#try and have me add him on facebook and tell me that he only lived right down the road

[gamingbeats]

i truly wish some days being in a fandom paid the bills

[fuck-customers]

Names changed.

Buckle the fuck in.

I have been wanting to tell anyone about this series of events at work. The story doesn't start with me, an ex-coworker who was a Lead and was the one who checked in Julius the dog for a month-long stay. It is well known that his owner Mario is a bit of an Eccentric old Queen. He thinks he's a vampire and other shit. Whatever. He's checking his dog in and mentions he's going to Colombia to find a husband and do cocaine.

Okay go off, if I were retired and lonely I'd probably do something similar. I know he's lonely because every time he comes in he starts the same conversation about how all his family is dead and he's single.

Clearly, he's a bit out there, but if I was a retired old gay like him I'd have some fun too. Whatever. The owner calls our partnered trainer for a few sessions. A few weeks go by and for the third training session, he's not answering. Really weird for him, but we chalk it up to him avoiding roaming fees.

Our trainer finishes his allotted training since he didn't answer to add more. She calls multiple times for 3 days, and she wants the extra money. This is very important.

We get a call from one of Julius's emergency contacts since s in South America saying that Julius is going to be staying for another 3 weeks, and now his stay is two months. Mario has to pay us the current total to prevent abandonment, Joe's friend gets the money wired and the stay is extended, he's using Facebook Messenger as his communication method. So it takes a whole day to do this Totally get it when I got back to my home country. I do the same with Whatsapp. This is normal, this is fine! We extended the stay.

Three weeks pass and we get another call from the same agent, Julius is staying one more night, and Mario's flight got canceled. Annoying since the dog is nasty and a pest (affectionate) but we extend the stay.

He comes in to pick up his dog the next day straight from the airport (not that far it's maybe 20 minutes away). He starts chatting with the Manager, Assistant Manager, and me. He's talking about drinks food, and hotel price. He keeps making a point about the currency exchange rate. USD to COP. So cheap to him. The Assistant and I eye each other we're both Latino so this is annoying.

Then he starts ranking about how he hired security to escort him through all the major cities of the country, Medellin, Cali, and Bogota. All with heavily armored guards.

Our computers start fucking up so the invoice has to be inserted manually, my Manager does it. This is when he starts talking about how dangerous it was in Colombia, how that's why he hired guards ( he had pictures, lots of them, lots and lots). Now I'm uncomfortable. Colombia isn't as dangerous as he's making it out to be, normal people live normal lives and tourism is huge!

By then I'm praying to Jesus and his baby daddy too, as he admits to drunk driving and running over a dog. Then he starts calling the locals whores? How everyone was pimping out their kids and everyone and their mother were forced into sex work because of poverty. Everyone was greedy and envious. I'm trying not to leap over the counter and beat the shit outta this guy.

Then he starts talking about how the main purpose of his trip was to go find a husband. He was proposed to by 2 guys, he showed us the rings (ugly as the man wearing them) and emphasized again how "they were all so fucking greedy". How everyone wanted to talk and be near him because he was popular and had money.

I try to veer the conversation away from that but he goes back to the shit load of drugs and sex he had. My Assistant manager leaves around here.

Now for the pièce de résistance.

He starts detailing how he got KIDNAPPED by a "family" (I'll sell my left kidney if they actually were a real family)

He was fucking ransomed for 7K USD and proceeded to explain that he was kept subdued with sex. This explains his mystery absence and random ass extension AND how his friend was the only one who could be contacted. As well as the obscene amount of money paid in full to extend Julius's stay. This guy is fucking loaded and he was showing it off so much that someone noticed he's as stupid as they come and kidnapped him.

Sweet baby Jesus. But it gets worse.

He shows us proof. He sent his guards away because he wanted to have sex with a 20-something-year-old. By now he's showing off pictures of all the men he had sex with. Accidentally showed us nudes while showing off the cocktails he drank. And turns out! That the family had a father and son and he had sex with both of them. He implied a threesome. I suddenly wished I didn't know English.

I leave because I will laugh, and yell. I start asking my ancestors instead for guidance but instead they laugh as I am forced to back up front.

So I get to hear how he wants to move to Colombia. Apparently, he's moving there as soon as he sells his house here. Which….no words.

I go to the back again and work on cleaning rooms. Later when I go to the kitchen my manager is there and I make a comment about him. And here's the really fucked up bit, while he was explaining that he was both terrified and in love with his experience in Colombia my manager was like "Yeah I don't think I could go and have a time like yours" He looked her up and down, a willowy, average height blond blue-eyed white women in her 20s, and said "no way you be raped so bad" My hand went to my mouth I swore loud and she just shrugged.

This guy has a coke-fried brain, my god. Anyways, the dog just stayed with us again while he was in Colombia again, and luckily, we didn't have to deal with another checkout since he had his dog shipped over to Colombia via a company. Good luck to them both, and I hope the guy who marries him leeches him out of all his money and then some.

[girldragongizzard]

Chapter 3: Joel

By the time Joel wakes up, I’ve bitten through the ballistics webbing that has bound him, and through the cable of the radio tag that was wrapped around his front left ankle. Or wrist. Whatever you want to call it.

He wouldn’t have been flexible enough to bite it himself, and he couldn’t have clawed it off without hurting himself. But my teeth and jaws made quick and easy work of it without even bruising him.

So, as he’s coming to, I’m sitting upright at a respectable distance from him and looking off to the side. Which puts one eye on him, and the other on our surroundings. Perfect relaxed standing guard pose. From his position, the burning helicopter is behind me. I may have gone out of my way to make sure of that.

And watching him wake up is a little like watching a dog come to after surgery at the vet. He’s a little goofy and a little unaware of his surroundings at first, just trying to figure out how his body works again. And he makes it to his feet before he really gets a good take of his surroundings.

And then he sees me posing with the burning helicopter behind me, and tenses up. He shakes his head a little to clear it.

Having guessed well with my encounter with Harold and Ginnie, I decide to try a similar tactic, and I drop to a loafing position and slowly close my eyes. But then, I add in the word, “Yes.”

Just, straight up, pure positivity.

He clearly decides that I’m absolutely not a threat, which is good, and he turns around this way and that, making sure no one else is around. Fortunately, the humans had managed to get completely out of sight by the time he woke up, so he doesn’t have any immediate targets to attack. But he’s obviously suspicious, because there’s the helicopter but no sign of them.

Oh, I wish I could say, “come with me,” or, “fly.” But, I’ve got to do that with body language.

I let him stomp around a bit more, and watch as he circles me to examine the helicopter.

When I call it a flaming helicopter, or say that it’s on fire, it’s probably important to visualize it right. I can expel quite a bit of burning fluid from my chest, for a creature that has the same rough weight as a large man. But I can’t exactly coat a whole helicopter in it, and I concentrated it on one spot. You know that photo of a duck that looks like its head is on fire that’s been circulating Facebook for a few years? The effect is like that.

The damage I’ve done to the chassis and rotors is by far much more evident than the flames now, especially since my biological napalm is starting to burn itself out. It’s just, I’m a fire breathing dragon, and I’m proud of that!

Joel sniffs most of the wreckage just like a dog might do. And then he sniffs the air and turns to peer northward.

“No,” I say, anticipating his intentions. “Peace.”

He yawps quite loudly in response.

I don’t give him a challenge in return. It was clear to me that he was shouting at the humans who’re somewhere north of us, and I don’t want to fight him.

Also, he can have this mountain now if he really wants it. I’m headed home.

I get up, walk past him and the helicopter, downhill a little ways but toward home, and then pause with wings partially outstretched and look back at him.

“Go. Yes,” I say, hoping that makes some kind of sense to him. But mostly, I’m just getting his attention and relying on my body language.

And then, I just take off.

I care about him, I realize. I want him to come home. I like the idea of having him live near me. He’s part of my city, and leaving him here to fend for himself is not appealing to me. Especially since I want to stick it to the assholes who dragged us out here. And I think he can be a valuable ally in fighting what’s happening back home.

But I can’t explain that to him right now. I can’t explain much of anything, even my plan on how to get home, which is simply to keep flying and to eat what we can on the way. I can’t even tell him he gets first dibs on any food.

I can only hope he follows me.

Which he does.

Not right away, though. It takes him a bit to decide what to do and what his priorities are, but he eventually takes off after me. And instead of circling to watch and be sure, I just keep going and glance over my shoulder occasionally to see what he’s doing. He doesn’t catch up, but he doesn’t fall too far behind, either.

What he can’t seem to do, after a bit, is make the same altitude as I can, and he’s not made for soaring.

I’m still really baffled that he can fly at all, honestly. His anatomy does not look flight worthy to me. But there he is, plodding along behind and below me, and I don’t bother to outpace him.

We are going to have to weave through the mountains to get home. But I think that’s going to work out OK, even if it makes us take longer. A mid morning stop at Ross Lake should be good for him, and we can rest and sun ourselves on the dam before following the river a ways.

I’m not sure about my geography, or what river that is. I just know Ross Lake, because it’s big and notable and has that dam, and we camped near it when I was a kid. I’m pretty sure the river it lets out into is going to take us south of Fairport, but it’ll be the fastest way to where better food is, and it’ll be low enough for Joel to fly along it, and we can always drink the water.

On the other hand, though, if we hit any towns or cities, we might encounter other dragons.

Shit.

“Shit,” I say.

Well, first things first. A dip in the lake and a hunt for some food for Joel.

Unfortunately, when we get there I’m considerably more discouraged, because Joel is clearly wiped out. And he ends up sunning himself on the dam before doing anything else. And this trip is going to take even longer than I’d hoped.

I circle and soar for a little bit, resting in the air, to get a good look around. I note that Harold and Ginnie’s camper is still in its spot. And so are the other campers across the lake from them. And I don’t see any other birds that I feel like I can catch and eat.

I wonder if I’ll ever get big enough to eat a deer or something like that. Part of me wants to, but part of me really doesn’t. I’m a nice size for living amongst humans, honestly. Anyway, it’s not something anyone has a lot of control over, and I’ll be as big as I get, eventually.

And then I make my way over to the dam and come in for a landing next to where Joel is resting.

The moment my feet touch the pavement, however, Joel gets up, shakes himself off, and then takes a big flapping leap out over the lake behind the dam and plunges right into it.

Well, that’s one way to get a drink, I suppose.

So, I crawl over to that edge of the dam and settle down to watch, wings outstretched in the sun to soak it up.

I can’t really see him, he goes deep and far out enough that the reflections of the sky on the murky water make it impossible to see much below the surface. But I watch for him.

If he can exert himself and hold his breath this long on that short of a rest, maybe I don’t have to worry too much about our progress after all. We’ll just have to stop frequently for five minute breathers, and maybe more food.

I wonder what he eats.

For having just fought a group of eight humans with four guns and a helicopter, it’s a quiet and lovely day, actually. And sitting here in the sun for a while is doing good for my owl, which feels like it’s finally really starting to settle and digest with those two rocks I swallowed after it.

There are whisps of cloud and the smoke column from the forest fire, and smaller birds are chattering lightly at each other, and really not much else going on. Maybe the lap and splash of water occasionally against the wall of the dam. Maybe fish jumping, but I never catch a glimpse of them and I’ve got good eyesight for that.

There’s the blue sky above me, the murky water reflecting that below me, and green tree covered mountains all around. So much green!

And I have a moment to let my mind wander and the thought of green reminds me of the experiment Chapman did with me just last week with the Pantone Color Matching booklet. And I finally pull up short about colors and really have a puzzle on my mind about them. I’m a little bamboozled that I didn't think about this before, but I’ve had so much else on my mind I guess I just didn’t pause to consider it.

There is definitely a color I see as a vibrant orange.

I see it on myself in a few places, what I’d call a flame orange, here and there. And my new purse, which Chapman gave me, is the same color.

But when I looked at my radio tag yesterday morning, and Joel’s radio tag this morning, I saw a dull, dark green, and thought, Ah yes, the human orange. I almost have a memory of glancing at a Pantone color that was marked as orange but appeared a dull green to me.

But I don’t remember noting what my own orange was labeled when I was looking at the chart. I hadn’t been startled by the differences in colors until I’d gotten to the huge swaths of greens.

So, now I’m wondering what my orange looks like to humans!

I’m so stymied and bemused by this train of thought, I totally miss the other thing I could be worrying about, which is what happened to my purse and the tablet and magical amulet that was in it.

That’s probably going to occur to me later, though. Watch out for that moment. I’m sure it will be rough.

Maybe right about when my brain is going to latch onto that problem and worry it down to the bone, though, there’s a huge splash further out as Joel surfaces, lifting his head fully into the air and working his jaw to swallow something properly.

He’s eating a fish!

Oh, that’s great! If he can take his fill of fish here, we’re probably set for the rest of the way home.

—

Joel seemed reluctant to leave the lake, but once I set out again he begrudgingly followed.

And it doesn’t take us long along the river until we find another, much smaller lake, which he dives right into.

This one also has a dam with a small community of houses and a couple industrial buildings below it, and I seem to recall that it’s called Diablo lake.

I want to keep moving because I’m concerned that there’s another dragon here.

I soar and circle to keep an eye out while Joel swims and tries to find a few more fish.

Then he suns himself on the dam for a little bit, drying off enough to fly, and then we’re off again.

And from there, I guess I just let him decide when to rest on his own. And usually I circle to rest in the sky and watch while he does that. Occasionally I join him on the ground, when I feel safe about it, and he lets me.

I can’t say we’re becoming companionable, or even comfortable with each other’s presence. But we do seem to be on the same page, with the same plan, and I’m noticing little ticks of non-verbal communication between us that seem to go smoothly and are understood well.

He twitches his ear if something bothers him, for instance. And, if either of us gets up and stretches, and then faces downstream, it’s a clear message that we’re ready to keep moving.

Also, the fact that he doesn’t rest for too long, and half the time is the one to tell us when to head out, indicates he wants to get back home as badly as I do.

I like that.

But, because we’re not great conversationalists, this is giving me a lot of time to think to myself, and my mind is turning toward what I’m planning on doing when we do get home.

I just can’t assume that destroying that chopper and stranding that team will put a stop to the campaign to relocate dragons. However that’s happening, it has to be stopped either legally, through edict from the Mayor or something like that, or by utterly destroying the means to do it. And the latter is what I want to do, emotionally speaking.

But, I’m probably going to want to check in with Chapman and Rhoda first, and let everyone know I’m home. Which means I’ll need my tablet, and…

Oh.

Yeah.

Haa that, like, been lying on the roof this whole time, discarded when I was kidnapped? Or does Equisetum Wildlife have it? Or did they throw it away?

Oh, shit. Was it on the chopper?

I didn’t see it in the chopper, but I wasn’t exactly looking for it specifically. Well, I’m sure I would have recognized my bright-orange-to-me purse, though.

My purse with my tablet, my magical amulet to disguise myself as human, and my debit card, SNAP card, and enhanced Washington state ID. I also had a change of human clothes near the access hatch of the roof.

Imagine what a person could learn from all of that if they really thought about it.

I nearly fall from the sky in rage and horror.

I definitely let out an anguished squawk.

Joel yawps back, and I knock a few times as I work to regain my composure.

But I keep going and he seems to accept that.

If I find out that my purse has gone missing, or that my tablet is destroyed from exposure or something, and that Daniel Säure is behind the dragon abductions like I think, I’m pretty sure I’m actually going to eat billionaire. I just might do it.

—

A trip that would take a family car around six to seven hours via highways and dirt roads, if the roads went far enough, takes us nearly eighteen hours to fly, and we come in over the water to Fairport well after sunset.

I fly right over Joel’s territory to get to mine, and he drops easily and wearily to his to land in Bayside Park where we last fought side by side against the Sheriff and the police.

Shortly after he lands, he lets out his loudest yawp.

I wait until I’m landing on my roof to consider returning mine, but by then our surrounding neighbors are returning their cries, in the middle of the night. So, I add mine to theirs near the end.

We don’t do the full morning circle, where we each take turns leading the call and response song. But everyone hears that we’re both back, and it feels really good.

Nothing of mine is left lying on the roof, but I’m too exhausted to care.

I led Joel out of the mountains following the Skagit river and then through farmland, between cities and towns to avoid other dragons we didn’t know as best we could. The winding flight was long, and there wasn’t much opportunity to rest for the last leg of it. I think we may have flown nearly 250 miles.

Maybe a little less. I’ll need to map it out on my tablet, if I can find it.

But I pass out pretty fast once I settle down.

—

The next morning, Joel is the first to cry out and start the dragon song of roll call instead of me.

It’s usually me.

I feel a little taken aback that he beat me to it, but not exactly insulted. I’m more just absolutely ready to make it known that we’re still here, and I start the next round.

It does make me wonder if he started the song first thing for the mornings that I was gone.

What day is it today? How long has it actually been?

I need my tablet.

I need my purse.

[corruptedplaylist]

act iii: final notes

edit: 4/9/2024: added some more stuff!!! i'll put this emoji 🫧 next to the new things so u know where to scroll.

