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sluttyten · 4 years

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7 and 13 with Sicheng? 🐥

“You taste like fucking candy.“ + “I-I just, I wasn’t expecting that. But I liked it. A lot.” + winwin

You’re not a baby, that’s for damn sure. But somehow, someway, your mother still managed to foist a babysitter on you when you were a full-grown adult living in a city far away from her.

You were sick, but not the kind of sick that medicine could fix. It was more of an emotional sickness than a physical one, and that was something your mother didn’t really understand.

“It’s your birthday, you can’t be sick.” She’d told you as soon as you answered the phone. “What about going out with your friends, having fun?”

But that was just the problem. Since moving to Seoul a couple months ago, you hadn’t truly made any real friends. There were acquaintances at work, but none of them even really knew it was your birthday, and they certainly weren’t about to throw a party for you. You just didn’t know how to tell that to your family, especially since you’d told them stories about your coworkers enough that they recognized the names and assumed they were your friends.

“Mom, I just don’t feel well today.” You repeated against her insistence of it’s your birthday!

Truthfully it was because of all of this that you didn’t feel well. The loneliness weighed down your stomach like a physical stone resting in your belly, swelling with nausea every time that you remembered that it’s your birthday and you’re alone in a city that you don’t always feel that you belong in.

“Well, you shouldn’t be alone,” your mother says. “Call over one of your friends.”

Again, a pang in your belly. You bite your lip. “I don’t want anyone else to get sick.” The lie only makes it worse.

“You won’t get anyone sick, you’re being silly. If you won’t call over a friend, I’ll text that nice boy from your building and tell him to come over.” You can already hear her moving away from her phone, heading toward the old-fashioned book where she keeps track of important things.

“Mom, oh my God. No! That would be humiliating.”

What’s worse than being completely alone on your birthday? Having your mom send a random guy who lives in your building to come hang out with you out of pity. You can still remember the bizarre panic and embarrassment that had swept through you in those first few days when you were moving in. Your mother had come with you just to help you get situated and make sure that the apartment was going to be nice like the pictures online.

She’d gone out to get groceries on the second day while you tried setting up the wifi completely, and when she returned she was beaming and began telling you about the neighbor just two doors down who’d helped her when she dropped one of the bags, who was about your age and so handsome, and she’d told him all about her daughter who had just moved in upstairs. Somehow your sneaky mother had gotten his number just in case she ever couldn’t get in contact with you or if something happened to you and someone needed to contact her.

Or, you know, in case her daughter was lonely and she could humiliate you by contacting this neighbor you had never met, and asking him to come sit with you.

You were mortified.

“Mom! No!” You insisted again as you heard her stop flipping pages and make a quiet aha as she found the number she was looking for. “Mom, are you seriously–”

“You need to have someone with you on your birthday, even if you’re sick. Happy Birthday. Love you!” And she ended the call just like that.

Now you felt even worse than before, so to take your mind off of how you were potentially being embarrassed long-distance, you took a shower, but that just gave you more time to mull over things, so then you dressed and cleaned the apartment, scrubbing at a stubborn stain on the sofa, and then vacuuming and dusting.

And when you were just finished with that, about to sit down and watch a movie, there was a knock on your door.

She didn’t, you wanted to scream and you almost wanted to cry angry, embarrassed tears.

Another knock, and then, “Y/N?”

It wasn’t a voice that you recognized, but when you came over to the peep hole in the door, you were stunned as you realized that you did know that face. But how did it know your name.

You opened the door to face WinWin of NCT and WayV fame.

He looked at you. You looked at him.

“Uhh, when you moved in, your mom asked for my number, and she just called to ask if I’d come check on you?” He rubbed at the back of his neck nervously. “She said you were sick.”

You could feel your face heating up. “Yeah. You really didn’t have to come check on me. You were probably busy and I really, really don’t want to get you sick.”

WinWin looked at you again, glancing up and down. “You don’t look sick.”

You sigh and lean against the door. “I’m not sick. Not really. I just told her that so she wouldn’t get upset that I’m alone on my birthday, because then I’d have to admit that I haven’t really made any friends since I moved here. And it’s pathetic enough that I’m explaining this to you, I don’t want to have to explain it to her too.”

“Well, you shouldn’t be alone on your birthday.” He says, and then he holds something out to you that you hadn’t noticed before. “The auntie who cooks for us made this for you when I told her about what your mom said. She says it’ll make you feel better. She also told me that if I don’t feed it to you and nurse you back to health myself, she’ll never let me forget it.”

“Did my mom say that or the auntie?” You ask, carefully taking the food parcel from WinWin.

“My dorm auntie.” He smiles. “By the way, I can’t believe we’ve never met before. We live so close to each other, and if you’ve not seen me or the others before, I’m sure you’ve heard them. They get so loud.”

Sometimes late at night you’d heard happy shouts or music coming from somewhere nearby. And once you had thought you saw Kun, but he was wearing a hat and a mask and it was late, so you assumed your mind was playing tricks on you. Now you knew that it was most likely him you’d seen.

“Well, tell her thank you for the soup. And I’m sorry about all of this. I’ll tell my mom to delete her number, like, I’d really hoped that she would have lost it by now so that way nothing as embarrassing as this could ever happen.” You start to step back to close the door, but the look on WinWin’s face makes you pause.

WinWin clears his throat. “I can still keep you company, if you’d like? I’m serious, I don’t think you should be alone on your birthday unless that’s what you really want.” It’s not what you want, but you don’t want him to hang out with you if he’s just doing it out of pity. As if he hears your thoughts, WinWin says, “Also, that’s a lot of soup that she made. A lot more than one person can eat. And I might have candy that I’d be willing to share with you as a birthday present.”

“Alright.” You step back, this time holding the door open wider for him to come inside, and in a light, teasing voice, you say, “But only because of the candy.”

As you pulled your short coffee table closer to the sofa, clearing it off a bit to make room for the soup, you were glad you’d cleaned your apartment and showered. WinWin sat there on your sofa, looking around the place with interest. Suddenly you were very conscious of the paintings you’d hung on your walls, the basket of unfolded laundry sitting outside the bathroom door, and the movie you had queued up on the TV.

But thank God the stain was gone from the couch and everything else was neat and tidy, fresh as your clean cotton air freshener could make it.

You grabbed bowls and spoons from the kitchen, and as you ladled some soup into a bowl for WinWin, you told him, “You know, you really probably shouldn’t give your number out to just anyone. Even if she is a mother concerned about the future of her daughter.”

“Why?” WinWin looked up at you, thanking you softly as he takes the bowl from you. “She could be crazy? Or a sasaeng’s attempt at getting my number?”

Yes, those are exactly the reasons.

“But if I hadn’t given her my number, then what are the chances that I’d get to be sitting here with you?” Your belly does a funny floppy fluttery feeling at his words. “Pretty low, if I had to guess. And that would be a shame because so far I feel like we could get along.”

“It’s probably because you’re a Scorpio.” You say before you realize. Your eyes go wide. “I just, I mean, I get along really well with Scorpios.”

WinWin looks at you sideways for a second. “So you are a fan?”

Again, a funny feeling mixed with nausea and embarrassment. “No, not really. Well, yes and no. I like your music, but it’s not like I obsess over you or anything like that. I’ve just seen stuff about your birthday, so I know you’re a Scorpio.” How do I make myself sound less crazy? you thought, looking down into your bowl of soup, praying that the whirls of steam will reveal the answer to you.

“It’s not a bad thing if you’re a fan,” WinWin says after a moment. “Just as long as you’re not going to sell pictures of me or stories. Or try to sell some of my hair.” He grimaces, but then tries to hide it as he takes a spoonful of the soup.

“I’m definitely not going to do that. I didn’t even know you lived here, I swear. And I definitely didn’t want you or anyone else coming to my apartment today. That was entirely my mother’s doing.”

WinWin changes the subject, talking instead about the art on your walls, asking if you painted them yourself (you did), asking questions about you and how you like living in Seoul. You talk for a bit about how it is coming from somewhere so different to live here, how it’s not a culture shock necessarily, but getting used to living in a foreign country can be difficult.

Any awkwardness you may have thought you were going to feel with him vanishes, and soon the soup is gone but the conversation continues and WinWin produces the promised candy from his pockets. It’s sticky and sweet and exactly what you needed. Even after the last candy wrapper is crumpled up beside the rest, WinWin stays, and it’s only as it’s getting late that his phone buzzes in his pocket and he has to leave, but not before you exchange numbers, so the next time you’re feeling lonely your mother doesn’t have to be the one to ask him to hang out with you.

And crazy as it may be, you do feel much better afterwards, though you’re not sure if it’s the soup, the company, the candy, or some combination of all three.

You almost passed him on the stairs a few days later.

“Hey.” WinWin’s voice is what caught your attention this time. You looked up so fast that your neck twinged, and you had to clutch onto the rail to keep from falling. WinWin reaches out too. “Woah, careful. Don’t fall because of me.”

“Thanks.” You rub your neck, hoping to soothe it.

WinWin then digs a hand into his pocket and the next thing you know, he’s holding a piece of candy out to you. You give him a funny look, but you take it anyway.

“What’s this for?”

“Just to make you feel better.” WinWin comes to stand on your side of the steps as another person tries to walk down. “Something to keep you sweet.”

You laugh and smile and pretend like you’re not blushing. “Thank you.”

“Are you feeling better? Less sick?” WinWin asks. “Or is your mom going to call me again?”

“She should leave you alone. I told her to.” You unwrap the piece of candy and pop it into your mouth. “And I am feeling much better. It turned out to be a pretty good birthday.”

WinWin’s gaze was warm on your face, a slow smile growing across his face. “Any particular reason?”

“Oh, it was for sure all the candy.” You ball up the candy wrapper, roll it around in the palm of your hand until WinWin suddenly reaches out and pinches it between his fingers. His fingertips brush your palm, leaving a tingle behind under your skin. Distracted by that, your voice comes out a lot softer when you say, “And the soup. Maybe the company, but that’s yet to be decided.”

Your busy smiling at WinWin, so you don’t notice when somebody rounds the stairs behind you and clears their throat. WinWin starts, and turns his gaze at the intruder. Hendery’s standing there, staring at WinWin’s fingers in your palm, the candy wrapper that you’re both seeming to cling to.

“Are you coming?” Hendery asks.

WinWin nods. “Yeah. A minute.”

Hendery slowly leaves, and when you’re alone again, WinWin says, “I have to go.” He steps down a few steps, not breaking eye contact with you in a way that suddenly feels very intimate. Before he turns away, he says, “You know, if you’re not going to let your mom contact me to come hang out with you, you could text me. I’ve got more candy, if you want it.”

As if you need the candy to want to hang out with WinWin. He’s handsome and funny and nice, sweet and smart and fun to talk to.

From somewhere down below in the building, you hear a door open and close.

“Go,” you tell him. “I’ll see you around.”

WinWin smiles and then dashes away down the stairs to catch up with Hendery.

Every time you see WinWin after that, he hands you a piece of candy. Sometimes more than one. Even if you’re only passing on the stairs or in the hall outside your apartments and neither of you has time to stop and chat, he’ll pass you a piece of candy and a smile. When you actually do text him and ask if he wants to come over, he brings candy. Once you even ran into him when you were coming home from a grocery run and he was stopping to grab some food from the place around the corner, and even then he had candy to give to you.

It was weeks or months later when you finally brought it up to him.

You were sitting together on the floor of your apartment. WinWin was leaned back with his head resting against the sofa, his eyes closed as he groaned about how full he was. You were still picking at what remained of the take out, but you were feeling pretty full too, and if the food continued sitting there, you knew you were just going to pick at it until you were miserably full.

So you started to clean up, gathering empty cola bottles, glasses, the food containers and napkins. And then you noticed a piece of candy sitting right there on top of your phone.

You sigh and pick up the piece of candy. “What’s this?”

WinWin cracks open an eye to see what you’re talking about. He frowns. “A piece of candy. Like usual.”

“You know, you don’t have to give me candy every time you see me. I promise you, the candy is not why I like seeing you.” You hope he knows that every time you’ve said that the candy is why you let him in that first night, that was a lie. The candy is not what keeps you coming back to him.

“I like giving you candy.” WinWin says. “Keeps you sweet.”

You wrinkle your nose at that cheesy line.

WinWin leans forward then and plucks the candy from your fingers. “Fine, no more candy for you then.”

“No! I didn’t say I don’t want the candy.” You whine and reach for it, but he pulls it farther out of your reach.

He holds it out of your reach, and you crawl toward him, stretching your arm up but your fingers only reach his wrist. WinWin laughs, and you watch as he nimbly unwraps the candy with just his one hand without dropping it. And then quickly, he brings it down. You move to intercept it, but then he closes his hand completely around it.

“Do you want it?” WinWin teases. You nod. WinWin jerks his chin. “Okay, sit back. Open your mouth.”

You do just that, sitting back on your heels right beside his knee, and WinWin holds the candy out, making airplane noises at you like your a child. He flies it toward your mouth in a zig-zagging pattern, and you’re not about to try to chase it now, but then it’s so close, right there within your grasp, and you move forward.

Your lips bump into his fingers, but it’s too late. WinWin jerks his hand back, pops the candy into his own mouth, and his lips curl into a victorious smile.

“That’s not fair!” You sit closer, so close to him that when he opens his mouth, you can almost smell the sweetness of the candy. “That was mine!”

WinWin laughs and takes your hand.

For a second you forget all about the candy. All that matter is his warm hand on yours, and your heart races trying to catch up with your mind which is jetting off into all sorts of different scenarios, down curious pathways.

