#to watch a movie that is an hour and fifty minutes

[catcatb0y]

You'll never guess who just finished Promare again.

[spider-ghoul]

Babysitting <3

Percy Jackson X gn!reader (fluff)

In which: a call from Sally Jackson leads you to help with her youngest, and spend the night with her eldest son. Lingering glances and sleepy confessions only to be forgotten by morning.

Warnings: Reader is mentioned to be smaller than Percy once, kissing, none I can think of but as always lmk if there's anything!!

this might be complete shit lmao I finished this at like 3:00 am last night but I wanted to get something out to feed the beasts of this website

~~𓈒ㅤׂㅤ𓇼 ࣪ 𓈒ㅤׂㅤ⭒ 𓆡 ⭒ㅤ𓈒ㅤׂ 🫧~~

At six o'clock on a Friday, normally I'd be rotting in my bed after the week of school. And that was the plan, until Mrs. Jackson mom called.

"Oh- (y/n) I'm so sorry for asking but do you think you could watch Estelle tonight? Me and Paul had a date but Percy was going to the movies with Grover tonight and we-"

"Mrs. Jackson, yeah, it's fine. When do I need to be over?"

"Six is when we're leaving."

"I'll be there at five fifty."

"You're a savior."

This was perfectly fine. Me and Percy were friends and i was the only half-blood who lived around here. I watched Estelle a few times before too. No biggie. Except for the fact I'd been in love with Percy Jackson for...a while.

I mean, he was  kinda my friend. But god, he was Percy Jackson.

At five forty, i headed out. I grabbed my backpack, making sure i had the baby sitting essentials for any four year old: nail polish, beads, and my old rainbow loom (i also spent a extra minute making sure my hair looked okay so that if i saw a certain older brother) I figured that and the t.v. would be more than enough to keep us occupied till her bedtime at eight.

I got there right on time (surprisingly), and Sally greeted me with another thank you. She tried to hand over a few bucks cash, but i pushed her hand away.

She rushed out of the door with Paul after a few more (failed) attempts of paying me, leaving me with an excited two four old. And before too long, she had me watching Bluey (Though i do thoroughly enjoy that show), and making bracelets for us.

She watched as i showed her how to bead the string and make sure the letter beads where on the right way, and then she helped me choose colors.

To start i made one with her name in purple and white. She giggled and slide it on her wrist. I started working on a second one, and she told me to tie hers. It was all blue and had me spell out 'Percy' with beads for her.

"Is this for your brother?" She nodded excitedly, "well, we'll give it to him when he get here, okay?"

I got a solid hour with the beads before she got bored, and by the end both of our wrists had a fair share of bracelets littering them, and a small pile of three bracelets for Percy.

I seriously hope she's awake when he gets here, I can imagine the teasing that would come with handing him bracelets and saying, "oh yeah sorry I'm at your house haha baby sitting- oh me and your sister made you bracelets-". Or i could imagine our hands touching causing me to panic. I could imagine a million things actually.

I think this whole crush is really getting out of hand, especially with me becoming his mom's go to sitter now a days.

Estelle broke me from my thoughts with requests to watch 'Nemo', her favorite. We've watched it every time I've babysat. Part of me wonders if Percy likes it too, I mean with the whole sea god thing. 

As for her request, I made a bag of microwave popcorn and set her down in front of the TV.

I vaguely remember the opening, and Estelle fell asleep next to me before i dozed off myself.

I woke up a bit later, maybe half an hour? The movie wasn't finished, but Estelle was already fast asleep. I took the liberty of scooping her up and placing her in her own bed before going to clean up the main room.

It wasn't bad, just putting away my beads, and getting the popcorn bowl out of the way. I was tired enough, school was rough this week. I just planted myself back on the couch, finding Nemo not quite finished as I did.

I'm not quite sure when i feel back asleep, just that i did.

I'm also not quite sure when Percy Jackson sat down next to me, but he did.

I woke up, curled around a throw pillow, the end credits were playing. I rolled onto my back, and that's when I saw him.

Maybe i was too tired, or maybe he was just smiling, but i didn't feel all that anxious. At least not like i normally do around the son of the sea god.

"Do you always fall asleep to Nemo or is this a special occasion?"

"Do you always watch me sleep or is this a special occasion...?"

He laughed and my heart fluttered.

"Uhm, sorry your mom had me come over to babysit, I didn't know you'd be home yet." I say awkwardly smiley as i sit up, yawning. 

"It's fine, y/n. She texted me, sorry to have you waste a Friday."

"Oh its fine, better than doing nothing. Your sis was an angel, like always." I say, shifting, my shirt bunched up around my waist while I was sleeping. I was also pretty positive my hair was a mess. 

"Oh and speaking of my mom- before i forget." He pulled out a twenty, "now I figure you aren't gonna want to take it, but it's sally's orders."

"I'd feel bad, its just a favor. Your mom is always so nice, she patched me up after a monster attack once, this is just me repaying her."

"She did? When?" His eyebrows furrowed together, his eyes filled with concern.

And i felt my face getting hot again.

"A few weeks ago, your house was closer than mine, it's fine." I mutter, looking down. 

He sighed, "what happened?" he said, reaching out to put his hand over mine. I short wire for a moment, looking back up at him. 

"Just something on my way home from school, it wasn't bad."

After a brief moment of silence, i wanted to crawl out of my skin.

He sighed, "as long as you're fine." he lifted his hand off of mine, though I could still feel his warmth. 

I smiled weakly, "oh uh..what time is it?" 

"Uh.. ten-ish?"

"I should be getting home." I say, sighing turning away from him. 

"It's pretty late, I wouldn't want you to walk back alone."

"It's not far-"

"I'm sure my mom would say the same thing, you know."

I sighed, knowing he was right, "i don't want to intrude." 

"Neither me or Sally would care."

"...."

"...can i bribe you to stay with waffles?"

"...yeah you can." I sigh, any of Sally's food was enough to make me do just about anything. 

Percy smiled, making my heart melt.

"Great, it'll be like a sleepover. Do you need to borrow a shirt or something?"

"Yeah, that uhm- that would be great." I mutter, pushing myself up off the couch. My neck was sore, who would have guessed that a throw pillow wasn't great for sleeping? I stretch my arms out over my head, yawning again. 

"tired?" He chuckles, raising his eyebrow. 

"well you did just wake me up-" I resort, rolling my eyes. I always forget how nice Percy is. I always worry about stupid things, but when I'm with him none of it really matters.

"You woke up on your own- I was simply..." He trails off, and I laugh:

"Watching me sleep?" 

"What can I say? You looked so.. pretty." He look down at me, and I could swear my heart stops, but I don't look away.

"...Yeah, whatever." I mummer quietly,  staring into his eyes and blinking a few times before finally breaking eye contact.

After a short moment, He mumbles something about getting me to bed. I nod quickly, following him to his room, which is surprisingly clean. He digs though his dresser drawers for a moment, pulling out some old band tee, and blue plaid pants. He hands them to me. 

"Is this fine for you? might be a big big, just let me know-" 

"it's fine. No worries." I say quickly, taking them, making sure to avoid his hands. "Thanks." 

He smiles again, and I leave for the bathroom, my heart pounding in my ears. 'pretty'? it's nothing, Percy is just nice like that. 

I change into his clothes, the smell of ocean engulfing me as the soft fabric hangs from my body.  I can't help but to push my head into my shoulder. It smells like him. 

I ball up my jeans and tee shirt, shoving them into my backpack. I slipped out the bathroom once I calmed myself down enough to talk to him again. 

I walk up to Percy's door, "Hey, I'm gonna go lay down do you have a blanket or something I can use..?" 

His eyebrows furrowed as he looked up at me from where he was laying on his bed, "You don't seriously think I'm making you sleep on the couch-?" 

"Well I kinda assumed..?" 

"Get over here you dork." He said, scooting over on his bed, "Plenty of room- you don't mind, do you?" 

Part of me lit on fire, and part of me was desperate to put it out. My ears got hot, but I managed to nod.

"No, I don't mind.." 

I place my bag on the floor by the door, walking up and sitting on his bed, sliding my legs under the covers and sliding down to lay next to him. I was stiff, worried to so much as touch him. But eventually, I relaxed, turning to lay on my side, facing him. 

I looked at him through half-lidded eyes, my body already starting to sink into his bed, ready to get a proper night's sleep. My eyelids slowly drifted shut. 

I was woken when Percy broke the silence. 

"Y/N?" Percy whispered, almost silent. 

"Mhm..?" I mumbled back, not bothering to open my eyes. 

"I really like you, you know that?" 

If I wasn't half asleep, maybe I would have said something different. If I had the energy maybe I would have been flustered. 

"... I really like you too." 

I only heard him chuckle before he placed a hand on my hip. 

"Get some sleep, yeah? I'll confess my undying love when you'll properly Remember it." 

I must have frowned, because he laughed lightly and pulled me a little closer. 

It didn't matter though. I slipped back to sleep, and when I woke up I didn't  remember. 

I remembered waking up some point in the night, but I didn't know what was said. 

And in the morning, I got the promised waffles and left the Jackson's apartment. 

The ever chivalrous Percy Jackson (who I woke up cuddling with), offered to walk me home. 

We took the long way, and when we reached my door step, he pressed his lips to mine and told me he couldn't wait for me to babysit again, though he wouldn't mind me coming around before then. 

He left me breathless and giddy, and so so happy to have accepted Sally's offer.

[lancermylove]

Things You Do That He Doesn't Understand (HC)

Fandom: Twisted Wonderland

Pairing: Leaders with fem!Reader

Warning: None

———————————————

Wake up at an ungodly hour so that you can do your hair and makeup before going to work or school. You are not going to a party or a modeling show, so just use those hours to rest. Honestly, it's okay if your hair isn't perfect and your face looks natural.

Collecting anything. Leona can't understand how you have so much patience managing a collection of items. However, he finds it a little amusing when you agonize over not being able to find that miniature pizza to put in your mini kitchen collection.

Shapewear. Do you honestly like the feel of someone squeezing your organs out of your body? If so, just ask him for a hug. Leona will be more than happy to give you a bone-crushing hug.

Complex hair routine. Malleus likes to watch you do your hair, but it makes his head spin. Why do you need 50 different products for your hair? You look fine without putting those products in your hair.

Fear of abandoned places. Why are you scared to go into the castle that looks like something will jump out at you from the corner at any moment and attack you? It's really not that scary, says a powerful dragon who is over 200 cm tall.

Need for fluff. He finds it amusing that whenever you see fluffy things, you absolutely have to touch them no matter what, even if it means crossing a pit filled with lava. Sometimes, he wants to wear a fluffy coat so that you stay glued to him and can't stop touching him his coat.

Shave only half of your legs. Just take a few minutes to shave your entire legs.

Going to sleep with makeup on. NO, just NO! How dare you commit such an atrocious crime against your skin? He knows you might be tired, but take five minutes to clean your face or call him. He will do it for you. Vil better not find your face transferred on your pillow when he walks into your room to wake you up in the morning.

Telling your best friend/girlfriends everything. Do they honestly need to know how good he is at kissing or anything else? That's between the two of you, so why do you have to tell them? Vil finds it embarrassing that you are discussing such private affairs with your female friends.

Large handbags. Some of the handbags you carry are half his size. Why do you need such a huge bag? Are you hiding a pet or child in there? Also, why is it so heavy? Do you have dumbbells inside?

Expandable stomach. Riddle can't understand how, in the morning, your stomach looks one way, but after dinner, you look like you expecting a child. You tried to explain to him that's how women's stomachs work, but he still can't wrap his head around it.

Long nails. How do you keep your nails so long and manage to do things, especially if your nails are the lengths of claws? Whenever you struggle to open a can tab or pick up a flat object from a table, Riddle crosses his arms and waits to lecture you.

Worry about weight. Why worry about numbers when you could just enjoy eating? Food is too good to resist, so don't fight the urge and enjoy your life!

Impeccable memory. How do you remember what he said fifty days ago when the two of you were talking in the evening? Does your brain have a date/time stamp log with all the conversations you had? This means he can't get away with anything. T_T

Multitasking. How do you manage to do so many things at once and not mess up? Kalim can't understand why your mind is able to handle so many computations at once; he can't even handle one thing at a time. He doesn't know whether to be impressed or be scared.

Spend hours in the bathroom. Why does it take you a few hours to come out of the bathroom? Do you just sit there and watch an entire movie? If you do, why not just do it on your bed or sofa? It's much more comfortable.

The number of shoes. Why do you have 500 million shoes? Also, can we talk about high heels? Why do you wear them? Azul can't even understand how Vil and some of the other students are able to walk around in killer high heels. Unless you use them as a self-defense weapon.

Math is scary. What? It's just a bunch of numbers that you need to add, divide, subtract, or multiply. What's so hard about it? Then, he remembers he has a special talent for doing mental math and that not everyone is able to. Azul apologizes.

The urge to party every weekend. Why do you want to party every weekend? No, wait, why do you want to party in general? Too many people everywhere. Too many eyes and ears on you.

Details. Why do you need to ask the whys? He told you the truth, did he? Then why do you still need details? Can't you just accept the simple answer and let him move on?

Crying while watching romance movies. It's just a bunch of actors acting, so why are you crying? Seeing your tears fazes him quite a bit. So, when you start crying during an emotional scene, Idia gets startled and freezes, not knowing what to do.

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➣ Twisted Wonderland [1][2][3] ➣ Main Masterlist

➣ Buy me a Ko-fi? ➣ Commission: Open ➣ HC/Scenario Requests: Closed || Quick Ask Requests: Closed || GIF Requests: Closed

[steveseddie]

of movie nights and holding hands

rating: t | cw: none apply | word count: 1,841

tags: eddie munson lives, eddie munson has a crush on steve harrington, holding hands, getting together, first kiss

for the @steddielovemonth prompt “love is asking ‘do you want a blanket?’” by @thefreakandthehair

a/n: i liked this prompt so much that i wrote two fics for it! enjoy!

click here to read on ao3

***

Eddie tries hard to focus on the movie.

It shouldn’t be that hard since Top Gun is supposed to be a good movie. Tonight was the first time since movie nights at the Harrington residence became a thing that an argument didn’t break out amongst the group when they had to choose what to watch. Everyone just agreed. And even if the movie didn’t turn out to be good, Eddie would never waste the opportunity to ogle Tom Cruise for an hour and fifty minutes.

Except he is because, for the last thirty-two minutes, Eddie’s focus has been solely on Steve.

This isn’t the first time they sit next to each other during movie nights. More and more lately, they tend to gravitate toward the other whenever they hang out, and Eddie loves this as much as he hates it.

He loves being close to Steve, being able to whisper to him or touch him, or lean against him. But he hates how it makes him feel. How it makes his palms sweat or goosebumps appear on his skin. He hates it because he can’t let Steve know. Steve might’ve been cool about Eddie being gay and he’s cool with Eddie being touchy and loud and basically too much, but Eddie doesn’t think he’ll be cool with him having a huge hopeless crush on him.

(He probably would, though, because Steve is a good guy, the best guy Eddie knows, and he would let Eddie down easy and make sure nothing changes between them, but Eddie would still feel rejected and they might still end up drifting apart because he can’t handle that.

And Eddie would rather go against another army of Demobats than lose Steve.)

So Eddie tries hard to pay attention to the movie and be normal about the fact that Steve is basically sitting on top of him tonight.

They didn’t start the night like that. At first, it was just Steve, Eddie, and Robin on the couch with plenty of space to sit comfortably. But then Max and Lucas got into an argument- a childish quarrel really- that will probably be forgotten by the end of the night, but still she demanded that they open a spot for her on the couch since she didn’t want to sit with Lucas and the others on the floor anymore. To do that, Steve had to move closer to Eddie, pushing him against the arm of the couch and trapping him between it and his body. Max sits cross-legged next to him which leaves Steve with little to no room for his legs, so one of his thighs overlaps with Eddie’s, same with their arms. And of course, Eddie, who always dresses in multiple layers, decided to only wear a shirt and his battle vest tonight, meaning that his bare arm is touching Steve’s and every time he so much as wiggles trying to get comfortable, a shudder runs through Eddie’s spine.

He thinks Steve is too focused on the movie to notice, but halfway through it, he feels Steve shift closer (and how does he keep getting even closer?) and whisper right into Eddie’s, making the hairs on his neck stand up. “Do you want a blanket, Eds?”

“What?” Eddie asks. It comes out as a squeak. So much for acting normal.

“You keep shivering. Are you cold? Do you want a blanket?”

The thing is Eddie isn’t cold. Eddie feels warm all over actually, but he can’t tell Steve that the reason why he keeps shuddering or why he’s getting goosebumps is him.

So he says, “Uh, yeah. I could use a blanket.”

He expects Steve to get up so he can get it or to tell Eddie where to find one. Instead, he lifts the blanket that he placed across his lap when the movie started and drapes it across Eddie’s body too, shifting even closer to him.

“Better?” Steve asks with a sweet smile. Bless his clueless heart.

Eddie wants to scream “No, it’s not!” but instead, he just gives him a shaky smile that he hopes looks genuine and nods. Then he shoves his hands under the blanket so he can anxiously play with his rings without Steve noticing, feeling restless and jumpy at having Steve so close. After a moment, he sees Steve do the same out of the corner of his eye. Maybe his hands are cold.

Steve stays still after that, and Eddie can somewhat focus on the movie.

That is until he feels Steve’s pinkie finger brush against his under the blanket.

When it does, Eddie yelps, his leg jerking and kicking Lucas who sits on the floor right in front of him. He feels Steve withdraw his hand like he got burned.

“Dude!” Lucas protests.

“Sorry, Sinclair, uh. Muscle spasm,” Eddie mutters. The other kids give him weird looks but thankfully they go back to the movie.

Whispering so he doesn’t bother the others, Steve says, “Uh, sorry. It was- uh, it was an accident.”

“All good, Steve-o.”

Steve gives him a tight-lipped smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, and Eddie gets the feeling that he’s lying, but then it would mean that his hand touching Eddie’s wasn’t an accident, but a deliberate move.

But why?

Glancing at him out of the corner of his eye, he notices that Steve looks nervous. He’s biting his bottom lip and there’s a divot between his eyebrows, his cheeks are also tinted bright pink.

So Eddie thinks, fuck it! and moves his hand under the blanket, hooking his pinkie finger with Steve’s.

Steve’s reaction is definitely more subdued than Eddie’s was, but Eddie still hears him gasp. He glances at Eddie, big doe eyes wide and a little hopeful, and Eddie feels like throwing up because holy shit, Steve Harrington was, in fact, deliberately trying to touch his hands and now their pinkies are linked. If it weren’t for the fact that the blanket offers them the cover that they need to do this, Eddie would toss it away. He feels like could burst into flames any minute.

Soon, it’s not just their pinkies touching. Soon, the tip of Steve’s remaining fingers find Eddie’s. He waits for a second, probably to see if Eddie is gonna jump again, but when he doesn’t, Steve tangles their fingers together and gives Eddie’s hand a little squeeze. And Eddie wants to scream, he wants to melt into the couch, he wants to kiss Steve, the kids and Robin be damned.

He doesn’t. He stays still except for his thumb which starts rhythmically stroking over Steve’s knuckles. Eddie hears his breath catch and sees his blush spreading up to his ears. At least he’s not the only one affected by this.

Neither of them is paying attention to the movie at this point, too focused on playing with each other’s hands and biting down on their dopey smiles.

Eddie doesn’t want it to end. He doesn’t want this bubble that they created under this blanket to burst. He’s afraid Steve won’t want to hold Eddie’s hand ever again if it does.

But eventually, the movie does end. The end credits start to roll and the kids spring to their feet, stretching and talking excitedly about the movie. Eddie hopes they don’t ask him anything about it, he couldn’t tell them the names of three characters if he tried.

“Did you like it?” Steve asks quietly.

“The- movie?”

Steve’s eyes crinkle at the corners. “I think we both know you didn’t pay attention to the movie, Eds.”

Eddie feels the blood that rushes to his cheeks at being called out. “Well, I was distracted,” he murmurs, thumb flicking over Steve’s knuckle one more time just to see Steve’s eyes widen a little and his lips part.

“Yeah? By what?” He asks, his voice sounding a little strained to Eddie’s ears.

“A pretty boy holding my hand.”

Steve whines low in his throat. Eddie is glad that the kids are being loud and that they’re focused on each other instead of them.

He continues, “Which I liked. A lot. And uh- I would like to do it again.”

“Me too,” Steve says with a shy smile. God, Eddie wants to kiss him stupid.

“Eddie!”

He jumps when Max calls his name. He and Steve both let go of each other’s hand at the same time, but keep them under the blanket.

“What?”

Max’s eyes roll to the back of her head. “The movie is over? We have to leave now if we want to make it home before curfew.”

“Oh. Sure thing, Mad Max.”

She narrows her eyes at him and Eddie tries to look innocent, not like he spent the last eighty minutes holding another boy’s hand. He’s not so sure that he nails it.

Together, they quickly gather the blankets and the pillows and stuff them into the hallway closet. With Nancy skipping tonight’s movie night and Robin still having no license, it’s up to Eddie to drop everyone off, and unless they leave right now, they’re gonna be late like Max said.

That doesn’t stop Eddie from running back to the house after everyone already piled up inside the van, claiming that he forgot something.

After he knocks on the door, Steve opens it with a confused frown that melts into a smile when he sees Eddie.

“Did you forget something, Munson?”

“I did actually,” Eddie says and for the second time that night, he thinks fuck it! and surges forward, pushing his lips against Steve’s in a quick kiss.

Steve yelps, but Eddie feels the softest press of lips from him before he backs away.

Before Eddie can spiral because oh, god he just kissed Steve, Steve is grabbing him by the lapels of his vest and pulling him toward him. They both stumble back into the house a couple of steps, just enough so they’re hidden from view and Steve can kiss Eddie for longer and a little more forcefully this time.

“Do you want to come over tomorrow?” Steve asks when they pull apart.

“To watch a movie?” He asks. Steve licks his lips and Eddie’s eyes track the movement. “Or not watch a movie?”

Steve smirks. “The second one.”

Eddie nods enthusiastically. “It’s a date,” he says with a grin that Steve mirrors.

They jump when the horn of his van blares, probably waking up a few of Steve’s neighbors.

Eddie makes a face. “Gotta go or the brats are gonna be late.”

“Drive safe,” Steve says, giving the vest a little tug.

“Always do, Stevie,” he says, giving him a two-fingered salute. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah. See you tomorrow, Eds,” Steve says with a dopey smile. Eddie starts walking backwards.

And if he trips on the steps because he’s too busy watching Steve and almost falls on his ass, then at least it’s just Steve who sees it.

And at least, he does it with a sweet smile painted on his puffy pink lips that Eddie just kissed.

[skzhua]

if i leave, which i must do

MASTERLIST

pairing: han jisung x female!reader

genre: fluff, angst, isekai, portal universe, strangers-to-lovers.

word count: 29,083

warnings: swearing, car accident, mentions of death, mentions of sex, suggestive. (proofread-ish)

summary: a movie night by yourself turned out to be an unexplainable experience as you got stuck in the film you were watching. it was a true nightmare until you found jisung to help you.

a/n: one of my favourites ever! it took me so long to finish it but i can't be any prouder. i really hope you enjoy it!

Being sick was one of the things you hated the most, and there wasn't much you hated. Having a cold meant having to cough every five minutes to clear your throat or blowing your nose all the time to the point it got red from how irritated it was. One perk, however, was that you could use it as an excuse to skip work. Getting to stay at home to do nothing was everything your lazy nature would dream of. Plus, your love for movies and cinema came handy when all you could do was watch films all day.

So when you began to feel your throat getting dryer and your nose building up snot, you couldn't be any happier. The office you worked at had given you very strict deadlines and you'd been working your ass off for weeks to meet their expectations. By taking the next day off, it would give you a very much needed break since all of your documents would be given to someone else to finish them. 22 years old was too young to be doing this much, you thought. But you needed the money so you had to settle for that, only temporarily.

First thing you did when you got home that day was to open all the windows of your apartment, not considering your poor rabbit in her playpen who didn't ask for any cool air. It might not have helped much in making sure you would stay sick the next day but you gave yourself credits for trying nonetheless.

Afterwards, you hurried yourself to get changed into your pyjamas you loved so much and order food since you had no energy to cook. Once your order arrived, it didn't take you long to get settled on the couch to get ready for a movie night on your own. Before doing anything, you still made sure you had everything — meaning your food, water, your blankets, cutlery for your meal, etc. — and then grabbed your remote to turn the television on. As you browsed through Netflix's selection of recommended films for you, you realized how the movies on there became repetitive and you had seen most of them. Still, you continued to scroll in hopes something would be eye-catching enough to you. But none seemed good enough. Annoying, your food was getting colder by the minute.

You were about to move onto another streaming platform until you read a synopsis that grabbed your curiosity. It followed the journey of a struggling artist in his early 20s who can't seem to find the inspiration for his music, all while having to face his personal issues called becoming an adult. This was not the type of movies you would usually go for which made you wonder why it even caught your eye. The duration was an hour and fifty minutes and that was also not what you'd go for on a daily basis. Besides that, heavy subjects as these ones felt a bit much for a Wednesday night. However, you weren't going to work the morning after so fuck it. Happy with your choice, you grabbed your plate and brought it closer to you to dig into it and clicked on the play button.

The opening scene showed a young boy — not much older than seven if you had to guess — playing in a playground with a few friends. Some credits appeared on screen as the mellow score played in the background. As the children continued to laugh loudly, a woman's voice could be heard calling out a "Han Jisung". The boy turned around to see his mother walk up to him as she informed him that it was time to head back home. The boy shook his head violently, insisting on staying longer to play. The woman repeated herself but unlike what she would've liked, her son refused to budge and headed to the swings he was playing close to, holding tightly onto one of the poles. Sighing heavily, she asked him again but he did not move. Poor woman, she was obviously exhausted and wanted to go home to take a nap.

"You and me, girl," you commented in-between bites.

Growing impatient, Jisung's mother approached him and reached her hand out to him. Stubborn, he shouted he wanted to stay, and ran all the way to the other side of the street to get away from her reach. As any mother would do, she ran after him while telling him to slow down as he was much faster than her. He still ignored her demands. Sadly, she was not quick enough to catch up with him and, just as she was crossing the road, a pickup truck collided with her body right before Jisung's eyes. It took him a moment to process everything, he was left speechless. Mouth wide open, he stared at the figure of his mother on the ground in horror. He fell onto his knees, his legs too weak to support his body as he was still in disbelief of what just occurred.

You paused it.