AHHHHHHHHHHHH I FINISHED MY FIRST FULL LENGTH FIC HOLD ON LEMME JUST THROW UP IN THE CORNER REAL QUICK

i am sooooooo normal rn anyways let's get into it thank u for having me on the show, mr. kimmel. i've had a raging headache all day so the content underneath each sections will be kinda short. i'll go through and add more to it once i recover but i wanted to get this up before the week got too busy!

krolia

guys…. im so sorry for the angst….. it was necessary for the plot…….

maybe it’s just me projecting but in the actual show, i kind of wish we had seen more of the emotional fallout that occurred after krolia revealed that she was keith’s mom. because let’s be real here, there’s no way that keith’s traumatized ass would just willingly accept her back into his life. he’d have questions. he’d be in disbelief. it’s hard for him to open up to others and he carries a lot of hurt from being abandoned.

it was crucial in the course of this fic to have that confrontation between krolia and keith. it's not always going to be rainbows and sunshine, and even though they both missed each other deeply, you don't just automatically connect and forget everything that's happened. even if keith hadn't gone into the foster system, he definitely would have carried a lot of anger and hurt towards krolia when she shows back up. i'm sure that things won't just be smooth sailing and they'll need to hash things out multiple times as they rebuild their relationship but that first fight was a big hurdle to get over.

if you’re curious, i have a whooollleeee backstory for what happened with krolia and why she couldn’t get back to her kid. i couldn’t really fit it into the fic but i’ll put it right here for those who are interested:

2000: krolia in the US on student visa, first year of of PhD program

krolia meets heath and they fall in love

2003: krolia gives birth to keith

2008: krolia finishes grad school/PhD program/doctoral degree and applies for a work visa 

2009: she and heath and baby keith are living their life but krolia’s parents find out and are like girl you need to come home NOW or we will disown you 

krolia’s family are really wealthy and powerful 

krolia: i’ll come back for you guys idk how but i will 

krolia goes back to the states

2009-2011: she and heath write letters but then the letters start getting intercepted by the family and eventually peters out

krolia in arranged marriage and thinks her partner forgot about her or didn’t care

meanwhile heath doesn’t know what happened to krolia but can’t do anything about it bc she’s in a diff country and he doesn’t speak korean

2011: heath and keith move to texas for job or whatever

heath tells keith all about krolia and how she loves him but can’t be there and obvi that fucks keith up bc he misses his mom but where tf is she? how does he know she loves him if she’s not even there? he's a little kid

2013: heath dies and keith is put into the system

heath has no other family members

krolia put her english name on the birth certificate and so ofc she doesn’t exist in the US

texas social services try to reach out to krolia along with some friends but letters are intercepted

2016: someone reaches out to krolia after she finally gets facebook 

friend: thinking of you. miss you. so sorry about heath

krolia: …. what the fuck about heath?

friend: uhhhhhhhh

krolia goes on rampage to her family like wtf u mean u didn’t tell me that the father of my child is dead

cousin shows up with the intercepted letters (official notice from social services, heath’s letters and pictures, keith’s little notes and drawings)

krolia starts the process of legally and financially emancipating herself from her family (she basically was Britney’d)

2017/2018: finally is free and able to get a job in the states

starts tracking down heath (they only had a forwarding address for krolia so they’re like wtf who is this bih)

at this point, keith has already met the shiroganes and changed his name

krolia is in a different state and can only do so much 

spends the next few years trying to find him, hires P.I., again keep running into blocks bc social workers and case managers are NOT going to budge on giving up keith's personal information

2023, winter break: krolia reaches out to keith through facebook but it goes into his spam since they’re not facebook friends

allura

what better allegory for sacrificing yourself to save the universe is there than graduating college? in all fairness, i felt like sticking to the notion of allura saying goodbye and leaving the group had its merit, just y’know, i wanted to take a step down from the whole dying thing. i tried to pay homage to the canon material as much as possible while also providing my own spin on things.

one thing that’s been important to me is depicting allura as a college student. sure, while i think most iterations of allura as a kind and a great leader and intelligent are great, even in modern au fics, i just wish there had been a bit more... silliness? outside of her being like the girlboss, the hell yeah supporting character or love interest or bone-tired leader, i always wonder what she would have been like if she hadn't had to save the universe and was just trying to heal on her own terms. yeah, i nerfed her parents in this universe but i tried to showcase her doing normal college things as well, like presenting at research conferences, getting a bit messy drunk, having pizza nights and group hang outs. the funny thing about grief is that life does not stop for it, so you have to just figure things out along the way.

i also didn't want to elaborate too much on her relationship with lotor. she didn't magically heal from that one conversation with lance in chapter 8 but i wanted the readers to get a taste of what was going on in her head through their dialogue. plus, it was a little moment to show how she was allowing herself to open up to other people like lance. no one woman is an island, no matter how much of a bad b!tch you are.

🫧 also, i wanted to include it somewhere but basically, keith knew allura and romelle were hooking up since chapter 14! keith caught romelle sneaking out of allura's room early one morning and he just kept it to himself because snitches get stitches.

pidge

they are so precious to me. they're an amalgamation of 2 of my closest friends, and well, me.

i always knew that pidge was going to be a super important piece in klance development. while lance and keith are great friends, i think pidge played a crucial role in bridging them together in the beginning, before the two of them had cleared up their misunderstandings and made that truce. sure, allura asked them to be on the paintball team but pidge really forced the two of them into close quarters. lance might have extended the offer to keith to hand out without pidge or he might not have. honestly, i'm not really sure. but pidge inviting keith to hang out in chapter 4 was a quiet but big moment because both keith and lance are friends with pidge and will set aside their differences long enough to tolerate each other's presence in a shared space. pidge just has #babyofthefriendgroup privileges.

🫧 i honestly think that after the main two, pidge has undergone the most growth (physically and emotionally) throughout the fic, even though they're a supporting character. we can all benefit from community and friendship but i think pidge needed it a little bit more.

🫧 i partially wrote pidge to represent my younger self, especially when i first attended college. i was scared and alone and i had never been away from home and it was a struggle to form new relationships (and figure out my gender identity. mannnnnn fuck that). it was nice to see pidge find their place and niche among the greater social fabric of college, kind of like comforting my younger self for all the loneliness and uncertainty i endured.

hunk

i love hunk so dearly. ngl, i wanted him to have a bigger arc than he did but hopefully i did a decent job at making feel more well-rounded as a supporting character. i decided to actually kind of lean into this distance in the later chapters as well, esp from lance's pov, as they both got busier. at the end of the day, though, i knew that those two would come back together. hunk is a kind and sympathetic friend and his and lance's friendship will persevere because they're good communicators. their little talk in chapter 17 was me talking to myself and to anyone else who has went through a similar thing where they find themselves drifting a little farther from a friend.

people get busy and that's okay! there will be ebbs and flows in every relationship. even though shared history is a crucial part of a friendship but it can't be the only thing that will keep it going. you need to nurture it and tend to it in order for it to keep it alive and flourishing. hunk understands this and he and lance will be just fine after their talk. hunk is probably the most emotionally intelligent person after adam in the group, and i'm glad he was there to help both lance and keith out when they needed it.

adam

this man!!!!! got i have gotten so fucking attached to adam throughout this fic. he is so dear to me. i know in chapter 10 i wrote from adam's pov and he's a goofy guy in his twenties who's just trying to be a good dad friend but somehow he ended up being a voice of reason and comfort for klance in this fic. lance misses his family a lot and i think adam can not only relate to lance with the homesickness but also lance has started to rely on him a bit like he would with his siblings.

i wanted to try my own spin on adam and keith's relationship. i've seen fics where adam and keith hate each other, don't interact much, or adam takes on a parenting role towards keith as a kid. i wanted to look at keith and adam in the context of two people who both love shiro and then grow to be good friends/surrogate brother-in-law? idk. long story short, adam is very emotionally intelligent and i think he genuinely wanted to get to know keith outside of his connection with shiro and was patient enough to coax keith out of his shell. i tried to write in small ways adam takes care of keith like giving him LactoJoys because Keith likes the taste better than Lactaids, being there for him for his panic attack, adding food to his plate. things that won't draw too much attention, because we all know how keith is about receiving acts of kindness.

i mentioned this in a comment under one of the chapters but all of the advice adam gives keith is either advice i personally received myself or something i wish i could tell my younger self. i hope those words bring you comfort as well!

shiro

i had a lot more planned for shiro but goddammit i had no fucking time or space at this panned out. it's more so klance's story than shiro's.

look, there's a small moment in chapter 18 where shiro is very pleased (and a little surprised) that keith has talked about him with krolia. it has less to do with his faith in keith and more with how he sees himself. shiro has already acknowledged that he has heavy imposter syndrome and deals with his own struggles with self image. it's just always a jolt to your system when someone (could be your own family or your partner of years) validates your relationship.

shiro loves keith very much and just wants to be the best big brother. he has such eldest child syndrome, where he tries to pretend that everything is fine even though things are actually crumbling around him. the thing is, though, you can't build intimacy— real, lasting intimacy and depth in a relationship— without being vulnerable. shiro understands that even though he wants keith to work on opening up, he has to do the same and reciprocate the actions, or else neither of them will really get anywhere and be stuck in that loop of "are you mad at me/i feel like you're hiding something from me/i don't really know who you are."

i tried writing a bit from shiro's pov but i quickly realized that that would drastically change the tone of the fic so i had to scrap it. i might post a little oneshot in the distant future with adashi, though.

keith

🫧 i've talked about this before but although i think keith grew the most as a character in the canon show, that shit was WAY too fast and off-screen. also, i know that the whole found family trope is what drew a lot of fans to voltron in the first place (like me) but is the found family in the room with us rn? i felt like they all started to fall apart or at least weren't as close as the show wanted us to believe. it felt a lot like telling with no showing. other than some occasional moments in the show, the whole #teamasfamily felt hollow.

🫧 i wanted to build on this potential found family for keith's character. he's never had a support system before and he's used to pushing people away but now he has a whole ass friend group that's ready to fight for him if he gives the word.

🫧 initially, when i was writing keith's pov and trying to get a feel for his voice and tone, i struggled a bit. keith is one of those characters that i liked and sympathized with, but getting into his head was a whole different story. i'm more of a lance kinnie but once i got the hand of keith's voice, it was a lot easier. some of my best pieces of writing are from keith's pov! i tried to be as cognizant of keith's development as much as possible as i wrote (think me having various checkpoints for his journey whereas with lance i could just coast on vibes), and i'm pleased with how far he's come.

🫧 although both keith and lance's progress can showcased through their consciousness and thoughts (like duh ur reading from their povs), i leaned into keith's behavior as a way to portray his progress a bit more than lance. things like him being more open to physical affection, not sitting on the outskirts of group dynamics and sticking to shiro, and allowing himself to collect things, which by the way:

🫧 i like the idea of keith's room, once being so empty and ghost-like, is now full of stuff, mementos of his relationships that he's built. i tried to sprinkle in some relics from past chapters (paintball flag, polaroids, ticket stubs), as well add some new tidbits, like shiro giving him a cacti and that korean cookbook!

proud of u, keith bby <3

lance and marco

no i did not just torture lance for the sake of torturing him i would never do that to my boy.

i know this is a fanfiction, but from the start, i wanted to ground this fic in reality and breathe some life into it. lance's little arc with his brother having a substance abuse problem was loosely inspired by events in my personal life.

🫧 i'm not saying that everyone goes through something as drastic as a loved one going to rehab, but as young adults, when we leave home for uni, jobs, other opportunities, etc, there's this worry that something bad will happen while we're away. and often times it does. someone gets sick, a beloved pet passes away, it's all bound to happen. your childhood becomes a thing of the past, and things that you thought would stay the same just won't.

i projected a lot of my feelings onto lance ngl, and writing him work through his own grief and guilt over not being able to be with his family when they're going through a crisis helped me process a little bit more.

although lance had a happier ending than a lot of families might get in reality, i still wanted to show lance having a support system at college and realizing that he has a second family to lean on, and people who love and support him. he doesn't have to pretend to be okay for anyone and that's okay.

black paladin lance or as close to it as i could get

it was so important for me to make lance the new captain of their paintball team, as a stand-in for the black paladin arc he could have had in the show. he’s always been a selfless guy who puts others first and really pulls up when he needs to. he deserves to be recognized for that. not only did every single one of his friends validate him, but the person he looks up to the most literally endorsed him. lance struggles with his inferiority complex and the election scene was a little feel good moment for me, personally, so that he could receive the acknowledgement he deserves, especially with his growth. he's gonna be an awesome team captain (he'll be shuffling down to shiro's room at 2am covered in hickeys and talking about paintball strategies).

wrapping up loose ends

i tried to wrap up as many loose ends as possible and give all the characters a proper send-off. originally i wanted lance and hunk to also move into the house in castle street, like repurpose the basement or something but i realized that that just wasn’t possible because most college basements don’t even have heating or like,,,, a livable arrangement.

ultimately, i think it makes sense for pidge to be the one to take up allura’s room at the house. pidge has lived a single during the academic year but they also had lance and hunk right fifty feet away so it’s not like they REALLY lived alone that year. there was also the logistics of the house having a vacant room, and as much as i would have loved to have all of voltron under the same roof (hunk and pidge sharing a room, keith and lance sharing a room), i think they would kill each other. pidge filling in the gap felt like the right move. and lance and hunk are gonna be over a lot anyways, so it’s not like much has changed in the trio's group dynamic.

🫧 what was your favorite chapter to write?

i think i have different chapters in mind for different reasons, even if it's a copout answer. here are the chapters that are dearest to me:

chapter 4: recalibration this is the chapter where i really got to play around with character interactions. keith and lance's worlds were beginning to integrate in chapter 3 but in this chapter, i got to explore different friendships, like keith & pidge and lance & hunk, and the dynamics they entailed. you can see how important these friendships are to both lance and keith, and how their connection with others eventually helps them to reflect on their previous feelings toward each other, like "hmm maybe i've been too harsh with the other."

chapter 10: let's go to the beach the group dynamics were so solidified to this point, and it was so fun to write. i loved writing from adam's pov and being able to zoom out and showcase klance's relationship progression.

the winter break interludes i waxed poetic about these in a previous faq but to reiterate: i'm really pleased with the way each individual chapter turned out. i love a good character study, and it was a great challenge to my writing and characterization to dig deeper into their home lives and see how the past confronted the present, where their respective childhoods were brought into the light, and how long-held notions of belonging, home, and identity were challenged and remolded.

chapter 17: warm and light my beta reader drunkenguac said that this was some of my best writing and i've been coasting off of that validation for the past 4 months. keith's reunion with his mother was especially cathartic for me. as an adoptee, writing this chapter honestly helped me work through some of my feelings about my adoption as i pictured what it would look like if i was ever reunited with my birth mother. i'm very fortunate that i didn't have to go through the same experiences keith did, but i tried to imbue as much humanness as possible into his section.

chapter 18: moving on it just felt like a proper send-off, the one that we never got from s8 of voltron. i wanted the last chapter to basically have this vibe of "hey, things won't be the same but it's going to be okay because we have each other." when shiro tells matt in the end, "we'll still be here," that's me as the author, telling you, the reader, that this fic will still be here whenever you want to revisit it. it was a comfort to write and i've heard that it's a comfort to read, which is so so so gratifying. when i set out to write this fic in august of 2023, i didn't have any plans of grandeur or even expect like more than 100 people read it— it was just a passion project that i decided to share, and i'm glad that others have sought safety in it. outside of fandom, this fic is a love letter to my own college experience. i remember reading a college au fic when i was still in high school and lonely and closeted and repressed and wondering if i would ever be able to get out of my hometown and find a community as tightly-knit as the fic portrayed it. in a way, i got to reflect on my college experience by writing looking out for you. i find solace in this fic when i read back over it, and i can see aspects of my adventures throughout my freshman and sophomore and junior and senior years, waving from behind a thinly veiled curtain. this fic is dedicated to all the people who made my college experience.

anyways that's me rambling for now! thank you again to everyone who has tuned into looking out for you. this is the first piece of creative writing i've done in a long time, and i never expected to actually finish it. i'm so happy with the way it turned out and the love it's received. until next time!

[thislovintime]

Peter Tork with the Fairfax Street Choir (in their bass vocal section); pictured in photo 1 with Ralph Pennuneri, Hosanna Bauer, and Bill Craig. Via the Fairfax Street Choir Facebook page, except for photo 4 (courtesy of Mark Kleiner).

Photo 2: “Peter Tork has his banjo but never played it with the choir that I remember but He was a really good musician and I remember him playing at the Lady. [...] I've heard some of his live stuff on tape that he did at the Sleeping Lady and was blown away by how great he really was as a musician.” - Marla Hunt Hanson, Facebook, January 3, 2021

“Peter showed me some banjo picking patterns... he was a nice guy fun to play music with.” - David Carlson, Facebook, January 2021

“To us, he wasn’t famous, he was just Peter. [...] He was just a sweet, dear man that, you know, everybody loved... He was just a good guy. You know, ‘Sleep on the couch, have a good one. You know, we love you. Come on in.’ [...] His destiny in this lifetime was with The Monkees. We were like his backup friends, or his backup band, whatever you want to call it.He came to us wounded, like a wounded bird, really. […] He never really got to escape from being one of The Monkees. It was very hard, you know, it was hard for him. I wish we could have given him more. [...] I said to him, ‘Well, why are you going back when they treated you so badly, and blah blah blah?’ And he said, they offered him something he couldn’t turn down, something like that, so it had to do with money of course, because… so, yeah, he went back, poor thing. God bless him. [...] [W]hen you’re a Monkee, the fans will come out of, you know, somehow they’ll seep in through the furnace floor or a little crack in the window. You’re always on display, you’re always having someone looking at you or tagging at you or pulling at you or saying, ‘God, I remember that episode…’You know, and you’re always having to be on the stage or on— in gear, or answering with a smile to your fan group, whatever that is. You’re trained to do that through the industry itself. You know, anyway, I don’t want to go that far. In this group consciousness that he was a part of for a short period of time, he didn’t have to do that. He just didn’t have to do that. And that’s why I think that was — he’ll never forget that group or the Sleeping Lady however many lifetimes he lives. And I’ll tell you this, he was happy in a very strange way for as long as he was there with us. He was happy in a different way, not in the way that you are when you’re famous. In the way you are when you’re happy. [...] Someone like Peter Tork, who shines a light out onto this world, can only shine as brightly as we allow them to. […] When you see a flame, move back and let it shine, don’t go in there and try to get it, because the reason that it’s alive is because it’s got oxygen, air, and there’s not a lot of moths hanging out around it trying to, you know, take its life. I think a lot of that is true about Peter. That’s how — what I think.” - Marla Hunt Hanson, interview with the Nesmith Tork Goffin & King podcast, February 2020

"Back in Marin. Peter Tork began to hang out at the Sleeping Lady. (He works there as a waiter now). One night The Fairfax Street Choir was there. He was amazed, saw a home, and joined. He grins as he adds: ‘In some ways I was a cold, lonely hitchhiker being picked up by a warm school bus.’ [...] He’s happy. Content. And hopeful. For the Choir. And himself." - San Diego Reader, December 6, 1973 (originally published in the Chicago Reader; interview conducted by Chuck Stepner) (read more here)

“What a group! 35 voices strong; some harmonies! It was something, very encouraging, very comforting.” - Peter Tork, Goldmine, May 1982 (x)

Peter Tork: "As soon as The Monkees was over, I went to Marin County to try to recapture some of my Greenwich-Village-days happiness, and I did. I was very, I was very lucky, there was a lovely scene in Fairfax, Marin County, and I had a great time up there for a couple of years, worked as a waiter in a cooperative restaurant and it was great, it was actually great. The thing about The Monkees, it was so difficult, was to be yanked out of — off the street, flung to the pinnacle and then, you know, and then dropped.” Q: “Yeah.” PT: “So, so I went back to the street, where I’d, you know, gotten my roots together. It was great.” - GOLD 104.5, 1999 (x)

[fallevs]

It's been a long time since we played an interactive game... (although I did tag you on picrew art one)

If you would only like to play this

Pure ask

No 7,14,35 ✨️

You are absolutely right, Annie! I had been tagged along with you and responded to the original post forgetting to thank you for your tag as well (don't hate me, please 😭)

Thank you for wanting me to play, I will respond very gladly!