WinWin presses something into your palm and curls your fingers around it. “I have more candy.” His words are soft, sweet, wrapped in a layer of affection you’ve never noticed before. “I’ve always got more candy for you.”

As soon as his hand leaves yours, you unwrap the candy and pop it into your mouth, savoring it on your tongue. It’s the same candy it’s always been, but somehow it tastes sweeter.

One of the others lets you into their apartment when you show up at the door. By this point, they all recognize you as the neighbor that WinWin keeps spending all of his time with when they’re not working. He’s not there now, but he will be soon, and you didn’t feel like waiting around in your apartment for him, so since he’d recently told you that you were welcome over at his place whenever you wanted, here you were.

And oddly, none of the other guys seemed to find anything strange about that.

You were just showed to the room that belonged to WinWin and someone else, neither of them were there at the moment, so you sat on the bed that was WinWin’s and you waited.

Looking around, you could see what in the space was his, what parts of it he’d made his own. And the more you looked around, the more you wondered, where did he hide his candy stash?

You didn’t want to look around through his things, being nosy and invading his privacy was not the reason you’d come over. However, it had been a few days since you saw him last, and you were craving just a taste of sugar. It didn’t really take long. You just took a peek under his bed, and there you found storage box that had a large bag of candy in it as well as some other snacks.

You couldn’t help it. You quickly dug out a handful of candy, unwrapped them, and stuffed them in your mouth, shoving the evidence in the pocket of your sweatshirt as you fell back onto the bed to enjoy your mouthful of stolen candy.

Several minutes later, you were still like that when WinWin came inside his room. He looked a bit worn out, a little rattled, and when he looked at you he seemed calmer.

“Hey.” You sat up, and in a light voice, you asked, “How was your day?”

He didn’t answer, not with his words anyway.

WinWin walked toward you, dumped his bag beside the bed, and put his hands to your cheeks, and drew your mouth to his in a bruising kiss. You gasped, opening up to him, and WinWin deepened the kiss, pressing you flat on the bed.

Part of you wondered if you’d somehow fallen asleep, if this was a dream? Because this had come out of nowhere. Hadn’t it?

You kissed him back, slowing it down and softening the kiss. WinWin makes a low moan that you echo back at him.

“You taste like fucking candy,” WinWin murmurs. He kisses you again, touching his tongue against yours in a way that has you squirming and making another little sound of pleasure. “So sweet. Hmm.” WinWin sits up then, runs his fingers through his hair, and suddenly frowns down at you. “I haven’t seen you in a few days. Why do you taste like candy so much?”

Tucking your hands into your sweatshirt pocket, you shake your head. “I don’t know. Maybe that’s just how I taste.”

WinWin shakes his head. “I don’t think that’s it.”

He leans over you again, and you laugh, place a hand to his chest. “Might I ask what brought this on? Not that I’m complaining about you kissing me. At all.” You can feel his heartbeat pounding against your palm, and it picks up again as he looks back at your lips.

“Don’t try to change the subject.” WinWin leans in again, and this time when he kisses you it’s just so gentle, his lips caressing yours, a hand cradling the back of your neck.

Your hand slips under his shirt, and he makes a strange but cute sound, shivering when you curl your fingers against his hip. “WinWin, why–?”

There’s a soft crinkling noise as WinWin touches your belly. He breaks the kiss, looks down at your sweatshirt, and then his hand plunges into your pocket, and draws out the crumpled up wrappers. “Mm, that’s what I thought. You found my sweet stash?”

“Yeah.” You tilt your chin, and WinWin crushes his mouth to yours again, the candy wrappers cascading from his fingers. “WinWin, really, what’s brought this on?” You ask between kisses.

“You make me happy.” WinWin strokes your cheek. “My day was kinda not great, but you make me happy. And I’ve been holding myself back, thinking that you don’t like me too. You just like me for my candy. But today, today I needed something happy, and here you were waiting for me.” He kissed you again, and this time you loop your arms around his neck.

You’re still kissing when the door opens. The floor creaks then creaks again and the door closes.

“Oops, your roommate’s probably scarred now.” You laugh.

“That’s okay,” WinWin says. He kisses you again. “Now he knows to leave us alone.”

You put a hand on his chest, pushing him back slightly as he moves forward to make out with you once again, and this time he pauses and looks down at you, your face all blushed and you a little out of breath.

“Are you okay?” WinWin pushes your hair back behind your ear.

You nod, twist your fingers in his shirt. “Yeah, just a little out of breath.”

WinWin moves off of you anyway. He rolls off the bed, and for a second you hear him rummaging around beneath it, and then he reappears.

“For you.” He holds out a candy to you.

You laugh and take it, unwrap it and pop it into your mouth, puckering as it’s a sour one that really hits you. You squeeze your eyes shut and shake your head, reaching out to lightly punch at WinWin as he laughs and slides back up onto the bed with you.

“Sour?” WinWin cradles your cheek, his thumb tracing the shape of your puckered lips.

“A little bit.” You shake your head and swallow. He offers you another candy, and this one is sweet.

You’re in the middle of taking a bath when you mother calls. The bath was nice and relaxing before, filled with bubbles and a pretty flowery scent. The free-standing bathtub had been your favorite feature of the apartment when you moved in, and it still was one of your favorite things about the place.

She didn’t really want anything in particular, just to talk at a time of day that would work out for both of you. You chatted for a bit, talking about work and life and how you were going to make dinner after this call was over since you were in the bath at the moment.

You run your fingers through the bubbles, scooping some of them up and blowing them around the room while you listen to your mother telling you about what her neighbor’s have been doing, which is apparently something gossip-worthy.

That’s the exact moment that WinWin decides to make use of the key that you recently lent him to your apartment. You hear the distant sound of him sitting down his keys and his phone on your table.

And then his voice echoes through the space as he calls your name.

Your mother’s story stammers to a halt. “Who’s that?” She asks as WinWin calls your name again. You groan, but your mother ignores that and excitedly says, “Do you have a boyfriend? Wait, is that your handsome neighbor?”

“Mom, oh my God. No. I have to go.” You end the call, stabbing at the screen with a soapy finger. “I’m in the bath, WinWin, I’ll be out in--”

Before you can say anything else, he’s come around the corner, right in clear view of you through the open bathroom door. You’d been alone just a minute ago, not expecting anyone over, so you hadn’t bothered to close the door as you usually didn’t.

You check your phone again, making sure that the call with your mom is ended, and then you sink lower into the bath, fully covering your body in bubbles, leaving only your head just above.

“WinWin.” When you say his name, a few bubbles blow loose, drifting in his direction. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I just wanted to come see you.” He stands in the doorway, leans against the doorjamb, and tries to not stare directly at you. “I was going to ask you if you wanted to grab dinner, but you’re clearly busy.”

You lift a bubbly hand and curl it over the edge of the tub. His eyes land on it and can’t seem to move away. “I’m just finishing the bath. I’m definitely not too busy to go to dinner with you. Especially if...”

“If what?” WinWin looks back up to your eyes again.

In a small voice, you say, “If it’s a date?”

Since that day when you’d made out on his bed at his apartment for the better part of an hour, you hadn’t done anything like that again. Things were almost just normal, just friends. That had been weeks ago, but there was still tension between you, an awkwardness but a strong connection that was just unaddressed.

“If you want it to be a date.” WinWin’s lips curl up in a shy smile.

You nod. “Can you hand me the towel?” You point over at the towel hanging a few feet away, just out of reach.

WinWin takes a few tentative steps inside, and then he grabs the towel, and as he hands it over to you, his fingers meet your slick skin. Instead of moving back, WinWin stays there for another long moment, his eyes run over your face, lingering on your lips.

“WinWin.” His name leaves your lips as a whisper, but it is enough.

He touches his fingers just beneath your chin, tilting your mouth up to perfectly slot against his in a new, heart-stopping kiss.

You push a soapy hand into his hair, fingers running against his neck, leaving bubbly trails behind, drawing him more deeply into the kiss. He sits on the side of the tub, his hand drifting lower until it’s sunken below the bubbles, his fingers resting on your shoulder. You drop your hand down, twist it in the bottom of his shirt, and give a tug, trying to get him closer to you.

In just an instant, he loses his balance, and comes sliding into your bath.

“Oh, shit!” WinWin laughs.

The room fills with disturbed bubbles. Water splashes over the sides of the tub. WinWin soaks in the water, his mouth barely pulled away from yours, and his denim-clad ass rests between your legs.

“I’m sorry.” You laugh and stroke a hand over his hair. “Are you okay?”

“Can’t say I’ve ever been better,” WinWin says. He closes the small space between you and him, pulling you into another kiss. You cling to him, kissing him back hungrily, desperately, and you shift, moving your legs out from under him just enough that you can throw one of them over his lap.

You draw yourself up. The cool air bites into your damp, bare skin, but the bubbles cling to you just enough that although WinWin’s eyes are wide, drinking in the sight of you, he can’t make out anything more than he’s really seen before. “WinWin,” you whisper his name again. As you rise fully up onto your knees, he brings his legs into the tub, shifting around so you can comfortably settle down onto his lap.

The soaked denim, the bubbles, the warm water and his sinking hands feel strange on your body, but at the same time, the feel of his thigh beneath your pussy drives you wild.

You press your bare chest against his, and you rub your pussy over his thigh with a whimper.

“Oh God.” WinWin looks at your face. “You’re so perfect, you know?”

“Shut up.” You kiss him. “I want you, need you.” Your hands fumble beneath the water, trying to undo his pants, and when WinWin realizes what you’re doing, his hands dip down to help you. His pants come open beneath your fingers, and then there’s his dick, hard and throbbing at your touch.

WinWin groans. You cover his mouth with yours to keep him quiet, a hand curling against the back of his neck, and the other you keep working at his dick beneath the bubbles until he’s fully hard, swearing between kisses until finally he pulls back just enough to tell you, “Please, I want to be inside you already.”

You lift up and then sit down on him, sinking down slowly to the sound of WinWin’s half-swallowed moans.

It’s strange feeling his clothes wet against your skin, his dick long and so good inside you, and his mouth caresses yours, his hands brush away the bubbles from your skin, leaving more and more of your bare to his eyes and touch. You shiver when his thumbs traces the curve of your breast, when it swirls in towards your nipple, so by the time he reaches your nipple it’s a hard peak awaiting his touch.

You let out a squeal as he tweaks your nipple, and WinWin smiles into the kiss and does it again. You grip his shoulder, rising up just to drop back down on him, kissing his sweet moan from his lips.

Each move you make as you ride him sends ripples, swallowing down the bubbles slowly. WinWin’s hands hurry the process along, as he touches you moving the bubbles around.

“God, you’re so fucking pretty.” WinWin tells you, his hand on your hips helping keep your rhythm steady as you grow tired of riding him. “After that day, I just thought you didn’t want anything to do with me. You didn’t make any moves like you wanted me.”

“Are you kidding?” You moan as he rocks his hips up against yours. “I’ve been dreaming about having you like this for weeks now. When you kissed me, God, WinWin, it awoke something in me and I just wanted to have you fuck me.” You cry out, and the sound echoes around the bathroom. “I’ve had all kinds of dreams.”

His hold on you tightens, bouncing you up and down on his dick. “As much as I’d love to hear them, I don’t know if I can take it at the moment. I’m close. You’re so warm and tight on me. Do you want me to cum inside?”

Your clit rubs against the fastening of his jeans and he fills you up so well, and at the thought of him cumming inside of you, you feel a tightening in your belly. You’re on birth control, so you’ll be fine, plus you want it so much.

“Cum inside me, WinWin. Oh, please, oh God.” You sink down to have him fully within you, and you swirl your hips in circles, your clit against that fastening of his pants, his dick rubbing against your G spot. “I want to feel you cum inside me.”

WinWin swears and bucks up into your heat a few times, and then he orgasms, shooting his load inside your pussy. You desperately rock yourself on his dick, pushing yourself nearer and nearer until a last it overwhelms you, your orgasm unraveling you in one quick moment.

You slump forward against him, heart racing, and you move on him a few more times, just getting the most out of it that you can until your energy leaves you, and you just bury your face into his shoulder.

“Are you okay?” WinWin cradles the back of your head.

“I-I just, I wasn’t expecting that. But I liked it. A lot.” You sigh softly. “I thought I’d just have a nice relaxing bath, wrap up and make something to eat for myself. Tonight turned out so much nicer.”

“It was nice, right? But I guess we’ll have to put a hold on dinner. For a little while at least.” WinWin brushes his fingers down your spine. “My clothes are a little too damp to go out to dinner.”

You draw his mouth to yours again, just leaving a little kiss. “I have a machine that dries clothes, believe it or not. If you just want to take your clothes off I can get you dry in no time.”

“I think you just want to get me naked, actually.” WinWin laughs. He pushes lightly at your hips, and you lift up off of him, stand to let the water sluice down your body, the last of the bubbles sliding away and leaving you totally visible for him. You grab up the towel from where you’d dropped it on the floor ages ago, and you wrap it around yourself, carefully stepping out of the tub. WinWin groans. “You’re so cute. Your butt, I mean.”

You swat a hand at him. “Get out of the tub. Take you clothes off. I’ll dry them for you, and I’m sure we can find something else to do while we wait for the to dry.”

As you walk toward the door, you hear him splashing out of the tub. There’s the wet slap of his shirt hitting the tile floor, and you turn to look over your shoulder just before you step out of the bathroom.

