#what’s keeping me solid is knowing that about five people will read this and that’s what matters

[kedsandtubesocks]

in the shadow (of your heart) - Mandalorian!Bakugo

pairing: Mandalorian!Katsuki Bakugo x Jedi!Reader

tags & warnings: (all characters aged-up 25+) Star Wars AU, intense yearning and light angst, brief discussion of raising children, a surprise Jedi!Todoroki x Smuggler!reader appearance, Monoma bestie supremacy, exploration of mandalorian lore and customs, inexperienced Bakugo and the endearing fluff that comes with him

wc: 7.6k

a/n: here it is…the cultivation of all my other snippets and ficlets that have led to this moment, you don’t necessarily need to read them before to understand this but I think it would just add to the goodness of reaching this point, biggest and dearest thank you to @willowser & @ofmermaidstories always being my mando bakugo squad, also the title of this piece comes from the always lovely Florence + the machine & her song ‘cosmic love’ - thank you for reading!

⋆｡ ﾟ☁︎｡ ⋆｡ ﾟ☾ ﾟ｡ ⋆ .𖥔 ݁ ˖☾𖤓.𖥔 ݁ ˖ ⋆｡ ﾟ☁︎｡ ⋆｡ ﾟ☾ ﾟ｡ ⋆

It’s been a galactic month since your entire world collapsed.

A month has passed since the Jedi temple was attacked. A month since you woke up and found yourself in the bedroom of the mandalorian that conquered your heart.

And a month since you…

The thought of what you did has you flinching in pain like you just touched an exposed live wire.

Someone calls out your name. When you turn there stands Shouto along with his intriguing friend - the scavenger pickpocket who could speak seven and maybe even more languages.

“We plan to explore Tatooine tomorrow.” Todoroki is patient and calm, a true honor to his Jedi title. “You’re more than welcomed to join us.”

Even his friend, the pickpocketing smuggler who still does not seem trustworthy, wears a rather understanding look mirroring Shouto’s.

You think of the heat on Tatooine, the blistering mirage of the sand and the change of scenery it might bring.

So you agree to go.

Shouto smiles a reassuring grin that whispers of how proud he is for you to take this step.

His smuggler friend grins wider. “Sweet, guess that means I get to steal a bigger means of transport for us.”

“No.” Shouto flat out swiftly shuts the idea down.

Something hollow, the echo of a laugh leaves you but you hope even this is the start of returning back to yourself.

You send Monoma a private message over your jailbroken data pad about your upcoming trip. He immediately calls as you pack.

“Sure Tatooine is boring but...” Neito begins, a bit bored himself. “You can go snag me one of those nice satchels the vendors there sell.”

The truth is easy to find under his words.

I’m glad you’re getting out, I’m glad you’re trying to move forward.

You ask if the Jedi council has anything new to stay and just thinking about it draws a deep ache in your soul.

“Nah. They’re mainly keeping busy overseeing the rebuilding process and there’s been no update on the hunt for the culprit.”

You sigh. There had been no leads or luck on your side of the search either.

“I’m not surprised. Leads are going cold. Even with Sir disgusting picture perfect Jedi knight Deku still on Naboo, we got nothing.”

Oddly enough you missed hearing Monoma complain about the shining star that emerged from your academy class.

“Let’s hope Tatooine has something.” You hope.

“Well now with you on the investigation team I know we’ll get shit done. And if not, I’m getting so close to blowing something up myself.”

“Hey now.” You playfully chide Monoma. “No threats of violence now, Jedi Knight.”

Monoma chuckles weakly but the comment draws blood at a barely healing wound.

A silence settles between you and your dear friend. Its heaviness over the call clogs your senses and painfully crawls over your skin.

“Miss you dummy.” Nieto coughs out through tears and you furiously blink back your own.

“Miss you too, you annoying ass.”

⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

Tatooine’s heat bears down unforgivingly.

The planet’s two suns stings your eyes. There’s even sand in places you didn’t think it could reach. But the liveliness of Mos Eisley, the commotion of the markets, comfort you and raise your spirits.