7 – Dream place to live?

The dream of leaving this country is slowly fading for various reasons. I used to dream of US, then Scotland, then simply getting out of my small town and going to the city. If I could just pack my bags and leave, I would say... yes, maybe Scotland. It is currently at the top of the list of places I want to visit, and who knows, maybe someday?

14 – What high school stereotype were/are you?

(I hope I understood the question!?)

I attended an art high school. Here in Italy the stereotype for those who attend an art school is to automatically be a stoner and a slacker lmao. Just think that I have never smoked a joint in my life, despite my classmates rolling them in class with the professor present, and I have always studied hard! Add to that the fact that I stayed in school until the evening twice a week to do lab hours.

I was never anything in particular anyway, I think? I dyed my hair, praised painters on Facebook, smoked (normal) cigarettes in the yard without being seen and drew a lot, but I didn't do anything "special"

35 – Is love something that scares you?

It was... when I was a teenager I didn't get along with myself (not that I'm my own best friend now, but I certainly care for myself a little more) and as a result I thought I would never find anyone who appreciated me. At 17 I met the one who to this day is my partner. We talked in such a simple, normal way that I thought "wow, I think I want to be with you all my life," but when I told him about my feelings, he (politely) rejected me. And I moved on. At 20, we found each other again, me with other awareness and him as well. We decided to give it a try and in a month we celebrate seven years of relationship. He is the best person I could have wished for. Never critical and judgmental. Always attentive to my moods and needs. He supports me, spurs me on and helps me reason without ever telling me I'm wrong or belittling me. He is a living green flag hahah

[becomingkatie]

(this post ended up way longer than I'd planned. It's about mental and physical illness and family things.)

Yesterday my dad EMAILED my brother a picture of his truck in a ditch on the side of the road as the way of letting us know he'd been in a car accident. So Andrew forwarded me the email and we were both trying to call him but he wasn't answering. We were trying to decide how big of an overreaction it would be to just start calling hospitals, but the accident didn't look bad, but like... he wasn't answering his phone??

Except, my dad has also been rejecting my calls for a while because he feels like I've taken my mom's side in the divorce (because I won't listen to him vent about their relationship or divorce negotiations). So it wasn't clear if he wasn't answering because he was hurt, or if he was busy dealing with a tow truck and the logistics that come with a car accident, or if he just didn't want to talk to me. He doesn't seem to feel like my brother has abandoned him and he's accepted Andrew's calls more than mine, but he wasn't answering him, either. So we were panicking.

Eventually he called my brother to tell him he was fine, that the truck was being towed, and that was that. No more information.

But then he called me this morning. He was kind - it wasn't the awful, tense calls filled with accusations and vitriol where I have to repeat "I'm not going to talk about this" a half-dozen times. But he's not well. Like, "vomits in the house without warning but doesn't have the strength or energy to clean it up" unwell. Bed-bound, at least today. But when I said I was coming to help take care of him he vehemently refused the offer and cried that he didn't want me to see him like this.

He has a "friend" (girlfriend? friend from high school? how did she get roped into this I have no idea, since she lives like six hours from him) who comes to help him every so often, but she's not coming again for another almost two weeks.

I'm just at a loss. At what point do you say, "I know you don't want me to see you living in filth, but you can't live in filth, so I'm here and I'm going to clean you up and help you."

There's no way he'd let a home care nurse into the house. His delusions mix with reality and he can turn mean and nasty on a dime, so I also don't really want to put myself in that position. But I also love him and can't just let him exist in that state alone, or nearly alone.

As the older sister, I messaged my grandmother on facebook (that's the only way we communicate, and we rarely communicate at all) to let her know about the accident and his poor health. She's panicking wondering what to do, but like... you're his mom? I'm panicking wondering what to do, but it feels like I shouldn't have to be advising her. I don't want us to ambush him and show up, but I also couldn't let her just go on not knowing about this. But it turns out he was just there a week ago and seemed fine?? Which further adds to the confusion around what his condition is and how long it's been this bad.

Anyway, you can have a totally normal and healthy father for nearly thirty years (or be married to a normal and healthy man for 35 years) and then suddenly he's awful and mean and abusive and accusing you of poisoning him, and then suddenly he's sick, puking and shitting and can't clean himself up.

So that's my family tragedy right now. I got "comfort nigiri" yesterday and goodness knows I'm making Ken agree to "comfort pizza" tonight. I have my weekly write-in that I host so unfortunately I have to go out into the world and function.

[chromisomi]

lifebuoy, a reylo fic | ch 2 posted!

Benjamin Solo.

The cursor blinks back at Rey as she stares at the search bar. She remembers the signage just outside of Professor Hux’s office, reading Armitage Hux, Ph.D., and just below it: Benjamin Solo, Ph.D. “Here goes nothing,” she mumbles before searching his name on Google. The search comes back random, with multiple images of older men posing for headshots or Facebook profiles of younger men looking nothing like the americano enthusiast.

“Try Ben,” Finn whispers next to her, eyeing the screen intently.

They’re sitting on the living room couch, the first day of the semester done and over with. It’s evening now, with the sun setting outside the window overlooking other student apartments.

She does as he says, typing out Ben Solo and pressing enter.

“Yes!” Finn cheers.

His headshot comes to view first, lined up with photos of other men. Further down are links to profiles, but only one belongs to him – a LinkedIn page. Rey pounces on it, making sure her browser’s still in incognito mode. The same headshot from the first page comes to view, along with his name and occupation.

Ben Solo, Ph.D.

Lecturer at Coruscant University

Postdoctoral Fellow with CU Department of Communications

“So, you’re telling me,” Finn turns to her, eyes wide and lips barely suppressing a grin, “you’ve been shitting on a professor this whole time?”

“Lecturer,” Rey corrects him.

“Not just a professor,” he continues, sitting up to face her fully, “but the one rooming with yours, who no doubt is hitting on you by the way.”

“Once again, just a lecturer.”

“Not to mention that he’s also working in the communications department,” Finn’s grin grows into a shit-eating one as he shakes with contained laughter, “and you’ll no doubt have him later in your program.”

“You’re not making this any better.”

He explodes, laughing against his knees to the point of tears. “Rey…” he struggles to get a breath in, “it’s only the first day of class, how is your semester this fucked already?”

“I think you’re being a little dramatic.” She crosses her arms, “It’s not like I threw a drink at him or anything. Just laughed at the name.”

“And treated him horribly.”

“He was mean!”

Poe walks in from the kitchen with a plate of leftover pizza, “She’s right, peanut. It’s not that bad.”

“Thank you, Poe.” Rey sighs.

“I mean about the Solo guy,” he adds. “You’re pretty much doomed with Intro to Public Relations. Is this Hugs guy hot at least? Think you can… you know, for a good grade?”

“Poe.”

Finn points a finger at Rey, “If anything else happens, you better tell me first.”

Rey stands from the couch and grabs her laptop, “I will not tell you anything, because nothing will happen, got it?”

The two lovebirds smirk at each other.

She groans before stomping off to her room and shutting the door. Plugging in her earphones and blasting music, she gets ready for her evening of study. She pulls out her planner and exits out of the browsers still up on her laptop before opening her course page.

Off to the side, her phone lights up from a notification. With a quick glance, she sees it’s from Instagram.

I’ll check it later, she tells herself. Her mornings are taken up by work and her afternoons are taken up by classes. She’ll be damned if her evenings are taken up by distractions.

Rey reaches for her phone anyways.

She gained a new follower on her photography page.

User1826740.

“Okay,” Rey mutters, tossing the phone on her bed, not thinking anything of it.

Read the rest of the chapter on ao3!

[occult-roommates]

Awkward reunion

After his mom called him to tell him she knows he dropped out of college, Dawud assumed for some reason Audrey had snitched on him, since they talked about it the night before. But no, actually, he accidentally caused his own downfall. Shortly after hanging up with Audrey, he mindlessly posted on Facebook a selfie of him with Daniele clearly in front of the San Myshuno art museum, thinking to himself he’s gonna private it so only Audrey can see it...He forgot to do that. Maybe he should just stop going to the art museum with Daniele, nothing good ever came of it.

Now, how did his mom figured out it means he has dropped out. Well, let’s not forget that after dropping out, he lived with Audrey for about a year, and around once a mom, her mom, Jacqueline, came to visit her. She promised to keep the secret and not tell Farida before he’s ready, but at that point it’s been more than 18 months, and Farida finally knew he’s no longer in Oasis Spring. And so, Jacqueline told her the truth about her son’s whereabouts.

Now, it had been way more than a month, it was in fact almost July. Dawud tried to avoid his mom, which was hard as May was both Ramadan and her birthday month. So, when he finally got his two weeks off work, he decided to finally see his mom again, trying to make up for what was at that point almost two years of acting like he was dead. The first day after coming back home was incredibly awkward though, very little talking, quite obvious Farida was still pissed at him.

The next one appeared to be better at first. Farida was gardening happily, while Dawud laid on a lounge chair in his bathing suit, unable to believe it was not even noon and it was already scalding hot outside.

Dawud: I could not be a woman, like how do you even handle being dressed like that when it’s over a 100 degrees outside? Farida: I wouldn’t have told you how to dress if you were a girl. I can’t even get you to wear a shirt.  Dawud: I mean, I think if I were a girl I’d have more of an incensitive to wear a shirt cause not doing it is uh...illegal. But I don’t think I’d be able to wear a bra. Like, I tried Audrey’s one as a joke once and it was so uncomfortable I felt like I was wearing a straitjacket. Farida: What?

Ah, he said too much again. Well, at least he didn’t also add he used to just not wear underwear growing up, up until that day in middle school when he got his dick stuck in his fly and he had to go see the school nurse to free it. She doesn’t need to know that. I’ts also marginally more acceptable when you have roommates to walk around in your underwear than cock out.

Farida: I don’t even understand why you are like that. I thought you’d outgrew that like the fact you used to constantly rock back and forth or shake your hands agressively, especially around Audrey, and you two would make incoherent noises. It was cute when you were toddlers, not so much when you were 12. Dawud: I didn’t outgrew it, I was bullied out of it. I told you, you just never believed me.  Farida: And you still walk on your tiptoes when I told you it is bad for your back in the long term, and you can barely speak Arabic in spite of all my attempts to teach you. Dawud: Ok I get it I’m a fucking failure! Farida: And don’t used such words in front of me!

Getting mad, Dawud went inside and locked himself in his bedroom, as if he was a teenager again. It sucks, it really does. He tried so hard to make his mom proud, and it seems like it’s never enough...To be fair, he did messed up badly by lying to still be in school for more than a year, but still.

And then, as he was starting to regret being stucked here for two weeks, ruining his vacation, he received a very special text message from a very special someone...

Prev - Next

[jodilin65]

Tom’s giving plasma now. Hopefully anyway. They won’t take him if they see leftover bruising from the last draw, and he’s been having trouble getting his arms to clear completely. He’s been gone a while now, so I’m guessing they took him.

I’m trying to make a point of getting 10 minutes of sunlight every day that I’m available during daylight hours. I didn’t get up until 8 this morning, so by the time I was fully awake nearly two hours later, I went out and it was beautiful. The sun still hurts my eyes at times and I guess it’s because I spend so much time indoors. That’s part of why I’m making a point of getting out there when I can. I’m definitely going to add two vitamin Ds a week rather than three because I can tell my TSH is rising. My energy levels are still better, but I definitely want to keep out of those double digits.

Spectrum was next door again yesterday and Ray still hasn’t gone back to blasting the TV. Who knows if that’ll change when I’m staying up in the evening when sound travels better and he’s more likely to open a window? Maybe he was busy doing something else in another room at that time but still wanted to hear whatever was playing so he cranked it up. We have the same house model and his TV is in the same place ours is which means the only way you can see it is if you’re actually in the living room. Hopefully, it won’t override the MLV or be noticeable in other rooms to the point where I need to talk to him. You just never know how people may react, but I do know my temper. I still shouldn’t have to listen to anyone else’s TV, music, or anything in my home just like they shouldn’t have to hear any of my shit in theirs.

Still sorting drawers and cabinets in the kitchen and closet and making progress. The negative to a small place is that while it may be good for the electric bill, it’s not good for finding things because you have to have so much stuff packed in tightly. In a bigger house, there’s room to spread it out, although I still forget where things are a lot because my short-term memory is going to hell. Nonetheless, I’m doing my best to organize things.

I have all things painting gathered in a large, clear plastic bin but there are other hobby-related items to organize as well, like diamond painting and drawing. I now have the latch-hook rug and cross-stitching stuff as well, though I don’t see myself taking the cross-stitching too seriously. As for the latch-hooking, I don’t know yet.

I’ve been toying with the idea of dedicating a Facebook profile that wouldn’t be in my real name to journals and other things. I already have an account that I’m slowly adding old journals to and the reason the idea kind of appeals to me is that while I wouldn’t be able to see my visitors there, I could easily share pictures and even my tweets there. On the other blogging sites, this is a real pain in the ass and I have space limits on me as well. I wouldn’t give up the blogging sites, though. I’d just share the link to it. I decided it’s okay to share links that don’t involve my main Facebook account. I’m very picky about who I add on my main account. I prefer to keep that for people I’ve actually met or cyber friends that go way back in time. I mean pre-Citrus Heights time.

I still long for a friend like Aly but I realized this is never gonna happen. There will never be another Aly again. It still would have been nice if there could have been someone with similar traits. Tinkerbella isn’t Tinkerbell, but she’s similar. She’s smart, playful, loving, and affectionate.

Understandably, we all want some attraction to those we’re intimate with but whenever it comes to friends, I’ve never given a shit what they look like. I would value a 300-pound blimp full of acne who was honest, real, intelligent, and accepting over a gorgeous person who lied and was judgmental. Honesty and intelligence are what I value most on top of acceptance. They don’t have to be a rocket scientist because no one knows it all. It’s just that smarter people tend to be more reasonable.

Only stupid people like Andy would think I could possibly have some reason to lie about my sleep disorder, for example. What compounded his stupidity was that he should have known better after knowing me all my life. It wasn’t just me, though. He thinks everybody is lying about everything. But smarter people are usually smart enough to be able to tell these kinds of things and also able to put themselves in someone else’s shoes, even if they’ve never been in those shoes themselves. They just seem to be better at being able to rationalize and understand things even if they’ve never experienced them. So Aly was smart enough to realize A, there couldn’t be any good reason why someone would make up something so bizarre to begin with, and B, no one would want to live with such a thing. It didn’t take her God knows how much time to finally “hit her like a bell in the night” that no one wants to get up at 3 in the morning.

Actually, it’s getting up around 6 in the evening I hate most because while I may get more peace that way, by the time the sun is up and stores are open, I’m getting tired.

I like smart people. They’re observant, they catch on quicker, they tend to retain what they learn, and are just more open and accepting in general. I would love to have a special friend like that where we share what’s going on in each other’s lives nearly every day and have some interests in common, especially writing. But I just don’t see it being meant to be. I wasn’t kidding when I said that Aly losing her life wasn’t just a punishment for her, but for those who cared about her as well. There’s been an empty void in my life but you can’t make people be what they aren’t or hunt for a specific person and expect them to want a relationship or friendship and like the same things you do in the way you can hunt for a specific item of clothing. There’s just no ordering up a second Aly-like friend. I’ve found that most things that happen aren’t planned. If she’s out there (a he would be fine, although I still prefer a she) I haven’t met her yet and if I have I don’t know it.

I made a promise to myself that if I ever meet this special friend, as long as she’s honest, not overly emotional/dramatic, doesn’t use me as Mary did, and isn’t hurting anyone, I’ll never judge her and will be a good listener when she wants while also giving her space when she wants. If she wants me to keep her out of my journal, I will do that as well. People seem to be all over the place as far as that’s concerned. Some don’t care if you write that they’re crazy mass murderers, others only want you to write good things, and some don’t want you to even mention the most mundane of things.

Unfortunately, Aly was a little less open with her life than I was but one of the things I really liked - for reasons I can’t understand – was that she really came to know me well through our talks and my journals, and she really got me too. I really liked her curiosity and how she cared enough to pay attention and learn things about both my past and present.

It really does seem like so much of life is unplanned. I never planned Tom, but even though I have been attracted to more women than men, his award-winning personality drew me in like a drug. Not that he was ever ugly or just there in the looks department. He’s always had nice eyes. The face is what I notice most. I’d rather a nice face on a less-than-perfect body than a perfect body with a boring or ugly face.