WinWin catches you looking, so he winks your way, and you hurry to your room to put some clothes on. You rummage around, looking for anything you think he could wear while you dry his clothes for him. There isn’t, and it doesn’t seem to matter to him because you turn around from searching your clothes, and see him standing comfortably in the doorway with just a towel around his waist.

“I have something for you.” He says.

You eye his towel, but WinWin grips it tighter around him.

“Not that. Here.” He holds out his hand, revealing a piece of candy in a soggy wrapper. “It’s a little wet, but I brought it for you.”

You take the candy, but you won’t eat it, not after it soaked in your bathwater. “How about we make some dinner, dry your clothes, and have a night in?”

Cooking while half-naked turns out to be a bad idea. The towel grows loose, you grow distracted, and you end up almost burning the food when you get a bit handsy and make out with your hand beneath his towel. But you wipe your hand clean on the towel, and sit down together to eat on the sofa, curl up to watch a movie together, and forget all about everything else but each other.

#winwin smut #winwin drabbles #nct smut #wayv smut #sicheng smut #asks

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rhetoricalrogue · 4 years

Text

Making a House a Home

I got hit with one of those ideas that come to you in the middle of the night. What if the detective decided to move from their default apartment into different places around Wayhaven? What would their love interests think? Slight end of book 2 spoilers for Zoe’s ficlet.

Ava and Lucas

“It’s too exposed.”

“It’s a modern loft, it’s supposed to be exposed.”

She ran her fingers over one of the many windows, her mouth set in a frown. “There’s a huge security threat downstairs. You never know who is coming or going at any point in the day.”

Lucas nodded. “One of the reasons I picked this spot. Plus, a coffee house that’s open almost 24 hours right downstairs and a gym that is open all day directly next door? Ava, this spot was practically made for me.”

Her frown lightened as she made her way through the empty apartment. There wasn’t much of a kitchen, but what was there was made out of updated equipment. She could already see him using the concrete countertops to prep his weekly meals. He was fond of entertaining, and the open area that made up the living room was large enough to comfortably host gatherings.

Climbing the stairs, she looked at the bedroom critically. There were massive closets on either side of a door leading to a spacious master bathroom that she had no doubt would fit his entire wardrobe and then some.

A singular thought occurred to her that there would be plenty of room for her here as well, if she wanted it.

“What do you think?” He asked, coming up behind her and wrapping his arms around her waist, his chin at her shoulder.

“The security concerns are going to need looking at,” she started, softly leaning back until his chest was pressed against her back.

“But…?”

She made a hrmphing noise. “It’s suitable. There’s a nice view.”

She could feel him smile against her cheek. “I like the view from here too.”

Adam and Aubrey

“Your commute to and from work should be shorter than it normally is.” Adam commented, standing at the window in the living room. He could see the police station a half block away, quiet and closed off on a Saturday afternoon.

“It means that I’ll be able to get a good extra ten minutes of sleep in, plus maybe come home to grab lunch if I don’t feel like eating in the office,” Aubrey replied, walking around with a measuring tape in hand, already mentally deciding where her belongings would go in this new little townhouse.

The garish pink walls would have to be painted over first thing. Judging by the way Adam had squinted as he stepped foot inside her new place, he wholeheartedly agreed.

“It gets good light. Your plants will be happy.”

“I’m feeling a but coming from you. What are you thinking about?” Aubrey set her tape down at the kitchen counter so she could go over to him. Adam was tense, his finger pressing down on the cheap plastic blinds so he could see out. “I’m surprised that you haven’t said a peep about security.”

“Because security isn’t an issue. I’ve already looked the place over and couldn’t find any faults there. Besides, you now have a five minute walk home after work.”

She tipped her head. “Then what’s wrong?”

He flicked his finger, sending the blind springing back in place. “You used to have a fifteen minute walk before reaching your old apartment.”

Dawning realization hit and she smiled at him. “Adam, are you upset because our regular evening walks are going to be cut short?”

“That would be ridiculous.” He let out a sharp sigh. “But it is a factor, ridiculous or not.”

Aubrey didn’t laugh, but she did wind her arm around his and press her head against his shoulder. “Well,” she started. “I guess there’s only one solution to this dilemma.”

“And what would that be?”

“After you walk me home, you can just come inside to spend more time with me.”

He pretended to think her suggestion over before giving her a soft smile. “I believe that arrangement would be agreeable.”

Farah and August

“So, what do you think?” August poked his head down from the lone bedroom in the tiniest house he’d ever owned. Granted, it was the only house he’d ever owned, but that was neither here nor there. He’d just signed the papers and the keys were his.

“I can almost touch one side of the wall with one hand and the other side with my other!” Farah exclaimed, looking in all the empty drawers where she could picture his things going.

“This reminds me of a treehouse I had growing up. It was about this big and I used to love hanging out in it.” He climbed down the ladder leading up to the little bedroom area and turned a crank that opened one of the windows overlooking a bare lot. “And the bonus is that I can hook this up to my car and tow my house around wherever I want. I’m not stuck in one location!”

“Maybe you could park it by the Warehouse,” she suggested. “When it starts to get too busy in there, we could just hang out here, just the two of us.”

August grinned. “Actually, I was wondering what you thought about maybe getting something to commemorate the event? I was thinking about another fish.”

Farah laughed. “Auggie, you have a ten gallon tank for Mr. Fish already taking up some prime real estate. I don’t think you can fit another tank in here.”

He dug in his pockets. “Okay, so maybe not an actual fish, though I’m pretty sure I could persuade Mr. Fish to share his tank with one more roommate.” He held up a single key attached to a neon pink and yellow painted metal fish keychain. “How about it? Wanna have a home of our own to hang out in?”

Farah didn’t say anything for a couple of seconds, her gold eyes as large as saucers. Then she quickly closed the distance between them, her arms wrapping around his shoulders in a tight hug.

“Our home,” she breathed. “I like the sound of that.”

Mason and Zoe

“Why are you moving again?” Mason asked, building another cardboard box for Zoe to throw her things in. She wasn’t neat about it, just shoving what little things she owned into boxes and then scribbling what was inside in black marker on top.

There really wasn’t much to box up. Mason had caught her in the middle of a cleaning frenzy one night right after the carnival, most of her belongings set in different piles. He hadn’t questioned her when she asked him to take one pile out to the dumpster, though he happened to look inside a plastic crate to find numerous photo albums full of pictures with her and Verda’s family inside.

He’d tucked those away instead of giving them a dumpster burial. He wasn’t certain what was going on between them, but knowing Zoe, she would regret doing something in anger sometime down the road.

“It’s too noisy here,” she told him, taking another box he built her and heading to the bathroom. “Plus you hate my neighbors.”

“I don’t hate your neighbors,” he told her, watching as towels and toiletries got packed with a little more care before the box was labeled and carried to the now empty living room. “Well, not all of them. That lady one unit down is nosy as fuck.”

Zoe’s grim expression lifted for the briefest of moments. “That’s because she’s an old fashioned gossip who believes that men and women shouldn’t fornicate outside of wedlock.”

He grinned, pointed tips of his fangs showing. “Oh, so that’s why you made sure we were extra loud that one time I had you up against the wall you share with her.”

“Maybe.”

“Still doesn’t answer me, Sweetheart. What gives with the sudden move?”

Zoe stopped and looked around the place, then at the four boxes neatly stacked in the middle of the empty apartment. Fuck, Mason thought. Her life always feels bigger than just four measly little boxes, a guitar, and a few framed pieces of art.

“I need a fresh start,” she finally said, her voice low. “This place…” her voice choked off when she noticed a small stuffed rabbit she’d missed sitting on a built-in bookshelf. She went over to it and held it tightly to her chest, her breath coming out in a shaky wheeze.

“You already have a spot picked out?”

She shook her head. “Yeah. Harry’s got a place over his bar that’s coming up in a week or so that he said he’d cut me a deal on rent if I poured drinks during some of the busy weekend hours.”

“What about the meantime? Where’s all your furniture?”

Zoe ran her fingers over the stuffed rabbit and absently kissed the top of its head. “I put it in storage. Harry said I could couch surf at his place until my new digs were ready.”

He started to pull his packet of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket, but stopped and offered her a package of chewing gum instead. “You could always stay at the Warehouse,” he casually suggested, watching as she took a stick of gum, that first whiff of mint as she took off the wrapper stinging his nose like too cold air on a winter morning. “No need to couch surf when you’ve got a bed of your own.”

Zoe chewed thoughtfully before crouching down to open one of the boxes and carefully, lovingly, placing the bunny inside. Mason caught the smallest portion of the word Cara embroidered on the rabbit’s foot before she closed the cardboard flaps once more. “Harry’s couch is super uncomfortable,” she reasoned. “And best friend or not, the man snores so loud you hear it through two closed doors.”

“So, you want me to take your stuff back with me?” the question of are you coming home with me was unspoken, but lingered in the air between them.

She licked her lips. “Yeah.” She sniffled as her eyes went to the box with Cara’s rabbit in it but then she blinked and gave him a smirk, taking hold of his hands and drawing him towards the shared wall they’d talked about earlier. “But first, let’s say a proper goodbye to Old Lady Jenkins. For old time’s sake.”

Nate and Morgan and Rowena

“So, what do you think?”

Morgan stuffed her hands into the pockets of her jacket and shrugged. “Still smells a little like old people in here. They should have aired the place out before they showed it.”

Rowena smiled, but moved towards the large picture window in the formal living room and opened it, letting some fresh air into the place. In her mind’s eye, she could already picture a piano taking front and center stage. No tiny upright electronic thing that maybe sounded like an actual piano, but an honest to goodness instrument like the one she’d been carefully saving up for years to buy but never had room to house it. There was room for a few comfy chairs and she could easily picture Nate sitting in one, a book from one of the beautifully crafted built-ins in his hand.

Morgan perched atop the bare window seat and looked out over the front yard. “It’s quiet. Not a lot of traffic.”

“It’s a bit of a drive to work,” Rowena commented. “But I think it’s worth it.”

“Closer drive to the Warehouse though.” Morgan flipped through the flyer that the real estate agent had handed them as they entered. “A little big for one person, don’t you think?”

Rowena shrugged. “It’s a four bedroom. I figured that one of the spares could be an office for me, another could be a library for Nate, and the third…” she sat down beside Morgan. “It could be yours, if you wanted it.”

Morgan slowly turned from the window to look at her. “What, no sharing one room?”

Rowena rolled her eyes. “Come on, you’ve stayed a night with the two of us on my Queen sized bed. Nate nearly ended up on the floor and I was pressed up against a wall. Even if we upgrade to a King, it’s still going to be a tad bit cozy.”

“I dunno, Sweetheart. I sort of liked pressing you up against a wall.”

Rowena leaned forward, brushing her lips against Morgan’s. “So did I, just not when I was trying to sleep. And besides,” she leaned back when she heard the real estate agent’s heels clack against the hardwood floor, “even if you’re not coming over for sex, it’d be nice to have a place of your own to enjoy the quiet, wouldn’t it?”

Morgan cast her eyes around the room. “You know, it’s not a bad place. Old person smell is starting to fade after all.”

Rowena smiled and ran a hand over Morgan’s thigh before giving her knee a fond pat. “I’m going to see where Nate went off to.”

She didn’t have to look very far to find Nate carefully inspecting the cupboards in the kitchen. “What do you think?” she asked, leaning against the large kitchen island.

“I think this house is lovely,” he replied, moving to lean beside her. “If you don’t put in an offer, I will.”

“What if,” Rowena asked, leaning against his arm. “We both put in an offer?”

Nate moved until he could wrap his arm around her, sighing contentedly when she immediately snuggled up close, her head fitting perfectly in the crook of his neck. “Are you suggesting, Detective Kingston, that we make a home here? Together?”

“I am suggesting just that, Agent Sewell. Does that sound like a good idea?” A small part of her at the back of her mind was screaming that this was too soon, that what they had was still so new, that she had a perfectly fine apartment that she didn’t want to break her lease on. The other part of her at the forefront of her mind was quietly encouraging her to take that leap of faith, that Tina had always loved her place, and that Tina’s lease on her own apartment was going to be up for renewal soon.

“That, dear heart,” he bent his head to give her a lingering, smiling kiss. “Sounds like an excellent plan.”

“Wait! I need to test one more thing.” Before Nate could question, Rowena moved in his arms and began to sway. “Just pretend it’s three in the morning.”

“Slow dancing in the small hours of the night in your own kitchen is a fantasy of yours?” He rested his hand at the small of her back as he led them through some simple steps, the two of them barely moving. “How am I doing? Passing your test?”

“With flying colors.”

“What did Morgan have to say?”

She snuggled closer, the two of them swaying more than actually dancing now. “She didn’t quite say so, but the idea of having a place of our own outside the Warehouse has its appeal. Even if we’re just here a few nights out of the week, the monthly payments are cheaper than what I was paying on my apartment.”

He laughed. “You’ve been thinking about this for a while?”

She ducked her head, but he could still see the faintest hint of a blush across her cheeks. “Would it be weird if I said that this house has been calling to me ever since I was a little girl? I used to walk this street on the way to and from school and I always stopped in front of this house, wondering what it would be like to live here, what it would be like to run upstairs and downstairs. Did it have an attic? A cellar? Were the people inside happy? When I was on regular patrol, I drove by here and couldn’t stop looking at the place. If felt like it was waiting for me.”

Nate thoughtfully stroked his chin as he looked around. “I couldn’t sense any sort of magic around this house, but it might not hurt to have some of the agents who specialize in that sort of thing make a sweep to inspect.” He pressed a kiss to the crown of her head. “Or, it could be that some places are simply meant for people and this one was meant for you.”

