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amethystunarmed · 1 year

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Entangle

Relationships: Steve Harrington & Eddie Munson, Pre-Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson, Eddie Munson & Corroded Coffin

Warnings: Referenced Child Abuse, Period-Typical Racism

Word Count: 4,789

AO3 Link

~~~

Summary: "Looks like you could use some company."

Harrington sighs as he looks over Eddie with resigned eyes. “I’m still on concussion protocols. If you’re trying to get in a fight, pick a different jock to fuck with. I’m pretty sure another hit to the head will just straight up kill me at this point.”

Eddie looks at Steve Harrington sitting all alone after his fight with Billy Hargrove and sees a lost sheep to add to his flock. So, much to the rest of the Hellfire Club's horror, he makes Steve an offer.

~~~

Entangle

Components: V S

Duration: Up to 1 minute

Range: 90 feet

Grasping weeds and vines sprout from the ground in a 20-foot square starting from a point within range. For the duration, these plants turn the ground in the area into difficult terrain. A creature in the area when you cast the spell must succeed on a Strength saving throw or be restrained by the entangling plants until the spell ends.

~~~

Following November 5th, 1984, Steve Harrington missed an entire week of school. There were plenty of theories as to why: an epic bender in Indianapolis, a mental breakdown following the loss of both his high school crown and his girlfriend, a rough bout of mono after making out with Carol Perkins as revenge against Tommy H. As the school’s resident drug dealer, Eddie heard all of it. The popular kids tended to forget Eddie had ears when they came to buy from him. As a result, Eddie had learned that freshman Abigail Evans was pregnant, quarterback Mike Hampel was doping before state, and no one knew exactly what happened to Steve Harrington.

Billy Hargrove was involved somehow; the guy smirked with malicious glee whenever Steve’s name was mentioned. When picking up their usual weed order, Billy had bragged about their fight to Tommy H. “Put the bitch in his place, went down easy despite all that posturing. You’ll see, if he dares show his face here again.”

Given the black eye he had and the new curve to his nose, Eddie figured he was exaggerating the one-sidedness of the fight. Despite all the shakiness to his reign, King Steve would be back with his cavalier attitude and cocky smile and Hawkins High would hear all about how Steve handed Billy his ass on a silver platter.

Eddie was fucking wrong.

Even a week out from their supposed fight, Steve looked like shit. Both Steve’s eyes were blackened, dark enough to make the one Billy was sporting look like a love tap. Lighter, yellowy-green bruises smudged down his cheekbones to his jaw line, and both his lips were swollen. His nose was puffy too, and there were dark glue patches around the bridge and nostrils where bandages had once been. It must have hurt too badly to scrub it all off.

The darkest bruise was at his left temple. Instead of the rounded marks left from Billy’s fists, this one was a curved, near-black line, like Billy had hit him with the edge of something, hard. Small cuts burst around it, like falling confetti down Steve’s skin.

Despite how fucked up his face was, it was the state of his hair that gave Eddie the biggest shock. It fell limp and greasy around his face, like even washing it had been too much effort. This from the guy who brought his own miniature bottles of shampoo to the gym showers, which no one even bothered to tease him for, because it fucking worked. Steve “The Hair” Harrington’s iconic locks were an oily unkempt disaster, and that was what made Eddie realize exactly how far the former King of Hawkins High had fallen.

It seemed like the rest of the student body had also picked up on the atmospheric pressure change left by Steve’s rapid descent. The cheerleaders who once fawned for his affections began avoiding his gaze in the hall. Members of the basketball and swim teams who once looked to him for guidance shoulder-checked him in the hall. Even Nancy Wheeler, the once doting girlfriend, had taken to openly leaving with Jonathan Byers after school. The trio was cordial between classes, even waved to each other with seemingly genuine smiles. But still, Steve took one look at Nancy and Johnathan holding hands across the table at lunch and decided to sit alone. Eddie didn’t blame him.

It all built to one, seemingly impossible fact, something that Eddie wouldn’t have deigned possible even a month ago.

At this rate, Steve Harrington would end his senior year at Hawkins High completely and utterly alone.

And that was when Eddie got a very dumb idea.

~~~

“Think he’d come and sit with us?”

Jeff’s head snaps to him, then follows his gaze to where Steve has a lunch table all to himself. “Are you high?” he nearly shrieks and Eddie has to lunge across their seats to clamp a hand over his mouth when people start staring.

“If you want me to get held back again, there are easier ways to do it than screaming to the entire cafeteria that I am on drugs!” he hisses, and at least Jeff has the gall to look sheepish.

“Sorry, sorry... It’s just that... You want King Steve... to come sit with us?” Eddie tries to shush him, but unfortunately all of his fucking friends are eavesdropping little shits.

“Eddie, please tell me you have had a Mountain Dew induced breakdown, and are going to wake up tomorrow and instantly slap yourself for even considering this course of action?” Grant spits, caustic in that way he only is when he’s anxious. Eddie shoots him a reassuring smile.

“‘Fraid not buddy,” he chuckles, “I’ve been thinking about this for a few days now.”

“Days!” Grant and Jeff shout and Eddie literally cannot believe these are the people he chooses to hang out with.

“Yes, days, as in a multitude of twenty-four hour periods.” He rolls his eyes. “It really isn’t that big of a deal.” Both Jeff and Grant have words to say about that, both of them breathing in deeply for what will surely become an incredibly irate chorus. However, an anxious rat-tat-tap-thump-thud interrupts them, and they both turn to Corroded Coffin’s newest member.

Gareth is a talented drummer, a freshman Eddie had literally collected off the floor of the men’s room. He is unfortunately still small and awkward enough that his nervous expression still melts Eddie’s heart. Just a little bit.

“Eddie... It’s Steve Harrington,” Gareth insists, like he thinks Eddie has forgotten just who he is threatening to bring into their lunchtime sanctuary. He may not have been in school during King Steve’s heyday, but he still heard the stories, knew enough to be afraid. He is still tapping out a rapid quick beat with his fingers, always a violent ball of rhythmic energy. Despite himself, Eddie softens; he reaches out and aggressively ruffles Gareth's already messy hair.

“You’re looking at it all wrong, guys. Think about it. I go up to Steve, and he rejects us, we lose nothing. But if he accepts? That is literal proof of the Munson Doctrine. Steve Harrington, going from high school royalty to a member of the freaks? It means that none of them are safe. And they’ll look at us, every day, and have to remember that.” Eddie can tell they're starting to buy into it, so he brings out the big guns. “See the bigger picture, boys! Steve was the former king of Hawkins High! Even after getting his ass beat by Hargrove, none of the jocks fuck with him. It’s solidarity or some shit. Don't you think it'd be nice to have some of that protection for ourselves?”

They're looking at him, and the doubt is still present, but there's hope there too.

"If you really think this is a good idea..." Jeff begins slowly, and Eddie latches onto it.

“Of course I do!” he lies, because this is fucking unprecedented and he has no idea what he's doing. The next part, however, he means with all his heart. "I am not going to let you guys get hurt." If Steve ends up being a dick, Eddie will glad jump up on the table and tell all of Hawkins what a fucking douchebag he is. But... He really, really thinks this could work.

Jeff sighs again, but nods. Gareth's tapping gets louder, but he doesn't say anything against it. Grant just rolls his eyes. “If he punches you, I'm not saving your ass,” he grumbles.

“Wouldn't ask you too!” Eddie cheerfully replies, and gets up from his chair with a flourish. “Wish me luck boys!” He ignores Grant’s mutterings about how Eddie is going to get himself killed and walks over to the near empty table where King Steve has decided to host his solitary court.

Even with the bruises and the swelling, Harrington is still pretty. Eddie knows he shouldn’t, but he always has stared at pretty boys longer than he should have, even absolute douchebags like Steven Harrington. He would never, ever act on his private queer fantasies, but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t have eyes . He’s seen the smile, the tiny basketball shorts, the hair. Steve has finally managed to style his hair into an approximation of its usual glory. It’s softer than usual, gentle waves that perfectly frame the cuts on his temple. Usually, the extra primping would make Eddie infuriated, but right now it just makes Steve look like an abused cocker spaniel, and it's so pathetic he can't even bother.

The thing is, Eddie had meant all those things he said to the rest of the Hellfire Club. Adding Steve to the group would shake up the social ladder at Hawkins High. His reputation, no matter how tattered, would give them a much needed boost up the social ladder, even if it only lasted to the end of the year.

But that isn't why Eddie decided to talk to Steve Harrington.

It's because the way Steve's sitting reminds him of Grant. Grant, who had also been alone at his table, curled around his food tray like he thought someone would once again steal it and dump it in the trash cans lining the hall to the door. The bullies had snorted at him, telling him to eat from a trough like a good little pig.

It's because the way Steve breathes reminds him of Gareth. Gareth, who Eddie had found soaking wet on the floor of the men's bathroom gulping for breath because he couldn't convince his lungs his head was no longer being held underwater. He still can't pass by the door without getting a nervous hitch in his breath.

It's because the look in Steve's eye reminds him of Jeff. Jeff who takes every awful word spat at him in the halls with a blank indifference in his eyes, like this is the way things have always been and will always be. Eddie has taken to punching loud mouth racists, just so Jeff knows at least someone hears what they're saying and cares. It means he's gotten detention more this year than the past four years of school combined, but the shocked gratitude on Jeff's face makes it totally worth it.

(It's because Steve's face reminds Eddie of looking in the mirror when he was eleven years old. Little Eddie Munson, who had a starburst of scratches around the bruise to his temple, where his dad had smashed a glass over his head and finally failed as a father in the eyes of the government. Eddie remembers tracing each scratch with dedicated precision, and wondered when Uncle Wayne would also give him marks to show the rest of the world just how hated Eddie Munson was.)

Steve Harrington reminded him of every little lost sheep he'd collected since starting Corroded Coffin, since founding the Hellfire Club. So Eddie knows his voice is just a little too sincere when he says: "Looks like you could use some company."

Of all the responses Eddie thought he’d get, he can’t say this was one of them. He mentally pinwheels for a second, before deciding to do what he originally planned: ignore all the protests Steve gives and show him a kingdom that will grant him asylum. He pulls one of the chairs out from the table and turns it around, so he can lean on its back as he and Steve talk.

“I bring no challenge to you today, fair sir.” Eddie uses his most over the top Noble voice, the one that made Gareth snort Pepsi all over his character sheet during his first session. He doesn’t get a smile from Harrington, but he also doesn’t tell him to fuck off, so this is already going better than Eddie planned. “The great Hellfire guild in fact wishes to extend an olive branch. A gesture of good will, you could say.”

Steve squints at him like he is trying to decipher a foreign language. “Hellfire... that’s the D&D club, right?”

“Oh?” Eddie genuinely hadn’t expected he would know who they were. Somehow, Harrington keeps managing to surprise him. “The Steve Harrington has heard of us? The king bothers to keep track of his subjects' favorite punching bags?” It’s hard to tell under all the injuries, but he thinks Steve goes a little pink in his cheeks, and Eddie considers that a win. He also doesn’t try to defend himself, which is another point in his favor in Eddie’s book.

“It’s a little hard to miss your posters. You have a rather distinctive logo.” He gestures to the demon on Eddie's shirt. “My kids play D&D, it's why I noticed it, not 'cuz of the punching bag... thing. I am sorry. About that." Steve stumbles over his words, like this is a conversation he has never considered having, but one he desperately wants to get right. "They’re really shitty to you guys.” And Eddie can’t even register the actual apology Harrington is giving him, because he is still reeling from the phrase ‘my kids.’ His face must be going on some sort of unprecedented emotional journey, because Steve is quick to add. “The kids I babysit, I mean.”

“You're a babysitter?” Eddie can’t keep the judgment from his voice. He doesn’t know what parent would dare leave their child with someone who is best known for his kegstand record.

“It's a relatively... New gig,” Steve admits. “They're the reason why I got in the fight with Billy in the first place.”

“I thought you got in the fight with Billy because he fucking hates you.”

“Yeah, that definitely didn't help? But Billy showed up looking for his sister and when he saw her with Lucas Sinclair...”

“The racist piece of shit lost his goddamn mind.” Eddie knows intimately where Billy Hargrove's biases lie. Hellfire has taken to forming a protective ring around Jeff when they walk to class, just to try and keep him out of Billy's line of sight.

Steve sighs. “I assume he isn't including that part of the story when he tells it?”

“Can't say he does.”

A small little smirk appears on Steve's face, the first time he's smiled since Eddie walked over. Maybe for the first time since he's come back to school.

“I'm assuming he also left out the part where he nearly pissed himself after his little sister threatened his balls with a baseball bat?"

“Shut the fuck up, that did not happen!” Steve’s grin widens, and Eddie can’t help but return it. “Harrington, if you're pulling my leg-”

“I swear to god, dude!”

“Oh my god, I wish I could have seen it!” He is laughing harder than he has in ages, picturing Billy’s bug-eyed look of terror as a little girl threatens to castrate him

“Me too. Apparently his expression was priceless.” At Eddie's puzzled expression, he continues. “I was unconscious, the kids told me all about it though.”

“You were unconscious?!” Eddie had seen plenty of fights, but most of them were schoolyard scrapes, where the loser scuttled off with his tail between his legs. He thought knockout punches were something that only existed in action movies and boxing matches.

“Yeah man.” Harrington gestures to the cuts on his face. "He smashed a plate over my head." Eddie hates that he can guess exactly how much that hurt, but luckily Steve misses his flinch. "Hit me a bunch after that too, but it's all kind of blurry."

“Jesus fucking Christ!” With the bruises on his face, it is all too easy to imagine; Steve, unconscious on the ground, Billy Hargrove above him with bloody knuckles, same sick smile on his face from when he was describing the fight. “It sounds like he was trying to kill you!”

Steve blanches at that, like no one has said the words out loud to him before. Like he’s never even considered the possibility. Maybe Eddie should try and comfort him but he has no goddamn idea what you say to the guy who was a victim of attempted murder and apparently didn’t even realize it. He decides to change the subject instead.

"What did the police say?" Eddie doesn’t know how trials tend to go, but he figures that the accused don’t usually just get to attend high school like nothing happened. Eddie wonders how Billy managed to swing it.

"What?” Steve blinks at him, looking absolutely bewildered. “Why would I call the police?"

And, on one hand, Eddie gets it. He has a trailer full of drugs and a reputation for demonic rituals and car theft. The cops are just as likely to shoot him as they are to actually arrest any of the assholes harassing him. Calling them wouldn’t be his first thought either. But on the other, more important hand, Steve Harrington, darling of Hawkins High and jewel of Loch Nora, has none of that to worry about. The police would probably actually help him. The Chief has let Eddie off on multiple possession charges, with a shake of his head and a warning to get his act together. Surely, he would actually help Steve after something like this.

“I know Hopper seems like a hardass-” Eddie begins, but Steve cuts him off.

“I know, man. I spoke to him. He even offered to arrest the guy, but I’m not pressing charges.”

He sounds so dismissive that Eddie feels the need to shake him. Probably would have if he wasn't afraid of giving the guy permanent brain damage.

“Steve, he tried to kill you.”

Steve waves his hand, like he is trying to dispel Eddie’s very concern from the air.

“It’s not worth it. My parents would kill me themselves if they had to deal with a trial. It was bad enough when they learned about the concussion.”

“Your parents were... Mad at you. For having a concussion.” Eddie is getting a picture of the Harringtons in his head, and they are beginning to look frighteningly similar to his old man.

Steve laughs. It's a bitter sound, so different from even cruel King Steve's mirth while his loyal hounds Carol and Tommy were tearing some poor freak apart. No, this laugh was something he'd heard from Uncle Wayne's friends. It reminded him of when they talked about 'Nam, about coming home after. It was the laugh of someone who wished they could still be as naïve as you were.

“Nah, man. If it was just the concussion, they wouldn't even have bothered to call.” And his face is so goddamn serious, Eddie believes him.

Eddie feels pinned like a butterfly. He meant to come over to corner Steve, cajole him into taking the best offer possible. He thought it'd be an easy sell to a washed up jock. He wanted to help, yes, but he's seen Steve aimlessly walking from class to class. Drifting through high school like a balloon some toddler had been careless enough to release. He had thought this sharpness had been burnt out of him. Eddie swallows, but can't look away. Steve grins at him, like he is oh so polite for spelling this all out.

"What the concussion means though, that's a whole 'nother story. I wasn't kidding, you know, when I said another hit to the head might kill me. Between the one I got last year and the severity of this one, even a bad fall could give me permanent brain damage. Which means basketball is out of the question. Which means the scholarship I lined up is also out of the question. And though Boston University is 'Very sorry to hear about what I've been going through', they no longer think I'm Eagles material. I was surprised my dad didn't pop me one right there and put me out of my misery."

Eddie doesn't know why Steve is telling this. Steve has been the subject of more than one of his table rants, and while Steve never did anything in retaliation but laugh, he must know just how low Eddie's opinion of him was before today. So he has no idea why he is the object of this tight stream of vitriol, why he is on the receiving end of the pressure value overloading.

Steve scoffs. “I... It doesn't matter anyways. It's not like there's still any reason to go." He glances over, almost magnetically, to where Nancy Wheeler and Jonathan Byers are pouring over a chemistry textbook, close as matching puzzle pieces.

And Eddie realizes he's hearing this because Steve has no one else to say it too.

Fuck, does anyone else even know?

Jesus.

And Eddie... Eddie has no idea what to say back to him.

Eddie is rarely a fighter. He has spent so much of his life running from bullies that getting the hell out of dodge is as instinctive to him as breathing. But Eddie has learned that certain things take him out of his body. Possess him with this roiling, unending rage that fills every inch of him, until he can barely recognize the person under his skin.

The utter filth certain kids spat at Jeff when they passed in the halls. The god awful comments Andy had made about Chrissy Cunningham after seeing her cheer routine in the middle school talent show. The first and only time Uncle Wayne had approached Eddie from behind once he had come to live with him, and Eddie had thrashed and spit like a feral cat, had fought and clawed Wayne so deeply there were still nail marks in his uncle’s forearm because Eddie refused to let anyone hurt him ever again-

Eddie feels that way now. Like if Hargrove or Tommy H. or any basketball team asshole came up to the table and said shit to Steve he would utterly lose his shit and fly across the table in a red hot rage, because Steve Harrington had been decent for once in his life and this was the thanks he had gotten for it.

As the silence drags on, that intenseness flees Steve, leaving him that sad, lonely sheep that Eddie had wanted to talk to in the first place.

“I’m.. sorry,” Steve sighs. His cheeks carry a bit of that cherry red, but the misery that radiates off him brings Eddie none of the joy he had deprived from their earlier teasing. “That was... A lot, honestly, and I shouldn’t have-”

“So what you’re saying-” Eddie interrupts, speaking over Steve with a calm deliberation. He doesn’t want to fuck this up, wants to get this right with a desperation he is not yet willing to name. “-is that you are free during weekdays after school now?’

Steve looks at Eddie like he just told him the sky was green and Billy Hargrove was looking to apologize.

“I mean, I guess?”

“Then you can come to the next Hellfire meeting on Thursday?”

“You’re... inviting me to a Dungeons and Dragons club meeting? Like an actual session.”

Eddie shrugs, like he hasn’t once pontificated outside the theater about the sacred nature of their sessions and banned any observers from setting foot inside while they’re playing. “I suppose I am.”

“You know having me around is gonna make people fuck with you, right? I’m not some cool trophy you can win.”

“Steve. It’s Dungeons and Dragons. None of us are exactly looking to win Prom King,” Eddie rolls his eyes at the very thought, before remembering Steve was the shoo-in candidate before Billy supplanted him. He winces, but Steve just chuckles.

“Guess I fit right in then.” He hesitates a little, before adding. “I’m warning you, I've tried before, I’m not good at the math. I can’t keep all of the stats straight. The kids tried to help me make a character while I was in the hospital but... It was pretty hopeless.”

“Then you had a bad DM,” Eddie shrugs. “It’s my job to make sure you understand the rules and how to play. Otherwise, the club is likely to kick me to the curb.” Steve still doesn’t look convinced, so Eddie tries another tactic. “And you can always watch if you don’t like it, dude.” He raises an eyebrow at Steve. “Don’t tell me you're scared?”

“Oh, go fuck yourself.”

“No, really, I get it. If pretending to fight monsters is just too much for Steve Harrington, who am I to try and change fate.”

“You’re fucking ridiculous.”

“Prove me wrong, then.”

Steve stares nervously at the rest of Hellfire. Eddie follows his gaze and resists the urge to slam his head against the table. He’s pretty sure the only way it would be more obvious they were eavesdropping would be if one of them was holding a sign announcing the fact. Jeff is eagerly reading an upside down history textbook, Gareth is honest-to-god whistling, and Grant is not even bothering to act uninterested, just glaring straight at Steve like he could ignite him with a fireball if he tried hard enough.

"I swear they're nice?" Eddie tries.

Steve snorts. "Pretty sure they're better than any of the assholes I used to hang out with." This is true but Eddie is polite enough not to comment on it.

Steve's eyes drift over their table and lock onto the Dungeons and Dragons manual Eddie left open in front of his lunch. Somehow he manages to get paler, throwing his bruises into sickeningly sharp contrast. “Seriously, I may not be the best fit for this. With my- with my head and shit, it can be hard to- like, I've been trying to my assignments, and stuff, seriously, but-”

And Eddie finally puts it together. Traumatic brain injury. Huge rulebook with teeny tiny writing. Not a good combination.

"No worries, I can read it out loud or something, if that would help." He started doing it when Gareth joined, sometimes the kid can only listen if he is standing up and moving. Eddie's even had Jeff do it for him a few times, when he is trying to piece together the last bits of an encounter, but can't focus long enough to get it done.

"Seriously?"

"It's not a big deal." And it really isn't. But Steve is looking at him like it is. Like Eddie just offered to carry him to Mordor, offered to carry him since he can’t carry Steve's burden. It's a heady feeling, the full force of Steve Harrington's gratitude. Like being high without the fuzziness. Eddie is already a little addicted to it.

"But... What if I don't..."

"If it's not your thing, don't worry about it. We can just hang out. Like I said, no big deal," Eddie assures him, even as Tommy H. is glaring at them like he is trying to come up with the quickest way to rip their hearts out, and Nancy Wheeler has stood up with her fist clenched, ready to fight him, and Jonathan Byers seems ready to hold her earrings and watch, and the cafeteria has gone dead silent as each and every table has realized Eddie Munson and Steve Harrington are talking and it feels like the whole world is holding its breath waiting for the answer.

Eddie can tell Steve feels it too, the oppressive tension in what they're doing, by the way his shoulders tense and he squirms in his seat. He looks like that abused puppy again, slapped one too many times by the hand that fed him, and he is wondering if now is the moment to finally bite back.

So Eddie tries to reassure him. Puts on a show. He keeps his posture loose, rests his chin on his hands. He gives Steve a little smile, like they're in kindergarten and Eddie is asking to share the one black marker that hasn't run out of ink. Like this is easy.

Steve takes a deep breath.

"Sure," he says breezily, his own practiced smile safely on his face. "Where should I sit?"

#steddie #steve harrington #eddie munson #stranger things #corroded coffin #the hellfire club #tw racism #tw domestic violence #My writing #my fanfic #my st fanfic #Would You Like to Add Another Member to Your Party?#long post

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lumiereandcogsworth · 6 months

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that baseball ask you sent (which I'm answering rn :3) made me wonder if Belle or Adam or any of their kiddos ever play sports? or enjoy any? 👁️

FUN QUESTION YAY!!! i am going to divide it between canon and modern au because i think about BOTH.