Under the dry air it feels as if you are resurfacing, emerging from a fog you have existed in for an entire month.

It’s invigorating, has you strolling through the markets with a relaxed ease.

Shouto and his smuggler, who is notoriously friendly with the Jawas, decide to check the junkyards first for any new information and leads. You instead head to the city to hopefully pick up any chatter about the temple.

After all, you are no longer in your Jedi robes.

So any fear of someone not speaking about the temple around you is gone.

Among the bustling marketplace in the heart of the city, a stall with shimmering jewels and trinkets twinkling under the two suns snags your attention. Specifically a beautiful iridescent gem like pendant immediately catches your eye. The jewel hangs off a simple sturdy leather thread and allows the stunning crystal to be center focus. Your fingers trace over it gingerly and fondly.

“Oh, are you planning to propose soon?”

The vendor suddenly asks intrigued and brightly curious. Her words make you choke out a wild dry cough.

“Excuse me?” You politely and weakly laugh.

“That’s an engagement pendant!” The older twi’lek woman beams excitedly with a twinkle in her eyes almost rivaling her jewelry.

“You have someone special in mind?”

The image of who you have in mind flashes fast. His striking black beskar armor, the electric orange and green trimming… his loud voice…

Your heart starts crumbling in your chest.

“No.” Your reply is rather hollow. “Just thought it looked beautiful.”

Whatever else the woman hears in your voice is enough to quiet any more questions she might have. You return to browsing the other jewels offered on the stand. But even with the beautiful craftsmanship before you, a slow poison seeps into your mouth and you try swallowing it back. But your heart remains an open wound thinking of that mandalorian.

And you think it always might be now.

The stall vendor who went silent now gasps so sharply it spooks you. You snap your gaze up to her.

Her eyes staring beyond you are wide and hypnotized.

“A mandalorian.” She whispers.

A terrifying dread runs up your spine. The rational voice screaming inside your head argues it could be any mandalorian, that you shouldn’t be getting this worked up.

You decide to see and prove to yourself that it is not the mandalorian haunting your existence.

When you turn off to the side -

You discover striking obsidian beskar armor, a beautiful ink dot against the shimmering sands.

Your heart collapses. Your legs almost buckle.

The familiar beskar helmet stares straight at you.

“Shitty Jedi!”

Then the mandalorian screams so gutturally loud that half of the market turns towards him.

You turn the other way and run.

Your heart races wildly loud in your ears, a horrifying war like drumbeat.

It can’t be him.

But in your heart of hearts you know it is. You would know it’s him in every lifetime, in any other reality.

In such a wild panic you can’t fully comprehend your focus. You even forget to use the force to run away.

A dead end hallway stops you in your tracks. Before you can bolt in another direction, a mandalorian descends down from the sky. He lands before you a fiery man of myth immortalized straight from his people’s creed.

“What the fuck?!” Bakugo screams at you raw and demanding.

“Stop screaming!” You hiss back but your voice already begins cracking.

“No!” He snarls back.

“You’re going to cause a scene.” You snap back harder and glare fierce at him.

“I don’t fucking care!” He punches out every word not wavering once. Standing across from you, Bakugo is an intimidating force so broad and filling up the space with his armor.

It’s a simple staring contest. No words are spoken for what feels like hours. A part of you wonders if maybe this is all just a heat mirage illusion brought on by your sad heart.

You end up sighing defeated.

You weren’t going to have this discussion, this reunion, here in an alleyway of the city. You and him deserved better than that.

So with a silent nudge of your face beckoning him to you, the mandalorian wordlessly follows you back to the hostel Shouto’s smuggler booked.

A rapid nostalgic haze tugs at you. This feeling of him so close to you, walking through a crowded planet is as if not a day has gone by.

Yet, an entire month hangs between you and him.

Thankfully your two travel companions are still out when you return to the suite. In the eerie stillness of the cramped room, you turn to the tense warrior.

“What are you doing here?” You don’t even have the energy to yell at him.

Out of all the planets in this grand universe, how did you have the luck of stumbling into this man here?

“That annoying fuckin’ blonde Jedi friend of yours.” Bakugo replies gruffly and his words rattle your brain.

