It was the most vulnerable he’d been all day and the most sheltered.

Eddie didn’t let go until Buck pulled back and even then he didn’t go far, “Have you eaten since practice?”

“I didn’t think I’d be able to without throwing up,” Buck said honestly.

“Do you want to order something from-”

The timer on Buck’s laptop shrieked and they both jumped. Eddie recovered quickly, but Buck’s heart leapt into his throat. He’d almost forgotten. How could he have forgotten? Pulling away from Eddie, he turned off the timer and refreshed the post, looking for the link he knew would be there.

“Come on, Buck, really?”

Eddie reached out to slam the laptop closed, but Buck shoved his hand in the way. “I have to, Eddie. He’s doing an AMA. I have to-”

“I’m not going to let you torture yourself reading what a bunch of sick assholes have to say, Buck. No way.”

“I have to.”

“No, you-”

“Yes, I do!” He shouted it, standing up to look Eddie in the eye. “I have to read it. I have to see it now because if- if- if I wait and it gets reposted- I have to know if he has- I have to-”

“Buck,” Eddie said, putting his hands on Buck’s arms, trying to rub calmness back into him even as Buck’s heart-rate accelerated. “What does he have? What could be worse than what he already-”

“Pictures,” Buck yelled. “I have to know if he has pictures.”

A dark, dark look came over Eddie’s face and he stopped rubbing Buck’s arms to squeeze instead. “You think he has pictures?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Buck whimpered. He saw himself as if from above, stretched out long and lewd against Jay’s sheets. He imagined ten thousand other people seeing it. “He took- I caught him taking one. Once. But I don't know if it was the only one. I don’t- I can’t let them get out. If he has them, I have to know. I have to report the post. I have to-”

“No,” Eddie said.

“Yes, Eddie. I have-”

“I hear you. Okay? I hear you, but I’m not letting you do that. I’m not letting you put any more of that garbage in your head.”

“Eddie.”

“I’ll do it. I’ll report every goddamn post.” Lifting one hand, Eddie stroked a thumb softly along Buck’s hairline. “Let me do it. Let me protect you.”

Buck swallowed hard, fear and relief and longing fighting for control of the tears that were building up again. He didn’t want Eddie to see any of that. He didn’t want Jay’s words in Eddie’s head. But Buck really really didn’t want them in his own. He wanted someone to protect him. “Thank you,” he said, falling forward again to rest his head on Eddie’s shoulder.

“I’ve got you,” Eddie replied, rubbing his hands firmly up Buck’s back.

Eddie wouldn’t let Buck sit on the couch while he monitored the thread. He fished Buck’s phone out of the couch and made him answer the important messages. From Maddie. From Bobby. From Hen and Chimney. Then he’d told him to order food from the Lebanese place they always ordered from when Eddie came over, asking for extra of the pickled turnips. All the while, Eddie’s fingers slammed onto the keyboard, that sound the only reaction he gave to any of the posts.

It should have been unbearable, letting Eddie comb through the messages. Even without seeing them, Buck knew what they were like. He blocked people every week for the same kind of thing. But Eddie had a defense against them that Buck never had: he didn’t believe they were true. Not even a little bit. He didn’t believe there was a chance that Buck was getting what he deserved for being a show off, for never being a points leader, for being open and soft hearted, for being himself. Eddie believed Buck deserved to be protected and he was ruthless about it.

“No pictures,” he said, a while later, when Jay had finally stopped replying to every comment on the page. “And the rest of it is… well. It’s nothing new.”

“Really?”

“Really. I think it’s done.”

Eddie closed the laptop as if by making that gesture of finality, he could make the words true. Buck, allowed back on his own couch, let himself believe it too. Let himself lean into the safety of Eddie’s arm over his shoulders, breathing in a deep sigh of relief as they caught the Canucks game.

The next morning, Jay’s story was hardly anywhere to be seen. It was replaced. By an essay in The Players’ Tribune. It excoriated Jay. It called out Kirk Davis by name and hundreds of online posters by their bad intentions. It praised Buck’s grace, tenacity, and backhand shot and it demanded respect and compassion and privacy from anyone who called themselves a hockey fan. And it wasn’t anonymous.