CANON:

adam: he… does not like exercise at all. he got teased a lot as young lad for preferring to sit in the shade (or inside) and read during recreational time, rather than joining the other boys in activities. now, i did a bit of digging, and actually at this point in time, france wasn’t a very sporty place. they were much more into the ✨intellectualism✨ of it all. and sports were rough and grimy. blegh! even still, the upper class (i.e. where Prince Adam would be hanging, if you can believe it) had lots of tennis, fencing, and equestrian things. i think adam liked Watching equestrian races/obstacle courses/polo matches, (and probably(definitely) developed crushes on some jockeys) but wasn’t super interested in Doing those things. he preferred to just ride horses freely, not so much for challenge’s sake. but he loves horses a lot so watching them was fun for him :3 anyway, he hated tennis because there’s way too much running and coordination involved and you’re usually just standing directly in the sun. disgusting. even if it was indoors it’s too SWEATYYY. BUT! i do think he enjoyed fencing a lot! he sees it as less exerting (though it is) and more of an art form to master. and he was pretty good at it! which was a nice confidence boost. i have a fic that’s a few years old but it’s when adam & belle are still courting and they FENCE!! it’s incredibly adorable. here it is

belle: ACTIVE ADVENTURE GIRL WHO RAN LIKE A MILE AFTER GASTON PROPOSED TO HER????? hell yeah she sports. like i said though, “sports” weren’t much of a thing. and especially since she didn’t have any friends to play with :( BUT i absolutely think that her and maurice would toss/kick a ball back and forth of SOME kind. you can’t convince me otherwise. she always wanted to be outside!! and maurice was with her much of the time!! so i think they played catch. i also hc that he taught her how to swim in the river that flows past the village, and i think she’d enjoy swimming A LOT. when she learns about mermaids she loses her freaking mind and wishes on stars to become one. but anyway, she was as sporty as a french 18th century village girl could be!! she climbed trees constantly (definitely has lots of little scars like giselle!!) and loved to RUN ! she just had (and still has) So Much Energy. she also just made up a lot of silly games that requires running between trees and making her own obstacle courses. and as an adult, as QUEEN! i think she enjoys tennis and plays with either her kiddos or her ladies in waiting. (or just anyone. i could see her being like “hello sir we need to figure out this business thing. shall we discuss over a game of tennis?” and he’s just like ??? okay ?? your majesty ???????)

renée: SPEAKING OF ENERGY! little renée is just like her mama. loves running and jumping and climbing!!!! but a major difference is they grew up in entirely different stations!! when renée grows older she gets REALLY into polo and maybe even equestrian obstacle courses - though idk the policies on women doing that stuff at that point >:/ but she’s the princess royal so fuck you. anyway she also enjoyed fencing and tennis when she went to university. (i don’t think she was super good at either of them but… she does her best) she’s just such a horse girl !! so that’s where she shined. (her & adam sometimes go to horse races/shows together,,, bonding time. i’m sure belle joins a lot too but she’s BUSY and adam is more willing to play hooky from work, lmao)

juliette: not really a sports girlie. she loves running around and playing with her siblings !! but she wasn’t as brave in terms of climbing trees, and she was afraid of horses until she was like, 8 (and even then, she’d only ride with adam or belle). i think her favorite way to be active is either going on walks or swimming :)

maurice: little reecy is much like his mama too, just chaos and running and climbing. he has fun swimming too. he also likes to WRESTLE even though he’s not all that muscular. he and his best friend xavier, since they were toddlers, simply attack each other for fun. (maurice also likes picking play fights with adam, and adam’s always like sON PLEASE— but maurice has already tackled him onto the bed or sofa adjskd) anyway i think it would be so funny if he just absolutely DOMINATED in tennis when he goes to university. like just an absolute legend. they put his name on the plaque in the trophy hall and everything. and what’s so annoying is he doesn’t even care about it that much. he’s just having fun and making friends. he’s one of those people that is naturally good at a lot of things… very annoying but he’s so charming and sweet that you don’t even care 😮‍💨

(oh and, obviously, all the kids are WELL verses in many many many different dances. just comes with the 18th century royal territory ✨ they all took classes and they all enjoyed it to varying degrees!)

okay, MODERN AU!

adam: once again, sports were not his vibe. PE class was a damn nightmare for every possible reason. later on when he’s with belle, she Tries to take him on runs or at least to do some yoga or something. and he just hates it man😭 “why must you TORTURE ME” but then it always bites him in the ass later because he’ll be groaning from aging and being randomly sore and belle’s like “if only you stretched!😌☕️” and he’s just like 😒

belle: sooo sporty as a kid, i can’t even decide if she had a favorite. soccer basketball softball volleyball track cross country tennis lacrosse swim team ?? i think she’d enjoy basketball and soccer most, just because they’re the most stimulating and active. but she really did enjoy trying all of them!!! i think cross country was also lovely for her bc she could just run and THINK! in college she probably took a lot of fitness classes (i took kickboxing and spin, which she Definitely would too) and just be at the rec center as much as she could (which unfortunately wouldn’t be much, since she was doing two majors and So Busy). and as an adult she probably is always doing some kind of fitness class, as well as going to gyms to swim! and going on runs when the weather is nice (the runs make adam uneasy because WHAT IF SOMEONE KIDNAPS YOU!!!! so she’s like 🙄 and turns on location on her phone so he can check if it’s been Too Long. also he makes her carry pepper spray. the man worries Okay) anyway she’s always doin somethin <3

renée: again, like belle, she tried lots of sports!! not as many as her mama, but lots. she also did dance/ballet for many years. like from toddler age to maybe 10 or 11 or so. and that took a lot of her time, but she still somehow found a way to try other sports too. i think of the ones she tried she probably liked volleyball the most. and it’s the only one she did in high school. (she focused more on academic stuff anyway, so one sport was satisfactory). she’s still a horsegirl in modern au though and, given their financial capabilities, she probably did horse stuff on the side like polo. i think she always wanted her own horse but it was never realistic, she focused more on other things and couldn’t devote her time to it. but she definitely complained about it A LOT when she was younger. looking back as an adult though she’s glad she didn’t Have A Horse to care for still. she had her favorites at the ranch she’d go to and that was good enough!

juliette: still not a sports girlie! lmao. PE was Also a damn nightmare 😭 but she did ballet with renée for a handful of years as well, and i think she liked taking swim classes, so adam & belle found some kind of swim team club thing for her to join that was less intense than school competitions. (which Really helped her get a tad better at socializing !! but still always a struggle for her 😞) anyway i think she still swims sometimes in college, but is much more focused on school and being in the orchestra (we got a violin prodigy over here!!!!) so it’s less and less. but as an adult she walks and such. whenever her & renée can meet and catch up, they go on long walks together :”3 and sometimes horseback riding !

maurice: okay reecy ALSO did ballet as a kid, just like his sisters, but he only did it a few years because he got Really Into Baseball !!!!! so he traded his dancing shoes for CLEATS! i think he did other sports too, soccer, track, maybe even tennis to be reminiscent of his 18th century counterpart, but baseball is his love. he may even play in college, perhaps! as an adult i can totally see him being the baseball couch for his nieces/nephews/kids later on. i think he’d enjoy that a lot :”3 AND he’d also be really into hiking. he’d wanna be all “into the wild” and go on a solo hike somewhere lesser known but adam 1000% forbid it. “that boy was an idiot. you’re not doing that.” and maurice says “DAD! don’t speak ill of the DEAD!” and adam goes “my point entirely😮‍💨” but anyway reece obeys and only goes on hikes with groups of friends and in Relatively Known Areas🙄. he even drags his family on a hike every now and then when they’re all adults! only belle and his partner eloise really enjoy it with him 💔 reecy & belle prob do (VERY CUTE) mother-son hikes sometimes though!!!!!🥹

#EEEEEEEEEEE :)))))#sorry i talked so much but AH!#i couldn’t Not include modern au. i think about that universe A Lot #anyway thank you🥰🥰🥰#alex tag #answered #batb 2017 #batb headcanons #adelle #modern au adelle #oc writing #adam #belle #renée #juliette #maurice

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peace-coast-island · 7 months

Text

Diary of a Junebug

Go with the flow like the autumn koi and swim away without a care in the world

I should strive to be more like the autumn koi in the Moonlit Choral Brook. They follow the rhythm of the river like it’s a dance, always moving forward. I wonder how the world looks from their point of view through the crystal clear water.

We’re in Sunburst Villa for a fishing tourney involving autumn koi obviously. They’re kinda like the village’s mascot, so it’s no exaggeration to say that they’re everywhere. I don’t mind, I think koi are pretty, especially the autumn koi with its warm and vibrant colors.

Along with the journey, there’s MellowCon, an anime convention where Alexi and Emma are attending. Of course, I got a couple signed prints from them, one of them having been commissioned from Cheyenne, who regretfully couldn’t make it. Luckily, the next convention Alexi’s going to is about half an hour away from where Cheyenne lives and they have plans to meet up with some old college friends during that weekend.

We’re also hanging out with Jamie and the Linnea Squad for some sightseeing. Jamie wanted to treat the Linnea Squad to a vacation when she found out an old friend and her traveling party was in the area, so she introduced them to us.

The fishing tourney has been fun in a chill, low-key kind of way. I always prefer events more of that pace than something big and extravagant. Sure, those can be fun, but they also can be draining. For me, fishing is about taking it easy, so it makes sense for it to be a low stakes kind of thing. It would be nice to catch lots of huge fish and get a nice trophy, but that’s not a priority for me. I’m just here for the cool sea creatures.

MellowCon was also fun, although it’s not really my scene, so I didn’t really spend a lot of time there. To be honest, I really only hung around Alexi and Emma because I’m not familiar with the other shows and games over there. Really, I only know a very small handful of characters they play, specifically from Pillars of Stone and Flame. Still, it was fun looking around and seeing all the art and cosplay.

At least I was able to get into the conversations revolving around Pillars. Along with Emma and Alexi, it seems like a lot of the English VAs really kicked off their careers with Pillars - and most of them happen to be fans of the game too. The new update’s coming next week with a new exploration area and story chapter, both which I’m hyped for.

Along with the excitement for the new update, we also talked a bit about that dev, the one who was memed in an interview for coming off as a snob — and rightfully so, to be honest. Apparently, she made a spectacle of herself in a podcast by being sort of passive aggressive towards the fanbase. From my understanding based on translations, she doesn’t like the criticism towards the writing, except she kinda blows it out of proportion.

I mean, I kinda get it, but at the same time those criticisms are usually valid. I got interested in Pillars for the story and exploration, and while I am invested, I find the writing to be uneven at times. In other words, when it’s good, it can be really good, but when it’s bad, it falls flat. At least, in my opinion, the story has improved a lot since the beginning, though pacing seems to be its weak spot.

The podcast also goes a bit into Constellation Matrix, which is another game produced by the same company as Pillars, and that was what prompted the dev’s rant as she worked on both. I don’t know too much about Constellation Matrix’s lore, but there’s a lot of comparisons made between the character Fury and Pillar’s October - who happens to be played by Emma - in terms of their character arcs being similar.

From the gist of it, Fury was a fan favorite, at least until the writers butchered her character arc so badly that she died an anticlimactic death. In other words, she was a well written character with a lot of potential to take the story in another direction. Fans speculated that the writers didn’t want to commit or something, so they decided to kill her off and then act like she never existed. Of course, fans protested and the phrase “offed like Fury” became a thing. Even the company and the devs poke fun at it occasionally.

I mean, imagine screwing up so badly that you sort of became a cultural phenomenon, like, damn. I can see the parallels between Fury and October, which are likely intentional, though I think I have faith in Pillars to not pull an “offed like Fury” with October. I mean, October’s second character story chapter’s coming out in the new update, so she’s not disappearing from the spotlight anytime soon. Really, the only thing I’m worried about at this point is the pacing, especially later on when the story begins to focus on other characters.

And on an unsurprising note, that dev isn’t a fan of “offed by Fury” and went off on a tangent on why it was necessary for Fury to die and people were too dense understand what it meant for the narrative or something. I didn’t understand most of it, but she seemed really defensive over that for some reason, which is what people are memeing over because it really is ridiculous.

Aside from hyping about Pillars, the biggest highlight of MellowCon for me was seeing Alexi and Emma with their fans. Both of them never imagined that they’d make it as voice actors, not with the way their families discouraged them from pursuing it. And now here they are, living the life they never imagined would be possible if they hadn’t taken the plunge. It really is amazing to see.

Alexi had a pleasant surprise when her brother showed up with his friends to support her. She mentioned that out of her family, she has a difficult relationship with her oldest brother and their father after the accident. The way she describes it, they see her as damaged goods, a traumatized amputee who should be ashamed to be alive. Sounds harsh, but that’s just the sad reality of how some people are.

While things are far from ideal between Alexi and her brother, at least they’re talking. It’s sad that they used to be close, only for him to pull away when she needed his support the most. She said the worst thing was that he was being dishonest, always making up excuses to justify treating her like she’s less of a person. And when her voice acting career took off, she felt that his “support” was purely superficial, as in he only cared when it benefitted him.

As for her father, not only he looks down on her, he also thinks that voice acting is not a real job. His response to her getting more recognition as a voice actor was basically along the lines of, “Do these people have anything better to do? Aren’t they tired of her yet?” How rude.

Alexi said she wasn’t super close to him as they didn’t really have a lot in common to begin with, but they got along pretty well back then. She described him as old fashioned, the kind of person who thinks that people should just develop a thick skin and get over it. Basically, although he’d never say it outright, he’s ashamed of having a disabled and mentally ill daughter.

By now, Alexi’s accepted that they’ll never see eye to eye. She admits that she can be difficult, though I don’t think that’s an excuse for him to cast her aside like that. Sounds like the kind of person where there’s just no winning with them. When you’re at your lowest, they make fun of you for being weak. And then when you stand up for yourself, they complain that you’re unreasonable and stuck up. Sometimes you just have to say “Fuck it, I’m not bending over backwards just to get your approval.” Alexi’s been through a lot of shit and she doesn’t have time to deal with people like that. Good for her!

Then we met up with Jamie and her friends, the Linnea Squad and Caerwyn’s adventuring party. Linnea and her comrades are still traveling with Jamie from time to time, mainly because they need a mentor figure to look up to. They’re still at large, so going off on their own isn’t the best option.

Linnea’s still trying to reason with Jet and Gabe, but it seems like her pleas go in one ear and out the other. There’s no point in forcing them to talk if they refuse to, so she has no choice but to let it go. She and the others are still hoping for a reconciliation, but knowing how stubborn and hardheaded their friend is, they’re gonna need a lot of patience before things settle down. As long as he’s not causing trouble, and potentially putting the rest of the squad at risk, Jamie advises that it’s best to leave him alone for now. Sounds like a tricky situation, though I think the squad’s handling it well.

As for Caerwyn, she’s an elf mage who’s adventuring with her apprentice mage Salka, and Kalle, a warrior from the Glacial Mountains. They were planning to travel further up north, but they encountered problems at the Hallowed Pass. There was another member, a healer mage they picked up during their travels who later parted ways not too long ago, right before the group headed towards the Hallowed Past.

The ordeal the party experienced over there caused a considerable setback, but since they’re not on a strict schedule, it’s not that big of a deal. Basically, there were a bunch of curses and monsters acting haywire to the point that the roads became inaccessible. Caerwyn said it was just their luck that their healer mage just left because he happened to have an innate immunity to some of those curses, which would’ve made cleaning up a lot more easier. Still, it wasn’t anything that Caerwyn couldn’t handle.

While Caerwyn and Salka took care of the curses and flying monsters, Kalle handled the beasts and whatever physical obstacles came their way. The whole cleanup took nearly four days and they succeeded in reopening those routes, a feat that Caerwyn said would be considered impossible for most mages and warriors. I don’t think she’s exaggerating, otherwise, I think Jamie would’ve called her out.

Those four days really tested their stamina, especially for Kalle, so they have to take it easy for a while before going back on the road. Since they have to cross the mountains and blizzard season is approaching, which can get deadly in these parts, the group figured that it’s not worth risking their necks out there. Along with overexertion, Kalle also sustained some injuries while fighting, so he had been on strict bed rest orders.

Caerwyn and Salka are almost fully recovered while he still has to take it slow. And of course, he’s gone a bit stir crazy from being in bed all the time, but at the same time too tired to really do anything. That can be a drag sometimes. At least he was well enough to join us on the tourney for a bit and catch some autumn koi.

Since there’s no way of knowing when’s the next time they’ll cross paths again, Jamie and Caerwyn have a lot of catching up to do. Jamie says Caerwyn doesn’t have the best sense of time because she has a long life, so Salka often has to keep her in line or else she’d be taking them on detour after detour. After all, she may have all the time in the world, but for us humans, we don’t really have that luxury.

Salka has explored the village in and out, so she’s become our tour guide. The three of them tend to do their own things when they’re staying somewhere for a while. Caerwyn likes to look for shops that sell magic stuff, according to her, shadier a place looks, the more likely you are to find some treasure. Jamie wasn’t exaggerating when she said that Caerwyn’s a walking tome on magic. While she’s off doing that, Salka’s exploring the shops and replenishing on supplies, and Kalle’s running around helping the locals out.

There’s a cafe that’s not too far from the tourney, so it’s become our hangout spot. Not only the pastries are good, they also have these cute autumn koi rice cakes for the occasion. It’s kinda become our thing to end the night with rice cakes, green tea, and a couple card games.

The nightlife is pretty active here, so Caerwyn and Salka have been using these game nights to seek out a new member to join their party. As their journey goes on, they realize that they need a healer, preferably a licensed medic. The guy who left, Emlyn, wasn’t a medic, but he was a mage who Caerwyn considers a genius. Not only he’s immune to most curses, which is considered unusual, he can easily heal ailments that are difficult for even the most experienced mages. And the worst part, according to Caerwyn, instead of putting his gifts to good use, he spent most of his life living with regrets. Based on her tone, I wonder if she’s speaking from experience.

Before going off their separate ways, Emlyn left a notebook on various spells and medicinal herbs for common ailments, which has been a godsend for them. While that alone has been helping them get by, Caerwyn’s open to recruiting a medic just to be safe. According to her and Jamie, those kinds of mages are considered to be very niche, which is why it’s hard for them to find one. Basically, mages aren’t very common, and licensed ones, especially in the medical field, are very few and far between. Emlyn happened to be a unique case, so their replacement has some big shoes to fill.

Well, like Caerwyn says, there’s no rush. It’s not healthy to live life burdened by worries and regrets. Sure, there are things that are outside your control, but don’t let that stop you from living. Although Caerwyn’s made a name for herself as a powerful mage, she says she can’t help but feel like she hasn’t done enough, which is why she’s on this adventure now, to take it slow and really get to know her companions before she inevitably outlives them like most of her friends.

After getting burned out with the incident at the pass, she said seeing the autumn koi swimming in the river reminded her why she and Salka set out on this journey in the first place. Instead of a definite endpoint, they’re just going with the flow like the koi, and they’re content with that. Even if you decide to stop moving, the currents will take you along anyway whether you like it or not, so you might as well let it carry you away. You’ll end up somewhere, and you have the choice of exploring your surroundings or just burying your head in the sand. Like I said before, sounds like Caerwyn’s speaking from experience.

It won’t be long before we all go our separate ways again. Jamie hopes it won’t be too long before she and Caerwyn cross paths again. There may be no guarantees, but considering how much Jamie travels, Caerwyn bets that they’ll meet up again in the future, and hopefully introduce her to their medic. From how Jamie, Salka, and Kalle talk about her, Caerwyn is an interesting figure, one who I really hope to meet again in the future if fate allows.

Read on AO3

#animal crossing pocket camp #animal crossing #headcanon ramble #diary of a junebug

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sam-glade · 1 year

Text

Find the Words Tag

Tagged by @oh-no-another-idea here and @toribookworm22 here. Thank you both💜

And passing it onto: @squarebracket-trick @writernopal @canadjester @winterandwords. Your words are: know, knock, knight, keen.

This time I'm looking in all the files with outtakes, old drafts, and self-indulgent fluff.

From @oh-no-another-idea: sun, cloud, break, wave, and swim

SUN

“It was a mutual agreement.”

“Gullin, please. Don’t embellish.” Ianim sighed. “I wasn’t expecting to be named the First Prince’s Successor. Light-of-my-Sun my Grandfather is a cosmic constant; he wasn’t supposed to step down. I wasn’t prepared. I realised that between family obligations and joining different divisions upon graduation, we wouldn’t be able to give each other enough time and attention, and it would be hard on both of us. So, I broke it off.”

CLOUD

The leaves on the trees glistened from the wetness, orange and yellow. The grass had lost its lustre, but other than that, the area looked so much better maintained. The manor was freshly plastered, and the utility buildings painted white to match. The roof was cleared off moss and smoke was rising steadily above it. It didn't look large, not with edges of it hidden behind large bushes, and the heavy clouds providing a backdrop.

BREAK (From a kulig Gullin was invited to. I should turn it into a short story)

The sun set soon, and the sleighs were lit up by shaking lanterns. At some point Gullin found himself in a completely different sleigh, with people he didn't know, but with enough tincture to break the ice.

WAVE

“A little birdie told me that you need someone to cheer you up,” Catnip said as a greeting.

“I’m pretty sure it was a squirrel,” he retorted, shaking her wrist.

She waved at him to follow her back to the city. He did. Yes, he was probably wasting precious time, but on the other hand, he was flying around the Five Princedoms, looking for dragons, and it didn’t look like he was getting any closer to finding them. Maybe, just maybe, clearing his head for one evening would help.

SWIM

“Master Claren,” Lissan interrupted him. “I can’t swim.” Claren looked at him in disbelief. “The only body of water near the house back in Aritia was a river which barely reached past my knees, and who would have taught me anyway?” Lissan explained, amused by the man’s expression.

From @toribookworm22: subdue, fate, told, believe.

SUBDUE

“What ‘other threats’ do you mean? We mustn't be involved in law enforcement.”

“Natural disasters. Fires, floods, this sort of things. Either a Sword wielding the Element may be able to subdue it, or someone with protective powers can get the people to safety.”

FATE (Gullin speaking first)

"I love you."

"I know." He was pleased. And amused. He was trying not to laugh, Gullin knew that expression all too well, the lit up eyes, the corners of his mouth twitching. Gullin glared with indignation. He wasn't supposed to laugh at a statement like this. "I'm sorry, I'm just… really happy to hear it when you're conscious."

"When I'm–"

If the Fate had a shred of mercy, she'd turn him to ash on the spot.

TOLD (also from the kulig)

And then there was another party, and he vaguely recalled Lissan sitting on a table when an irate noble attempted to flip it. Sabres were drawn, and he was about to step in, but Lissan wrapped an arm around his shoulders and told him to watch.

"They're drunk!" Gullin objected. He marvelled at how most of these people were still upright, given the amount of strong alcohol they'd consumed.

"Yes. And also not new at this."

BELIEVE

"You still coming to the shooting ranges on Wednesday?"

"I can come," Gullin said with a shrug. "If you really don't believe my word that no, I definitely cannot intercept bullets in the air."

"I have a bet with Ritenya that you can." Nikols's tone was more guarded. Gullin frowned. Why did the name ring a bell? "What?"

"Remind me, is it your girlfriend or your buddy from the shooting competition?"

"Artillery's Second Brigadier."

Gullin's mouth turned into a wry smile.

"Not yet the former then."

#days of dusk #find the word tag #tag game #writeblr #writeblr tag game

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injunnie-dreamie · 2 years

Text

The Language of Flowers

Markwin

…

Winwin is pretty and Mark is simply not able to cope with this fact.

There has quite possibly never been a more beautiful boy to grace this earth than Winwin. Mark thinks it’s a crime that someone can be so beautiful and also the top swimmer of their college swim team, top student, and also unbelievably kind and gentle. A person that perfect shouldn’t be able to exist.

Mark may have accidentally drunk confessed all of this to Haechan one night, a fact that Haechan makes fun of him for constantly.

Although just in general Haechan makes fun of him constantly, so that’s not much of a difference. It’s a key part of their friendship.

It’s “doubly important when Winwin is involved”, according to Haechan, and he makes sure to tell Mark he’s blushing any time he even looks at Winwin.

Or, god forbid, Winwin looks at him.

One time Winwin smiled at Mark and he almost passed out.

Jisung has pictures.

Mark thinks he deleted the pictures from Jisung’s phone but he did NOT; Jisung backed them up.

Blackmail material for Winwin and Mark’s future wedding, as Haechan would say.

But anyways, Mark is totally not freaking out at all he’s acting perfectly normal. He is having a totally normal reaction to seeing such a dreamy, beautiful, amazing, wonderful person gracing his presence.

Right.

…And it would be fine except Mark just keeps seeming to run into Winwin and it is NOT helping with the little baby crush Mark has been developing against his will.

…

Winwin has a habit of dropping into Language of Flowers, the florist shop Mark works at, on his way to swim practice at the rec.

Not that Mark knows Winwin’s schedule by heart or anything!

But Winwin almost always comes in to look at the new displays and fresh flowers. He gets such a soft smile on his face when he leans in and smells a particularly lovely bloom.

It entrances Mark just a little. Only a little!

…It’s gotten to the point where even Mark’s manager is aware of his crush on Winwin.

She’ll push him out to the front with a new palette of flowers to arrange any time Winwin is in, saying, “Go place these on the table, right next to where your pretty boy is.”

And every time it makes Mark’s face burn bright red, but this is literally his job so he has to.

She jokingly scolds him afterwards because every time, instead of saying anything, Mark just quickly and quietly places the flowers in vases, trying not to look to his right side even slightly.

But then one day, by some horrible act of the universe, one of the flowers tips out of Mark’s hand before he can catch it, tumbling to land by Winwin’s feet.

Who then picks it up.

And hands it to him.

Mark is definitely not blushing again.

But Winwin doesn’t point it out, just smiles softly and places the flower into Mark’s open hand. “Here, caught this one for you.”

“Uh.. t-thank you. Thanks.” Mark stumbles over his words.

Winwin smiles again at Mark and he thinks he might faint. “Of course.”

Mark stands there frozen for far too long. “Um. Yeah I’m just gonna. Go now.”

“Okay, I’ll see you later then.”

“Um yeah.”

“Do you work here every day?”

“Um most days! Every day that you come in though. Not that I memorized it! I sound insane.” Mark says miserably. “I’m terrible at talking to pretty people.”

“You think I’m pretty?”

Mark freezes. “Aaaand I said that out loud, now I have to go throw myself off the nearest skyscraper.”

“No, I think it’s cute. You’re cute.”

“Oh. Uh. Thanks.” Mark turns to leave abruptly, blushing bright red again.

He turns back around just as suddenly. “Sorry, um are you flirting with me?”

“Yes Mark, I’m flirting with you.”

“Oh.” Mark answers brilliantly.

“So, are you doing anything after work?”

“Oh uh I mean usually I go home to study and work and-”

“Mark! I’m trying to ask you out.”

“Oh. Oh! Yes! Um yes! I would like to go. On a date. With you.”

“Cool, I could pick you up after work?”

“Uh yeah! Yes.”

Winwin smiles. “Okay cool, I’ll see you then.”

“Yeah, see you then.”

Winwin leaves the store, and when Mark turns around he finds his manager leaning against the front counter, smirking at him. “So, when’s the wedding?”

#nct #mark #winwin #markwin #markwin fic #flower shop au #nct fic #rarepair

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gold-onthe-inside · 2 years

Note

Sometimes I wonder what Logan would be like if we saw him separate from Rory the way we see Jess separate from Rory. With Jess we get to see him have conflicts that don't involve Rory like with his parents or Luke or school. But with Logan the conflict we see outside of romance is with his father and even that we see it almost exclusively from Rory's perspective.

I get why we don't, at the end of the day Gilmore Girls is about the girls. But I still wonder if I would have liked him more if we had a storyline about him that did not involve Rory.

It is pretty speculative but I agree that it’d be easier to understand where he’s coming from if we knew more about him. I haven’t watched the full episodes, I gave up after Jess left and only watched the important scenes with Paris and Rory and Logan. I mean, one of my biggest points of contention with the show is that it excessively focuses on Rory and Lorelai, but then again, it’s not like the show lied to me about it. It’s about the Gilmore Girls, everyone else is just peripheral to them. [insert cristina telling meredith that she’s the sun]

It’s just hard to come up with storylines for Logan that I would genuinely care about and want to see. I think we do hear a lot more about Mitchum and Logan’s relationship than actually seeing it; a lot like Christopher and his parents. I’m not sure that seeing it would make me empathise with Logan more though. He’s just too privileged for it to seem like a genuine problem because he enjoys his status and his privilege but also doesn’t want to accept the responsibilities that comes with. Weirdly enough, I could probably empathise with Mitchum more than Logan [ excluding the bit when he was a dick to Rory ]. I mean, imagine you’ve worked your whole life to build this massive newspaper magnate and then your son is like, whatever, I’d rather shoot a paintball gun at my friends. It really is like he’s allergic to responsibility and he claims he has no freedom, but we also have no idea what his ambitions are. Logan’s in his 20s, he finishes college, and he still has no idea what he wants his life to be. It’s actually pretty close to what Christopher says to Lorelai in season 2; he doesn’t know what he wants to do, he just doesn’t want to end up like his parents and it’s like… THAT’S NOT A PLAN!

On the other hand, you have someone like Lorelai and Jess who never finished high school and had to, figuratively, sink or swim. They both crash in the only place that’ll take them, they work their asses off, and eventually come to some kind of respectable place in their lives. That said, you don’t really see Jess doing those things, he just shows up out of the blue with a book he’s written which is a shame. The other parallel I really like between them is that despite all they’ve done, people still throw their mistakes in their faces; you have Luke saying Lorelai doesn’t have the best decision making skills because she had a kid, you have Rory saying that Lorelai never went to college so she doesn’t understand that people take time off, you have Richard pointing out that Lorelai never went to college so she doesn’t understand the admission process etc etc. In the same way, Logan pretty much squashes Jess’s accomplishment as a published author, even Luke when he throws the fact that Jess was employee of the month back at him. I don’t know how relevant this is to the question, but it was something I wanted to add.