Releasing an exhale you didn't know you were holding back, you stared at the screen in shock. You were barely ten minutes in and you could not believe this had to be how the film began. Setting your plate on the coffee table, you walked to your rabbit's playpen and picked her up, bringing her close to your chest. You jumped right back into your blankets and made sure both you and the animal were comfortable.

"Fifi, I won't be able to finish this if I don't have you with me," you said to your bunny in a child-ish voice.

The screen was still frozen while you debated whether you really wanted to continue it or not. In the end, you gathered all the courage you had and clicked on play, giving Fifi scratches to release your stress.

The next scene was a time skip to Jisung's 23rd birthday. When you thought he was all alone as he was staring longingly at a picture of him and his mother, one of his friends barged in his room as he shouted a "happy birthday". He responded with a smile and set the picture back on his desk before the both of them walked out to their dining room. There were only two other men with him who seemed to be living with him. The place wasn't that big but it was functional which is what mattered really. Jisung's other friend placed a cake in front of him as they sang the birthday song to him, all of them exchanging wide smiles. You learned that he is the youngest since his friends kept on teasing him for being a year closer to their own ages.

"Have we gotten any calls?" he asked after blowing on the candles.

From their reaction, they didn't receive any sort of call that they were expecting. This didn't make Jisung lose his joyful spirit and he went ahead with cutting pieces of cake for the three of them.

"Great, now I'm craving cake," you grumbled to yourself. "Should I get a cake? No, it's too late and the grocery stores must be closed."

The scene switched to an anxious Jisung in his room who kept on rewriting on a piece of paper while tugging on his hair, eyebrows furrowed as to show his focus on the task at hand. He bopped his head up and down and began to hum a melody. Unsatisfied, he shook his head and noted something down on his phone. Multiple shots of him doing the same couple of actions — rewriting, erasing, humming a beat, throwing a paper away, getting distracted by something he saw on his phone —played one after the other. It was like he was stuck in a loop and the more it went, the more he was getting discouraged. Finally determining he wouldn't get any work done that night, he grabbed his jacket and walked out the door.

The following shot was now set outside where the night was slowly settling, sunset on display. As a melodic score played in the background, Jisung walked down a small street as he kept on kicking on a tiny rock he found on the ground. Taking in the fresh air, he suddenly stopped and took notice of his whereabouts after having walked a decent distance. The camera panned out to a playground, the same one where his mother was hit.

You felt movement on your thighs and frowned, only to remember you had brought your bunny out of the comfort of her home. Since the movie didn't seem to be getting into anything as traumatic as the first scene, you stood up to get her back to her playpen. However, with having the screen as your only source of light in the room, you tripped onto the plastic bag that was used to wrap your takeout. You felt yourself fall onwards and let out a yell in panic. Your bunny was quick enough to get away from your grasp and hide underneath your couch. As for you, you kept on falling and closed your eyes shut in waiting of your head hitting something. Only, everything went black.

You didn't know what happened but one thing was for sure. You did not hit your head.

Everything was blurry when you finally opened your eyes after gaining a bit of consciousness. You tried to see better around you but a sudden eerie ringing was suddenly bursting through your ears, making it impossible for you to concentrate on something else. You shut your eyes closed again from how painful the ringing was and put your hands on your ears in attempt to diffuse some of it.

"Miss?" you thought of hearing faintly but nothing was vivid enough for you to be sure. "Miss?" you heard the voice say again, this time a tad bit clearer.

You began to hear again much clearer, allowing you to open your eyes properly. Needless to say you were stunned once your gaze fell upon the man in front of you. He had a concerned look on his face while analyzing your figure, making sure you were not injured in any way.

It couldn't be possible, no.

Looking around for a hint or anything, you realized you were exactly where the character of your movie was standing through your screen only minutes ago. The same character who was now all flesh and bones, standing tall (or short for some people) at 5'7ft in front of your very eyes.

"Miss," he said again. "Are you alright? Do you need help?"

You blinked slowly as you stared at him up and down, almost creepily. You hadn't realized he began to feel uncomfortable until he cleared his throat loudly, bringing your eyes back to his own. With one eyebrow raised, he repeated the question. No luck, you kept silent.

Jisung looked around and noticed the sun was about to get down completely, meaning it would be pitch black in this part of the city. Although he thought of you to be odd, he was humane. Never would he let a young woman — might he add as attractive as you were — on her own this late outside.

"Do you live nearby? I can walk you home," he offered.

Again, you didn't seem to find an answer. Well, how could you even describe that you believed to have gone through your television screen which caused you to travel into the movie's universe? Yourself couldn't believe it to be true. Nonetheless, you couldn't deny the man was very much real and that the cold was very much coming through your clothes.

Your clothes. You weren't in your pyjamas anymore, but rather in a business attire. You held a briefcase that you had no idea what it was for, and you felt an unknown phone in your back pocket. You could feel the blisters on your feet caused by the heels you were wearing and although the blazer was most definitely fashionable, you were freezing. You pondered the possibility of having transferred into a character's body unintentionally.

"Do you have somewhere to stay?" Jisung asked as he caught onto your oblivion.

The only thing you could do right until finding out what happened to you was say nothing and lead your own investigation on how you got here and how you can return to the comfort of your house with your bunny. Fuck, Fifi! Poor her, she must be so afraid without you around to take care of her.

"Hey," Jisung spoke again in a comforting voice. "You'll be okay, I want to help you. Did you forget where you live?"

How sweet of him, you thought. In your own universe it was hard for you to find caring men, you hit the jackpot when stumbling upon him. Still, you had to remind yourself that this person was technically a fictional character, he didn't represent reality. You made a mental note to yourself to check if this movie was directed or written by a woman when you would get back home.

"Do you know your name, at least?"

Oh, right. Maybe the guy deserved some sort of answer at the very least.

"Y/N."

You were taken aback when his face lit up to show his boxy smile. He had a very pretty smile, it was a reassuring smile.

"Miss Y/N, my name is Han Jisung. Now that I know you can speak, can you answer my questions from earlier, please? I would hate for something dangerous to happen to you and I genuinely want to get you home safely."

You chuckled at his words, feeling uneasy from his display of chivalry. "I-I don't remember a lot."

You had seen this in movies: in situations of travelling to an alternate universe, faking having amnesia was the way to go if you wanted to survive through this. People put their guards down usually instead of being wary of you.

Jisung nodded and looked up for a moment to think of what to do next. "I live nearby if you need a temporary shelter for the night. I have two roommates and the place might not be as tidy as what you must be used to, if you remember. I don't know if you are comfortable with it but I'd be happy to help you gain your memories back."

Seriously, why couldn't people be more like this in your world? Trying to ignore to storm of feelings, thoughts and emotions that was happening in your mind, you shyly agreed to stay at his place. For the night only. You should get back in less than 24 hours, no?

Jisung was right and his apartment was no further than a few blocks away from the playground. The building was rather small and a bit torn down but besides that, it seemed to be just fine for him. As long as the necessities were there, it didn't bother him if the quality was not one of a five-star hotel.

It took you three flights of stairs to get to his place which was so painful to climb up with your heels. You still managed through the pain all the way up to when Jisung opened the door wide to let you in first. To say you were startled when you walked in would be an understatement. Two men — you recognized as his roommates — were walking around the flat with no shirt on while they were preparing themselves what seemed to be like chicken sandwiches. The sight was not what you had anticipated, although this whole situation wasn't either, and you let out a scream without thinking first. The two of them shot their heads up and were obviously confused to see a young woman stand there instead of their younger friend.

"Can we help..?" one of them who had blonde hair asked reluctantly.

"Guys!" Jisung exclaimed from behind you before coming to stand next to you. "This is Y/N. Y/N, these two are my roommates. This is Changbin."

Changbin held his hand up, still lost about what was happening in his own home. "Hey?"

"And that's Chan."

Chan was kind enough to grab a hoodie that was laying on a chair nearby and put it on before shaking your hand. Your heart stopped from the contact with his skin and you seriously wondered what was up with the men of this world.

"Y/N is a bit lost, I think she had a some sort of brain injury when I bumped into her. She was holding her head tightly and she was visibly in pain. I asked her a few questions about herself and the only thing she could remember was her name," Jisung explained to the older guy who listened attentively.

"Amnesia?"

"That's my guess. Until we can help her find who she is, I offered her to stay here."

Chan nodded in approval while Changbin shrugged his shoulders. "As long as I can work on my stuff in peace, I don't mind. She's kind of cute too."

"Changbin," Chan sent him a look, making him mutter a quick apology. He then turned to face you which scared you a little. "I bet you're tired. Or hungry, maybe? Can I offer you something to drink?"

"Do you have green tea?"

He clasped his hands together and headed off back to the kitchen. "On it."

"I'll give you a tour of the place," Jisung informed. "It's not big but it's home. Here is the living room which we do not use that much. I'll sleep there tonight, though, so you can have my bed."

You held your hand up in disagreement. "I'll take the couch, it's alright. I'm lucky enough you're letting me stay."

He pfft at you. "Nonsense, take my bed. I insist." When he got a nod from your part, he moved on to continuing showing around. "This is the bathroom. Not that big but it does what it needs to do. Here's Changbin's room and I recommend you don't knock if the door is closed. Just wait until he's done. And here's Chan's room where he never sleeps, just works."

"Not true," you could hear from the kitchen, making Jisung smile, embarrassed.

"Yeah, uh, we can pretty much hear everything throughout the whole flat. It's not that bad from the rooms to the common areas because we tried to soundproof them as much as we could but yeah."

"Soundproofing for your music, or for other types of activities..?" you implied jokingly.

Damn it, the air in this universe was different, you couldn't even be yourself. Well, you did make a lot of bad jokes, sometimes related to sex, back home. Still, you really had no filter there. Noticeably, both of you were quite surprised from your statement and were a blushing mess for a few seconds before he answered.

"Music, but it is useful for these... things."

He cleared his throat and walked away shyly, and you most certainly thought this was adorable. Containing yourself, you followed his lead to the room at the very end of the hallway. Everything you saw from the movie was still at their exact spot, including the picture of him and his mother. While he was telling you about his room and cleaning it up a bit at the same time, you couldn't hear a thing he was saying. Your eyes stuck on the framed image for longer than they should but there was something in his mother's eye. A shine? A glow? Or something more mellow? You couldn't figure it out but it was enchanting, she was beautiful. It was crazy how much Jisung took after her, their features being so similar and yet so different.

"She's pretty," you spoke before thinking, yet again.

Jisung awkwardly walked to his desk and put the picture face down. "It's my mom," he said, clearing his throat and avoiding your look.

"She raised a very kind son," you added and he mouthed a small "thanks" as he kept his eyes on the floor.

You took the opportunity to get a good insight of his personal space. Even if cleaned a bit, it was a mess but not in a disgusting way. It was a comfort kind of messy, the one that screamed "this place was loved and well lived in". His bed had simple dark blue sheets with a single pillow, his desk and dresser were a matching set, and his bookshelf was filled with figurines, one or two books and many music albums. His entire desk was dedicated to his music, even the background displayed a guitar. It felt homey.

"Someone ordered tea?" Chan said as he came in with a mug. He set it on the desk while you thanked him kindly. "Be careful, it's still boiling hot."

Without adding a word, he left the two of you alone in your awkward silence. While you were still looking around, Jisung was biting his lip down, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt with one hand while the other was still on the picture. Eventually, he seemed to snap out of his discomfort and went to open one of his drawers. From there, he pulled a t-shirt out along with a pair of sweatpants before holding them out to you.

"I'm pretty small so hopefully it'll fit. You can use the shower as long as you need, the shampoo and soap are in the basket. Use any towel, we washed them this morning," he informed to which you nodded. The silence was slowly coming back but, decisively, Jisung wouldn't let this one through. "I'll be in the living room if you need anything."

"Thank you, Jisung."

He gave you one last smile before vanishing into the other room, leaving you alone to get changed. That was important, yes, but what you'd been dying to find out was what the fuck happened with you. You didn't waste another second to take the phone in your back pocket and turn it on. Obviously, it had a password unknown to you. What did help was the wallpaper: a picture of yourself hugging a bunny that looked identical to Fifi. At least, you knew you were yourself and not some random woman whose body you had to take over.

If this was your face with your bunny, did it mean it would be the same passcode as the one for your own mobile? You had to try at the very least, this phone was most likely your only chance to understand the situation better. You typed the first five digits and waited a second before typing the last one, tension growing in you. You closed your eyes, pressed it, and slowly opened them back. The sigh of disappointment that left your mouth would be indescribable but it was very discouraging. At least, you knew there was another Fifi waiting for her owner to get home in this universe too.

You quickly got changed, finally taking off these uncomfortable heels, and went to freshen up in the shower. Despite the fact the counter was a huge mess, the shower itself was kept pretty clean, more than you had expected for a boys apartment. You didn't wash for long, already exhausted from the day you'd had. After putting Jisung's clothes on, you walked out the bathroom, went to grab your tea, and joined the man who helped you in the living room.

When he got a good look at you, his eyes grew bigger while his plump cheeks flushed a little. The sight of a woman in his clothes was never something he though of ever happening. And yet, here you were. As beautiful as a model, you were in his clothes.

"Can I join you?"

Fuck, even your voice was pretty. He didn't realize it at first –probably because he only focused on helping you out– but you were drop dead gorgeous. All of the sudden, he could feel his hands getting sweatier and his heartbeat getting faster. What was happening to him?

"Sure," he mustered the energy to answer without stuttering. "How are are you feeling?"

"Calmer, but I'm still worried. I have no idea who I am and the background of my phone is myself with my rabbit who must be wondering where its owner went," you answered and pulled the phone out of your pocket to show it to him.

"Cute," he commented, not knowing if this was directed to you, the rabbit, or both. "Did you try getting in?"

You nodded. "The only password I could think of didn't work and I don't want to risk blocking it."

"I have a friend, Felix, he's studying in computer engineering. I can give him a call tomorrow and he could come to unlock it."

Your face lit up instantly. "That would really help, please."

"I'll do that first thing in the morning."

"Thank you."

He looked away and cleared his throat, your presence was making him so nervous. "It's no problem."

You got up and began to inspect the room, a little bit like you did in Jisung's. The couch wasn't aesthetically pleasing to the eye but it did the job and was the perfect amount of squishy. Their television was without a doubt second handed from someone else while the furniture that supported it was freshly new. You liked how they managed to organize everything to be functional without feeling cramped in the place, since it was very small.

"Do you always do this?" Jisung asked after watching you himself.

"What do you mean?" you frowned.

His face warmed up, embarrassed. "I meant, because you keep looking around like an investigator or something like that."

"Jisung, I've just lost all of my memory. I'm just trying to process everything and the very least of things would be to make sure I wasn't welcomed into an unsafe place, not like I think you're dangerous, but you know what I mean."

He nodded while pursing his lips in understanding. He proceeded to mentally flicker his forehead, swearing to himself to shush it around you. He really was trying to come off friendly and helpful but his reserved nature would force him to tell you stupid things like this.

"I'm done with my tea," you announced, showing him the empty mug.

He stared at you for a second until he snapped out of his thoughts, taking the mug and rushing to the sink to wash it. You chuckled at the sight. You were glad it was him whom you had stumbled upon. Although clumsy, he was being the sweetest.

"I guess I'll go to sleep," you said as he was still rinsing your remaining tea.

He raised an eyebrow at you. "Are you sure you have everything you need?"

"Don't worry, I'll call you if anything."

He nodded his head with satisfaction before wishing for you to sleep well. As he watched your frame disappear, he let out a heavy breath. He knew his social anxiety was bad but this was becoming an issue. He headed to the couch and settled himself to doze off. Still, his mind was on you, on how he had interacted with you. Meanwhile, you were staring at the ceiling blankly, wondering if you were even sure if you could get back home. That, and also thinking how it wouldn't be so bad to stay with these welcoming gentlemen.

To sum it all quickly, you didn't sleep much that night, and neither did Jisung.

If you thought you ever had a headache, the one you got when waking up was much worse than anything you'd had experienced. This was mildly due to the events of the previous day, but also to the screaming happening on the other side of the apartment. You felt safer leaving the door open to have easy access to help in case you needed any but this was not a good choice on your part. You had slightly forgotten men could be noisy as hell when it came to living with other men. And this, it was a confirmation you were not in a dream and still in a fictional character's home.

"Chan, give me the fucking eggs!" you heard Changbin shout angrily while the two others were uncontrollably laughing.

You yawned loudly before getting off the bed, rubbing your eyes in the process. Even if your body was telling you to get back into the soft bedsheets and sleep all day, your mind was screaming for you to not miss a moment to find a solution to your, slightly surreal, problem. Thus, you joined the three boys in the kitchen who were all still in their sleeping attires. By that, I mean Chan and Changbin were shirtless again while Jisung was wearing shorts with a tank top that was a bit too tight in your opinion. You unconsciously began to check them out in silence, standing like a poll.

Changbin finally noticed you and waved in a nonchalant way, visibly annoyed by his friends' antics. "Hey."

Jisung's head shot up from his breakfast to you and he didn't lose a second to join your side. "Hey, good morning. How did you sleep? Are you feeling better? Can I make you something to eat?"

His friends exchanging knowing looks didn't go unnoticed by you but you determined it would be better for the younger guy to be spared from such embarrassment and you ignored them. "I slept alright, although I do have a bit of a headache."

"I have Tylenols in the bathroom's cabinet. Do you want one or two?"

"I'll take two if you don't mind."

He hummed before sprinting to the said-bathroom, which left his friends struggling more to contain their cackles. You ignored them still and joined Changbin, whose body was quite distracting to say the least, and scanned the items displayed in front of him.

"What are you eating?"

The man left a frustrated sigh. "Toast and eggs if only Chan wasn't being a dick by hiding them from me."

"I told you I hid nothing, we just don't have eggs!"

"There were three left yesterday when I checked. How would they disappear out of nowhere?"

Jisung came back with two pills and a glass full of water, sheepishly smiling as he approached his friends. "Yeah, uh, I might have eaten them last night."

Both shut their eyes closed, clearly trying to not burst out at him. Meanwhile, you left out a small chuckle and joined him to get your pills.

"Thank you," you smiled at him and you saw his Adam's apple bop.

He returned the smile shyly to then focus back on the important matter of the day. "I didn't know you'd have an egg craving this morning."

Changbin shook his head. "It's not a craving, I need my proteins for my workout today," he huffed out as it this was the most obvious thing.

They continued to bicker for some time. It lasted long enough for Chan to remember you were still there and probably very hungry. He made two portions of his own breakfast, which was a bowl of cereals and fruits, and sat next to you while placing both dishes on the table. You gave him a thankful smile and the two of you savoured the food while Jisung was trying his very best to defend himself.

"You can just go buy some later," he said, rolling his eyes.

"I needed to eat them now, or it would fuck up my very precise diet."

You let out a grunt, and stood straight up. "Gosh, can you two shut up? I get that I'm bursting into your bubble by having slept here but I have a headache and memories to regain so can you please put your quarrel aside for now?"

To that, Chan pursed his lips and clapped quietly, obviously impressed. As for Jisung, he looked right into your eyes, unable to move. Day two and he was still fucking things up around you, great. He muttered an apology, not even loud enough to be heard, and embarrassingly walked back to his spot at the table to finish his breakfast.

"Sorry, Y/N. I guess I did overreact," Changbin admitted even though you could see it was hurting his pride.

The entire flat was silent for a few minutes with only the sounds from munching your food being heard. Eventually, Changbin went to get changed and headed out to what you presumed to be the gym. Chan was the next person to put his dishes in the dishwasher and lock himself in his room. That left a very quiet Jisung alone with you. He was hunching slightly and his eyes were focused on his phone, almost as to distract himself from your presence.

Feeling a bit offended, you called his name out. His doe-like eyes instantly found yours and you had to keep yourself from squealing at how cute he looked.

"Did you contact your friend for my phone?"

His eyes that were already big enough in your opinion got larger and his mouth opened agape. He most definitely had forgotten.

"I'll call him right now, I'm sorry."

He left the app he was scrolling through previously and dialed up a number before putting it on speaker. Nervous, he was nibbling on his lower lip while his legs were jumping up and down. Even with friends, having to call someone was a challenge for him.

"Han?" a deep voice answered the call.

"Hey, am I bothering?" Jisung asked, visibly uneasy.

"Never, what's up?"

"I got this... Uh, how do I say it? I met this girl yesterday-"

"Wait, a girl?" he cut him off with a gasp.

From the reaction of his friend, Jisung rolled his eyes before looking at you apologetically. He should have expected Felix to react this way by the mention of a girl. Jisung was too insecure and nervous to approach one, it was almost a miracle he even had the courage to even speak to you. Well, the context was much different. He was a man of principles and one of them was to always offer a helping hand to someone in need — you in this case.

"Where? How? What happened? Is she cute? Did you ask her out?"

For what seemed to be the hundredth time to him, he blushed and chuckled nervously. "She can hear you..."

There was a pause from the other side of the line for a brief moment. "Oh."

"Yeah, uh... So I was on a stroll around the neighbourhood and saw her having some kind of panic attack. She's calmed down since but she lost her memories. She has a phone but she can't remember her code so I was wondering if you could come by and unlock it for her, please."

"Sure, I'm with Hyunjin right now, though. Is it fine if he comes too?"

"Yeah, no problem. Thank you, I owe you one." He quickly hung up and smiled before looking at you. "Felix is an expert when it comes to technology, you'll see."

"I trust your judgement," you affirmed. "In the meantime, can I ask you a few questions?"

He was a mystery to you. Not only because he was from another universe, but also because of how he has been acting around you. If you had watched the entire movie before teleporting in it, you would've probably understood his being a lot better. However, his shy attitude and the way he acted when you were talking about his mother was something that bugged your brain cells.

"What kind of questions?"

You shrugged. "I know nothing about myself so I can't really tell you about me. But you have been so nice to me, it's only natural I'd like to know more about you."

"Good point," he let out a breathy laugh. "Alright, go ahead."

"Have you always been this introverted?"

With no hesitation, he shook his head no which wasn't the answer you expected. "I used to be outgoing but things got complicated at some point and I- let's say I rather keep to myself."

"But you've been pretty outgoing with me, no?"

He frowned, seemingly not agreeing with you. "Are you kidding? I'm surprised I'm not having a panic attack right now."

"You're doing good," you reassured with a chuckle.

"Thanks," he said with a nervous cough. "I'm trying."

An awkward silence settled between the two of you while you were still figuring out how to bring up the topic of his mother, especially his feelings towards it. The only thing that you could assume was the trauma it must have caused him based on what you saw on screen yourself.

A knock on his front door was all it took to bring your mind back on track, which caused Jisung to physically relax and run to answer whoever was coming. When the door opened, two men were greeted warmly by the young man. One was standing tall and gracious with his long dark locks falling in front of his eyes. He was pretty, you thought. The other was shorter but his voice was deep, so much you were doubting it was actually his voice. The freckles on his face stood out as much as his smile and his blonde hair was another aspect you took notice of. You learned him to be Felix and the moment his eyes fell onto your small figure, he stared at you with bright open eyes, almost as if he had seen a ghost.

"Oh my, Y/N! I swore Mina and I thought you vanished," he said in a worried voice as he sat where Jisung was previously. "Why didn't you answer our calls? Wait, let me guess, you put your phone on Do not disturb again?"

The taller man, who you were informed to be named Hyunjin from Jisung's greeting, rolled his eyes and sat next to him. The move was very smooth, you were doubting if this man was a model or an angel. Both answers would've made sense.

"Let the girl breathe, you're scaring her. Didn't Han say she has amnesia? Gosh, I'd think you're the one with no memories," he huffed, insinuating that Felix was stupid.

You were a bit startled by his rather rude behaviour but when you looked at Felix's reaction, it seemed to be a normal thing between them. As for Jisung, he stood still next to the door and confusion was sprawled all over his face.

"You know her?" he asked.

Felix lifted his eyes up, as if it was the most obvious thing. "She lives with Mina next to our place."

You nodded your head slowly although you were still totally clueless. "Right, Mina..."

"You really forgot? Damn, okay. Well, I know your passcode because you told me so this won't be a problem. I'm very curious, though. Do you know what happened to you?"

Telling them the truth was tempting but, again, who would even believe you? The thing itself was a mystery to you and felt surreal, you doubted they would take you seriously. Even more so if you mention the movie aspect of it.

"No idea," you shrugged which disappointed Felix.

"Alright, I'll help you regain your memories, then," he sighed and held out his hand in your direction. "Give me your phone."

You did as told and, immediately, Felix tapped the password with no problem before giving it back to you. As you browsed through the apps, you realized not much was different from what you had in your actual phone. If anything, this was the spitting image of it. Your first instinct was to go for the photos you had. As expected, many of them were of your bunny but another majority of them were of you with another girl.

"Mina?" you asked Felix, pointing at the girl's face to which he nodded as a confirmation.

"Your roommate and best friend. If I'm correct, you two have been friends for almost your entire life."

You continued to scroll through the pictures attentively. The other you had a much busier life. You seemed to be out in college parties often and other photos showed yourself in classes with many other friends. You were also quite disturbed to see that your parents were the same ones you had in your real life. Was the movie like this or did your unintentional arrival modify it?

One picture grabbed your attention more than others. It was you at a party again but what your focus was on was the boy behind you smiling happily with a bottle of beer in hands.

"Jisung?" you called for him to see and he proceeded to rush to your sides, hovering above your shoulder to see better.

Your breath cut short at the proximity as you could feel his own hit the side of your face. For a second, your mind went foggy and you turned your head around to look at him. His frown showed as much confusion as you had and you noticed his lips to be pinker than you thought.

"Is this me?" he said in a whisper, which reminded you to focus.

"So you knew who I am!" you exclaimed, almost offended he didn't tell you.

"I swear I don't recall seeing you ever," he tried to justify himself.

Felix stole the device from you and looked at the photo as well, Hyunjin leaning closer to do the same. While he couldn't figure out when this was taken as he was in the picture as well, Hyunjin seemed to have recognized the moment instantly.

"This was at Jeongin's."

"Who?" you and Jisung asked at the same time.

You looked at one another and a blush appeared on both of your faces. Hyunjin, however, didn't give a shit about your somewhat cute interaction and went on with explaining.

"Jeongin, a friend of mine. He hosted a party about a year ago with pretty much the whole cohort of freshmen."

"Oh," Felix exclaimed as the memory came back to him. "Yeah, there were people I never talked to again after that. Must have been the case for you two."

"But if I'm friends with you-" you began but were cut right away.

"We're neighbours, not friends. I don't hang out with you much, no offense."

"None taken."