[strangerivy]

Confessions in the Snow

Summary:  The first winter for Levi and Y/n on the surface and in the corps. A misstep in the training course reminds Levi of how easily it could be to loose you. Warnings: Swearing | Spoilers! for OVA No Regrets Pairings: Levi Ackerman x Reader (y/n) Genre: 18+ | Fluff | Tiny Angst Word Count: 3.7k Author’s Note: Let me know what you guys think! and if anyone wants to be tagged in future Levi fic’s just let me know and I’ll start a taglist 😊 💜

|| Masterlist | AOT Masterlist ||

Year 844 - Winter

It was your first winter on the surface and you so far were not a fan. It was cold all the time, you were starting to forget what it felt like to be warm. You were laying in your bunk now the blanket pulled tight around you, but you were still shaking from the cold.

You heard a heavy sigh from behind you and then some footsteps coming towards you stopping right at the side of your bed. You turned your head to look behind you to see an annoyed Levi staring down at you.

“You can’t be seriously that cold,” He stated, and you shot a glare up at him

“I’m sorry I’m not cold-blooded like you,” You spat turning back over pulling the covers tighter trying to stop from shaking but it only lasts a second before it started up again. He clicked his tongue pulling the covers completely off you, causing you to start shivering even more legs pulled to your chest as you tried to preserve what little heat was left. 

“What the hell Levi!” You yelled sitting up ready for a fight, he looked at you with a bored expression.

“You can sleep with me tonight if you’re that cold,” He said walking towards the door to head to the men’s barracks, you quickly shot up scrabbling out of your bunk grabbing your cloak since you were only in a nightshirt and shorts. Which was probably one of the reasons you were cold but you refused to sleep in pants, they made you feel too constricted to sleep. You caught up to Levi pulling your cloak tight as you walked down the hall.

“Are you sure?” You asked shyly your voice coming out smaller than you intended, he looked back over at you with gentle eyes giving a small nod before opening the door to the men’s barracks it was quiet except for the sound of snores. You scurried over quietly to Levi’s bunk at the end of the room climbing into the blanket. You heard a small scoff and peaked up from the blankets to see Levi shaking his head at you, a small smile on his lips. This made you smile, he looked so nice when he smiled. You wished he would do it more often.

He laid out your blanket on top of his for extra warmth before telling you to scoot more, climbing into bed wrapping an arm under you pulling you close to his chest making you freeze up. Eyes wide with nerves.

This wasn’t the first time you two had cuddled, but this was the first time you both were doing it consciously. Of course, when you had slept in the same bed in the underground you had woken up countless mornings wrapped in each other’s arms. You used him more as a pillow than the pillow that was there. You had offered on multiple occasions to get another bed, but he always said it was a waste and to not bother.

Furlan would go on to tell you that Levi never slept in the bed until you had come around from that first night. You smiled softly at the memory as it passed through your mind closing your eyes. You rolled over so that you were now facing Levi, his other armed draped across you.

You took a deep breath trying to relax your nerves, snuggling more into the pillow. You felt a gaze on you that had you open your eyes, he was looking at you with a gentle gaze, the hand draped across you rubbing small circles on your back. You don’t know how long you two looked at each other like that like there was so much more between you than what was shown. Like you meant everything to him. You fought to keep your eyes open and he noticed another small but rare smile gracing his lips. One that only seemed to be reserved for you.

“Go to sleep, Y/N,” He whispered pulling you closer to him, you let out a small quiet yawn your eyes slowly closing.

“Levi,” You mumbled, he hummed in response, you tried to open your eyes to look at him before muttering a small thanks. You felt his chest vibrate for a second and then the faintest feel of his lips on your forehead and the small sound of something leaving his lips but sleep was already taking you to hear what it was.

Your ear twitched as you picked up on something in the room, you let out a groan snuggling further into the blanket. It was so warm you weren’t ready to get up. The blanket shifted under you. Wait, blankets don’t move. Your eyes slow open blinking sleep out of your eyes. You gazed up at a sleeping Levi without moving to not give away that you were awake to the guest in the room.