Here we go again with the barking. What happened to being able to go weeks at a time without hearing the fucking thing? It’s been a daily occurrence again. Still better to have a few bursts of that that only last a minute or less than TVs that go on for hours, but still. I guess I’m just a real peace junkie.

A dog I’ve never heard before was making this horrible squeaking sound the other day and the honker’s mutt was howling. I feel bad for the poor thing because he’s been out more and more and therefore it’s got to be lonely. Before, when he went out with his girlfriend, the other dog was still with it. So the thing is spending an awful lot of time alone.

In real life, Nane never had kids. She got pregnant at 39, lost the baby, and didn’t want to try again. But in the dream I had last night, I was thinking that her son was 8 years old when we last talked and would now be 12.

Then I had a nightmare that woke me up for a few minutes. A guy kidnapped me and was trying to pin me down on his bed. I was able to punch him hard enough in the head to knock him out. Then I wasted precious time trying to decide if I should carry on with the attack to ensure I got away or if I should just run.

I made the wrong decision and chose to run. I sprung up off of the bed, out of the bedroom, and down a flight of stairs, hoping to hell the door was unlocked at the bottom because he was already up and chasing me. I was able to get out the door and into the dark of night. I seemed to have run from a building that had a row of apartments in a secluded foresty area. The nightmare ended with me screaming and pounding on doors, hoping someone would be up and able to help me as the maniac closed in on me.

[keenregine]

A Tale of Two Harry's lol

Trying to back track like I always do, January of 2023. Another year, another 365 days of trial and errors (mostly errors, my pessimist self tells me). 

Being in a long-distance relationship suck, because number 1.  It's 'long-distance'. 2. I have no other reasons to think of. But I'd say we're managing well. No big fights, no big misunderstanding that can't be solved within the day.

No massive Facebook drama. We feel like we're too old for that sh*t. I'm hoping in the nearest future, this predicament of us being an 'LDR' couple will come to an end. But honestly, it doesn't feel as difficult the way it was before, especially now that we're near to each other. I believe I made that point very clear before. 1 hour flight away is such a breeze, but no flight at all would be the dream.

 So anyways, I went to Lyon, France to visit Alex. With his field of work, he gets the opportunity to travel places, that means me too. I've been to Paris 2019, pre CoVid time. Now, I'm glad I get to see Lyon. France has indeed redeemed itself on my perspective (yet it's only the 2nd city I saw of France, I'm trying to make jokes here). Quite the contrary to Paris, Lyon has less rubbish, less drunk people. And although they're not very welcoming (which I'm very much used to), at least they will try their best to speak English to a foreign looking person like me asking where I could find a type C to iPhone cord charger. Plus, I love the countryside-side-but-not-really vibes to it. Let me explain, even though Lyon is geographically small and not highly urbanized. Massive known shops can be seen everywhere, I would even say it has the best options of products that I haven't seen anywhere else. And at the same time, side by side local shops of the most expected French products are also there, but in a tiny, secluded version. The Airbnb we stayed in, is somewhat weird but in a way, Passing through the door, you will step into a narrow 2-person capacity elevator, I can't imagine how one can bring heavy groceries in there or appliances. There's a choice to use the stairs which is cemented, reminds me of stairs in churches, dark and roughly rendered, it adds up to the already cold temperature coming from the outside. And there's the museum, situated in the center is the Lyon, is the Museum of Fine Arts where I finally saw The Great Flood painting. I think I spent nearly 15 minutes just staring at this beauty, and the rest well I lost count. There are other museums to see but we haven't got much time. It's important that I get to ride their transports, the train, buses, we even tried the public scooter (we learned so much from our Barcelona experience), and little did I know they have a tram. This steep tram leads to another town in Lyon, forgive me I forgot what it's called but the main thing we intended to see is the Roman Lugdunum Theatre. I don't really want to describe this (I realize I'm bad at it as you can see), and there you can appreciate how beautiful this ruin is, plus the history it has. I was in a trance imagining what it's like living there before. I hope I get to see more of these in future, it is comforting how they preserve this historically significant places over the years, especially during the war. It just sat there, and survived.

Most of the year I was ill. I had Covid again (which is the worst one, I literally thought I would die there and then), and had flu atleast three times. I guess this was just me adjusting to this cruel cold place. In between those times, all I could do is go to work, the usual cycle. In April, we get to see Jo Koy, he was just fantastic. He's given us our money's worth sitting near front. We plan to see him again in his next show(s). And the midst of searching houses online, when the universe really wants to make it happen, I swear it will happen. Few days prior I was crazily searching decent houses online. The very next day, a colleague of mine randomly asked me if I was 'looking for a house', she was presenting their one-bedroom bungalow flat which was super cute and cozy. As I said, it was the perfect timing. When we first went to see the house, Alex and I immediately fell in love with it and right away said yes. I had to leave my old place, and in that time no one in any of my housemates seen me off. Or even sent me a message of good luck, goodbye or see you around, nothing. *one tear drop But well, I won't hold a grudge and just move along. But here I am mentioning it. lol If it wasn't for Alex the whole process of moving will be four times as hard, he arrange all the things, made sure everything is in order. Alex is too nice that sometimes I feel like I have to balance it, but he won't budge. My colleague who was moving out, have so much stuffs that it took them days and many rounds to completely clear everything out (ours only took one go because of how organized we did it), but Alex helped them all through out. especially with the heavy lifting , throwing out old furniture, and still volunteering to do other things. When everything was done, he thought of things needed for our new house, thought of arrangement in the living room. Even he though he doesn't like folding clothes, he helped me with it and actually did more than I do. He would let me do things I like, such as hammering nails just because I enjoy it and using the screwdriver, and the others he'll finish. I understand it gives off the impression that I'm the useless one here . Well, I do important things sometimes like vacuuming, it's fun. He also does the cooking and prefers to do the dishes after, he would let me carry on sitting on the couch and watch tv, read or scroll on my phone. And still, I have the guts to be mad at him for just anything. tsk tsk Women.

It may seem like we're living together all this time. But not actually, we just had the opportunity visiting each other frequently and we're lucky for that. I was alone in the summer doing the usual boring things. And oh, I went to see Harry Styles out of bliss. When I first came in the UK, I would always listen to his songs. I'm not a fan of One Direction during their peak, not once ever. His solo songs are for me my guilty pleasure, it's kind of stupid that I don't want anybody else to know I'm quite obsessed with him just because I hate joining the bandwagon, I'm pretentious like that. But in all honestly, I just legitimately enjoy his music and he's one of the many artists whom I pleasurably listen to the entire album top to bottom, even until now, no joke. I went alone in his concert in Wembley which is filled with white people, I don't know why is this relevant. It's not 'unusual' that I would go alone if you know me well. The whole time, I swear to God I was just standing there singing out loud and dancing, and because it's a sudden decision, I regret not bringing a pink feather boa or wore a pink glittery hat. I wore my staple black on black outfit. 

I'm pretty sure I didn't mention before. Visiting the Harry Potter Studios was of course one of the musts-see places once I arrive in the UK. I met an old college friend who's also a big 'HP ' fan, without having second thoughts, I went to the studio for the second time, no regrets. lol I missed my friend and we reminisced our college times, drunk and fun times but still thrived. Summer season is the best time to travel anywhere, but weather is just so unpredictable here that even in summer you can't be 100% sure. We arrived there bright and sunny as hell. mid day turned cloudy and by afternoon it rained hard, did I see this on the weather app, no. I went to Bath with my colleagues, it was of course no surprise historic. Same with Lyon, the Roman Bath was beautifully preserved to its core and make you feel like you're a part of an important history. And also, you'll realize how the Roman conquered pretty much everywhere in the world leaving their marks. There's this one juicy information I came across, that they just copied their 'ideas' from those who invented it first, flourished them and presented it in the entire world as theirs. What a cheeky bunch, and now they're known as the brilliant minds. I want to say more but I might be haunted by Julius Cesar's soul in my sleep. Goodnight, it might be a very long wait, but good things are coming. (:

[screamingintonothing]

i don’t have anything brothers. it’s just me, my little sister, my mom, and my dad. my dad makes me glad i don’t have brothers.

being home from college for well over a month is always taxing, but it gets worse every time because all i can see is my dad and how he acts. he’s the breadwinner, my whole family loves to cook including him, he tells me and my mom all the time he should come home to huge meals out of our millions of cook books every night. it’s not the demand that’s frustrating, we like to cook, what’s frustrating is that half the time he doesn’t even bother to come home and eat it. he’s always out for drinks, playing sports, or at some party none of us are privy too. he loves tennis, i love tennis too i played for years because of him, we do not play tennis together.

actually it’s funny how often he does that. we all love to cook, but he refuses to share the kitchen with me. we both love tennis, but we haven’t played together since i was a little kid. and this week, football. my college- his alma mater of course- had the best football season we’ve had in over a decade and made it to the bowl game. all my friends were going, i really wanted to go, so i tried to find two tickets. one for me one for my dad. i didn’t find them, they sold out immediately even with my student access. i thought damn this sucks, but maybe he’ll stay home and we can watch this game together. then i found out on christmas eve he was going, he has gotten four tickets for him and all his friends. they even had a group bus he advertised on facebook! so my dad went to the bowl game. i watched it alone in my living room.

i didn’t even like football until i was in college, i come from a big football city but it never appealed to me until it was my school i was cheering for- my dads school i was cheering for. i didn’t pick tennis as a child, i was a gymnast actually, i played tennis and soccer cause he loved tennis and soccer and only tennis stuck. i could’ve never learned to cook because my parents will always cook for me, it would be a shame upon my family but it’s true. i learned to cook because my family, my culture, my heritage revolves around food. and it all comes from my dad.

tonight my mom made beef stew. tonight i made gorgonzola gnocchi, from scratch, start to finish. he came to the table late to watch football for another minute. he went searching for extra ingredients to add to his stew cause he didn’t think my mom had made it right. he didn’t try my gnocchi until he was full on his doctored stew- he didn’t like it. he says he doesn’t like blue cheese, there’s always blue cheese in our house and he’s the one that buys it, i grew up eating the gorgonzola gnocchi from trader joe’s it’s the only frozen pasta we will touch.

i made gnocchi from scratch, my mom made stew all day, just as he asks. go through the cookbooks and find recipes. we did just as he asks. and he didn’t like it. now i can hear him on the couch watching more football while my mom cleans the kitchen, i already cleaned up my mess which he never does. my mom cleans up when he cooks too.

sometimes i hate how much i idolize my father. i hate remembering at the end of the day my father, my idol, is just a man.

[anitabyars]

Avery Keelan has revealed the gorgeous cover for Playmaker!

Releasing: December 4, 2023

Cover Designer: Andra M Designs

Summer

I know better than to fall for Gabriel Carter, notorious NHL playboy. Not only has he broken innumerable hearts during his 7 years in LA, he's my boss--even if he does have a smile that leaves me weak in the knees, a body built for sin, and enough charm to melt my sundress clean off.

So what if I swoon a little over the way he sings Everly to sleep every night he's not on the road? So what if he's deliciously protective and alpha-male over me whenever the paparazzi get too close? It doesn't mean anything... or does it?

I try to tell myself it's just a job, but between the stolen kisses and blurry lines, playing house with him is starting to feel a little too real.

Gabe

Summer Crawford loves nothing more than putting me in my place. She's five feet, five inches of sweet southern sass-- and temptation sleeping in the bedroom next to mine.

When all the rules go out the window one night, everything changes. After knowing how explosive our chemistry is together, there's no way I can go back to pretending we're just friends.

There's one small catch: Summer is my employee. My daughter Everly's nanny. Ev needs her, which means she's completely off-limits. Or at least, she should be... but I've never been good at following the rules.

Turns out, I need Summer too. Now I'm playing for keeps--and I always win.

Pre-order your copy today!

Amazon: https://bit.ly/3ra4riA

Amazon Worldwide: https://mybook.to/9mRDEIJ

Add to Goodreads: https://bit.ly/3RcSHpX

Meet Avery

Avery Keelan is an Amazon top 20 bestselling author of sports romance and contemporary romance, a lifelong hockey fan, and a diehard coffee lover. She writes swoon-worthy happily ever afters with hot hockey heroes, snarky banter, and enough steam to fog up a mirror. Plus, of course, a hefty dose of drama and angst along the way.

With undergraduate degrees in Commerce and Psychology, Avery specialized in government policy and legislation in a previous life. She lives in Canada with her husband, two boys, and two spoiled rescue cats.

Connect with Avery

Website: www.averykeelan.com

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[nox77]

Chronology, Archaeology of Woods Canyon Pueblo

Growing Self’s dating coaches are completely different. Views, people watching, and window-shopping are free; additional restaurant and bar tabs. Provide name tags for participants (first name only or first name and last initial), as well as clipboards, pens and comment cards so that daters can keep track of the people they meet. נערות ליווי בהרצליה Finally, remember to share, like, tweet, and comment below. Now, nearly everyone I know has met someone online, and I’ve been to a number of weddings where the couple met on apps. “I’m divorced-after marrying pretty young-so it was mildly horrifying to try out dating apps for the first time in my late 20s. But I learned from that first marriage that I didn’t want to waste time on anyone who didn’t reach out often enough. That’s why we reached out to 12 real women from all over the country who were able to do it successfully and asked them for their best online dating tips. Over time, ionizing radiation is absorbed by mineral grains in sediments and archaeological materials such as quartz and potassium feldspar.

It might take him a while to choose a partner or accept a date, but when he does, you can expect him to give 100 percent. If you don't want to permanently delete Facebook Dating, you can take a break instead with that specifically-named option. So, if we know how much of the nuclide was originally present, and how much there is now, we can easily calculate how long it would take for the missing amount to decay, and therefore how long it’s been since that particular sample was formed. Maybe someone you know is going through the same thing or has an ‘I can top that’ terrible date story that will make you laugh. We don’t know who said "opposites attract," but that’s usually just when you’re talking about magnets. So whether you’re just getting back into the dating game or have been dating for awhile with little luck, just remember: what you’re looking for is out there. I think going on dates is great, and you should go on dates if you’re interested in the person you’re messaging with, but if they don’t message you back in a timely way, just move on.

You live and work in Phoenix, so you don’t need an opportunity to meet with someone to only have enough time to ask him or her about where they live and what they do for work. These stubborn, loyal bulls fall fast and hard, often falling for people who don’t even deserve it. Taurus’s seventh house of relationships is Scorpio, so in one-on-one connections, their top priority is intimacy, even if it comes at their own peril. They’re not shy about asking questions and can disarm even the most introverted person enough to get their life story. Plus, the in-depth profiles and "ice-breaker" questions encourage meaningful conversation, making this app perfect for those looking to start serious relationships. A few times I spent weeks messaging or texting with someone I hadn’t met, and then by the time we did meet up, it felt like we had done all the getting-to-know-you questions online, and it inevitably fell flat.

Seeking Arrangement can connect you with partners willing to pamper you like the sugar baby you are. Index fossils are fossils that are known to only occur within a very specific age range. Something that immediately attracted me to my fiancé was that, after a couple of messages, he asked me out right away with a specific place and time. Franz and I dated for almost three years after that, then got married just last month! Beyond that, it might be best to trust your unconscious feelings too as your implicit "gut reactions" can have a big impact on attraction. So, such computer-mediated communication may have an artificial and unemotional quality. Matching: Online tests may not be able to tell you your perfect match, but they can help narrow down the options. Long introductory emails may be counter-productive and off-putting too. Add to that our dislike of forced socializing, penchant for quiet, and strong need for meaningful interaction, and finding a partner can feel downright impossible. In particular, such testing often identifies potential daters who would be a poor relationship partner for anyone.

[paradisetemporarilymisplaced]

So I was being a basic bitch the other day and listening to my true crime podcasts when it occurred to me just how suspicious Nile’s “death” would look to everyone not in the Guard, leading me to a train of thought that, 2200 words later, absolutely got away from me but I can’t let go so I’m inflicting it on all of you!

To set the stage, we know the movie takes place over approximately a week. Here’s what happens to Nile from the military’s point of view:

She dies is very seriously injured

She heals without a scratch

Just before she’s supposed to be shipped out to Germany, she vanishes, leaving two men concussed (and presumably reporting being knocked out by a woman with short hair wearing civilian clothes)

She goes AWOL for several days

They get word from the CIA that she is to be reported killed in action (details unclear)

So, at the beginning of this very weird week, the USMC has to tell Nile’s family of her death critical injury. What her family was told depends on how long she was dead – a Google search tells me that family will be notified in person within 8 hours of a soldier’s death, but we don’t know how long her first death lasted. For an injury, however, they’d get a phone call to notify them and the unit would arrange for them to visit as soon as the soldier is transferred out of a combat zone. Like I remember when I was in high school, a guy from my church who was a Marine was really seriously injured in a helicopter crash in Iraq and from what I could tell, his parents were told immediately and were flown out to Germany to see him, so it stands to reason that Nile’s family would have been informed relatively quickly after her throat was slashed, one way or another.

And then, she goes AWOL. Her family would be notified while the USMC tried to figure out where she went, not least because the military would want to know if she’s contacted them. (And it’s possible that her family may have been on the way to Germany to see her since we know that’s where she was supposed to go!) So for several days:

Nile’s mom and brother have no idea where she is

They know she was seriously injured and most certainly should not have been moving around on her own

They can’t get a hold of her

The military can’t tell them anything

And the next thing they know for sure is that she was “killed in action.” After being injured and vanishing into thin air. And they presumably cannot produce her body or any concrete evidence of her death. In any case, something sketchy is going on, so they’re like. SMELLS LIKE A MILITARY COVERUP.

In a surprise to probably no one, there is a well-documented legacy of mysterious US military deaths, particularly of women of color (TW for sexual assault in these links). The cases of LaVena Johnson and Vanessa Guillenin particular have made national news because of their families’ persistence in seeking justice. Likewise, Nile is a Black woman, and her mom and brother are most certainly hypercognizant of (a) state violence against Black people and (b) these high-profile cases of suspicious military deaths. So her family are seriously side-eyeing the situation, knowing that (a) the military has a serious incentive (and a documented history) of covering up things that make them look bad and (b) nothing about Nile’s disappearance and supposed death are adding up.