She ran her hand over the front of his sweater, stopping over his heart. “For us.”

He nodded. “Yes. For us.” Taking her hand, he spun her around and joined in her delighted laughter. “Shall we speak with the agent to draw up the paperwork then? See what the timeline is for making this our home?”

“Yes. Let’s.”

#my writing #aubrey miller #lucas greene #zoe dawson #august lin #rowena kingston

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arkt-nehrim-archive · 4 years

Note

Thoughts on the actual land of Nehrim?

Soooo many thoughts! Possibly too many to share in one post, but I’ll try to keep it contained(I make no promises). I’m still gonna put a break in it so it doesn’t just throw a WALL onto people’s dashes.

Before saying anything tho, I subscribe to Nehrim’s clock that 1,000 years really did pass between certain events, so I’ll be cataloging my thoughts according to that.

So the land of Nehrim! Possibly the single most diverse place on Vyn! Trouncing even Qyra, since Qyra is still overseen teeeechnically by a theocratic element (Saldrin) for a vast majority of time and is mostly just arid/tropical desert. Sure Qyra is SUPER progressive as far as Vyn’s various territories go, and I dream of a game set on that continent- AAAH okay, focusing. Here to talk about Nehrim, not Qyra.

So at one point in time, we’ll say somewhere in the 7200s a.St. by the Light-born’s established clock, Nehrim was a loosely unified place under Erodan. Not in the sense that everybody -agrees- with one another, but y’know, nobody is -actively- at war. We got the Middlerealm of course, which is the seat of Erodan’s power in which he may or may not have actually -lived- amongst his subjects (given Narathzul is described as being his right-hand dude and the Order of Paladins is stationed -on- Nehrim up north, I’m inclined to think this is true). Then there’s the North, which wasn’t it’s -own- territory at this point but still definitely had its own diverse culture and possibly still some manner of monarchy specifically loyal -to- Erodan (not too hard to believe given Erodan is actually a half-breed between “Light-born” and Norman anyway; King Wuran). Then we have Ostian, which only -recently- in lore has been the theocratic dictatorship we see in Nehrim (only existed for 40 years by then), otherwise being described as being a home of art and culture, much like Qyra. A place still recognizing Erodan’s rule, but likely having its own power structure beneath him- again, a lot like Qyra/Golden Queen/Saldrin. Lastly there’s Treomar! Which I am fascinated by because it’s a swath of territory -attached- to Nehrim, that is openly -not- loyal to Erodan or the Light-born. From those that live within during Nehrim’s gameplay, one can assume it was primarily, if not entirely a nation of Aeterna, possibly loyalists still to ancient figures like Asatoron and Aeterna from Irdor (which is it’s own whole fuckin’ thing, I’ll share thoughts on that later). With its geographical location its not too hard to imagine they came from Myar Aranath and landed in what they’d found as Treomar, building this Dalaran-esque (any Warcraft peeps in here?) mage society and aaaaaaaaaah, they’re cool.

There’s all of this going on and co-existing at least to some degree, with the only other place approaching being that diverse being Arktwend later. I honestly would have looooved to see this Nehrim, before all the craziness and war and murderdeath that results in the country -we- know and experience in the game itself, as back then I’m fairly sure the magic abolition hadn’t been a -thing- yet (because Aeterna and magic weren’t such a threat to Barateon’s power), so Aeterna would’ve still had rights n’ such, though they were probably still looked down on because of heritage (soooo gonna get into THAT later mmmMMM). Erodan all in all seemed pretty chill all things considered, which may be owed to his half-breed status, he’s closer to the people on a genetic level, so maybe that makes him inclined to treat people better I dunno. We only get to see him for like two seconds and -can’t- talk to him! So! -shrug-

OH SHIT I forgot somebody really important! -Anku-! Technically speaking that is totally a fifth nation/state, as it encompasses a huuuuge swath of territory (underground) and is ruled by some fashion of monarchy, so -EVEN- more diverse cultures on this continent. The Starlings don’t answer to Erodan, but still exist peacefully within Nehrim within their own lil’ pocket nation and MAN I was sad most of our time spent with the Starlings is in the parts of their territory they don’t actually spend time in. I get it, when we got to see Anku is a time when there’s very few Starlings actually -left-, but still. They’re such a neat race, especially when you consider Nehrim’s lore for them over Enderal’s (which downgrades them significantly from the literal galactic superpower they’re said to be in Nehrim).

And all of this! All of this and still the Nehrim -we- see and adventure in is -so -different. Erodan is dead, has been for -centuries-. Now there’s this grubby, tyrant human in the throne named Barateon, who’s loyalty literally goes only as deep as whatever preserves his life the longest. Credit where it’s due, he’s still a powerful arcanist, extending his years beyond what mortals should be capable of (which is exactly what the myths say the Light-born did so hhHHMMM more on that in another post). Treomar is destroyed, and much of its history is gone with it outside of specific documentation the Light-born for some reason keep around and guarded instead of getting rid of it- like they -want- people to rise up against them or something. Ostian is a friggen magical radioactive wasteland where the fabric of reality is so damaged now even the skies rage with toxic super storms- and as if that weren’t enough the part of its that’s still inhabitable is now kept under the bootheel of another powerful mortal mage whose roftstomped everybody into a new highly oppressive, morally appalling religion that saw Enderal’s Prophet created from its awful maw. Like, Nehrim has become, in its centuries outside of -direct- supervision become this tragic shadow of what it once was, and when you actually dig into the lore of how it all ran before, it’s just like auuuughh -man-. It’s so sad. ;_; It’s tragic that somebody as negligent and awful as Tyr, is proven right, because of how life has degraded in the absence of direct intervention. And I’m not making a case for Light-born tyranny here! I’m just saying Nehrim 1,000 years ago was pretty cool and I would’ve loved to see it (I’ll just have to write stories from that era heheheh >>;).

So yeah uuuh... OH! I didn’t even mention the sheer amount of Aeterna ruins all around Nehrim! Suggesting Asatoron’s empire probably had a decent chunk of it built there when it was still part of the super-continent of Pangora! I would’ve loved to be able to actually -speak- to the clans of Aeterna that took refuge and used these ruins; I want to know so badly -who- Etronar is, I want to know more of the various Aeterna peoples that splintered off and had to find safe corners in Nehrim to exist after Narathzul’s rebellion and subsequent defeat/capture, that is centuries worth of time, a significant swath of history and there’s so much to play with there that y’know, stuff like cutting the timeline apart and whittling it down just makes all the unrealized potential sssoooo friggen unsatisfying, but anyway.

Overall, I think Nehrim, as a region, is a fascinating place. So much has happened there, absolutely world-defining events that changed so many things; how Aeterna were viewed and treated, how use of magic is policed/outlawed, how the Light-born govern purely from a fear of -what if they rebel again-, I mean they ALL retreated to Inodan after Narathzul and Arkt unleashed their individual rebellions and ruled from a distance, bringing about this era of mystery where the peoples of the world just -forgot- what it was to -see- and -hear- their Gods, leading to no small amount of many just, -not- thinking they actually existed. I mean shit, look at how Jespar thinks, that man came out of an upbringing that tried its -hardest- to instill faith in the Light-born, but without them actually around to -prove- anything for -centuries-, what grounds did they really have to prove to the kid they were legit? But there I go getting off topic -again-, because I love Vyn way too damn much.

I love Nehrim. I think Nehrim is awesome, and fascinating, and I feel too many feelings. xD

Thanks for the ask @mirogeorgiev!

#answered ask #ask me Vyn things #Vyn #Nehrim #Nehrim: At Fate's Edge #vyn-spoilers #damn it i totally forgot to talk about the friggen Tel'lmalath #aaaaaaaaaah

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nimbus-cloud · 6 years

Photo

Dear Mom...

A Kuroken collaboration (thank you Ch. 318) Story by @nimbus-cloud Art by @mookie000

Our previous collaborations: Something Old, Something New (x) Longing (x)

More fic and more art under the Read More!

----

“Oh yeah, mom told me to tell you that you’re ‘welcome over’ for New Year’s,” Kenma mumbled through his scarf as he and Kuroo made the short trek back home from the grocery store.

During winter, he hated leaving the warmth of his room (mostly his bed) for anything, but running a quick shopping errand for his mom wasn’t so bad when his dad made sure to give them a little extra for snacks. Kuroo or no, his father understood that he needed more than your average incentive to go outside.

Kuroo’s mouth twitched with a smile at the invitation before he could quite think to keep it in, but he quickly straightened his expression and dropped his eyes to his shoes.

“Ah... thanks but... dad and I will be going out of town that weekend.”

“Oh...” Kenma couldn’t help sounding a little surprised, but he didn’t question why.

Kuroo bit his lip, chapped from the cold—he didn’t have a nice thick scarf on like Kenma—and debated telling his friend the reason. He wanted to go over to the Kozume household, and he wanted Kenma to know that. He’d argue with his dad for permission if only...

“We’re gonna go visit mom,” he said finally.

Kenma fumbled with an awkward step, but still said nothing. Kuroo felt like Kenma’s silence was courteously leaving room for further explanation, and he felt compelled to fill the empty space it was leaving in the conversation.

“Bring her flowers, tidy her grave a little, that kind of thing.” He shrugged and tried to keep his voice sounding casual. He didn’t want Kenma to think he was sad. “Maybe next year!”

He grinned wide but Kenma remained at an uncomfortable loss for words. The words he needed for his friend were too big, and he didn’t know them, couldn’t hold the weight of them with his eight-year-old hands. So he nodded his head meekly in reply, and Kuroo smiled for the both of them.

Because truthfully, he really wasn’t sad. Not really, not for himself anyway. He knew it was harder for his dad, with his bigger adult heart. It made the sadness bigger too probably. That’s why they’d moved away from her, away from the home that held all the memories of her. And that’s why Kuroo made sure to reach out and hold his father’s hand as they walked down the neat little rows of family plots. He only let go when they reached hers and knelt down to pray.

He clapped and bowed, then with eyes closed and hands clasped, he spoke to her spirit in his heart, never once doubting she’d hear.

I made a new friend, mama. His name’s Kenma, he lives nearby in our new place, and he’s just a little bit younger than me. He’s kind of quiet and likes to play video games the most, but now I’ve got him hooked on volleyball too. He’s really smart, and I like playing with him. I know you’d like him, and I’m glad we’re friends. Dad misses you, more than he’ll say. I hope he finds a friend like I did. Help him if you can, mama. I’m doing fine.

--- 9 years later ---

The very first time Kuroo had visited his mother’s grave—nine-years-old and forced to leave his volleyball in the car—he’d been allowed little more to do than to place flowers and pray. At less than half a year since her ashes had been placed within the family grave, there’d been little to clean then and his father hadn’t trusted him to light any incense. Now that he was grown they shared the tasks equally and worked in silence together washing the grave stone, pulling out the weeds and overgrown grass, and neatly arranging the flowers they’d brought. Kuroo placed the bundle the Kozume family had kindly provided, which they’d done every year after Kenma told his parents why Kuroo went away at the end of every year.

Lastly, Kuroo and his father lit one incense stick apiece, and clapped their hands and bowed.

Mama, we made it to Nationals! Nekoma, the team that Kenma made—we did it! Not only that, this year we were reconnected with an old rival school from Miyagi, Karasuno. You wouldn’t believe how crazy they are. And how much fun they are to play against. It’s the most fired up I’ve ever seen Kenma get, and they made it to Nationals too. It’ll be the rival match of the decade, mama. Make sure you’re watching!

His father patted his shoulder suddenly, offering his son a wry smile.

“Did you ask her to watch over you for college entrance exams and graduation?”

He looked down at his father sheepishly and quietly said, “...I told her about Spring High actually. And asked her to watch us play.”

His father opened and closed his mouth, probably biting back a reproach of some kind. He might never have discouraged Kuroo from playing volleyball, but he’d never quite understood his love for it either.

“Well... you’ve always been smart so exams were in the bag, I suppose. Volleyball was the unpredictable one.” Then after another glance at the black gravestone he added, “She’ll watch you for the both of us.”

“She always has,” Kuroo smiled.

He’d never doubted her support—or his father’s, despite his absence—and he’d tried to be the model student to make sure neither would worry about his future.

But there was one little thing he couldn’t quite bring himself to tell her, even in his prayers, even though she could no doubt see it all. If he really believed she could hear him call out to her in his heart, then surely she knew of the love that had sprung there and who it was for. But he hadn’t said it or thought it explicitly yet, so it still felt like a secret somehow.

Next time, he promised. Next time, I’ll come without dad.

---5 years later---

“It’s nice not having to do this in winter,” Kuroo mused as he pulled hard on a particularly stubborn patch of weeds. “And with so many other people around. Makes the cemetery feel less creepy.”

Kenma made a face at the ‘other people’ comment. Obon was the traditional time of year for people to go visit the graves of their loved ones, and the cemetery was practically bustling, if only people weren’t here for such a solemn reason. Kenma poured water gently over the gravestone in silence, thinking that to be quiet was to be respectful. He wanted very much to be respectful. He also wanted to hide his nerves.

As if Kuroo could guess at his anxiety, he kept talking. “One year, dad wanted to drive up extra early in the morning, I can’t remember why, and I was almost too scared to walk past the gate. It was misty, and there was no one else here, and I was cold and scared of ghosts. But dad wanted to avoid the crowds like this, so we always came up around New Year’s.”

Now satisfied with his pruning efforts, Kuroo removed his gardening gloves and took up the flower bundles from the water bucket. He passed one of the bunches to Kenma, who took them without saying a word still. Not even a peep.