Suddenly, you heard a small gasp coming from behind you. All eyes stopped on Jisung who was covering his mouth with his hand. You cocked your head to the side to incite him to speak but he shook his head and left to run to his room. You glanced at the two remaining men in search of an answer but they shrugged and continued to look through your pictures.

"Ah, look! Your most recent one dates from yesterday," Hyunjin noticed and gave you the phone back.

You scanned the screen and frowned. In the background, you could see a tuft of hair that was too similar to Jisung's for it to not be his. You were wearing the same outfit as the previous day and you were obviously only taking a cute selfie for yourself. This was without a doubt taken just before you appeared. Was this version of you an actual person? Where was she now if you were in her body at this very moment? What if she was in yours? How traumatic for her would that be if she learned she was nothing more than an extra in a Netflix film.

"I wonder where I was going," you decided to say for now, not wanting to look suspicious.

"If I had to guess, back home. You're on an internship in an accounting company this semester, thus the attire."

You were so grateful Felix knew about you enough to give you a better insight of your life. Nonetheless, this was helping you in no way to go back to your universe. You discarded the phone away from you and let your head fall on the table while mumbling a "thank you" to him.

"The school offers free therapy sessions for those in need," Hyunjin suggested, earning a bump of the elbow from his friend. "What? Sorry for trying to help."

"I can take you back to your place for now, Mina might be better than me to help you," Felix offered, ignoring Hyunjin.

"That would be great, yeah," you said gratefully, lifting your head up. "Can you take me now?" He nodded. "Good. You don't mind if I go thank Jisung first?"

"Go ahead."

The door of his room was closed which came as no surprise considering the way he left so abruptly. Still, you knocked softly and waited patiently for him to answer. It took a minute or so but he did open the door, just wide enough for you to see his face. Just when you thought you had seen him at his most embarrassed, here he was, avoiding your gaze.

"Felix is going to get me home."

He nodded quickly before muttering "That's good."

"I came to thank you again for letting me stay. Not many people are as kind as you have been to me."

He cleared his throat. "I told you, it's no problem."

"Still, thank you."

Since you were visibly making more and more uncomfortable, you didn't stay any longer and were quick to head out, not forgetting to at least wave bye to Chan.

You weren't living far from there, only a couple of streets away. On the walk to your dorm, you learned Felix and Hyunjin were living together and that they were both studying in contemporary arts at the same college you were attending. Both knew you to be the nice girl next door while Mina was much louder than you were. Needless to say, you were looking forward to meet this girl.

"You're at the end of the hallway and we're here," Hyunjin informed as he stopped in front of their place. "Let us know if you need anything."

"Thank you, guys, so much."

Felix sent you one of his warm smiles and the two of them disappeared into their home. You stared at the door in the end of the hallway slightly scared. You had no idea what to expect but, here you were. Having not much of a choice, you went ahead and unlocked the door with what Felix told you to be the key to your place before walking in.

The first thing you saw was a wide playpen with a bunny munching onto its food; Fifi. You wondered if she had the same name or not. Just besides it was a couch where a girl was lazily scrolling through her feed. Upon hearing someone coming in, her head turned to see who it was. From her face, you concluded she was relieved to see it was you. Immediately, she jumped off the couch and came to hug you tightly.

"Y/N, what the fuck! I was worried sick, where the hell were you?" she almost screamed into your ear.

Yeah, she was definitely a loud person.

"Hey..." you trailed off, unsure on what to respond.

She let go of the hug, still holding your shoulders, and gave you a skeptical look. She scanned you from up and down which made you self-conscious for a second. It was almost like she was leading her own investigation.

"Why are you so stiff?"

Upon hearing her remark, you tried to relax a little but according to her expression, this did not work. "Uh, you might want to sit down for this one."

Her eyes went wide and she grabbed you to go sit on the couch. "What? Did you meet someone and slept at their place? Did you get kidnapped?"

Gosh, she really was adamant about your whereabouts and getting answers from you. In a way, you couldn't blame her as she had been thinking for almost 24 hours that her best friend had vanished. It didn't mean this didn't overwhelm you nonetheless.

"Kind of?"

"Which one? The kidnapped part or sleeping at someone's place?"

"The second one."

She gasped in surprise. "You slept with one of your co-workers!"

You rolled her eyes at her assumption, growing tired of her already. "Mina, can you let me speak please?" She seemed to get startled by your intervention but she nodded and kept her mouth shut. "Thank you. Okay, so, where do I start? Uh, first of all, I actually don't know you."

She quirked an eyebrow. "Are you kidding? We've known each other our whole life."

"This is more complicated..."

Then, you proceeded to explain everything to her. Well, the whole amnesia story. She surprisingly sat still and listened throughout your entire monologue, expressing a couple of times her reactions with gasps and hums. When you were done, she was looking up in the air to think. You hoped what you said made enough sense so she wouldn't have any doubts.

"Han Jisung who lives with Chan, no?" she asked and you nodded. "As in Bang Chan?"

You shrugged. "I don't know his last name but I guess it was him."

"Damn, you were with these losers," she exploded in laughter.

If she really was your best friend in this world, you were beginning to question yourself on why you would hang around someone thinking this low of other people. To you, these guys couldn't be any kinder. Besides the fact their apartment was a bit trashy, you couldn't think of a single thing that would make someone call them with such names.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, honey," she started with an exhale. "They've been telling people they will become a successful group but they've been getting nothing more than a few gigs here and there. Not only that but I've heard Han can't even come up on stage."

Your heart dropped. Of course he would have stage fright, he was so insecure just by stepping foot outside of his home. Something else bugged you about her comments. She had a bittersweet tone coming with it, like she had an history with these guys.

"It doesn't make them losers..."

She scoffed. "Wow, amnesia did something to you. If you still had your memories, you would agree with me."

"I just don't understand why you'd say they're losers if they're struggling with their career. Challenges happen to everyone."

"I know but- You know what? I'll tell you after you regain your memories. For now, I'll help you get back into the real world."

If only she meant this as actually going back... If she were to have this attitude while helping you go through this, you were debating to go back to Jisung's place and let them help you instead.

However, after this uncomfortable altercation, she was being nothing but the sweetest. She went through every aspect of your life slowly, from your birth until now, and made sure you were following along. Everything you had to remember about your present self wasn't so complicated; you were an accounting student following an internship and you were a second year college student. You liked your bunny a lot (who you discovered to be named Fifi as well), your best friend was Mina and Seungmin was your favourite co-worker at your internship. As for your personality, you were pretty much the same with the exception of loving to go out and socialize.

Great. You were going to love being here.

A week or so had passed since your arrival and you were starting to panic. There was not a day where you wouldn't get homesick and miss your old life, nor there would be a moment you thought of the potential other you having to live elsewhere. This was still a mystery to you. In the little time you had to do some research about travelling through different dimensions, the only thing you would find were fictional stories or theories from crazy people that were in no way consistent with what you were experiencing.

Besides that, accounting would never be a field of career you would personally choose which made all the lot more difficult. You were lucky to have Seungmin, a bright guy who volunteered to help you adapt upon learning about your issue.

"You're getting better," he commented after reviewing your report.

"Hopefully I'll be as good as I was in no time," you sighed before letting yourself drop on your chair. "Why did I even choose accounting?"

"You'd do it with such ease, it was an obvious choice."

"Yeah, well post-amnesia me hates it."

"And post-amnesia you is done with her shift for today."

You checked the time and realized he was right. You were glad today was ending in the early afternoon, it meant you would have time to stop by at the school's library to go on with your research. Without losing another minute, you sorted your documents on the small desk that you were assigned at and grabbed your belongings.

"See you tomorrow?"

Seungmin shook his head and chuckled. "Tomorrow is Saturday."

You formed an "o" with your mouth, blushing from embarrassment. You were quick to say bye to him and walk out of the building. Luckily, the campus wasn't too far from there. Nonetheless, you had to use the GPS as you weren't used to the neighbourhood yet. You were hoping you would never get used to it, anyway.

Having to wear heels at the company, you got the habit of bringing a pair of sneakers to change into once the day was over. This way, you could walk like a normal person instead of stumbling onto your own feet.

Once you reached the school's library, you were a bit intimidated by the size of it. There were so many rows just filled with bricks of books, each one of them different than the other. How on Earth would you find what you were looking for?

"May I help you?"

Your gaze moved to the front desk where the person calling for you spoke and you jumped at the sight. While the gentleman at the computer was smiling politely at you, a quiet Jisung was seemingly sorting books behind him, doing everything he could to avoid your eyes.

"Hi, do you have some sort of search browser for the books available here?" you asked the young man.

"There's a browser available on every public computer, although I have one with me just here. I can type in the book you're looking for right now."

"Oh, that's very nice but I'm actually not looking for one book in particular."

The man held his hand up to stop you. "Let me guess, magazine issues for a research project because the teacher asked for a paper reference?"

"Uh, no."

Your answer confused him furthermore, causing him to drop his shoulders in exasperation. "You read for fun?"

"Minho," Jisung interrupted the conversation. "You could help her instead of judging."

You were pleased to know he had enough self-esteem in him to speak his mind. The two of you hadn't seen or spoken to each other since you went back home-ish and you had been wondering what he was up to. Him working at the college's library had definitely not been what you thought he'd do to make money. Still, this was only a student job so it made sense. But a library? You didn't see a single actual book in his room.

"Right," Minho cleared his throat. "I apologize, what can I look up for you?"

"I'd rather look it up by myself if you don't mind," you said, a bit embarrassed.

"No problem, the computers are behind the philosophy essays section."

You nodded your head but didn't move the slightest. While this was supposed to be a place every student would go to get their work done, you didn't know your way here. Heck, it was a miracle you even made it to the library considering you visited the campus once in the week you'd been here.

"Go straight ahead and turn left when you see the couches."

You smiled at Jisung as a thank you, although he didn't return it, and followed his directions. Soon enough, you sat down at one of the stations and turned the PC on. The screen flashed the school's logo beautifully before it changed to the log in page.

Of course, you had to get into your student account to have access to this stupid computer. If you had an account, you certainly didn't have a clue about what your infos were. You went into your phone's notes to check if the other you had noted it down at some point. When you stumbled upon a note named Passwords, you thought you held the solution to your problem. However, the note itself was private and needed another code to get in. Even by trying your phone's passcode, it stayed locked.

Decisively, the world was against you for this one. Having no other option, you opted to look for what you were searching for on your own without any catalog. If it had to take until midnight, you'd stay until midnight.

You searched one row, and this one only took forty minutes to get through. This was discouraging but you wouldn't give up just yet. And so, another row was done after another forty minutes. There wasn't a book remotely close to what you needed, it was frustrating. And so, another row, another forty minutes.

"Need something?"

You really had to stop jumping every time something took you by surprise. Your focus was lost when Jisung, who was leaning on the bookshelf, was staring at you with a concerned look.

What you weren't aware of was that he had been watching you since you stepped foot in the library. He couldn't keep his mind off you since you left and seeing you so suddenly made him quite nervous. Seeing that you were as much of a mess as he was when you were looking around for a few hours now, it was good enough to give him courage to make the first move and come up to you.

"Actually, yes. I'd look through the catalog but I don't have a student account."

"Or rather you forgot it," he corrected and you nodded. "What do you need? It's my second year working here, I know the place like the back of my hand."

"No, I really rather look into it on my own."

He sighed but didn't insist any further. "Alright, I'll log you into my account."

You let out a breathy groan, throwing your head back in relief. "You have no idea how you're saving my life right now."

And you meant every word in their literal sense, unbeknownst to him. He led you back to the computers and chose one where he logged into in no time. You wanted to cry out of joy when you saw the welcoming page pop up with the school's tools already opened for the students.

"Thank you so much, I really owe you now."

He scratched the back of his head in uneasiness. "It's nothing."

You shook your head vigorously, refusing his answer. "You're too kind for this world and I want you to know it."

A blush crept on his cheeks and he allowed himself to smile a little. "Alright, then you're welcome."

With a satisfied grin, you sat down and opened the library's browser immediately. You looked into the categories first to see if you could make a more subtle research before jumping right into the actual topic. The section Legends and Myths caught your attention and you clicked on it. A vast selection of books, magazines and essays were offered to you which almost made you want to give up on the spot. But still, nothing online was helping you so this was your last hope.

You spent a lot of time, too much time, scrolling through the catalog. So much, you hadn't realized how dark it was outside until you looked around. There was nobody left, only you. When you checked the time, it was merely 8:00 P.M. which meant you still had about three to four hours to continue. However, the growl coming from your stomach was telling to take a break and get a snack. Were you too stubborn to quit and kept on searching anyway? Yes, you were.

The sound of wheels coming your way, on the other hand, could not let you focus properly. It was weird as you thought everyone had left. That was until you saw Minho and Jisung conversing while the latter was pushing a cart labelled with a paper reading Returned Books. Minho, who wearing his school bag, waved at his colleague before heading out, seemingly having finished his shift for the day.

"Jisung?" you called out once the man was alone.

He was startled to see you still at the same spot as earlier but he came your way, leaving the cart behind him. "What's up?"

"Is there a section about scientific research or something like that?"

"What kind of scientific research?" he perked an eyebrow at you. "Aren't you in accounting?"

"Uh..." you trailed off. This was too suspicious to your liking, you had to do without his help. "Actually, forget it. I wouldn't want to bother you while you still have stuff to do," you justified while gesturing the cart from afar.

Jisung wasn't having any of your bullshit. Sure, you were sweet and all but because you had been there for almost the entirety of his shift, he was growing skeptical of you. Your sudden amnesia was one thing but it had been a week, surely you wouldn't be in a library for hours not getting any actual schoolwork done if you didn't have something to hide. As observant as he was, he noticed all of your quirks. All of them were so similar to his own, meaning you were nervous. He didn't want to accuse you of anything, he genuinely wanted to help. Nonetheless, your behaviour caused him to doubt.

Or maybe was it just an excuse he was making up to get closer to you...

"The cart can wait," he argued.

And maybe having one person knowing about your situation might actually come handy. And if you had to pick someone to be aware of it, it would be Jisung. You weren't close enough with Seungmin and Mina seemed to have a tendency of gossiping and talking too much. Jisung was ideal. Plus, the man was the protagonist of the movie, a movie you weren't close to have finished watching. Having the opportunity to get a full insight into his personality wasn't an opportunity you'd pass on.

"Uh, okay," you started, preparing yourself mentally. "I- Can you promise me to not tell a word about this to anyone?"

His expression changed instantly, coming from a frown to a surprise. "What are you about to confess? A crime or something?"

"No, but it's still a pretty big thing and- Just promise me you won't tell a soul about it and that you won't judge me. And that you'll believe me."

His frown came back but he didn't seem as taken aback. "Uh, sure, yeah. I'll keep it to myself."

"Thanks... Okay, uh, where do I begin?"

"Hey," he said while putting a hand on your shoulder, a move that surprised the both of you. "I promise I won't say a thing, you can trust me."

This seemed to do the trick and you calmed down. "I don't have amnesia, I am perfectly fine in terms of memory. I just- I'm not from here."

"What do you mean?"

You were so fucking thankful he didn't accuse you of lying right away. "Do you know the theory about the universe having multiple copies of itself? Hence, many versions of a person?"

"I've seen it in movies."

"Yeah, except this is pretty fucking real for me right now and I somehow managed to come into a parallel universe in my other self's body."

You decided to spare him from telling him he's a movie's character. This was already a lot of information to process for him, telling him he wasn't real would be crushing him.

For a moment, he didn't respond. The frown never left his face. If anything, it got more defined. The longer he wasn't answering, the more you were getting nervous. Did you fuck it up by telling him (half) the truth?

"I saw one book about it, but I'm not sure if it applies to your situation."

Good, he didn't call you crazy. "Can you show it to me, please?"

He immediately led you to a section that was the furthest away from the entrance. It was a bit sketchy as it visibly wasn't frequented a lot. His eyes scanned a specific shelf while his fingers ran through the books. Eventually, he picked one out that had a hard cover with nothing on it other than the title: The Multiverse and its travelers.

"Here, hopefully it'll do."

You took it from him and read the back of it to figure out if it was fit for you or not. When you saw the phrase "seizures and blackouts tend to occur before the shift itself", you determined it would do the job. This was the closest you had gotten to knowing what happened, you had to read this.

"It's perfect, thank you."

"Great, I can enter it under your student account now," he smiled as he was about to go back to the front desk.

You shook your head immediately, grabbing his forearm to stop him. "I can't rent this. What if the other Y/N or other people see this? They'll have questions."

He sighed but he got your point. "I can put it under my name if it'll make you more comfortable."

"Please."

It didn't take him long to enter everything in the system before he gave the book back to you. You were so grateful he didn't react as bad as you expected. Not just that, he was even willing to give you a hand.

"Now that this is done, can you explain what happened to you to have travelled universes?"

Okay, maybe he wasn't totally chill with your situation, which was totally understandable. Before you could speak, your stomach made, yet, another grumble to tell you that you must eat.

"We can do this over a snack," he suggested.

"Aren't you working right now?"

He shrugged, unfazed. "Nobody's here and I can empty the returned books tomorrow."

In no time at all, he put the cart back behind the desk, clocked out of his shift, locked the doors, and walked you to the nearest convenience store. He insisted on paying for your drink and ramen, saying you must be exhausted from the day. Although you wanted to tell him otherwise, he wasn't wrong.

And that's how you were now sitting on the benches of the school's empty football field with only a couple of lights for you to see around.

"Alright, go ahead with the questions," you breathed out before taking a bite of your noodles.

He let out a chuckle as he watched you slurp. "Which one do I even ask first?"

"Whatever comes to your mind."

"Okay, uh... Where are you from?"

You hummed. "I actually don't know what to call it. Earth, obviously, but it's just another version of this one."

"Is it different here?"

"Not really, it's the same year and all but my other self is living a completely different type of life."

"How come?"

"I don't party that much, nor do I like anything having to do with accounting."

He let out a laugh. "I'd say I'm the same."

"Yeah, staying at home is ten times better."

"I agree," he acquiesced before taking a bite of his own meal. "What happened before you got here?"

You shrugged. "I tripped, thought I hit my head, and here I am."

"That's odd."

"Tell me about it," you said in a scoff. "How was I when you met me, anyway?"

"Do you mean you as in you or your other self?"

You frowned. "I thought you didn't know my other self."

He sighed. "I do know her, I just forgot about her. At the party, we actually hooked up but when she learned Mina had a feud with Chan, she told me to forget this even happened."

This explained many things, especially why Mina had such a dislike to the three men. You also began to wonder how did Jisung get in bed with the other you. Before your mind could go much further with that, you stopped yourself and let out a nervous laugh.

"Well, it worked," you chuckled awkwardly. "But yeah, how was I last week in front of that playground?"

He bit in lips while thinking, one of his habits you thought to be adorable. "From afar, you were walking around normally but then, you just kind of froze and began to have a panic attack or something."

"And you were kind enough to come to my rescue," you saw with a dreamy sigh, making him roll his eyes.

"Make fun of me all you want, you're happy I'm the one who rescued you."

"I am," you affirmed.

The blush on his face didn't go unnoticed by you, which also made your face red. Gosh, he really had to be this stinking cute? You had to muster all of your energy to not pinch his plump cheeks.

"Your name is really Y/N, right?" he asked just to be sure.

"That part is true."

"Okay, good."

Unlike other times, the silence that slowly settled between you two was rather comforting. Maybe it was because you had been mostly honest with him, or maybe because he was managing to get more comfortable around you. Either or both ways, you were content with how sereine it was.

"This is fucked up," he commented.

"I know."

As a new silence took over, Jisung's eyebrows furrowed as he stared into his ramen cup, deep in thoughts. While he was having what was probably a mental debate, you gave yourself permission to stare closely at his physical traits. He was hard to read and complex, which was mainly what made him so fascinating to you in the first place. His character was developed as someone so real and sincere, you were almost disappointed he wasn't actually real. His bead-like soft eyes, his perfect glowing skin, his hair that-

"My mom died," he informed you out of the blue.

Your heartbeat quickened all of the sudden. While you processed what he just said, the image of her death came back to you. "I'm sorry," was all you found the energy to say.

"That playground we were at last week was where she was hit by a car. I was so young, it was painful."

Sadness rushed through your body as you were now getting a full image of his emotions. You never expected him to be transparent with you about it, even less since you didn't know each other so well.

"Why are you telling me this? This seems to be pretty personal."

He smiled sadly. "I think she's the reason why I wanted to help you then. I felt her around me, telling me to save someone else for her."

"That's very sweet," you commented in a soft voice.

"It is," he laughed out. "I miss her a lot."

"I would too if I was you."

Slowly, the night came as you began to hear crickets around you. Deciding this was enough for tonight, the two of you left the school grounds. Jisung was generous once more when he offered to walk you home. He would lie if he said his heart didn't pinch when you refused. Nonetheless, you parted ways and began to walk in opposite directions on the dark streets. You were getting further away from each other when you decided to turn on your heels and run back to him. As he heard you come back, he turned around, watching you until you got face to face with him.

"Can I have your number? Since you're the only person who knows about my struggle," you explained, even if you used it as an excuse to keep contact with him.

"Yeah, sure. We can meet a few times to search for a way back together," he suggested which made you grin.

You might not have found a way home that day, but you found a friend.

Mina was still staring at you with disgust while you were getting ready to go to Jisung's place. Apparently, Changbin and Chan were going to a party that night which left the apartment to himself. This was merely three days after your interaction at the library and you were still somehow stressed out about meeting up with him. The fact Mina was throwing a few comments at you about him didn't help.

"I'm simply trying to understand what you find interesting in him," she groaned.

"He's done a lot for me since the incident, I owe him."

She sighed in despair. "Alright but if he breaks your heart like Chan did to me, don't be surprised!"

You also took the weekend as an opportunity to get to know your roommate and her relationship she had with Chan. It had taken a toll on her emotionally, so much that she had no intention in being polite with whatever — or whoever — that was in relation with him.

"Don't become besties with him or I'll seriously consider cutting you out of my life," she added.

You deadpanned at her. "You wouldn't actually."

She rolled her eyes. "Of course not but I wouldn't be happy with it."

With that being said, you left the apartment and made your way to Jisung's place with your bag hanging on your shoulder, full since it contained your belongings plus his clothes you had forgotten to give him back. You were starting to know your way around which you didn't consider as a good sign. This meant you were getting used to this place and it just couldn't be like this.

The moment you knocked on Jisung's front door, it slung open for him to welcome you with a smile. He had seemingly cleaned a little around but it was still messy, as expected.

"So, I looked up some stuff online and I'm surprised you didn't see what was on there. It looks like many people believe to have experienced it," he said before turning his laptop's screen to your direction.

"I did see those and it just sounds like people dreaming of another universe before "travelling". For me, I just tripped."

His shoulders dropped. "I see."

"I appreciate the effort, though," you reassured, feeling a bit bad.

He invited you to get to his room where he could make some more research on his PC while you'd have the bed to read the book comfortably. Before going there, he didn't forget to make some hot beverages for the two of you as you were expecting for this to last a long while.

His bed was as comfortable as you remembered, you had almost missed it. Not that your own bed in this world wasn't nice, it just felt a bit too firm. Jisung's, however, was soft and warm. As you began your reading session, the only thing you could hear was Jisung typing on his keyboard and clicking with his mouse. It wasn't annoying in itself, but it was too distracting for you to focus.

When you realized you had been reading the same sentence for the fifth time, you decided to do something about it. Getting up, you tapped on his shoulder which made him take his headphones off.

"Did you find something?" he immediately questioned but you shook your head.

"Your typing is kind of distracting on its own. Do you have music you can play in the background?"

He blinked a few times before nodding. "I was listening to my own stuff, actually."

Oh, right. Jisung was described as a struggling musician in the synopsis, you had almost forgotten about that. This suddenly made him all the more interesting than the search and he definitely saw it in your eyes. Hesitantly, he disconnected his headset and plugged his speakers in before opening his files. There were so many audiotapes, you were stunned. To think all of this were his creations.

"I don't think I've told you but the guys and I are music majors."

"You didn't tell me but I heard about it, yeah."

"Well, we've been experiencing with sounds and beats to find what fits us. This is all of it, pretty much. We're trying to make an actual career out of it but none of the calls we've made have come back," he said as he let out a heavy breath, one of disappointment. "I'm actually starting to consider giving up on that."

You scoffed. "Nonsense, you're great!"

"How do you know? You've never heard anything by me."

Not exactly. The clips of him in his room struggling to make music in the film had a few samples of his songs playing and you did remember them to be very good. Of course, he would never know this, so you had to lie.

"I haven't but I'm confident you're very talented."

He chuckled, embarrassed. "Now I'm just nervous to show you if you have such high expectations."

"Don't be."

He scrolled through his files for a bit in search of the perfect song to show you first. There were many that were done with the other guys. Still, he felt like he wanted to show something that was 100% him. Something raw that you could relate to. The cursor stopped for an instant on his track Alien. Considering the context, this must have been the fittest one for you. So he clicked on it, letting it play through the speakers.

And just as he thought, this could not have been a better choice. From the first note, you were entirely immersed into the melody, bopping your head along with it. And when he began to sing, damn you were melting. Not only were his lyrics so personal and true, his voice had a melodic effect that made you want to squeal. Seriously, why was he struggling with his career if this was what he was putting out?

When the song ended, the only thing you could do was let out an emotional sigh. "You, guys, have so much talent."

He scratched the side of his arm sheepishly before shaking his head. "That was just me," he corrected.

"All of it?" you asked with admiration.

"All of it, from the sound to the singing and the lyrics."

He wasn't one to brag usually, but if it impressed you and interested you, there was nothing wrong with showing off a little. This information had visibly made you more fascinated by his work and you didn't hesitate to steal his mouse and put the cursor over another track.

You did this for a while, playing one song after the other. You were as amazed as you were by the first one every single time. This eventually made Jisung so shy about his work, he had to force you to stop even if you argued you wanted to listen to more. Forcefully, he kept you away from his computer and put a random playlist on for what you had originally requested, which was ambiance music.

You crossed your arms and pouted. "Is it so bad to want to listen to raw talent?"

"When the artist is right in front of you, yes. Now, get back to work."

You snorted at him. "Yeah, yeah, whatever."

Nevertheless, you still opened the book and continued to read. The first couple of pages weren't telling anything new. It mostly consisted of summing up what was already known of travelling through the multiverse, meaning not much. Although the research this author made was impressive, this had in no way the exact thing you were looking for. And as your reading kept on going, the more discouraged you were growing. There was a point you thought of abandoning the book. However, there were still too many pages left to risk missing something out.