“Honestly, I wish they would just admit it to each other already, I mean look at them!” Your eyes widen as you realized you two were no longer alone in your barracks. “Plus, it would probably soften up shorty over there,” You recognized the voice as Hange, you felt Levi shift under you and that is when you realized the position you were also in. Your leg was draped completely over Levi and his hand had found its way up the back of your shirt hugging you close to him. The blanket that was once pulled tight around you two was now at your waist being pushed down at some point in the night.

Levi shifted under you and you glanced up seeing his eyes flutter open before instantly going into a cold glare once he was fully awake.

“What the hell are you doing here?” He asked clearly annoyed by Hange’s presence and whoever was with her.

“Just coming to get you two lovebirds for training, and to remind you that she isn’t supposed to be sleeping in the men’s barracks, but I know you won’t listen,” She said cheerfully not even phased by Levi’s cold tone. “Make sure to wear your jackets, we got some snow last night.” You went to sit up a rush of excitement running through you, never having seen snow before only reading about it in the few books you had collected down in the Underground, but Levi was quick to pull you back down covering you up with the blankets.

“Out.” He demanded with a stern voice, Hange grinned with a chuckle before leaving you two alone to get ready for the day. You sat up quickly once the door was shut and you heard no one else in the room everyone already going on with their business for the day.

You raced over to the window looking out hands on the windowsill as you bounce on your toes out of excitement to see the white snow outside. You let out a soft wow as you looked out the window. The trees covered in the stuff, little pillows of snow covering each branch. You felt Levi grab your arm spinning you around while putting your cloak on you then turning you to face towards the door.

“Go get ready,” He demanded not having any of your bright energy this morning. You let out a chuckle as you went out the door and down the hall to women’s barracks going to your bed getting changed into your uniform.

You were getting your boots on when Levi appeared at the other end of the room leaned up against the door frame all set for training this morning. You buckled your boot getting up grabbing your clock putting it on as you walked towards him with a bright smile. You walked side by side down the hall.

“I hope you know I won’t be slowing down for you because of the weather,” He informed you, keeping his eyes straight ahead before opening the door for you. You sucked in a breath when the winter air hit you, but you were completely mesmerized by your surroundings the snow-covered ground and trees, looking through the frosted window did not do it justice.

A chill ran up your spin that you shook off as you adjusted to the cold, “You're just mad because I beat you the last time at the obstacle course,” You gloated giving a toothy smirk as he let out an unamused scoff before heading towards the training grounds with the snow crunching under your boots. You noticed that even though there were people out and about around HQ it seemed oddly quiet for it. A peaceful quiet that you had never really thought possible.

“That’s because I didn’t let you win, you would have thrown a tantrum like a child,” He said coolly making you frown.

“Would not,” You protested making his lip move into a smirk “Don’t be such a sore loser,” that’s when you got an idea which he was quick to notice the mischievous glint in your eye,raising an eyebrow at you curiously knowing this would not bow well for him. “Why don’t we make a bet?” you suggested, I mean there is nothing wrong with healthy competition when training for life and death scenarios, right?

“What do I get?” He asked as we reached the forest training ground getting our ODM gear ready. He helped you adjust the straps so that the gear sat better.

“The winner buys the other a box of their favorite tea?” You suggested and his eyebrow went up curiously, you looked up and saw Hange giving you the signal to get ready, Mike, getting ready to follow you two to observe though it wasn’t really needed, you both proving to be a skilled duo.

“I’m not buying you a box of chai,” Levi deadpanned, getting into position, you gave a small smirk.

“So, you’re saying I’m going to beat you?” You smirked

“Tch not a chance,” Hange could see you were both in a competitive mood and looked at the two of you gleefully to see what kind of maneuvers she would see from the two of you today while Mike looked slightly annoyed at the idea of having to keep up with the two of you.

“Alright you two we are almost reset,” She announced waiting for the signal from a Scout in the forest, you and Levi both waiting ready to go the second you saw the signal, and when you did you both were gone before she could even tell you to go a loud squeal of excitement as you two flew off.