You’re right, everything does revolve around the Gilmore Girls which you can’t really complain about, but then you get characters with half-assed development. I’m still pretty sure the only reason everything worked out for Jess is because he got the hell away from everyone in that town and in his family. But even then, he’s still hung up on Rory like they’re Gatsby and Daisy.

#gilmore girls #logan huntzberger #jess mariano #rory gilmore #lorelai gilmore #asked and answered

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chezzywezzy · 3 years

Text

Yandere Henry Bowers (5/5)

(@bywie)

Word count ; 3.9k

*Edited.

Bev tugged on my arm, pulling me away from the main commotion. I was entranced with her cute smile and her new hair style. I loved her.

“What did I tell you?” she giggled.

“Yeah, I know, you’re usually right,” I agreed easily. “It’s nice to wash away my worries, too. I heard some pretty terrible news this morning, so it’s nice to have a distraction.”

Bev tilted her head. “Bad news?”

“You haven’t heard? Just like that other kid, Greta’s gone missing. I know she was a bully and everything, but I can’t help feeling like —“

“It wasn’t Henry,” she instantly reassured, her hands ghosting over my shoulder. “Kids are disappearing a lot these days… He was just heartbroken. I’m sure as we speak, he’s getting over you. You don’t need to think about him anymore.”

“It’s hard not to… He really scared me.”

Bev cupped my cheeks, successfully silencing me. “Now, now, no more negativity. We’re having girl time. Plus the boys, I guess, but you see what they’re up to…”

As she drew my attention to the rest of the group, I smiled. All of the boys were eagerly wrestling each other, their laughs echoing across the lake as they were fully enveloped in their water wrestling. Our hands held tighter as we gazed at them. I couldn’t help but feel this was the perfect way to mark the transition into college life.

“Hey! You losers can’t beat me to the river,” Richie suddenly declared. It was generally aimed towards the boys, but Bev and I shared mischievous smiles and started swimming down the river. The boys shouted after us, trying desperately to catch up.

We swam quickly and gracefully - or, at least, Bev did - and we swam far enough to where the water became shallow. We were both dripping wet as we stood up. The water was at knee-length and had weighed us down when we tried to stand.

Bev and I laughed as the boys tried desperately to catch up. Eventually, of course, they did, but I noticed that somehow Ben came into second place despite previously being farthest away, followed by Eddie, Bill, Stan, and Richie in last.

“We kicked your asses,” I declared haughtily, pointing at the group.

Richie was quick to defend his pride with,” No way! You guys were way more ahead.”

“We were also the first to jump,” Bev added, stifling her giggles.

“W - well, we would’ve if you told us to,” Bill agreed, huffing in embarrassment.

Ben had a deep blush as he watched Bev, and I couldn’t help but tense. Ben was a lovely boy, so I would support Beverly is she ended up falling for him. But I knew I’d be jealous. I’d hate to see it happen. Not to mention, Bill obviously had a crush on her, too. She already had enough of a love triangle to deal with without me in the picture.

Before we could argue further, a boy suddenly came stumbling through the woods. I’d seen him at school before. He was bloody and dirty. Everyone went to the shore, utterly astounded by the boy’s appearance.

“Isn’t that Mike?” Bill asked in confusion.

“Mike, what’s wrong?” Beverly called to him.

The boy tripped on some rocks, splattering to the ground. He was too concerned about escaping… something to reply. Our questions were swiftly answered as the Bowers gang emerged from the woods. Belch was swift to grab the boys collar, pulling him to his feet, with Patrick helping him.

Henry immediately glued his gaze to me. The other three sufficiently began tormenting the poor boy, but Henry just stared.

Suddenly, Beverly stooped over and grabbed a rock. And threw it, right into Belch’s forehead.

Mike took the chance to scramble across the river. I helped him up, pulling him into a comforting hug before pushing him to the back of the group.

“Holy shit,” Richie gasped.

“Nice throw,” Stanley breathed.

“Thanks, but don’t act so surprised.”

There was a tense silence as the loser gang and Bowers gang stared each other down. I was too afraid to get involved, so I made sure to distance myself from the scene, backing into the shrubbery just enough.

“Rock war!” Richie suddenly declared.

And just like that, Richie gets pegged with a rock thrown by Belch. So, both groups engage in a vicious war. I managed to avoid the attention because both gangs were on good enough terms to let me leave me out of it. Rock after rock, hit after hit, the battle rages on.

However, I noticed that little by little, people from both sides filtered out, and soon it was only Henry left. I was horrified when Richie shouted ‘run!’ and delivered a final blow to Henry, sufficiently knocking the boy to the ground.

I let out a gasp as Bev suddenly tugged at my arm. The other boys had already ran away in hopes of getting their clothes and escaping. But I turned to her, pleading with my eyes. I had to help Henry… I knew things were hard for him.

So, wordlessly, Bev understood. She turned and ran after her friends, leaving me to myself and my passed out ex-boyfriend.

I waded across the stream to him desperately, worried sick for him. He had a gash on his forehead, but aside from that, he seemed very beat up. His dad… I left him alone to his dad.

I sighed, immediately tending to his wounds. Goddamn those friends of his. Leaving the poor guy to fend for himself. To be fair, he was once again bullying a random bystander, and was a violent man, but I couldn’t help but feel responsible for him.

I wiped a stray tear away. I tore off a piece of his tank top and dabbed it in the stream before returning. I dabbed his forehead, wiping away the blood, before applying the cloth permanently. Afterwards, I pulled his head into my lap and readjusted his hair. And so, I waited.

And waited.

…And waited.

It was hard to believe a few rocks knocked him out for such a long time, as the sun was beginning to set and I was getting cold, but I knew I had to.

I was starting to doze off, my head falling forward. But just then, I felt Henry stir. He turned his head and his hand made his way to his to head, clutching it tightly. He let out a hoarse groan, turning on his side. The rocky shore shifted underneath his weight.

I shushed and comforted him quietly as he regained his composure. The moment his eyes shot open, his gaze warmed.

“Are you really fuckin’ here…?” he muttered, baffled.

“Yes,” I exhaled reluctantly. “How do you feel?”

“Why did you wait for me?” he inquired, his voice breaking. “I fuckin’ hurt you and you’re still… here.”

“Let’s not talk about that. You’re hurt. Why did you make the dumb decision to pick on Mike?”

“I was fuckin’… pissed. He was an easy target. And I’d do it again, too, if it meant you’d be here.”

He abruptly sat and turned around, crawling so that he was on his knees, facing me. I sighed, , leaning back slightly. My nails dug into the grass behind me. “Listen, Henry… I meant every word I said. There’s no changing what happened. But I don’t want you destroying yourself because of it.”

I never thought I’d see him, Henry fucking Bowers, cry, but there he was, tears sliding down his cheeks. God, my arms ached to welcome him with a warm hug. But I couldn’t succumb. Henry frowned, wiping his tears away furiously.

“I can’t fuckin’ live without you,” he stated shakily. “You’re the bitch I’m meant to marry. You’re my fuckin’ everything. I know… I’m rough around the edges and I don’t have anything to my name, but I love you. So fuckin’ much. Why aren’t I enough for you, Y/n?”

His hands made their way to my thighs, grabbing the tightly. I gulped, heart beating rapidly in my chest. “I… I’m sorry, Hen. I really, really am. It’s not you. You deserve a girl who can truly fall in love and dedicate to you, and I just can’t. I love you, but it’s always been as a friend. Besides… I can’t date a guy who’s been… violent towards me.”

“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to hurt you - you just wouldn’t let me talk! I was desperate, I’m still desperate!” he begged, and my heart wrenched within me. “Please, Y/n, you can’t leave me.”

I couldn’t take it anymore. It was getting darker. He was crying. I was crying. I wrapped my arms around him tightly, pulling him to me. He cried into my shoulder, holding me equally tight.

I couldn’t help it. I cared too much about Henry. And nothing would ever happen with Bev.

“Let’s just… go on a date. Let’s try to fix things. Little by little. Is that okay?”

“Thank you. So fuckin’ much.”

Maybe it was an unhealthy move, but we couldn’t help it. With all the pent up emotional damage and overblown emotions, we healed each other that night in the woods, just enough.

~~~

I kicked my feet against my bedroom floor. Bev was lying on my bed on her side. She was terrified because of her father, so, I had her come over for dinner. It was the least I could do for the girl. Especially since she was always there for me, and she was strong enough to never previously need me.

“I just don’t understand why I deserved to end up with a shitty dad like him,” Bev sniffled, grabbing my hand and playing with my fingers.

“Nobody does. He’s the absolute worst. You deserve so, so much better.”

“Sometimes it’s hard to live. I’m just lucky I have a best friend like you.”

I almost flinched, but I should’ve known better. I was with… Henry again. The two of us were broken shells of humans that needed each other, even if I longed to be with Bev in every way. I hadn’t told Bev yet, though. I’m not sure I knew how. And it’d already been a week.

“You’re quiet,” Bev commented. She sat up and sat behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist. “Is it Henry? You don’t need to be scared anymore.”

“Sort of. But it’s not important right now. You’re what I’m focused on.”

Bev frowned, nuzzling into the crook of my neck. Her soft hair tickled me. “That’s not true. Did something happen at the lake? Did he hurt you?”

“Yes - I mean no - it’s just complicated,” I heaved.

“Honey! Someone’s calling for you,” my mom shouted from down the hallway. I took the chance to hop up and out of my room, racing downstairs. My mom was holding the phone, wearing a sweet smile, which I mimicked.

After I took the phone, she left to go to the kitchen. I muttered into the receiver,” Hello?”

“Y/n,” Henry immediately panted. “I need you.”

“Wh - what? Hen, I’m with Bev right now —“

“No. Please come over, I need help. It’s serious,” his shaky voice insisted, almost whining. “It’s serious.”

“Fine, fine, but can’t you tell me what’s going on?”

“I - I can’t. It’s about Patrick disappearing, I don’t fuckin’ know. I just need your help. Please, please, please —“

“Y - yes, Henry, calm down. Have some water. I’ll be over soon, ‘kay? I love you.”

“I love you too.”

I hung up, concern wracking my body. I rushed up to my room, not paying Bev any heed as I started grabbing my things. Bev grabbed me, forcing me to stop, clearly worried.

“What’s wrong, Y/n?”

“I - It’s Henry, he needs my help,” I gasped, struggling to make her let go of me.

“Wh - what? No way, you’re not going to visit that psychopath —“

“Yes, I am, Bev,” I boomed. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I took him back. I just had to. And he needs my help —“

“Why on earth did you take him back?” Bev cried, forcing me into a hug. “Are you really that desperate? Why died’t you just try things with your crush?”

“Because it’s stupid, Bev! It’s never going to happen! Henry and I need each other. And he needs me now, so just let me go to him!”

“No! At least tell me who your crush is! Please, let’s talk about this —“

“It’s you, Bev! It’s always been you,” I admitted passionately, finally shoving her away. “I’ve been in love with you since we first met and you’ve never felt that way with me! It’s fuckin’ fine, but please, just respect my decision.”

Bev’s lips trembled and her doe eyes widened in shock. “…Me?”

“Exactly. You don’t feel the same way.”

I couldn’t cry. Not over her for the millionth time. So, instead, I turned tail and went down the stairs. And out the front door.

~~~

I tripped as I hopped off my bike. Hen’s father’s police car was parked in the front. I’d never been to Henry’s house before. Sure, the gang and I occasionally dropped him off first, but I’d never been inside. It was safe to say, though, that the house radiated negativity. It seemed so decrepit. It gave me the creeps.

I wasted no time, marching up to the front door, my purse hanging loosely off my shoulder. And then I knocked.

When my hand collided with the wood, I was surprised that the door creaked open eerily. I didn’t hear anything from inside, except for a vague static noise. I pushed it open. My heart wanted to jump out of my chest.

The sight I beheld was vile. Scarring. Traumatic.

Leaning over a dusty couch was a corpse. A middle-aged man hung off the side, fairly fresh blood seeping out of his neck. It dripped into a large crimson puddle on the floor. In the side of his neck, Henry’s pocket knife was deeply lodged. I could only see the back of the man’s head, but I didn’t need to see his expression to know that he was dead.

So, understandably, I screamed.

My knees were trembling and my vision blurred. Oh my god, Henry just killed his dad. Holy fuck. I collapsed to the floor, black dots consuming my sight. My hands grasped at the wood panels. My legs hurt and a splitting headache consumed me. I was crying, but not because of the officer. Because of Henry.

He killed a guy! What the hell would he do now? He’d go to prison, oh my god —

Warm, strong arms circled around my waist. I greedily took in Henry’s form, hugging back. My tears stained his tank top. He smelled rank. He was covered in blood. But I couldn’t find the strength to push him away.

“Henry,” I sobbed,” what have you done?”

“Th - there was a clown, and I don’t know how it happened. I just… I was outside and then suddenly I just - just found myself there and he was dead,” he replied shakily. “He fuckin’ deserved it. But I don’t know what to do. What am I supposed to do, Y/n, I love you too fuckin’ much to go to fuckin’ - fuckin’ prison!”

“H - Henry.” I breathed in and out. In and out. In and out. “We… we have to hide the body. I can’t - you can’t leave me. We have to… to clean it up.”

“But what the hell will we tell everyone?” He tilted my head up, and my stomach churned fro the blood rolling down the side of his face. “I fuckin’ love you, but what the fuck can we do about this?”

I pushed him away, disgusted by the blood staining my hands. I had to calm myself. I had to… help Henry. He was my boyfriend. And his father… he deserved it. Yes, he deserved it, so Hen didn’t deserve to rot in prison. I had to help him.

“I’ve seen enough horror movies. We need to - to cut up the body into smaller parts. And we can dump it to the bottom of the lake. And - and we get rid of the car. ew throw it into the swamp and shit,” I thought aloud. “When… when people show up and ask questions, we’ll tell people that when he attacked you while drunk, he just stormed off. He abandoned you. He took important shit and… and left you. He’s gone.”

Henry nodded, wide-eyed and clearly not sane. He nodded more and ore, until I finally grabbed his cheeks to stop him. He let out a choked sob, pushing his forehead against mine. “I fuckin’ love you. Promise… you won’t fuckin’ leave me after this.”

“I promise, Hen. Let’s… let’s get to work.”

We both stumbled to our feet, holding hands tightly. Henry pulled me into the kitchen. He got a large butcher knife while I showered the kitchen for bleach, gloves, and trash bags. I was surprised that there were such materials lying around. Thank god.

We went to the corpse, both of us staring at it dejectedly. I was glad that Henry was as new to the whole ‘covering up murder’ thing as I was. For a moment, I had thought that he was involved with Greta and Patrick’s disappearance.

Henry put on his gloves and trudged over to the lifeless body. He grabbed his legs and pulled him onto the ground. Without hesitation, he took out his pocket knife and brought the butcher knife down on his throat. A disturbing crunch echoed in the room.

He repeated the action until, suddenly, he pushed it to the side, and the head completely dislodged from his neck. I wanted to throw up so badly. I was glad Henry was doing the dirty work, because we both knew I was unable to even touch that disgusting thing.

I decided to find a bucket, wash cloth, and a mop. I was grateful that for a few minutes, I didn’t need to watch Henry dismember his father’s corpse. I returned to the living room with a bucket filled with a water-clean mixture.

Henry had sufficiently dismembered his upper body. Bone marrow mixed with the blood. More blood was seeping out from the body as Henry sliced him up further. We were both silent, unable to lighten the mood - for a good reason. I stepped around him and turned off the television, which was nothing but static. I wondered how long it had been going for.

Afterwards, I soaked the crimson-stained couch with bleach. After a few minutes of hard scrubbing, I got out the various stains minus the entire floor. Henry suddenly spoke,” What the fuck do we do now?”

I paused, thinking deeply. “Uh - I - well… it was a really fucked up movie that I’m using as a reference, so… Next they rolled up the flesh into tiny meatballs. But no way in hell are we doing this. We - we should put it all in a trash bag…. I don’t know what to do about the fucking teeth, but…”

“Okay. Okay, I fuckin’ got it. Yeah,” Henry confirmed.

He was clearly disgusted at his own work. He grabbed the limbs and started plopping them into a doubled-up trash bag. I cringed at each resounding plop. While Henry did that, taking up several trash bags, I started mopping up the blood. After a few sweeps of the mop, I had to change the water.

I rinsed and repeated several times.

At least half an hour later, the living room was spotless and smelled strongly of detergent and bleach. Henry and I stood next to each other, coated in dried blood. I felt completely numb. I assumed Henry did too, from the stoic yet fearful expression he’d maintained the past hour.

Even in our filthy states, our fingers intertwined tightly. Henry gave me a reassuring squeeze. “What… what fuckin’ now?” Henry grumbled, basting his gaze to the floor.

“We need to… to Febreeze this shit,” I answered breathlessly. “And - and strip. We’re absolutely filthy. We have to get rid of the clothes. But in a… different place. You get the Febreze, I’ll start dealing with the clothes. And - and you knew him best. Get a bag of his most important shit. Stuff he’d bring with him if he abandoned - no, when he abandoned you.”

Henry nodded obediently. “Yeah. Good fuckin’ thinking. I… I love you, Y/n. Don’t fuckin’ leave me after this.”

“Stop. Stop talking about that shit. We just committed murder together,” I sighed, shaking his hand away.

I started stripping down to my underwear. Henry mimicked my actions, and once we finished, I took his clothes. Sure, there was probably a way to not get rid of the clothes, but ew. I just covered up a murder. The last thing I wanted to do was wear remnants of today.

Henry disappeared into another room. I bleached the clothes and shoved them into a trash bag. I sighed, my gaze lingering on the three trash bags that accompanied it.

Henry came back a few minutes later with a a bottle of Febreeze and bags. An idea suddenly hit me. There were dozens upon dozens of beer bottles and packs around. Henry and I seemed to share the same idea. I took some of the bottles and threw them against the television and floor. Just so then there’d be evidence of an angry white bitch storming out on his kid.

Half-naked and numb, we stood there and took a breather. “I found his fuckin’… car keys.”