“Wait, Monoma?!” You’re the one shrieking now.

The helmeted warrior nods.

“He told me you’d be here…” Bakugo’s voice trails off.

Even with the rabid confusion consuming your brain, you remember Neito was planned to be sent back to Mandalore. However, he never spoke about it with you. So you began to wonder if he ever did go. Now it makes sense and only confirms your suspicions.

“Why did he tell you?” Your voice wavers frustrated.

The mandalorian’s fist clenches. “Because I told him I needed to talk to you, shitty Jedi.”

The term claws at your soul.

“I’m not a Jedi anymore.” You flat out tell him.

A moment passes.

“Yeah…blondie told me about that too.”

Your heart drops. Of course Monoma told him. He always was a damn gossip.

All you can do is shakily exhale.

The memory still stings so raw.

Leaving your lightsaber at the ruins of the temple, crying with Neito over your decision, sitting with a thick confusion that had you in a daze for days…

“Why?” Bakugo asks, confused, dare you even say genuinely concerned.

“Why did you leave the order?” He clarifies.

The question you knew was coming.

The weight of its answer still feels too grand, too out of reach even for you. It’s like your heart and mind can’t fully comprehend into words the complicated sticky reason.

You tried to justify that your confusion mainly stemmed from the trauma of the temple attack and that you needed time to mediate, to heal. But the truth, your answer, is that you wanted more.

You wanted to yank off the shackles keeping you from reaching for him, that kept you from embracing every aspect of your heart.

So you half heartedly lie.

“I couldn’t wholeheartedly serve the order anymore.” Even stripped of the title of Jedi knight, your answer surprises you. So noble and composed as ever, a hard habit you think you might never fully be rid of.

“What’s that supposed to fuckin’ mean?” Of course Bakugo sees through your words, tries digging through them.

“It means what it means.” You reply back sharply. “I couldn’t stay in the order. I had too much on my mind and I knew…”

You knew that everything in you ache to break everything you were raised with. Because after you faced ruin and destruction, you ached to step forward into a future full of life without anything holding you back, without worrying if you were disappointing anyone or even yourself.

“I knew I couldn’t honor the Jedi.” You finish simply.

You were thankful those like Shouto and Monoma especially understood and helped guide you. They supported you even after your path diverged from theirs.

It’s why you would continue to still help look for the culprit who attacked the temple. You might not see yourself as a Jedi anymore but that didn’t mean you would truly abandon them.

So absorbed in your thoughts you don’t realize how quiet the room has gotten until Bakugo suddenly breaks it.

“Sorry…Knew how much it meant to you.”

It did. But you realized there are things that might mean more.

All you can do is weakly thank him.

You sigh again as the weight of this moment slowly curls over your shoulders and tries to dig past your skin.

“Is that why you left without saying shit? Without even saying goodbye?” His voice gradually fluctuates with tension and hurt. It shreds apart your heart with a jagged edge.

After you had woken up in Bakugo’s room, you stayed in a pretend sleep whenever he returned, not ready to face him yet. You couldn’t continue to keep bringing him into your path of trouble. Even after meditating, even after deciding to leave the Jedi order, you came to the same conclusion. You needed to leave this mandalorian.

For his sake and maybe mainly yours.

So you tell him how you managed to leave like a wordless ghost.

In your first true selfish act, in your first step at shattering your sense of self as a Jedi, you used the force to sense when Bakugo left. Once he was far away enough, you slipped out of the hut. Using the force to cause diversions, you bolted straight to the planet’s port of entry. After that you slipped away onto the next transportation shop.

You cried the entire time on the way back to Coruscant.

You do not tell him this.

Now the consequence of all these actions, your actions, stands before you hurt and anger forged in a man of beskar armor.

“You didn’t even tell me.” His voice cracks and your eyes blink through cloudy tears to stare at him.

You ache to see his eyes, to know what this man looks like.

“I have my reasons, and I’m sorry. I really am.” You apologize, wiping your tears away.

“Yeah? Those reasons better be real fucking good!” He snarls and you glare furious at this mandalorian.