“Think of it this way,” Kuroo said quietly. “It’s not the first time you’ve given her flowers.”

“My parents sent those,” Kenma protested, finally breaking his silence if only to set Kuroo straight. He bit his lip almost immediately; he didn’t want to argue in front of Kuroo’s mom.

“They were from all of you,” Kuroo smiled. “Your mom always said they were your idea.”

He knelt down to place his bundle and Kenma mimicked him slowly. The flowers they’d chosen were predominantly red in color. ‘For Nekoma,’ Kuroo had joked, but for other reasons too. Red for good fortune. And for love.

They took one incense stick each and lit them, then clapped their hands and bowed and prayed.

I’m sorry it’s been a while since my last visit, mama. I don’t have a good reason for it, but I wanted to say sorry. I finally brought Kenma to meet you! I care about him a lot, mama, I think you know that. He’s been my best friend my entire life. My best friend and more.

The gold ring on his left ring finger glinted in the setting summer sun—a ring that matched the one on Kenma’s left ring finger—rings that marked them as definitively more than best friends.

You’re the first to know. I’m not sure I could even tell dad, and we’re not sure how Kenma’s family will take it either. I don’t know if you’d give us your blessing but—

Kuroo nudged Kenma’s shoulder with a lean and smiled as their eyes met. Kenma had had his eyes scrunched rather tight, praying in earnest, but once he’d opened them he seemed a little less sullen, perhaps from a burden lifted.

“What’d you tell her?”

“An embarrassing story about the time a bird pooped on your head,” Kenma said flatly. “Just in case she wasn’t watching that day.”

Kuroo gave an expression of utter betrayal, but Kenma continued. “Which is why I told her I’d take care of you. And that she doesn’t have to worry about you.”

“Kenma...”

“And I thanked her,” Kenma kept on, fighting the silence he’d clung to earlier. The words flowed out like water now, and he knew these were the words he didn’t know to say back when he was eight, the words he could never have dreamed he’d need.

“I thanked her for giving me you. And I apologized to her. For keeping you to myself. I told her I’m proud of you and she should be too. And that I’m going to do my best to make you happy.” His eyes turned to the slowly burning incense and mumbled, “I don’t know if she’ll believe me...”

Kuroo grabbed his hand and laced their fingers together, and he hoped his mother was watching. “She does. You’ve made me happy my whole life, and she’s been hearing about it every year since I was nine.”

Kenma flushed and he hoped the reddening sunset would be kind and help hide his blooming embarrassment.

#kuroken #haikyuu #kuroken fanfiction #collaboration #mookie #fanfiction #writing #yeah the chapter isn't super specific as to whether or not Kuroo's mom is dead #just that his household is himself and his dad and his grandparents #they might just be divorced who knows #but we piled on the sad instead and went for dead #hq 318 #p.s. there's more art under the read more

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elizabethrobertajones · 6 years

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14x09 watching notes

jingle bells, bobo smells, It is no fun, for us to wait All christmas in hiatus

Berens... please...... I beg you........... don't kill the sweet precious moonchild that is Garth. Please. The joke is "how are you still alive!?" and it would be a disrespect to Bobby's memory, and he represents a stable post-hunting endgame that was a beacon in season 9. In this essay I will

They used Dean's dead-voice "we're the guys that scare them" speech about hunting monsters in 13x05 to open. I wonder if Yockey wrote that thinking it might be the logical open to 13x23 and instead they used "this is boring, got any music?" also from one of his episodes.

[i guess! meme]

The recap left us hanging about if Jack was alive or not for the Kaia recap which turns out to be rude even though I know that he's fine ("fine") now because I am so emotionally affected by this dumb lump of nougat that not seeing an instant "he's okay haha tricked you!" legit raised my stress levels a notch.

Maybe because it's 4am and I was demolishing a slab of toast before the December chill in my room got it first, but I don't think there was any particular art or storytelling to the recap worth mentioning or musing on, and this came across almost more like the recap AFTER the break because getting back to plot stuff like seeing Mikey things again... The 13x05 lines make me wary on Dean's emotional behalf but obviously these are for very different reasons so the only real thing that might come up is that Cas is hiding his deal from Dean and Dean sounded so dead in the feels because Cas was dead. Obviously the real stress right now is what's up with Dean re: obvious nerve-wracking things like the djinn bouncing off his head or his swooshy vision, things we've been collecting up to ask more pointed questions about when Michael's in the room.

Americans: "that's downtown Vancouver!/an actual American city!/the ACTUAL American city in the caption!" me: "hurrrr skyline"

How much budget for Christmas music

I hate this episode already

Okay the blood and screaming is improving things.

Listen, werewolves always have so much fun these days. We had the knock knock one in 13x09, the Kardashian ones in 13x23, and now we have wereSanta here, who just spotted the mistletoe. D'aaaw.

These halo-shaped lights in this apartment Michael picked sure are gonna come in handy if the director knows what they're doing.

GARF. Please say you're here undercover.

OH SHIT. Michael KNOWS. Being in Dean's head does that to you. All his peeps get embedded in your brain. Please tell me some 2 way vessel/angel nonsense happens and you can't bring yourself to harm him.

GARTH HAS A LITTLE GIRL NOOOOOOOOOOOO

She adores Mr Fizzles. Garth spends hours with them hanging out together.

I don't believe him though. I mean. He's just telling Michael what he wants to hear, right?

Having a little girl is such a way to die, though. I mean. Can we just... not do that?

Let Garth Go Home For Christmas

Those halos sure aren't landing over Michael's head no matter how many of them there are

Jack: eating gross cereal made of cookies at midnight in the dark

Me: I love and support you and have done the same

Cas: *SQUINT*

Dadstiel is the best

Sam being the "it will rot your teeth" dad is also the best. I love the Dad Heirarchy being established here. Sam is still Dad no.1 and the one who lays down the rules and gets disobeyed about midnight cereal, full on domestic dad-ing. Cas is the dad who hears you munching from across the entire Bunker and sighs and gets out of Dean's bed where they've been watching movies together (I extrapolate from missing data) and comes to investigate but ends up in the Secret Midnight Cookie Cereal Pact instead.

If Garth dies he may bequeath Mr Fizzles to Sam to help parent Jack, who is now keeping secrets about midnight cereal consumption and needs an expert lie-detector to help him parent.

Okay, so, in season 9 after Dean took the Mark of Cain he was up all night eating cornflakes and not sleeping. The corn was symbolic to Cain. Jack goes through all he did and has cookie cereal which is just his sweet tooth. But he had foreign grace implanted in him, and also is tapping a lil bit of his soul to be alive, meaning he's in a weird power situation and we don't know what's up with him at all. TFW are very much like "upright and not coughing blood is good enough for us", especially when with magic involved it's not like they might have an actual science explanation ever come their way.

Jack sitting in the dark is obviously symbolic of hiding things, his cookie cereal is disapproved of and a guilty secret from Sam in the first place, he's consuming something - willingly - that's bad for him and will rot him right after the sweet sweet probably not Gabriel grace he ingested 2 episodes ago, and added all up makes a secret - and he and Cas of course share Cas's deal secret so it's not like Cas can go stomping around complaining to the other dads what he found Jack doing without Jack being like yeah well guess what CAS did.

It's sure a fun way to parallel the beginning of Dean's dark dark arc and Jack's sugary sweet dark arc.

Dean: kid if you are going to sit in the kitchen at weird hours and eat cereal, at least self-flagellate a little *slams the box of cornflakes down in front of him.*

Jack also is wearing a lot of red lately.

Though his new jacket is santa-coloured not like... Mark of Cain doom blood death coloured like demon!Dean's infamous red shirt.

He's currently wearing Cas-coloured shoes and sitting in Dean's spot from 9x13 aka the iconic cornflakes scene in question.

"If you can't sleep, that's understandable, given recent events." "You mean dying and coming back to life."

Cas has been around the humans too long. He talks in euphemisms and gets called out by his too-literal son.

The tables turn.

Oh Jack... so full of worries about Heaven and if his mom is safe, and making Cas confront that nothing is perfect, even Heaven, and have to say it out loud because he can't lie to Jack and sugarcoat this.

Reminds me of 13x06 where he had to tell Jack that yeah sorry not all angels are perfect either. Sweet lil foetus!Jack sure picked the correct angel to be his guardian.

Naomi is "complicated"

Cas. Hon. *hands him a blanket and a bowl of cereal*

OH MY GOD Jack calling him out on why can't Sam and Dean know about the deal.

Having Jack around is so much a breath of fresh air that Cas is starting to regret ever kidnapping him in 12x19.

"They CAN I just don't WANT them to know" CAS. You've been forced to Verbalise A Thing Using The Correct Language. I am giving you an entire gold star. TWO GOLD STARS. I'm drawing a smilie face on them.

Jack is upset that Cas made the deal for him: "they don't need that burden. you don't need that burden" "of course I do. You did that, for ME" - the ole season 2 Dean thing, where it took until 2x08 to know for sure what John did and it basically killed Dean 3 times over and he was a Mess. Not knowing but not having all the answers and being worried/suspicious about what's up with the neat circumstances of being alive again is hooorrible. And this is calling out the whole Winchester cycle of sacrifice (conveniently now with us knowing that John will be dropping by for an episode to really hammer the point home) by addressing how Jack now has to carry the burden of knowing that Cas did that for him.

Cas is like, "Yeah don't worry I haven't been happy in all of Creation." Jack looks earnestly at him. "I'm sorry."

Cas diverts to eating the gross cereal, which he apparently also secretly indulges in, or else, as Mittens pointed out to me, Dean does too and either way Cas is being gross and adorable and hanging out with his kid and this is horrible I hate it oh god it's more sickly sweet than the cereal they're eating.

Garth hiding in the kitchen to panic and phone mom to get him from the party.

"THIS ISN'T YOUR MOM, GARTH, THIS IS AN ARCHANGEL"

And he's just learned to say "balls" appropriately too.

Sam immediately gets The Guilts because he's being leaderly and losing Garth would be his first major blow as a leader oh god oh god no oh Sammy oh GARTH I can't handle this.

Berens sure is invested in the leader!Sam stuff and telling this story long before anyone else was and had his minion Glynn tease us with Maggie earlier in the season D:

I'm calling mom to get me from the party

"It's Ketch" Sam raises his eyebrows like "I forgot he was in this season"

Does that mean Ketch skyped Cas first

that's hilarious all by itself

He has tea because of course he does

Oh my god he's skyping with Jack. Are they buds? HAS HE ADOPTED JACK?

Honestly of all the characters in the entire show he's probably resisted longest so far when it comes to adopting Jack if they ever met even briefly in Apocalypse World.

This is how you can tell he's the worst :P Rowena "I will never love again" MacLeod took all of 20 seconds to adopt Jack.

He's been in England for like a week and his accent is 100x more hammy. "ExPRopriATE"

He's rolling his Rs. I mean. Is that even in our accent? Not in mine.

Jack watching attentively while he tells his story with no judgement forthcoming, just pure interest in what Ketch says... good thing Ketch is too self-centred on his tale of derring-do or he might find Jack's sweet interest flattering and begin wondering if he has it in himself to be fatherly.

I'm suddenly legitimately interested in the unstoppable force of Jack's adoptability vs the immovable object of Ketch's ego.

He posted it. Around Christmas. Look I'm friends with a postie and she's hucking around a bag as big as herself.

Maybe he put a ribbon on it.

From BUDAPEST. Paying extra really is gonna speed THAT up

"Where is our weapon?" "It's been sitting in Guam for a week. I don't understand. Why is it in Guam?"

TFW all react with snark, side-eyes or despair at Ketch, and 2.0 doesn't even get a reaction because I don't think Jack understands how dumbass Ketch is because he's too smol to have fought the mail :P

"We appreciate the effort" "DO WE?"

Cas is staring into the void, meanwhile. Internally, "Well at least I can be sure I'm not going to worry about allowing myself to be happy any time THIS month"

Oh, sweet! The laptop is set up right next to Britain on the map table :')

Hey if they have to brave the post office to get the egg, they can find out Harper is still stalking Jack :D

Cas can't even work out which direction to start rolling his eyes, gives up and walks off. Dean gestures the screen, look what you made him do! You asshole!

"Only thing that can take him down now is the full Ichabod" "?" *gestures decapitation* "oh."

Poor Garth. Werewolves really are the worst. I can see why you were so upset about being turned.

Remember when Sam described him as an "ichabod crane alike" or something, I think in 9x12 when asking at the hospital about him? Maybe? I swear to god that might be a less subtle hint Garth is going to die than Charlie's "merry christmas"

Garth honey nooo

I'm pretty sure we saw Michael mind-controlling the werewolf in the cold open which means we're in for SOME sort of drama next

Oh good Cas is back, I guess he went to scream outside.

"Oh it would have made it if it wasn't closed for the holidays" Sam is being so withering I hope Ketch can feel it from Budapest.

Garth you are going to get in so much trouble and I'm so scared for you and your family at Christmas

At least in this scene Dean n Cas are playing footsie under the table if nothing else.

With Michael holed up in a towerblock for Christmas I am so worried that I should have watched Die Hard before getting here.

D'aw Dean teams himself up with Cas without even hesitating.

Holy shit they used a season 1 clip of the Impala driving past a field of cows.

"Hi we shot this for 1x06 it's practically an easter egg now"

God, it's the promo scene and we're 16 minutes in.