And Andy’s right. Nile does come from warriors. And you know who else does? Her brother.

Don’t get me wrong. Nile’s mom would absolutely not back down. She’d know something was up and want to get to the bottom of it. But based on what I know about Gen X parents (mine), they’re not the most technologically savvy. Like they can use the internet, but they didn’t grow up with it the way we young millennials and Gen Z did. So Nile’s brother takes the lead. And what do zillennials do best?

Social media.

Nile’s brother starts going hard on any site he can, trying to get the word out to see if anyone knows what happened to his sister. He starts a Reddit thread. He starts a Facebook group. He reaches out to the media and true crime bloggers and podcasters à la Sarah Turney, getting loud and being a general nuisance in hopes of getting some answers. He gets his friends and Nile’s friends involved. Maybe eventually Dizzy, Jay, and others from Nile’s unit hear about it and reach out, telling him what they saw and how weird it all was. He’s drumming up interest, and soon “Nile Freeman” becomes a household name (at least among the true crime fans).

Copley is, of course, trying his best, but at this point there is just so much that it’s impossible for him to scrub everything. Sure, he can erase new footage of Nile and the Guard, but what can he do about Reddit threads and podcast episodes that are speculating something weird has happened? Maybe he could hack the sites and shut those things down, but honestly, that’s the last thing he’d want to do, because that only adds weight to the theory that Nile’s disappearance is a military coverup. So eventually he has to tell Andy what’s going on.

Andy, obviously, does not take the news well. However, she is also completely computer illiterate, because that’s Booker’s job and he’s the only one who ever bothered to learn what the internet is in any meaningful way. (She probably calls Booker for advice, and for the record, I think Booker would have no qualms about shutting down conspiracy threads, tinhats be damned, but Copley is too concerned about the consequences. He’s ex-CIA for crying out loud, he knows how it’ll look if they scrub every mention of Nile’s name from the internet.) Maybe she confers with Joe and Nicky but, let’s be honest, they’d be equally unhelpful. So at this point, she knows they have to bring in Nile.

But the thing about Nile is that she, too, knows how to use the internet (duh). Aside from her being a young millennial/digital native, we know from the cave scene where she’s giving Booker suggestions on how to track Copley that she clearly is even more computer savvy than the average person. And for that reason she almost definitely took over the day-to-day tech stuff after Booker’s exile. So I think it would be foolish to expect her to be unaware of what’s happening. She’s not contacting her family or posting on the message boards or anything, but she knows what’s up. So Copley and the team probably sit her down to “break the news,” but we know the girl does not have a poker face (see: literally shooting herself in the foot and not being able to play it cool whatsoever) and cracks immediately, telling them she’s seen everything about her case – she’s not interacting with any of it, she certainly didn’t instigate anything, but she knows. (And she is so goddamn proud of her brother.)

At this point, I’d like to pause and consider Nile’s role in the overall narrative of this movie. She’s set up as a foil to Andy, obviously, but she’s also a foil to Booker. Booker, who, like Andy, is a serious pessimist, but who, unlike Andy, still has very fresh memories and trauma associated with being the new kid, which have destroyed him. In his mind (and Andy’s), if Nile communicates with her family, she’ll become just like him in a century or two – bitter, alone, and stuck with her grief and memories of watching her family die and knowing they died resenting her. It’s a small sample size, but this is the only experience they have to go off of.

But it doesn’t have to be like that.

There’s been a lot of discussion of TOG being a fundamentally queer movie – a group of people brought together because of something inherent about themselves that is different, that must be hidden, that causes others to hate, fear, and reject them. Booker’s backstory is the archetypal traumatic “coming out” story – his family learns who he is, hate him for it, and attempt to cast him out of their lives. He’s stuck with his trauma, his pain, his loss, and it consumes him.

But what if Nile’s family would be the opposite? What if her “coming out” to them as immortal is met with acceptance, love, celebration? What if her family is just overjoyed to have her back, and they don’t care what the circumstances are? I'm reminded of this incredible post from @shitty-old-guard-deaths a while back, where Nile’s mother hits Booker with a frying pan because “my baby let me believe she was dead for FIVE YEARS based on your bad advice???” (which may or may not have inspired this whole tangent). Nile takes the advice of someone who did the same thing she wants to do because she doesn’t want to risk her family’s rejection. She wants the good memories with her family and is afraid that showing them her true self will bring her unbearable pain, forever replacing those memories. But, with high risk comes high reward.

Anyway. Nile and the team are trying to come up with a plan for how to handle this whole thing, but she’s not really participating because she’s too afraid to hope. Until finally, quickly, so she doesn’t lose her nerve, she suggests she reach out to them, knowing that, realistically, that’s the only solution before things snowball even further out of control. The team is shocked, but realize that she has a point. They decide that Copley should actually be the first point of contact, posing as a US government official to talk with them and test the waters.

So Copley goes to Nile’s family’s house to talk with her mom and brother. They’re probably distrustful and apprehensive, but nonetheless secretly ecstatic that their work has paid off. They talk and review all of the information that they’ve collected, including testimonials from the people on Nile’s base and recent sightings (along with photos) of Nile (with the same three people) over the last few years that people have sent them but they haven’t posted publicly. At this point, Copley’s like, yeah this is about to blow up, we gotta put our cards on the table. He convinces them to come with him to some safe house/black site/whatever he can get that is technologically impenetrable (I’m picturing them in like, an interrogation room at a police station kind of deal), takes their phones, locks the doors, and brings in Nile.

What follows is the most delightful reunion scene of all time, bringing Joe, Nicky, and even Andy to tears as they watch and listen from outside the room. With Copley’s help, Nile tells her mom and brother about her immortality and what’s been going on since she died (within reason, of course), and they are thrilled. They don’t understand why (because no one does) but they don’t question it and they see it as a gift from God – she’s been resurrected, she will live, and she has a purpose. Her mother and brother are so happy to see her again and are willing to agree with pretty much anything to stay in her life as long as they can.

So. They set up some complicated agreement (they bring in the other three for support/intimidation as needed) setting the terms of their relationship. They swear Nile’s family to secrecy, maybe bringing up the lab to show how high the stakes are, and they readily agree. They come up with some cover story for Nile’s brother to share on the message boards (maybe that the government has opened an investigation but because it’s an open case he has to shut it all down? Tells people to direct their tips somewhere else? Something to that effect). There’s still speculation, of course, but without Nile’s brother at the helm providing the energy, the hype dies down as news stories are wont to do without any movement. And Nile’s family goes to work for the team. The experience has taught them that Copley can’t possibly do everything himself, especially when it comes to social media, so Nile’s brother takes the lead on the day-to-day tracking/social media while Copley and her mom focus on finding jobs and scrubbing their traces afterward.

So there you have it: Nile gets to integrate her biological family into her found family and spend the rest of their lives with them as it should be, Copley gets some badly needed help managing the reality of social media, the team finally has a positive narrative surrounding outsiders Knowing About Them AND about interacting with people from their previous life, and the audience gets the happy ending to this very lovely and very queer story to counteract the pain associated with Booker’s family.

Plus, you know, I’m a sucker for both a good government conspiracy theory and for Nile getting every good thing she deserves.

[snackhobi]

pairing: taehyung x reader / word count: 13.3k / genre: fluff, friends to lovers, smut (NSFW, 18+)

summary: you’re used to being in love with taehyung. you’ve had a lot of time to get good at it, after all—by this point you’re the world’s expert at keeping your less-than-platonic feelings hidden from him, what with the amount of practice you’ve had.

but then he signs up for a massage therapy course, because apparently you can never catch a break.

or: the one where taehyung gives you a full body massage and then some.

warnings: sexually explicit content, massage with a happy ending (literally 🤧), cursing, edible massage oil/lube, fingering (f), unprotected sex (be safe when you have sex please), multiple orgasms (f), oral sex (m), cum swallowing, pet names, body worship?, brief mention of shower sex

a/n: I swear this was meant to be pwp. this was literally meant to just be pwp with some massage shenanigans. and then I blinked and it had become a soft 13k fic which honestly… kicked my ass quite a bit. but I hope you enjoy it!! thank you as always to @hobi-gif​ for beta reading this and encouraging me and putting up with me changing this multiple times, what would I do without your support miss hope?

--

Taehyung goes through a lot of different phases.

He just finds so many things interesting. Photography, art, art history, music, fashion, thrift shopping; heck, there was even the time he got weirdly into making tea and became some sort of connoisseur, going through the whole rigmarole of buying the loose leaves and weighing them out, checking the temperature of the water, brewing for a precisely measured amount of time.

You still remember the look on his face when you said it all tasted like hot leaf water to you.

Because, of course, as one of Taehyung’s best friends and his roommate, you’re inevitably swept up in everything he does. You’re used to the weirdly acrid smell of photo development fluid and how cold dark rooms can get. You use phrases like chiaroscuro and sfumato to describe the simplest things after listening to Taehyung do the same for so long. You’ve lost count of the amount of times you’ve tripped over his saxophone case when he leaves it lying around the apartment. You regularly wear the baggy t-shirt with the face that Taehyung had painted on it—even if you still refer to it as the Squidward-House-Shirt despite the fact you know he was inspired by Basquiet and Schiele and not the Easter Island themed stone head that Squidward lives in.

You don’t mind getting dragged along with whatever he does, honestly; you don’t have time to attend every class, but go with him when you can. It’s always good to expand your horizons. You also love watching Tae’s face whenever he learns something new, the various expressions that flit across his features—from wide eyed excitement and eyebrow raising astonishment to the more solemn side that appears whenever he’s taking something in and thinking deeply about it, turning it over in his mind, mulling on it.

(You love watching Tae’s face all the time, actually, but that’s a whole other can of worms you’d rather keep shut.)

However, the latest course he’s signed up for is not one you’d been expecting.

“Massage therapy?” Your face twists in equal parts confusion and surprise.

Taehyung’s dropped this latest nugget of information while you’re cooking, trying to fry some rice while also peering at the phone screen that’s been thrust into your face. You’re not bad at multitasking, per se, but Taehyung’s iPhone is drifting so close that you’re almost cross-eyed and it’s blocking you from seeing what’s going on in the pan. 

“I had a coupon,” he says, as if that explains everything. (It doesn’t.)

“Scooch,” you say, and he immediately moves so you can turn the gas off.

“Jiminie and Jungkookie say that my massages help with dance, and that's just from Youtube tutorials.” Taehyung continues to talk as you bustle around the tiny kitchen. He’s already set the table so now he’s free to watch you finish doing the rest of the work. “And Joon-hyung says I have the perfect hands for it.”

You fumble with the pan as you’re scooping the steaming rice into a large bowl, only just managing to save food from scattering everywhere. You’ve thought about Taehyung’s hands a lot, about how large and long fingered and beautiful they are, but he doesn’t need to know that.

“Really? Huh. That’s nice.” You stare at the pan, fixated on getting every grain of rice so you can avoid looking at Taehyung’s face. And hands. Which are still cupped around his phone. Which looks so small in his big, pretty grip.

Jesus Christ.

“It means I can give you massages if you ever start to get tense.” Taehyung sounds pleased, lovely grin on his face at the prospect of being able to rub his hands over you. As if that isn’t going to make every single one of your muscles lock up and turn you into some sort of coiled rope of a human being, which is the complete opposite of what a massage is supposed to achieve. 

“Great.” Despite your inner turmoil, your voice is level and steady as you meticulously scrape the last grain of rice into the bowl, chasing the tiny fleck of white around the huge pan. Scrape, scrape, scrape. “Sounds fabulous. Can’t wait.”

Of course Taehyung would sign up to learn something that he could use to help his friends. He’s so big-hearted and loving. Big-hearted and loving and kind and funny and affectionate and beautiful and deep-voiced and so entirely overwhelming in every single way imaginable. 

You do what you always do when confronted yet again with your all-consuming crush—you bottle that shit the fuck up until he’s not in the room.

And then you have a miniature breakdown at Pickles.

“I am going to die,” you whisper-scream. “He’s going to offer to massage me and he’s going to get a bottle of massage oil out and he’s going drizzle it onto his massive hands and I am going to fucking die.”

The bearded dragon cocks his head as he stares at you. Taehyung had come home with the reptile one day, tank and all, saying that someone on Facebook had been giving him away because they were moving house and could they just look after him for a little while, please, pretty please? Until they found a good home for him? Please?

That was over a year ago. (You’ve always been bad at saying no to Taehyung.)

“I hate my life,” you lament to the lizard, but then you hear the noisy flush of the toilet and know that Taehyung is going to emerge from the bathroom soon, so you have to wrap this miniature meltdown up pronto. “I wish I was a bearded dragon too, you know. All you do is get fed and sit under the heat bulb. Your life is so easy. You don’t even know what capitalism is.”

The silence you get from Pickles is far more support than you get from your human friends once you tell them. Yoongi just raises his eyebrows while Seokjin and Hoseok laugh outright in your face, just like they always do when you cry to them about Taehyung.

You need new friends. These ones are defective. (If only you’d kept the receipt so you could return them.)

“We learned how to do neck and shoulder massages today!” Taehyung says brightly after the first session.

You hum in response. You’re rewatching Pacific Rim together, cuddled up against Taehyung’s side, and you don’t have to turn your head to know what expression is on his face. There’ll be that little upturn to his lips, happiness at learning something new. That warmth in his eyes at being able to share it with you, even if you couldn't be there with him. Those little freckles on his face, under his eye, his nose, his lip; the one you’ve imagined kissing more times than you can count.

“My teacher says I have a natural talent with my hands,” he adds, and you’re so grateful that you can blame your sudden intake of breath on the scene that’s playing on the screen, as high stakes as it is. 

“That’s nice,” you say, and mentally pat yourself on the back at keeping the strain out of your voice. You've had a lot of practice at this. “I’m not surprised, though. You’ve always been good at doing things with them.”

That’s not a euphemism. Taehyung’s always so careful when he makes things; you’d learned how to fold different origami patterns together, matching crane for crane, lotus for lotus, and he’d always been so delicate with his fingers. He’s always so careful and considerate with you, too, fingers splayed wide across your shoulder as he squeezes you closer to his side, leaving you breathless.

“I wish you could come too.” Taehyung sounds disappointed. “We always have so much fun together.”

For the first time in your life you’re grateful that your manager at Olive Chicken is such a hardass and won’t let you swap shifts, so you’d had to miss signing up for the massage course with Taehyung—because you know there’s no way you’d be able to keep it together if there was some sort of tandem practice in class or whatever. Your crush on him is filled with equal parts of tenderness and lust and you’re well aware of that. You’d rest your hands on the soft skin of Taehyung’s shoulders and back, the lust would overwhelm you, and you’d immediately burst into flames like some sort of demon stepping over the threshold of a church. 

Why oh why did God have to make Kim Taehyung so hot?

Why oh why did God have to make you so… not?

You know Taehyung doesn’t see you in a romantic light at all. You’re grateful for this deep, platonic relationship you have, and you love him to pieces, but holy hell is it hard to walk around with Kim Taehyung looking the way he does and wanting to jump his bones while simultaneously being aware that it’s never going to happen. Whenever he smiles at you, or touches you, or holds you, it’s in exactly the same way as he treats any of his friends—and as happy as you are to be one of those friends, it also kind of kills you inside. 

(Because you know you don’t have a chance, have never had a chance, and will never have a chance.)

The idea of offering to massage Taehyung is one that makes you want to melt into a puddle of horny goo. But when he offers to massage you, it’s because you’re a convenient practice partner who he’s comfortable with. It’s no big deal. You could strip naked and slather yourself up in oil and stand in front of him with your bosoms heaving and say ‘Have at me, big boy’ and Taehyung would say: ‘Sweet! A chance to practice deep tissue massage! Gee, thanks for being such a great pal!’

The kind of deep tissue you want Taehyung to massage is very different to whatever he’s talking about.

… Anyway.

You manage to avoid Taehyung using his apparently magic fingers on you for a surprising amount of time, though you’re kept up to date with his progress, because he shares everything with you and tells you about everything and you always, always listen. Because, more than being your crush, he’s one of your best friends and you love him.

Which is why you try your best to be gentle, graciously refusing his offer of a shoulder massage after he sees you wincing, even if with anyone else you’d just tell them to back off with zero hesitation.

“It’s fine,” you say, flapping a hand at him. “I just slept on it funny.”

“A massage would help! It won’t take long, I promise. Five minutes? Please?” 

Taehyung’s looking at you with those big puppy eyes of his, pleading. You waver. You’re torn between being steadfast and avoiding a situation you’ve literally had nightmares about (Taehyung had offered to massage you, and you’d said yes, but then you’d fallen over as you were walking to him and suddenly a lasagne had appeared in your hands and you’d spilled it all down your shirt and he’d pointed and laughed and laughed and you’d felt so embarrassed that you’d woken up, cheeks burning), but then he pouts and you give in like the spineless and lovesick fool that you are.

“Five minutes,” you say, and Taehyung nods emphatically, looking pleased.

(You have the backbone of a chocolate éclair.)

You send quiet thanks to whatever God is listening when he doesn’t ask you to take your top off and doesn’t break out a bottle of scented oil. Instead he just asks for you to straddle a chair, clutching a plushie against your chest to cushion where it leans against the backrest, and tells you to get comfy.

“Just relax,” he says, as you desperately try to remember how your body works and coax it to relax like Taehyung wants you to. You fail miserably. You feel like a ball of rubber bands, each muscle a layer of tighter and tighter elastic that’s circled around you. “Lean forwards a little?”

At least Taehyung can’t see your face from this angle. You have no idea what sort of expression is twisting your features; consternation and horrified anticipation, probably. You're basically throttling your plushie, taking out your tension and frustration on the poor thing, Rilakkuma's placid face morphing into a twisted expression of sympathy under your grasping fingers.