“You wouldn’t understand.” You snap back like a cornered loth cat. You’re tired. You’re emotionally drained and the heat of the planet is catching up to you. You wearily move to sit on the creaky dusty couch.

“To have something control your life that keeps you away from someone…from somethings-”

You quickly correct yourself, but your voice continues wavering more and more with the frustrated tears threatening to spill.

“You’re so loyal to your own creed and I…I couldn’t face you.”

You don’t tell him the whole truth.

You don’t utter the truth that you loved him so much that it alerted your entire world. You wanted to let yourself love him against all odds. But, you wonder if this myth of a man could even possibly hold the same feelings towards you.

Every emotion tears you apart all over again. Inside of you rages a storm ripping apart every safe harbor you had built. All you can do is close your eyes to stop the tears from the storm raging.

“You said it kept you away from someone.” Keen as ever, Bakugo catches your comment.

That’s when you also notice his voice is closer.

Your eyes snap open and your heart drops into your stomach. The explosive mandalorian kneels before you.

“Who?” He asks calm, firm and surprisingly low.

You can’t even say his name and instead stare at him, stubborn and your tongue locked up tight

Bakugo says your name in the same direct tone except now with an undercurrent of urgency.

“Who?” He repeats again.

Out of frustration or maybe finally the weight of your emotions cracks you. Angrily shove away tears until you eventually cry into one of your hands not even able to look at him.

“I knew we could never be together.” You croak out a whisper. “You’re engaged. And with your creed, even when I stopped being a Jedi I just…”

The words escape you on another sob.

Large gloved hands suddenly rest gently on your thighs. Panic snaps your eyes open and there his striking black helmet stares unwaveringly at you.

Bakugo firmly says your name and you wait for the heartbreak that’s about to come.

“Marry me.”

It doesn’t.

“What!?” You ask through tears and snot.

“Marry me.” Bakugo repeats as unflinching and true as he did the first time.

“You… you’re engaged!” You stammer out.

“Obviously not! I’m in love with you but I’m not a fucking asshole! I wouldn’t have asked you if I was still engaged!”

His words knock you breathless, throw you out of orbit and you’re surprised your body has not floated away.

“You love me.” The words don’t sound real even from your mouth.

He coughs out a watery sound and moves forward. His bodily slots between your legs effortlessly. He curls against you and presses his helmeted forehead to yours.

“More than you know, shitty jedi.” He croaks while his strong arms wrap you in his embrace.

“Not a Jedi anymore.” You mutter watery as you clutch onto him.

“You’re not.” Bakugo confirms as he moves to rest his helm against your face.

“Be my riduur instead.”

During your time in Mandalore you picked up on plenty of Mando’a phrases and words. You even flirted with the idea of trying to learn the language fully.

You did learn some mandalorian words held a sacredness that set them apart because of their layered holy weight.

Riduur is one of those words.

It translates to wife, husband, spouse. But riduur held the weight of a partner forged in such a deep love that the basic term of spouse couldn’t capture the bond a mandalorian marriage would bring.

Your eyes widen and a storm of tears blur your vision. This time however, it’s the overwhelming overflow of emotion filling your heart and spilling over.

Nodding you holding onto him tighter.

You try joking about wanting to be the only one who gets to annoy him for the rest of his life. But your voice comes out a ridiculous sob.

Bakugo barks a wild chuckle and his arms tighten around you as well.

“S’why I asked you. Couldn’t put up with any other extra.”

Your eyes close right as you now hold onto your fiancé, and the thought of that makes your brain trip over itself.

“We’re getting married.” You mutter out mainly to yourself still not believing it.

“Damn right.” Bakugo growls low and proud.

“Congratulations.”

Your eyes snap open wide and horrified at hearing Todoroki’s simple flat comment.

Your mandalorian scrambles away from your embrace to instead lean in front of you, as if to shield you.

Standing in the door’s entryway is Todoroki and his smuggler friend who smacks your once fellow Jedi knight.

“I told you to keep quiet!” The smuggler cries out horrified at being caught.

You’re embarrassed. Bakugo is screaming obscenities but for some reason, you laugh. It’s a buyout laugh filling you bright and beautiful. That’s when the force suddenly surges through you warm and celebratory.