The air was crisp as you flew through the trees, goosebumps forming all along your skin, but you didn’t let that slow you down, moving faster from tree to tree. You twisted and turned through them with ease making sure to keep your eyes open for the wooden titans to appear.

A fake titan appeared in front of you as you maneuvered out of a path of a tree and you gracefully bounced off of a trunk of tree going higher into the air flipping upside down dragging your blades deep into the fake nap cutting out a more than deep enough cut to kill. You flipped back up with missing a beat moving on.

“Careful Y/N, you'll dull your blades before we’ve even started,” You heard Levi mock somewhere in the trees, you continued through the trees another titan appearing on your right but before you could make your move Levi came out of nowhere just a quick flash of green.

You let out groan in frustration picking up your pace. Another Titan appeared on your right and you went for the kill but when you went to use a tree branch as a launch point you hit some ice on the branch losing your footing. You let out a small gasp as you lost control and began falling to the forest floor, you quickly caught yourself though sending out your grappling hooks pulling yourself back up just barely giving you enough time feeling your hair drag against the ground before swinging yourself back up in the air.

The last titan in the course showed up on your right and you couldn’t hear Levi anywhere and just as you were about to swing your blades for the kill, he flew past you taking the kill for himself. You grumbled to yourself as you reached the end of the course landing down on the ground.

“I didn’t even hear you!” You shouted walking up to him, he turned to face you with an annoyed look, “Where the hell did you even come from?”

“You need to be more careful,” He critiqued not even minding to address your question, you gave him a confused look.

"Yeah I didn't see the ice on that branch," You smiled at him but something was really bothering him with your slip up. He narrowed his eyes at you letting out an angered huff. 

"You would have been dead from that slip up you had," He spat

“What do you mean? We aren’t outside of the walls Levi,” You questioned him not sure why he was starting to grow this angry with you.

“That one misstep outside of these walls could cost you your life, y/n!” He snapped at you, he walked up to you anger fuming off him and that’s when you could see it in his eyes that this wasn’t about the slip you had. This was more than that. Mike moved on back to the start of the course noticing that you two were now fighting and did not want to get in the middle of it. “I am not about to lose you to the filthy beast outside of those walls! I can’t lose you!”

“Levi…” Your voice was quiet as you stood there unreactive to his anger as you stared at him with sad eyes the faces of Isabel and Furlan running through your mind. It hadn’t even been a year since you lost them. Levi hid his pain well. Until now it seems.

It had started to snow once again; you could see each breath of his coming out in heavy pants. You reached out quickly pulling him into a hug so he couldn’t reject it. He stiffened sucking in a breath at the sudden gesture so openly out her in public. You gripped onto his shirt snuggling into his chest, his arms slowly wrapping around you as he accepted the simple display of affection and comfort you offered. He pulled you tighter to him his head falling to your shoulder his breath tickling your neck.

“You’re not going to lose me, Levi,” You felt a tear fall from your eye, your hand traveling up weaving your fingers into his hair holding his head, “I promise I’ll always find a way back,” You whispered, you felt him grip you tighter at your words.  You both stood there holding one another quietly as the snow fell.

"Do you think they would have liked the snow?" You whispered to him, he let out a small scoff

"Isabel would probably be as excited as you were this morning, I can't imagine we would get anything done," He muttered fondly to you as you both thought of your two dear friends.

Levi pulled away just enough to look into your eyes his hand reach up and rubbing your cold and reddened cheeks from the winter air. You felt the familiar butterflies in your stomach that you always felt when you were together like this that you always managed to push aside but it was getting hard each passing day especially after that day when it became just the two of you left.

He had been growing more and more affection over the past couple of months leaving you completely confused on what his intentions were. You thanked god it was cold out to hide the blush on your cheeks as he looked at you. He leaned forward leaving a small kiss to your forehead.

“Ohhhh loovvvebirds!” Your eyes went wide at the sound of Hanges voice, Levi, and you both pushed the other away feeling your cheeks heat up at being caught in such a state. You stared at the ground as you heard Hange get closer and closer.