Not over Cas being like "you're happy" because he can't be happy but he's seeing Dean being, you know, cheerful. It's worrying because it's so close to endgame... if they kill Michael, Dean can be happy. And if Dean can be happy...

bye bye Cas

It's so easy with Dean looking away for Cas's silence to be "lol never" instead of "I ought to tell you the string that is attached"

*quietly climbs into the garbage pile as I think about how neither can be happy while the other is as a literal plot mechanism*

Them leaving the door open seems so significant I thought we were going to see Bad!Kaia comically hiding behind it

Awwwwww Jack wants to break into his first building with lock picks!!

I can't believe they're doing this in broad daylight.

I can't believe there was a Gish item to go to a post office after hours dressed as Santa's elves and that's what Jack is doing with that coat

"Who taught you to pick a lock?" "I did. And the internet"

Sam's "that's my boy" face.

"I wanted to stay useful"

that was your cue to tell Jack he's useful regardless

On the other hand he got the door opened and smiled up at Sam so I guess he gets the validation that way instead.

"HAPPY Holidays" Jack is SO PLEASED the box is saying something nice.

BOOM you have witnessed, once again, Sam being knocked out.

Wow, no. His skull is getting thicker, he manages to cling on long enough to watch his boy being abducted.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS, SAM.

Awww Michael came to oversee it. HAPPY HOLIDAYS, Michael!

Sam is way too concussed to deal with this. Or drive.

Michael has a really similar coat to what he had in the AU but for a fancy rich lady instead of a badass hot cowboy which really begs the question of why he dressed SO SO OTT for Dean, even given his fashionista tastes for the other 2 vessels we've seen.

I am sad we don't have the other Michael vessel just because he's off making out with Constantine on Legends of Tomorrow (meta textuality of THAT to be unpacked by fandom at length :P), but she's an absolutely uncanny female double for him with the coat and the ominous camera angles and her general scary vibe.

"You're going to kill me anyway" *MOOSE CHARGE*

I stan one concussed boy

Blorp

No fancy weapons for you guys, use your heads.

Not Sam's head, he's just taken his 3rd hit in a minute.

Garth gets caught snitching though I suspect Michael knew he was listening in and sent Dean to get attacked by Bad!Kaia anyways.

There's chess being played here.

Er, and you're the pawns.

I think Dean is the other player and everyone ELSE is a pawn in Michael's reckoning.

"WHY ARE YOU HERE? WHAT DO YOU WANT?" Kaia, they just shouted like 20 minutes of the plot so far at each other, you know as much as we do at this point.

I love Kaia's fighting stance but oh my GOD Dean walking up to the spear and having it put against his heart. He knows it's a power move but it's also a gentle one, and he's waved enough guns in her face and our Kaia's face... This is one of those moves you use both on frightened animals and also to show you are a good unarmed nice guy and it's an attempt to re-negotiate after all he's done to Kaias over time >.>

"if you're not going to give it to me, kill me" Dean says, at the end of his big emotional appeal to Family And Saving People as his divine guiding forces in the universe by which he sets his moral compass and acts as the best version of himself in the defence of.

Cas behind him like "I hope this works because I love this dumbass and if you ACTUALLY kill him I'm contractually obligated to murder you so like, pls don't escalate this"

"How do I know if you're telling the truth" well he's not so jot that down.

Cas like "can you please stop talking, Dean, I am not agreeing with any of your policies here" because not only did he drag Jack into it, he made a promise that Jack's completely unable to uphold since he, you know, doesn't have the power to get Kaia home any more.

Poor Bad!Kaia though. Spent her life running from monsters too. She and our Kaia have the same trama, but she's so hardened by it :(

"If you don't bring this back to me I will find you and kill you"

Yikes, magic weapons are having a bad run in these parts, I think Dean's pretty much a gonner :P

I love that the Wayward Sisters music plays around Kaia but it makes me so so so so sad

"So, what, is he playing us?" he's playing YOU Dean. Your move!

"Don't you go in there alone." "I know, drive fast"

Aka concussed bab is gonna go in there alone if you don't hurry.

I have literally no comprehension about the driving times involved in this episode because I don't know US geography like that, but it's Berens not Dabb but he's mentioned specific locations so he better have looked these all up on google maps because this is one heck of a fact checkable episode with 4 distinct known and named locations and you all driving to and fro.

I love Michael's new apartment. It has a dark Heaven aesthetic vibe which is perf.

Jack's here and he's immediately deposited under the halo lights.

I can not WAIT for a Jack vs Michael scene.

*chin hands*

"Why didn't you kill me?" *eyebrow raise*

Poor nougat is being made to feel useless again :( This is Michael grinding his heel into Jack while he has him on the floor, kneeling in supplication under those halo lights.

Michael is into villain monologuing. A terrible, terrible habit.

"Death from above," Michael says, the first time he's had halos over his head.

His concept of soul ownership intrigues me because he would get all the humans who died in an attack on this city in his original world. In this he's turning them into monsters but with his grace, so they belong to him. That means that somehow or other he's probably overriding not just their nature to be controllable by him, which overrides in turn Eve's control over all monsters. She totes isn't dead BTW she's just in Purgatory. I'm like 100% sure of it :P Anyway I do wonder if Michael's control over the monsters extends so far as accidentally granting them passage to Heaven by claiming them and overriding Eve's control. Who knows. The thought wandered by and really tickled me.

Because it's a long game with the real value in people for beings of this level just being in their value as collectibles after death, and season 5 was all about our Michael getting all the souls by killing all the humans and storing them away in Heaven and that was his Paradise he was fighting for. And if he's converting entire cities to monsterhood in order to gain control over the territory in a quiet no mess way, then his control and command of them is passed on through the bite thanks to whatever he did to them. At the very least he's managed to make himself into their new Alpha.

I mean unless this is a phase one and he's sacrificing getting the souls of these lot in exchange for a lot more souls down the line.

LOL Michael pulls "I'm your only kin" and Jack's like, uh, REAL Michael is in the cage, POSER.

I love how Jack's got the such simplistic child language of "I hate you" which comes out so honestly and fiercely. Jack's 1 layer personality is reaaally deep even if it is mostly 1 layer. A very very thick slab of nougat. Full of goodness. It's EXCELLENT character writing to balance a character like this. He has a good understanding of the world by now, evidenced by very clearly being able to distinguish AU!Michael from his living kin of our Michael in the cage, and yet at the same time his emotional range is still 100% whatever he feels about a thing and so for Michael it's hate. Because when kids get upset they can yell "I hate you I hate you!" in a tantrum, and Jack's personality is that but moderated and adult and reasonable, and that... What a good approach to writing a character. Om nom nom.

This vessel is definitely way more expressive than the previous two Michaels, which is something I've noticed in a looot of the vessel gender swaps, which really makes me go sociological on why gesturing and fiddling and so on is so much a part of presence for a female character on screen, while male characters are allowed to stand still and just kind of radiate presence. I mean, she HAS presence, but she's been moving her hands a lot and it's the main detail which makes her not match up as neatly. Jensen threw his whole personality into not moving Michael's arms, to follow on from Christian's portrayal.

I think Raphael's second vessel was menacingly still. That actress did a great job. That slow head turn after they hurl an angel blade at her in 6x22... Nice.

Lisa Berry strikes a nice balance at huge presence and only necessary gestures, and Julian Richings was always fiddling with junk food as Death despite his cosmic presence.

Meg was all in the voice and eyebrows, both actresses.

Why am I musing on this? Because it's 7am and I'm having a wave of immense sleepiness and I think I need tea to keep on watching but it's cold so I'd rather stay bundled in blankets >.>

... I have now turned on the heating and got tea and done some stretches to try and ward off the cold-blooded lizard stupor I was sliding into. Brrr. We get Christmas break on episodes because it's so hard to watch in the cold.

"Our relation is more a matter of scale, power." Ooohohohooo but you just said you weren't killing Jack because he was powerless.

I mean I'm crowing at Michael for maybe revealing a flaw in his monologue to me but at the same time that's terrifying for what he plans for Jack because that presumably involves powering back up but under HIS control. Nephew theft.

I say smugly having posted Jack being kidnapped by Michael in Andrea's Diner for his power/money last week so that I can just ride this one out with a "in before this plotline" raised eyebrow.

I mean I was using a hybrid season 8/14 set up with Naomi still being Michael's flunky but the important thing is that he was trapped in an office in a towerblock which may or may not now be exactly this one since I have eyes on it and Michael was gonna do whatever it took to get Jack's share of the company until Cas marched in and saved the boy.

Yeah my diner AU has corporate drama, deal with it.

NOW we're getting to the epic speeches. The time that makes mountains. Epic. And Michael is like hey you and me are the only ones left... And as your power returns and grows, we'll only become more alike. Cut to Jack being HORRIFIED by the concept of becoming anything like his AUncle and losing his human compassion and turning into this evil being that cheerfully talks about how not only to level cities but to improve on the concept.

Finally, we hit the epic tragedy level of Jack's story he's been hiding from in other genres from disney to rom coms to cute twee Christmas movies and even a detour into 1800s consumptive child drama to avoid it. But Hamlet's procrastination has to be challenged occasionally, and so they're face to face and Michael is taunting Jack with how he might be cute as a nougaty 2 year old but oh dear the terrible 2s are nothing to the terrible 2 billionties.

I think this room even has Heaven's furniture, as a riff on it. What's one world to another? One Heaven from another, as Michael says. Find a head office, treat it like a place of power and intimidation and it becomes one.

All Jack says is "Sam, Dean and Castiel. They'll come for me." Because he doesn't know much but in his 2 years he HAS learned who fights for him and considers him family, and who he will really set his morality by.

Of course if Cas ever allows himself to be happy, then ALL of Jack's family has an expiration date and no one can follow him through those eons to stop him straying.

Also: now eternity has a sense of horror to it. The reminder that immortality is awful and this is what it does to ancient eldritch beings. And as a result, that finite humanity may be better when it doesn't come at the cost of erosion of self.

To thine own self be true, to quote a terribly mis-used part of Hamlet and yeah yeah I studied it I know Polonius said that and it's meant to be a ridiculed line. But it's still emotionally relevant >.>

Jack's fierce sense of self and family is his only weapon here. Michael can't cast doubt on that. Maybe fear for the future, but in the immediate presence, Jack has a ROCK.

That red coat also makes him very distinctively the only real colour in the room.

Michael is wearing dark blue for the red vs blue coding, but it's dark enough to not stand out in the decor.

TFW are all wearing brown and tan.

I'm actually quite fond of this stupid jock werewolf.

Awkward silences with jingle bells in the background... why are they making werewolves inherently comical in Dabb era, I don't know. But I LOVE it.

RIP the sexy werewolf.

Dumb jock werewolf has already run off, which MAY be a reminder to panic about all the monsters in position, or he might get stopped on the way by TFW in a strategic position...

RIP other sexy werewolf.

Both, sadly, as hot as they were, die with amusing riffs of jingle bells to accompany their decapitations. No dignity in death for these fuckers.

Sam may or may not be doing a Red Meat by taking them on alone but he sure is in a better position with only a mild concussion leftover from the earlier attack rather than, you know, a barely-treated gut shot.

Man I hope Cas healed up the residual damage of that before the end of season 11.

Sam is indeed alone as he promised not to be while 100% intending to rush right in, which means that dumb jock werewolf did indeed run off into the city, which means that with 10 minutes left a whoops we let Kansas City turn into monsters cliffhanger might be a lark.

Merry Christmas everyone but Kansas City.

I mean Sam doesn't need to rush on the Jack rescue, Michael literally has eons of AUncle-nephew bonding planned.

The fact Alex has visible chicken pox scars on his forehead amuses me so much. While Jack fast-track grew in 12x23 he randomly inflicted the pox on himself as part of the childhood experience. Like, oh, I better get all my immunity from mom so when my 3 dads collectively fail to get me vaccinated at least I've got that. *boop* chicken pox scars appear.

S'gonna be Garth on the other side of that door

OH NO IT IS

Oh no Sam, it's a trap, he's gonna eat you. Oh no oh no you can't cut Garth's head off. He's a Beloved Sweetie Pie.

If this ends with watching Mr Fizzles get a hunter funeral I am sending Bobo a mountain of coal for Christmas.

Love that universal trope of the werewolf ducking away for an embarrassing uncontrolled transformation that looks somewhere between puking and period cramps. Moonsickness.

Michael is the moon controlling it in this case.

Cosmic bodies.

Don't touch him, Jack!!

Transformations with glowy eyes suck :<

This is just CRUEL to make Garth be like "I'm sorryyyyy" as he charges at Sam.

LOL THIS IS A CRYPT SCENE. He's in Garth's head!

"You don't have to do this!" "You can fight this, Garth!"

Me, staring at my mess of red string connecting crypt scenes: How did I get to Garth wolfing out while shouting apologies at Sam and Sam begging him to stop when this all started with Dean n Cas fighting over a lump of rock 6 seasons ago

Oh thank god they ended it with Sam vulcan neck pinching Garth to sleep after Jack took a rolling tackle at him and Garth ends up still controlled and shoved in the back of the car for later problems.

We'll file this under the failures section between bros and move on though I won't deny Berens had me in a cold sweat that I was going to have to throw years of work out because Sam would grab Mr Fizzles out of Garth's pocket and soothe him back to himself :P

Mr Fizzles x Garth as the Destiel parallel of the year

"Thanks for waiting for us," Dean says, angrily gesturing the alive and rescued Jack while uselessly holding the spear.

It's okay baby there's 7 minutes left and Cas still doesn't have fake blood all over him.

I think Mikey might come back around to gloat. He strikes me as the supervillain type to do that.

They figure out the last few chess moves that Michael made while sitting on the trunk that Garth is locked in. Rough.