Earlier this month you thought it had slipped away. That even the force itself began to pull away because of your decisions.

But now it hums beautifully in and around your body, exhilarated and electric. You think you could power an entire planet.

You laugh and simply lean against your fiancé who continues to threaten to blast poor Todoroki out the window. But his hand suddenly reaches out to your knee and he squeezes it tight, reassuring as if to say I am here.

You came to Tatooine simply looking for a lead on the temple attack.

Now would be leaving it engaged with a mandalorian by your side.

⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

“Come back to my ship with me.” He mutters softly after you manage to drag him away to a local cantina to grab something to eat.

You don’t hesitate to follow him.

The inside of his grand sleek starship, modified to fit a whole room compartment, greets you like the warmest old friend. You even take a stroll around trying to see if he added anything new.

“So you wanna to get married now or what?” Bakugo simply asks.

Your mind feels as if he just set off one of his explosives inside.

“Now?!” You shriek shrill and chaotic.

“Yes now.” You’ve been with him long enough to know this tone suggests he’s rolling his eyes.

Trying to process this your mind sputters in a spiral like a broken speeder bike.

You understood mandalorians held certain courting rituals that you vaguely heard of. You voice this concern to your mandalorian who crosses his hands over his chest in a pouting type manner.

“That’s for potential marriage partners. We’re already engaged aren’t we?” Bakugo challenges.

“So we just skipped an entire courting process?” He seemed like such a traditionalist and would be upset over this. You even sound more upset than he does.

Especially when your fiancé simply shrugs.

“You’re not mad?” Now you have to ask and he shakes his head a casual no.

“Didn’t need to court anyone else.” He gruffy asserts confident and true.

So that meant jumping straight into marriage?

Whatever lies on your face, whatever is clouding your heart, your fiancé notices it and sighs.

He explains how Mandalorians typically didn’t have long engagements. When someone proposes marriage it’s with the acknowledgment they would be wedded moments or at the latest days after.

It mirrored the same direct quickness the first mandalorian vows were rumored to have been said in the creed’s legend.

“Look,” Bakugo continues with all the conviction a warrior pursuing victory holds.

“I know that’s my culture and shit but…We can wait whenever you’re ready.” He reassures you.

“I’ll wait for as long as you need because I know the ending s’always going to be the same. And that’s me as your husband. So if we do it today or fuck a year from now, I’ll wait.”

Love crashes into you in waves and you cannot fight the current any longer.

“So whenever you’re ready.” Bakugo’s beautiful beskar helmet nudges towards you. “You let me know.”

Now, you want to marry him now.

“Bakugo-” You are about to say your answer when he cuts you off.

“Katsuki.” He corrects you, a gentle firmness that speaks of his kind understanding.

His first name.

The most precious of gifts he can give to you and now here it is ready for yours to hold.

“Katsuki.” And you find to tastes like the most reverent prayer.

Mandalorian weddings, from what you remembered, were quick and privately intimate ceremonies. Here in his ship, away from his home planet and far away from yours on Coruscant, it’s as if this space is carved out just for you and him.

You don’t care about how long it’s been since you last saw him or that you only have been engaged for less than a day.

You want this, to be married to him, for him to be your husband.

And maybe it’s the shackles of the Jedi order being released from you but you want to be selfish. You want to grab at anything you want and greedily say yes it is okay to want without any guilt. It is beautiful to embrace it.

“Guess you’ll be the one having to call me Bakugo then huh?” You tease light but adoration coats your voice thick.

His shoulders tense. You can almost sense, almost see the suspended hope hanging on by a thread.

“So…you saying yes?” He tentatively ask.

You nod repeatedly and firmly.

“I want to marry you now.”

Katsuki walks closer to you, gently holding your hand in his.

“There’s this saying…” he begins low as if someone outside the ship might hear him.

He says a phrase and you can’t process what it is. You barely even pick up a word of Mando’a

“It’s a way we say I love you.” Katsuki explains. “But translate into basic it means something like… I’ll know you forever.”