“Good. Let’s load up, I guess.”

~~~

I ruffled Henry’s hair, enjoying the feeling of his bare chest against mine. I was too tired to keep my eyes open. It was cold outside, so I constantly tried to pull the man closer. He always obliged to give me more affection, one of my favorite things about him. We almost felt normal.

But we weren’t. Henry had gone batshit crazy and I helped him cover up the murder of his father. If anyone saw us now, they’d think that we were a normal teenage couple that just finished having forest sex, but we weren’t. We were cuddling after a traumatizing afternoon of burying a body in the lake we used to go to constantly for a swim.

How had my life ended up this batshit crazy? My senior year was supposed to be normal. My last high school summer was supposed to be normal. I used to be normal. But all because of the Bowers gang, Henry in particular, I dedicated myself to a toxic relationship, was dating a psycho kid that killed his dad, and I now had a body count.

It was safe to say, normal teenagers didn’t have a body count, yet here we are.

“Fuckin’ thank you,” Henry mumbled into the crook of my neck. “I don’t know what I’d ever fuckin’ do without you. You’re the bitch I’m gonna marry.”

“You haven’t even asked,” I chuckled dryly.

“Don’t need to.”

“We just graduated. Calm your tits.”

“Yeah, and we’re fuckin’ free to do whatever we want now.”

“A little.”

“You don’t sound excited,” he huffed.

“Pardon me for being traumatized,” I defended. “We just dumped your dad into the lake.”

“…Yeah. We just gotta fuckin’ move on somehow. I’m fuckin’ moving with you. We can live off campus, I’ll work fuckin’ part-time.”

“Let’s not talk about this right now. Let’s just… cuddle.”

“Okay. I fuckin’ love you.”

#yandere #x reader #x y/n #yandere male #richie tozier #the losers club #pennywise #it stephen king #it movie #it chapter one #it 2017 #it x reader #it chapter two #yandere it #henry bowers #patrick hockstetter #yandere bowers gang #yandere Henry bowers #self insert

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just-jordie-things · 3 years

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A Lover And A Fighter - Richie Tozier

word count: 3122 warnings: swearing, sight sexual harassment summary: Richie promised (y/n) that he wouldn’t get into fights anymore, but sometimes he just can’t help himself. Especially when it comes to protecting her.

___

It was an understatement to say that Richie was protective of you. The boy was downright insane about it. Everyone in Derry knew not to fuck with (y/n), not unless they wanted Richie Tozier tracking them down and beating them half to death.

You’d given him a talk numerous times. But not once did they work, it always went in one ear and out the other..

He’d beaten up three ex boyfriends, a couple guys that looked at you the wrong way, and Greta Keene. He was proud of that amount.

But he’d promised that he would try his best not to act out on your behalf anymore. And you made him pinky promise. That’s a big deal. And he didn’t want to break your trust or your promise.

However… once he walked past Henry Bowers and his dumbass friends, and heard your name being mentioned, he couldn’t stop himself from getting involved.

“What was that?” He spoke before he could think things through.

The boys turned to him, each bearing a scowl that wasn’t out of character.

“I said, (y/n’s) not fucking worth it,” Henry practically growled out. “Now why don’t you fuck off, Tozier?”

“Your damn fucking right it’s not worth it,” Richie spat back, turning away, doing the right thing. “I’d break your goddamn nose” He muttered under his breath.

“It’s not worth it to try and get in her pants,” Henry called out before Richie could walk far enough away.

He stopped in his tracks.

“Cause she’s such a slut anyways, it’s not a real victory to fuck-”

Richie had never whipped around so fast. And with the punch he delivered went all common sense, and all the promises and reassurances he’d given you to prove he was going to ‘mature’ as you’d begged him to do. ___

“Hey, Richie,” You held your phone between your ear and shoulder as you painted your toes. “This is like, my fifth message… so… call me back, I guess. Okay, bye”

You sighed as you set the phone back on it’s holster. Richie wasn’t the type of guy to stand you up, especially on taco tuesday. And even if something came up, he always always, called. But now he couldn’t even bother to return one of your calls, leaving you to assume that he was upset with you for some reason, and therefore ignoring you.

You weren’t sure what you did, and at this point, you also weren’t sure that he was going to tell you either.

When Richie didn’t want to talk to someone, he was the damn best at avoiding them.

But he’d never given you the cold shoulder. And there was a time that you’d thought he never would. Richie was your best friend, you trusted and confided in him more than anyone else, even the other Losers. And in the last seven years of being his best friend, he’d never treated you this way. In fact, he always treated you amazingly, like a princess, it was very surprising actually, the way he cared about you.

It was that care that always led him to picking fights where he shouldn’t be, though. It started with your ex boyfriend. He broke up with you once a ‘better, prettier’ girl showed interest (his words), and the next thing you knew, Richie was throwing him against the lockers.

When your next boyfriend straight up cheated on you, Richie took care of him too.

He broke the third one’s nose.

And then there was the Greta Keene incident… Beverly may have let it slip that Greta had been writing nasty rumors about you in the girls bathrooms. And Richie declared that he didn’t have a problem beating up a girl if it was justified (and if that girl had man arms). That was when you drew the line, and made Richie swear to try and control his anger. And he pinkie promised to work on it, and that he wouldn’t get into any more fights over you.

You weren’t sure why he got so enraged over these things. It was just drama, and you found it pointless that he tried to bring you justice, since he was so reckless about it.

It was getting late, and you knew that Richie wasn’t going to return your calls. So you finished painting your toenails blue, and decided to spend the night in your room, reading, alone.

Even though you should have been eating a bunch of tacos and gossiping with Richie.

Just as you got situated in bed, and had turned off the overhead light in exchange for the soft glow of your lamp on the bedside table, there was a knock on the window.

When you glanced over, you could tell it was Richie by his silhouette, and you frowned slightly.

Nonetheless, you got up and unlocked the window, before sliding it open.

“Where the hell have you been?” You asked.

He could tell that you couldn’t see his face very well.

“Busy, you gonna let me in?” He grinned.

“Richie, it’s-” You glanced over your shoulder to the alarm clock on your table, before glaring back at him. “-midnight. Are you kidding me? Did I do something to piss you off?”

“What? (y/n/n), no-”

“Then how come you were dodging all my calls? And you’re seven hours late?” You asked, crossing your arms over your chest..

Richie crawled in through the window, even though you hadn’t invited him in yet. But he figured it was only a matter of time before you cave anyways.

Your distressed face disappeared as you caught sight of him now that he was in the light. His left eye was bruising, and so was his right cheekbone. Along with a split lip and a bloody nose, it was clear what had happened.

“Oh, Richie…” You mumbled, hand reaching up to cover your mouth as your eyes widened at the sight of him. “Tell me you didn’t-”

“Look it’s not what you think-” Richie tried to protest.

“Don’t give me that shit”

He knew he fucked up, because you weren’t yelling. Your voice was soft, and low. You were heartbroken.

He stared down at the ground, too anxious to look at you anymore. Not when you looked so disappointed in him.

“You promised- you-you pinky promised me-”

“I know-! I know and I’m sorry, really, I’m really fucking sorry” He told you, desperately hoping that you’d forgive him.

You shook your head at him, and gestured for him to sit before you left the room. Richie was the most frustratingly complicated person that you knew, and it drove you insane. Why he couldn’t just walk away and not beat the shit out of people… you weren’t sure. But it really hurt you that he didn’t even seem to try, and he broke his promise.

Richie was sitting on the side of your bed when you came back into the room. He chuckled as he eyed the first aid kit in your hands, the same one that you’ve used the last four or five times you dealt with the aftermath of his episodes of rages.

“You don’t have t-”

“Yes I do” You cut him off and unpacked what you’d need.

You were upset, you were fuming, actually. It angered you that Richie broke his promise, not even a month after making it. That promise was important to you, because he was important to you. And now here he was, waiting to be fixed up by you once again after he so stupidly, so recklessly got himself beaten to a pulp.

But no matter how angry you were, you remained silent. Dabbing at the excess blood under his nose, which at least wasn’t bleeding anymore. And when you were finished with his cheek, you moved on to rubbing cream over the bruise on his cheek. Richie’s eyes fell shut as he sighed in relief at the feeling of the cool lotion, and your gentle fingers.

He knew your silence wasn’t a good thing. In fact, it was the worst thing. It meant he messed up beyond redemption. And he’d never fucked up that bad before. Sure, he’d pissed you off and frustrated you on the daily, but that was just the hallmark of his friendship, and it was never anything serious. Just when he dragged you out in the middle of the night for slushies, or got you in trouble in class because he was running his mouth. He’d never made you this genuinely upset before.

“(y/n)-”

“Save it” You muttered before he could even start with the apologies.

That was another hallmark of his friendship. You knew what came next. The apologies, the excuses, the begging for your forgiveness, followed by a playful ‘you know you love me, you need me’ and puppy dog eyes that you couldn’t refuse. Except tonight, you might just be able to.

He took you by surprise when he didn’t protest, and snapped his mouth shut. Your eyes met his for a moment, before you started applying a smaller amount of lotion on the bruise surrounding his eye. It was going to look a lot worse in the morning, but this would help with the pain now.

You hated that your heart ached for him right now. You hated that you wanted to cry and hold him and make him feel better. Because you were so fucking mad-

“I don’t understand,” The words suddenly spilled out of your mouth, as if your mind just couldn’t take them swimming around in your head anymore. “I just- I- I don’t fucking get it”

He nodded, ducking his head down, only for you to lift it back up by his chin and continue with the lotion.

“I care about you, dumbass, and all I asked, which I thought was simple, all I asked was for you to stop with the fighting-”

“I know” He mumbled back.

You stared at him skeptically, wondering if he really did know, or if he’d show up again in a few weeks with the same battered face and guilty look in his eyes. Richie didn’t look back at you. He couldn’t.

“Who?” You asked, trying to soften your voice so he wouldn’t whither away from you like he was doing right now.

“You’re not gonna like it” Richie answered, fingers pinching at your bedsheets in an attempt to distract himself. From the pain that burned across his whole face, or from the intensity in your eyes, he wasn’t sure, but he needed the distraction.

He hadn’t had a smoke in months, but it sounded pretty damn good right now.

“Well, newsflash, I don’t like any of this,” You told him. “But I think I deserve to at least know what happened”

Of course you do, Richie hung his head in his hands. You deserve so, so much better.

You watched as he rubbed his palms over his eyes, and it took everything in your power not to take his hands and hold them in yours, to tell him it was okay and you forgave him.

“Bowers”

He muttered the single word without even looking at you. But he didn’t have to look at you to know exactly what you looked like in that moment. You probably had a dropped jaw and furrowed brows. Disappointment, disgust, anger, all displayed in one heartbreaking look.

“Richie…” You murmured without meaning to. “Why? Why would you-”

“I had to, okay?” He shot up suddenly. “I know that you hate it, and as soon as I swung I- I knew I fucked up, but I had to”

You wanted to argue it, argue that there’s always another option, that he can always walk away. But you bit your tongue. Something about the way he spoke told you that there was more to this than his stupidity.

“I’m sorry, (y/n/n), I am. But I… I don’t regret it”

Your heart sunk all the way down to your stomach. Richie had such a toll on your emotions and he didn’t even know it.

“Tell me what happened” You said quietly, and shifted closer to him.

You wanted him to know he had your undivided attention, and that he should have the chance to at least explain what happened. You pulled your leg up to rest on the mattress, and turned your body to face him.

Richie looked at you before looking back down at his hand, which was now fisted in your blankets.

“Richie,” You hummed, brows furrowing as you saw how reluctant he was to opening up. “Tell me” The words were so soft, it was almost inaudible.

You wondered what Henry could have done that Richie didn’t want to tell you about. He must have really outdone himself.

“He was just talking shit-”

“Richie,” You cut off his bullshit before he could even start. “Come on, the truth”

“It’s not-”

“I deserve to know, Tozier! Whatever it is, I don’t care, okay? Just tell me-”

“He said you weren’t worth sleeping with!”

Just like that, you’d gotten him to snap.

And you shut up instantly, shocked by the outburst. His words processed slowly in your head.

“He said it wasn’t worth trying because you’re- because you’re a slut, and it wasn’t fucking true!” Richie continued to yell. Not at you, he just couldn’t contain his own anger anymore.

And you thought you were pissed.

“Motherfucker had your name in his nasty fucking mouth and he was telling his buddies fucking lies and I couldn’t- fuck I couldn’t walk away. I should’ve fucking killed him”

You were staring at him, speechless. You should’ve known it was about you, Richie was always so fiercely protective of you. And Henry’s wouldn’t be the first nose that he’d broken protecting you. But this wasn’t like before. He’d beaten on your ex boyfriends after they broke your heart. Henry hadn’t said or done anything to you, he was just doing what boys do. (Make shit up because they think it makes them impressive when really they’re even shittier than they look)

“I didn’t mean to break your promise,” Richie huffed. His face was slightly flushed after his mini tantrum. His hands grabbed both of yours, holding them close to him. “I’m so sorry I put you through this again”

You were still silent, but he knew this wasn’t a bad silence. You were still processing, still trying to figure out how to forgive him while making sure this was the last time he crawls through your window looking like this.

“I hope you know that it came from a place of- of caring about you,” He added. “Caring about you too much, I guess” He mumbled as an afterthought.

Your stupid lovesick heart skipped a beat at the sweet words. Richie wasn’t one for words, at all, but he somehow managed to say the most loving things without even realizing it.

“I can’t promise it won’t happen again, that much is clear. And if Bowers says one more goddamn thing about your ass I’ll fucking string him up- I will- but I can promise I’ll try, okay? I will, I’ll really try”

He squeezed your hands a little bit, hoping you believed him, hoping you trusted him.

Your eyes flickered between his for a moment, and you could see in them that he was being sincere, and that he was broken up over hurting you.

“You…” He started to speak, but trailed off unsurely. “You deserve better” He finished.

His eyes flickered to yours for a brief moment, before he turned away.

You shake your head, before you let go of one of his hands, and took his chin between your thumb and index finger, turning him to look back at you.

“(y/n/n)-”

You cut him off when you leaned in and gently kissed him, trying to be mindful of his split lip.

Richie’s eyes remained focused on your closed ones, too stunned to close them, or really kiss her back.

He wanted to kick himself when you pulled away. He managed to miss his fucking chance because he was too slow to do anything about it.

Your eyes fluttered open in such a beautiful way Richie swore you were holding his heart in your perfect little hands.

His brows were furrowed like you’d confused him, and you absolutely had. He hadn’t expected you to kiss him.

“Why’d you do that?” He asked breathlessly, and your cheeks burned pink.

Your shoulders raised a bit in a shrug, and you had to bite your lip to keep from smiling too much.

“I just… wanted to” You whispered.

A smile twitched on the corner of Richie’s lips before his hand cupped your cheek, and he pulled you in again, so he could kiss you right this time.

Your lips were just as soft, if not softer, than he’d imagined they’d be. And he’d imagined countless times what they’d feel like. Daydreaming in class, before he fell asleep, and being right by your side for the last seven years.

Kissing you was bliss.

He did it again, taking your face in both of his hands and pulling you impossibly closer. He could feel your lips smiling against his own, and once again, his heart was beating out of his chest trying to get to yours.

“I’m in love with you, (y/n/n)” He murmured when you parted, and you laughed softly.

“That makes sense,” You replied, reaching a hand up to play with the curls on the back of his neck. “And… I love you too”

Richie gave you a sunshine smile, which you couldn’t help but return.

“I’m still upset, by the way,” You told him, still playing with the curls. “But only cause I’m tired of seeing you covered in bruises, okay?”

He nodded, and you leaned your cheek further against the palm of his hand.

“I promise to try” He said, and then raised his pinky.

You looked from his hand and then back to him, a slight glare in your eyes.

“Come on, just do it,” He urged, you rolled your eyes, but he was persistent. “Just link fuckin’ pinkies with me”

With a giggle you hooked your pinky with his, and held it for a moment.

“You want to go get tacos now?” He asked, and you grinned, nodding your head.

“You read my mind” You answered, and followed him back out the window.

It dawned on you that Richie was both your lover and your fighter. And he held those titles proudly.

As he took your hand and walked alongside you down the street, he decided there were no other title he’d want to be labeled, besides yours. ___

taglist: @thegr8kush

xoxo ~ jordie

#it #it chapter one #it chapter two #it fanfiction #richie tozier #richie tozier x reader #richie tozier scenario #richie tozier imagine #richie tozier fanfiction #finn wolfhard #finn wolfhard x reader #bill hader #bill hader x reader

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noperopesaredope · 2 years

Text

SvtFoE Rhombulus Rewrite (Pt. 4)

You know the drill. Go to here if you don’t. So, this post is gonna be a bit different. I was working really hard on the Season 4 rewrite, but it was ridiculously long. At one point, it was twice as long as my previous posts, if not longer, and I was only about halfway through! This was because Season 4 will have the most changes from canon, as well as some new scenes and maybe even new episodes. Some episodes will go through major changes too. In order to get this part out sooner and also not rush myself among other things, I decided to split this post in half. So this post, Part 4 of the rewrite, will be the first half of my rewrite for Season 4 (not including the final few episodes since I have a special plan for those). I will post Part 5 of the rewrite when it’s finished, which might take a few days (though I’ve made a lot of progress on it). So I hope you like this and sorry for the wait. Warning: Super extra long since I am going to add in some new episodes and rewrite other ones completely.

Season 4 (Part 1):

- We start off not during “Swim Suit”, but earlier in the season, because Rhombulus is getting his arc this season and I am promoting him to major character. He isn’t quite gonna be a part of Star’s main friendgroup, but he is going to play a more important role in the story and, as I said, he is having an arc (unlike most people here).

- I will ignore episode constraints and maybe even pretend to take out stuff involving shipping drama in order to throw in the actually important/interesting stuff. Rhombulus needs more screen time and this is his season to really grow, and I will make that happen, no matter how many shippers I have to kill to do it.

- Also, one final thing is that Hekapoo probably won’t be getting her whole poorly done “redemption” in this rewrite. One reason can be summed up in this video, while the other can be briefly explained as: the writers probably only redeemed her because she is a fan favorite and not because it is in character for her. Also, they definitely switched out Rhombulus and Hekapoo’s roles in the story. I am simply switching them back.

- It doesn’t mean that I don’t like Hekapoo or that I’m gonna be completely villainizing her and think that you should hate her. I just think that her role in the story is not the same as the role Rhombulus deserved. One of my endings does give the whole MHC a redemption arc though, so there’s that.

- Anyways, here we go.

- Rhombulus will make a short appearance in “Butterfly Follies” when he and Star accidently run into each other in the palace. Rhombulus is very awkward around Star, mainly due to the fact that they haven’t really had a proper talk since the trial, or even gotten to talk about the trial. Rhombulus is about to ask if he and Star can talk, but Star picks up on this pretty quickly and asks if they can talk sometime later.

- Rhombulus agrees, but first asks her if she can talk with Eclipsa about the whole “no imprisoning monsters” law. He’s not sure how to approach Eclipsa about it, but a lot of the people in his crystals are monsters, and he “can’t free all of them! There would be anarchy!” Star says she’ll try, and they part ways.

- The next episode he’s in is “Swim Suit”, which will be the same as before and yet very different, but mainly, very important. I might rename this one “Crystal Prism Prisoner” as well. The episode will not start out with Star prepping for beach day, as that can happen in another episode.

- Instead, it will start out with her getting ready to take a nap, when she is suddenly woken up by a panicked Eclipsa, who leads her to the room where Globgor is imprisoned. Inside is Rhombulus in hypnoslumber.

- Star also panics at this, and asks what happened. Eclipsa quickly explains that she tried asking him about maybe having him free Globgor, and he denied doing so, and they got into a small arguement. Then he started to leave out of frustration, and she panicked and cast hypnoslumber on him.

- Star, exasparated, tells Eclipsa to undo the spell so she can help them work things out. Eclipsa undoes the spell, and Rhombulus wakes up completely p*ssed off.

- He starts yelling at Eclipsa, saying that that was really messed up and that he thought things were okay between them, but Star cuts him off and says that he’s allowed to be mad, but they would be all better off if they worked things out.

- Rhombulus reluctantly agrees, and Star sits the two supposed adults down to work things out. It’s kinda like preschool. She makes sure Eclipsa says her side, then Rhombulus says his side. Star then asks what they might be able to do to fix this problem. Rhombulus childishly says that Eclipsa can find something better to do then harrass him about freeing Globgor, and they start arguing again.

- Rhombulus ends up saying a few legitimately hurtful things in a moment of frustration, and Eclipsa responds in turn with another spell. This starts a physical fight.

- Star has had a long week, and this isn’t helping. Completely fed up, she drags the two of them into a room in the castle, takes away the wand, locks both Eclipsa and Rhombulus in the room together, and tells them that they can work it out themselves and that they’re not gonna come out of that room until they sort things out. To reenforce this, she puts a spell on the whole room that makes sure they won’t get out any time soon.

- After a few minutes of silence, Eclipsa gets back into the Globgor thing, and this immediately frusturates Rhombulus. They start arguing again, and it eventually turns to whether or not Globgor is actually evil.

- Eclipsa finally shouts “YOU BARELY KNOW HIM! WHY DO YOU THINK HE’S SO EVIL?!”

- Rhombulus snaps back “Because I’ve seen what kind of person he is! The damage he’s done! I was there during his rampage right before I crystalized him! I’ve the ruins of the villages he’s destroyed!” He gets less angry and more sad and upset (and a little bit scared?). His voice gets softer and quieter as his eye starts to stare off, remembering things from hundreds of years ago.

- “I’ve met the soldiers who went to battles against him and didn’t come back. I’ve heard all the horror stories and eye witness accounts. I know that he took no prisoners. I’ve had to defend villages against his wrath. I’ve seen him fight. I’ve fought against him.” He wraps his arms and tails around himself. “It’s terrifying.”

- Eclipsa is slightly shocked that he would open up to her like this, and she isn’t sure how to react. She says that she’s sorry that he had to go through all that when he was still pretty young, and that she understands why Rhombulus wouldn’t want to free Globgor.

- But Eclipsa also finally decides to open up to Rhombulus about why she’s so desparate to free Globgor. She explains that she never felt like anyone ever really understood her as a person, but Globgor was someone who was always willing to listen. He changed and evolved as a person, going from violent and cruel to kind, loving, and well meaning.

- They grew together as people, and he was very important to her. So when she lost him, she didn’t know what to do with herself or how to move on. And now she’s in a whole new time period trying to be a good queen and raise a baby all at once. She begins to tear up, ending with “I don’t think I can do all this without him. I need him.”

- This strikes a cord in Rhombulus, as he remembers losing Lekmet, the grief he felt, and the grief he still feels.

- Eclipsa says that this is the last time she’ll ask, and if he says no, she won’t bring it up again, but she just wants to ask one last time if he will free Globgor.

- Rhombulus becomes very indecisive. After a few moments of thinking very hard, he finally says “I’ll...think about it.” Eclipsa says that that’s all she needs, and Rhombulus, head full of thoughts, leaves.

- He runs into Star, who was waiting outside, and she smiles at him knowingly. She says “sooooo, I’m assuming you guys worked things out?” Rhombulus says yes, and thanks her for her help. He then takes this chance to properly talk with her about the trial.

- He apologizes for lying and says he wants to make up for his past mistakes. Star says that while he and the MHC really messed up in the past, she’s glad that he revealed the truth and he’s clearly trying to make up for it. They agree to become friends again. End of the episode.

- I’ve decided to replace “Yada Yada Berries” with my own episode because it was very easy to add in the important bits and it was also very expendable. Sorry if you liked that episode. I don’t really care about it though. This new episode is called “Between a Rock and a Hard Place” because it fits and I’m basic.

- The first minute will be dedicated to introducing the idea of that episode, complete with the Eclipsa assasination attempt, but we won’t get to see the big mystery solving stuff. This episode is actually about Rhombulus and the MHC.

- Basically, the premise is that Rhombulus is still thinking about the thing with Globgor, and he decides to reach out to the rest of the MHC for advice. This will be used to help explore the different dynamics/relationships Rhombulus has with each member of his whole family.

- First is Hekapoo, who is the one he feels closest to (besides Lekmet but you know...), and she feels pretty close to him, despite their disagreements. Unfortunately, closeness does not prevent a lack of communication.

- In this scene, Rhombulus is clearly trying to talk with his older sister about the Globgor thing, but she keeps on accidentally brushing him off and ignoring what he’s trying to say. Hekapoo clearly cares a lot about him, but has a tendency to be dismissive of his feelings. She also sees him as a little kid (he kinda is, but his concerns should still be taken seriously), and ends up patronizing him.

- Eventually he slightly lashes out at her, saying that she always treats him like a little kid, and Hekapoo immediately gets annoyed, snapping back that outbursts like that are the exact reason she treats him the way she does. They start arguing, and eventually, Rhombulus shouts that he was going to ask her for some advice, but she’s clearly not going to be helpful to him, before he storms off.

- This conversation shows the tensions in their relationship, and a bit of how Rhombulus is ignored even by those closest to him.

- The next person Rhombulus goes to see is Omnitraxus. Rhombulus and Omni aren’t particularly close, but Rhombulus still kinda looks up to him, seeing his older brother as really cool and powerful, but also intimidating.

- There conversation is the shortest, as Omni is pretty dismissive of Rhombulus as well, but less in the way some might dismiss a little kid, and more him trying to redirect the conversation to more bureaucratic stuff.

- They basically have a very distant relationship. But this conversation does tell us a few small things about Omni. First off, he is the most formal, and prefers to focus in on things related to their jobs. He follows protocol and orders to a T, having full confidence that what he and the rest of the MHC are doing is right. This can clash with the others, as some are more focused on emotions and the like.

- Omni also isn’t really a huge bigot, as he doesn’t despise monsters the way some Mewmans do. After all, in the Magic Book Of Spells, he does sometimes advocate for peace. He’s simply more…apathetic and neautral. Still racist, but not super extremist. Honestly, he does express that his main problem with Eclipsa is her use of Dark Magic and how she abandoned he duties.

- He will even say this to Rhombulus, stating that he doesn’t have a problem with monsters, he just wants to follow the system and keep the balance.

- Omni isn’t very helpful to Rhombulus, but the crystalhead doesn’t really say this, he just reluctantly leaves.

- Getting slightly frustrated, Rhombulus decides to visit someone he hasn’t seen in a long time: Reynaldo. This scene is...sad.

- There’s also a lot of pauses and silence in it. I might not even add much background noise. While the other scenes have more movement and white noise in them, this one won’t have much of that.

- Reynaldo and Rhombulus’ greetings to each other are slightly awkward, and as I said, there will be quite a few awkward pauses in the conversation. I’m not going to do rhymes for Reynaldo’s dialouge right now because I don’t feel like writing out that stuff right now.

- Reynaldo asks Rhombulus why he’s here, and Rhombulus says he needs some advice. Reynaldo asks him why he doesn’t just go to Lekmet about it. Rhombulus is quietly forced to admit that Lekmet passed away a few months ago.

- Reynaldo’s reaction is not said, and changes very quickly over the course of a couple of seconds, all done in one still shot, but it tells a bit of a story. He first looks shocked, freezing up with an almost blank expression on his face. Next comes an extreme wave of grief and sadness. He then looks almost angry. Nobody told him. He wasn’t even invited to the funeral.

- He looks almost as though he is ready to lash out, before he glances at Rhombulus for a second and looks sad again. Despite being the youngest, Rhombulus was arguably the closest to Lekmet, and it’s likely he was absolutely heartbroken about his death.

- Lekmet changes the subject by asking what Rhombulus wanted to talk to him about. Rhombulus chooses to be slightly vague, saying that he feels like he might have misjudged someone and really messed up someone else’s life and family by crystalizing certain people.

- He’s considering setting a person free, but he also is wondering if that will make things even worse, whether they deserve it or not. It’s almost like no matter what choice he makes, it will always be the wrong one, and he’ll always end up disappointing someone. Just like all the time. Maybe this is why he’s Glossaryck’s least favorite child.

- He starts getting a little self depricating, when he is suddenly wacked on the head by a paddle. Reynaldo tells him that that’s not true. Rhombulus argues “but Glossaryck-” but Reynaldo tells him that he shouldn’t let Glossaryck’s opinion shouldn’t determine his self worth. Rhombulus grumbles that Reynaldo cares about Glossaryck’s opinion of him, and before immediately regretting this and apologising.

- Reynaldo doesn’t have a response to this, and it’s quiet again for a few seconds as Reynaldo continues rowing down the river. Then he speaks up again and says that giving someone a chance couldn’t hurt, and if it turns out to be a mistake, he can always recrystalize the person later.

- Rhombulus thanks him, and Reynaldo drops him back off. Before Rhombulus leaves, Reynaldo asks him if he could visit again sometime, to at least tell him how it went. Rhombulus says yes to this.

- At the end of the day, Rhombulus really wants the rest of his family to take him seriously, and there’s a sense of loneliness to his character. I was going to add some other scenes to this episode besides the next one coming up, but the scene with Reynaldo honestly spoke more than the others could, and It’s my favorite in this episode.

- Rhombulus then decides to talk to Hekapoo and Omni again, and chooses to call a small meeting between the three of them. He’s about to pitch his idea, when one of the other two interrupts him and tells him they have something they need him to do.

- Hekapoo and Omni have a lot of duties they need to fulfill outside Mewni, and they might not be able to check in quite as often. This will leave Rhombulus as the only member of the MHC still in Mewni. That’s why they would like him to low key spy on Eclipsa for them. End of episode, probably. Unless I feel like extending this final scene. But I don’t right now. So yeah, end of episode.

- In this video by Sarcastic Chorus (at timestamp 8:12), he points out that part of the problem in the later season of Star Vs. is that basically almost all the Mewmans are unlikeable, one particular example being the family in “Down by the River”.

- I decided to remedy this by having the family in that episode not be annoying jerks and instead focus the episode less on some people annoying Moon and River, and more on the flaws in Eclipsa’s new policies. The Mewman family is actually pretty nice, and they start the village with Moon later on.

- But, though they weren’t originally particularly racist (at most, they were ignorant), the family’s experience being kicked out of their home did have an affect on them, and it’s implied that it’s caused them to slightly resent monsters. This makes them easy to radicalize.

- But enough about that.

- I’ve decided to add an episode between “Surviving the Spiderbites” and “Out of Business”. This full length episode will be important not only to the Rhombulus rewrite, but it will add more to Eclipsa and Globgor as well. This is because it is a bit of a flashback episode for both of them.

- The episode is called “What Remains of My Family” and is a flashback to a series of events; Meteora being switched out, Shastican being eaten, and Globgor/Eclipsa being crystalized. These events will be told from 3 POVs: Rhombulus, Eclipsa, and Globgor.

- But they will all be in the form of dream sequences. Or maybe not. I’d need to decide. But I think the dream sequence idea could capture some of the feelings of each event and the hazy POVs. It might be slightly like Beatrice’s dementia sequences from Bojack, in the fact that most of them are technically correct retellings, but also a bit twisted and exaggerated. It will also help us see how each of the characters view things the way they do.

- First, we start out with Rhombulus’ POV, and get to see LITTLE RHOMBULUS. He’s not super little, but clearly a bit more of a child, as he is only about 100 years old in this flashback. He physically and mentally about 7 years old in this. In Rhombulus’ version, he’ll seem a bit more mature, but still pretty young, and act a lot younger than usual. Because it was his POV, he views himself as more mature, but his actual actions say otherwise.

- Rhombulus is outside playing a game with a couple of figurines he made out of crystals. In his power set, he will have some mild control over the shape of the crystals, but he practices size rather than shape, so he doesn’t often make things out of his crystals anymore. Besides, he’s out of practice in the timeline of the show.

- In this episode though, he’s using his figurines to reenact his most recent battle, and it is very cute. At this point in time, Rhombulus has been fighting on the battlefield more than anyone else in the MHC, and never really had a proper childhood. He’s been exposed to the horrors of war, and isn’t completely innocent. But he still has some of that child-like wonder and playfulness.

- Despite the war, Little Rhombulus doesn’t completely understand the nuances of the Monster-Mewman conflict, and will have a very black-and-white view of the world. He also full trusts the adults around him, and only doubts them when it’s extremely obvious that something is wrong. But that doesn’t happen often, and his lack of understanding causes him to half the more impulsive opinions, such as “lets go to war.”

- Lekmet comes over to him and tells him that the MHC is having an important meeting about something. For the first time, we actually get a chance to understand what he is saying, which is through subtitles. Rhombulus quickly melts his crystal toys away and holds Lekmet’s hand. As the two walk towards the meeting room, Rhombulus tells Lekmet all about his day, and how he’s been practicing his crystallizing a lot lately. Lekmet congrats him on this and pats him on the head.

- They arrive at the meeting room, and sit with the others. Rhombulus is seated next to Hekapoo, who he whispers hi to, before asking if she knows what their meeting is about. She whispers back that she has no idea, but that she’s already bored, causing Rhombulus to giggle.

- Yet another sidenote: Because this is a dream and from Little Rhombulus’ perspective, everyone’s features are slightly exaggerated. Hekapoo’s hair is really long and fluffy, Lekmet’s wings are really big, Omni is even bigger than usual to the point that you can’t see his face, and Reynaldo’s neck is just, like, super long.

- Moving on, Shastican comes into the room and says that he has some news. Spies have managed to capture Eclipsa and Globgor’s newborn baby. The MHC are to do three things: 1) get rid of the baby (he doesn’t care how, just get it done), 2) find a replacement heir, and 3) erase any and all traces of the Monster-Mewman baby’s existence from the records.

- The MHC have a variety of reactions to this, but they all say “yes, your highness,” anyways. Immediately after Shastican leaves, Lekmet protests against doing something like this, but only Rhombulus understands him, and in those days, he sometimes forgot to translate. Rhombulus, who is completely confident in the king, tries his best to reassure the goat man that this is the right thing to do, but it doesn’t fully work.

- We cut to an extremely low angle shot (basically looking straight upwards) of the MHC looking down at something. Omni looks neutral, Reynaldo looks unsure, Hekapoo looks very conflicted, Lekmet looks sad, and Rhombulus just looks confused. We cut back up to see that they are standing over Meteora’s crib.

- Reynaldo asks everyone “are you sure we should do this?” and Omni answers with “well, the king ordered us to, so it seems we must.” They all then start discussing who should do what task, except for Rhombulus, who starts entertaining the baby. The adult discussion is slightly muffled in the background as Rhombulus is completely focused on the cute baby.

- Lekmet tells Rhombulus that they are about to leave, and Rhombulus follows him out the door, but not before looking back one last time.

- He slightly wonders what Meteora’s mama must be doing now that her baby’s missing, but pushes it out of his mind and goes into a training room to practice his magic.

- We then cut to Eclipsa’s POV (the changes in POV are indicated via zooming out of the eye of the new POV character). She are walking through the forest, and then we, the audience, get to meet Globgor here rather than in “The Monster and the Queen”, though this is admittedly a slightly romantisiced version of him since it’s from Eclipsa’s POV.

- Eclipsa expresses her concern for Meteora, but Globgor tries his best to reassure her, and it makes her feel slightly better. This smallish conversation is meant to show the audience Globgor’s more soft, caring side, and his more positive traits.

- It also shows a bit of why Eclipsa and Globgor work together so well as a couple. She encourages him to improve as a person and stands by him when he needs it, and clearly cares about him, and he in turn protects her and supports/encourages her, boosting her confidence when she starts to doubt her capabilities.

- The next scene is the two of them spying on the palace and forming a plan to rescue Meteora. This scene also shows them working together, as well as their respective skillsets in terms of planning and strategy.

- In both these scenes, they are clearly very much in love and a power couple and I love them so much together.

- They decide that basically, Globgor will be a distraction while Eclipsa will look around the castle for Meteora. They separate and put the plan into action.

- We then cut to Globgor’s POV, who sneaks into the palace to inact the plan. Globgor’s POV is the most accurate and least dreamlike, and he essentially reliving a memory. Of course, there will be a couple dreamlike, metophorical moments that show how he remembers it and the emotions he was feeling at the time. This is also the part where we see a bit how he sees himself and his internal thought process rather than what others see.

- He starts causing havoc and running around through the halls, and eventually arrives at the throne room, which he barges into. On the throne is Shastican.

- Globgor leaps over the guards and lands in front of Shastican, and with a fierce look on his face, demands to know where his daughter is. Shastican, quite cruelly and with venom in his voice, tells Globgor “I got rid of your little half-breed brat. She’s gone, and you’ll never see her again.”

- Globgor freezes in horror at this, and we see his world shatter around him as Shastican’s words echo around him. The artstyle slowly shifts into one made up of more abstract sketches, very mess and almost frantic. We can vaguely hear Shastican still talking in the background, but his voice is muffled and begins to get completely drowned out by a high pitched noise like a flatlined pulse.

- All color slowly becomes one violent shade of red, and Globgor’s twists into an angry snarl. We see him roar with fury as he pounces at Shastican and menacingly shouts “YOU’LL REGRET THAT!”

- Everything cuts to black, with only the sounds of Globgor’s carnage to be heard in the background.

- We cut back to Rhombulus’ POV, where he is running around the palace, earthquakes caused by Globgor’s stomps shaking everything every few seconds. The halls are dark and everything looks both too big and too small at the same time. As he runs, we flicker back and forth between the hallway and a battle before resettling on the hallway.

- Rhombulus runs into Hekapoo, and he asks her what’s going on. She tells him that Globgor is attacking the palace, before pausing in the middle of her explanation and staring at him with a contemplative look on her face. She tells him to come with her and that they have no time to waste.

- She leads the very confused Rhombulus to the Monster Temple, and they arrive to what is basically a hellscape. Rhombulus looks around in confusion and fear, before he sees it: a giant beast straight from a nightmare. This is how Rhombulus remembers seeing Globgor during his rampage.

- Other members of the MHC are fighting him, but he is getting close to winning. Lekmet flies over to where Rhombulus and Hekapoo are, and Hekapoo goes back out to fight Globgor. Lekmet turns to Rhombulus and tells him that he needs to crystallize Globgor. Rhombulus is unsure, but Lekmet encourages him, saying that they all believe in him, and he is the only one who can do it.

- This empowers Rhombulus, who walks in front of the still rampaging Globgor.

- We cut to Globgor’s POV, which is very hazy and confusing looking, but one figure becomes clear: a little crystalheaded monster type thing. Rhombulus looks much younger in Globgor’s POV, a lot like an innocent little kid with a determined look on his face. He starts flickering back and forth between himself and Meteora, but when he raises both arms and gets ready to fire, he suddenly looks like a shadowy, slightly evil looking figure. Rhombulus fires, crystals appear at the edge of Globgor’s vision, and we cut to black.

- We switch to Eclipsa’s POV, where she is searching through the deepest pits of the castle. A lot like in Rhombulus’ POV, the castle walls are eerie and nervewracking. She opens a door and steps inside another room, which has her wand inside. She grabs it and sighs with relief, when she suddenly feels a presense behind her. She turns around to see Hekapoo standing behind her, dual wielding scissors.

- Eclipsa points her wand at Hekapoo threateningly, and Hekapoo gets into a defensive stance in response. Hekapoo tells Eclipsa she should probably just give up, and reveals that Globgor ate Shastican and has been crystalized by Rhombulus. Eclipsa isn’t quite sure how to process this information, but she decides to suddenly blast one of the scissors out of Hekapoo’s hand and summons it towards herself. Eclipsa takes the scissors and quickly opens up a portal before Hekapoo can even react, and it closes behind her.

- Eclipsa arrives in Rhombulus’ dimension, and starts looking around for Globgor. She stumbles upon two paths, one which leads to crystalized POWs (it’s pretty practical: you don’t need to feed them, they can’t escape easily, they don’t age or really experience their imprisonment, so there’s no trauma or anything, etc.) and one which leads to “Really Bad Guys”. She sighs and goes down the bad guy route, and continues looking around.

- Then, she turns around to see Rhombulus standing behind her. He looks at lot younger in her POV in comparison to his own. “Rhombulus,” Eclipsa says as a greeting, though it isn’t friendly. She then says that he better tell her where Globgor is, or he will regret it.

- He says that Globgor was crystalized at the Monster Temple, but Eclipsa won’t be going back to him, because she has been declared guilty of crimes against Mewni and is sentenced to crystalization.

- Eclipsa says that she’d like to challenge that, and attacks. What ensues is an epic fight scene that shows off more of Eclipsa’s really cool fighting style and the variety of techniques Rhombulus uses to fight.

- Eclipsa’s moves are refined, elegant, almost as though she is gliding or even dancing. Her spells, on the other hand are much more dangerous and sharp. Everything is very strategic and focused more on precise but powerful blows.

- Rhombulus’ fighting style is surprisingly well tuned. Then again, he does have the most fighting experience out of the rest of the MHC, and part of his purpose is being strong and a fighter. His attacks are more blunt and broad, designed to land across a wide area. He also relies on the terrain, which makes sense since he can change the terrain. And in this AU, since he has two pretty long snake tails, he also partially crystalizes the ends of those, then using each a bit like a scorpion tail. The final major aspect of his fighting style is a mixture of defense and capture, using his bigger crystals to both defend himself and trap his enemy.

- The fight ends when Rhombulus manages to get a lucky hit on Eclipsa’s hand and knock it away from her before he quickly crystalizes it in mid air.

- Eclipsa stares defiantly at Rhombulus, and tells him that he and the rest of the MHC won’t get away with all this. Rhombulus doesn’t respond, and in one big, beautifully animated moment (that Tom Barkel will animate hopefully), he crystalizes her.

- There is a short, somewhat concluding scene for the flashbacks. It’s from Rhombulus’ POV in which he is looking at the ruins of Spiderbite Village and watching as some other members of the MHC help out the villagers. Lekmet walks up to Rhombulus and congratulates him on saving everyone. Rhombulus says he feels like he didn’t save anyone. Lekmet is quiet at this, before remembering something.

- Lekmet reminds Rhombulus that, as much as he hates it, they will have to keep the Meteora conspiracy a secret. Rhombulus looks reluctant to do this, but he says okay.

- The episode end with Rhombulus and Eclipsa waking up in the present time, revealing that the whole episode was a dream, though their reactions to said dream, reveal that it was also a memory, just a weird interpretation of the past. They both also tell themselves that all that is over, and they want to forget about it as soon as possible. But then we cut to the still imprisoned Globgor, whose eyes flash omniously. He will not forget, and he is still remembering. Cut to black.