"Got anything?" Jisung finally spoke after about an hour of research.

"Nothing, what about you?"

"Apart from a few people on Reddit talking about their shifting experience in their sleep, nothing."

You scoffed. "Yeah, not relevant to my case."

You closed the book and let out a loud yawn, catching Jisung's attention. "Tired?"

"A little," you shrugged. "Are you?"

"No, but this is getting tiring if I'm being honest," he chuckled and you smiled as to affirm you agreed. "How about we take a break and order some food?"

"No need to ask me twice."

In the time of a heartbeat, he jumped off his chair and ran out of his room, leaving you chuckling at his demeanor. Jisung was cute, you couldn't argue with that. Even more so because he seemed to like food so much, something you could relate to yourself. Before he would come back, you decided to look around some more, although you had analyzed the place quite a lot on your first day here. His room was cleaner, probably because he knew in advance that you'd be coming. For once, his closet was wide open which gave you a good opportunity to check what he wore on the daily basis. While you had only seen him in casual clothing, what you could see through his clothes were great fashion items. A shelf was filled with different kinds of hats and a whole section was dedicated to jackets of all sorts.

"It's always the fictional characters," you muttered to yourself, thinking about how none of the men from your world had this much taste in their choice of wearing.

"Alright," a loud voice said while coming in the room, almost startling you.

Jisung, unlike what you thought he'd do, sat next to you with a few flyers in hands from restaurants around the neighbourhood. Ramen, sushi, BBQ, fried chicken; there were too many, you felt a bit overwhelmed at the options.

"What do you want?" you insisted on him choosing.

"We could go for ramen," he shrugged before composing the number to make his order. "What would you like?"

"Anything, I'm not picky."

He gave you a nod before focusing back on the call as it seemed that someone answered. "Is this Felix?"

Felix? Why the hell was he calling him all of the sudden?

"Hey, man, can I have two of my usual?" Jisung continued to speak. "In thirty? Okay, good... Yeah... I'll tell him... Bye," he ended the call.

"You called Felix?" you asked.

He frowned. "Yeah, obviously, he–" he was about to say until he realized you actually didn't know. "My bad," he coughed out, embarrassed. "He works at the best ramen place near campus so let's say I get a few free stuff when it's his shift."

"Oh, okay," you said with a nod.

An awkward silence settled as you noticed him starting to fiddled with the hem of his shirt, looking at anywhere but you. Although you always found him adorable when he got shy, you weren't going to let this be too uncomfortable for him. He was already helping you a lot, this was the least you could do.

"Do you want to watch something?"

He stopped his fiddling and looked up at you. "Do you think you have the same films and shows where you're from?"

You frowned. "Good question. Show me what you have and I'll tell you if it's the case."

He went to take his laptop and turn it on before sitting back next to you. He shyly gestured for you to get comfortable and lay with your back against the wall. You complied and, soon, he positioned himself next to you. You could see he was a bit nervous but he didn't let it show through too much. He was quick to open his Netflix account, which you thought was nice that the platform was here as well, and he scrolled through the few movies and series that were appearing. From the looks of it and based on his recommendations, he was watching a lot of anime movies and series.

"Yeah, it's very similar to what I have back home," you affirmed. "It's odd, how the hell is it the same?"

Jisung frowned as he also realized how bizarre it was. "Maybe you are in the same world as me?"

You shook your head. "How would you explain this other me having an entire different life than me while having the same name and the same bunny I have? Heck, she has the same parents."

Maybe you really did modify the movie by coming here. For the whole part of you having your own life, at least. As for the content of cinematography, it was logical that a movie would put the same cultural references to make more realistic to the audience. How were you going to explain this to Jisung, though?

"I don't think I have the brain to think about this too much, it's kind of freaking me out," he gulped. "I'm actually just starting to realize how fucked up your thing is..."

Your eyes went wide. "No, please, don't think I'm crazy..." you pleaded.

"I don't know, Y/N, this whole thing is weird as fuck."

"I swear I'm not making this up, I find it as bizarre as you do."

He shook his head. "No, I believe you. It's just, how the fuck?" he trailed off.

You only responded with a faint smile as to show him you weren't understanding this any more than he was. Thankfully, the moment wasn't long and you moved on by suggesting on watching a Ghibli movie. You loved them, he seemed to enjoy them, this was a perfect choice.

As the film was starting, the bell rang and Jisung paused it to go greet the delivery person, which you assumed to be Felix. You were confirmed to be right when the man himself walked in the room behind Jisung with two plastic bags. It took him a moment to take in your presence in his friend's bedroom.

"Damn, I knew this was going to happen after–"

He was interrupted mid-sentence when Jisung put his hand over his mouth. "Yes, this is a great reunion but we're just taking the food and you can be on your way."

"But–" Felix started when he managed to push the hand away, only to get cut off again.

"Felix," he gave him a look. "How much was it?"

Finally understanding he wouldn't get answers tonight, the two proceeded to payment while you watched them, still waiting patiently with the movie on pause. You chuckled upon seeing Jisung's slightly pink cheeks as he crawled back to your side with the food in hands.

"You two, lovebirds, enjoy your date," Felix said in a teasing voice before winking at Jisung.

As the boy left the flat, Jisung couldn't contain his embarrassment any more than this. "I swear to God I will kick his ass next time I see him," you hear him mumble under his breath.

You shrugged. "He has a point, it does look like a date night for a couple."

He cleared his throat. "I suppose it does a little... Anyway, this is what I got. I hope you like sea food."

"Not a favourite," you admitted which caused his shoulders to drop a bit. "I like it, though."

This seemed to cheer him back up and he happily took the bowls out of the bag. Next to his bed was a tray he kept close for occasions like these. Well, not the having-a-girl-over part but rather the watching-films-in-bed part.

"Fancy," you commented once he had everything settled and ready in front of you.

"Only the best for your stay here, miss," he joked and then proceeded to click on play.

You would've lied if you said the ramen wasn't good because this might have been the best meal you've had in years. It felt so perfect being in the comfort of a bed with hot soup while watching one of your favourite movies. Not only that, but there was this cute ass man next to you loving it as much as you were. This was quite a turn of events.

Jisung was a gentleman for taking your dishes out of the room after you were done enjoying the food. This meant that, for the remainder of the film, there was only a slight gap separating the two of you. Your focus no longer on eating, the only thing you could think of was the realization of Jisung's presence.

Needless to say, he was no better than you were. His eyes were still stuck on the screen but he could feel his head move instinctively towards your direction. It was much stronger than his free will, he was gravitating to you. As much as it scared the shit out of him, he was surprised to be loving it so much. You were easy to be around of, he didn't need to waste his social battery on you.

"Are you cold?" he asked as the characters on screen kept quiet for this scene.

You shivered a little, not having understood you were, in fact, cold. "A little."

"I- Do you... want to use the blanket?" he asked with uncertainty as he stared at the bedsheets beneath the both of you.

With a shy nod as a response, he invited you off the mattress so he could actually pull the covers down to allow you to make yourself comfortable. As you sat back down under the blankets, you stared at him in confusion upon noticing he sat still in a very stiff position on the covers of his side.

"This is ridiculous, come under here," you snorted at him but he didn't budge.

"That would be weird, wouldn't it?" he said in a small voice, making him too cute for your own sake.

"It is if you're making it weird. Don't question it, come on."

While your boldness took him aback for a second, he obliged the second after and, carefully, positioned himself in a much more comfortable way. Still, he was trying to draw himself away as far away from your body as possible. Of course, you understood the thought process of his actions but he was so far to the point he had to lean towards you to see the screen better. Even if you were thankful he was being respectful, this was simply ridiculous.

"Jisung," you sighed.

"What?"

Seeing that he wasn't moving a tiny bit, you took it upon yourself and scooted closer to his body, bringing the laptop with you before laying it on both of your legs. His body stiffed at the proximity and you thought of noticing him gulp.

"Is this okay?"

He looked back at you and nodded, his breath now cutting short from how close your faces were. If he had it in him, he would have kissed you right there and then. But sadly, this was not what happened and Jisung concentrated back to the movie.

A routine was set quite rapidly after that night. Every once in a while, Jisung would call you up so you could make some progress in your research — which I can affirm was not advancing as fast as you wanted it to — and also just hang out. Whether you wanted this to happen or not, you were close to him and he became someone dear to you. Two months and a half after your arrival and you were closer to him than anyone else even, you dared to think, anyone back home.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" you snorted at Mina as soon as she stepped foot in the office you and Seungmin were working in.

"Tonight is party time, baby," she cheered. "Soohee is hosting the event of the year."

You exchanged glances with Seungmin before looking back at her. "What does that even mean?"

She deadpanned at you. "Soohee, that senior in theater class."

"The girl you told me we should both hate because she got the spot you wanted in that play?"

"So you do listen!"

You rolled your eyes, resulting to Seungmin laughing. You ignored his antics. "What are you implying here, Mina?"

"You're coming."

"I'm not."

"Please!" she pleaded with a pout. "Seungmin can come as well if that can convince you."

He raised his hand in disapproval. "First of all, I am invited already. Second of all, do I have a say in this?"

"No," Mina replied with a cheeky smile. "Come, Y/N, please. I haven't been out with my favourite girl since her incident and I miss getting drunk with her."

"Yeah, you do owe her that," Seungmin agreed to which you answered with a glare.

"No one asked for your opinion."

"But it is greatly appreciated," she said with a wink.

Looking back and forth at the both of them, you let out a huge groan, dropping your arms on your sides. "Fine, you win. I guess it will help with getting my mind off work and all."

She squealed before rushing to you to engulf your body in a tight hug. It was obvious you were going to regret it but did you really have a choice at this point?

"I'm done in an hour, I can continue working on your file if you want to leave in advance to get ready," Seungmin offered much to your dismay.

Mina's eyes glowed at his suggestion. "You're an angel, thank you so much."

"Nonsense!" you exclaimed. "I'll finish up with you, you can't be doing all of this on your own."

Mina tugged your arm to get you up from your seat. "Y/N," she whined.

Seungmin chuckled at the interaction. "Go, I'll be fine," he assured.

"Okay," you said reluctantly with a grateful smile.

You and Mina then rushed out of the building back to your apartment. The time was only 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and the party wasn't going to start in another two hours or so. But Mina was insistant on getting you ready and gossiping. Yes, gossiping.

As she had just sat you down on a chair in front of the mirror in the bathroom, about to curl your hair, she was giving you a look you were not liking. "So?" she said while wiggling one of her eyebrows.

"What?" you responded cluelessly while sipping onto your bubble tea.

She gave you another knowing look. "Oh, please, don't act like you don't know what I am referring to."

"Jisung?"

"Obviously."

You sighed. "He's helping me with some work, nothing more."

"You could have asked me," she shrugged, insinuating how actually hurt she was for not being as close to you as she used to. "I'm great with school work."

"I know but Jisung is... He just knows some stuff."

She scoffed. "Sure, he does. Just admit you asked for his help because you like the boy."

You got flustered very easily, bending your head onwards a little. Mina immediately replaced your head so she could continue to style your hair, inevitably exchanging looks with her through the mirror.

"Y/N," she insisted once more.

"It's not like that."

"If you say so," she said although it was clear she wasn't believing you. "I'm just trying to warn you. These guys are no good news."

"You say this because of Chan."

"I'm not," she argued.

Whether she wanted to admit it or not, her feelings were only getting the best of her. In a way, you were glad she was trying her best to protect you. At the same time, you'd seen no sign as to why you should be wary of Jisung. So far, he was someone sincere and honest, someone you really could rely on. It was hard for you to even think of the possibility of him hurting you.

"What if I like him?" you questioned.

She pondered for a second, visibly troubled by your question, but she answered. "Then I'll be very sad for you."

The remainder of time before the party was a bit awkward. You silently agreed to not speak on the matter anymore, so it was mostly small talk about what kind of products she was using to make your skin glow. It was hard to deny, she had the trick in terms of getting ready for events.

After bickering for a while about what you were to wear, you settled on a casual shirt with jeans while she chose a skirt for herself. You weren't planning on staying there for that long, anyway.

"Bye, my love," you cooed at your rabbit, earning a heavy sigh from your friend. "Hey! Let me love my bunny!"

"Alright, alright," she rolled her eyes. "Come on, now. We don't want to be late."

Soohee was the kind of girl who'd get anything from her parents as long as she kept her grades up. She was an excellent student, meaning she had literally everything she'd ask for. One of them was to have her own house near campus. Yes, her parents were that rich.

So no need to say how stunned you were when you arrived in front of the literal mansion. The music playing inside could already be heard from where you were and you spotted many students walking in and out of the place. This was worth to be in a movie. Funny enough, it was a movie. You began to wonder if this party would occur in the actual film. Probably not, since Jisung wasn't the type of person to go out.

"You're looking gorgeous, ladies," you heard coming from your right.

You smiled at Seungmin before enveloping him into a hug. "You don't look too bad yourself, Mr. Kim," you complimented.

"So," he let out after breaking away from your embrace. "This is what the big deal is about."

"Fancy, isn't it?" Mina said excitedly. "Let's go inside, I need a good drink."

Before you could say something, she was already heading towards the entrance. You and Seungmin couldn't do anything else but follow her. While you didn't feel at ease so much, you were happy to see a familiar face as soon as you walked in.

"Hyunjin?" you called him out.

The man had his arm wrapped around Soohee's shoulder when he spotted you. "Hey! Y/N, right?"

"That's me," you chuckled.

Soohee looked back and forth at the two of you. "You two know each other?"

Hyunjin shrugged. "A friend of a friend of a friend... We met each other a couple of times, nothing more," he explained, seemingly trying to reassure his partner. "Y/N, this is my girlfriend Soohee."

"I know, you're kind of a big name around here," you said to the girl.

"Yeah," she said sheepishly. "Nice to meet you! Any friend of Hyunjin is welcomed here."

Mina nudged your arm, a sign she wasn't too fond of your newfound friend. Nonetheless, she greeted the girl happily as if they had been friends for years. She was a lot better than you in faking kindness.

"I'm glad to see you made it," Soohee said with a smile.

"I could not miss it for the world," Mina said through her teeth.

The couple left to greet more people coming in, leaving your trio together. Mina, who hadn't enjoyed this interaction, hurried herself to go get something to drink — you and Seungmin following her again. The counter had tons of sorts of drinks. Some had questionable colours but most looked tasty as hell. Assuming Mina knew what to take, you picked a cup of the same drink as hers. Seungmin went ahead with getting himself a beer from the cooler near the counter.

"That girl is so annoyingly nice, I hate it," Mina spat out in-between sips.

"Now, don't be so harsh on the girl. We're in her house after all," Seungmin tried to resonate her.

She shrugged. "Sure. Y/N, I'm going to the other room if you want to come with me."

"What other room?" you asked, confused.

"The room at the back is the biggest of the house where interesting stuff happen."

You looked at Seungmin for advice but he shrugged, letting you choose for the three of you. You ended up following her lead since she was the expert in social events like these. She was right, the room was so much bigger and organized as to make a few beer pong stations in the middle while couches were put against the wall for those who preferred sitting down. Mina didn't wait for you when she heard that a new game of beer pong was starting and she rushed to say she and you would play.

"Oh, great," you mumbled to yourself but Seungmin heard you as clear as day.

"Go have fun," he chuckled but received a glare from you.

"Seungmin, want to join our team?" Mina yelled out at him, causing him to sigh.

"Come on, let's go have fun," you copied him teasingly and it was his turn to glare at you.

You took his hand despite his protests and joined Mina at the table. She was already setting the cups ready for the game and you lost no time in giving her a hand.

"Oh, Y/N?" you heard a familiar voice say.

Looking up, you were pleasantly surprised to see Changbin grinning at you. "Hey, Bin."

At the sight of the man, Mina's eyes went wide open. "Fuck, don't tell me..."

The worst she was expecting happened when Chan joined his friend's side. He looked as troubled by Mina's presence as she was by his. You felt like you shouldn't be there, their staring contest was a bit much for you.

"Do you still want to play?" you asked her in a worried voice.

"Why wouldn't I want to play anymore?" Mina acted as if nothing was wrong.

Chan let out a chuckle. "Alright, if you say so."

"You don't believe me, Christopher?"

His jaw clenched but he remained calm. "I didn't say the opposite."

"You're missing a player," Seungmin pointed out.

"Are we?" Changbin cheekily said.

Almost on cue, another man joined the lot as he placed himself next to Chan. As soon as he saw you, Jisung froze. While he didn't want to come to this party originally, he certainly did not expect you to be there. Even less dressed up like you were. That shirt of yours exposed so much of your skin and curves, he could feel the sweat on his forehead.

"My bad," Seungmin said upon seeing Jisung.

Your gaze lingered on him for longer than it should. While it was the others' turn to play, the two of you were exchanging a few looks with each other. It was either funny faces or one of you mouthing something the other couldn't understand. At one point, you were growing frustrated to no be able to decipher what he was trying to tell you. He chuckled as he saw the frown form on your face.

"Cute," he mouthed but you were still clueless.

"Uh?"

Yeah, he gave up. You were not the best at lip-reading, it wasn't your fault. Instead of repeating himself like he had done for a while now, he winked at you. That was new. Not knowing how to react, your face went red as you attempted to look at anywhere but him. He grinned at himself, satisfied by your reaction. You were too adorable, he hated it.

Your team ended up losing, much to Mina's disappointment. The girl had drank so much from the game only, you were growing worried about her physical state. Despite that, her fury against Chan was much stronger than a couple of drinks and she rushed after him once the game was over.

"I should follow her, right?" you said to Seungmin.

"Yeah, definitely," he affirmed which was all it took for you to go after her.

As you got closer, you reached out to grab her wrist but she broke free harshly. "Christopher Bang Chan!" she called out.

You winced in embarrassment, feeling bad for her. Chan immediately turned around, eyes growing bigger while Mina threw herself onto him. Luckily, he was quick to catch her.

"Hey, maybe you should sit down for a minute, yeah?" he said softly to her but she was not listening.

"You're such an ass, embarrassing me all the fucking time," she claimed.

You felt a nudge on your arm and let out a sigh of relief when you saw Jisung by your side. You had been meaning to go see him once you made sure Mina was alright. Clearly, this was not how things were going.

"Maybe we should leave them some privacy," Jisung suggested.

"But Mina is obviously not okay," you argued.

"Chan is with her, it'll be fine."

He took your hand and, reluctantly, you agreed to follow him outside to get some fresh air. The night was just a little breezy, but it was perfect for this kind of social gathering. There was, unsurprisingly, an inground pool along with a jacuzzi and a few outdoor couches. A little fire was lit further away from the house where some guys you didn't know were conversing in laughs. You were glad to see that none of them had a drink nearby, meaning it wouldn't turn into a disaster.

Jisung led you to one of the couches and sat with you. You had not noticed until then but he brought you a drink along with his. You thanked him as he offered it to you and you sipped in silence while watching the other students mess around. Some couples were making out in front of everyone, groups of friend were dancing together, others were simply catching up... Somehow, it was calmer outside than what was happening in the house.

"I never thought I'd see you here," Jisung informed with a small laugh.

"I could say the same about you. What are you even doing here?" you asked, genuinely curious.

"Soohee has some friends who work in an entertainment company. Chan thought it'd be a good idea to make some contacts within the industry so we can get somewhere with our stuff," he explained without much enthusiasm.

"I suppose things are still not taking off?"

He scoffed with a small smile. "We've been putting music out for a while. Shouldn't we at least have established a bit of a fanbase yet?"

"I'm a fan," you grinned widely.

"It's different, the real Y/N wouldn't like our stuff. Besides, you're my friend. That doesn't count."

You tried to ignore the hurt his comment caused to your heart. "What tells you she wouldn't have liked it? And, sure, I'm your friend but I'm honest. I would have told you if your music was trash."

He smiled thankfully but you still saw a hint of sadness in his eyes. "I really appreciate it. Still, you're too nice and you might just be trying to cheer me up right now."

"Fine, guilty," you sighed. "I am trying to cheer you up but I'm sincere. I love your music."

He let out a heavy breath before taking your hand, rubbing the top of it softly with his thumb. "Thank you."

"It's nothing, I'm being truthful," you said while raising your shoulders.

"What about you? Why did you come here?" he said, letting go of your hand to take another sip of his drink.

You tried to hide the fact you missed his touch already and cleared your throat. "Mina."

This was all the explanation he needed. "She would have been too suspicious of you if you didn't go to a party with her at some point."

"I know, that makes me want to go home even more honestly."

He choked up on his drink at your statement. You panicked for a second, patting his back to make sure he was okay. Once his coughing stopped he looked at you right in the eye.

"That much?" he asked in an almost hurt voice.

You gibbered for a bit, unsure as to why he was reacting this way. "I mean, kind of? As much as I love it here, I do miss my family and my actual bed," you tried to joke but he didn't laugh with you.

"Minho's not working this Tuesday if you want to come at the library. We could do more digging into the books," he suggested.

"Oh, sure. Actually, that'd be perfect. Thank you, Ji."

Your smile pained him even more. Of course, he couldn't blame you for wanting to go back home, he would have felt the same. However, there was something about you he became addictive of. Whether it was your being, your presence, your ability to make him feel comfortable so easily... All of it became something he couldn't imagine losing. There was something else within you, a spark. The last time he saw one like it was with his mother.

"Hey," you called for him. "Are you okay?"

Remembering where he was, he gulped and got up. "Sorry, I have to go."

And just like that, he went back inside without a word. You watched him, confused, until his shadow disappeared among the other figures around him. You wanted to follow him but not knowing what had caused him to leave so abruptly held you off. Was he mad at you? And what for? You couldn't bear with imagining you had caused him pain. Hesitantly, you got up and walked towards the back door. Only, you never reached the back door.

"Ouch!" you yelled out when your body collided with a frame bigger than your own.

"Oh my Gosh, Y/N, I'm so sorry," the person immediately apologized.

While you had technically never met him before, you recognized Jeongin from the pictures in your phone. "No, don't worry about it. I wasn't looking."

"But I kind of spilled my drink on you," he chuckled, embarrassed. "And you spilled yours too."

You looked at your empty cup and groaned in annoyance. "Great."

"Do you want my hoodie to cover the stain?"

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, just give it back to me next time we see each other," he said with a bright smile. "Talking about that, I haven't seen you in a while."

You gratefully put his hoodie on and followed as he was walking back inside to get himself a new cup. "Yeah, I haven't been myself lately let's say."

"Beer? Punch? Sangria?" he asked while pointing at the different beverages.

"Sangria," you picked out and he gave it to you before picking one for himself.

"Yeah, Mina told me you had an amnesia episode or something?"

"Or something... I'm better now, though. Well, I think so."

He let out a laugh. "You do seem good. I assume you remembered me since you didn't look so confused when I went on about not having seen you in a while."

"Yeah, I do. It's a bit blurry but it's coming back to me slowly."

"Good, I'm glad. Did you go to a doctor to check it out?"

Oh. That was suspicious, wasn't it? Claiming to have amnesia without getting a professional to take a look at it. Your heart began to race as anxiety spread through your body. What if Jeongin was to uncover your act? What would happen then?

"I brought her to one the first day."

You thanked whoever who had brought Jisung near to save you. You wouldn't be able to explain how relieved you felt at this moment.

"Oh, that's good," Jeongin nodded. "Jisung, isn't it?"

He nodded. "Do you mind if I steal her from you?"

He sent the both of you a knowing look and didn't protest before walking away to elsewhere. As Jisung watched him leave, he sighed as he was about to nag you for not being careful. However, as soon as his focus was back on you, he froze in place when you dropped into his arms. It wasn't too noticeable but he could feel your body shaking.

"Thank fucking God, you were there," you breathed out. "I thought you were mad and I was going to look for you but I bumped into him and then I-"

"Hey," he stopped you. "I'm not mad at you, you don't have to explain anything to me." He pulled away from you but still had a grip on your shoulders. "How about we stick together for tonight?"

You nodded in agreement which he responded with his boxy smile. For a second — although it felt like minutes —, you couldn't see anything else but him. There was no way to describe how you felt around him. It was a mix of safety, happiness, comfort, nervosity, etc. All of these feelings, and more, altogether.

"You're pretty," you unconsciously let yourself slip out.

Jisung's cheeks had a faint pink colour to them but it didn't seem to bother him. "I think you're the pretty one between us," he corrected.

You shook your head and got closer to his face to inspect his features. "You're prettier," you affirmed once you analyzed his face.

He let a nervous laugh out. "Y/N..." he began, but didn't seem to find it in him to finish his sentence.

Your being brought him into a whole other world. If this was travelling universes, he'd want to do it all the time. This world only had you and him in it. Curiously, he was content with that idea. Somewhere where it could only be the two of you.

"Kiss me."

His brain short-circuited. A second ago, his mind was elsewhere, and now, you brought him back to reality in an instant. However, he still wasn't able to acknowledge people surrounding you. His sole focus was on the two words you said, and on your lips. Those pink lips he had always wished to kiss ever since that night when he saw you in his clothes. And you were demanding him to kiss you. Why couldn't he do it?

"Whoo!"

The loud scream coming from only a few meters away from you broke you out of your trance. Your gazes darted away from each other to find Minho, who was very much drunk, proudly showing his empty can to a group of girls after doing a shotgun.

The two of you, still holding onto each other, opted to go back to the main room in order to diffuse the weird tension between you. The sight you stumbled upon certainly was not what you thought of seeing any time soon. Chan was grabbing Mina by the waist, keeping her body close to his, as they kissed hungrily in the corner of the room. Near them was an annoyed Changbin, doing everything he could to avoid looking at the couple. The moment he spotted the two of you, he waved at you to come and join him.

"What's this about?" you asked, motioning towards your friends.

"Long story short, they left for a while and came back like this."

"Who would have thought she'd get laid with Chan?" you huffed.

Changbin glared at you. "Thank you for stating the obvious, Y/N."

Well, Changbin was being pretty sensitive tonight. It might have been the alcohol or the dislike he had for Mina. Anyhow, this looked pretty funny to you.

"The party's here, I see," Felix exclaimed as he joined you, bringing his arms around you and Jisung. "How are you, guys?"

"Tired," Changbin replied grumpily.

Hyunjin, Soohee, and Minho, who had all been following Felix, came to sit on the couch next to you. You had just then realized Seungmin was nowhere to be found, which was odd considering he wouldn't have been the kind to wander around too much.

"Soohee," Changbin called for the girl who broke her kiss with Hyunjin to look at him. "Did they say anything to you?"

You assumed he was referring to these friends of hers who worked in the music industry. Soohee clapped her hands together in response, a wide smile spread on her face.