To know is to love and to love is to know a person.

“That’s beautiful.” You admire and he nods silently.

“You know me, more than anyone else has.” Your mandalorian tells you. “And I know you. And even when I think I didn’t want to. I wanna keep knowing you for as long as I live.”

You swallow back a sob threatening to escape as you nod. You want that too.

He squeezes your hand.

“You ready?”

You squeeze his hand back. “I am.”

For a moment you think of the oath you took when you became a Jedi knight. How you swore to consecrate yourself to the universe, to a grand idea that would tie you to preserving an ideal and cause until your last breath.

Here you are now taking another vow, another oath, that you swear to honor for the rest of your days.

“Repeat after me.” Katsuki says and you don’t miss the slight waver in his voice.

“We are one when we are together or apart.” He declares and you repeat.

We are one when we are together or apart.

“We will share everything.”

We will share everything.

“And…” he pauses for a moment, but quickly gathers himself.

“We will raise warriors.”

The implications are not lost on you. You knew how open the mandalorians were about adoption, about raising children communally. This was a topic you would have to deeply discuss with him.

But the idea of simply guiding and watching over any young ones, even if they were not your own, even if you and him decide to not have children, shifts your world. Because just being by his side to help guide the next generation as you grow old with him is more than you can ever imagine.

We will raise warriors.

Once the words leave your mouth suddenly a shaky modulated exhale escapes your mandalorian.

Katsuki breathes out your name.

His bare hands move to cradle your face and a wide range of beautiful emotions begin to bubble in you.

“You shitty Bakugo.” Your husband, your husband, croaks to you tear soaked. You laugh loud and just as watery as he sounds.

That was going to take some time to adjust to. But this, in every way, is better than hearing him call you a shitty Jedi. Because you are Jedi no more. And now you exist as a Bakugo.

The excitement and giddiness bubbles over, illuminates you from the inside out. Katsuki presses his helmeted face against yours as you embrace him tight.

“I love you.” You breathe out to your husband.

Katsuki squeezes you firmer. You simply exist in this moment in his arms soaking in the quiet but powerful conviction of this new existence. You are someone’s spouse. You are his, just as irrevocably he is yours.

Katsuki mutters out your name.

“There’s…still one thing we gotta do.” He adds.

Oh?

Slowly Katsuki untangles himself from you and you already miss his warmth. His shoulders slightly curl over and his helmet can’t even face you.

A tinge of fear bubbles in you fast and threatens to poison the barely moments old wedding bliss.

“I’m going to have to fight your ex fiancé for stealing you away, aren't I?” The idea that pops into your head so fast and quick you can’t even stop it.

The beskar helmet turns back to you.

Then, Katsuki bursts out laughing. A true warm gruff cackle that shakes his shoulders and makes you want to smack him.

“What?! That’s it, isn’t it!?” You shriek. You immediately dreadfully think of having to go hand to hand against the red and white armored mandalorian of Yui Kodai, who you only met once.

Katsuki continues to laugh even after you begin pouting. He even shakes his helmeted head a solid no.

“Fuckin’ love your ridiculous ass so much.” He breathes out a wonderful modulated sigh.

His hands move up towards his helmet.

And then he begins to raise it.

The action clicks instantly in your mind. In many cultures and customs a kissing vow is exchanged after weddings. You wondered if that was a secret only known by mandalorians.

So out of respect for your new husband you naturally close your eyes.

The hissing sound of his helmet being removed fills the small space of his ship. You didn’t realize how much you had missed the quiet but electrifying sound.

You wait for the pressure of his lips against yours.

Nothing comes.

The force even retreats away from you so softly like a loth cat returning to its bed to nap and you feel a chill in the air.

Katsuki sighs slightly shaken and heavy.

You’re about to ask if he’s okay, want to comfort him already when he speaks up first.

His voice crystal clear calls out your name.

“Open your eyes.”

The words clutch your throat and ignite an electric wave throughout your body.

“What?” You ask a bit confused because maybe you had misheard.

“You heard me.” Katsuki urges gruffly but gentle, so truly like him. “Open your eyes.”

You couldn’t.