~~~~

Aaaaaannnnd, that’s the end of Part 1 for Season 4! As said above, I had to cut these into parts, since the OG post was getting so long and I wanted to pace myself. Stay tuned for Part 2! Hoped you liked this one!

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secretobsessionstuff · 2 years

Note

hi! if you don't mind a request, could you please do a sick/angsty dakota (eg: emeto because or something bad that reminds him of another occasion)? i read you dakota x blair fics, and absolutely love how much they adore each other. you're an excellent writer! <3

Here's an interesting change from my usual fics! Also thank you for that beautiful compliment!! I stared at it for so long!

Content Warning: Traumatic childhood memory involving near-drowning, head injury, blood, unconsciousness, and neglectful parent!! Emeto, graphic descriptions of vomiting!!

---------------------

*Please read the CW and do what makes you comfortable* 💙

They kept going back to the same Airbnb because this one was perfect—even if both Dakota and Blair took turns with a stomach bug one weekend at said cabin.

But that was behind them. They were determined to make good memories at this place because they were starting to form a friendly relationship with the owners.

After some exploring, the two of them stumbled upon a mini beach. It was a fair hike away from the house, but that was okay. Usually by the time they found the secluded beach, they were both ready to jump off the rocks into the water.

Like most small and private beaches, this one was rocky. There were a few patches of soft sand, but mostly the rocks took over. Dakota and Blair liked this just fine. They jumped off the rocks into the cool water nearly every day that they stayed at the cabin.

That afternoon, Dakota did not feel like swimming. He preferred to rest in the sun while Blair stayed in the water. His head was swimming enough as it was, overflowing with thoughts from the call he just had with his father.

“Baby, swim with me,” Blair shouted from in the lake. She treaded water to keep herself afloat. Dakota could see that the tips of her shoulders were getting red from the sun.

He squinted at her, his vision awash with bright afternoon light. “I don’t feel like it.”

“You’re no fun.” She pouted. “Why’d you have to pick up that call? What did your dad want anyway?”

“Just wedding stuff.”

“What kind of stuff?” Blair didn’t like his lifeless tone. Moments before his phone call, he’d been bouncing with excitement, eager to make the hike to the beach. Now he was withdrawn, preoccupied.

“Just...” He sighed. The pebbles and sand at his feet were suddenly the most interesting things in the world. He dragged his foot back and forth in the sand, creating a small trench. He could feel Blair’s gaze on him like the heat from the sun. Fine. He would have to mention it sometime. “Apparently my mom heard about the wedding.”

“How the hell did she find out?

“Maybe Logan said something.” Dakota’s sister had opened those communications lines a year ago, while him and his father stayed radio silent. Logan couldn’t seem to accept the silence with her mom and broke the no-talking streak.

“Okay,” Blair said cautiously. “I’m not saying you invite her to the wedding, but maybe you can send her pictures. Can you blame her for asking about it? Her son is getting married and she was the last to know.”

“She wasn’t supposed to know at all.” His foot scrapped along hard clay at the bottom of the trench he was digging. He grunted and kicked a cloud of sand towards the water. No, no. His mom did not get to show up at the wedding, without having shown up at any other point in his life.

“I’m sorry,” he conceded. “That phone call really ruined my mood. You swim. Have fun. I’m just going to lie here for a bit.”

He fell back against his towel, trying to find a comfortable position where no rocks poked into his back. The heat of the day was a welcomed distraction. Pretty soon sweat gathered around his nose. He was sure that his bare stomach would turn just as red as Blair’s shoulders. He didn’t care.

Water lapped against the stones with each wave and each movement that Blair made. She liked to swim back and forth in the small bay made by the rocks. With his eyes closed, he tracked her progress by how far away her heavy breathing got.

He saw only red on the inside of his eyelids from the sun glaring down on him, but in his head, he saw skinny arms emerging from the water with each front stroke. He and Logan used to swim in a lake like this one, with rocks along the shore in place of sand. Logan was a much stronger swimmer than he was, always beating him to the other side of the rocky bay.

They spent many good summer days in their secret spot, but Dakota could only remember one day. This one day washed away all others.

Caught up in that day, Dakota did not immediately realize that the sounds of Blair swimming had stopped. It was quiet, and he was so tired. So tired, he could have fallen asleep. But then his mind realized that something was missing. Some sound. Some presence was lacking.

He opened his eyes, hoping to spot Blair’s snow blond hair or sun burnt shoulders peeking out of the water.

There was nothing along the surface.

“Bee?” Dakota stood up quickly. “Blair!?”

Dakota walked briskly along the rocky shoreline. He couldn’t see her. He couldn’t see anything; the white light of the sun washed away the colours of the landscape. A harsh wave crashed against the rocks, making him jump. The sound was as loud as a crack. The crack of a skull.

She made a gurgling sound in her throat as water invaded her open mouth. Blood seeped from her head of dark brown hair and dissipated in the water. The wound continued to bleed, creating a trail of red as the waves pushed her body around like a doll.

She. She. She had dark brown hair like Dakota’s. She had tanned skin like Dakota’s. She floated, face down in the water.

Dakota—both young and current—jumped into the water. He splashed around, trying to get to something that was out of his reach.��

“Blair," the now Dakota mumbled under his breath. "Blair!?" The water was cold, making his voice quiver. “Where…where’d you go? Bee?”

The young Dakota reached the spot where his sister floated, unmoving. “No, no.” He dragged Logan out of the water, her head flopping back. He held on tight until he pulled his sister onto the rocks.

The now Dakota had nothing to hold onto. There was no one in his arms that he could pull to safety. So, he kept searching, thrashing in the water. He plunged his head beneath the surface and opened his eyes. There was only the dark shadows of the rocks and the murky expanse of the lake beyond the bay. That was the now Dakota.

Young Dakota was just that. Young.

He didn’t know anything about anything, not head injuries, not unconsciousness. He thought he could see Logan breathing but his brain focused only on the fact that she looked dead. Not moving, not responding, not waking up. Dead, to a child.

The only thing he did know was that he needed someone. The only someone around was his mom, but she was at home. Before ushering her kids out of the house for the day, telling them to stay outside until dinner, she had told them not to bother her. She had said she was sick that day and didn’t care where they went as long as they went.

Dakota—young and current—yelled.

“Blair!”

“Anybody!” the shrill, tiny voice of a boy.

“Blair!” the deep, yet strained voice of a worried man.

“Help!”

Only the now Dakota got a response.

The young Dakota, not knowing what else to do, ran home in his flipflops and bathing suit, praying this his mom wouldn’t be in one of her sleepy moods. Those moods made the whole house smell sour and lonely.

The now Dakota froze in place when someone replied.

“What?” Blair came running out of the tree line. “Dakota, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

“Oh my God,” he breathed out as he crawled onto the shore. He wanted to run to Blair, but his knees gave out and he crashed onto the sand. Rocks pierced his knees. “I thought…I thought—I don’t know what just happened. I thought you were gone. I don’t—”

“Shh, shh, honey. Calm down,” Blair said, taking his face in her hands. Her eyes were wild with concern. She knelt down on the sand with him. “I’m right here.” She hugged him to her chest.

Dakota’s shoulders hitched with each shallow breath. “Are you alright?” he asked, running his hands over her body. He checked her head, not finding any blood. There were no scraps along her stomach from where the water pushed her against the rocks because that had not happened to her. There were no gashes running down her legs because Dakota had not needed to yank her from the pool of water.

“Of course, I’m alright. It’s you I’m worried about.” She grabbed his wrists to get him to stop moving, to stop checking her body for non-existent wounds. She held his hands firmly in hers. Her eyes darted back and forth, looking intently at him. “What happened, Kota? You look terrified.”

Dakota swallowed thickly.

The young Dakota had only just arrived at his house and threw open the door. The kid would soon find his mom, draped over the couch like a smelly, threadbare blanket. No matter how hard he jostled her or how loud he yelled for her to help, she would keep waving him away. Her eyes would be drooping and unfocused. She would tell him to shut the hell up and go and play with his sister.

“Dakota?” Blair said, pulling him back to the now. She put a hand on his cheek, watching the colour drain from his face. “You don’t look well.”

“I’m gonna be sick,” he mumbled before doubling over and heaving his lunch on the ground between them.

“Whoa, okay,” Blair said, grabbing hold of his shoulders. A sharp spasm went through his whole body, making him shake as a sludge of vomit splattered onto the sand. Considering they’d been hugging seconds before, much of the sick got on Blair as well.

Dakota cough and burped up the food in his stomach at the same time that his younger self would have run out into the street, shouting for help. The kid’s cheeks would be wet with tears, much like Dakota’s cheeks were now with tears of exertion squeezing out of his eyes.

He moaned, feeling like every part of his body was being crushed. The pain in his belly was deep, so deep it came from a place that he didn’t recognize. Pressure threatened to make his head pop. The memory had been sitting there on the surface since that phone call and it found a way to force itself out.

He gagged and sputtered as another wave of sick came rushing out. It was like his body was having a sale. Everything must go. All the pain. All the toxins that bubbled in his gut. All the resentment. It had to come out whether Dakota wanted it to or not.

So too, came out the tears. Not tears of exertion, but of hurt.

“Ugh Blair, he whimpered. “I was so scared.” Dakota wasn’t sure he was talking about the past or the present, but it didn’t matter because the sentiment applied to both. “…and alone.”

“You’re not alone anymore,” she said, rubbing his back. He was still dripping wet from jumping in the lake, and now he was shivering uncontrollably. Blair grabbed his towel and wrapped it round his torso. She rubbed her hands along his arms, trying to warm him up.

“Here, sit down. That’s it.” She made him sit, away from the puddle of vomit, and continued to rub his back. “I’m right here. You’re not alone.”

“I thought you got hurt in the water, and then I couldn’t see you and I panicked,” he rambled. “Where did you go?”

“Well, you were asleep, and I didn’t want to wake you, so I took a walk by myself.”

“I fell asleep?” Dakota asked, very confused by the news. He thought he’d been awake the entire time that she swam, but that must not have been the case.

“Yeah. Did you have a bad dream or something?” she asked. “Something must have spooked you because it’s not like you to panic like that.”

“Not exactly,” Dakota said, looking at his hands. “It wasn’t a bad dream, just…a bad memory.”

Dakota told her the entire thing. About lifting his unconscious sister out of the water, begging his mom to get up and help him, being thrown back out onto the street for being too loud. He explained that eventually his neighbour came driving down the street and noticed Dakota running back to the lake. Mr. Ruth called an ambulance then drove Dakota and himself to the spot where Logan was still unconscious. Dakota remembered throwing up in Mr. Ruth’s car as they sped back to his sister. He still had the taste of vomit in his mouth when the ambulance came.

“Obviously she was fine, but it still stuck with me,” he admitted. “And with everything going on with the wedding and thinking about my mom, I guess it just came back up” —he nodded to the pile of sick drying on the sand— “literally.” He sniffled. “I’m sorry if I freaked you out.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for, babe,” Blair said softly. She grabbed his hand and brought it to her lips for a kiss. She was reassured by the fact that he seemed to be breathing normally again. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I just got punched in the stomach.”

She chuckled and leaned her head on his shoulder. “So, about that walk home…”

“Just…just stay.” He sounded so tired. “Here. With me for little longer.”

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petriquors · 3 years

Text

— your first date with karasuno

❤ boys !! daichi, sugawara, asahi, tanaka, nishinoya, ennoshita, kageyama, hinata, tsukishima, yamaguchi

❤ genre !! fluff

❤ author notes !! oops i write headcanons for haikyuu now

❤ daichi !! somehow, daichi is the perfect combination of “effortless” and “absolutely no chill whatsoever”. he has exactly one idea in mind when it comes to his first date with you, and that’s to take you out for dinner at the nicest restaurant he can afford at the time (if this is high school!daichi, it won’t be fancy, but you can tell he’s really trying). it’s not about him trying to impress you, but more like he genuinely believes that you deserve the very best that he can offer you: whether that’s food, activities, or even himself. you can tell that he’s trying to keep a tight schedule, trying to get to everything he has planned, and the amount of care he radiates makes you feel so warm. at the end of the night, after sharing dessert, he walks you home to make sure you’re safe and to have a few extra minutes with you before saying goodnight!

❤ sugawara !! suga might look and act like he’s keeping it casual by inviting you out to a café for your first date, but i promise you that this man is dying inside. he really wants to spend time talking and getting to know you in a low-pressure, calm-cool-and-collected sort of way, but he also spent two hours the night before your date coming up with conversation topics and things to ask you just in case. to be honest, you don’t even clock how nervous he is until he blurts something random like “so what’s your favorite kind of dog?” and you both stare at each other for a few seconds before you start laughing. after one terrifying moment where he thinks you’re laughing at him, he realizes you’re not, and starts to laugh with you, everything he was worried about melting away like the whipped cream on his mocha.

❤ asahi !! asahi has this whole idea in his head that he really wants to have the most romantic night ever, but figuring out what exactly that looks like makes him just a little panicked, so he decides to try keeping it simple. he takes you on a walk around the shopping area in town, and you can tell the entire time you’re walking shoulder-to-shoulder that he’d really like to do or say something… but he doesn’t. he keeps pointing out random things: the flowers on some tree branches, a cloud that looks particularly soft, some clothes in a shop window… and you feel like he’s just saying things to cover his nervousness until he finally, seriously, takes your hand and says, “thank you for coming with me. i was nervous when we first got here, but now that we’re together, i’m so happy you’re here.”

❤ tanaka !! hands-down, this man wants to take you to an amusement park. his plan is to ride as many rides as possible, hold you while you scream, convince you that he’s your knight in shining armor, and then you realize you’re in love with him. needless to say, that’s not quite how it works out for him, but he’s still pretty happy with the alternative: the two of you spend an entire day laughing so hard your sides hurt. he tries over and over again to win you a stuffed animal (it takes, like, ten attempts and all his spare change), so you buy him a snow cone in return, and neither of you can think of a better day than this one. he spends the end of the date recounting how much fun he had with you before he catches himself rambling and, hand on the back of his neck, just says, “i hope you’ll hang out with me again soon!”

❤ nishinoya !! nishinoya is a man who needs to move, so you’d best believe the first date he asks you on is something that involves a ton of energy! if your date is in the summer, he wants to go swimming, or if it’s in the winter, he’ll take you ice skating. now, this isn’t just because noya loves sports. what he’s really planning to do is a. show off his skills (or make you laugh with his lack of them) and b. spend time just bonding, playing, and being active with you! nishinoya wants someone who can keep up with him (because, really, he knows that he’s a lot), but he also just wants to be a little silly, a little competitive, and a lot close to you. he’ll find ways to make the date into a sort of competition (something like who can do the most laps) where the winner pays for ice cream or hot cocoa, but he’ll secretly lose on purpose just so he can be the one to treat you.

❤ ennoshita !! ennoshita is a traditional kinda guy who enjoys traditional things, so he’s taking you on a traditional date: a movie! now, we all know that ennoshita loves movies, so you can tell that he’s not only excited that he’s on a date with you, but he’s also thrilled to be seeing this movie he’s been looking forward to for months. you two agree to meet up early, and he’s going to buy you popcorn and drinks (or anything else you want!) that you snack on while you get comfortable in the theater and he starts telling you about all the facts he read online about the cast, the production, the source material... he makes you an expert before the previews even start. after the movie, he asks a ton of questions about what you thought of it, and tells you what he thinks. he also slips in that there’s another movie he thinks you’ll like coming out soon, but only if you want to go(!), and he’d love to be the one who takes you!

❤ kageyama !! kageyama probably has the hardest time out of everyone on this list figuring out where to take you on the date he asked you out on. like, he knows he wants to be on a date with you, and heck yeah you want to be on a date with him, but his mind sort of just blanks when he tries to come up with where that would actually be. he can’t take you to play volleyball (can he?), so he just settles on a walk through a local park, which feels totally lame, but the look of excitement on your face convinces him otherwise. he’s not much of a talker, but he is an excellent listener. he’s going to keep his hands in his pockets (because he’s afraid of touching you with sweaty palms, poor thing) and ask questions about anything you want to talk about: work, school, your favorite band, food, whatever. anything you say is interesting to him, and he just makes opening up so easy because all he wants is to get to know you.

❤ hinata !! he takes you to a zoo or an aquarium because animals are cool and he knows exactly one (1) animal fact that he’s dying to use to impress you. he spends the entire day unknowingly channeling his usual chaos into doting over you: “hey, we should get ice cream!”, “look, the gift shop has bracelets with fossilized amber; do you want one? matching bracelets would be so cool!”, “which animal is your favorite? we should look at that one first!” and honestly, all of this is more refreshing than overbearing. you spend the entire date flushed and flustered, genuinely touched at having this little ball of electricity so very concerned with your own happiness that he seems like he’s putting his aside. but, really, your happiness is his happiness, and you both realize that when you’re hand-in-hand at a novelty café, wearing matching amber bracelets and sharing a plate of animal-shaped pancakes.

❤ tsukishima !! your first date with tsukishima is one of those blink-and-you-miss-it experiences because it’s right in the middle of midterms and you make plans to study together. you pester him for weeks about wanting to study with him, and he keeps replying with something along the lines of “i don’t study with other people. it’s too annoying.” but, eventually, you get a “fine”, and when he meets you in the library after school, he jokingly plops his bag on your head while teasing you about being early for your “study date”. and that was just the first time he insisted on calling it a date all afternoon: “you know, i don’t go on study dates with just anyone”, “i hope you’re not planning on study dates with anyone else”, “what did you want to go over on our study date?”, “i suppose you want to have another study date next week.” you think you see him blushing by the end of it, so you decide to have another study date just to see if you’re right!

❤ yamaguchi !! he still can’t believe this is happening, but yamaguchi is working on the whole “being confident” thing, and that includes going on a date with the person he likes! he wants it to be unique and special but not, you know, cringe, so he decides one day to ask one of your friends what your favorite kind of food is. yes, you find out he was asking about you; no, you don’t tell him you know. he orders your favorite food as takeout (and decides that he can totally learn how to make it himself for another date) and walks you to a cozy spot by the river during sunset where he sets up a blanket, lights a cheap candle, and hands you a little set of plastic cutlery and a takeout container for your super-romantic night out. he’ll let you try a bite of what he’s eating, and you’ll let him try a bite of yours (“ohmygod is this like kissing?” he catches himself thinking, then instantly tells himself that was the stupidest thing he’s ever thought).

#haikyuu headcanons #haikyuu hcs #haikyuu x reader #daichi x reader #sugawara x reader #asahi x reader #tanaka x reader #nishinoya x reader #ennoshita x reader #kageyama x reader #hinata x reader #tsukishima x reader #yamaguchi x reader #haikyuu #karasuno #karasuno hcs #maria writes

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candlewaxandp0lar0ids · 4 years

Text

I Don’t Like A Gold Rush || Jungkook

Pairing: Jungkook x Reader

Summary: Jungkook is the golden boy, an excellent student, the star of you college's football team. Rumor has it, there's simply nothing he can't do. The same cannot be said about you, but you've never had an issue with that. You're happy with your small group of friends and your lack of talent in sports. And then, Jin befriends Jungkook, and you find yourself spending a lot of time with him. Before you know it, you've taken an interest in him — and you're sure you shouldn't. There's no way this can end well for you... right?