"They've got a spot this summer for new producers and they told me they'll slide a word to their boss to give you the position," she squealed excitedly.

"You're kidding," Jisung said blankly, not believing her.

"I'm not!" she affirmed.

Jisung heard her right. Still, he couldn't fully process what she said. He had the chance to actually make a career out of his hobby. This felt so unreal, his face remained hard as stone, unable to express what he was feeling. Quite frankly, he didn't know what he was feeling himself. While the others around him were cheering happily about the excellent news, everything was a blur for him. Even if he couldn't be any happier, this also meant things were getting serious. Was he ready for this? He was still so young, maybe this was happening fast.

"Ji?" you said to him softly, noticing that he wasn't quite there.

"Uh?" he said while blinking slowly.

"You good?"

He swallowed and then stared back at you. "It's all a tad overwhelming," he admitted.

You gave him a reassuring smile before taking his hand. "How about we celebrate for now and worry about the rest later?"

This did the trick to bring him back fully from his thoughts and he finally allowed himself to cheer with the others. The first thing he did was bring your body into an embrace, holding you close. So close, you could feel his breath grazing the top of your ears, sending a shiver down your spine.

"Guys," Soohee said loudly enough to grab everyone's attention. "I have to precise, there is no certainty you'd be taken. But if you are, then don't mess it up. You've got one chance, and only one."

"Having the position or not, this is the furthest we've gotten so far," Chan answered. "Either way, this is accomplishment."

"I say we drink to this!"

You widened your eyes when you saw Seungmin leaning onto Jeongin as the both of them walked towards you. This was definitely not how you imagined Seungmin be by the end of the night. He was the last person who'd get drunk like this. However, nobody seemed to care and they all agreed to get themselves more alcohol for the occasion.

Meh, at this point, nothing was keeping you from having fun. Besides, Jisung was there. There was nothing to be worried about, as long as he was around to keep you safe.

You didn't know how long you had been drinking and dancing with Mina when you felt yourself getting dizzy. You tried to shake yourself out of your drunken state but there was no use, you had consumed more than needed. Although Mina wanted for you to keep partying with her, you had enough sanity to decline and make your way back to the couches.

The faint view you had in front of you was of a concerned Jisung discussing with Minho. As soon as his eyes laid on your clumsy self, he lost no time in holding onto you to keep yourself from tripping.

"Hey, there," he said softly before guiding you to sit down. "How about you take a little water break?"

You pfft at him. "Who needs water? It tastes like shit."

"I'm not giving you a choice."

Before you could argue, Minho — who you hadn't noticed had left — held a bottle in front of you. Jisung gave him a thankful nod as he took it from him and opened it for you. One would say you were acting like a child as he was trying to get you to drink. Your whines and uncoherent babbles were both concerning and cute to him. The pink that had appeared on your cheeks didn't help.

"It's near 3:00 A.M." he informed to nobody in particular.

"Wow, so early!" you exclaimed.

"You're right, I think it's time we get you home."

You frowned. "Get me home? You found a way to get me home?"

He shut his eyes close for a second. "Not like that, your other home."

You pouted. "But I miss my bed."

"I know you do. Now, can you be quieter? There are people around," he whispered in your ear which tickled it.

"Ji," you giggled and he sighed in exasperation.

"Chan, Changbin," he said to his friends who were standing next to you both. "I think we should leave."

"Finally!" Changbin said with a groan. "I'll get our stuff."

"And I'll get Mina," Chan said before wincing at the sight of his lover.

The girl had found her way to a table where she had let her body fall onto. Her face was inches away from a beer someone had left behind and you could see in her eyes how she was debating internally whether she should take it or not.

The boys had no problem with taking the both of you in Changbin's car and driving back to their place. Although the two other men argued on getting you to your apartment, Changbin just wanted to go back in the comfort of his room. Not that he didn't have fun that night but he was tired as hell. As he was the designated driver, his friends didn't protest any more and they drove home.

"Are you okay with her?" Chan asked Jisung in a concerned voice as they both helped you and Mina get inside.

"Take care of her, don't worry about us. I'll just help her get in bed," he assured and Chan gave him a nod before disappearing in his own room with Mina.

You were left in his care as Changbin had no worry other than going to sleep. You weren't heavy which made the task so much easier for Jisung. Even if you were still mumbling things he couldn't understand fully, you seemed much relaxed than back at Soohee's which he took as a good sign. He carefully laid you down on his bed, making sure he placed your head properly on the pillow.

"Jisung," you mumbled.

He instantly stopped moving you around and crouched to face you. "What is it? Do you need anything?"

"What if I can't get home?"

His heart stopped for a second. He knew you had worries because you still hadn't found a way to travel back to your world but he hadn't noticed how much it actually was affecting you. He was foolishly too focused on spending time with you to notice that. It was time he showed you what he found, he thought. He couldn't be this selfish any longer, it was hurting you.

"You'll find a way, I'm sure of it."

Of course, he was. He had already found it. He was just not ready to see you go yet. Yeah, he shouldn't have gotten so attached to you. But can you blame him? You were so warm and caring to him, it didn't take long for him to like you.

"I'm not so sure, myself," you began to cry and it broke his heart.

"Don't cry, it'll happen," he shushed you softly, rubbing your shoulder.

Without thinking (well, you weren't thinking at all under the influence of alcohol), you took his arm and pulled him closer clumsily. You somehow managed to get him on the mattress and you snuggled into his chest. You could tell he didn't know how to react but you couldn't care less. You were sobbing and in need of his warmth.

"Y/N," he said in a whisper.

"The thing is, I don't even know if I want to go back anymore," you continued to cry.

He was confused about your statement. "What do you mean?"

The rubs he was giving you on your back gave you goosebumps, you didn't know if you had the energy to keep yourself from spilling anything you'd regret the next day. "I mean that I like being here with you."

His breath increased. "I am fun to be around," he joked as to ignore what he knew you were insinuating.

"As in I like you."

Here, you said it. Fatigue mixed with drinking hadn't been of help with keeping this to yourself. Heck, you didn't even admit it to yourself and here you were declaring your crush on a fictional boy. This was ridiculous. However, your sober mind was not present. You would have to worry about that later.

In the meantime, Jisung couldn't find the words to respond to this. This was what he had hoped for in a while, you feeling the same towards him. Still, he knew as much as you that this couldn't happen. But fuck, he couldn't fake it any more. Not only that but he had also drank his fair share, he wasn't fully aware of himself either. That's why he wasn't able to stop himself from speaking his mind.

"I think I like you too."

Six simple words. And yet, that was all it took for something to snap in your head. Moving to be face to face with him, you pulled him by the collar of his shirt and crashed your lips on his. He was quick to match your movements and pace making your lips move in total sync. Even if this was wrong on so many levels, there wasn't anything that felt as right as this. It was almost like you were meant to be together like this.

Jisung swiftly pushed you to be on your back while he positioned himself on top of you, giving him better access to pepper your face with small pecks. As one of his hands stood next to your head to steady himself, the other had no problem exploring your curves, moving up and down from your waist to your hips. A few squeezes here and there, and you were gasping. You wanted more. Your fingers found their way underneath his shirt and you couldn't stop yourself from touching the skin of his abdomen. Fuck, since when was he so toned?

You felt him shiver under your touch and he growled before attacking your neck, sucking on your skin. You gasped and a moan escaped your mouth. This was definitely going to be visible tomorrow.

"Make that sound again," he said in a raspy voice and it made your mind go crazy.

As he sucked once more, you moaned again and you could tell he was having the time of his life getting you to make these noises for him. In a hurry, you took the hem of his shirt and pulled it up needily. You felt his lips form a smirk against your skin. In the time of a blink, he helped you remove his shirt which now left him totally exposed to you. Your eyes widened at the sight. You didn't know he had been working out, his proportions were insane. From his tiny waist to his prominent pecs to his massive arms; he was perfect.

It didn't take long for him to get your shirt off as well. What he hadn't expected was the lack of bra. He immediately became bright red from seeing your breast on full display in front of him. Although this was a view that took his breath away, it switched something in his mind. He suddenly realized what was happening, as if he was sobering up all of the sudden.

"Y/N," he said again, his voice now shaky. "I can't do this."

You frowned. "What? Why not?"

"We're both drunk, I can't possibly take advantage of you like this."

Before he could hear your complaints, he got off of you and back on his feet next to the bed. Carefully, he brought the covers over your body and tucked you in. While you were still pouting, something about him caring that much about your well-being made your stomach flip upside down. He placed a kiss on top of your head and was about to leave the room. Only, you didn't let him.

Grabbing his finger, you looked up at him. "Stay."

And to that, he couldn't say no. So he stayed.

You would have been much better if you hadn't woken up half-naked in Jisung's bed the next day. While you thought you were in the comfort of your dorm with Mina, the scent of Jisung was all over the covers, engulfing you in another type of comfort. In a way, you were glad it was in his home that you were. On the other hand, his shirtless body laying next to you sent you into panic mode real quick. You had no recalling on what happened after the whole gang began drinking like there was no tomorrow and, frankly, you wondered if you wanted to know what happened.

You sat straight up, pulling the blankets over your chest to cover your bare skin, but an intense headache suddenly hit you. You had forgotten how hangovers were this painful. No shit you weren't going out a lot. As you winced at the pain, a few images came back to you.

The first to hit was Jisung's lips on yours. You suddenly remembered how you had pulled him into a kiss after having cried in his arms in his room. It still wasn't clear why you were sad, but one thing was for sure: you fucked up big time.

Another image that hit you was Mina in a much worse state than yours. Chan had her in his arms while her face became so pale to the point it wasn't a skin colour anymore. Where was she even? Did she make it back home.

The final memory you got back was of you removing Jisung's shirt. Well, at least you knew who between the two of you had been needier than the other. You cursed at yourself, already regretting having allowed yourself to let go this much. This guy wasn't real, for fuck's sake. In no way could you even consider the option of having feelings for him.

Well, there wasn't any feelings, technically. It was only a bit of kissing and making out, nothing more.

"Good morning," a deep and raspy voice greeted you, making you almost jump out of bed.

Jisung stretched his arms out before yawning loudly. Once he opened his eyes fully, he was met with your panicked face. That automatically got him nervous and by the way you were shamefully covering yourself, he felt like nothing good was about to happen.

"Fuck," he cursed out in a whisper before rubbing his face with both hands.

"That's one word to describe it," you huffed shyly. "Do you remember what happened?"

He lifted his head up and perked an eyebrow. "Do you remember what happened?" When he saw you hesitate, he cursed again. "Shit, I'm so sorry."

"No, no," you immediately said. "I do remember most of it. Just, not in details, if that makes sense."

His shoulders relaxed but that didn't dismiss the worry spread on his face. "So, what now?"

"Good question."

You didn't dare looking at one another, you were both too ashamed for that. As you were trying to find the right thing to say next, a loud bang was heard from the kitchen. You determined the boys must have woken up after hearing Chan nag Changbin for being clumsy. You and Jisung exchanged an awkward chuckle but that was it. You still weren't able to say anything.

"What's up, guys! Woah," Chan coughed out when seeing your physical state and he closed the door right after. "Uh, so... I made breakfast if you're hungry."

"Thanks, we'll be out in a bit."

The footsteps faded away after a few seconds which was your cue you were back to the awkward moment with Jisung. He didn't seem any more comfortable than you and you began to question if he had any regrets. Obviously, you hated yourself for what occurred last night but you couldn't regret it. It was so passionate and intimate, you hadn't felt so much lust with someone in a long time.

Jisung was the first to finally move and he walked to his closet. Shamefully, you couldn't contain yourself from looking. His back was well-defined, he was like a sculpture. There was no way his body was this perfect.

"Here," he said before throwing a hoodie your way. "I figured mine would look better on you than Jeongin's."

He didn't let you say anything back and he was out the room the second later, lazily putting a shirt on as he walked to the kitchen. You were left dumbfounded as you stared at the piece of clothing in your hands. There was a hint of teasing and jealousy in his voice, you kind of liked it. It wasn't possible for you that he had noticed Jeongin's shirt so much that he'd mention it to you. It was one way to know he might have feelings similar to yours.

After shaking your mind off these thoughts, you threw the hoodie on and went to join the boys to go eat. As soon as you stepped inside the kitchen, your gaze found Mina's. She looked much better than last night, having found her colours a little. She waved at you happily before taking another bite of her toast.

"I didn't remember you coming here with us," you commented as you sat next to Jisung (which was oddly the last free seat).

"To be honest, I don't remember a thing," she laughed. "But I do know Chan and I made up so that is what matters." She leaned to kiss him and then smiled even more. "I heard the two of you had an exciting night."

Jisung choked on his juice, coughing loudly. You chuckled a little but that didn't prevent you from blushing either.

"I'm guessing Hannie finally made a move," Changbin teased his younger friend with a nudge.

"I'd be more prone to think Y/N did," Chan added.

Your face grew redder by the second. "Can we not talk about it?"

This seemed to do the job and the others kept their mouths shut for the rest of the breakfast, only discussing about Mina and Chan's reunion. While you tried your best to take part in the conversation, your shoulder barely touching Jisung's distracted you too much. Weird, no? Only a few hours earlier, you had no shame touching him but here you were, terrified by his mere presence.

"I'll walk you home," Jisung announced once you were both back in his room.

"I can walk by myself just fine, thank you," you turned him down as you grabbed the shirt you were wearing last night along with Jeongin's hoodie.

"I'm not offering," he insisted. "I need to make sure you get there safely."

"Mina and I will walk together," you insisted back, not understanding why he was being so stubborn.

This time, he admitted defeat and dropped himself on his bed. "Text me when you get home, at least?"

"I will."

It reassured him a bit as he smiled shyly. "I'll text you for Tuesday, also."

Oh, right, Tuesday. You almost forgot about it. With a small nod, you left his room and joined Mina at the front door. She and Chan exchanged knowing looks but you ignored them. Waving bye to your friends, you both took off to get back home.

Tuesday came sooner than you had wanted to. Jisung barely texted you, only a few times to let you know where he was at with his research. Other than that, the few past days had mostly consisted of you ranting about your complicated relationship to Seungmin. The poor guy hadn't asked for anything and here he was, forced to listen to your problems. He actually did not mind, he was simply not very expressive when it came to gossiping.

"Are you sure you don't have more files to work on?" you asked him once again.

He deadpanned at you. "Stop this, you're going to go there and face him."

You whined. "I don't want to."

"You have to."

"Can't you come with me?"

"No!"

You huffed in annoyance. "Are you really my friend?"

He rolled his eyes at your question. "You're being so dramatic. What is even the problem? You like him, he likes you; it should be easy."

You bit your lower lip down. "It's more complicated than that."

"Is it?"

It was no use trying to explain to him, that would involve outing you out and you couldn't risk it. So, you sucked your sappy self up and left the office, earning you a "there you go" from Seungmin. You were supposed to meet with Jisung an hour ago but you were too much of a scaredy cat to actually get to the library and you worked some more to buy yourself time. But Seungmin was right, you couldn't put it off any longer.

You were almost shaking when you found yourself in front of the library's door. From outside, you could see him through the window. He was doing nothing more than sorting books and scanning a couple of them but the sight of him was all you needed to make your heart beat ten times faster. Taking a deep breath in, you repeated to yourself this was no big deal. You were coming to see a friend, nothing more. You finally pushed the door open and walked to the front desk. As he had told you, Minho was nowhere in sight. His back was still facing you, meaning he hadn't noticed you yet.

"Just a moment and I'm all yours," he spoke as he finished up his task.

This was a simple phrase of politeness. And yet, the idea of him being yours briefly passed through your eyes. No, this was getting out of hand. You had to stop this behaviour.

As soon as he turned around, his mouth's shape changed into an "o". "I thought you bailed on me."

You scratched the side of your arm in shame. "I had extra work to do at the office."

"No, it's all good. I just thought-" he was about to say but paused before shaking his head. "Never mind. There aren't many students today so we should be fine in terms of discretion."

You nodded as you watched him walk around the counter. Did he really have to look that good in his red shirt? He seemed to have put much more effort in his appearance than usual. Nevertheless, this was not the time to check him out. You followed his steps towards a section in the back, one you hadn't explored yet. You were quite perplexed when he stopped in front of the fairy tale section and scrunched his nose while scanning through the books.

"Fairy tales?" you scoffed. "You must be joking."

He rolled his eyes as he pulled out one book. "Let me show you first."

"Well, sorry but this is not very promising."

He sent one more glare your way and began to flip the pages. "Don't be mad, I actually found this a while ago. I was afraid you-" he restrained himself from speaking again. "That you'd judge it because it is a fairy tale."

This was not what he wanted to say originally, you could easily tell but the way he cleared his throat. Even though you wanted to insist for him to spill it, he didn't let you by shoving a page in your face. You scrutinized the words attentively as you took the book from him. It might have been a fairy tale, a work of fiction, but the story was almost identical to how you arrived in this world.

Once upon a time, a princess lived in a castle. The girl loved her castle more than you could imagine. She was living a happy life on her own with the company of the animals of the forest. Some were big, some were small, but all loved the princess very much.

One day, the princess was reading a book like she would do every night before going to bed. The only difference was how marveled she was by its story. It told the journey of a boy living in the country, trying his best to live by his late mother's wishes despite not being very wealthy. Something about this boy moved her, she felt for him.

As she was about to go back to her chambers, one missed step on the stairs caused her to lose balance. In the snap of a finger, she tripped. Only, she never really fell. Once she opened her eyes, she was in a place she had never visited before. She was in a quaint little farm where a dozen of hens were greeting her with their clucks. Confused she was but these thoughts vanished when her gaze fell on a boy. She immediately knew who he was.

"How is this relevant?" you groaned, not understanding how he even thought this was anything close to what you had experienced.

"She tripped and found a boy, just like you," he pointed out. "You can skip to the last page, that's where it shows how she came back to her palace."

The boy invited the princess for dinner. It was not much, but it was all he could afford for her. He had cooked all of the dishes by himself, something he was quite proud of. He was hoping he would be proposing to the girl. Tonight was supposed to be the most gorgeous eclipse of their era, according to the village's sorcerer. He would not miss the opportunity to make the most of it.

When the princess arrived in the backyard of his home, her heart melted at how beautiful the boy had arranged the place. It was so simple but it felt like home. A blanket had been laid next to his family's tree and, on top, he had placed the food along with the best beverage he was capable of buying.

The night was perfect. The princess had fallen in love with this place, never wanting to leave. Especially not when she had just realized how fond she had grown of her new friend. Dare to say, she was smitten. As they were watching the last seconds of the eclipse, the boy gathered all of his courage and pulled the princess closer to him. With the shadow over them, they shared their very first kiss.

What they did not know was how this would also be their last. Slowly, the girl's figure began to fade away, vanishing into thin air. The panic on the boy's face was one she had never seen before, one of great pain. She was devasted, so was he. She then understood this was her time to come home. As she forced a smile through her tears, she mumbled the only phrase she had meant to tell him all along.

You shut the book closed, not wanting to read the rest. "Really? A stupid little story is the answer to my problem?"

Jisung almost shivered from how cold your tone was. He had never meant for you to think he wasn't taking you seriously, of course he was. In a way, he did understand why it seemed idiotic of him to show you this. But he knew this was your last hope. Everything you'd tried so far was a great failure. And since the moment you told him how homesick you were at the party, he now wanted nothing more but to make you happy. Even if it meant losing you.

"She was reading a book, you were watching a movie. She tripped, you tripped. She found a boy, you found me," he went on to explain. "And, if I'm not wrong, you fell in love with me like she did."

Your breath cut short. Was it so obvious? You did everything in your power to not let it show, even more to not let it happen. Apparently, love did not work like this and couldn't be helped. This whole thing was shitty, falling in love with someone you could never be with.

"You're wrong," you mumbled. "I care about you a lot, but I wouldn't call this love," you lied — apart when you said you cared about him.

He huffed. "What would you call what happened the other night, then? Because, for me, it looked a lot like it was a confession of your feelings. Unless you'd been leading me on."

It was your turn to huff. "You think I would stoop so low as to do something like this to you?"

"If it isn't because you love me, I don't know what it is."

Unexpectedly, heavy footsteps came your way, You both turned around to see Minho walking to you, red in his eyes. You glared at Jisung since you thought Minho wasn't supposed to be here in the first place.

"If you're to argue about your little love life, can you do it outside? I can hear you from the entrance."

"I thought you weren't working today," Jisung said with a frown, ignoring what his friend had complained about.

"I don't work tomorrow, I'm taking over for the evening today."

Shit, Jisung didn't look at the work sheet properly. Despite your dark eyes still on him, he grabbed your wrist and led you outside, apologizing quickly to Minho as you walked past him. You tried to break away but he was stronger than you were, leaving you no choice but to follow him. He ignored the beeping sound caused by the book you were still holding as you hadn't officially rented it. Once out of the library, he did not stop there. Instead, he continued to walk away leaving you as clueless as ever.

Finally, you began to piece things together when you saw where he was heading to. It didn't take you more than a minute or so to reach the football field, exactly where you had started bonding only two months ago.

"Okay, can you explain to me now?" he sighed, crossing his arms on his chest.

You massaged your wrist. "First off, ouch." He only rolled his eyes which kind of hurt you somehow. "Second off, there is nothing to explain."

"Almost sleeping together after you told me you like me isn't nothing," he persisted.

"Why does it matter?" you groaned, getting annoyed. "I'm to go back to my world, it wouldn't change anything."

"For me, it would."

"Why?"

He grunted in frustration before grabbing you by the shoulders, visibly not in control of his actions anymore. "Because I love you."

You stared at him in silence, mouth agape. You couldn't comprehend fully what he said. He couldn't possibly love you. And if he really did, this entire thing had taken a whole new turn you weren't sure you could handle.

"What?" you whispered, not finding the strength in you to speak loud enough.

"I love you," he repeated, loosening his grip on you. "I've never been the best in terms of opening up and all. But with you? This has never been so easy. There is something about you, a spark. It feels homey and safe. I find extreme comfort and reassurance just by your presence. Not only that, you understand me on so many levels, I wonder if you know me better than myself at times.

"And at the party... Fuck, Y/N, it was like you got me under a spell. I always needed to have an eye on you or I thought of suffocating. Then, when we were in my room, it broke my heart when you began saying you were afraid to never be able to leave."

You almost wanted to thank him for not referring again to the physical part of the whole thing, how you had almost given yourself to him. Despite that, this whole-hearted confession of his was no longer only about mere feelings he had. He actually loved you.

"I'm sorry," you mustered the energy to say.

What were you apologizing for? Even you didn't know. For letting him love you this much, probably. You were dying to tell him you felt the same but in no way was this how things were supposed to be. Loving each other was only going to cause you great pain.

"Tell me you felt something too, please," he pleaded, eyes watery.

You could feel the lump in your throat grow when you shook your head, refusing to tell him what he wanted to hear. That was what made him let go of you as he took a few steps back. You hurt him.

"I'm sorry for reading into things that weren't there," he pettily scoffed. "Read the rest," he motioned the book. "There's an eclipse this Saturday just so you know. Find a way to get back, but don't count on me helping you in this madness anymore."

He turned on his heels and walked off in a hurry pace, obviously wanting to get as far from you as possible. You wanted to call him out, cry, scream, anything. But nothing. Your body was limp and wasn't letting you express what you were feeling. Instead, you dropped on the bench next to you with the book on your thighs.

You opened it back to read the end. Just like you had anticipated, this was only heartbreaking to come to the conclusion neither characters saw each other again. This was what you wanted to avoid, live with an void in your heart because you fell in love with the protagonist.

You did everything to prevent it. But you failed.

Saturday was dangerously coming fast and your stubborn self was refusing to reach out to Jisung. He told you to find a solution on your own, that was what you had been doing. Nevertheless, the only remaining option was him. He had to be there.

You ended up telling the truth to Mina the night after your argument. It was inevitable, your emotionless stare outed you right away the moment she saw you. You couldn't hide it from her anymore. She took it better than you thought. Not only that, you also told her about the whole movie thing. She had been nothing but supportive, not even a bit bothered that she was fictional.

"Fictional or not, what I feel is real and that's what matters," she had answered when you asked why she remained this calm.

She was a bit of a replacement for Jisung, she was fully aware of that. But when it came to trying to get you home, she insisted the fairy tale wasn't just an odd coincidence. And that was why you were staring at your phone with nothing but fear.

"If you don't tell him to meet you at the park tonight, I will," Mina threatened, growing impatient as it had been almost ten minutes since you agreed to invite Jisung.

"He'll think I'm just using him to get home," you argued.

"I guess you are, but he won't care about that. If he loves you, it'll be stronger than his free will to come to your help."

You bit on your lip and finally picked the phone up. Opening your chat with Jisung, your fingers lingered above the keyboard. You knew what to say. The issue was how were you going to word it. After one last glance at Mina, you took a deep breath and began to type.

Y/N: Hey. How have you been?

No, this sounded too weird. It was obvious he hadn't been well, it'd be stupid to start the message like this.

Y/N: Hey! I know I haven't been exactly the greatest friend to you. You are right, I keep leading you on when I fully know that what we have can't even happen. It doesn't change the fact that I never wanted to hurt you intentionally and I am so sorry for the trouble I've caused. If you are still willing to forgive me, and maybe help me, meet me at 4 at the park where we met. There are many things I still need to tell you. I hope to see you there.

Sent. And now all you had left to do was wait. Mina hugged you tight as soon as you let go of the phone. You could tell she was proud, it felt nice to know she cared this much for you.

"If he does show up, does it mean I won't see you again?" Mina asked while still hugging you.

"Most likely, yes," you breathed out. "You'll have your Y/N back."

She chuckled. "She's not like you. Sure, I miss her, but it would have been better if having the two of you was an option."

It was your turn to laugh and you pulled away from the hug. "I promise I won't tell a soul about this," she affirmed.

You smiled gratefully. "Do you mind doing me one last favour?"

"Anything," she didn't hesitate to respond.

"One last makeover?"

The grin was all the answer you needed. You spend the afternoon doing some self-care activities while exchanging and laughing. She asked you some more about your own world and you answered. You hated to admit so but you were going to miss her. You never had one close friend in particular, it was always people scattered a bit everywhere without being so close to them. It was probably a sign you needed to bond more with your own friends.

That was if Jisung showed up. There was no telling when the next eclipse would happen so the option of staying here for much longer stayed in your mind vividly.

4 o'clock was approaching and Mina was still debating whether you should go for a dress or a jumpsuit. You let her have her fun when you heard the notification sound coming from your phone. You immediately rushed to see if Jisung had replied but you were left disappointed when you saw it was only a promotional text from some random company. Your message, however, had been read. But no reply.