In the background, Cas strides over to the brooding Jack.

Boop.

"I wouldn't bet against us."

In Which Dean Nearly Decapitates His Brother

Rousing family speech about no odds or element of surprise or fear from Michael, and they go dramatically walking off towards the elevator with blaring Christmas music.

I hate this

Everyone has a weapon except Jack, who just has a series of incomprehensible troubled looks every time anything happens.

The Boy Is Concerned. But is it about what's going on around him, or inner turmoil disrupting his nougaty centre?

He looks placid again during the dramatic walk, while everyone else has their hero faces, he's surrounded by his dads so he can just be like :3 and enjoy the adventure.

Michael is bored and pacing because they took too long having broments downstairs and walking slowly towards the elevator and he wants to do this great dramatic turn when they arrive but the elevator is craaaaaaawling up the building.

Fine, what if I'm not by the window but sitting down with my back to them.

Is Michael NERVOUS?

Big talk about being a zillion years old and then getting impatient.

What did Michael just see? Because he lit up his eyes and got a lot more confident...

"There... he... is" he smirks.

Me when Cas

Cas doesn't usually nearly get a killing blow on me, though. Nice move, bud.

HEY, RUDE. DOn'T HURT HIM

I know he just tried to stab you but I'm allowed to yell that. Also stabbing archangels doesn't tend to work on them but whatever :P

Come on Dean, GET HIM. He hurt the bae! And Sam and Jack now! But nowhere near as dramatically!

Ironically if Michael had just had any patience he wouldn't have fallen for being baited into coming to see Cas snooping around his front desk.

OH NOICE THIS IS THE SAME FIGHT WITH MICHAEL AND DARK KAIA BUT DEAN AND MICHAEL

Ow, Dean not doing so well after all.

Is that Sam or Jack inching a hand towards the spear. If Sam stabs Michael then it's a thanks in return for stabbing Lucifer. If Jack does... Badass, kid needs a big kill.

On the other hand, we're so near cliffhanger time territory that.. well.

Nope, Sam just did the slide a weapon back to Dean thing and Dean got in a hit on Michael in their duel.

Same arm he got stabbed on.

"trust me, that's gonna leave a scar"

Jack I hope you are paying attention to Dad no.3's use of one-liners because he is a master.

When he isn't, like, "you're the shortbus, shortbus."

UHOH Michael is standing with aaaaaall the haloes reflected behind him in the window and Dean is having Suspicious Killing Hesitation

aaaand there's the whooshy vision wow what a surprise

I KNEW IT WAS COMING AS SOON AS MICHAEL'S SHOULDERS WENT ALL CONFIDENT AND HE STARTED STARING AND I'M STILL UPSET.

I mean I knew it was coming as soon as Dean stumbled in like ??? I'm not Michael???

But in the short term, argh.

WHAT IS THIS BAR

It has a moose head, Jo's shooting game from the Roadhouse, and the old jukebox from 4x01's diner where Sam and Ruby hung out.

Aside from anything else this is a horrible ploy by Michael to get the spear.

WHEN DID MICHAEL BARTEND.

I am so intrigued.

But yeah, checkmate, Dean Winchester. Snapped your magic spear and melted to magic egg. What next?

Oh good and now he has the halos behind his head :< :< :< :<

Wanek I am so angry. You get coal too.

LOL Michael giving them a lesson on maaaaaaaybe asking important questions about things instead of just leaving them as soon as a character appears to be functioning on the surface, I type with this paused with Jack in the corner of my screen as a fortuitous example

Michael gloating about breaking Dean is the worst Christmas cliffhanger. I hate you Bobo.

You aren't seriously going to end the season on a snap and make us make Michael is Thanos jokes all hiatus? I mean he already fucked up one planet, decimating it in the name of a better world. Please. Don't do this, Bobo.

He did it.

Reminds me of the end of 3x10 as well, with demon!Dean lurking under Dean, waiting until before the credits to snap his fingers from within Dean's subconscious to remind us he was lurking and waiting.

Aw man this sucks.

Now Jack has to murder Dean after all.

#14x09 #season 14 spoilers #berens fanclub #my stuff

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frigfridge · 5 years

Text

just finished rewatching toy story 1 thru 3 over the past few days, wanted to share my thoughts:

i love these movies a whole lot. the first 2 hold a bunch of nostalgia for me because i was A Baby when 2 came out and when i was also A Baby i would just watch our VHS copy of toy story 1 over and over again. this also makes me the exact age group to be emotionally destroyed by toy story 3, which came out just as i was entering high school and hit really close to home

individual thoughts:

toy story: the first thing i noticed was it still looks really nice even watching in 2019!! which i think is kind of spectacular for the first feature-length computer-animated film. it no doubt helps that the plot is mostly focused on little plastic dolls without realistic hair or clothing to animate but the semi-”cartoon” art direction means the human characters also look pretty nice without going too far into the uncanny valley.

also, the plot is WAY darker than i remember?? not because of sid and all the body horror toys, but because for like half of the movie woodys friends think hes an actual (toy) murderer carrying around the severed arm of his victim (!!) like, its hilarious, but also wow theres a LONG way to go between there and the climax of toy story 3.

the soundtrack is probably my favorite of the bunch. part of that is probably nostalgia but i just really like the consistency of having randy newman singing every song. it sort of elevates him to part of the story, like an omniscient narrator singing woodys (and later buzzs) inner monologue. 2 (and especially 3) didnt have as many musical numbers, which i can understand with a shift to a larger-scale approach to storytelling, but i really like the feeling it gives number 1. “you got a friend in me” is an obvious classic thats been remixed and brought back in just about every piece of toy story media im aware of, but “strange things” and “i will go sailing no more” deserve just as much recognition and praise. there just isnt a weak number among them

toy story 2: heres where the story started getting bigger and more existential, which basically becomes the new direction of the series. which makes sense! this one released 4 years after the first, and while theres no real timeskip in the story (maybe 6 months?) it had been a little while since we last saw woody and the gang. everybody in the real world had gotten older, and with the turn of the millennium approaching, the theme of impermanence loomed large in the collective unconscious. well, maybe not in my unconscious, because i was 2. but its really interesting as kind of a “time capsule” to what people were thinking about as the 90s came to a close.

so toy story 2 was a little more grounded, a little more focus on the human world, but it was also more fantastical in its presentation. the opening “video game” sequence (which still looks amazing!!) and woodys nightmare (”i dont wanna play with you anymore...”) show the animators at pixar really found their groove and started getting experimental. and to great result!! the fantasy sequences are a lot of fun and help 2 really stand out.

i would be remiss not to mention jessies flashback song here. its something else they hadnt really done in the first film and i think it really works. jessie in this film unfortunately doesnt get to do much other than fight with woody about whether he should stay or go (except for when she saves him in the end) but this song makes her character work. it also helps that it destroys me every time

also i think this is the movie that gave me an appreciation for the acting of kelsey grammer. i dont really agree with his politics (i also dont know specifically what they are) but he is a damn fine actor and gives the prospector a very genuinely intimidating edge after his heel turn. the casting really makes the character here, but thats nothing new for toy story-- every voice works. if i were the casting director, i probably wouldnt have pulled erudite kelsey grammer for a character named “stinky pete,” but as it is now i couldnt imagine him voiced by anyone else.

the last thing about toy story 2 is it feels like there were a lot more pop culture references? at least as far as i noticed. there are apparently even more than i noticed but i caught on to the “also sprach zarathustra” riff in the opening, and the jurassic park rearview mirror gag. and of course the extended star wars reference with zurg vs. utility belt buzz (and i guess zurg in general.) the references are cute and mostly unobtrusive but really i could take or leave them.

oh yeah also al is hilarious. just this rude, neurotic businessman whos incredibly self-important for the owner of a minor(?) toy store chain. hes such a puffed-up jerk, every time hes on-screen is a delight

toy story 3: this one kills me to death. i always get misty-eyed during “when somebody loved me” but the ending of 3 where andy introduces his toys to bonnie and plays with them one last time made me sob the first time i watched it. and it still does! thats the long game right there, thats the payoff of over 10 years loving these characters. its an emotional ketchup bomb, everything gets all messy and soggy and sweet. hopefully 4 can follow up, but im not really worried about that-- ive heard some good things. damn, its been 9 years since this movie came out, though! it really doesnt feel all that long, but i guess i havent been doing all that much

i actually dont know if i have much else to say about 3. the opening with the re-imagining of the previous films openings (woody versus one-eyed bart, buzz and woody vs. the evil dr. porkchop) is a highlight, although theres a conspicuous lack of bo peep. ive heard she has a big part in 4, but it was kind of weird to see a lot of toys missing and their absence (mostly) glossed over after the first few minutes. i miss r.c. and lenny, but i get they wanted to narrow down the cast so all of them could get in on the plot.

speaking of which, the escape scene is great too. its kind of a crystallizing moment of how close these characters are, and how well they work together. it reminds me a lot of the escape from sids house in the first movie, but there woody was working with sids body-horror toys and seemed to strike up a rapport with them bizarrely quickly. (speaking of which, i miss those toys! their designs were super cool, but i cant imagine they got much merchandise, especially babyface with the sharp, metal spider legs.) here, though, woody and the gang cooperate the best they ever have, and it really paints a picture of how close theyve become over the years, and justifies the emotional climax in the landfill. this is what i was talking about when i said i was surprised how dark toy story 1 got! these toys all hated woodys guts back then for what they thought he did to buzz. they kicked him out of a moving truck! its just weird to think about that conflict between them when you know how long they end up sticking together. but thats, like, neat, so its ok. it feels earned, its just kind of crazy in hindsight.

toy story 3 was also obviously made long after the first two-- by comparison, the lighting is way more sophisticated, the humans are a lot more detailed. theres just a lot more detail In General. the main cast is, like, super dirty for the middle 90% of the film, and it feels like, yeah, We Have This Technology Now. we can render so many individual glitter sprinkles suck to hamms ass and they will be in every single scene. the “fur tech” on lotso and buster is also an obvious clue, especially in the flashback to lotso trudging through the rain back to his owners house. its like “look! we can make this teddy bear SO wet!” and wow! yeah! you did! so wet!

lotso himself is also an interesting villain in terms of sheer bastardness. he is just a huge jerk. he could have hit that button so easily! and he was so mean to the baby! but at the same time hes a great character in how he slowly “changes” throughout the movie. he is kind of an obvious “pixar ‘twist’ villain” but again, the amazing performance by ned beatty really saves him. also he does get a nice comeuppance at the end, which was necessary because hes really the biggest villain in the series so far. hes knowingly malicious and doesnt have any greater motive, hes just an embittered megalomaniac who (apparently) has sent other toys to be broken, thrown away, and incinerated at the landfill. he honestly deserves worse than being strapped to the front of a truck but it works for a family movie.

i have a couple more thoughts on 3 (i guess i did have a fair amount of stuff to say about it) but im getting tired of writing. the music is good as usual, but the vocal stuff being entirely back-loaded (in the credits) is a bit disappointing since ive always been a fan of the songs, but i get that they were going for something different. the jokes about ken being, uh, ‘flamboyant’ felt out of place, mostly the one at the end (”uh, buzz? barbie didnt write this”) because it comes from one of the gang and not unnamed lotso goon #3, but i guess its pretty tame in the scheme of things.

overall im really looking forward to seeing what 4 does with the series. whew!

#hopefully ill see 4 this weekend #personal essay #got pretty honkin long. click at your own risk

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emmaswanchoosesyou · 7 years

Text

CSBB: Part of the Narrative (8/17)

Emma Swan just wants to write the follow-up to her bestselling debut novel, that’s all. But when she gets off to a rough start with her new editor, Killian Jones, she knows it’s not going according to plan. Then, an unexpected figure from Emma’s past reappears and life begins to mirror the crime thriller she’s penning. Suspicion and secrets abound–but love might too. A writer/editor AU with a thriller twist.

Rated E. Story warnings: sexual content, kidnapping, some gore, violence, and minor character death–not to mention salty language! On Ao3 here.

Chapter warnings: Profanity, discussions of past relationships and canon pregnancy-related issues, and some snogging.

I hope you all know that your comments and likes and kudos and reblogs have been cherished and squealed over. Thank you to all the wonderful peeps at @captainswanbigbang for all you’ve done to make this possible, and all the support you’ve given. Sophie @shady-swan-jones made the delightful banner and another photoset that I adore. Kayla @bleebug did some incredible art for the first and sixth chapters, which you can check out here and here. And all the love and thanks to Kris @sambethe for beta-ing this and making it a ton better.

[Ch. 1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]

Chapter 8

Emma comes clean to Killian about her past, and they bond during their second date.

Killian

Killian stared through the small window at the front of his oven, hoping the conversion to Fahrenheit hadn’t utterly destroyed his mother’s recipe for Lancashire hotpot. He stepped back and glanced out the window above the sink. Even through the dark, the grey of the clouds promised snow, and it was already colder than he’d like. So this would be perfect, provided it cooked properly.

In the meantime, this cooking adventure was distracting him from his nerves about the night’s plans with Emma. He knew they needed to talk--they truly did--but just the thought of seeing her filled his stomach with butterflies, in the best way. In a manly way, as he’d told Robin.

Aye, manly butterflies.

It had only been a few days since he had seen her, but he missed her. They had texted over the last few days, which had been pleasant--excellent, in fact--but it wasn’t the same as being in the same room as her, holding her in his arms or seeing the light in her eyes while she talked about the things she was passionate about.

He was just so…excited to see her again, to have dinner with her, to talk, to… snuggle. Or, perhaps more than snuggle. Either way, it would be good.