Also available on Ao3.

Word count: 17.3k

Genre: College AU, strangers to lovers, slice of life, mostly fluff

Warnings & Tags: discussed insecurities, alcohol consumption, reader almost has a panic attack at some point, shy jungkook, jungkook is bad at Feelings, Reader is bad at feelings too, mutual pining kinda, Jungkook has long hair, sfw, New Year’s Day themed.

A/N: I don’t know how I would name my stories without Taylor Swift. Anyway, this is more or less centered around the New Year (it was supposed to be more and then... it didn’t happen), and I hope you’ll enjoy it! Happy New Year everyone!

The first time you hear Jungkook’s name, it’s in the sentence “Man, is there anything Jungkook can’t do?”. You look up at your friend Jin from the book you’re studying. You have no idea who Jungkook is, but that doesn’t mean anything. Jin is always complaining about how you don’t know anyone on the campus, which you think is quite unfair.

…but then you really don’t know that many people on the campus.

“What’s going on?” you ask him, because he sounds extremely annoyed, and he shows you his phone. On it, there is a score for a basketball game. You think.

Your college is famous for its basketball team… Right?

“Uh-uh,” you still say with a nod, trying to make it look like you have any idea what you’re talking about.

“This kid is crushing it at school, the girls love him, and now this!” Jin complains, a little too loud, and shushing noises come from a spot behind you. You turn around to give the group an apologetic look. “I really shouldn’t have bet against him.”

Ah, there you know what to say.

“You really need to stop making bets. You never win them.”

Jin glares at you.

“And you are a terrible friend. You’re supposed to comfort me!”

“I’ll comfort you when you stop making the worst choices imaginable,” you mutter, going back to your work. Jungkook’s name, his supposed excellence, and that basketball match — if it even is basketball — leave your mind as fast as they entered it, without leaving a trace behind.

“So the school’s won another basketball game, huh?”

You look up at Namjoon who’s just arriving to the table, holding his tray in his hands. You know he can’t possibly be talking to you about that, so you’re not surprised when Jin appears behind him. That doesn’t stop you from throwing Namjoon a disgusted look.

“Really, Joon? Sports?”

Namjoon shoots you an amused glance from behind his glasses. It’s notorious in your friends’ group that you despise conversations around that subject. You hate anything that involves objects flying around and anything that’s played in a team, and, apparently, those are the only sports that people care about. They could discuss athletics, or swimming, which you wouldn’t enjoy but you wouldn’t hate, but that never happens.

“You were right, Jin. That Jungkook guy really is impressive.”

You tune them out. You don’t care about basketball.

“You’re talking about yesterday’s game?” Yoongi asks, coming out of thin air, and you sigh. You had been hoping you would have at least one person to talk to during lunch.

“Jungkook’s friends with Hoseok,” Jin says, leaning forward conspiratorially, which does get your attention. If that’s true, then that Jungkook guy can’t be a completely terrible person. Hoseok is probably the nicest person you’ve ever met.

That being said, he might have very low standards for his friends. You know him enough to appreciate him, not to judge his tastes.

“So I’m going to become friends with him,” Jin announces triumphantly, only to be rewarded by a chorus of groans and protests.

“But why, Jin?” you ask. “Please don’t talk about popularity. This isn’t high school anymore.”

“And that stuff was already stupid back then,” Namjoon adds, and you nod. You can always count on Namjoon to support you.

“And I hate people,” Yoongi says.

“And Yoongi hates people!” Namjoon immediately picks up. “Do you really want to make him go through that?”

You grin at the question. Yoongi’s misanthropy always comes in handy. Jin, however, is not amused, but he just shakes his head disapprovingly. He’s used to the three of you teaming up against him by now. Usually, it’s on academical subjects, but he isn’t phased by it anymore regardless of that. Not that there’s much that can phase Jin anyway.

“First of all, I said I was going to be his friend, not you lowly peasants, and second, he seems like a nice guy! Do I need another reason to want to make friends?”

You tilt your head.

“He’s protesting too much,” you say.

“I agree,” Namjoon nods. “That’s suspicious.”

“Very suspicious.”

“Come on,” Jin rolls his eyes, “do you really think that little of me?”

“And now he’s trying to guilt-trip us. Joon, can’t you analyze that conversation and figure out what it all means?”

“You know that’s not how literary analysis works, right?” Jin asks you, but you ignore him.

“Actually, it is,” Namjoon says, pushing his glasses back on his nose. “I’d say you were right with your comment,” he adds, looking at you. “I’d say… this is about parties.”

“You’re not going to actually believe—”

“Thanks, Joon,” you say, and the two of you high-five without looking at each other. Yoongi lets out an appreciate whistle.

Even if Namjoon and you aren’t being serious about this, parties actually make sense. Jin… isn’t quite a social butterfly but, unlike the three of you, he does enjoy people’s company to some degree. You know first hand that he’s been to a few this year — you had accompanied him for moral support — but they were pretty tame, and you’re aware that he at least wants to try some more intense stuff. The problem was that those were harder to be invited to. Hoseok could probably do something about it, but he tends to avoid parties on campus.

“Okay, then you should go for it,” you nod.

Yoongi and Namjoon, sitting on either side of you, approve. Jin looks a little surprised at your reaction.

“That changed your mind?”

“You said you wanted ‘the full college experience’,” Namjoon explains with a shrug. “If you think that’s part of it, we wouldn’t want to hold you back.”

“We will judge you for it, though,” Yoongi warns without batting an eyelid, pokerface perfect, and you laugh. You won’t be mean about it, of course. You just might tease him a little.

“Thank you,” Jin says. “I’ll do it, then.”

Good. If you’re lucky, it will be out of his system next time you all have lunch together.

Lady luck had never been on your side, for as long as you could remember. It wasn’t like you got the worst of things either, but usually, things that could go wrong, did go wrong. Because of that, you tried your best to remove those things from your path. Sometimes, though, you just didn’t manage to identify them.

And that’s why, when you hear Jin’s voice and look up from your food, being the first at the table as always, you see he’s accompanied by two people.

One of them has fluffy, dark brown hair, falling on either side of his face and in his eyes. He’s talking and laughing, and there’s something that you can’t help but identify as mischievous in his smile. The other is slightly taller, with jet black hair held up in a bun. He’s quiet, mouth opening for silent laughs when his friend jokes. Between them, there’s Jin, and you think that they look good together. All handsome, all holding themselves with confidence.

You had realized before that Jin felt out of place in your group, from an outside point of view at least, but it’s never been as striking as it is now, as he’s walking with people he clearly belongs with.

It makes you really thankful that he’s your friend.

“Hey,” Jin says, smiling widely, “these are—”

“You’re untying your hair before eating?” you say, looking at the guy with the bun who just sat opposite from you and took off his hair tie with a sigh. He looks up at you with wide round eyes, like you just caught him red-handed — doing what, you’re not quite sure.

That is the first thing you ever say to Jeon Jungkook.

“Um. Yes?”

“Aren’t you afraid you’ll get hair in your food?”

You know people find you too blunt sometimes, think you come off as aggressive, but you almost never intend for that to happen. In that case, you just think the logic here is a bit surprising.

“That’s… a good point, actually.”

“(Y/N),” Jin sighs, “let me introduce you to Jungkook” (he points to the man who’s now tying his hair back up) “and Taehyung.” (he points to the other guy, who’s flashing you a smile.)

“Oh,” you say, looking back at Jungkook. “You play basketball.”

He lets out an awkward laugh and avoids your eyes. Instead, he grabs his fork and focuses on it, twirling it in his hand.

“Yeah, I do— I do that.”

Huh. It takes you a second to piece things together, and you think Namjoon will be of great help once he’ll be there, but for now, one conclusion comes to you.

Jungkook is shy.

“I play basketball too,” Taehyung says, leaning over the table, grinning at you, and you can tell that it’s his way of swooping in to save Jungkook. You can appreciate that.

“She hates basketball,” Jin warns.

“That’s a strong word,” you say, but only half-heartedly, because, well, you definitely don’t like it.

“I think it works.”

“You think what works?”

Jin’s face falls while you grin. If Taehyung is Jungkook’s savior, Namjoon is yours. Your friend sends you a questioning look as he sits next to you, facing Taehyung. He gives polite nods to the two basketball players, like they sit with you at lunch every week, but you notice that he doesn’t quite meet their eyes. Namjoon is not particularly shy, nor a misanthrope like Yoongi, he just isn’t too comfortable around people he’s just met.

You and Jin, well, you’re perhaps a little too comfortable. Not everyone likes it.

“He says I hate basketball.”

“But that would imply you care about basketball.”

“Exactly.”

“And you don’t.”

“I know.”

“Which means you don’t hate basketball. As always, you’re wrong, Jin.”

Jin looks extremely, extremely done with you, but when you and Namjoon high-five, Jungkook laughs quietly and Taehyung nods in appreciation — for the gesture, not the debate.

That is the moment when Yoongi drops his tray on the table and sends a weird glance towards Taehyung and Jungkook.

“What did I miss?” he asks. His tone is a bit dry, and you see Jin’s shoulders straightening. He knows Yoongi is going to be the most difficult one to win over. Not that you’ve been won over yet, but you’re not that difficult. Usually, people don’t like you, not the other way around. You don’t blame them. You’re not sure you’d like yourself very much if you were in their place.

“Oh,” Jungkook says spontaneously, “we had a class together last year! You’re majoring in engineering, right?”

Yoongi looks at him. His eyes are shining with suspicion, and you can practically see the gears turning in his head. Knowing him, he’s definitely wondering why Jungkook would even remember him.

“Right,” he finally confirms, slowly.

There’s a moment of silence, which Namjoon breaks.

“I’m a literature major, by the way.”

“That’s really cool,” Jungkook comments honestly, with the same spontaneity he displayed earlier.

“And I’m in mathematics,” you say.

“Wow. I thought you people existed only in legends,” Taehyung says while Jungkook avoids your eyes. You decide that, yeah, you like Kim Taehyung.

“Don’t say that, I like maths,” Jungkook protests, voice soft, much to your surprise — and, judging by his reaction, Taehyung’s.

You were right, you decide. Jungkook is not a completely terrible person.

You didn’t expect it to become a routine, for Jungkook and Taehyung to eat with you guys, but it does, and as time goes on, other people join your little table. You’re not sure you like that. It’s clear that those people are orbiting around Jungkook, which, good for them, but you don’t see why you need to be there for that.

You do see that Jungkook is not completely comfortable with all of it. He’s good at handling people, good at making jokes and at laughing at the right times, you notice, but there is a stiffness in his shoulders more often than not, and it looks like he’s well-trained at it rather than enjoying it. It kind of reminds you of Jin, except Jin is not as quiet the rest of the time. Taehyung obviously does his best not to let his friend deal with things alone, which is sweet, but he can’t do everything for him.

You barely exchange a word with Jungkook during that time period. You’re usually trying to be forgotten when the table is buzzing with noise, finding refuge in Namjoon and Yoongi’s company. You thought Yoongi would be an ally in reclaiming what’s always been your spot, but it quickly becomes obvious that he has a crush on Taehyung’s friend Jimin, so he never complains about the recent invasion of the table by strangers.

You hear a lot of basketball vocabulary. More than you care for, to be honest. That’s one of the few moments when Jungkook’s face lights up and he gets truly excited, with an almost childish happiness. His demeanor changes, from shy to confident, and the transformation never ceases to amaze you. As soon as the conversation ends, his shoulders fall, he smiles awkwardly, and focuses back on his food or his phone.

You’ve met his eyes a few times in those moments, because he often looks around him like he’s afraid someone’s noticed. He averts his very quickly, though, so you’ve never said anything about it.

So, really, there’s not much that changes. You still only speak to your three friends — you think Taehyung is a good person, and you don’t think he hates you, but you don’t have anything to say to each other —, and sure, you have a little less space when you eat and more noise around you, but aside from that, it’s pretty much the same. You think that’s a relief. You’re not too fond of change.

Usually, you’re pretty decent at spotting it coming. You did miss it when Jin said he was going to become Jungkook’s friend, but other than that you’re able to do your best to avoid it. You don’t see anything coming the day Taehyung calls out your name, though. You look up at him from the book Namjoon is showing you, surprised. He has an arm slung over Jungkook’s shoulders, and Jungkook isn’t looking at you, of course.

“Do you think you could explain a maths-thing to Jungkook?”

You blink at him.

“What’s the ‘maths-thing’?”

“Does it matter?”

You raise an eyebrow, and Jungkook groans. You get the feeling that he didn’t really want Taehyung to ask you about it. He sends an annoyed glance to his friend, who is still smiling brightly at you, while pushing a lock of hair out of his face. His hair is tied, but this one traitorous lock always escapes.

“I’m struggling a little with probabilities,” he admits, glancing at you for half a second. “But I’m sure I’ll be fine once I can get my head back into it, I’ve just been training a lot recently and—”

“I can help you, if you want,” you say. “I’m not the most fond of probabilities, but it should be okay.”

“Great!” Taehyung says, patting his friend’s shoulder before Jungkook can answer. “You should do that then.”

“You’re sure you don’t mind?” Jungkook asks, actually looking at you this time. You meet his eyes, notice that he looks worried about it. You can’t figure out why.

“I really don’t,” you shrug.

He smiles at you, a small, hesitant smile, but a smile nonetheless. Probably the first one he directs at you. It’s a nice sight, you decide, and you smile back.

Jin’s sentence “is there anything Jungkook can’t do” takes all its sense on the day you meet Jungkook at the library to study. You don’t know what you expected. You never thought Jungkook was dumb or anything, but since Taehyung asked you to help, you thought he would have some difficulties, at least. However, as it turns out, he either understands immediately when you explain something to him, or he’s already understood it. He asks for some clarifications here and there, but all in all, you feel kind of useless.

“You don’t need me at all,” you say after a little while, and Jungkook looks up from the book with the worried wide-eyed look you’ve gotten used to.

“No, no, you’re doing a great job,” he protests. “You’re really helping me out here.”

“No I’m not. It’s obvious that you could do that all on your own.”

He deflates a little at that, looks away from you.

“You help,” he mumbles. “I have a hard time focusing when I’m alone.”

Oh.

That makes a lot of sense to you, actually. You’re good at focusing all of your energy on one thing, perhaps even too good, to the point where you easily get obsessed and become unable to take care of anything else, but even you need the right conditions for that.

“Okay,” you say with a nod.

Jungkook gives you an anxious look.

“So you don’t mind helping me out?” he asks, and there’s something in his voice that catches you, but you can’t tell what it is exactly. Maybe it’s the hope, or maybe it’s the fear. You don’t understand what he’d be afraid of. Worst case scenario, you would say no. That wouldn’t be the end of the world.

“We can work together,” you offer. “You can ask me if you need help for anything and I’ll just work on some other stuff.”

He seems relieved, and again, you just don’t understand it. It’s not like you’re his only option. There are plenty of people out there who could help him. Plenty of people who would jump at the opportunity of helping him. You know that, because he’s always surrounded by those people, and everybody in school seems to know him. Even when you walked into the library with him earlier, before you got to the table you’re sitting at now, a few students greeted him. You don’t see why he would attach any importance to you, specifically, helping him. You barely know each other.

“Thanks,” he says, and he gives you a small smile. For some reason, that makes you drop the subject. Instead of asking about it — which, knowing yourself, you probably would have — you shrug it off and reply with a nod.

The silence that follows feels comfortable, to you at least. You’ve never minded silence. Jin hates it, though. You get to work, watching absent-mindedly as Jungkook goes through the lesson he was working on. He does ask you a couple of questions, but it’s probably to make you feel like you’re doing something rather than because he actually needs it. You still answer them, and watch him grin, satisfied with himself, when he turns out to be right every single time.

“Are you coming to Taehyung’s party this week-end?” he asks out of the blue after about an hour.

You look up, surprised. The two of you haven’t exchanged much, and certainly have not talked about anything other than— well, other than maths. His eyes are on his notebook, as usual, and you don’t get any insight as to why he asked the question.

“I don’t know. Is Jin coming?”

“Uh, I guess? Taehyung’s probably talked to him about it.”

“Then I’m probably going.”

Jungkook mulls over your answer for a few seconds, twirling his pencil between his fingers, and you feel like you have to clarify, which is not an urge you have often. Usually, you let people decipher for themselves what you meant. That works very well with Namjoon, sometimes with Yoongi, not so great with the rest of the world. Including Jin, though Jin compensates with his impressive ability to interpret everything you say in his favor.

“We always go to parties with Jin. For moral support.”

For all that you tease him, you genuinely care for him. You know he wants you to go with him, so you do. It’s as simple as that.

Jungkook doesn’t look at you, but he still smiles at what you say, and it’s— it’s interesting. There’s something about his behavior that makes you curious, like you are when you’re trying to solve a complicated equation.

“That’s nice,” he comments.

“So… you’ll be there?” you ask. It’s taken you a long time to come up with that simple question. It often takes you a long time to find things to say to keep a conversation going. You’re pretty bad at it.

“It’s at my fraternity,” Jungkook informs you, glancing at you briefly, and you smile. This is exactly the type of party Jin wanted to go to. He’s probably happy about it. “The entire basketball team should be there.”

Great. People.

“That’s nice,” you say, because you have no idea what to add at this point. Jungkook simply nods, and the conversation dies an awkward death.

It’s another half an hour until Jungkook looks at his watch and starts putting his stuff back in his bag.

“I have to go to practice,” he tells you, clearly in a hurry. “Can we— Would you mind if—”

“We can do this again. If that’s what you meant.”

He gives you a bright smile, and that actually surprises you. He looks relieved that you finished his sentence for him.

“Thank you,” he says sincerely.

And just like that, he’s gone, practically running out of the library. For someone who talks as little as he does, he sure leaves a void when he goes away, you think, looking at the empty chair.

But you quickly shrug it off. You’re used to being alone. You like being alone.

Jungkook isn’t going to change that.

You realize very quickly that, while accompanying Jin to parties was never something you particularly enjoyed, going to this one was downright a mistake.

You have this unspoken rule, with your friends, that you shouldn’t stick together the entire time. You’re supposed to wander off, find something to do for yourself, maybe talk to some people. Get that college experience. You’ve never had a problem to do that, even if you ended up quietly sipping soda in a corner more often than not.

Here, though, you simply cannot shake off the fact that you don’t belong here, that this is not your scene. The people here are loud, energetic, garish. They make you feel like a black and white picture, like a silent movie. You want to run away, but you can’t. You don’t want to leave Jin, Namjoon or Yoongi behind, even if you doubt they’re having the same kind of problems you do. You’re pretty sure you saw Yoongi talking with Jimin, and last time you saw Namjoon, you think a cheerleader was holding him by the hand and leading him out of the room. You don’t know what Jin’s doing, but you’re trusting that he’s okay.

You walk around aimlessly, find Jungkook and Taehyung playing beer-pong with some people. Maybe you should be happy to see people you know, but you’re not. If anything, it only drives the point home even more to see them so comfortable: you don’t belong here. Your chest tightens, and you turn around. You need a little peace and quiet. You need to get away.

“(Y/N)!”

You jump at the sound of your name. No one’s said it since you’ve entered the house. No one knows you here.

Except Jungkook, who’s right behind you.

He’s more confident than usual, and you guess, based on his slightly hazy eyes, that it has a lot to do with alcohol.

“Are you having fun? How long have you been here? It’s nice to see you!”

He’s speaking fast, excitedly, and as he does, he runs his fingers through his hair, which he’s let down. It looks good on him, you decide, even as you reply to him with a tense smile.

“Hey, you should join us, we’re—”

“Do you have a closet somewhere?”

Jungkook blinks.

“A closet?”

“Yeah.”

There are probably very few things that are less weird than asking a guy if he has a closet you can get into because you’re on the verge of having a panic attack and you can’t stay outside surrounded by people a second longer.

Jungkook doesn’t say anything about it, though. He just leads you through the house and opens the door to a closet for you. You get inside without giving it much more thought, and he looks at you, puzzled. He’s actually looking at you, which you decide confirms that he is drunk.

“Do you— Are you waiting for someone?”

“No,” you say. “I just need a little break.”

He thinks about your answer for a while, probably longer than needed, and nods.

And then, he gets into the closet with you and closes the door.

Inside, it’s dark, with only a ray of light coming in. You can’t see his face, which doesn’t help you understand why he just did that. The space is cramped, and you can smell alcohol coming from his breath, can feel the heat radiating from his body, but it doesn’t bother you that much. It’s still better in here than outside.

“Why did you do that?”

“I thought I would keep you company. Like you’re here to keep company to Jin, you know?”

He’s drunk, definitely, and yet you feel genuinely touched by his words. You shouldn’t, because you doubt they hold that much meaning, but you can’t help it. You don’t need company, but that’s besides the point. His intentions are what matters.

“Thank you,” you say.

“It’s not a problem. You’re helping me with my maths.”

Your first reaction is to laugh at that, because it feels completely unprompted, but then the logic of the reasoning kind of appears to you.

“I mean it!” Jungkook protests. “You haven’t talked about how I’m good at everything or how I’m the one who should help you.”

You frown.

“You shouldn’t help me. You’re good at maths, but I’m better than you.”

It’s Jungkook’s turn to laugh, and just like his earlier smile, it takes you completely by surprise. It’s not one of those quiet laughs that he usually has. It’s light and pleasant, and you briefly wonder what his face looks like when he laughs like that. You kind of want to see it.

“You’re a scary person,” he tells you when he’s stopped laughing. “You always say those things directly. It’s like you don’t even care.”

You’ve heard that before. Well, you haven’t been called scary until now, but people have said that you were intimidating. You, personally, believe you’re the least threatening person to have ever walked this Earth. You couldn’t hurt a fly if you wanted to.

Jungkook makes some sense here, though. Your filter is very limited, and there are a lot of things you say that feel acceptable to you, and that other people… don’t think are acceptable. You don’t mean to do it. It just happens.

“I think you’re good at a lot of things, though,” you say slowly.

Jungkook lets out a long sigh and then you hear him sliding down to the ground. You hesitate for about half a second before joining him down there. You fold your legs, holding your knees against your chest while you wait for him to say something.

“People are always saying that,” he finally mumbles. “But what if I’m not that good? What if I fail one day?”

It’s strange. You understand what he’s saying, understand the feeling of pressure, but you don’t understand the emotions that should come with it. In your case, you know that no one holds you to a higher standard than you do. It can be unhealthy, the way you can torture yourself if you don’t meet the standards you’ve set for yourself, but at least you’re the only one you have to answer to. Obviously, it’s not Jungkook’s case.

“Then you’ll try again,” you say, because that’s what you do when you fail. “Or, if you think it’s not that important, you won’t.”

“But what will they say?” he insists. “What if we lose the next game? Or the one after that? What if I fail a class? I can’t get anything done these days.”

“You’ll be fine,” you say soothingly, half-wondering how you ended up here, comforting the college’s golden boy in a closet after fighting off a panic attack. “It’s not like you’re the only one in your team. People will understand.”

You think they will. You hope they will. They should.

“You would understand.”

It’s true, but then, you really do not care for basketball, and it’s not like you have that sort of expectations for Jungkook. You wouldn’t think much of it, if he failed at something tomorrow. If it was the maths test you’ve helped him with, you would be surprised, but that’s because you saw him studying and it was obvious he had understood everything, not because you think he can inherently succeed at everything he does.

Which you guess might be the heart of the problem here.

You reach out to put your hand on his shoulder. It’s not that easy in the dark, and you wonder for a second if you’ve grabbed something else, until you feel hair tickling your skin. Yup, you were right.

“You have the right not to be good at something every once in a while,” you say softly. “No one can be on top of their game all of the time.”

You hear what sounds like a choked sob.

“I like that they’re counting on me, you know? I like that I’m helping them out by playing. I just— I don’t know what’s going to happen when I stop being as good.”

He said when, not if, and that breaks your heart.

Without thinking about it, you slide your hand down his arm and grab his hand. You squeeze it in yours, gently, and then you inch closer to put your head on his shoulder. You remember reading that physical touch was good for people who were in emotional pain. You hope it helps him.

“You locked yourself in here with me because you thought I needed company,” you whisper. “There’s so much more to you than just being good at sports or having good grades. And if people don’t see that, it’s their loss. Because you’re a great person.”

He hums, but the sound is quiet, and it’s then that you realize how tense he is.

Shit. You must have crossed a boundary. You start to remove your hand, but he closes his fingers around yours, keeping you in place. He’s still tense, you can feel it everywhere his body touches yours. But he doesn’t let go.

“You mean that,” he says. There are so many emotions in his voice that you can’t identify them all. Relief, happiness, amusement… You don’t know where to start.

“I usually mean what I say.”

“I’ve noticed,” he says, and you can hear the smile that’s dancing on his lips.

He’s still not letting go of your hand, but you don’t mind. Staying here, with Jungkook, in this small closet is as good a way of spending your evening as anything else you could do out there.

So you stay.

“Where did you all vanish Saturday?” Jin asks, and Namjoon, Yoongi and yourself immediately find your food a lot more interesting. You exchange panicked glances that mean ‘did none of you stay around? This was poorly coordinated’ before finally daring to look up.

“I talked to Jimin,” Yoongi says, face as inexpressive as always.

“I played some beer-pong with Taehyung,” Namjoon says.

That leaves only you.

“I talked to Jungkook,” you tell Jin. That is technically true. It omits the part where the two of you were together in a closet, but if you said that, there would be a lot of questions you don’t really want to answer to. Somehow, you think you would be more embarrassed to tell them that there was nothing going on there than if you told them you hooked up with him. You’re not sure why.

“Jungkook disappeared for a long time,” Jin says, narrowing his eyes at you.

You do your best to keep a straight face while you poke at your salad. You don’t want anyone here to have the wrong idea, and you finally manage to put your finger on what you’re afraid of. Humiliation. You’d feel humiliated at having to tell them that nothing happened and that there is nothing Jungkook could possibly see in you. They would be nice to you, of course they would, but you don’t want to see the look in their eyes.

“Did he? Maybe that was after I left. I didn’t stay that long.”

That’s a lie.

“Really?” Jin asks, clearly skeptical. “I think I saw you there pretty late.”

Maybe when you went down to get some snacks and drinks to bring back to the closet. Damn Jungkook and his stomach.

“Well, that depends what you mean by ‘late’ and ‘long’,” you say.

That’s you calling Namjoon for help, and he recognizes your SOS for what it is. From the way Jin’s face falls, so does he.

“She’s right,” Namjoon comments, so nonchalant you would almost believe he’s doing it naturally. “What is ‘late’, really? Isn’t it always—”

“Please stop,” Jin groans, burying his face in his hands. “Just because you’re a literature major doesn’t mean you’re the only one who understands words.”