“Perfect,” Taehyung says. The sound of praise in his deep voice has your insides turning into overheated syrup, hot and thick, dripping down and pooling between your legs. You hate yourself. Getting turned on by the most innocuous words from your best friend, really? Get it together.

The second you feel Taehyung's warm hands touch the back of your neck, your shoulders hunch up faster than a whiplash, a turtle sucking its head into its shell. Your friend laughs.

“This is the opposite of relaxing,” he says, voice warm with amusement. 

“You surprised me.” You dig your nails into Rilakkuma's soft brown fur. Taehyung just thinks you're not used to being massaged, not that you're being weird because it's him that's touching you. Because he touches you a lot. He’s just never done it like this. “Sorry.”

“It's fine,” he replies, unruffled and oblivious. “Let me try again?”

You bite your lip, desperately trying to quell the mix of arousal and tension that’s churning in your stomach, begging your muscles to unwind. You’ve kept your crush a secret from him for this long, you can keep that energy up. (You have to keep that energy up.) “Um. Okay.”

You’re still tense when Taehyung puts his hands on you again. The touch is warm through your clothes, firm but careful, digging into the sharp line of tension laid across your shoulders; despite the way your heart is threatening to launch itself out of your chest, you start to loosen up, because holy shit that feels nice, actually.

You melt against Rilakkuma and smother the bear's face in your chest. “Your teacher wasn’t kidding when they said that you’re good with your hands,” you mumble. 

You’ve never gotten a proper massage before but it feels so damn good that you can’t help but unwind, turning to jelly at the confident presses of Taehyung’s fingers and palms into the soft skin between your neck and shoulder. A little sigh spills past your lips when Taehyung starts to work at the part that’s been twinging after you lay crookedly on it, limbs akimbo in your sleep after a long night at work. “Oh, right there, Tae.”

Taehyung goes still for just a second before continuing, trailing his fingers over your shirt. “Here?”

Your eyes have drifted shut so you can focus on the sensation of that tension being pulled out of your body. “Yeah, right there,” you repeat, massaged into a state of lazy euphoria. The breath you let out is long and deep, catching in the back of your throat at a particularly firm rub of Taehyung’s hands; if you weren’t so blissed out you might be embarrassed at how much the noise you make is like a moan, but as it is, you don’t even notice. You just let out a little sound of discontent when Taehyung’s fingers stutter in their motions, displeased that he’s stopped even for a second.

By the time the massage is over, you’re so relaxed that you feel like you could melt into the floor, a wobbly puddle of unwound muscles and loose limbs. It’s official. You’re a massage convert.

“Holy shit.” Your eyes flutter open as you lean away from Rilakkuma so you can turn around. They’re the first coherent words you’ve spoken for a while; small sighs and sounds have been dripping from your lips and it’s only now that you’re able to regain your breath. “Tae, that was amazin—”

You’re met with the sight of Taehyung’s back as he power walks away, steps rapid, a little shaky, awkward. Before you can ask what’s wrong, he’s stepping into the bathroom. 

“I need to wash my hands,” he says without looking at you, before the door slams shut.

You don’t remember Tae telling you about how quickly you have to wash your hands after finishing a massage. But, thinking about it, you suppose it makes sense—you know, with massaging multiple clients or whatever—even if it’s surprising exactly how fast he’d hoofed it away from you. It sounds like he’s switched both taps on full blast as well, noisy even through the wooden door, and judging from how long he’s in there, he’s being very thorough. Hand washing must be a lot more important than you’d realised. 

Once Taehyung emerges, his face is a little flushed, cheeks a soft red. You wonder if the hot water tap is playing up again and filling your dinky bathroom with hot steam, and make a mental note to look into it. You smile at Taehyung from your perch on the sofa, Rilakkuma plopped on your lap, smile spread across your features; one that Taehyung returns, as pink-faced as he is.

“How’s your shoulder feeling?”

“So much better, honestly,” you admit. It’s incredible. He hasn’t even finished the course yet and he's already this good. He really does have magic hands.

“I’ll have to give you massages more often,” Taehyung says, though the end of the sentence trembles a little. He must be light-headed after all the steam in the bathroom.

The thought of more massages doesn’t fill you with as much mind-numbing trepidation as it might have earlier, utterly languid as you flop across the sofa, muscles uncoiled after the lovely touch of Taehyung’s even lovelier hands. No wonder people rave about spa days if they leave you feeling like this. Maybe if you’d been staring at Taehyung in the eye when he’d been touching you, then you’d feel a lot more awkward—as it is, it’s no worse than usual. Your crush is still all-encompassing but you also got a massage out of it, so.

“Sounds great.” This time you don’t even have to fake your excitement. “Now come sit your butt down so we can order some takeout and decide what to watch.”

When you bend down to speak to Pickles later, the bearded dragon is lolling on his favourite branch. “There’s still a high chance that I’m going to die,” you say in a low voice, before you flick the lights off so the lizard can sleep. “But he hasn’t broken out the oils yet, so I think I’ll be okay for now.”

--

Your luck doesn’t last.

“Strawberry and champagne, lychee martini, mint mojito, white chocolate, or tropical coconut?”

You look up from where you’re painting your toenails. “Huh?”

Taehyung bundles into the room and throws himself onto your bed, flopping on his belly and ignoring the way the mattress is jostled. You, of course, are used to his antics, which is why you’d swept your open bottle of nail polish up before he could spill it everywhere.

“What do you think sounds best?”

“Well, that depends,” you say, squinting at your toes and carefully sweeping the polish over the freshly buffed nails. “For candles, I think they sound pretty nice. For sauces to pour over a steak, I’d say I’d give them all a hard pass. What’s it for?”

“Massage oils,” Taehyung says blithely, too busy staring at his phone to see you muffle a curse when your hand slips and you paint your entire little toe blue. “I was wondering which you think sounds best.”

“Oh. Uh.” You fumble to clean your toe and salvage the now-terrible pedicure you’re trying to give yourself. It was only a matter of time before massage oils were going to become part of your life. Taehyung never goes into things half-hearted, so of course he’s going to invest in oils, too. God’s sake. You can never catch a break, can you? “Why these ones in particular?”

Taehyung pauses for a suspiciously long time, but it gives you the chance to furiously rub at your toe while he’s distracted. “We get a free bottle from the course,” he says eventually.

Huh. Okay. “That’s pretty neat. What was the last one? Coconut? Stick with the basics, can’t go wrong with that, right?”

“Coconut is always tasty,” Taehyung comments absently, and you glance up from your Smurf toe.

“Agreed, but it’s not like you’re about to eat massage oil, are you?”

Taehyung pauses, and then buries his face into his phone screen—suddenly very intent on rereading the list of ingredients in each bottle, it seems. “No, of course not, you’re right,” he mumbles.

He’s almost finished the course. He’s not going to be an accredited masseuse or anything, but you definitely think he could be, if he wanted to—you’ve never had less tension in your shoulders and neck in your life. Taehyung always eases his way into your personal space anyway, casual and effortless after years of friendship, but now you’re used to his fingers sliding over the back of your neck, a gliding touch, sending tense little goosebumps over your skin while simultaneously making you melt. 

“It’s pretty cool that you get free stuff, though.” Your toe is clean, thankfully, no longer blue. “And not just, like, a generic bottle of oil or something. They all sound really fancy. I didn’t realise that you could get massage oils that were scented like that?”

Taehyung makes a non-committal noise, which is uncharacteristic of him, but you’re too focused on repainting your final nail to pay it too much mind, letting out a loud huff of triumph when you’re done.

“Get me a bag of shrimp crackers, please?” You have a sudden craving but you don’t want to penguin waddle to the kitchen and risk getting anything on your wet nails. “Ya girl is hungry.”

“Got it.” Taehyung rolls off the bed without protest. You’re used to his antics, and he’s used to yours, indulging you whenever you feel lazy or want him to do something for you. “You need me to feed you?”

“I wasn’t going to use my toes to feed myself,” you laugh, but Taehyung ends up feeding them to you anyway.

When you recount the list to Seokjin later, his face crumples in a way that’s equal parts offended and disgusted. “They all sound terrible,” he says. “White chocolate should stay in chocolate form and not be turned into an oil. Why does massage oil even have to smell like anything?”

You’re both holed up in the tiny smoking nook behind Olive Chicken; neither of you smoke, but it’s a good excuse to go outside and get fresh air during longer shifts. 

“Hey, don’t ask me, I’m not the one who’s taking the course. I think lychee martini sounds interesting, though.”

“Agree to disagree.” Seokjin unwraps one of the complimentary chocolates the restaurant gives to diners with their bill, swallowing it whole. “Besides, we all know Taehyung could approach you with dirty, used fryer oil and you’d let him dip you in it.”

You slap the next chocolate out of his hand before it reaches his mouth. He’s unmoved and simply plucks another from his pocket, which is apparently bulging with them.

“Yoongichi,” Jin says, calling to the delivery boy, who’s just appeared from the dark like some tired-eyed spectre of fried chicken. “Tell me this. If I were to ask you what smell of massage oil you’d prefer, what—”

“I would say that I really could not care less.” Yoongi flops down on one of the rickety fold-out chairs before silently accepting a chocolate from Seokjin’s stash. “And then I’d ask why you’re asking me in the first place, seeing as you’re the one using it, not me. If Taehyung’s asking what massage oil you’d prefer, Y/n, it’s because he wants to rub it all over you specifically.” Yoongi munches on the chocolate, already filling in the blanks without needing to be told the context. You really are that transparent, huh. “Please, we’ve been over this.”

Jin pouts. “You ruined my set up. I had a whole speech prepared.”

“Oh no.” Yoongi remains blank-faced. “How terrible.”

“I hate both of you,” you say. “I’m going to tell Pickles how mean you are.”

“I bet if that lizard could talk, he’d tell you how tired he was of you two dancing around each other, just like the rest of us,” Yoongi says.

There’s no dancing around, though, no matter what your friends say. Well. Not on Taehyung’s end anyway. You’re out here doing the fandango, castanets and all, while Taehyung just stands stock still, oblivious.

You let out an incredibly long sigh. Seokjin hands you a sympathetic chocolate.

The massage oil doesn’t make an appearance in your life for a little while, though. The end of the course comes and goes, Taehyung proudly flapping the laminated certificate at you, wobble-wobble-wobble, filling the apartment with the sound of rippling plastic. But no coconut oil.

The scent of ‘tropical coconut’ has started to haunt your dreams, in a way that’s both good and bad; when you wake up in a sweat, heart pounding, it’s not because you’re having nightmares, let’s just put it like that. It’s like there’s an invisible countdown that you can’t trace and it’s only a matter of time before it ticks over and the shoulder massages (that you’ve gotten very comfortable with) edge into something different. Taehyung’s going to innocently offer to give you a backrub and uncap that bottle of scented oil and you’re going to explode into a mess of putty under his hands.

Well… then again… you had been worried about that with all the shoulder rubs. Now look at you. You weather those like a champ. Sure, your skin tingles and you run hot and you think about the sensation of Taehyung’s hands gliding over you whenever you’re alone, but you’re basically fine. Your friend who just so happens to also be the great love of your life remains none the wiser.

You bet a full back rub would feel great after a long week.

Which is why when Taehyung steps into the apartment with a look on his face that you immediately recognise as tiredness, you sort of wish you knew how to massage people, too.

He falls into your arms with little fanfare. It’s been one of those days, one of those ones that everyone gets, even Taehyung—he’s usually so Switched On and Exuberant and Alive, and people don’t seem to realise that even he feels exhausted, sometimes.

“You alright, bubs?” You can’t massage him but you can rub his back soothingly, let him snuffle against your neck. Sometimes you think about that little space between your chin and collarbones as Taehyung’s, a hollow that’s perfect for him to press his face into, hair tickling your chin as he curls up into you. His and his alone. “Did something happen?”

He just shakes his head.

“Okay,” you say.

(Close proximity and skin on skin with Taehyung doesn’t always have your pulse rising and your heart racing. Sometimes it’s just this: quiet and soft, your heart bright with fierce affection for this boy, the only thought in your mind that you want him to be happy, forever.)

The long silence is broken by the sound of Taehyung heaving in a breath before letting out a long, exhausted sigh. 

“Thank you.” His voice is quiet and low, far less energetic than his usual self.

“Nothing to thank me for, Tae,” you reply. “Always here for you. You know that, right?”

He doesn’t respond straight away. He just burrows closer, draped over you, until he murmurs, barely audible. “Why?”

Your face twists. “Why, what? Why am I always here for you?”

“Yeah.” Taehyung squeezes himself impossibly closer, skin warm against yours, forehead pressed to the skin of your neck. You can’t see his expression from this angle.

“Because you’re one of my best friends and I love you,” you answer, immediately. You don’t even have to think about it. “Because you’re important to me and if there’s anything I can do for you, I will. I’ll celebrate the good things in your life with you, and I’ll be at your side during the bad times, just like you are with me. Please don’t ever forget how much I love you, okay?”

There’s a pause, and then it feels like all the tension leaves Taehyung’s body, slumping his whole body weight against you. “Okay,” he murmurs. “I love you too. Thank you,” he says again. You just reply by squeezing his shoulders.

He’s a little quieter for a few days after that. You’re not sure why, because he’d perked up after a lazy evening of lying around and eating too many snacks, flopped against you like an oversized, clinging starfish—but you’re gentle with him nonetheless. 

(Well. You’re always gentle with him. It just takes you half a second to fold in the face of his whims, rather than a whole, full second.)

So when the dreaded bottle of oil finally appears, you’re far less ready to fight off Taehyung’s insistence on a full body massage, caught off guard after days of indulging him. Fuck. 

“You’ve had a long week!” Taehyung insists as you scrabble your way over the sofa’s backrest so you can hide behind it, clutching a cushion to your chest. “You need to relax!”

Without looking you fling the cushion over the sofa. Judging from the fact that Taehyung doesn’t make a sound, you’ve missed. “I was feeling perfectly relaxed until you started yelling at me about it! Why are you so obsessed with the idea of me being relaxed?”

Taehyung doesn’t respond. Oh, crap. Maybe you did hit him with the cushion?

You pop up from behind the sofa. Nope. It's an embarrassing distance away from Taehyung, who’s got that surprisingly large bottle of oil held loosely in his hands. There’s an expression on his face that you can’t decipher; a little crestfallen, a little unsure, but there’s something else there, too, something you can’t put a name to.

“Taehyung?”

“I just… wanted to help,” he says. “You’re always there for me when I’m not feeling great, and you calm me down, and I wanted to do the same for you.”

You immediately feel like the worst human being alive. Take the feeling you get whenever you accidentally step on an animal’s tail, multiply it by infinity, and that’s only just a drop in the ocean of awful, awful guilt that you’re drowning in. 

“Oh, Tae,” you say. Your voice comes out so much softer and sweeter than you mean it to, but you can't help it. “I’m sorry. I was just joking. It’s really nice of you to be so concerned. You just surprised me. You do help me relax and your massages are great.” (You tell him that often enough that he should know it, but it never hurts to repeat a compliment.)

His face lifts. It’s like the sun bursting forth from the clouds after heavy rain, and you have to resist the urge to shield your eyes, blinded by the brightness and beauty. Kim Taehyung is so unfairly gorgeous (but what else is new?). “So I can give you a massage?”

Despite the fact the prospect makes you want to fling yourself into space, when you’re faced with Taehyung’s dark eyes and wide smile and large, warm hands, you cave, because of course you do. If, way back when you’d first been frying up that kimchi rice and letting Taehyung thrust his phone into your face, you’d been told you’d end up in this position, you would have laughed outright. Haha, yeah, sure, like you’d be stupid enough to let yourself be wrangled into such a vulnerable state in front of Taehyung, nowhere to run, helpless under his fingers. Not.

But here you are. Whipped for Kim Taehyung, forever and always.

The pastel blue towels under your stomach and chest are soft as they shield you from the cold, hard floor. You’re incredibly aware of how chilly the apartment feels, air prickling against your bare skin; you shift to try and get comfortable, glancing over your shoulder to fiddle with the towel that’s draped over your hips and ass, making sure it’s covering everything. Taehyung insists on authenticity (as if you’re not lying on the floor of your apartment rather than on a massage table) and he says that it’s normal to be completely naked for a full-body massage, even underneath any towels that are covering you up.

Authenticity is also why he’s in the other room, warming up the massage oil, because that’s apparently a thing?

(You’re going to die.)

It doesn’t matter that Taehyung will only be able to see the back of your head, your shoulder blades, the small of your back, a slip of your thighs, your calves. None of these things are especially scandalous; all the parts of your body that someone might find more interesting are out of sight, pressed against the floor or hidden under a layer of Egyptian cotton microfibres. 

And yet you can’t help but be hyperaware of how you’re entirely unclothed. Even if it doesn’t bother Taehyung—what with, you know, the fact he’s not interested in you like that and doesn’t find you attractive at all (sigh)—embarrassment creeps hot and uncomfortable under your skin.

It just feels so crazy intimate to be laid out like this, even if people do this all the time, happily strip down to let professionals rub the tension out of their body. 

(Then again, most people aren’t best friends with their masseuses and haven’t harboured long, one-sided crushes on them, either.)

Just breathe. You can do this. You love the shoulder massages that Taehyung’s been giving you; just think of this as a shoulder massage. 

… A shoulder massage that involves warm oil, near-nakedness, and Taehyung’s hands sliding all over you.

… You are going to have a very long venting session with Pickles after all this.

You’re so distracted by your own self pity and distress that you don’t register the sound of Taehyung entering the room; the little pause when he steps over the threshold, feet stuttering, just for a moment. It’s only when he’s kneeling down that you notice his presence, body jolting from surprise before you let out a slip of high laughter.

“Jesus, Tae,” you say. In any other circumstance, you’d be clutching your chest. “You scared me.”

“Sorry.” He sounds genuinely apologetic.

Your cheek is pillowed on your arms. When you turn to look at your best friend you immediately regret it; he’s settled back on his ankles, knees spread wide, and you come eye-to-eye with his crotch.