It was against the code, against everything he stood for, everything his people stood for.

The surprise brush of his fingers against yours provides a solid stability.

“What?” He teases light. “Afraid of what you might see?”

No. That wasn’t it at all.

You even shake your head a furious stubborn no that makes him chuckle.

You know without even seeing him that he’s beautiful, probably one of the most striking forces to ever be seen in this galaxy.

“You know I can’t.” A fervent urgency leaks into your voice as if you want to remind both him and yourself of the danger behind this act.

Defiance, banishment, excommunication.

The words sting you fierce.

Like the solid lifeline he is, the back of Katsuki’s bare hand tenderly running across your cheek floats you out of your hectic thoughts.

“We’re married now, idiot.” His voice wavers. “Clan members are allowed to see our faces.”

Something deep inside of you shifts so effortlessly.

You are a clan member now. The answer hangs so truthfully and effortlessly in the air you almost can sense the force itself giggling at you.

You want to see him. You’ve wanted nothing more than this, to know him and know the face of your husband.

So you open your eyes.

The first week after you left the Jedi order, Shouto’s smuggler friend took you out for a drink. There on the sips of alcohol and the freedom it tasted of, you spilled your heartache.

“In love with a mandalorain.” The scavenger had sighed almost a bit apologetic. “And you have no idea what he looks like?”

You shook your head no.

“I have imagined it though,” you instead added boldly because you had.

At first you couldn’t picture what this man of fire and beskar, who would fight a galaxy with his bare hands, would look like. But for some reason you always pictured his eyes bright, like the fiercest force that could never be dimmed because that’s the type of man he is. You believed his eyes would reflect that.

And now you find they do.

The most stunning crimson eyes stare at you so openly, honest, hesitant and guarded slightly. The bold red color is beautiful. You don’t even think you’ve seen eyes so gemlike.

You think of how red for a Jedi is aligned with the sith. It’s not a color one wants to encounter in a lightsaber. There was even a legend that spoke of how the first red kyber crystal was created when a sith held a white crystal in their hand until they bled and let the color soak into the gem.

The color that was once a warning sign now stares at you as a promise of your future, wonderful and warm like the red sky in the evening.

It fits him too.

The color of war, blood and passion so vividly mixing with the color strongly associated with love…

You think you fall in love all over again with this mandalorian.

Then you finally soak in his entire face and feel your soul leave your body.

He’s handsome. Of course he’s handsome you knew he would be. But he’s stunning in a way that has your thoughts clustering together in a collision.

A strong sharp manly jaw, high cheekbones, and the softest spikes of blonde hair -

You can’t believe it. He’s a blonde. He’s gorgeous.

And he’s yours.

“You’re beautiful.” You croak out freely and tear soaked.

You get to see his emotions flash across his face now, see how his eyes shimmer so glossy as his eyebrows furrow.

“Shitty riduur, that’s my line.” Katsuki replies back just as thick and his hand now simply cradles your face once again.

What did the vows say? That you and him were now one whether together or apart?

That already seems to be so true. Or maybe it always was.

The way you and Kastuki seemed to both mirror and repel each other like planets trying to fight a gravity bigger than your orbits. Now here you are.

You can’t help it.

You laugh a watery jubilant thing and clutch onto his hand still resting on your face. You happily burrow closer into his hold.

Slowly but so firmly Katsuki draws you into him. His bare face goes to rest against yours. His nose even burrows against your forehead as he towers over you.

Shakily your mandalorian exhales, relieved and gentle and you melting into him more.

“Thank you,” you whisper softly to him. “For showing me…for letting me know you.”

Katsuki’s arms wiggle out to now wrap you in a true warm embrace.

“Yeah, yeah.” He mutters back and your heart jumps at his lips tickling against your skin.

“You smell s’good.” His molten syrupy voice seeps into the very core of your being.

Your mind feels cloudy but in the best way so much that you can only hum back a quiet thanks as you press your cheek against his warm face more.

He says your name and your eyes, which had closed in pure content bliss, open wearily.

“There’s…there's somethin’ else…”

What elses could there be?