“What the hell do you want four eyes?” Levi’s voice back to his unamused self, pretending as if Hange didn’t walk into something meant only for the two of you. You looked up to see her grinning widely as she looked at the two of you innocently.

“We are getting ready to just go over some maneuvers, hurry up!” She shouted from where she stood waving her arm wildly around for you two to follow, Moblit standing right beside her shaking his head amused by her.

“On our way!” You shouted back with a wave looking over at Levi with a smile. He clicked his tongue before starting to head towards the others with you in tow. The moment you and Levi shared already pushed aside, stored in the very back of your mind.

You dragged your feet back towards your bed ready to take off your uniform and gear for the day, Levi turning what was supposed to be a simple training into an all-day event after your little slip in the woods making sure you had it down by the end on how to spot where you should and should not land when there’s snow and ice out.

You changed into a simple shirt and pants putting on some shoes heading back out into the hall towards the mess hall. You spotted Levi at your usual table a tray of food next to him that was meant for you. Hange smiled as soon as she spotted you. You took your spot next to him starting to eat your food.

Hange was probably your closest friend in the Scouts besides Levi of course. You would spend most of your time that wasn’t with Levi with her, helping with her experiments when needed or helping her organized her very messy office so she could actually find notes she needed when she needed them instead of days or sometimes months later.

As soon as you settled into your seat, she actually started talking to you about the idea of trying to capture a Titan but that she couldn’t get the approval.

“I mean that has to be really risky, wouldn’t it?” You asked her taking a drink of water from your mug, Levi rolled his eyes and you elbowed him under the table to knock it off.

“Yeah, and unfortunately, I can’t think of a way to make it safer,” She sighed disappointedly staring out past you, you could see the gears turning in her head that never seemed to stop with her.

"Well," you started, taking a bit of bread "If there's anyone that can figure it out, its you"

The rest of the meal was quick, and you said goodnight getting up disposing of your tray and dishes before heading back to your bed, but as you, passed a window, you noticed it was snowing again. You decided to go up to the roof to watch for a while. You stopped by your bed to grab your cloak before heading up.

It was cold but it felt good and it was quiet. No one around to disturb your peace this late. You walked over to the ledge whipping off the snow to clear a spot for you to sit. You dangled your feet over the edge looking up at the sky watching the snowfall around you. Blinking softly as a few flakes hit your lashes.

You closed your eyes letting out a relaxed sigh until you felt a presence. You opened your eye to see Levi staring out into the world. He held two cups of tea in his hand, offering the closest one to you. You gladly took it taking a sip letting out a hum from the warmth that coursed through your body. Levi took a seat next to you falling into a comfortable silence between the two of you.

There was that feeling again, the one that started in your stomach and filled your chest whenever you were with him. So many years of pushing it aside, it was easy at first but now it felt almost impossible but somehow you still managed not wanting to ruin the friendship you had. He was, after all, all you had left and vice versa.

“What are you thinking about?” your head snapped to look at Levi, a faint blush on your cheek as you forgot he was right next to you for a moment.

“N-nothing,” You stuttered taking another sip of tea, Levi still stared at you with his intimidating look that was just his face but still, it made you nervous when he stared like that. When he released you weren’t going to let up, he hummed getting gup from his spot leaving you to your thoughts.

You thought he was already gone but then you felt him right behind you kneeled down so his head was right next to your ear making you freeze to the spot as you felt his breath on your neck small goosebumps appearing on your skin.

“Come on, before you freeze yourself to death,” He whispered sending a small shiver down your spine. You turned your head to face him and noticed just how close he was to you, so close you could feel his breath hit your lips. You couldn’t help but glance down at his lips swallowing nervously when you looked back up to his eyes.

“Okay,” Your voice so quiet that you weren’t sure anything really came out. The corner of his mouth moved slightly into a small smirk, he leaned into you and you couldn’t move letting out a small gasp when you felt his lips just on the corner of your mouth before it was quickly gone. His hand grabbing yours and guiding you back up and back inside as you stared at the ground to hide the deep blush on your cheeks. He really didn’t need anymore boost to his ego, at least for tonight.