In an effort to look away from his clothed dick, your gaze flies up to his face, which might be even worse. He has this intense look in his eyes, and wow, alright, you’ve never been able to see Taehyung’s face as he’s been massaging you, but you never realised exactly how seriously he seems to take it, judging from his expression.

(Do all massage therapists look like that when they work?)

“That’s alright.” You’re a little breathless, but you’re going to blame that on how your boobs are smooshed into the floor, and not on anything else, nuh uh. Shoulder massage. It’s a shoulder massage. It’s just like a full bodied shoulder massage. (Maybe if you repeat it to yourself often enough then you’ll actually start to believe it.) “Uh. Do you need me to… do anything? Or do I just lie here?”

Taehyung’s expression lightens a little at the uncertainty in your tone, smile curling up the corners of his mouth. “You’re perfect right where you are,” he says, and then he reaches for the bottle of oil.

You turn your head away again, cheeks burning. There’s no way you’ll be able to handle the visual of him slicking his fingers and palms up. “Cool,” you say, voice only a little strained. “Coolcoolcoolcool.”

(It’s not cool.)

You don’t have a visual, but you do get the auditory experience thanks to the relative silence in the apartment. Goosebumps ripple down the back of your neck and trail down your spine at the sound of Tae’s hands sliding against each other, thoroughly coated in the warmed oil, and you’re so glad that you can blame it on the chill in the air.

At first, it’s okay. Taehyung starts at the parts of your body that are used to receiving his attention, though it’s different without the barrier of clothing in the way, not to mention how easily his palms glide over you, the air full of the light scent of coconut. It’s different, but manageable, and you think you just might be okay; as always, his touches are firm but careful, and your body is used to this by now, relaxing.

But. The second you feel Taehyung’s touch between your shoulder blades, you stiffen with a shiver. The oil is the perfect temperature against your skin, but you’ve always had a sensitive back; you can’t help but clench your fists, digging your fingers into your palms. Relax. Just breathe. 

“You’ve got a lot of tension here.” Taehyung’s voice is low as he digs the heel of his palm into the dip of your spine.

It’s because you’re touching me there, you think to yourself, but just let out a non-committal hum of agreement instead. 

You feel Taehyung's hands, a repeated sliding motion between your shoulder blades; the tension starts to leak out of you again, but your breath hitches in your throat at how you're pressed downwards and into the cotton towels beneath you, nipples hardening against them.

Thank God you're on your front so Tae can't see what effect he's having on you.

“Better?”

Taehyung's voice is always deep, but you'd swear it was even deeper in this moment, pitched low. Maybe that’s because the sound of blood pumping is filling your ears so it’s hard to discern. At this point, who even knows? Not you, that’s for sure.

“Yep.” Why are you so breathless? You haven’t moved at all, but you sound like you’ve just run the 100m sprint, winded and weak. “So much better.”

You regret agreeing to this. You are so out of your depth and there’s no way you’re going to be able to hide exactly how much this is affecting you and you want to collapse in on yourself and shrivel up like a sundried tomato, tiny and wrinkly and underwhelming. 

Taehyung shifts to reach more of you and you squeeze your eyes shut so you don’t come face first with his crotch again, shielding yourself from the view of his loose linen trousers stretched almost taut with how wide his knees are. It’s both a blessing and a curse—a blessing because you’re saved from aforementioned view, but a curse because your sensation of touch is heightened, and all you’re aware of is his hands sliding down your sides. You’d swear those fingers were so long he could circle your waist with ease.

(Massages are meant to relax you and yet you’ve never felt so tense in your life.)

Taehyung clicks his tongue against the back of his teeth. “I can’t get a good angle like this,” he mutters.

Before you can think anything or say anything, you become aware of the sound of moving and shifting and—

Your eyes fly open. Taehyung’s straddling your thighs, heavy and warm, and you suck in a breath so sharp and fast you can feel your chest expand, brain full of the screaming clang of warning bells. There’s no way this is a normal masseuse thing. There’s no way. It’s intimate and entirely too physical and there’s absolutely no way that this is something Taehyung learned in class. 

(What is he doing?)

But then any coherent thought in your brain slips when his hands settle on you again.

They so, so lightly brush the hem of the towel that preserves your modesty, and you can’t help the full-body shiver that wracks through you. You suck your lips into your mouth, swallowing down the noise that threatens to bubble up in your throat. There’s the sensation of fingers trailing up the line of your spine, feather light, smoothed by the slide of oil, and you feel like molten lava, burning hot and bright.

“Taehyung.” Your voice is high and faint.

His fingers splay down your ribcage and run down your sides, confident and smooth, warm with that coconut-scented oil, and you’re dying, you’re living; you want to disappear, you never want this to end. 

“Taehyung,” you repeat. Your voice shakes.

He hums, low and indulgent. “Yes?”

“M-my thighs,” you stammer, unable to articulate yourself. Why are you on my thighs, oh God, you’re so warm and heavy on top of me, oh God oh God oh God.

Taehyung completely misunderstands you. “Oh? Of course.” He sounds nonchalant. “I’ll massage those next.”

You can feel the drag of his linen trousers against your skin as he moves down to rest on your calves, and hear the bottle open as Taehyung drizzles more oil over his hands, far more than he could possibly need. His palms feel so broad and warm against the smoothness of your thighs, touches firm and confident as he digs his fingers into the muscle, and, oh, fuck, this is, this is too much—

Your legs jump when Taehyung hitches the towel up, just a little, baring more of your body.

“Fuck.” You can't keep quiet any longer. “Tae, I’m fine, I’m feeling way less tense now.”

He’s still, for a moment, before his hands slide up the back of your thighs. “Are you sure? You want me to stop?”

It’s only then that you realise how deeply Taehyung is breathing, fast and low, voice rough and gravelled. His fingers rest in wait, warm and slick with oil; you’re so close to losing any modicum of modesty, only one motion away from that towel being rucked high enough that there’s nothing protecting you from Taehyung’s touch and eyes.

“I haven’t finished yet, though,” he continues, digging his thumbs into your skin as he pulls his hands down your thighs, mindlessly following the motions he’s been taught. “There’s still more to go.”

You could twist around to look at him but you’re almost afraid to look at his face, afraid of what you’d find there. He sounds as affected as you are, but there’s absolutely no way. There’s no way.

“You don’t need to do the whole massage if I’m feeling relaxed, right?” 

(Because you’re feeling so relaxed right now, of course, and not like you’re about to go supernova and burst into heat and light. Absolutely.)

(But.)

(But. Taehyung’s hands settle at the back of your knees, swiping the sensitive skin with his thumbs. You can’t see his face, but you can feel something in that touch, something more than skin deep, like it’s sinking into you, through skin and muscle and bone, in in in, settling inside you, a flicker of—of—)

“Want to do this perfectly for you,” he murmurs. You clench your hands at the husky note in his voice, nails digging so hard into your palms it hurts. “You deserve the best. I want you to feel good.”

He must be able to see your back rise and fall as you breathe in sharply.

“Taehyung.” Almost pleading. 

“Yes, love?”

You suck in another sharp breath. The pet name sounds so soft and sweet in his mouth, somehow, even with the heated edge to his voice. One that’s definitely there. You’re not imagining it. 

(You’re not.)

“Do you want me to make you feel good?” he continues.

Before you can think, you nod.

“Yes,” you whisper. “Please.”

You’re trembling. Taehyung’s still heavy and warm across the back of your calves, sliding one hand to the inside of a knee and up the soft skin of your inner thighs. You instinctively shift them apart, as far as you can with Taehyung trapping your legs, and, oh, his hand is going higher, oh—

His hand is so big, cupping your overheated sex. It’s hard to tell where the oil ends and your own arousal begins, flushed wet and hot; when he dips his middle finger between your lower lips, long and gentle and firm, you let out a noise you didn’t realise you were capable of. The angle is off, a little awkward, the motions of Taehyung’s fingers stifled by how you’re lying flush to the ground, but God, you’re so turned on it barely matters.

You’re hyperaware of everything. The soft touch of air on the cooling oil across your skin. The fall of the towel, bunched around your waist, slowly slipping to one side. Taehyung’s hand, his fingertips easing through the heat of you, sliding over your clit, over your entrance, slow and soft and amazing. 

“Again,” you plead. “Again, Tae, please.”

“Feels good?” He asks, and you squeeze your eyes shut as you nod, cheek still pillowed against your arm.

“So good,” you say. “But I want more, please, Tae.”

“Anything you want,” he murmurs.

Taehyung’s hand shifts between your legs again, so hot, so big, so reverent. The slide is smooth as his fingers press into your folds, practically gliding. You twist beneath him, letting out a noise of displeasure when he draws his hand away, but then he lifts off your calves. You let him thrust your legs apart before he resettles between them.

Just as you’re distracted with the towel being tugged away from your hips, baring you entirely, Taehyung slides a finger into your weeping cunt.

You whine. It's so long. Now that your calves aren’t trapped, there’s nothing to stop you from rutting back against his fingers. He splays his other hand over the soft flesh of your ass, encouraging the rolling motion of your hips, and you’re gasping, wanton in your noises of desire and pleasure. One finger becomes two, and then three, Taehyung’s voice a low undercurrent to your stuttered moans as he presses them as deep as he can.

“Just like that, angel,” he breathes. “Want you to feel good, keep making those pretty noises, let me know how good it is—”

“Taehyung,” you whine, dragging the syllables of his name out when he curls his fingers inside you, so amazing, hitting you in all the right places.

“Baby.” He sounds wrecked, words sliding together, and you haven’t even touched him yet. “You’re so hot n’ wet, fuck. So perfect. Just like that, keep moving like that.”

You can hear the slick sounds of his thrusts into you. He’s already learned what you like, twisting his fingers in a way that leaves you breathless; they’re so fucking long, sliding into your greedy cunt with ease, reaching so much deeper than your own can. His pretty lovely hands are on you, inside you, and you’re heady at the thought.

“There, Tae, don’t stop, please, p-please.” The coil twists tighter in between your legs, a taut thread that’s ready to snap. He listens, repeating the motion that’s pulling you closer to the edge, eyes wide, staring at the way you’re writhing underneath him; the way the oil on your back and legs shimmers in the light, the evidence of his touch all over you, shining. “Tae, oh, God, right there, yes, yes, yes—”

Your entire body goes tense and then you’re cumming around Taehyung’s fingers, clenching your thighs together, trapping him inside as you buck your hips. You grind back against his hand, a loud moan falling from your lips, drowning out the noise of awe that Taehyung makes when he feels your walls pulsate around him. You're warm and tight and wet, arousal flooding thick against his skin, and he lets out a stuttered groan, fingers buried knuckle deep inside you, feeling every wave of pleasure that rocks through your core.

You’re panting by the time you settle back down and barely make a sound when Taehyung drags his fingers out of you. When he leans down the oil on your skin feels tacky against his clothes, material sticking to you, chest to back, hips to ass. You can feel the hot curve of him through his trousers, his cock heavy, getting harder—and it feels sososo good.

Taehyung’s face is so close, now, chin hooked over your shoulder. Even though you can feel the hardness of his cock pressed against you, the smile on his face is so gentle. Your heart thrums in your chest.

“So cute n' pretty,” he says, and presses his nose to the soft curve of your cheek. Rather than coconut, all you can smell is his shampoo, familiar and homely and heady. “All over. God, I can’t believe you’d let me touch you like this. I’m so lucky. Was that good, baby?”

“Yes,” you say, and then, because you’re still floating in a light haze of disbelief: “I’m the lucky one.” 

Taehyung laughs, low and quiet. It’s a honeyed moment, dripping slow and sweet, even sweeter when he tilts his head forward. His lips are soft against your cheekbone, your jaw, and when you turn towards him, they’re even softer against your mouth. You can feel the shape of his smile, and it tastes so bright, small kisses that turn open mouthed, so perfect. Because you’re kissing Kim Taehyung, your Taehyung, something you’ve been dreaming about for so long, now—even if this entire situation is pretty unbelievable, honestly.

When you pull back, his eyes spark with unadulterated joy. He’s warm and heavy, pinning you down against the towels that are soft against your front; arching your spine, you lean back against the weight of Taehyung’s body, his cock fattening up through the layers of clothes that separate you. He lets out a breath of surprise before he grinds down, pressing that hard heat against you, and your cunt clenches.

“Can I finish the massage?” He asks, sounding almost eager, even with the rasp of lust in his voice. You can’t help but laugh, an affectionate giggle that has you knocking your foreheads together.

“Of course,” you say, and he catches your lips again, swallowing the last of your laughter, sweeping his tongue over your lips, inside your mouth, wet and hot and a little messy, but good. 

“You need to be on your back,” Taehyung continues, slow after the kiss is broken, and, oh, okay, that has you shivering. “If you want to?”

Of course you want to.

“Okay,” you whisper. “Let me move.”

He shifts to give you room, but not before pressing a kiss to the back of your neck, the bump of the top of your spine, lips sliding against the oil that he’d rubbed there earlier, goosebumps erupting over your skin.

“So good to me,” he whispers. You don’t think he even means for you to hear it. 

(It’s said without thought; not thoughtless, no, but a soft little thing that says so much. A thought that’s slipped across his mind and fallen from his lips, warm and tender. Like you’re always good to him, and he sees it, he knows it, he feels it, he thinks it, and he’s almost in disbelief about it, because you’re so good to him.)

You feel warm and languid after cumming, loose-limbed as you flop onto your back. There’s no going back now. There’s no going back from this moment, naked and vulnerable under Taehyung, nothing hidden away any more—the soft fall of your breasts, your stomach, the lines of your hips, your fingers tightening in the towels spread beneath you as Taehyung’s eyes drink you in, wide and overawed at the sight of your flushed cunt, ripe and slick and ready for him.

(There's no more hiding how much you want Taehyung to have you, body and heart alike.)

You can see the shape of your body silhouetted on his clothes, where the oil has seeped into the material from how close he’d been pressed against you. You can see just how affected he is, cock straining against the loose linen of his white trousers, and you bite your lip to try and stifle the sound you make.

“Look at you,” Taehyung breathes, kneeling between your legs. “You’re so perfect.”

Your cheeks burn. “Taehyung, please,” you say, embarrassed. You really aren’t, especially in comparison to model-gorgeous Kim Taehyung, eyes dark and full of heated lust, hair falling in his eyes, effortlessly beautiful, always.

“You are,” he insists. “You have no idea how perfect you are.”

Before he reaches for the massage oil, he sucks the taste of you off his fingers, sloppy and messy. Your pussy throbs at the sight. And—you were also right about the visual being too much to handle, breath catching in your throat as you watch it drip into his broad hands. His palms shine as he rubs them together, interlacing his fingers, so graceful in their motions. You’re so wet from your orgasm, only getting wetter as you stare back at Taehyung, whose gaze has been heavy on you the whole time.

He starts at your collarbones. It’s even slower than before, and you ease underneath him, revelling in the softness of his touch. He sweeps his hands over your shoulders, down your arms, circling his long fingers around your wrists before lifting one of your hands. Your eyelashes flutter as he presses a kiss to your palm, a motion so full of adoration and tenderness it steals your breath away, and you squirm, shy.

“Tae,” you whine. “You can’t just do that.”

Of course he doubles down, lifting your other hand and repeating the motion, letting his lips linger between your head line and your heart line. “I can,” he says, words warm in your cupped palm. 

“I hope you didn’t do this in class.” Your voice is too weak for it to come out as the joke you mean it to be. 

Taehyung just shakes his head, mouth brushing over the tips of your fingers. “Only for you,” he says. “Did the whole class for you. I wanted—wanted an excuse to touch you more,” he admits, and your heart feels like it’s going to launch itself out of your throat.

“Then touch me,” you say, trying to sound confident even if your cheeks burn.

And he does. He lets your hands drop, gliding his touch back up your arms, down your body, over your legs; he massages your thighs and calves, digs his thumbs into the arches of your feet, circling his fingers around your ankles, shackles you don’t want to escape from. You feel so relaxed and lax, somehow, even if every touch has you biting your lip, anticipation roiling  in your stomach for what’s to come, Taehyung laying your legs down softly before he shifts back up, hands held out towards you—

—then he cups your breasts in his big, big hands and your back arches, fingers sliding over your nipples, glistening with coconut oil, circling them with the pads of his thumbs. You let out an embarrassing whine.

“Oh, Tae,” you beg. “More, please.”

“Whatever you want, sweetheart.”

You smile at another soft, unexpected pet name, flustered, but then your eyes slide shut when Taehyung bends down to kiss your neck as he continues to run his hands over the swell of your breasts. He trails his lips over your oiled skin, shifts down, drawing a line from your neck to the valley of your chest, the hard line at the center of your ribcage.

“Tae,” you murmur, and then, feeling bold under the heat of Taehyung’s dark eyes— “Baby.”

He hums before laying another sloppy kiss against your sensitive skin. You can feel the curve of his smile in the kiss. “Yes, love?”

“Is it really okay for you to… you know… get that oil in your mouth? I don’t want you to get sick,” you say, concerned, even through the haze of your arousal. His lips shine with it, at how he’s been trailing his mouth over all the parts of your body that he’s touched.

There’s a short beat, and then Taehyung buries his head against your neck—in that little hollow that’s his, in a motion he’s done dozens of times. Except this time you’re naked and he still has fingers splayed across the soft skin of your chest, nipples dragging underneath his palms.

“You’re always so considerate.” His words are muffled against your skin. “It’s fine. It’s edible.”

“You got edible massage oil from your course?”

Taehyung hesitates. “No,” he admits. “I bought it. It’s edible and, uh. Safe for intimate use.”

You’re silent, just for a moment, and then you can’t help it. You start to laugh. 

“Kim Taehyung,” you say, body shaking with amusement. “Did you buy edible massage oil that you can also use as lube?”

Taehyung pulls his face away from your neck and glances up. You’re giggling at him, and he feels so full of love and affection; he can’t help but join in, both laughing at him, loud and carefree.