“Actually it does,” you say with a nod. “That’s exactly what it means.”

You start lifting your hand for a high-five, relieved Jin’s attention is off you, but he sends the two of you a dark glare.

“You two are unbearable. Don’t do that.”

“We have to,” you protest. You would hate to miss a chance to high-five Namjoon.

“No you don’t, you—”

“Actually they do,” Yoongi says, and your jaw drops. Yoongi never intervenes, and you had always thought that if he did, it wouldn’t be in your favor. “That’s exactly how gravity works.”

Jin looks like his soul has left his body. He only comes back to himself after you, Yoongi and Namjoon have all exchanged high-fives.

“I hate you,” he says, sounding terribly tired. “I hate every single one of you.”

“Sorry Jin,” you smile warmly.

“No you’re not. You’re the worst.”

Except he sounds fond, affectionate, and you laugh before going back to your salad. You miss the quick glances your three friends exchange after that. They’ve all noticed you eluding and changing the subject. They don’t want to rush you, know you would hate it and that it’s better to drop it.

But they’ve noticed.

Working with Jungkook on Wednesday afternoons easily becomes a habit, so easily you don’t even notice it until it’s something you look forward to during the week. It adds to the time you already spend eating with him and Taehyung. Jungkook is, slowly, starting to become a part of your life. It’s a thought you refuse to dwell on, because it sounds so strange.

The Wednesdays afternoons are something special, though. You and Jungkook don’t really talk at lunch, even if he’s clearly more relaxed around you now, which you suspect is the reason why you’re ‘Taehyung-approved’. On Wednesdays, you— Well, you don’t talk much, either, but it’s different. It’s a time that only belongs to the two of you. You like that.

You slowly find out things about him, his family, his life. It’s never the main subject of conversation, but it makes you feel like you’re solving a puzzle.

“My father wanted me to focus on my classes and forget about basketball,” he comments once. “But I could do both.”

It makes you laugh, because he says it with obvious satisfaction, but it also makes you wonder if there’s more to it. Jungkook doesn’t add anything, though, and you don’t want to probe into his life, so you don’t ask. After that, small pieces of the puzzle keep falling into place.

“My high school coach told me I could train more if I didn’t work so hard for school.” But he could do both.

“My friends said I never hung out with them anymore and that I shouldn’t work so hard.” So he did both.

It’s always the same story. People telling him things, giving him opinions on what the should and shouldn’t do, and him stretching himself thinner and thinner. It’s almost a miracle he’s still doing as well as he is, honestly.

But his tone changes when he talks about his former relationships. He’s usually light and genuine, sharing with you just because. It’s clear that, as much as the stories make you frown, he doesn’t have an issue with them, and you guess that’s all that matters. The first time he says something about an ex-girlfriend of his, though, he’s guarded, almost careful. He sounds like he doesn’t want to tell you.

“My ex said I worked too much.”

He doesn’t add anything. Whatever it was she wanted, he couldn’t do it and work. Didn’t manage to do both. After that, he doesn’t look at you for the rest of the day, like he did when you first met.

You never get a name for the girlfriend. He talks about relationships again, but you don’t even know if he’s always talking about the same one. You doubt it, though, and it only makes things worse.

“My ex wanted me to attend fewer practices.”

“My ex said I didn’t care enough to make time for her.”

“My ex dumped me after I lost a game.”

That last one hurts you, because you remember him crying in the closet because of that exact fear. You want to take his hand again, but you can’t dare to.

“She’s stupid for that,” you say instead.

Jungkook looks surprised first, because you never comment on what he’s telling you, then a smile slowly forms on his lips.

“If the only reason she was with you was because you won a lot of games, you’re better off without her,” you add.

“That’s what Taehyung said.”

“Taehyung’s right.”

Jungkook goes quiet for a little while after that, to the point that you look up, worried that you might have offended him. When you do, he’s looking at you, something you can’t identify shining in his eyes.

“Everything okay?”

He blinks like he’d just woken up for a dream, then nods. He doesn’t tell you that he hadn’t believed what Taehyung said — until you said it and he looked at you and thought that yeah, maybe he was better off without her indeed.

You’re surprised to run into Jungkook late one night, as you’re walking back to your dorm. It shouldn’t shock you — you do go to the same college — but you’re so used to only ever seeing him in the library or the cafeteria that meeting him outside is almost confusing. At least he seems taken aback as well, if the way his already round eyes widen is anything to go by.

Then, his surprised face morphs into a smile, and a wave of warmth hits you without a warning. You don’t get any time to think about it before he waves at you. His shyness is not completely gone, and you see him waver, hesitate, even as he’s walking up to you. You’re quick to close the gap between you, meeting him in the middle. Just in case.

“Hey,” he says, voice a little raspy. He has what you identify as a sports bag, slung over his shoulder, and you wonder what he was doing out so late. You were working at the library until it closed, which is far from being rare for you, but that obviously wasn’t his case.

“Hey,” you reply, smiling back. “Were you— training?”

Amusement flashes in his eyes at the careful way you chose your words, afraid to get it wrong. As he grew more comfortable around you, he also started making fun of you for not knowing the first thing about basketball. Strangely, you don’t mind that much.

“I was at the gym,” he says. “Practice was earlier today.”

“Oh,” is all you can muster. You don’t know what you’re supposed to do. Should you ask what he was doing at the gym? The answer would only leave you with more questions, you’re sure.

You’re still debating it when Jungkook clears his throat. He reaches for his ponytail and undoes it, shaking his head so the hair fall back into place. The sight is— interesting. Pretty. You’re not sure why you’re so fascinated by it.

“Do you want me to walk you back to your dorm?” he asks, slight concern in his voice. “It’s late.”

“Is it on your way back?” you question, frowning. You would hate to be a bother.

“No, but—”

“I’m fine, then. I do that several times a week, I’ve never had a problem.”

That was, apparently, not the thing to say. Jungkook only looks more worried now.

“Several times a week? That’s really not careful.”

“I don’t see a problem, there’s no one around.”

“That’s exactly my p—” He stops and shakes his head, but gives a look you’ve seen before. A lot. It’s a look that says ‘I can’t believe someone as smart as you can also be so stupid’, in those exact terms. “Expected value,” he then says, and your eyes widen a little. Maths! Great. You can do maths. “Let’s say there’s a 99% chance nothing happens. Your gain is still minimal.”

Well, you get to study late and enjoy a walk home alone at night, but you’re willing to humor him.

“But in the one per-cent where something bad happens…”

He doesn’t have to finish his sentence. You know exactly where this is going, and you let out a sigh. He’s not wrong. On that aspect, at least.

“Fine.”

He grins widely.

“I just beat you at maths.”

“You didn’t beat me, I—”

“I just beat you at maths!”

You roll your eyes, choose to let him have that. It’s not going to change anything to your behavior after tonight, because the day has not come where you’ll let probabilities rule your life, but, after all, you don’t mind sharing your night walk with him.

Jungkook starts showing up to walk you home whenever he can. It’s not every time, which you’re kind of thankful for — you like his company, but you like being alone just as much, and you need a healthy dose of that every week —, but it does happen regularly. You find him sitting in front of the library, freezing cold, and you take pity on him, buying him a coffee from the vending machine inside, seconds before they lock the building.

That’s how you find out he likes his coffee tasting as little like coffee as possible.

Sometimes, he joins you later, and you hear him jogging to catch up with you. You don’t have the heart to tell him that that defeats the purpose of everything he’s doing, because it’s absolutely terrifying.

As the days turn into weeks, the air becomes colder, and you start seeing Christmas decorations appearing over the campus. You don’t know who is in charge of doing that, but they must be excited about it, because tinsel and few strings of fairy lights start appearing around the campus at the end of November. Jungkook is delighted by it, and you enjoy watching his reactions. You’re not big on Christmas, personally. You enjoy the tradition, the gift-giving, spending time with your family — you’re visiting them briefly this year — but you mostly see Christmas as an excuse for all of that. Jungkook loves it, though, and you decide that his excitement makes you like the season a little more.

“Hey, we should make a stop,” he tells you one night.

You look at him like he’s crazy. It’s the middle of December and it’s already half past nine. You’re cold, it’s dark outside, and you want to go home.

“A stop?” you repeat.

“Oh, c’mon,” he says, and he has that wide, childish grin that you’ve seen only a handful of times. You haven’t learned how to resist it yet. “C’mon!”

You sigh. But you follow.

As it turns out, he takes you just a little way off your usual trajectory. Behind a building you’ve never really paid attention to, Jungkook leads you to a small basketball court. You eye the place suspiciously. It’s empty, well lit, but you never know. A ball might come out of nowhere to hit you in the face, as they had a tendency to do when you were in high school and playing for a team that had picked you last.

By the time you turn around to tell Jungkook that, okay, you’ve seen it, let’s go home now, he’s taken off his coat and pulled a basketball out of his bag. You don’t even want to ask. His grin is even wider than earlier.

“C’mon,” he says.

“Absolutely not.”

“Let me show you, okay?”

You want to say no but— It can’t hurt, right? And Jungkook loves basketball, and you’re his— friend or something, so you should try to take some interest in it.

You take off your coat and let him lead you onto the court. There, you watch him as he dribbles in what you guess is an effective way (you can’t know for sure, you’re barely able to catch the ball after it’s bounced once so your standards are incredibly low), and then demonstrates his ability to score a handful of times. It’s not that you’re not impressed — again, you can’t do anything with this unpredictable, devilish round thing — but you also can’t say this is a quality you think much of.

You liked it a lot better when he convinced you to let him walk you home by talking about the expected value.

“You want to try?” he offers, holding the ball out for you.

You would rather die.

But you take the ball from his hand and eye the basket like it’s personally offended you. That makes Jungkook laugh.

“You can get closer than that,” he says.

You hold back a groan, aim and, of course, fail. It’s almost a relief. You can cross that off your list, again, just like you did as a kid first, then as a teenager. You’re bad at sports, always have been and, considering the effort you’re putting into it those days, always will be. That’s something you can count on.

Before you can say anything, Jungkook’s caught the ball and is running back towards you.

“Okay, let me show you.”

Is he going to— No, he’s just demonstrating it. You’re kind of disappointed not to get your typical ‘guy teaching girl anything sports related’ moment, disappointed that he doesn’t come to stand behind you to show you like they do in movies, but you can’t unpack that right now. You do watch with some degree of interest as he shows you how to position yourself.

“So you really aim for the line above the basket, not the basket, okay?”

“If you think that just because I aim for something I hit it…”

He chuckles, then gives the ball back to you, and you sigh. This. This is why you hate sports. It’s not the one-off failure, that would be fine on its own. It’s the constant humiliation whenever you even try it. You’re going to fail this attempt, and the next one, and the one after that. You’re a lost cause. You’re fine with it, too, but you don’t particularly want to go through that again.

You do your best, though. Not because you think it will change something, but because you kind of want to prove that this isn’t all you. That, even if you’re trying your hardest, there’s just something that refuses to let you score or do it right.

“Wait!” Jungkook walks over to you, puts his hand on your back, and you freeze. “You need to straighten yourself a little,” he says, placing his hand between your shoulder blades, and you nod. His hand is warm and large, you can feel it even over your sweatshirt. “There.”

He removes the hand, and you’re left a little off balance without him by your side. You shake your head quickly, shoot, and, without any surprise, miss.

Jungkook is on the ball just as fast as before, but you’re as quick as him to grab your coat and put it back on. You’re already feeling warm all over, though.

“You don’t want to try again?” he asks, sounding genuinely disappointed.

Of course, you take pity on him.

“Maybe next time,” you say.

He gives you a bright smile, so genuinely happy, and you know that you won’t be able to deny him next time either.

Jin is the reason you’re here, and that is the version you will stick with. No, you didn’t want to go see a basketball game, even if Jungkook is playing. No, you didn’t feel the slightest bit curious about it. No, you would not be there if Jin hadn’t asked. It’s Jin’s fault if you’re here on a Friday night instead of being, well, at your place, likely doing something equally as unproductive.

You don’t even understand what is going on in the field. There’s a lot of running and throwing the ball, that’s for sure, but then, you’ve just learned that scoring from different places in the field and at different moments will not earn the players the same amount of points.

You don’t think you’ve ever seen your friends look at you with such consternation as when they had to explain it to you.

In that situation, you can’t say that you get much from looking at the field. You definitely follow Jungkook with your eyes, cheer and clap when he scores, and let out cries of disappointment with the rest of the crowd when he doesn’t, but truly, the only way you have any idea what’s going on is by looking at the score board. And the truth is, that score is a little too close for comfort.

You hate that it has that much of an impact on you, but it stresses you out. Your leg bounces on the floor, an habit of yours Jin hates, but he’s too focused to notice, which is only more stressful. Jin always notices, and if it doesn’t, it must mean that the situation is dire.

The remaining seconds are slowly ticking down. Jungkook’s team is ahead by only one point, which means that if the other team scores, they will win. You think. You’re not entirely sure, but for your defense, you’ve just heard about it. Jungkook seems to be everywhere on the field. Taehyung is his shadow, perhaps not as noticeable or as spectacular in his actions, but certainly effective.

Again, you have no knowledge of basketball whatsoever.

Jin grabs your thigh, and only then do you realize that something’s happened. The action was so quick, so smooth, that you missed it entirely — but maybe you were also kind of thinking of something else.

Someone from the other team — you don’t even know your school’s team’s players, you’re not going to learn the other ones — just made a break for it. Based on what you can tell, Taehyung blocked his path, pushing him straight into Jungkook’s arms. In a movement you cannot begin to comprehend, Jungkook takes the ball from him, without ever stopping his run.

After that, he’s unstoppable.

He crosses the field, looking almost like he’s dancing in the way he avoids his opponents, and, of course, scores.

The time falls to zero. The crowd stands up like one man, screaming and shouting, and you yourself find yourself jumping up to hug Jin. He hugs you back, but the two of you quickly separate, patting each other’s backs awkwardly.

Jin starts talking with Namjoon and Yoongi, but you tune them out — it’s not like you understand what they’re saying anyway — to look at the field. The players have lifted Jungkook on their shoulders and he’s laughing, holding on to them so he doesn’t fall, and you grin.

“Come on,” Jin says, “let’s go congratulate him!”

That sounds like a terrible idea, you think. You won’t be the only ones, as the crowd has already invaded the field, and you doubt you’ll be able to get very close.

You still follow him. You alternate between clinging to his arm and to his shoulders so you don’t lose him, and trust him to elbow his way through the crowd. You hear him apologizing profusely in front of you, but he does not stop. Slowly, you make it down. Once you’re off the stairs, people are not as compactly gathered, and you can just walk between them. Jin grins at you, and you give him a thumbs up. Yeah, he did good here. You can give him that.

“Hey, Jungkook!” he calls out.

Jungkook was talking with some girls, but he looks up at the sound of his name, excuses himself, and jogs towards the two of you.

And it is then, in the few seconds it takes him to get to you, that it hits you. Like a ton of bricks.

You had known that Jungkook was objectively attractive, of course. There was no ignoring that. But Jin was objectively attractive, too, and that had never changed anything between the two of you. With Jungkook, right now, it does. His skin is glistening with sweat, and he wipes his chin with his shirt, and oh no, you can see his well-defined biceps and the line of his abs, and some hair is escaping from his ponytail, and he’s grinning with a happy, proud smile, and his eyes are shining and—

Jungkook is hot. That’s your realization. You had been aware of it, technically, but it’s like it only clicks for you at that exact moment.

“You came,” he tells you with a bright smile, and you can feel your entire face heating up. You pray that it’s not visible.

“Yeah,” you squeak out. “Great, um, great game?”

It sounds like an interrogation because you have no idea if it was one. It looked difficult, but maybe that was because they played terribly today. You don’t know that.

Jungkook’s smile widens a little, and you know that he has you all figured out. He knows you don’t understand the first thing about this whole thing.

“Thanks,” he still says.

His chest is still heaving quickly, and it draws your attention to his— his everything. The way he’s leaning towards you as he’s trying to catch his breath doesn’t help either. You wait for Jin to say something, to save you, but when you look around, you realize the traitor has abandoned you completely.

Okay, he hasn’t technically abandoned you, he’s just gone to congratulate Taehyung, but it’s the same difference.

You hear someone else calling Jungkook’s name before you’ve figured out what to say. He looks around, then gives you an apologetic look.

“Sorry, I—”

“No problem, you should— I have to go anyway.”

This is not like you. You’re an awkward person, and you struggle in social situations, but you don’t usually trip over your words like that. You kind of hate it.

“Okay, so, um, I’ll see you…?”

“Wednesday, yeah. Or— before. At lunch. If you’re there.”

This is terrible.

“Okay.” Jungkook gives you one last smile, and then he’s off, and you’re standing alone in the middle of a crowd. Your chest is heavy and it feels painful.

You hate this.

It’s only after that that you start realizing how big of a part Jungkook now plays in your life. He walks you home at night sometimes. You eat with him once or twice a week. You study together for an entire afternoon on Wednesdays. He’s just— everywhere. And it’s not that it’s a bad thing, because the feeling you get when you see him is a pleasant one, but it is disconcerting. It’s something that you have no control over whatsoever and that’s not— that’s not good for you.

You realize how much attention you were already paying to him, too, which is even more annoying. The signs were there. You should have understood this sooner. If you had, maybe you could have prevented it.

Because that’s the thing. You know the situation is ridiculous. You believe Jungkook sees you as a friend, and you’re happy with that, but there is no way he thinks of you as anything else. That is not an idea you should even begin to entertain. You can handle rejection, you’re used to it in so many aspects, though it’s rarely romantic, but you cannot take getting your hopes up only for them to be crushed.

The thing is, you can’t help it at this point, can’t force your feelings back in. There is so much to like about him. The way he plays with his hair, the quiet laughs when he’s in public, the loud ones when he’s walking you home, the sparkle in his eyes when he asks you a question in maths and it turns out he already had it right, the look on his face when he talks about basketball,… There’s so much.

You briefly consider avoiding him, but that’s not really an option. You like being his friend. You see your feelings as annoying, pesky little things that have no business being there in the first place. You don’t even hate the rush that goes through you when you see him, the way just looking at him brings a smile to your lips that you simply can’t hold back.

But you really, really hate the wishful thinking. The hope.

The feelings are fine, as long as you don’t think too hard about it. As long as he doesn’t have a girlfriend. Because that would break your heart.

And it’s only a matter of time before that happens.

You really considered declining when Jin asked you to come to this New Year’s party. Your last experience had effectively convinced you that those new parties he was getting invited to were not for you. That was fine, to each their own, but that did mean you didn’t really want to go. He clearly didn’t need you there anyway. You didn’t even know why he asked.

But he did, and he insisted, and he gave you his best puppy eyes, and that’s the thing about Jin: he’s very, very good at giving puppy eyes.

So that’s why you’re there, wearing a red dress that’s way too flashy for you, leaning against a wall and staring into the void. You feel empty and, though you’re not alone, lonely. You’re surrounded by strangers, and there are people everywhere in the house, but you don’t know them, and you can’t just start a conversation with them. It’s not something you do, it’s not even something you want.

You haven’t felt the urge to lock yourself inside a closet yet, though, so you guess that’s an improvement compared to last time.

Looking around, you can see Jimin, perched on the counter, listening to Yoongi talk with a smile on his face. Jin is somewhere else in the room and, though you can’t see him, you sometimes hear him, so you know he has his flirting voice on. Namjoon is nowhere to be seen, but that’s probably a good sign. He always get lucky at those parties. You don’t know how he does it. It’s impressive, honestly. Hoseok showed up earlier, and everyone greeted him like he was a star — which is kind of accurate, actually, at the campus’ scale.

You know, of course, that Jungkook and Taehyung, as inseparable as ever, are by the pool table. You also hate that you know it, because now your mind is constantly wondering if it’s weird that you haven’t been there yet, or if it would be weird to show up. Neither, probably, because exactly no one cares except for you, but you’re the master of torturing yourself with useless considerations.

God, you hate having a crush. It’s just so— unpractical. You also hate that you didn’t see that one coming, and that you didn’t do anything about it until it was too late. Usually, you’re pretty good at nipping those kinds of feelings in the bud. Now, you can only wait it out.

With a sigh, you push yourself away from the wall to wander aimlessly around the house. You promised Jin you’d stay until midnight, and you intend to keep that promise. It’s not like there’s anything for you to do, but still, that way you can look like you’re doing something and look a little less weird. Or maybe you don’t. It doesn’t really matter anyway.

Passing in front of the room with the pool table, you realize that Jungkook is gone. Taehyung is still there, playing with Hoseok, both looking pretty wasted, but Jungkook has vanished. That’s not good. You don’t want him to spring up on you out of nowhere like he did last time. You won’t know how to react if that happens, probably fumble for words, and it will be very unpleasant and very embarrassing for everyone.

You consider finding another closet, then decides against it. There’s just fifteen minutes left until midnight, anyway. That’s not too long. You can just wait it out.

You slowly make your way through the house. No sign of Jungkook anywhere. Maybe he left. Maybe he’s already back to the pool table and you missed him completely. Maybe he’s locked himself in a room with a girl and—

Oh you hate this. You hate feeling jealous. You hate that you have no control over it, you hate that it makes you sad, you hate that you have no right to feel like that. Jungkook isn’t yours. He’s probably even considered you for anything. You should consider yourself lucky you’re even friends with him in the first place.

You do your best to push everything out of your mind. Alcohol has never looked more tempting, but you don’t want the hangover with the morning, so you ignore the inviting bottles of beer and walk out.

It’s freezing — of course it’s freezing, it’s December you idiot, is there anything you can do right tonight — and you shiver, but you stay there. The cold is both numbing and soothing, and while you’re mentally complaining about it, you’re not thinking about anything else, so that’s good.

The door opens and closes behind you, and you guess someone is coming out to smoke. You move over to give them some space, but just as you do that, a jacket falls over your shoulders. You jump at first, and then the warmth makes you sigh in relief.

“You shouldn’t go out without a coat,” Jungkook says, because of course it’s him.

“I feel that you’ve been scolding me a lot recently,” you chuckle, glancing up at him.

He pouts, buries his hands in his pockets. He’s obviously cold as well, but at least his shirt covers his arms.

It also hugs his muscles real nice, but that’s besides the point.

“That’s because you make very poor decisions,” he mutters, looking at his feet. “You have to realize that.”

“You’re right. I could have taken my coat outside.”

“You know that walking back all alone in the middle of the night is way worse,” he protests, and then you laugh, because that’s exactly what you wanted, and he goes quiet for a second. “Don’t make fun of me,” he mumbles, looking away from you again.

“I’m not,” you say, and you take a step in his direction so you can bump your shoulder against his. “You shouldn’t worry that much, but I think it’s nice that you do. I was just trying to get a rise out of you.”

“That worked really well,” he says, and he sounds surprised about it. You wonder if it’s because he usually doesn’t get angry for stuff, but you can’t tell for sure. “Hey, you—”

People start shouting numbers inside, and you turn around to look at them.

“It’s midnight,” you say.

“Five!”

You look up at Jungkook. He’s significantly taller than you. Not as much as Namjoon, but still.

“Four!”

Jungkook looks back at you, smiles, and it takes your breath away. His hair looks very good like that, you think absent-mindedly, with the way it falls on either side of his face.

“Three!”

It’s too late to go back inside now. It would definitely be a weird thing to do. Which means you’re here, alone, with Jungkook.

“Two!”

Your eyes flicker to his lips. You wonder what it would be like to kiss them. You haven’t let yourself even consider it before, but right now your brain isn’t functioning all that well. Probably because of how loud your heart is beating in your chest.

“One!”

You look back up and his eyes are wide and focused on you. There’s that same tension in his shoulders as when you first met him, except, back then, he couldn’t look at you, and now it seems that he can’t look away.

“Happy new year!”

You decide you shouldn’t think about your next move. You get on your tiptoes to plant a kiss at the corner of his lips, right at the border between friends and something else, but he leans forward right at that moment, and his hands cup your face, and then he’s kissing you.

It’s like an explosion. You don’t know what you should focus on. How warm he is, how soft and large his hands are, how his lips move against yours, how he tastes, or simply the fact that he’s kissing you, Jungkook is kissing you!

The door slams open, and the two of you move away in a jump.

“Happy new year Jungkook!” Taehyung shouts, obviously drunk, soon joined by several other members of the basketball team. If he’s seen what happened, he doesn’t say anything, and you doubt Taehyung would have that kind of control over himself.

Soon, Jungkook is surrounded and they start to drag him back inside. He gives you a brief, apologetic look, then follows them, laughing. You remain there, frozen, unsure of what to do. You take a hesitant step towards the door, only to see a girl planting kisses on his cheeks while he blushes. What gets to you, though, is the arm he’s wrapped around her, the way he’s tracing circles on the naked skin of her shoulder. It makes the gesture look… intimate. Personal.

You let out a brief, bitter laugh, that there is fortunately no one to hear. You feel confused, but mostly, you feel stupid.

Fuck that.

It doesn’t take long for you to drop the jacket onto a chair and find your coat. You wish a happy new year to Namjoon, when you pass by him on your way out, and he looks a little surprised, like he hasn’t heard the shouting. You don’t want to know what he could have been up to.

You’ve kept your end of the bargain, you think as you leave. Jin won’t be able to complain to you. You feel some petty sort of satisfaction when you step outside and find yourself alone alone, finally. You like this. You like being alone. You’ve never asked for anything else.

You give one last look to the party, then vanish into the night. You’re better off on your own anyway.

“I don’t think I’ll be coming,” you say, nonchalantly, as everyone around the table is talking animatedly about a party for the next week-end.

You had hoped it would go unnoticed in the middle of the conversation, but, unfortunately, that doesn’t go as planned. Taehyung turns horrified eyes towards you, Jin, Namjoon and Yoongi all look surprised, and Jungkook… You don’t know how to read him. There’s that surprise, as well, but then he looks down before you can tell anything else. Not that that changes much. He’s barely looked at you today.

You haven’t talked to him since New Year’s Eve. You had other things on your mind, and then he didn’t show up at the library last Wednesday.

“What do you mean, you won’t be coming?” Jin asks. “You always come to parties.”

You shrug. You don’t miss the alarmed looks your friends are exchanging, and you’re sure Namjoon can see through you. Because it’s not like you to do something like that, whatever reason you may give.

“I don’t like them. They’re too loud, and I can’t say that I really enjoy standing alone for half the night.”

“You could stay with us,” Namjoon offers.

“And watch you pick up a girl every time? No thank you,” you reply with a disgusted shiver.

“You could stay with me,” Yoongi says.