Mina said nothing from seeing your sad face, but she came to show you the dress she chose. You were still amazed at how she always found the perfect combination for an outfit.

"Do you want me to come with you?" she offered but you shook your head.

"I'll be fine, but thank you."

She let you get changed and once you did so, the two of you sat in silence in your shared dining room. You were intensely staring at the clock and it was killing you how time seemed to pass by so slowly. Eventually, ten minutes before 4 o'clock came and it was time to head out.

Mina couldn't help herself but cry as she hugged you close to her. "Don't forget me, yeah?"

"I could never," you reassured. "And don't forget, the other Y/N is still me in a way. You haven't lost me completely."

She sniffled as she let go of your body. "Good luck with your man."

You gave her one last warm smile and you walked out the door. You sighed heavily as you walked down the stairs. This was already a day full of emotions, you weren't sure if you were ready for what would happen next. Either you'd be heartbroken Jisung didn't come or you'd have to leave him forever after finally telling him how you truly felt.

The walk to the park was quick and you were about a minute early. You walked to one of the swings and sat there, slowly swinging your body back and forth. You were glad the weather wasn't too cold since the dress wasn't exactly the warmest thing you could have worn.

Minutes passed, maybe even an hour. There was still no sign of Jisung. You began to think it was a bad idea to ask him to meet where his mother had died but you assumed it being the spot where you appeared would be an important factor to get back to your world. Perhaps he simply didn't want to see you again. You did hurt him a lot, it would be understandable.

You weren't counting the minutes anymore when you concluded he wouldn't come. Jumping onto your feet, you were on the verge of walking back to Mina but you stopped on your tracks stiffly.

He was there.

You couldn't quite believe what you were seeing. With only a lamppost nearby to illuminate your surroundings, his face was glowing. There was obvious resentment in his face but you could tell he was not as pissed as the last time you'd seen him. He gradually approached you while you remained hard as stone, unable to move. It was a miracle you were even breathing, in all honesty.

"I guess I still help you in the end," he began, avoiding your gaze.

"I thought you wouldn't come," you said with relief and he sadly laughed.

"You could call this a payback from when you arrived an hour late."

You felt even more relieved he was feeling comfortable enough to still joke a bit. However, you couldn't take his presence for granted. There must have been a reason for him to show up despite the hurt you'd done.

"Can I sit with you?" he gestured towards the swings and you nodded.

"I don't know where to start," you nervously chuckled. "I guess I can start with apologizing."

"That'd be a good start."

You cleared your throat, feeling a tad uneasy with how bizarre the tension was. "I'm sorry for not being truthful. I wasn't honest with a lot of things, including my feelings for you."

He frowned as it clearly quirked his attention. "What didn't you tell me?"

Even if his voice was shaky, it still held so much softness, as to not put pressure on you. If this was his goal, it worked. There was no turning back now.

"I don't have the proper words to put it out easily but I'll try my best. Remember how I've told you I was watching TV when the shift happened?"

His breath hitched. "What about it?"

"It might have been a film about you."

He didn't panic or get mad. In fact, it was quite opposite. He looked relieved and happy. You searched in his face any sign of anger but there was none, which left you more confused.

"Jisung?"

He let out a breathy laugh. "I kind of figured it out, I was just wondering if I was going crazy with this theory or not."

"What- Since when?"

"I'm not sure. It's like I've always known. Same as when you told me you were from another dimension, it just made sense for some reason."

You huffed. "How come are you so chill with it?"

He looked at you as if you had asked the dumbest question. "I might be fictional where you are but, here, I'm pretty fucking real. If I'm not, then I can't explain how I have all of these complicated thoughts and emotions when it comes to you."

You could feel yourself swoon at his words. "I don't want to leave suddenly," you confessed but he shook his head.

He stood up and stopped in front of you to take yours hands and get you up as well. Face to face, you could feel him exhale on your forehead. It felt nice to have his body close to yours again, like you had longed for it without knowing.

"You know you have to go."

You finally looked up at him. "No, I can stay. I get along just fine with Mina and the amnesia lie seems to be convincing everyone."

"Y/N, you already struggled with lying to me. How can you handle putting a façade up for the rest of your life?"

You wanted to scream at him, tell him how wrong he was. Accuse him of how low he thought of you by saying this. The truth was he was right. You knew deep down your place was not here. But just one thing was stopping you.

"But I love you," you mumbled as tears began to fall on your cheeks.

Jisung was surprisingly very sereine and he wiped your tears away with his thumbs. "There, you said it," he grinned victoriously.

You shoved him slightly. "Shut up."

He laughed again and damn was he pretty when he laughed. "That's all I wanted to hear, that you loved me too."

"If you love me, why should you let me go?"

He sighed as he rubbed your cheeks gently. He wasn't going to answer, you both knew it wasn't necessary. Nonetheless, it didn't mean it didn't hurt at all. It stabbed you like a knife. You had gotten so used to being around him. How were you going to deal in a world where he didn't exist?

"Can I kiss you?" he whispered even if his mouth had already had the time to get closer to yours.

It was all you needed to kiss him yourself, standing on your tippy toes to reach his level. It was just like you remembered it; sweet, tender, passionate. It was so addicting, you didn't want to imagine how breaking it would feel like. His hands let go of you to move on your hips before he pulled you even closer.

He didn't want to let go either.

You didn't notice he was crying as well until you reached your hand up to cup his cheek. It pained you more and more, and how you still were kissing him despite getting out of breath was a proof of it.

You both pull away eventually, even if it was clear as day both of you didn't want to. Jisung kept his forehead against yours and, without speaking a word, his gaze dove in yours. He wanted to remember your eyes, get one last good look at it. Because he knew what was already occurring right before his eyes.

"I'm leaving already, aren't I?" you cried out, as if you had read his mind.

"There's an eclipse, and I kissed you."

You nodded slowly and scanned your body. "It's a strange feeling."

He watched you slowly fading away and his heart clenched. "Think of me, please," he almost begged.

"Always," you smiled weakly. "I love you."

"I lo-"

And then nothing.

A loud music woke you up. Your eyes shot wide open as you gasped for air. Taking a look around you, you stood from the ground. Everything was exactly where it had been. The first thing you went to look for was your sweet rabbit. Her nose peeking from under the couch, she wasn't hard to miss.

"Hey, baby," you cooed as you picked her up. "For you, it's been a second, but I haven't seen your cute face in months!"

You carefully placed her back in her playpen. Once she was safe and sound, you finally allowed yourself to look at the screen. It was Jisung, having a blast at Soohee's party. You forced yourself to smile as you watched him hold tight onto a girl. Even if you wanted to, you couldn't finish this movie. Not any time soon, at least. Grabbing your remote, your turned the screen off and crashed on your couch.

It had been a while since you felt yourself relax. Still, the headache you had made you question if what you had experienced was a dream or not. You did wake up because of the music coming from the television. That meant it was very possible this was only a dream.

Either way, it was over now. You had gone back to your life and now you needed to call your workplace to inform them you would be coming in tomorrow in the end.

And tomorrow came as usual. Nothing out of the ordinary; work, eating, more work, and then back home again. It felt rather underwhelming after your journey with Jisung. Somehow, you couldn't get him out of your head, not even for a second to work correctly.

You were very much distracted. Too distracted. Frustrated, you let go of the soup you were slurping and walked to your room. Sitting down at your desk, you opened your laptop and began to look up Jisung's name. You hadn't even noted down the title of the movie, his name alone should do the job.

The moment you clicked on "enter", articles and websites flooded like a river. All of them about Han Jisung. It was him for real, with his actual name next to tons of pictures. So he wasn't fictional after all. Then, who the hell was he?

You scrolled down to find a recent article which mentioned the movie itself. Opening the link, you read it all so quickly. It said Jisung was, indeed, a young artist who had the chance to collaborate with many renowned producers to make a film about his struggles. His main purpose was to reach an audience who could relate to his pain and learn to get through struggles like he did.

You weren't sure what this was referring to since you technically didn't watch the film entirely. What caught your attention, however, was the final paragraph.

The singer has begun his promotion tour where he holds conferences concerning mental health in younger generations. He hopes to spread awareness as much as he can. To see him, his next seminar is to be held in Seoul the Thursday of next week.

You checked the date this article was published and thanked the universe that it was no older than a week. That meant the conference was tonight. You didn't know if it was a good idea but you still had so many questions about everything, you felt like getting the chance to speak to him might answer a few of them.

"Looks like I'll be spending $40 tonight," you groaned to yourself before opening the sign-up page to the event.

You were lucky it wasn't starting too early and that you still had two hours before it began. It was enough time for you to wash up, get changed and hop onto a bus that transported you all the way to the other side of the city.

One would call you crazy for going all the way in for this boy who probably had no idea you existed. But the memory of him was too fresh, it bothered you. You thought it'd help you to see him in person. That was not exactly how it went.

As the crowd settled comfortably on their seats, the host greeted the audience warmly. Needless to say, you were taken aback to see the man you grew to know as Chan on stage. This was surely the actor who played him.

"Hello, everyone," he waved with a bright smile. "My name is Bang Chan and I will be your presenter tonight."

Okay, this was getting weirder and weirder. First Jisung was a real person, but Chan as well?

"As you may know, I have contributed with the production of the movie Alien: I'm so lonely. The mastermind behind this work is my dear friend, Han Jisung. But you knew that, that's why you're here. I ask of you to be patient as him and I will discuss his journey on this project. Afterwards, you may ask your questions and Jisung with happily answer them. Please, welcome Han Jisung!"

The crowd applauded as he came on stage. He looked tinier and intimidated on this big stage in front of so many people. You were starting to question yourself if this was the same man you had in mind. But as soon as he flashed his smile, your heart skipped a beat. This was him. And visibly, these feelings were as strong as they were back in the movie's world.

"I'd like to think you all came here after enjoying my movie so I'd like to start with thanking you all for your support. It means a lot," he smiled before bowing.

The two men sat down and Chan was the one to initiate the discussion. "I had the pleasure to be part of your project but there are things that are still a mystery. The entire film is based on your own experience whether it is the loss of your mother, your struggle to make a name for yourself in the music industry as well as the mental struggles you had to face. However, there is one aspect that was never part of your actual life and it is the character of Y/N."

Your body stiffened. Had you heard him right? This had to be yet another disturbing coincidence, it wouldn't be logical otherwise. The real Jisung didn't know you.

"We're getting right away into your favourite part today, aren't we?" he chuckled uncomfortably. "I had a dream long ago. It consisted of my usual day-to-day life but this girl appeared out of nowhere. We went through everything together the way we did in the movie. It was only a dream but I woke up feeling empty. She wasn't real but she was present for me more than anyone."

"Are you saying you felt more connected to an imaginary friend than to your close ones?"

"Of course not," he scoffed. "I came around the idea she was a fragment of myself that represented my strength. I'd like to think she really existed, but I can't drive myself crazy over that."

The rest of their discussion was nothing but a distant sound to you. Plenty of possibilities about what occurred were now open and, quite frankly, it was giving you a headache. You had never met Jisung in this world, but maybe his other self was still a part of him. That, or you visited his dream and not the movie.

The two men discussed some more details for another hour. After what felt like an eternity, the question period finally arrived. You had forgotten all pre-prepared interrogations you had by then. Despite that, you were determined to, at least, speak to him once. Nervously, you raised your hand while he was already responding to someone.

"So yeah, I'd say my mother was the main reason why I wanted to make this film," he concluded his answer with a nod.

Chan looked among the audience and it was almost like he recognized you. With a knowing grin, he pointed at you. "Miss with the red shirt."

The crew member walked to you to give you a microphone and it abruptly hit you how unprepared you were for this. You gulped as you shakingly brought the mic closer to your mouth.

"I had a question concerning this Y/N character."

Jisung, on his side, looked a mess the instant he heard your voice. He went closer to your side of the stage while squinting in order to take a better look at who was talking. He would recognize that voice anywhere.

"Go ahead," he finally said.

"When you said she appeared out of nowhere in your dream, what did you mean by that?"

And once and for all, he got a good glimpse of you. The actress who played you looked nothing like you. She was no match compared with your soft features. That was why she was the only character he struggled to cast — besides the fact half of the cast was his actual friends playing themselves.

"I-" he pondered for a moment. "You know what? Can you come see me after the conference? I feel like this is not something I can answer in the span of two minutes."

Surprised, you didn't let it show and nodded as you sat back down. What were the odds for him to want to talk to you one on one? Like he had requested to, you remained seated when Chan dismissed the audience.

It wasn't long after that a security member came to fetch you. He guided you all the way to a room backstage. Only from afar, you saw Jisung talk with Chan. He looked disturbed and worried. You started to think it wasn't a good timing to interrupt him. However, before you could have a say in it, the security guy pushed you inside and closed the door.

You looked at anywhere but them, rocking your body back and forth to hide the nervousness. There was a long silence before Chan sighed in a discouraged way. Without saying a thing, he walked past you and left the room.

It was only you and him.

"Is your name Y/N by any chance?" Jisung broke the ice making you look at him. His eyes were filled with hope.

"It is," you confirmed and his body immediately relaxed.

"I don't want to sound too creepy or whatever but..." he hesitated a little as he bit his upper lip. "I feel like I've seen you before."

Your breath cut short. He remembered.

"I might have a similar feeling towards you."

This made his unsure expression break into a smile, which then made you smile. It was like meeting a friend you hadn't seen in years, except you saw this same guy only hours ago. Heck, you were kissing him.

"Do you have time to go out for dinner with me?"

His question might have made you happier than you were supposed to be but you didn't care one bit, and it didn't look like he did either. After you shyly nodded a yes, he walked your way and drowned you in a hug. You didn't fight back.

"I think I forgot to tell you something," he mumbled softly against your ear.

"What is it?" you responded in the same tone.

"You left before I could finish; I love you."

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[copperbadge]

Lately, it's felt like every time I've started to work on writing, I'll just be getting into the rhythm of it when I get interrupted, either by work or the cats or because the time I'd booked in the library study room is up (you can only do two hours at a time, and only four hours a week total). It was getting to the point where I kept re-reading the same chapter or so of previous work but never managing to add to it.

So I tried an experiment this past weekend -- I found a really cheap rate on a local hotel room, and on Friday I took an overnight bag and a very old laptop with limited processing power and checked into a room about a mile from home for a quasi "staycation". I unpacked and had a quiet night on Friday, as prelude to working Saturday-Sunday. The idea was to write uninterrupted by other people, pets, the presence of all my Stuff around me at home, et cetera.

I had snacks but I also bought meals out, which was nice; I don't often order in or buy out when I'm at home. The way I set up was that I would do fifty minutes of writing with do-not-disturb engaged on my phone and then ten minutes of checking email, texts, etc. since often what pulls me out of writing is a text or an email that needs answering, or the anxiety that I'm missing one that would. If I set it so that every hour I check, well, nobody's going to die if something doesn't get answered in an hour, so the anxiety isn't there, and neither is the distraction. (I found a nice app for this, review later depending on how functional it continues to be for me, but it's a like $4 app called Forest.)

It worked pretty well -- writing for an uninterrupted hour, as long as I know what I'm working on, is very functional for me. I average about two thousand words, that way, though there is a limit to the number of hours I can put in. I ended up doing two hours in the morning and one hour in the afternoon, then switched from fiction writing to clearing out my tumblr drafts and some correspondence for the fourth hour. So it went something like

Go out and get breakfast, bring back and eat in room

Change into lounging clothes and do two one-hour sessions

Go out and get lunch, eat lunch out

Bit of a rest break back in the room

Two one-hour sessions, one of writing; when tired, switch to something that requires less creativity

Go out and get dinner, bring back and eat in room

And then in the evening the plan was to watch movies or catch up on reading, but I ended up being mentally weary, so instead I did some simple tarot reading. It was less divination or even meditation than just messing around, keeping the creativity stimulated; I did a couple of Creative Writing spreads, some very brief divination spreads (I nicked a nice three-card spread here that I mentally call He To Hecuba, and just used it in general rather than for a specific question) and then invented a spread when I was starting to get irritated that the same like, five cards kept coming up, more on this in its own post.

Sunday I did one more writing session but it was less successful, I think partly because what I was writing required a lot of research and partly because the previous day I'd dumped eight thousand words into the file. (Research took longer because I brought the most garbage laptop known to man, and the browsers crash if you try to open Google Maps, but in other ways it was ideal since there wasn't much I could do on it other than write.) But I had a good breakfast, got some rest, packed up easily enough, and headed home just ahead of the rain storm.

I don't think it's something I'll be able to do in that format especially often, since the deal I got on the hotel was an anomaly and Chicago lodging, even just AirBNB stuff, is stupid expensive. But in addition to helping get some work done it was a nice break, so I'm going to look into ways I could swing it on a perhaps monthly basis, or some other way to cheaply spend an entire day alone with decent access to a bathroom/snacks and a way to come and go easily. I've looked into coworking spaces before but they tend to be prohibitively expensive and don't really have the setup I'd prefer; there's a hostel on the north side with private rooms that I might try out but it doesn't seem significantly cheaper than a hotel. I might just have to pick one weekend a month and watch last-minute hotel price cuts where they simply want to fill a room for a day or two.

Anyway, functionally I wrote almost a fifth of a novel this weekend, and one that I wasn't feeling super on fire about; I'm feeling much better about it now that I've got some established plot going and I feel like I "know" the newer characters a bit better. (Also I'm enjoying writing Simon as someone who is absolutely entranced by his love interest and clueless that what he's feeling isn't mild antipathy because they met while fighting over ricotta.) So it was a big help, although if I were to put a budget line item in the Extribulum Press ledger for "writing staycation" it would wipe out my royalties surplus very quickly.

[joelscruff]

one thing i'm missing (joel miller x reader) PART FIVE

i'm SO appreciative of all the kind words, it all means so much to me. thank you so much for reading & here's my kofi if you'd like to leave a tip. masterlist | ao3 summary: you and joel accidentally end up falling asleep together, and what follows is the beginning of a quiet and tender relationship neither of you saw coming. rating: 18+ explicit (mdni) warnings: (for this chapter) fem!reader, smut, age difference (reader is in her mid 20s and joel in his mid 50s), unprotected p in v sex (very tender & loving), cunnilingus, pet names, soft!joel word count: 5.1k

Pulling yourself out of Joel's arms was probably the most difficult thing you'd ever had to do, but you'd been standing there kissing in the hot spring for at least twenty minutes at that point, smiling at each other between stolen pecks and tender whispers. The way he looked at you now was still the same but somehow less guarded, more open. He didn't try to hide the way his gaze darted to your lips, to your breasts, to your legs and back up again. You felt so safe in his embrace, his fingers trailing up and down your back in a steady motion as he kissed you sweetly. You never wanted the moment to end.

But it had to. Ellie was waiting back at the cabins and it wasn't wise to leave her alone for much longer. You'd obviously checked the entire resort for infected but you'd been caught off guard before; it was always better to be safe than sorry.

“We need to go back,” Joel murmured against your lips, almost like he'd read your mind, and you felt yourself pout.

“I know, but I don't want to.”

He smiled, kissing you again, hands palming your shoulder blades, “I know. I could kiss you for hours,” he groaned playfully against your mouth, “Suddenly I'm sixteen years old again.”

“Cute,” you giggled, “I bet you were adorable.”

“I was a football player,” he teased, “Got all the cheerleaders.”

“Suuure you did.”

He raised his eyebrows, “You think I'm joking? They loved me. Don't I look like a cheerleader magnet?”

You rolled your eyes, “All my cheerleading knowledge comes from Bring it On, did you ever see it?” He shook his head, “It was a movie about cheerleaders, it came out a few years before the outbreak. I remember my sister rented it and let me watch it with her.” You smiled at the memory, it was one of the more concrete things you could remember from before the world had gone to shit.

He groaned again, shutting his eyes, “Please don't remind me how old you are, I just went from sixteen to fifty-six in about five seconds,” you laughed and he shook his head, trying not to smile, “I'm serious, I really do forget that you're...” he trailed off.

“Young?” you finished for him, “I know. I'm sorry. If I could change it I would. But unless we find a time machine out here I think we're stuck the way it is.”

“I just worry,” he was suddenly serious, brow furrowed, “You know, when we tell Ellie...she might think it's weird. I mean, she sees you kind of like an older sister, doesn't she? I don't want her to think I'm being a creep or something. That's half the reason it took me so damn long to...” he gestured between the two of you, “...do this.”

You stared at him for a second and grimaced.

“What?” he asked, raising an eyebrow, “What's that face?”

“Well...um...Ellie actually knows.”

His hands dropped from you like he'd been shocked, “She what?”

--

“The whole time,” he said for about the tenth time as you walked with him down the overgrown path back to the cabins, both of you now fully dressed, “She knew the whole time.”

“I think that's a bit hyperbolic,” you patted him on the shoulder reassuringly, trying to keep up with his fast pace, “She didn't really know anything, and to be fair even I didn't really know what exactly this was between us until about an hour ago, so I mean...”

“I thought she had PTSD or something,” he gritted through his teeth, “I thought she was traumatized.”

“Turns out she's just a matchmaker.”

He rolled his eyes, “Please stop trying to make this funny, it's not funny.”

“Joel, slow down,” you grabbed his arm, “Stop.”

He huffed to himself but stopped in his tracks, spinning around to face you, “What?”

“This is a good thing,” you told him softly, trailing your fingers along his forearm soothingly, “Yes, it's surprising, yes it's kind of annoying that she never said anything, but wouldn't you rather this than the alternative?” your hand found his and squeezed it gently, thumb caressing his knuckles which now felt smoother from the soap and warm water, “She's not traumatized, she's okay.”

You watched his expression soften as you soothed him, slowly nodding at you and closing his eyes when you reached your hand up to stroke his face gently. He smiled at your touch, hand resting tenderly on your wrist as your finger traced the shape of his lips.

"Don't ruin today," you said quietly with a reassuring smile, "You just kissed me in a hot spring, let's focus on that."

He smirked, "Did a lot more than kiss you."

You bit back a laugh and started walking again, shaking your head, "You really are sixteen at heart, aren't you?"

--

Ellie had already finished her lunch by the time you both got back to the cabins. Admittedly, you would have gotten there sooner if Joel hadn't kept stopping every so often to admire you, appraise you, thumb your cheekbone and kiss you softly in the middle of the path. You weren't complaining though. You'd been waiting to see this side of Joel for so long, knew it was there somewhere beneath the surface just waiting to have a reason to come out. Turns out, that reason was you.

"How was the bath, Joel?" Ellie asked from her place at one of the picnic tables, journal open in front of her.

"Very... informative," he replied, voice a bit stiff, making direct eye contact with her.

She stared back at him in confusion, "Well that's ominous."

"I told him," you explained quietly beside him, and you watched guiltily as her jaw dropped.

"What the fuck?" she slammed her journal shut and extricated herself from the picnic table, then stomped over to you with a hellish glint in her eye, "Why would you do that?!"

"Ellie, I'm-"

"Look, I'm sorry if I crossed a line but you're the one who asked," she interrupted, face going redder and redder with every word, "I was gonna keep it to myself, I told you it was none of your business."

Your brow furrowed in response, confusion settling on your face. Joel, who obviously hadn't been there for the conversation, immediately began to defend you.

"She did the right thing," he said firmly, although his voice had become a bit more tender at Ellie's sudden surge of emotion, "I have a right to know."

"Neither of you have a right to know anything," Ellie growled, clutching her journal to her chest and backing away from the both of you, "Jesus, I may have been born after the outbreak but I thought this kinda shit was supposed to be private until the person themselves actually wants to talk about it."

Joel froze then, making a similar puzzled face as you, "Wait, what?"

You slowly began to put your hand up, lips parting, "Hold on, I think we're talking about two different things here."

Ellie's angry expression faltered, looking from Joel to you and back again in total bewilderment. She held her journal even tighter against herself and realization suddenly doused you like a bucket of cold water.

"Oh my god, Ellie, no. I didn't tell him about that," you gestured to her journal, shaking your head frantically, "I told him that you knew about us."

She froze, lips forming a small "o" as her grip loosened on her journal. The anger was gone but her skin had somehow gone even redder, "Oh."

"I'm confused," Joel said, eyebrows raised.

"And you're gonna stay that way, sorry," you winced, patting his arm carefully and trying not to feel too bad when he frowned at you, "Ellie and I, we talked about, uh, two completely different things earlier. She thought you were mad at her for...something else."

"For what?" Joel suddenly looked concerned, peering over at her again, "What else should I be mad about?"

"You actually wouldn't be mad about the other thing," you said quietly, eyeing Ellie again. Her eyes had begun to fill with tears and she was still standing there quite dejectedly, "It's just personal, girl stuff. Nothing to worry about."

"He might get mad," she suddenly said, biting on her lip and giving you a worried look, "He's old."

"Hey-" Joel began but you put your hand up again to stop him, shaking your head.

"He would never be mad about that, Ellie. Trust me," you took a few steps toward her and opened your arms a bit, "I'm not mad, am I?"

She nodded slowly, the tears fading before they'd had a chance to spill over, "That's true."

You closed the distance between the two of you and hugged her tenderly. It was the first time you'd actually shown her any physical affection; you'd been too scared to cross her boundaries before, worried it would trigger something deep within her about David. Obviously, those worries no longer existed.

She buried her face in your jacket, sniffling a bit, "This is so embarrassing," she whispered, voice muffled.

"Hey, it's okay," you whispered back, quiet enough so only she could hear you, "What you're feeling is totally normal, believe me," you pulled back a bit to look at her again, hand coming up to cup her face, "I only yelled earlier because you took me by surprise, you know that right?"

"I know," she nodded, "And I know I shouldn't have been looking at you. It's just...it's not like I'm ever gonna see another pair of boobs out here in the middle of nowhere. I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about."

You laughed, rolling your eyes, "I get it, but yeah, no more looking at me like that, okay?" you scrunched up your nose, "It's not appropriate, I'm sorry. Not because I'm a girl but because I'm an adult. But after all this is over I'm sure you'll find a girl who will actually let you look at her boobs."

Her skin, which had faded back to a gentle pink as you'd spoke, suddenly surged a bright red again, and she began to pull away from your hug, "Okay, no more boob talk please," she groaned, "This is way too awkward for me to handle."

You chuckled and released her, stepping away and turning around to see Joel still standing there with a look of pure confusion etched all over his face. You walked back over to him and gave him a pat on the shoulder fondly.

"What was that all about?" he asked both of you, "Are we fighting or not?"

"Not," Ellie responded with a small smile, "Definitely not."