“It’s why I asked which one you liked,” he confesses, once he can catch his breath.

“I can’t believe you lied to me,” you say, but you don’t mind, really, and he knows it. You lift a hand to push hair out of his face, running your fingers down his scalp. He leans into your touch with a smile, bright and lovely, before he abruptly shifts one of his hands down so he can lick a hot, wet stripe across the skin of your breast.

That stops your laughter pretty fast, surprised hiccup shifting into a broken moan when he engulfs your nipple in the heat of his mouth. “O-oh,” you gasp. “Oh, Taehyung—”

“Been thinking about this for so long.” Taehyung’s eyes are lidded and dark as he leans back, watching the way you react to his touch, arching up towards him. “Wanted to touch you like this so much.”

“Wanted it too,” you breathe. “Wanted—oh, God, Tae, fuck—”

It’s overwhelming. Not just the way Taehyung is flicking his tongue over each of your nipples, pressing his lips against your skin, no—but the idea that he’s been hoping for this, too. Each wet motion of his tongue over your pebbled skin drags pulls out of you; Taehyung’s cock twitches at a loud keen that’s drawn from your lips, a wet patch of precum seeping through his boxers and trousers, darkening the fabric, even though you haven’t touched him yet.

When you reach out to grasp him through his clothes, his hips jolt forward and he bites off a surprised gasp, cutting through the sound with his teeth. He feels long and heavy as you stroke him, thumbing over the wet patch at his tip, hot, even through all those layers between your skin and his.

“I want to feel you, Tae,” you say, staring at him. “Inside me. Please.”

His breath hitches when you tighten your fingers around his shaft and drag your hand upwards, slow and intent. 

“The oil isn’t condom friendly,” he admits, abashed. 

“Then you can cum in my mouth,” you reply. No hesitation.

Taehyung’s eyes are so wide, but then he smiles, eyes squeezing into crescents, mouth turning up into that lovely, broad grin of his. He looks so sweet and sincere, and you feel like you could explode, stuffed overfull with love for him.

“You really are perfect,” he says.

“Only for you,” you reply, your smile just as bright.

He lays one final kiss to your chest, above your beating heart, before he starts to strip. The oil has obviously soaked through his shirt and onto his skin because it sticks when he peels it off and carelessly throws it aside. 

Just like his heart, Taehyung’s body is soft and lovely. You sit up so you can touch him properly, catching him off guard when you pull him in for a kiss—one he eagerly leans into, and without the shirt in the way you can feel the way your skin slides against his, softened with oil. 

There really is no one as beautiful as Kim Taehyung. You drag your hands over him, so warm and wonderful under your palms; his chest, his cute tummy, his waist, his hips, the soft skin above his red, neglected cock. He’s radiant in his nakedness, every easing line of his body so perfect as he kneels in front of you, the flush of his skin, the heavy weight of his arousal, head shining with precum, so wet it’s practically dripping.

You lean in to kiss his neck and nip at his Adam's apple as his hands slide over your shoulder blades and down your back, the parts that make you shudder.

“Want you, Tae.” You whisper into his mouth, a soft secret that isn’t really a secret at all, not any more. “All of you.”

“Going to give you everything you want.” The words flow out of him with ease. “Everything you want.”

His chest and stomach shine with the massage oil that’s rubbed off from your own skin. You run your hands across him, and when you finally grasp his cock without the barrier of cloth in the way, he’s almost burning under your grasp, thick, his entire body shuddering when you pump his length. So sensitive to your touch.

“I’m goin’ to make you cum again,” he promises, and you love it, the way he talks when he’s losing himself. “Bet you’ll feel so good around my cock, so perfect.”

A shiver skates through your body. Taehyung’s fingers dig into your skin when he feels you trembling under his hands, and all you can think about is how you want him in you.

“Please,” you say. “Please, wanna make you feel good too—”

“Hands and knees, angel,” he rasps, and, God, yes, those words cut straight through you, sharp and electric.

Maybe you should feel embarrassed at how quickly you obey. The towels underneath you, so carefully placed at the start, perfectly flat, become rumpled as you shift into position; you arch your back, wanting to look as good as possible, and glance over your shoulder to see if it works.

Judging from the look on Taehyung’s face, it does. He looks like he’s never seen anything more awe-inspiring, eyes wide and mouth a little slack, dumbstruck. But then his jaw snaps shut and he splays his hands over the soft skin of your hips, your waist, your ass, shuffling closer to you; you feel the curve of his cock slide against your skin and you bite back a noise of need.

“Fuck, so beautiful.” He ruts forward, and you can feel the wetness of his precum slicking against you, a beaded line drawn across the sheen of massage oil. “My beautiful, perfect girl.”

“Tae,” you plead, already overwhelmed with need, heart squeezing at his words.

“Just one more thing, angel, I promise.”

It’s a good thing that the bottle of massage oil is so big, considering how liberal Taehyung is with it. You gasp when he uses one hand to spread your ass and before you can react there’s a drizzle of oil falling onto your skin, down-down-down, over your cunt, dripping over your inner thighs; Taehyung catches the excess with his palms before he slicks himself up, spreading that sweet coconut over his throbbing cock.

(You wonder what it’ll taste like when you lick it off him.)

When you feel the blunt head of his cock nudging at your pussy, your entire body lights up in anticipation, nerve endings on fire, every inch of your body singing under Taehyung’s touch—and when he finally sinks in, it’s almost effortless. He’s thick and long but everything slides so easy; you gasp and he moans, both lost in how your body opens up for him, hot and wet. By the time he’s bottomed out you're a quivering mess, collapsed onto your elbows. You’re so full. You feel split open in all the best ways, wanting to draw him in impossibly deeper even so.

Taehyung is gripping your sides, hands unmoving even with the slick oil underneath them, fingers digging into your skin. He��s breathing so loud, and when you experimentally shift your hips, he bites back a noise that cuts through that breath.

“How’s it feel, love?” His words slur together in arousal, but the hand that strokes your back is slow, thoughtful. “Feel good?”

“Fuck me, Tae, baby, please,” you beg. It’s so, so so much, so good, amazing, hotter and bigger and harder than anything you’d let yourself imagine, your entire body taking Taehyung and holding him in, in, in. “Please, I need it, it feels good but I want more, please.”

When he pulls away it’s slow and torturous and he goes so far he almost slips out, cock nearly sliding out of your folds. You whine, a little shameless, mostly needy, but then—

The snap of his hips drives you forwards, towels shifting underneath as you scrabble for a hold on something. Each sharp motion of Taehyung’s body has you choking for air and letting out whimpers and gasps, drowned out by the slap of skin on skin; his hipbones meet the soft flesh of your ass, again and again, but all you can focus on is the thick heat of his cock inside you, in-out-in-out, the press of his balls against your clit, everything so wet and smooth and slick.

You can feel how you’re losing yourself to that heady place that’s golden bright with feeling, lust and sex, the rest of the world gone, unimportant. There’s nothing but this—Taehyung touching you, filling your body so well, so perfect, helping you chase that high that’s growing faster and faster, that precipice of pleasure that he’s going to throw you over again, intent on it.

One of his hands trails up your back, between that sensitive dip of your shoulder blades and into your hair, locks tangling with coconut oil before he urges you up. He doesn’t yank or pull but his hold is firm and you end up back on your hands, arms trembling as you try to keep your balance, back bowed, overwhelmed. 

“Baby,” he rasps. “Oh, you’re so tight n’ hot, so pretty, fuck. You feel so good, do you feel good?”

Your answer is almost a wail, so overcome with pleasure, sensation, the glide of his hands over your shining skin, the mix of oil and arousal that drips out of you, only getting wetter with each thrust of his hips into you. “So good, o-oh God, Tae, baby, fuck, oh, theretherethere—”

“Here?”

He punctuates this with a roll of his hips, using the hand still on your hip to pull you back onto his cock as he fills you up once more, throbbing heat. He bends over you, and this time, there’s nothing stopping the skin on skin contact, the slide of his chest against your back as he kisses the soft skin behind your ear, nipping at your lobe, and that’s it, you’re gone. Your eyes slide shut and your mouth falls open as another orgasm crashes through you, legs shaking as you cum around Taehyung’s cock, grinding back against him to drag out that pleasure; the only thing holding you up is the hand still in your hair, the lips trailing up the side of your bared neck, the hard cock inside you, keeping you against him, so many points of connection with Taehyung.

(His chest pressed against your back, heart beating so hard you can feel it, your own heart moving in tandem, matching him.)

He’s been whispering filth to you, heated praise and love, how good you feel, how beautiful you are, what it’s like to see you like this, touch you like this, have you like this. Lovely, pretty, perfect, gorgeous, hot n’ wet n’ tight, fuck, love, oh.

You’re still shivering, the final pulses of your orgasm curling through you with each unintentional shift of Taehyung’s hips, the drag of his length inside your inner walls. You can feel something dripping out of you; oil, cum, you don't know, but fuck, it feels so so good.

“Oh, God,” you say. Breathless. “Oh, Taehyung, oh.”

“Pretty darling,” he murmurs. He swivels his hips, grinding against you, and your entire body jolts with oversensitivity, clit swollen where his balls press against it. You tighten around him and groan at how hot and big he still feels inside, even as you still shiver from the come down of your second orgasm. “Gonna roll you over so I can see that perfect face.”

And when you’re on your back again, fucked out and mussed and wrecked, he just stares at you. You’ve watched his face for so long, seen so many expressions flit across his features, but never something like this—it’s a mix of amazement and awe and tenderness and lust and love, a lift to his brows and a spark in his eyes and a set to his lips.

And when he leans down to kiss you, that look doesn’t leave. It melts and softens around the edges as you catch each other's mouths, as you kiss and kiss, small tender things interspersed with longer, deeper touches, lips and teeth and tongue—his eyes darken and his mouth flushes darker pink, kiss swollen and so beautiful, but that expression stays. It stays for you. 

Kim Taehyung is beautiful and lovely and unique. Kim Taehyung is so far out of your reach it’s kind of stunning, actually. And yet, here you are, existence of his touch over every part of you, in every part of you, lust driven, love full; the carefully balanced weight of his body splayed over you, pinning you down, keeping you close.

“I wanna see you cum, Tae,” you say. “Please?”

And just like he always does, Taehyung indulges you, just like you indulge him. He presses back inside you, cunt opening up for him so easy, so smooth, like his touch has already been etched into the memory of your body, perfect for him. He stays pressed close, face so near as he rolls into each thrust, sweat and coconut oil painted across your skin as your bodies shift together.

He’s been covering you in his words, both heated and sweet, and now you return the favour. You tell him how good he feels, how beautiful he is, so good, so perfect, so considerate, how much you’ve wanted this. So good, so long and thick, oh, Tae, feels so good, ah-ah-ah, baby, you’re unreal, fuck.

You can see the exact moment he starts to reach his high, the way he sucks in air, the way he lifts his chin, starts to thrust a little harder, a little faster, chasing that thread of pleasure that’s spiralling through him, and you urge him on. You lift your hips and clench so tight it has him gasping, hips stuttering, and you press your nose against his jaw, saying give it to me give it to me give it to me, wanting him to feel the same pleasure he’s given you. 

When he pulls out, you’re too busy moving to pay attention to how empty you feel, settling between his legs and swallowing down his shining cock almost desperately. There’s no coconut. You can only taste yourself and when you lave your tongue across his slit it’s all Taehyung-Taehyung-Taehyung, hot and salt and bitter; he gasps and his hips jump and you take it all, lowering your head as far as you can, the head of his cock at the back of your throat before you pull up, dragging your tongue over the pulsing vein at the underside, messy and wet. You drink down the wetness of his cock, your own arousal, mixed with his, the precum that beads at his head, staring up at him, your hands sliding over the sheen of his stomach, his thighs, cupping his balls, everything slick with oil and sweat.

“Oh, God.” Taehyung’s eyes are blown and his hair is a mess and his mouth is wide open as he pants for air, watching. “Baby, baby, I’m gonna cum, I’m gonna cum.”

You suck hard, dragging your lips up from the base of the cock to the rounded tip, swirling your tongue, bobbing your head faster—

“Oh, fuck—”

—and you swallow down each wave of cum, swallow down the way his cock twitches as he spills the evidence of pleasure into your mouth, swallow down the lovely noises that shudder out of him, watching him the whole time, never wanting to look away.

When you take your mouth off his softening cock, you draw a line of kisses with your mouth, up the soft skin of his body, stomach to chest to neck to mouth. He licks the taste of coconut oil off your lips, the taste of himself off your tongue; you curl up in his lap, settled against him, the apartment’s cool air even sharper against your skin, magnified by the oil that still lingers.

(Even without the oil painted across him, Taehyung would still shine, even under the weak light from the cheap lightbulb that hangs above you.)

You feel soft and warm and small in the circle of Taehyung’s arms, pulled close, and you can hear the words in his chest as he speaks, a resonance that touches against your skin.

“‘M sorry,” he murmurs. 

You pause.

“Baby, love, darling.” The endearments are sugar sweet in your mouth, soft against his skin before you pull back to look at him, confused, concerned. “Sorry for what?”

“I really—I really was just planning to do a massage, but you’re so…” 

You let out a slip of laughter. The room smells of coconut and sex, but when you lay your head against Taehyung’s collarbone all you can smell is the light tinge of his sweat. You breathe in, deep, like you can hold onto that ephemeral part of him. “Oh, Tae. I’m so what?”

“You’re so good,” he says. “So good and kind and lovely and—and so beautiful. I was going to do the massage to make you happy and then… tell you. About how happy you make me.”

You burrow your head into the hollow of his neck, the way he does to you, shy. “I’m not as beautiful as you,” you reply. “Tae, you are literally the most beautiful person alive, and—God, I’ve. I’ve been. So head over heels for you.”

There’s a pause. “Really?”

When you pull back to fix Taehyung with all the surprise in your gaze, you can see that he’s surprised, too. His hair hangs into his eyes, and he looks a little unsure, like he believes you, but finds it impossible to fathom.

You leave massage oil on his cheeks when you cup his face in your hands, staring at him with wide eyes. “Kim Taehyung, I have had daily breakdowns about the intensity of my love for you to Pickles ever since we got him. You’re the first person I think about each morning—usually because we wake each other up—and the last thing I think about at night—well, usually because you end up climbing into my bed more often than not, but, it still counts,” you say. You’re both tangled together in so many ways already. “You’ve had my heart for a long time, you know. I just never thought I had a chance?”

When Taehyung kisses you, it’s brief, a hard press of his lips before he rests his forehead against yours. “You really, really have no idea how perfect you are,” he murmurs. “I’ve wanted—I want to do everything for you to show you how grateful I am for everything you do for me.”

“You don’t have to,” you protest, but he just smiles.

“I don’t have to, but I want to,” he says. “Like you don’t have to look after me, but you do.”

“That’s because I love you,” you say. “Like, capital L love you.”

You’ve been so afraid of confessing, so convinced that it was an unattainable dream; that Kim Taehyung would never, could never, has never seen you as more than a friend. But the way he’s looking at you now, the way he’s touched you, the way your body still echoes with the feeling of him inside you: you’re not scared, any more. You don’t need to be.

Taehyung’s eyes are so dark and warm when he replies, easy and effortless. “I love you, too.”

Your relationship has always been a give and take, is the thing. When you climb in the shower together, he washes the oil from your back while you massage shampoo into his scalp, laughing when he makes devil horns in his hair. He catches you by surprise when he presses you against the tiles, swallowing your moans when he coaxes one final orgasm from your tired body, rubbing tight circles over your clit as you buck against his hand and water cascades over you both. His cock hardens in your hands, sliding between your legs when you press them together, tight-tight-tight, his length rubbing against your cunt as he fucks your thighs until he’s moaning and shaking and cumming again.

(The water’s cold by the time you finally climb out, but that’s okay. You giggle and kiss as you dry yourselves, each other, excuses to keep touching and feeling, driven by affection, not lust.)

When you’re both clean, and dry, Taehyung’s leg thrown over your hip as he tugs you in, flush with his body under the covers, you press your lips against the line of his jaw.

“Taehyung?”

“Yes, angel?”

You smile and hunch up even closer to him, scrunching yourself up as small as you can to plaster yourself against his side. “Thank you for the wonderful massage. Definitely the best massage I’ve ever been given, ten out of ten, would do again.”

Taehyung laughs, pressing his rectangular smile into the kiss he lays against your lips, and you think that nothing tastes better than the happiness curling his mouth.

“Love you,” he murmurs. Always romantic. “I love you love you love you.”

“Tae-honey-hyung.” And it feels so nice to not have to filter your words, to bite back that second layer of meaning, to try and keep things platonic and chaste when you speak. “I love you.”

And it feels so nice to have your Taehyung beside you, your body still aching with the press of him inside you, a good ache, a nice ache. A physical ache from good love, rather than a heartache from a love you didn’t think was reciprocated. But it is, somehow, each of you so bowled over by each other.

--

(“Hey, Pickles.”

The bearded dragon looks up at you, placid as he lounges in his tank.

“Well, you’ll be happy to hear that you won’t have to put up with me ranting at you any more,” you say. “Taehyung did break out the massage oil but it’s all good. I didn’t spontaneously combust or anything, like I thought I would.”

Pickles’ tongue flicks out as he shifts, and you smile.

“Okay, that’s it, I��m done,” you finish. “Thanks, Pickles. You’re a real pal.”

Taehyung nuzzles into your neck. His arms are a tight circle around your waist, chin resting on your shoulder as he looks down at the reptile, too. He’s warm and solid against your back, and you lean into him, happiness tingling through you.

“I wonder how much longer we would have taken if you didn’t get that coupon for a massage therapy course,” you muse, and Taehyung chuckles, warm and lovely.

“We would have gotten there eventually. And we would have had each other until we did, anyway. Right, angel?”

Pickles stays quiet as you both kiss, but you can tell he approves.)

--

taglist: @beyoncesdragon​