Obviously, they had a fairly heavy conversation ahead of them, but he was optimistic. In the days since their date, he hadn't heard from August. Nothing. Not a word. And, frankly, Killian was relieved. He was in no rush to hear from his current boss and former conspirator. He had actually emailed him the other day with an update from the next chapter Emma was working on. It was the exact sort of thing he should be talking to August about. The exact thing a publisher needed to hear in the earlier stages of developing a novel, and not what he had asked Killian to do.

And what a chapter it was! The story was starting to unfold, and Killian was hooked. They had finally met the protagonists, a social worker and the child she was trying to help get out of the foster care system.

He couldn't help but see the parallels to Emma's own life, and to Henry. And he was thrilled. Not only was Emma clearly drawing from her own experiences, but she was painting them vividly. It left Killian feeling he knew her a little better for it and knew it would draw others into the story.

A knock at the door interrupted Killian's musings, and he gave a sigh of relief. Not that he wasn't enjoying contemplating Emma and her story, but maybe the butterflies could actually settle down now that she was here.

"Just a minute," he called out, pulling the dish out of the oven. He straightened his vest over his shirt, ran a hand through his hair, and went to the door.

He opened it to find Emma's beautiful face, her small, crooked smile betraying how glad she was to see him too. She was carrying a bottle of wine and shifting her weight as she stood up on the tips of her toes, her nervous energy soothing him and putting him at ease even as his heart skipped a beat. At least he wasn't alone in this.

"Good evening, Swan. You look delightful," he said, brushing a quick kiss across her cheek and taking the wine from her.

Emma blushed, but eyed him hungrily. "You look good too." Then, her eyes drifted away from him as she sniffed at the air. "Okay, that smells fantastic."

He held the door open and motioned for her to come through. "Well, then come in and let's get us fed."

He watched her as she moved past him, her cream-colored sweater and figure-hugging pants making her look delectable. The style made her seem soft, approachable, while also unaccountably badass when coupled with her knee-high boots, and he couldn't wait to continue what they had started on Friday.

Killian shook his head and idly thumbed at his mouth, hoping he hadn't been drooling. He let his prosthetic hand drop to the small of her back, guiding her into his flat. "Would you like the tour, or would you like to eat first?"

She turned and offered him a smile. "Tell me what that delicious smell is, and then I want a tour. I know your tour of my place was interrupted, but I'm curious."

He smirked at her as she peered over his shoulder back into the kitchen. "Then all in good time, love. Our dinner will be a Lancashire hotpot. My mother's recipe."

Emma softened. "That's great--what's in it?" Stepping back and turning to stand beside him, she kept her eyes on him.

"Traditionally, it's made with lamb and local vegetables, but I used beef, as lamb… well, it takes a fair hand to cook, and I’ve only got the one. I also didn't imagine slaving in the kitchen for hours would fall under the terms of 'casual' we agreed upon for tonight."

"Well, regardless, I can't wait to try it. Now show me your lair," she said, grinning at him.

He raised an eyebrow and set the wine down on the counter. "Lair? Do you see me as the sort that would have lair?"

She waved his question aside airily. "Lair, berth, dwelling...whatever."

"For starters, my 'lair' has this kitchen, and a cozy living room," Killian said, gesturing to the room in question.

Emma smiled, eyeing his well-worn and well-loved chair, the one he had brought across the ocean in spite of--no, because of--its odd appearance.

"At some point I'll tell you about my chair, that is if you tell me about yours," she said, turning away from the chair to face him.

"Deal."

"Shall we continue?" she asked, starting down the short hallway.

"Aye, we shall. As you can see, this is the hallway, and the bathroom. And through here is my bedroom."

She followed him into the room in question, running her eyes over the grey and navy striped coverlet, the sea chest in the corner, and the anchor and ship painting on the wall, the room’s feel neat and organized. Emma looked around almost wistfully. "It's very… nautical. And grown-up."

"What were you expecting? A single bed with posters from popular films?" His gentle tone belied the biting words a little.

"No, I just… well, my place stays fairly orderly too, but that's because I don't keep much there. And I totally drop my clothes on the floor."

Killian laughed. "Normally that might be the case here, but there's this lovely writer who promised to come over for dinner, so I may have put things in order."

She smirked at him. "Hmm, feeling hopeful, were you?"

"Always," he said seriously, meeting her eyes.

She didn't look away.

&&&

After they finished their meal, Killian poured them each another glass of the wine Emma had brought.

She smiled up at him and took a slow sip. "That was delicious. Your mom's recipe totally holds up."

"Doesn't it? I'm glad it worked out over here, even with the adjustments to American ovens and measuring systems," he said happily.

"Maybe sometime you'll show me how to make it?"

He paused, seeing the hopeful look on her face. His heart beat faster, the idea of working side-by-side with Emma in his small kitchen--in either of their kitchens, really--the very opposite of vexing. "Certainly, if that's something you wish to do."

"I...I really do," she said, reaching across the table and taking his prosthetic in her hand. He patted her hand with his and let her continue. "I...so, yeah, I really enjoy spending time with you. I also realized that I want to get to know my son, and it seems like a lot all at once."

"I would hope you wouldn't consider me a burden, love," he said, trying to keep his features schooled, not wanting to place any sort of expectations on her even as he felt a twinge of disappointment.

She looked surprised for a moment, then rushed to reassure him. "No--Killian, not at all. But I think there are things you should know before we make any decisions." Her brow was furrowed in concern.

“I’d be happy to listen to whatever you want to tell me.”

“I know you were upset that I hadn’t told you. I could tell the other night, and I--just, well--I don’t owe you my story just because you told me yours,” Emma said, her voice low and intense.

Ouch. He knew her words were harsh, but also fair. He considered his own before nodding, acknowledging his silent display of frustration from the other night. He lifted his hands at her in supplication. “You’re right. You don’t owe me anything, but know that I would like to get to know you, and your story. So when you are ready to share, know that I’m all ears.”

She smiled at him, accepting his unspoken apology. “I was sixteen. I’d been in the foster care system my entire life, and I’d just run away from my last home. The Dixons...well, Mr. Dixon was interested in me in ways he shouldn’t have been, and Mrs. Dixon didn’t believe me. So I ran.”

“Christ, Emma, that’s awful,” he said, reaching for her hand again.

She didn’t pull away, instead she threaded her fingers through his and took a deep breath before continuing. “I went to Portland. The one in Oregon, that is. It seemed as far away as I could get. And, well, I was a sixteen-year-old with no skills, so I stole. Usually just small stuff, but I won’t lie, I was stealing more and bigger things as time went on.”

Killian rubbed his thumb over her wrist and nodded at her, encouraging her to go on.

“So I saw a car. A yellow VW Bug...”

“The one you have now? You still have a car that you stole?!” His voice was incredulous but tinged with amusement, and his eyebrows skyrocketed up toward his hairline.

“I’ll get to that, Jones, but yes,” she said, the exasperation in her tone lightened by the smile she gave him. “Anyway, the car was old enough that I knew it wouldn’t have anything too fancy to deal with in terms of alarms or locking mechanisms. So I got in and got the car going.”

“Next time I need to hotwire a car, I know who to turn to,” he teased.

Emma smacked his hand in mock reproof. “Nope, you’d pick something new and shiny. It’d be awful, and we’d so get caught.”

“I’ll have you know that I was a very good thief as a twelve-year-old,” he said, smirking at her.

She shook her head in response before taking a deep breath and continuing. “Well, I got in the car, and then I got the shock of my life when some guy popped up from the backseat.”

“Ah,” he said, the pieces coming together for him, “Henry’s father?”

“Yeah. His name was Neal, and as it turned out he had just stolen the car.” A melancholy look crossed her face, but she pushed it away. “He was older and had that irresponsible, easygoing vibe that screamed bad boy. So, naturally, my sixteen-year-old self fell for him immediately.”

He nodded, encouraging her to continue.

“We decided to team up. There were a lot of cons that were easier with the two of us, and we made our way from Portland to Arizona. We were together by then, and I was crazy about him. He said he was crazy about me. We had even started talking about going straight together, doing the right thing somewhere with a nice view of the beach. We were thinking Florida,” she said, her lips turning downward with a wry twist at her youthful naivete. “We settled on Tallahassee, not realizing it doesn’t have access to the beach.”

“What went wrong, love?”

“Neal had some watches he’d lifted a while ago stored in a locker in Phoenix. We were going to grab them, sell them and use the money to start our new life. But when we got there we found a bunch of wanted posters with Neal’s face on them. So I volunteered to go get them.” She paused and he squeezed her hand. “We were going to meet up afterward and head out of town.”

Killian winced, imagining all the ways that could have backfired. He wondered which way it had.

Emma didn’t let him stew in his curiosity for long. “I picked them up without a problem and went to meet Neal. Only he didn’t show, a cop did. Said they’d gotten an ‘anonymous tip’ someone would be making a grab and running with them.”

“Bloody hell, an ‘anonymous tip’? He--” Killian cut himself off, heat blooming in his cheeks as fury bubbled in his chest at the man who had so betrayed Emma. He was so appalled that he pulled back, disentangling their hands.

“Yeah. I think even the judge felt bad for me. My sentence wasn’t as heavy as it could have been, and they made sure I got resources so that I wouldn’t turn back to theft when I got out,” she said, fiddling with her napkin and not meeting his eyes.

He reached for her again and squeezed her hand, overwhelmed at what she had gone through.

She looked up at him, smiling sadly, a bitter twist to her mouth. “Two months into my year-long sentence I found out I was pregnant. I had just barely turned seventeen, I was in jail, and I--well, I couldn’t even fathom being a mother. Even if it meant I had to do the one thing I’d sworn I’d never do to my own child, I knew he deserved better.”

“And so did you,” he whispered, his heart breaking for her.

“Does that make me selfish? It’s just that what was best for him was also best for me, or so I thought at the time.”

“Of course not. Or rather, if it is...it’s the most understandable thing I can think of in your situation.” He lifted her hand to brush a kiss across her knuckles, then furrowed his brow. “Did Henry say something?”

“He wondered about why I had given him up. I told him the truth, and that I don’t exactly regret it. But I also told him that I do want to know him.”

Killian smiled at her. “And hopefully he wants to know you. If not, he’s missing out.”

She blushed but returned his smile. “Thanks. We talked last night on the phone, and we had a good chat on the way to Portland. I think… I think it’s going to work out.”

He desperately wanted to pull her into his embrace. “Thank you, Emma, for telling me about your past.”

She looked at him, something shy and earnest in her gaze. “Thanks for listening. I don’t generally talk about this stuff with, well, anyone.”

“I’m honored to have your trust,” he said honestly, even as the guilt of his work with August knifing through him even as he smiled. It was an honor, even if it was one he didn’t deserve, but he would endeavor to be worthy of it.

She didn’t seem to notice anything was off, and Killian let out a silent breath of relief. She didn’t ever have to know about his past behavior, especially since it was no longer an issue. Killian leaned back in his chair, shifting his hand to lift hers, thumbing at the top of her knuckles as he did. “Well, love, would you like me to pour us another glass of wine? We could do that and watch something, if you’d like,” he said.

Emma slumped her shoulders in relief, clearly relieved to have the more serious portion of their conversation over with too. “That sounds great.”

They settled onto the couch, Emma sitting comfortably beside him, his arm draped over her shoulder, as they watched Parks and Recreation. He wasn’t entirely sold on the American comedy, but Emma assured him it would change his life. He was willing to give it a shot, especially with such a glowing recommendation, and if it meant it was something they’d have an excuse to continue to do together outside of the office.

Honestly, though, he stopped paying attention to the show about the same time Emma’s hand started caressing his thigh. He tightened his hold on her, the chamomile and sunshine scent of her hair bewitching his senses.

She turned to look up at him, and he wasted no time capturing her lips with his. His tongue traced along them, begging entry that she granted. Their embrace grew more passionate as she turned to face him, her legs straddling his. She pressed against him, her fingers cupping his jaw as his hands slipped under her sweater. He lightly traced nonsensical patterns up her back with his hand and his prosthetic, letting them slide against the softness of her skin and moaning against her mouth as he did.

Killian’s moan seemed to startle Emma, and she pulled back. He was gratified, though, to see she seemed to have trouble catching her breath. As she paused but didn’t pull back further, he pressed open-mouthed kisses down her throat to her collarbone.

She arched into him again and sighed before finally pulling away. “Hey, Killian--can we--can we stop for a moment?”

He closed his eyes but nodded, acquiescing. Lowering his hands and removing them from under her top, he looked up at her above him, her long hair flowing over her shoulders. She looked like a goddess of sunshine, he thought, his brain still somewhat fogged, not receiving all the blood flow it normally would.

“Sorry, I just… well, a lot is going on right now, and I want to see where this goes. But I also want to slow down a little,” she said apologetically, her cheeks red--with either embarrassment or arousal. Possibly both.

He smiled, and pressed a chaste kiss to her nose. “You have nothing to apologize for, Emma. We can take this as slowly--or as fast--as you’d like. Whenever you like.”

“I just… well, you’re my editor.” She gave a small shrug and looked away a moment before returning to look directly down at him. “I want this to work, I really do. But if it doesn’t, we still have to work together.”

“I understand. Truly, lass,” he said, beseeching any god who might listen to please help it work out. He reached out and touched her chin, kissing her again, trying to keep it from becoming too desperate a thing.

#cs ff #captain swan #cs au #csbb #cs mc ff #part of the narrative #amber writes #they bond! they snog!#he cooks!#also i really want lancashire hotpot now

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