You give him a look, and he grimaces, backing down immediately. Okay. He can see why you wouldn’t want that either. Plus he’s pretty sure that Jimin and him are about to get it on after weeks of flirting, so it’s probably not a great idea.

“What about me?” Jin asks. He doesn’t sound as energetic as usual, his voice almost quiet, and you realize that he probably feels bad because of what you said. He knows you come to those parties because of him, so knowing you don’t have fun at all when you’re attending — you understand that he might feel responsible.

“I think I would bore you very quickly,” you chuckle. “You’re not going to get the fun you want with me. But it’s fine, really. I tried it, and now I know it’s not for me. I can just—”

“No,” Taehyung says.

You blink.

“No?”

“I’m taking this personally,” he tells you, looking you dead in the eye. “You’re coming to this party and I’m going to make you enjoy yourself.”

You’ve never seen him so serious, and you can’t help it. You burst out laughing.

“Taehyung,” you say softly when you’re done. “I appreciate that, I do, but I don’t want to do that anymore.”

Taehyung opens his mouth, then winces and closes it. You’re not sure what happened there, but he gives Jungkook an offended look.

“I’m sorry,” you add. “I’m sure your parties can be great, but—”

“I get it,” he sighs. “But you owe me.”

You’re not sure why, but fine.

“And you can’t say anything bad about those parties, to anyone. Ever.” In that moment, he looks almost threatening, and you blink, confused. He can’t possibly take it that seriously, can he?

Then he yelps and rubs his leg. He gives Jungkook another annoyed look, but Jungkook doesn’t even look up from his food.

“Leave her alone,” he just mumbles.

Taehyung rolls his eyes, but doesn’t add anything. He does give you a long, pointed glance, though, before muttering under his breath something that sounds a lot like “I won’t let that slander stand,” and you think that’s hilarious too.

When you risk a glance at Jungkook, his arms are folded over his chest, and he looks deep in thought. He’s chewing on his bottom lip, eyes focused on his meal, though he’s not touching it. It’s stupid, but the image of a child that has just been scolded flashes in your mind.

“Jungkook? Is everything alright?”

He jumps at your question, looks at you like a deer caught in headlights. Your eyes meet, but it’s extremely brief, and your chest tightens. This sucks. You thought the two of you had gotten past that now, and you hate that you lost what you had. It’s not like it’s your fault. He kissed you, and then he bailed on you first chance he got. Why would he do that, why would he risk it, if he was going to react like that afterwards?

“I’m fine,” he says with a tense smile, and you doubt it’s true, but you don’t know what you should ask him to confront him about it. You don’t want to talk about the kiss ever again. You certainly don’t want to do it in front of your friends.

So you jump on the first chance you get to leave the table. You don’t ask yourself if it’s a weird thing to do. It probably is, but fuck it, you’re weird, and everyone else can deal with it. You refuse to subject yourself to something unpleasant longer than absolutely necessary.

Except the looks you get are mostly concerned ones, from Namjoon and Jin. Jungkook does look up as you walk away, eyes following you almost longingly, and then he lets out a long sigh that catches Taehyung’s attention. He doesn’t say anything, but he narrows his eyes at him.

God. He really has to get everything done here, doesn’t he?

At first, you think that this is it. Your— your whatever it was that you had with Jungkook is over. You’ll see him around every now and then, and maybe he’ll give you a polite nod, though it doesn’t look like he would even do that right now, but there won’t be anything else. You’ll go back to being basically strangers, and it will be fine, because really, nothing happened there, right? You had a crush on him, he kissed you once, and then nothing. It’s fine. You’ll be fine.

Sure, it makes you a little sad. Sure, you catch yourself looking at him while he’s surrounded by girls who are all so much better for him than you ever were, and it hurts a little. Sure, walking back home alone at night is a little more unpleasant than it used to be, but that’s the thing. It’s only a little. You would almost pat yourself on the back for it. Congrats, (Y/N). You made it out before you got too attached. You probably avoided a world of hurt.

Because you know. You know that if you had gotten in too deep, it would have hurt like hell to not have Jeon Jungkook. And sure, it hurts right now.

But only a little.

You’re good. You’re safe. You know that Namjoon and Yoongi would nod if you told them about it. They understand, in a way a lot of other people don’t. You don’t think that Jin would, for example. He would tell you to take the risk, not understanding that people like Jungkook used to pick you last for their teams when you were in high school, not understanding that as far as you’re concerned, you’ve handled more than enough rejection throughout your life. But Namjoon and Yoongi… They’re definitely more successful than you in matters of the heart, but they would still understand. Not that you’re going to tell them about it, because it’s a stupid story, because there never was anything there, and because you’d feel really dumb talking about how you thought, how you hoped that— You’re not going to tell them anything. At least everything’s okay now.

And then, Jungkook appears at your usual table at the library on a Wednesday afternoon. He drops his bag on the floor and takes a seat next to you. You’re surprised to see him when you look up, too focused on your studies to notice him approaching. He has big, wide doe eyes, and he watches your reaction carefully.

“You’re— This seat isn’t taken?”

You shake your head. No. People rarely come here, and you don’t really study with people. Well, didn’t, you suppose.

“Do you mind if I sit here?“

“The seat’s free. You can take it if you want.”

You don’t know what to do. You don’t know how to react. This wasn’t supposed to happen. You never considered that Jungkook would— That he would—

“I, um, I like studying with you. It helps me focus,” he says, eyes flickering away from you. “So, if you don’t mind I’ll— Can I come back here on Wednesdays?”

You want to tell him that you can’t stop him, that he can do whatever the hell he want, but even though it’s on the tip of your tongue, you don’t.

“Of course you can,” you say instead.

Jungkook looks up long enough to flash you a smile, and you know. This isn’t over, and you’re not going to be fine. You’re probably going to feel crushed, sooner than later, and you could have stopped it all right now.

You think about Yoongi and how not like him it is to be doing what he is with Jimin. How he’s taking a risk. How it could oh so easily not have paid off.

It’s going to, of course. You just need to look at Jimin’s eyes when he’s talking to Yoongi to know that. But Jungkook doesn’t look at you like that. Jungkook doesn’t look at you at all.

And yet here you are. Taking that exact same risk.

God. You can be so stupid some times.

Jungkook glances at you quickly while you’re deep in thought, tapping your pencil against your cheek, and a small smile forms on his lips. He’s quick to glance away, because he would hate it if you caught him, of course, but the smile doesn’t fade.

He couldn’t have forced it to do so if he tried.

“You have to come to the next game.”

“Taehyung, hey, nice to see you to, I’m doing fine, I—”

“I’m serious, (Y/N). I know you hate basketball and everything that breathes, but—”

“I don’t hate you.”

“—this is really important and— Wait, really? Thank you. I feel that means a lot coming from you.”

“Is that how you see me? I don’t hate everyone, Taehyung.”

“Can you give me a list of people you don’t hate?”

“Well, you, Jin, Yoongi, Namjoon…”

“Jungkook?”

“…Sure. Jungkook. Why do you want me to come to the next game?”

“Because we might lose.”

“And I’m supposed to change that how?”

“You owe me, remember?”

“I— Because of the parties? Seriously? I need to sit through hours of you guys running after a ball because I don’t like parties?”

“I would really appreciate it if you could avoid describing basketball as ‘guys running after a ball’.”

“I would really appreciate not having to go watch the game.”

“Don’t you want to support your friends on the team?”

“Ugh. Fine. I’ll be there. Just— stop that thing you’re doing with your eyebrows. Why are you even doing that?”

“You’re so slow. How are you so slow? I thought you were supposed to be smart!”

“Taehyung…”

“Just be there!”

“I will.”

“You better!”

“Or what, what will you— Taehyung! You can’t just run off like— Well. I guess he could.”

You hadn’t thought sitting through a basketball game could become a more painful experience to you than it already was. As it turns out, you were wrong. It was so much worse when the people you wanted to win were losing. Despite yourself, you found yourself getting invested, standing up and shouting encouragements along with Jin and Namjoon, and protesting loudly when things didn’t go your way.

You were not cut out for this. Not because you still didn’t understand half the rules — you could have by now if you had made the effort of memorizing them — but because of the stress. God, how did your friends handle that regularly? How did the players handle it? You kept looking at Jungkook. You could tell how unhappy he was with the situation, could see the disappointment settling in. He also seemed to get more nervous as time went by, which didn’t help his performance, and his words kept echoing in your mind.

”I don’t know what’s going to happen when I stop being as good.”

You’re half way through the game and things are not looking good when Taehyung waves you over. You run to the railway, straining to hear him, and when you finally understand what he’s saying, you regret making any effort at all.

“You can’t possibly be serious!”

But he is.

“You owe me, (Y/N)!”

“I’m already— What’s it even going to do?”

“Trust me on that one, okay?”

You glare at him, but he’s looking at you with his beautiful brown eyes, and there’s nothing you can do against that. You sigh deeply. Your heart is beating wildly in your chest just thinking about what he’s asking you to do. Maybe it’s not such a big deal for him, that sort of stuff, but for you— For you it’s downright insane to even consider.

“Kim Taehyung,” you hiss through gritted teeth, “if this goes bad, I’ll kill you and plant your head on a stick outside of my door to warn my enemies not to underestimate me.”

He has the audacity to shrug at that.

“It won’t go bad.”

You look up. Take a deep breath. And call Jungkook’s name.

The gym is insanely loud, and it takes both you and Taehyung’s efforts, as well as a lot of waving, for Jungkook to notice you. When he does, though, he runs towards you, worry obvious on his face. He’s looking directly at you for once, and the intensity of his stare almost makes you shiver.

“Is everything alright?” he asks when he gets there, eyes scanning you quickly to make sure that you’re okay.

“It’s fine, I just—”

“What are you doing here? You hate basketball. Did something happen?”

You shake your head. You don’t know how you’re supposed to do this, especially when he’s looking so puzzled and when he’s questioning your sanity for showing up at one of his games. You glance over at Taehyung who gives you a decided nod.

Ah. Fuck it.

Leaning over about as far as you can go, you cup Jungkook’s face, and as his expression turns to one of surprise, you kiss him. If people around notice or have a reaction, you can’t tell, because Jungkook pushes himself against you and buries his hand in your hair as he holds you. There’s not much space left for thinking in your mind, instead entirely consumed by thoughts of him. He’s completely sober this time, and you don’t taste alcohol on his tongue. He’s also not going as slow, almost desperately kissing you back, one strong hand supporting you so you don’t fall over, and you just melt.

It takes everything in you to push yourself away. When you do, you’re breathless, and he’s staring at you with eyes even wider than usual. You’re pretty sure Taehyung would want you to give an encouraging speech right now, but you don’t want to do that right now.

“I really don’t care if you’re winning or losing games,” you say instead. “If you’re sad, I’ll be sad with you, but it’s never going to change anything in how I see you. But I’ll be here encouraging you.”

He grabs your hand, squeezing it tight.

“Promise?” he asks, almost childishly.

You’re not sure which part he’s referring to, but they’re all true, so you nod.

“I promise.”

He smiles, and then both him and Taehyung are running back across the field and getting yelled at by their coach, but even from where you’re standing, you can see their smiles.

You guess that means you’re not going to murder Taehyung.

“This is actually insane. How is Jungkook even doing that?” Yoongi asks in disbelief after Jungkook scored extremely impressively yet again, and you fidget in your seat. You’re very happy to see that, though you don’t how you feel about the smug looks Taehyung is sending you, but you don’t want—

“It’s the power of love,” Jin says, nodding like he just gave an essential truth to the meaning of life.

—this. You, very specifically, don’t want this.

“Jin,” you sigh, “there’s no such thing as—”

“Actually,” Namjoon interrupts you, “I think he’s right. The power of love is a thing, and I think this is a perfect demonstration of it.”

You gape at him, in shock. He betrayed you?

“Did you just—”

“Namjoon’s right,” Yoongi nods. “This is how the power of love works. You take love, and you turn it into strength.”

And then, him, Jin and Namjoon high five, and you gasp. Traitors. All of them.

But after that, Jimin says off-handedly “Maybe you should come and kiss me before my next competition” and Yoongi’s brain visibly stops functioning, so you consider yourself avenged.

After the match, you wait for Jungkook outside of the locker room. Jin insisted you should go celebrate on the field, but you had declined. It felt like the situation required something a little more private, so now you’re here, leaning against the wall, looking at your phone so you’ll seem busy, even if there’s nothing on there to occupy yourself.

You’re not the only one there, and that doesn’t help soothing your nerves. There are a lot of girls, all pretty and smiling. It makes you feel like a groupie, and you don’t like it. You’re relieved for a second when the door opens and the team comes out, but it doesn’t last long, because the girls are soon surrounding them. You remain where you were standing, watching the whole thing happen. It takes a few moments before you notice Jungkook’s bun standing out of the group, and it makes you smile.

You catch Taehyung’s eye first, and, after you’ve sent him a glare that you hope was threatening, he pushes Jungkook out of the group. At first, he seems confused, before he finally finds you. You wave at him hesitantly. He blinks a few times, his eyes wide, then walks towards you.

“Hey,” he says when he joins you. He’s towering over you. Usually, you don’t like that, and you’ve complained about having to look up at Namjoon more than once, but you don’t necessarily mind right now.

“Hey,” you reply.

Silence stretches between the two of you as you try to think of something to say. You should have prepared a speech, you know that, but you’re pretty sure you wouldn’t have been able to say it either.

“Taehyung told me he told you to kiss me,” Jungkook blurts out after a while, looking away from you, and you give him a surprised glance. “So, you don’t have to—”

“No, I wanted to kiss you,” you interrupt him, a puzzled frown forming on your face.

Jungkook’s head whips back towards you, and you just stare at him in confusion.

“Do you really think I would have kissed you just because Taehyung asked me to?”

“Well you— you came to the game because he asked you to, right?”

“That’s not the same—”

“Jungkook!” someone from the team calls. “We’re going to grab a bite to celebrate, do you wanna come?”

Jungkook sighs, then gives you a sharp look.

“You wanted to kiss me,” he repeats.

You nod.

“Why?”

You bite your lower lip, and you’re not oblivious to the way his eyes fall to your mouth when you do.

“And I’m the blunt one,” you mumble.

“Sorry, I–”

“No, no, it’s fine, it’s just— I wanted to kiss you because I like you. Obviously.”

Jungkook swallows, and you can see his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. He looks over his shoulder at his friends.

“You can go without me!”

There are some protests, but he ignores them to give you his entire attention. It’s… not an unpleasant feeling.

“You disappeared after I kissed you the last time,” he says.

“You left,” you protest immediately. “You kissed me, and then the second your friends arrived, you acted like nothing happened and you left.”

“I didn’t want to— I just— They’re really annoying about that stuff, you know? I thought it would probably be better if I talked to you after— ‘m sorry. I didn’t— didn’t realize it—”

You look at Jungkook, watch him fumbling for words, and it hits you like a ton of bricks, how much you do like him. Those words really don’t do it justice, and maybe you’re not quite ready to talk about love just yet, but you like him so much, so much it makes your heart swell, so much you don’t think what what he’s trying to tell you would change anything to it, and yet what he’s trying to say is exactly what prompts your realization. He didn’t want to hurt you. Wanted this to be private, for just the two of you, wanted to see how you felt about it. And maybe he went the wrong way about it, but it means everything that he was trying.

“Walk me home?” you ask.

Jungkook finally stops his rambling.

“Are you sure?”

Of course, he has to ask that now, after weeks of trying to convince him to let you walk on your own. Still, you smile and nod, and when you start walking side by side, you grab his hand. He freezes temporarily before grinning and squeezing your hand, pulling it into his pocket so you won’t be too cold, because the air of January is chilling.

“Congratulations for the game,” you say after a long, comfortable silence. You had almost forgotten about it.

“Thanks,” he chuckles. “I had some help.”

And then, he winks at you, and your heart misses a beat. That’s when you understand something you hadn’t even considered before: if Jungkook stops being shy around you, you’re done for. You’ll be the one constantly flustered.

“So,” you say, slowly, trying to keep yourself composed, “why did you kiss me?”

“Um. Same as you?” Jungkook’s confidence disappears, and he returns to his awkward self, and you see that, as much as you like it, you want him to be comfortable around you. But that doesn’t mean you can’t tease him a little.

“What do you mean by that?” you ask innocently.

He gives you a horrified look that soon turns to an offended one when he notices you grinning widely.

“You’re so mean,” he says, but he’s smiling too, “you’re the meanest person I know.”

You’re laughing at that point, as you stop in front of your dorm.

“That’s not an answer.”

“Fine,” he sighs dramatically. “I kissed you because I like you.”

It’s funny. You knew that was what he was going to say, knew it was coming, and yet it gets to you all the same.

“With you, I don’t feel like I have to be the school’s star, you know? I can just be— Jungkook. You don’t expect me to be anything else.”

He’s right. You like Jungkook. With his insecurities and his flaws. You don’t want him to perform for you, and you don’t care what he’s doing right and wrong. Just studying maths in the library with him makes you happy.

He eyes your dorm and takes a deep breath.

“I should go,” he says.

You hum.

“Yes, it would be a really bad idea if you came up tonight.”

But you’re not letting go of his hand, and he’s close to you now, close enough that you can feel his breath catching in his throat. It makes you smile.

“You’re so mean,” he repeats.

This time, instead of laughing, you kiss him, and it’s completely different from the two previous times. There is no uncertainty in this kiss, no surprise, no pressure, no fear. It’s perfect. Jungkook’s hand comes to cup your cheek, his lips soft against your own. His long fingers gently stroke your jaw as he keeps the kiss chaste and sweet. It only makes you yearn for more and when he moves away, you can see in his eyes that he wants more as well.

You just don’t think he wants it now.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, then?” you ask.

“I’ll meet you for lunch,” he says solemnly, and it rings like a promise, which makes you smile.

When you move away, though, he doesn’t let go of you, and a pouty expression appears on his face before he releases you.

“I— Yeah. You should go.”

“You can come up if you want to, you know?”

He hesitates, rolls his lips together.

“I want to savor this,” he admits to you in a near whisper.

“Then I’ll go.”

“Yes. Good night.”

“Good night.”

You feel light and giddy as you walk through the door. It’s a nice and strange feeling, like you could just start floating any second.

You already can’t wait for the next day.

People are definitely weirded out by your relationship with Jungkook. Or, rather, by Jungkook’s relationship with you. You’re pretty sure most of the people who give you weird looks when you sit next to him and he wraps his arm around you, or when you walk hand in hand, wouldn’t pay attention to you if you went to class naked. But they all know who Jungkook is, and you guess it is weird to see you in conjunction with him.

They could ignore it and consider you mere part of the scenery when he ate with you, you suppose, but it is harder to do now. You’re not too fond of being the center of attention, to be honest. You don’t know how Jungkook does it.

What takes you by surprise the most is people being nice to you. That confuses you to no end, because you know for a fact they don’t care about you, not really, and you cannot fathom what they think they’re going to get out of this. You’re pretty sure there are a girl or two who are doing that to get closer to Jungkook, and some, you think, have decided to be nice to you because they think that if Jungkook likes you, you can’t be a total lost cause.

You don’t like that feeling. Not at all. You don’t like it when you’re going to class, you don’t like it during lunch, and you definitely, definitely do not like it when people rush towards you the second you get to a party.

Yeah, you’re giving Taehyung what he wanted, in the end. He said that both you and Jungkook owed him, because without him you wouldn’t be together, and you eventually gave in.

You thought it would be fine, now that you have someone to spend time with, but you understand with horror that your status has changed now. You’re not invisible anymore. You’re Jungkook’s girlfriendTM. Because of that, you spend much longer in the entrance making small talk than you would have wished to, and you’re stopped a couple of times while you’re desperately looking for your boyfriend to save you from this hell on earth.

You’re not surprised at all to find him playing beer pong with Taehyung and other guys from the team. He hasn’t gotten time to get drunk yet, so he’s quite impressive, but then again, they all are. That’s why they usually end up wasted.

The second he sees you, though, he abandons the game completely, and the smile on his face threatens to make your heart explode in your chest. Some of the guys turn around to look at you, give you a wave or a smile. Taehyung shouts a greeting.

“Hey,” Jungkook says, leaning in to press a quick kiss on your lips. He doesn’t like PDA all that much, but he never misses a chance to kiss you, and the thought makes you all giddy.

“Hey. Are you, um, having fun there?”

He shrugs.

“It’s not that bad. Wanna play?” He waits for your expression to turn to one of horror as you try to refuse politely before laughing. “Just kidding. Don’t worry about it.”

You let out a relieved breath. You know you and Jungkook are very different people, and you’re doing your best to take an interest in the things he likes. You’ve been learning the rules of basketball, for example, and though you still don’t believe you get the point, you like the way his eyes shine when you say something right about a game.

But you don’t take part in any of that stuff. Okay, you stop at that field that’s on your way home from the library every now and again, but that doesn’t count. It’s just you and him then, and you feel good and relaxed. You’ve even scored a couple of times now.

“Come on, I want to grab a drink,” Jungkook said, taking your hand in his, and you follow without protesting.

It’s probably your second mistake of the night: not realizing that getting a drink with and without Jungkook are two very different ordeals. On your way there, you get roped into several conversations. Those are fine. You can’t say you enjoy them, but they’re fine, and it’s not like those people are actually talking to you anyway.

What you genuinely dislike is that, when you’re by the table with the drinks, a girl starts openly flirting with your boyfriend. It’s not subtle, either, with the way she keeps touching his arm and how she laughs at his every word.

For a while, you just stare in disbelief. You know Jungkook is oblivious to that sort of things — probably one more reason why he likes how blunt you are — but you can’t believe her. You wouldn’t necessarily blame the girl for trying, either, if she didn’t know about you. Jungkook’s quite the catch after all, and you understand liking him better than anyone else.

No, it’s the fact that she’s doing it right in front of you, while Jungkook is holding your hand. It feels so— dismissive. So insulting. She’s not exactly saying to your face that she doesn’t take you seriously, but she might as well.

You watch incredulously when she puts her hand on his arm one more time. You don’t know how you’re supposed to handle that, so you just tug on Jungkook’s hand a little awkwardly. You’re pleased by how quickly his attention snaps to you, even while the girl is in the middle of her sentence. It’s a petty sentiment, for sure, but you can’t help it.

“Everything okay?” he asks. “Is it too loud in here?”

“Kind of, but—”

“Let’s find you a quieter place.”

He forgets about the drink he wanted to get, forgets about the girl, who he abandons there unceremoniously, gently pulling you through the room. Next thing you know, he’s carefully closing the doors of the closet he’s found for the two of you behind you.

“There,” he says, sounding satisfied with himself. “Better?”

You chuckle at that and, guessing for him in the half-light, you pull him towards you for a kiss. You press your body against his, pushing him against the back of the closet, and a groan forms in his throat. His hands tighten around you, sending shivers through your entire being, and you only lean into him more. You run your fingers over his chest, just to feel him tremble under your touch and he does, hissing with pleasure at the contact.

“Fuck,” he mumbles into your mouth. “Was that— was that what you had in mind?”

You shake your head, and he’s close enough to feel it.

“That girl was flirting with you,” you tell him.

“Oh. Are you sure?”

You are.

“So… are you jealous? Because that’s kind of hot.”

You laugh softly. Truth is, you really, really don’t want to be the jealous girlfriend, but Jungkook actually sounds happy about the idea.

“You really didn’t notice?”

There’s a moment of silence.

“I didn’t. Does that— Did it bother you, that she was doing that?”

“Kind of,” you shrug. “What about you? You’re— cool with that?”

“If it bothers you I don’t like it,” he replies simply, one of his hand leaving your waist to grab yours and squeeze it gently. “I’m sorry I didn’t notice.”

That makes you chuckle.

“How didn’t you? She would have made it barely more obvious if she had started undressing herself.”

Jungkook has an awkward laugh, and you can feel his breath on your face. He starts fidgeting, but then you press a kiss right at the corner of his lips, and he calms down, if just a little.

“It’s— You have to promise you won’t make fun of me.”

“I won’t.”

He hesitates a second longer, as though he’s trying to judge your sincerity by looking at you — except, of course, he can barely see a thing in here. You kiss him again, following his jaw, and he finally gives in when you start making your way down his neck.

“When I’m with you, it’s like my vision narrows on you,” he says, voice low. “I know everything and everyone else is still there, but I just think about you. Sorry, it’s really stupid.”

“It’s not,” you say, shaking your head, wondering if he can feel your heart beating stupidly fast in your chest, all because his words make you feel like nothing else ever has before. “But I’m— I’m kind of boring. That can’t be fun.”

“You’re not boring,” he protests. “You listen to people, even when you don’t look like it. You always look like you have a thousand things on your mind but you always make time for your friends, and when you’re studying here, you play with your hair.” He twirls a lock of your hair around one of his fingers before releasing it, as if to demonstrate. “You’re a very, very interesting person to look at.”

The only thing you can do is stay there, frozen in his arms, after he’s said that. You may be blunt, but Jungkook is honest. Devastatingly so. His vulnerability always shatters the walls that you’ve built around yourself, and you still don’t know how to react when that happens.

So you push yourself on your tiptoes to kiss him again, except this time it’s slow and gentle and you’re trying to put everything he means to you into it. The tip of your fingers are on his cheeks, your mouth barely moving against his, soft noises filling the closet. Jungkook remains still, letting you in complete control, like he’s afraid he could break you if he moved.

“Thank you,” you whisper when you pull away from him.

“For what?” he asks, breathless.

“For being here with me tonight, and for coming with me at that first party.”

“Of course. Any time.”

He lets himself fall to the floor, taking you down with him and keeping you into his lap once he’s done that. You rest your head against his chest. You hear the noises of the party still going on outside, but Jungkook is your island of peace in the middle of the chaos.

“I think I’m going to stop basketball,” Jungkook blurts out without a warning, and you look at him, surprised.

“Really?” you ask.

“Yeah. Really. I just— I don’t want to be doing that anymore.”

You think about it for a few seconds, then nod.

“You probably should stop, in that case.”

“People are… not going to be happy about it.”

“I’m sure Taehyung won’t be mad at you. Well, not for too long.”

He laughs softly, but his hold on you doesn’t relax, and you know that this was hard for him to even consider. You know it’s a terrifying decision to take, too.

“Thank you,” he says. “For being here with me tonight, too.”

“Any time.”

The truth is, you wouldn’t give that moment away for anything in the world, and something tells you Jungkook wouldn’t either. It’s not ideal, it’s not perfect, but you don’t believe there is such a thing, and you’re happy to satisfy yourself with the imperfect.

But any moment you can spend in Jungkook is as close to perfect as can be.

“I love you,” he whispers in your ear, and you think that he might feels the same way, which almost makes you burst with happiness.

“And I love you,” you whisper back.

Not perfect, perhaps. But close enough.

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