--

At around one o'clock you'd already overstayed your welcome at the springs and knew you had to get back on the proverbial road again. As much as you would have loved to spend another night in the cabin with Joel, in an actual bed, you both knew that time wasn't on your side. You still had a ways to go before Salt Lake City and you all just wanted to get it over with, have all of this behind you and be able to go back to Jackson with a clear conscious.

"So since you're not actually traumatized, we could probably start traveling by road again," Joel suggested about three hours into the days' hike, giving Ellie a semi-irritated look.

"You're never gonna let this go, are you?" she replied with a groan, "Come on, I did you a favor and you know it."

Joel flushed red and you giggled quietly, walking ahead of them a bit and listening to their familiar banter. It was so natural to settle back into things, the step you and Joel had taken together not really changing anything in the grand scheme of your little trio. It was a relief to hear them laugh together, rib each other, knowing Ellie was okay and Joel was okay and that was all that mattered.

Your mind kept playing back the image of him standing in front of you a few hours ago, baring himself to you, not just his body but his soul and his heart. My girl, he'd murmured to you in the spring, don't want anybody but you, you hear me? Nobody.

You smiled to yourself; you were his now. His girl.

Ultimately you all decided to stick to the heavy cover of the woods, knowing it was better to be safe than sorry. It would take a bit longer to get to the city but at least there was a less likely chance of one - if not all - of you dying before you got there. The forest just made more sense, and with it came the promise of another cozy night under your sleeping bag with Joel. It would be different this time, and you shivered at the notion.

"So you guys are together now, right?" Ellie asked a few hours later when you'd set up camp again, sun setting as she poked at the fire the way Joel had showed her.

You looked at Joel, unsure of what to say, but to your satisfaction he gave you a soft smile and then said kindly to Ellie, "Yeah, kiddo. We are."

--

Ellie had never set up her sleeping bag as far away from you as she did that night. You and Joel both watched as she settled into it and turned to face away from you, almost completely out of your eyeline and hidden by the dark branches of the trees. You'd both protested, but she'd been stubborn in her decision.

"You deserve alone time," she'd said, addressing you both like you were children and she was the adult, speaking slowly and clearly, "I'm giving you guys a free pass to be gross, please just let me."

"This is the most awkward conversation I've ever had," Joel had grumbled, head in his hands.

"Everybody poops, Joel," she replied, purposely trying to sound wise.

You'd both looked at her in confusion.

"Everybody poops," she repeated, "And everybody has sex."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Joel had groaned, and practically kicked her away from the fire, "Go to bed."

"I'm just sayin'!" she'd called back with a grin, making her way over to her faraway sleeping spot, "I can't hear you over here!" and she was right; once she'd gotten into her sleeping bag you couldn't even hear the rustle of the fabric, let alone see what she was doing.

"God, she is so much like Sarah sometimes," Joel muttered beside you, and your eyebrows went up in surprise at his mention of her, turning to peer at him gently. He smiled crookedly at you, "She used to try to set me up on dates with her teachers."

You covered your mouth to stifle a laugh, "And how'd that work out?"

"Let's just say I'd lost my sixteen year old mojo by then," he replied with a grin, "Made Tommy go to the parent-teacher conferences so I wouldn't have to face 'em."

"Really? You were that against dating?"

He shook his head, "I wasn't against datin', just not with Sarah's much older and very married teachers."

You shrugged, "Nothing wrong with someone who's older, I think it's sexy," you wiggled your eyebrows and he rolled his eyes, tossing a pebble into the fire.

"Well, anyway, I did go on a few dates - ones that she didn't set up - but nothing panned out," he looked over at you and smiled tenderly, "Was waitin' for you, I think."

You scoffed, "Oh, now that's bullshit."

"No, sweetheart, that's flirting," he replied, and suddenly his hand was on your thigh, palm warm and flat through the denim, "Woulda thought you knew that."

Immediately your eyes fell to his hand, swallowing tightly at how large it was on your thigh, thumb gently stroking you through your jeans. You looked back up at him and involuntarily licked your lips, feeling a cascade of tingles flutter through your body when you saw him looking right at you.

"...Are we gonna have sex?" you asked bluntly, voice quiet, and the expression on his face changed from sensuality to shock as he released your leg and groaned, covering his face.

"How do you both do that?" he asked, voice muffled by his palms, "How do you just say shit without any thought?"

You covered your own mouth, trying not to giggle too loudly. He was right, you and Ellie both did have a bluntness about you, a desire to say what you felt before really thinking about it. You supposed asking him directly if you were going to have sex was probably not the sexiest thing in the world, but you were desperately out of practice.

"I'm sorry," you laughed softly, "I'm just... I'm not good at this. It's been a long time since I've...." you shook your head, "Like, I'm talking years, Joel. That long."

He gave you a smile and dropped his hands again, placing his left back on your thigh and squeezing it gently, reassuringly, "We don't have to, it's okay."

"But you want to," you replied immediately, "So do I, I'm just worried that..." your gaze scanned the tree line until you saw Ellie's still form, far away in the darkness.

"Let's just get in bed," he breathed, squeezing your thigh again, "We'll figure it out."

You felt yourself blush, starting to feel slightly self conscious as the reality of what was about to happen - because it was about to happen, you knew that - set in.

"Sleeping bag, you mean," you replied a bit breathlessly.

He cringed, "Oh. Right."

You both laughed and any tension you'd been feeling melted away in the warmth of his voice, the softness in his expression. You trusted him so much, you knew that if you asked him not to touch you he'd listen, would respect you completely. Your ears burned red as you shuffled over to the sleeping bag and thought alternatively that if you asked him to touch you, asked him to do pretty much anything to make you feel good, he'd do that too.

The safety you felt climbing underneath the sleeping bag beside him was unmatched; the last time you'd slept this way under the stars you'd still just been friends, allies, protectors. Now you were his girl, and you guessed that meant he was your guy. The thought made you smile.

You cuddled in close beside him, resting your head on his chest as he wrapped his arms around you and pressed a gentle kiss to the top of your head. There was no more hesitation, no more questioning what anything meant, you were his and he was yours. Simple. Sweet.

You laid like that for a while, both of you secretly waiting until you were sure Ellie was asleep, even though you doubted she'd be able to hear you at this distance. Still, you waited, and so did he, just holding each other and quietly enjoying each other's company.

"I want to," you eventually told him softly, burrowing yourself into him more and inhaling his scent, so much fresher after his bath in the spring, "Take it slow, though, okay? Be...be gentle."

"Of course," he murmured, kissing your head again, "I'll go as slow as you need me to, I swear. The second I do something wrong, you tell me."

The next few minutes were pure bliss on their own as you both undressed each other in the darkness, feeling for buttons and zippers and laughing breathlessly as you exposed yourselves to one another again. It was different this time, laying there getting naked instead of standing across from each other. You reveled in how strong he felt beneath you, the way his fingers trailed up and down your back like they had in the spring, pulling you closer.

"You're so beautiful," he whispered, and carefully flipped you so he was on top, his big hands gliding across your body hungrily, "Don't know how you're real."

His words made you feel so warm, so safe. Your hands came up and tangled in his hair as he leaned down to capture one of your nipples in his mouth, tongue dancing across the sensitive little bumps that trailed across the flesh. You whimpered and pulled slightly at his curls, soft and silky under your touch.

You felt one of his hands snake down your torso and cup you where you were completely bare for him, already wet and begging to feel him. His finger slipped between your soft lips, opening you up for him and rubbing circles into your clit gently. He continued to suckle at your breast, the scruff of his beard scratching against your skin in the best possible way.

He pulled back to look up at you, eyes hooded and lustful, "Feel good, sweetheart?"

"Yes," you breathed, voice breaking, "Feels so good, Joel. Need more."

He smiled at you knowingly and pressed one final kiss to your nipple, thumb tracing it lightly before he slowly began to shuffle downward beneath the sleeping bag. You watched in slight confusion before you realized where he was going, what he was doing.

"Oh, fuck," you whispered, and he looked up at you again.

"Gonna taste you, that okay?"

You nodded, cheeks flushing a bright red, "If you want to."

He chuckled like you'd said something funny and pressed a tiny kiss to your hip bone, wet and warm, "I want to, baby. I've wanted to."

You watched with your lip between your teeth as he disappeared beneath the confines of the sleeping bag. Part of you wanted to lift it up and watch, but you weren't sure you could handle that level of vulnerability, not when you were already feeling so shy. You just closed your eyes and leaned your head back, taking deep breaths and focusing on the way his lips pressed more gentle kisses back and forth along your hips, your belly, your thighs. He was so tender, so sweet, so loving, it almost made you want to cry.

When he licked a gentle stripe along your center you felt yourself involuntarily begin to fist the blanket beneath you in both hands, trying not to make too much noise as he tasted you for the first time. His breath was so hot against your pussy, his lips damp and tongue so wet as he circled the tip of it around your clit, one of his hands pressing flush against your stomach, the other snaking up to your inner thigh to hold you open. You shook in his grasp, feeling yourself drip down onto the blanket, shaking even more when he pulled back to lap up what he could from one of your thighs.

"Joel," you moaned softly, eyes still closed as you reached down and felt for his hair, tugging on it gently.

"Is this okay?" he asked quietly, waiting for your reply before he went any further.

"Yes," you whined, "More." You didn't know where this demanding version of yourself had come from but he didn't seem to be complaining, chuckling softly to himself as he leaned back in to taste you again. He sucked gently on your clit, his beard pressed firmly against your throbbing hole. You couldn't see him but you knew he was probably covered in your wetness, practically dripping in it. The thought made you tense up, stomach tightening as you felt his tongue slip from your clit to your entrance and slowly prod its way inside.

"Oh, fuck," you groaned, fingers tightening in his hair, "Right there."

Listening to your encouragement, he pushed his tongue further inside of you, nosing your clit and holding you open a bit wider. He moved his hand from your stomach and brought it down to touch your pussy, slicking up his fingers before delicately pressing one in alongside his tongue. You writhed beneath his touch, pulling his hair probably a bit harder than you'd meant to, but he didn't seem to care.

"Gonna come," you said it apologetically, slightly ashamed as your legs squeezed his head between your thighs as he continued to fuck you with his tongue and finger, nose still pressed firmly against your clit like it belonged there. He didn't say anything, didn't stop, just kept licking and sucking and fingering until you were a complete mess, whimpering out his name hopelessly in the darkness. He kept going throughout your whole orgasm, only stopping when you told him to, completely overstimulated.

"You doin' okay?" he asked you softly, crawling back out from underneath the sleeping bag. You were right; his face was glistening with your release, beard wet and shining.

You reached up and touched his wet chin, scrunching up your nose, "I'm sorry."

He looked surprised by your words, "For what?"

"You're a mess," you replied, feeling embarrassed, "And I came too early."

He shook his head with a smile, "Sweetheart, the mess is the best part."

--

He didn't want you to suck him, admitting to you with a hint of guilt in his voice that he would end up coming before getting to actually be inside you, and you made a mental note to make sure you tasted him next time. It was only fair.

Plus, you wanted to. Very badly.

You now found yourselves laying underneath the sleeping bag again, him spooning you from behind and kissing your neck as he fingered you steadily, groin pressed firmly against you. It was so different now that you were both naked, his cock sitting large and heavy against your ass while the head bobbed back and forth along your lower back, leaving your skin sticky and wet. Your eyes were closed, a stream of whines and whimpers falling from your lips as he pushed a third finger inside and fucked you slowly, whispering things in your ear that you'd only dreamt of.

"Takin' my fingers so well," he murmured, kissing your ear tenderly and pulling some of your hair back and out of your face, "Gotta get you ready for my cock, don't wanna hurt you, baby."

"I need it," you moaned, leaning back into his touch, feeling his hand reach down to cup one of your breasts, "Joel, please, I'm ready."

"Okay, sweetheart," he whispered, "Lay on your back for me."

Lying there underneath the sky as Joel situated himself above you, seeing his gorgeous body silhouetted against the shape of the moon and the twinkling of stars, you knew in that moment that this was exactly where you were supposed to be. You watched with tender fondness in your eyes as he placed his hands above you, leaned down to press a soft kiss to your cheek, and aligned himself at your entrance.

"I'm so glad you exist," you breathed, wanting him to know how you felt, wanting him to feel it the way you'd felt it that first night.

"Baby," he breathed, brow furrowing as the head of his cock slipped inside you slowly, "I don't exist without you."

You wrapped your arms around him, holding him close as he pushed himself inside inch by inch, watching your face and making sure it felt good, making sure you wanted it. You'd never wanted anything more in your life than you wanted him at that moment.

He found a rhythm easily, fucking into you slowly and steadily while he cradled your head and peppered kisses all along your skin, showing you continuously how much he wanted you. In response you held him tighter, hands pressed flush against the width of his strong back as he plunged in and out of you. Every so often he'd make sure to look directly in your eyes, give you those special smiles he reserved especially for you, and whisper to you how good it felt.

"You're so big," you whispered, voice broken and weak, "So fucking big."

"Doesn't hurt, does it?" he asked, slowing a bit and peering down at you with concern, "Don't need me to stop?"

You shook your head frantically, "No, don't stop, feels so good, Joel," you looked up at him earnestly, feeling tears prick in your eyes, "Go faster, please."

He didn't need telling twice, picking up his pace, bringing down one of his hands to thumb your clit as he fucked you, bringing you closer and closer to the edge. You dug your nails into his back, eyes shutting tightly as he pounded into you over and over.

"Where do you want me to come, sweetheart?" he groaned in your ear, breath hot against your skin, "Tell me where, quick."

"Anywhere," you whimpered, biting down hard on your lip as he rubbed your clit furiously, wanting to get you there at the same time as him, "You can come anywhere you want, please."

"Oh, fuck," he groaned, "Tell me when you're coming, wanna come with you, baby."

"I'm close" you replied almost immediately, eyes going wide as you watched him start to fall apart above you, "Oh my god, don't stop, don't stop." you gripped his wrist tightly as he pressed harder on your clit, sending you over the edge, "Right there, Joel, right there."

You felt him pull out of you as you began to shake with your orgasm, body convulsing underneath him as he aimed his cock at your breasts and painted you with his come, marking you. Your eyes rolled back in your head, his fingers still stimulating your clit over and over until you'd finished.

"Oh my god," he groaned, deep and husky, the last few aftershocks wracking through his body as he released his fingers from your clit and brought them to his cock, slicking himself up as he fisted himself a few more times, small spurts of come still pulsing out of him and onto your chest.

"Fuck," you breathed in response, throwing your arms above you and laying there panting. The stars had somehow moved from the sky and were now permanently dancing behind your lids, white and sparkling every time you closed your eyes.

Your body was heavy and warm, relaxed and satisfied. You didn't want to move. And you didn't have to, feeling Joel wipe you gently with some of the toilet paper you'd stolen from the resort, taking extra care to make sure he cleaned your thighs as well. Eyes still closed, breath becoming more and more even, you felt him swipe the tissue along your breasts, slow and gentle.

"Almost done," he murmured, ripping off another piece and pressing it to your forehead where you realized you were practically drenched with sweat. He wiped it off and stroked your hair, kissing your temple lightly before settling in beside you. He pulled you in close, his body still naked and warm, heart pounding quickly against your back.

"I love you," you whispered into the darkness.

He pulled you impossibly closer, nosing your neck and breathing you in, "I love you," he whispered, like he'd said it a thousand times before.

And maybe he had.

[otaku0411]

A GLASS OF WHISKEY PLEASE?

SUMMARY: This takes place in LA, before the movie. You’re a bartender and you two meet and it might become a regular occurrence. *MIXED POV* *18+*

_______________________________________________

It’s another Friday night shift for you. Because of the nice sunny weather and the sports games that’s going on tonight, you have a good chance at making some money. You work a a fine casual dining restaurant as a bartender. The job is enough to be comfortable but not long term. When arriving at work, you greet your coworkers and begin prepping the bar.

Finishing up, you turn the TV to the MLB channel and see that the Dodgers and Yankees were playing. You let it play in the background, not knowing what is to come and soon you started getting customers.

It’s now 9:45 p.m. and the bar is PACKED! Middle aged men watching the game while drinking their beers, and guests conversing among each other. Despite all of the noise and some inconsiderate people, you were holding up well and just trying to make it through the night.

Eventually, you get everyone situated and things started to slow down. You got one more hour til closing and you’re relieved that it’s almost over.

I’m washing the glasses in the sink when I see a man sitting at the bar. I dry my hands off and go to take his order.

“How you doing sir, what can I get you started off with?” I asked him. He look at me and gave me a small smile. I was never one to be nervous around men, especially since being a bartender I dealt with the worse in men, but his aura and demeanor did something to me that even I couldn’t put into words.

“I’m fine, can you start me off with a whiskey meat and some wings please?” He answered, still holding that grin. I nodded “ID please?” He hands me his ID KENJI SATO, never heard of him. I handed his ID back and fixed his drink. Once I gave it to him, I commented, “I wouldn’t expect you to be a whiskey kind of guy.”

His thick eyebrows rise up with my comment. “What do you mean by that.” “I mean you’re a young and seemingly fit person. I would’ve just expected like a tequila or a beer kind of guy is all I’m saying.”

He chuckled at my answer. “If I’m being honest, I do prefer my beers. But after the day I’m having, only whiskey could make me feel better.” He sips on his drink.

“Well if you ever wan to talk about my day. I would be more than happy to hear. After all, a bartender is like part therapist.” I joked at the end. For a minute it look like he was considering it, but ultimately he declined. “No I don’t want to get into it. It’s Friday and everyone should be in a good mood. Plus I don’t like making pretty women upset with my problems.” He smirked as I could feel myself getting flustered. I quickly turned away from him before he could see my face.

I continue to tend to other customers but I glance at him whenever I get the opportunity. He seems to be focused on the TVs. I admire him a little more and see how well kept and attractive he is. His black compression shirt is complimenting his physique and he run through his hair every now and again. Of course, it’s Hollywood and there’s beautiful people everywhere but as corny as it sounds he’s different.

I go back to him to check up on how’s he’s doing and offer another drink. “No thank I’m good. I’m ready for my tab please.” I print out his ticket and he asked “How much is it?” “Just $32 dollars. You just got a drink and appetizer.”

He takes out a fifty and a twenty. “Keep the rest. I had a good time. When you work if you don’t mind me asking?” I was a little taken aback from his questions. I never give out my work schedules because of creeps and stories I hear. However there’s a first time for many.

“Well I obviously work Friday night and Saturday night. If you want to see me, you’ll have to come here every night to see for yourself.” I smirked. Most guys would just say fuck you! But his guy, he smirked back and came forward to in my ears “Challenge accepted.” He whispered. “I’ll see you next week then.” He walked off but before he did, he looked back and gave me a final smile.

By the time he left, it was ready to close. As I’m cleaning up my station, my coworker comes up to me and shrieked. “OMG! YOURE SO LUCKY! YOU GOT TO SERVE KENJI SATO!!” I look at her confused not knowing what the heck she’s talking about. “Yeah, what about him?” I asked. She look at me dumbfounded “KENJI SATO! The baseball who plays for the Dodgers.” She pull up her phone and my mouth dropped when I saw who was on her screen.

How tf can I be so dumb. It all makes sense now. His Jacket, the muscle, his attractive face. I get celebrities and influencers often time, but rarely do I get athletes.Especially now that he’s going to be a regular of mine.

“Well this job just got a lot more interesting.”

_______________________________________________

A/N: HEYY YALL! Thank you so much for reading this story! It’s the first fanfics I’ve written in years😭 So if I make any mistakes, please tell me.

But I’ve been fixated on this man for a week now, which is why I’m writing this story. I hope you enjoy this story.

Also this will be a three part story. I am already halfway done with part two so it’ll be released by tomorrow🌸!

‼️‼️UPDATE: PART TWO IS OUT, ITS PINNED ON MY PAGE‼️‼️

[judgementdaysunshine]

Sleep stream

Pairing: Judgement day x Fem reader

Description: Your partners join you on your sleep stream leading to a tender moment caught by fans

Gif credits to @mxmoth

You fix up the couch as your partners come home jumping in Damian's arms while everyone else either changes, showers, or grabs food before joining you back in the living room in pajamas since it was night time all five of you piling up on the couch with snacks, drinks, dinner, and chargers. Everyone jumps at the test clip to make sure the speaker next to the table works "Okay chat that's good thank you a bit too loud" all of you joke around jumping, laughing, or questioning what the chat sends laughing when the chat sends the regular clip of Edge and Christian causing chaos throughout the years which is what someone sends to you every stream followed by a Gordon Ramsay ear rape clip of him screaming "It's raw!", "Where's the lamb sauce!", "You fucking donkey", and finally "Fuck off" soon the stream turns to chaos of being jump scared, yelping when Finn bites your hand, screaming and laughing when Dom and Rhea tickle you, and damian accidentally pulling your shorts down as you get up thankfully you were out of view of the camera but that doesn't stop your yell and the laughter between all of you that lasts for twenty minutes of the two hour, fifty minute, and seventeen second video managing to catch your breaths before all of you were cuddling and watching movies in between the clips dancing whenever certain songs would play even salsa dancing with damian when someone sent in Spanish music in followed by you and dom slow dancing to his uncle Eddie's old WCW theme song which fans record absolutely melting from the cute moment. After a few hours of laughter, yells of "What the fuck!", "Mami's always on top", "Dom's baby leave him alone", and "Y/N is our's she's our baby girl" you blush lightly as they all share a soft kiss with you before the Where is she dark knight ear rape plays you and dom laughing like little kids each of you taking a bathroom break and eating leftovers from dinner laying with your head in rhea's lap braiding damian's wavy hair before you were sandwiched between him and dom falling asleep as the last few videos played on with different reactions from the group until they look in the chat with everyone saying there were no more clips each of them lightly shaking you before damian kisses on your neck "Bebe there's no more clips stream's over" you immediately tell them to end the stream making rhea laugh as dom talks to the chat one final time all of you laughing at the clip of edge and christian again like earlier before ending the stream being carried upstairs to bed by rhea sharing snuggles and kisses before asleep molded between damian and rhea.

[kiragecko]

A few weeks ago, I flew to visit my grandma with my little brother and sister. My little brother had never been on a plane, and my sister only has once, almost a decade ago. It was an experience.

All three of us are in our 30s and neurodivergent¹. My little brother has Down’s Syndrome² and is probably autistic. He communicates mostly through echolalia³.

I suspected there might be challenges, so I tried to contact the airline before purchasing tickets. This did NOT work. The Westjet agents weren’t allowed to discuss anything with me until I had booked a flight. I was purchasing nonrefundable tickets. The website was quite clear that they could kick us from the plane if they couldn’t support our needs. And they wouldn’t tell me if they could support our needs!

I ended up calling around 8 times. Finally, after purchasing tickets and jumping through all the hoops, someone was willing to talk. They mostly said that everything was up to the people letting us on to the flight, but at least they talked to me!

My main concern was the pacing. My brother’s favourite activity is pacing in circles and repeating movie/song quotes to himself. Once we got on the plane things would be fine (we had movies for him to watch), but I was concerned that other passengers waiting to board would find this stressful. Like - that isn’t our problem, it’s their’s - but flying is hard! If there was a way for us to not add more stress, I wanted to find it!

The airline was zero help, so we did our best to prepare on our own. My uncle died the day before the trip, and that increased stress levels. My autistic sister was dealing with that, a sense of responsibility for my brother, and also anxiety about a mostly-new experience (flying).

-

And then the plane gets delayed.

By an hour, at first.

The airline said we should be there TWO HOURS early for domestic flights. Which is ridiculous. TWO HOURS??? Especially since everything before security can now be done online? But we obediently turn up two hours before the new flight time, and are immediately directed to the priority security line. Which is good. Even the short line is boring for my brother, and I can’t let him pace in the few open spaces. But ten minutes later we’re at our gate, ready to leave.

Now we just have to wait for an hour and fifty minutes!

We had hoped my brother would want to watch his first movie. But he's riled up from lines and crowds and gets right to pacing. A few people have to slow down as they pass, but he’s not hurting anyone, so I let him be.

I’m more worried about my sister, now. She lives with the aunt that found my uncle. She hasn’t slept in days, worrying about the trip. She isn’t handling the noise and crowds. So I keep an eye on my brother (at least 50% to make sure he doesn’t take some of the chocolate he keeps eyeing when he passes the gift shop), occasionally ask if he wants to watch a movie, and watch my sister slowly descend into a panic attack. Not fun. Eventually I send her to the bathroom, hoping that it will be quieter and she can calm down.

BUT! Events have happened during this time! The plane has been delayed another 15 minutes! It is explained that they have had to replace the plane with one they haven’t yet finished retrofitting. This new plane doesn’t have as much overhead baggage space. They need at least 15 pieces of carry-on luggage to be checked. If the passangers aren’t willing to do this, there will be large delays once loading starts, as people are FORCED to check their luggage. Also, there’s no first class on the new plane. Or charging ports. Or meals. Or in-flight entertainment. First class passengers can request some money back. And if anyone misses their connecting flight due to the delays, tickets to their new flights will be provided upon landing.

People start to get tired and stressed. The intercom keeps threatening them. Now it’s 30 bags that need to be checked. Delays will be even longer if this doesn’t happen!

At this point, security shows up. They ask if anyone will take responsibility for the pacing guy. I do. They show visible discomfort with the situation, and his disability. Can I make him stop pacing? I can try, but probably not. Please do that, it is bothering the other passengers. Oh? Really?? Who could have guessed that?!

My brother is NOT willing to sit down. We stand in the concourse, while I talk to him about sitting down and he makes annoyed sounds at me. I’m not about to force him. I don’t want us to get kicked out of the airport, but can they do that for something as minor as acting weird in public? Mostly, I’m worried about all our electronics, which I abandoned in the open when security showed up. I’m not sure if security will try something with my brother if I leave him to pace while I clean things up.

And now, the hero shows up. The head of security has been called, and he comes over and asks me if there’s anything my brother needs. No, there isn’t, he’s quite happy to pace. It’s everyone else that is being bothered.

“I don’t care about them. He has just as much right to this space as they do. I just want to make sure you guys have everything you need. Would he like a sensory package?”

He wouldn’t like a sensory package, but this guy’s offer of the chapel as a quiet space IS interesting. Mostly because my sister is off in sensory shut-down somewhere, and needs a quiet space. But also because I could relax a little nobody would be watching us, and I could relax if my brother had an enclosed room to pace in. (No chocolates!)

As I’m agreeing to this, my sister returns. Head of Security respectfully tries to explain the situation to her. I look at her hunched body language and tell him to just talk to me. Then I send her to pack up our stuff. He wants to Include Her. She really, really does not want to be included.

He also wants to Include my brother. It’s kind of cute. He’s overflowing with good intentions, but obviously hasn’t had a lot of chance to put them into practice yet. He’s incredibly respectful, but in ways that would work a bit better for people who are more interested in their own decision making than my brother. I’m charmed.

Another person shows up. She is introduced as the Accessibility Specialist, and we are asked if we’re okay with her support. Oh yes, I am very okay with this. After she gets caught up - and she reiterates that everyone else can suck it, my brother is allowed to inhabit this space how he wishes - we get ready to head for the chapel. But the plane is about to land. There probably isn’t enough time to transition there and then back. So instead, we all wait around and listen to our two heroes conspire.

Accessibility Specialist has had the job for a month. Or, at least, she's been PAID to do this job for a month. She's been doing it unofficially much longer. She has IDEAS. So that’s where all the unpolished We Respect Everyone energy is coming from. Head of Security is one of her co-conspirators!

In-between plotting, Accessibility Specialist asks me questions. She hears about the amount of phonecalls, and the unsatisfactory answers. The complete lack of support. The fact that I had told the airline that this exact situation was likely to happen, and then got security called on us anyways. She tells me that this information is very helpful. Her plans will benefit from specific examples.

She tells me how unsatisfactory it is to have to send people to the chapel. They're pushing for a quiet room. I agree that this would have been helpful. My brother would probably have been calmer in a quiet space, which would have helped us AND reduced the stress for others. (Also, both me and my sister would have benefited from the quiet. But I didn’t say that.)

In all the commotion, I’ve forgotten to talk to the boarding people about priority boarding. But Accessibility Specialist is on the ball! We stand off to the side, behind a rope, while the plane disembarks. (My brother starts off pacing RIGHT in the way of the disembarkment, so sneaking into the roped off area is a good idea.) We’re going to be the very first ones to board, even before the people in wheelchairs. I pray that my brother is willing to walk onto the plane – he hasn’t been willing to follow me since we got out of security.

The boarding people are on their best behaviour. They make a special trip over to us to scan our tickets. They send someone down the ramp to check on the plane’s status. We are now VIPs. And we seem to have made the Accessibility Specialist’s day. She is so SMUG as she whispers with the Head of Security!

They ask if we’re okay with them accompanying us to the plane. Sure! I’m having a great time watching their excitement. It’s changed a very difficult experience into a pleasurable one. (For me. They are thankfully respecting my sister’s desire to be ignored. She is still not having fun. And my brother is pretty done with this experience. He’s found some quotes about ‘going home’ and ‘not doing this’ to share with me.)

Finally, we get the nod. My brother calmly follows us down the ramp. We get to the plane and are asked to pause for a moment while they finish moving some storage carts around. Seems reasonable to me, but Accessibility Specialist darts forward and takes photos, documenting SOMETHING. And then we get on the plane.

-

The plane itself would have been great. My brother happily took a seat. Enjoyed looking out the windows. And was excited to watch Shrek. My sister relaxed. And I LOVE flying. But, sadly, electronics must be stowed during liftoff and landing. My brother did NOT take these unreasonable demands from me well. He eventually forgave me for the take-off misdemeanor, especially after I put on my own headphones and quoted the movie with him. But my sins at landing were too much. For half an hour after he left the airport, he kept repeating, “NO more flying!” and “Not like this!” Any comments about flying for the next day got his hackles up.

So, I won’t do that to him again. But it was a very interesting experience for me! I am glad I got to have it.

And if anyone has flown through Winnipeg’s Richardson International Airport⁴ in the last while, and wants to tell them about any good or bad accessibility experiences, I think there’s someone there that would appreciate it. I want to see what she can accomplish.

-

PS. She’s also started a program where you can practice getting ready to board a plane! You sign up and they take you through the whole experience, from signing in to walking the boarding ramp. (Or, possibily, just whichever portion is concerning you.) I wish I had thought to contact the airport itself, rather than just contacting the airline and looking at the government’s resources. Good things are happening there.

-

¹ neurodivergent – brain works in a non-typical way

² Down’s Syndrome – an intellectual disability

³ echolalia – communication by repeating/echoing things heard, either right after hearing them, or a long time later

⁴ Winnipeg is in Manitoba, Canada

[starchaserwrites]

@jegulus-microfic / february 15: poison / word count: 787

When Regulus agreed to babysit Venus (Sirius and Remus' puppy), he thought the seven days they would be out of town would go smoothly. Thinking that was his first mistake.

The thing is, Venus is very quiet most of the time... except in winter when there are thunderstorms. It's winter, and what are the odds of that happening three nights in a row? One hundred percent, apparently. To say that Regulus' apartment was ruined is an understatement. 

His second mistake was thinking he could leave Venus alone for more than an hour to go shopping. Regulus takes full responsibility for this one, as he must have seen the noise complaints from his neighbours coming when he had the idea of leaving the husky with apparent separation anxiety alone.

Completely exhausted from lack of sleep and complaints, Regulus thought he could take some time out to distract himself by watching a movie with the puppy, which of course was Hachiko. They both settled down on the couch in the living room with a large carrot for Venus and a chocolate bar for him, and Regulus clicked play on the film. Regulus considers the eight and a half minutes he was awake an achievement. Third mistake.

One hour and fifty-two minutes later, when something warm licking his hand wakes him up, panic overcomes the youngest Black. Venus seems more energetic than ever, the carrot is intact except for a few bites, and there is no trace of what was left of his chocolate bar.

Missing chocolate + Venus = POISON

It's the equation that appears in neon letters all over his brain. 

Regulus can already imagine the thousand and one ways his brother and Remus will kill him for harming their baby, so for a long minute he sits, paralysed, eyes closed, as Venus chews on the sleeve of his hoodie.

When his phone vibrates, indicating a new message, that's all he needs to react, it's a message from Sirius asking how the little furball is, and just as Regulus is about to call and tell him everything in tears, a new message pops up, causing a light bulb to go on in his head.

J. Potter: Dinner tonight?

And Regulus has never been happier that James never gives up on him, so he decides to call him.

"I wasn't expecting you to call and finally agree to a date with me, but I suppose the solemnity of the occasion deserves it, what time shall I pick you up?" is the first thing he says.

"I need help, something bad happened," the younger man says, running his hand through his now tousled hair several times. There is a noise at the other end of the line, probably caused by a sudden movement.

"Where are you?

"I'm in my flat, but James, I need your help as a professional," Regulus says hurriedly. His brother's best friend has been a vet for about three years, so he should know what to do. 

"But you don't have - oh, is it Venus?"

A few minutes after Regulus chokingly confirms "yes" and explains the situation, James arrives at his flat. As he runs some routine tests on the husky, Regulus can't help but think once again how handsome the vet looks today and how grateful he is to have him in his life.

"Are you sure she ate it? She's not showing any symptoms of chocolate ingestion, her temperature is normal, as is her heart rate, and she's not puking. Have you checked the flat?" the doe-eyed man asks as he finishes his inspection. 

The lack of response is enough for James to start scanning every corner of the living room, and when he pulls the chocolate bar of discord from behind a potted plant, Regulus swears he could kiss him, but the feeling that he's been a complete idiot the whole week he's been with Venus is greater. So when the tears of relief and frustration start to fall, he can't help but feel pathetic. 

"Hey, it's all right, okay?" the older one says, reaching over and grabbing him by the shoulders, "I know taking care of Venus can be draining, I had my fair share of her a while back too. You must be tired, let me take care of you, okay?"

And that's how they end up sitting close together on the couch (only because Venus takes up most of it, that's the only reason, really), wrapped up in a blanket and a cup of chamomile tea, watching an episode of Dr. House that Regulus has already seen about 6 times, and knowing that in a few moments, and for the first time, he'll be the one asking James out on a date.

[superiorsturgeon]

Pyrrha: Oh, I’m so excited to finally watch this movie together! “Love, More Than Likely” is supposed to be such a beautiful love story!

Jaune: *carrying popcorn and drinks into the theater* Well, it’s no “Huntsman Rises,” but you won the coin toss…

One hour and fifty-five minutes later…

Pyrrha: *swooning as credits roll* Awww! That was so adorable! 🥰

Jaune: *crying like a bitch* It’s so magical that they made it work between them…! I must follow their example! 😭

[emjiroki]

I couldn't contain myself, I had to write something for Reo. He's been plaguing me.

Nagi's stepsis! Reader x Reo (kinda enemies to lovers sort of)

Wordcount: 1k-ish

TW: Dubcon (Reo is a perv and a little selfish and a lot impulsive), explicit scenes and language, all characters over 21+, this wasn't rushed but written pretty quick cause my brain was working for once. Hope everyone enjoys 💕 likes, reblogs, and comments always appreciated.

Reo always acted like he hated you, couldn't stand that you were even on the planet, despite being the one to insist on staying at Nagi's place. Where he knew you would be. Nagi's pretty stepsister who, Reo claims, is the bane of his existence; always arguing with him and being pouty like the spoiled brat you were.Nagi had explained to him on the ride over that you were just staying with him for a bit as you finished up the last semester of university before you moved into an apartment with one of your friends; But how was he supposed to keep up the facade and act like he wanted nothing to do with you when you were flouncing around his best friends house every time he showed up, with your glossy lips and gorgeous eyes that begged him to fuck your throat till tears were spilling from them. He'd never admit it to anyone but his favorite piece of material in his spank bank was a picture of you at your birthday dinner last month, wearing the tight houndstooth pattern skirt he had bought for you and and looking absolutely gorgeous in it. Had he handed you the gift bag and barely uttered a happy birthday before heading off to the gym with Nagi? sure but it didn't mean he liked you. Just... begrudgingly tolerated you. Despite stroking his cock till it was nearly raw every night to thought of fucking you full of his cum and make you his girl.

○●○●

Reo had been trying and failing for the last hour to concentrate on the game him and Nagi were playing online with Yoichi and Hayoma; but the only thing in his mind was you and that whiney voice of yours. Bratty. Pleading with "Shiro-ni" to let you have the big tv in the living room to watch one of your dumb movies, despite having a perfectly good fifty inch flatscreen in the guest room you were staying in to use. Reo couldn't help the way his dick had jumped at your begging, his breath stuttering as all the blood in his brain rushed south. He wanted you whiney and begging for him, tone dripping with lust and brain full of nothing but him.

"Died again. Damn it" Nagi groaned rolling his eyes when he Chigiri taunted him over the headset, "what is up with you tonight?". It took a moment for Reo to realize Nagi was talking to him.

"Huh? Nothing, what's up with you?" He retorted, shifting uncomfortably in the beanbag as his cock throbbed and strained against his sweatpants, "been letting us get our asses kicked".

"Me? You're the one over there spacing out thinking about my sister". Reo's heart began hammering in his throat and he could feel his face heating.

"Oh god as if" He scoffed, rolling his eyes and breaking contact to look away, "She's so goddamn annoying".

"Right, I know you like her dude" Nagi said simply, getting up to switch his controller now that the battery had died before the next round.

"Whatever, Im gonna go piss I'll be back" Reo said, his jaw tight.

"Grab those chips we got at the convenience store earlier while your out there". Reo waved him off as he shut the door but he would grab them anyway. He didn't actually have to piss, he just wanted to leave the room and break the tension, Damn that white haired bastard for calling him out and being right.

Reo didn't see you when he walked out into the living room, the last twenty minutes of your movie still playing and setting the room in a bright glow. It wasn't until he got to the doorway of the kitchen that he saw you, sprawled out asleep on the couch, the throw blanket you had been using falling off onto the floor and leaving your shirt rucked up and short sleeps shorts on full display. He nearly swallowed his tongue when he realized you were wearing one of the T-shirts he had left over here, an old one from when he was in BlueLock. The sight of your soft skin with the cotton pulled up, knowing you most definitely were not wearing a bra underneath, had his blood running hot again; saliva pooling against his tongue and his cheeks burning like open flames. 'Chips, get the chips' He chided himself, turning his back and going to the cabinet to pull the bag out. But then he was in the doorway again, bag lightly gripped in his hand as he stood there a moment, just gazing at you and wondering about everything wrong with him. Everything inside him that was shuffling his feet forward to get a look under your loose shorts, just a look. He'd just pull them to the side real easy and you'd never even know. He was on his knees at the side of the couch, chip bag forgotten on the floor, feeling equal parts shame and excitement as he hooked his fingers beneath the soft material; feeling the lacy edges of your panties. You were so warm under his fingers and it made him throb to think about how wet you'd be, what you'd taste like. He bit back a groan as he let his mind wander for a moment, thinking about how sweet you would be against his tongue and how much he craved it. Craved it like a dog. He couldn't help the feelings of shame dissipating as the mental image of you spread bare and dripping for him broke the last of his restraint. It would only be a taste, just to quell the urge and allow him a little self indulgence. That wasn't wrong right?

Reo was still delicate as he moved your shorts and underwear to the side, not wanting to risk waking you by trying to take it all off, his bright purple eyes taking in every bit of skin he could see until he finally had your pretty pussy on display.

"God, angel just look at you" he murmured just below the volume of the tv, inching his face closer to your exposure until he brushed his nose against the wiry hairs at your mound. He was fulfilling every fantasy he had the moment he sucked your clit in against his tongue, running the slippery muscle up to nudged at the sensitive little bud before dipping down to taste at your entrance, your body tensing beneath his hand lightly on your hip. He couldn't get too greedy, not wanting to wake you but also so so desperate to make you cum so you'd drip against his tastebuds. He tried so hard to be gentle, delicate and light with his menstruations but the more of you he tasted, the drunker he became; vision growing hazy and his moans getting harder and harder to hold back. He was trying so hard not to buck his hips, to not cum in his pants like some inexperienced teenager, rolling and suckling your clit with his lips and tongue stimulating you so much your hips began to unconsciously chase his mouth anytime he attempted to pull away, which only drove him more crazy. You wanted him, you needed him,at least that's what his fuzzy brain was screaming. Craved him as much as he craved you for the first time and his animal brain wasn't about to let up and disappoint you. He needed you to cum for him, needed it like his lungs needed air, and any thought other than getting you to that high was irrelevant; his cock heavy and leaking through his underwear a distant thought. Drool was smearing from his lips against your puffy clit and the light rub of his teeth against your sensitivity had a breathy moan gracing his ears. Reo thought he had died and gone to heaven when he felt a hand card through his violet hair, and not that you had awoken when a desperate groan had spilled from his lips and vibrated against your pussy. He didn’t stop, trying in vain to gain his breath as his heart sat like a rock in his stomach and he was barely able to look up knowing that you would be looking at him.

"Reo?" you mumbled sleepily, pressing up against his fervent mouth even as uncertain butterflies burst through your stomach. You could practically feel the heat radiating off his face as he grunted a confirming sound, not able to tear himself away even as he gained the courage to flash his gaze up to you when you didn't push him away. The stars in his eyes were infectious, addicting in a way you weren't expecting as he looked at you; his pupils blown wide and expression pleading you not to reject him as he pressed closer to devour you and bring you to your high. You were a lot closer than you thought, the feeling of him spitting messily against your clit sending you over the edge with a cut off moan, your hand clamping over your mouth so as not to alert Nagi, your legs tensing around Reo's broad shoulders and shivers running up your spine. He eased back just as your toes uncurled, pressing soft kisses against your inner thighs and smearing your slick against your skin and across his chin. You giggled breathlessly, focusing on the feeling of his shallow breaths and the softness of his hair beneath your fingers.

"Reo, if you wanted me so bad all you had to do was say pretty please" You admitted quietly, watching as the purple haired man smirked and bit your flesh teasingly before shouldering his way past your thighs till your legs were around his waist and his lips were hovering over yours, the pussy drunk look on his face only sending heat to your core again. He kissed the corner of your lips and then your cheek before trailing down your throat to your pulse point, a shaky breath and groan fanning your skin.

"P-Pretty Please"

[jackfrombaskinrobbins]

road trip as a teenage avenger headcanons!

type of writing: headcanons / scenario

word count: 1k

request: yes / no

dynamic: avengers x teen!reader (teenage avenger series)

characters: lots ofc but i'd say big emphasis on reader (duh), harley keener, peter parker, miles morales, scott lang, clint barton, bucky barnes, sam wilson, tony stark, happy hogan, natasha romanoff, and bruce banner. more are prob in it but i don't wanna type it all out lol

a/n: y'all i think my pictures are getting more chaotic & tbh i think it's a good thing anyways requests are still open, send in an ask whenever :)

taglist: @nutellani @thecloudedmind

(fill out this form to be on my taglist!)

-----------------------✰--------------------

it was an annual tradition for the avengers to go on a road trip.

steve always said it was "team bonding". it was honestly kind of fun.

better than the other "team bonding" you did, which mainly consisted of running long distances!!

anyways, they usually would do it soon after you, harley, peter, and miles finished school (also yes im including miles now bc i love him)

tony would come over the intercom while you all were lounging around and tell you to pack your bags.

packing is always a big issue.

let's just say that SOME people are big overpackers...

COUGH scott COUGH

no offense to him but like ppl have had to sit in the trunk before because of him

and he overpacks with stuff that rly doesn’t make sense

like once y’all went to colorado

and he packed snorkeling equipment

and so you were like “scott. seriously?”

and he looked at you with such a serious face

“y/n. what if all the snow melts? then we would be underwater!! i have an extra snorkeling mask too. i was gonna give it to you, but now idk….”

HAHA

bruce overpacks too

but he overpacks in a good way

guys bruce is like the mom on vacation

well him and tony both

you’d think steve would be but he is NOT

like the man doesn’t even wear sunscreen

and then here comes bruce with a tote bag full of snacks

which tony eats half of by the way

smh

the best part of having thor on a trip is that he will ALWAYS pick you up if you’re too tired

like once he had you and peter under both his arms like footballs bc u got tired

and clint was sad bc he was tired too

he tried to get scott to pick him up but scott wasn’t ready and they both fell and they like hit their heads

that was an interesting day

ok so setting the scene again

you, peter, harley, miles, natasha and bruce were in the middle of a very competitive round of uno

like y’all

competitive doesn’t even begin to cover it

anyways you were about to get uno

FR

you put down your card and suddenly 

“HEY EVERYBODY” “SHHH you’re being too loud” “ohh sorry HEY EVERYBODY”

you started laughing at the quite obvious blunders of thor and clint in the intercom room

“thor, buddy? you don’t need to be kissing the mic when you speak, alright?”

tony, from another room, always quick with the jabs.

“AH! MY BAD STARK. HAHA! THIS MUST BE BETTER”

natasha just shook her head but you and peter, harley and miles were DYING

“ANYWAYS IT IS ROAD TRIP TIME. EVERYONE PACK UP AND BE IN THE FAMILY ROOM IN TEN MINUTES… what? MY MISTAKE. ONE HOUR. THAT’S RIGHT ONE HOUR.”

with that done, you all got up, groaning.

“uno.” natasha smirked at you, noticing that you only had one card.

“darn it!!!” you said. “well, doesn’t matter now. we have to go anyways.”

“we can always resume it later, y/n :) “ 

“fine, nat. but i’m going to win this time!! right bruce??”

“well, kid, you know i’m usually on your side, but…”

“aw, come on!!”

ok fast forward. 

you were in the family room

aw guys isn’t that cute that they call it a family room

bc ur a family

awwwwww

ok anyway

and here comes scott with his fifty bags

“relax sharpay, we’re not gonna be gone for THAT long”

guys i wanted a cool tony nickname and tbh i just remember vaguely that sharpay had like suitcases on the cover of her movie i never even watched it so i could be wrong but that was my intention

“tony, these are my essentials.”

“scott, why don’t you just shrink that down? like seriously, man.” miles remarked, and you couldn’t help but agree.

“hey, y’know what? that’s a great idea miles!!”

and so he ended up shrinking his luggage

but then he couldn’t find it

oh scott

sigh

anyways tony and happy did a lot of car assignment work

to make sure everyone would get there safely

and your car

was

drum roll please

ok also this was only for the trip there

the trip back would be different

ok the car was

tony, happy, clint and peter

tbh this was not a bad car at all

poor miles and harley were stuck with scott, bucky, sam and steve

natasha and wanda and pietro and thor were the other one

although here’s the issue

guys

fr

tony is a bad driver

but happy didn’t feel like driving

and u were just starting to drive so clint was like “NO WAY do i trust y/n in a car!!!”

that goofy clown fr

so tony was driving

oh and btw y’all were going to the compound

tony told you and you were like 

“dude, that’s not a road trip”

and he was like “we’re in the car for more than an hour. it’s a road trip, kid.”

and miles and harley kept texting like theorizing about where u were going

harley said europe

and you were like

harley

anyways ya 

so tony is like swerving and speeding everywhere 

ok maybe thats dramatic

but happy was holding the little bar

and he was like yelling at tony to slow down

meanwhile clint is just singing along to the music thats BLASTING

and u and peter are ready to accept ur deaths

like u literally texted sam a video of what was happening and he almost called happy to tell him to pull over 😭 

sam’s got ur back thats for sure!!

anyways tony pulled into a drive thru

bc he needed coffee

guys hes tony stark he needs stuff like that

and he got u and peter and clint happy meals :D

and clint was so excited like 💀 

love him

happy made sure u and peter had ur seatbelts on 

he said it was bc he didn’t want to have to explain to midtown why yall didnt come back for the next year 😭 

that and “too much paperwork”

smh

anyways tony finally got it together

u and peter decided that he just needed an acoustic song on the radio bc as soon as something more relaxing came on he was a lot better lol

the rest of the drive was pretty alright

i'm gonna do another headcanon set about the avengers actually on vacation but yeah there ya go :)

thats how the road trips work yahoo

-----------------------✰--------------------

[cursmudgeon]

Y'all need to stop looking to Hollywood hoping for it to do anything remotely interesting. I just spent a week at a film festival watching weird as shit five minute shorts from around the world with a bunch of sixty years old film professors and it was the best time I've had in a theater in years. 70% of it was garbage that made no sense but at least it was interesting garbage! At least it was trying to do something other than sell you the rotten corpse of your own childhood with a thin coat of shiny paint that's already flaking off. Marvel movies try to sell you on spectacle and a unique experience but they just turn to the same bland grey forgettable mush. I don't remember a single plot point from the last marvel movie I saw but I am never going to forget the experience of seeing two people in their fifties adlib a whole story out of other people's family photos they dug out of trash while performing a live soundtrack. It wasn't good! It was awkward and confusing, the jokes ran thin after about 30 minutes of their hour-long performance and it ended with an unhinged rant about how photography has forced us to live in "hybrid temporalities" followed by a bunch of old people hula hooping. But! I've never seen anything like it and never will again and that's what's missing from cinema now! Support weird local art and drag your friends to weird shit so you can laugh about it together.

[intermittent-showers]

Part 3: Postponed Games & Rainy Days

When the rain ruins the day's plan, Tommy and Evan still make the most of it.

Read below or on AO3

---

"So, that was Hen." Buck said, tossing his cellphone on the coffee table before taking a seat next to Tommy on the couch. "She said the game was postponed."

Tommy stretched out a bit. "Mm, not surprising. That field would be a mess if they played on it in this rain."

"Yeah, I was looking forward to going, though, and so was Denny and Mara."

"We can take them next weekend."

Buck sighed but nodded. He knew Tommy was right, but it still annoyed him that their plans had been canceled. Hen had been so relieved when Buck volunteered both him and Tommy to take the kids to the baseball game today. Karen had to work, and Hen was not a fan of the sport whatsoever.

Shaking off the disappointment, Buck got up off the couch and headed into Tommy's kitchen, deciding he'd use today to make that new recipe Maddie had told him about. He had picked up the ingredients yesterday anyway, so he might as well do something productive with his day.

Reaching up into the cabinet above the stove, Buck felt two strong arms snake around his waist. With a kiss to the side of his neck and a tender squeeze, he heard. "You okay?"

The item he was searching for was completely forgotten in that moment. "Yeah. I'm... I'm fine."

"Evan."

Sighing, Buck turned to face Tommy. "It's stupid."

"I highly doubt anything going on in that head of yours is stupid. Odd, maybe... interesting, always... but never stupid."

"Promise you won't laugh?"

"Scouts honor."

"When I was young, my parents were... uhm... distant, I guess you could say? They'd make a promise to take me and Maddie somewhere and then when the day came... well, we never went."

Tommy leaned back, taking in the almost hidden pain on his boyfriend's face. "And you think that because the baseball game was canceled, you let Denny and Mara down."

It wasn't a question, but Buck still answered. "I guess? Maybe... I mean, yeah, I do."

"This situation is completely different. You didn't cancel the game, baby. The rain did."

Buck smiled at Tommy, suddenly feeling silly for allowing his mind to berate itself. "You're right. I know you're right. Sorry, my therapist says the same thing, but I still doubt myself sometimes."

"And that's okay. It means you're normal." Tommy chuckled when he got an eye roll from the younger man. "So, what are we making?"

"We? You don't trust me in your kitchen?"

"Key point there is that it 𝘪𝘴 my kitchen."

Buck shoved Tommy away playfully. "I'm making meatloaf."

"Can I observe the cook at least?"

"You mean, can you check out my ass while I zoom around 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 kitchen?" Buck looked back at his boyfriend, who was raising an eyebrow in his direction. "Always."

"You're a menace. You know that?"

----

Half an hour later, Buck slid the meatloaf into the oven and set the timer.

"Now, it has to cook for an hour. You wanna watch a movie or something?"

Without any acknowledgment of Buck's question, Tommy linked a finger through Buck's belt loop and pulled him close. "Or something." He said, hooking two fingers under his boyfriend's chin, making sure they made direct eye contact. "I really like you in my kitchen."

Buck grinned into the kiss, sighing happily when Tommy deepened it, all the while expertly untying the straps of Buck's apron.

The kiss broke abruptly, allowing Tommy to slip the apron over Buck's head, discarding it somewhere on the floor. Then, with a growl, Tommy lifted him onto the counter, eagerly taking up refuge between Buck's legs.

"Someone's eager."

"You said we only have an hour, right?"

Buck reached down, grabbing the bottom of Tommy's shirt before helping him remove it. "Probably closer to fifty-six minutes now."

Laughing, Tommy brought their lips together once more, one hand anchoring them both to the counter as the other cradled the back of Evan's head. He shivered, feeling the warmth of Evan's hand running up his bare chest, ghosting over his nipple before continuing its descent down to the hem of his pants.

Tommy pulled away slightly, both of them gasping for air, yet both still willing to drown in one another. "Think we can beat the clock?"

One nod was all it took for Tommy to grab Evan's wrist and lead him straight into the bedroom.