Begrudgingly you draw back from his warmth and glance up at him a bit curious now.

It’s so interesting and even a bit funny to see how expressive your husband truly is now. His crimson eyes are averted from you. His pretty blonde brows furrow so hard and faintly a hint of pink begins to color his cheeks.

Embarrassed, he seems embarrassed.

You’re about to ask what he means when suddenly those gemstone eyes of his snap back to you quickly and fierce.

“I wanna kiss you.”

He flat out says it but with unwavering solid sharpness.

The thought almost makes your body buckle. You even almost choke on the sharp inhale you take.

“O-oh.” You stammer out.

“Yeah.” Katsuki mutters out low and slightly bashful.

At just the thought your eyes immediately flicker to his lips. You noticed them earlier of course when you first saw his face but didn’t want to stare. Now you find they are soft, plush and you want to press your lips against his more than ever.

“I haven’t…” your mandalorian begins then his voice trails off.

He hasn’t kissed anyone.

It makes sense. He’s so abstinent in his loyalty that he would never remove his helmet for a simple kiss.

And, for some reason that truth licks a dangerously warm heat up your throat that also seizes your heart. To know you’d be the first and only one to kiss him awakens something clawed and pleased inside of you.

Katsuki swallows hard.

He’s hesitant, embarrassed, maybe even worried. It paints his handsome face so easily.

Very cautiously your hand rises up to his face.

After having his face covered for most of his life out of instinct Katsuki immediately snaps his attention to your hand with a hard cautious scowl. You freeze, wondering if this is all too much.

But then realizing what you are trying to do, your mandalorain’s scarlet eyes soften instantly. When your hand softly rests against his face, mainly against his sturdy jaw, Kastuki exhales heavily as he closes his eyes.

The weight of this force of a warrior melts against your hand as he leans against it fully.

“You’re considered the best of the clans,” you begin. “The best out of all the others.”

“Damn straight.” He mutters out still looking like a blissful lothcat against your hand.

You hold back a chuckle that still manages to trickle your lips.

“Then you have nothing to be afraid of.” You reassure him. “You’re a natural and the best for a reason.”

But you also realize that yes, even though he said he wants to do this, this does not have to be done right now.

“Plus, there’s no rush…We can wait whenever you’re ready, I’ll wait as long as you need.” You repeat the same words he told you, feel their weight and devotion, patience and love, weave deep into your bones.

You even feel a smile tug your lips.

Hazily, almost sleepily, his eyes halfway open to stare out at you with such an intense warmth you feel as if you are staring into his heart's core.

He’s so unbearably gorgeous you almost can’t stand it.

Then without any warning, Katsuki leans forward and presses his lips against yours.

The surprise of him acting so quickly mixes with the surprise of finally getting to kiss him that you wonder if your heart is going to give out from the rush of emotions. But then your mind melts to simply solidify into this moment.

You’re kissing him, your husband, your mandalorian. You’re kissing Katsuki.

His lips are so soft, warm and the faintest smell of his herbal soap suddenly fills your senses.

Slowly his lips begin to pull back ever the slightest before you jump back at him with the same energy of acting without hesitation.

Your eyes close as pure bliss fills you to the brim.

Your lips meet his once, twice in sweet simple kisses but each time he presses closer and closer to you.

Katsuki’s lips now chase yours as if to ask for another kiss every time as if he wants to slowly kiss you again and again until he can’t any more.

You almost want to snicker, but you believe if you do your secretly tender hearted husband might storm away in embarrassment. But it’s not out of humor why you want to laugh. It’s out of a giddiness you can’t describe.

Until you realize the giddiness is simply love.

It is a love stitched into your bones and so overjoyed to finally be free, to finally be in this moment with the man with crimson sunset eyes.

⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

You came to Tatooine with Todoroki and his scavenger. You now would be leaving the planet with your husband.

“Are you sure you don’t want to just come back with us?” Shouto asks with the most intense sincerity in his dual colored eyes. He stares so directly into you wanting to gauge if you give him a secret sign saying otherwise.

“My ex jedi is coming home with me!” Bakugo barks back angrily at Shouto who ignores him flat out.

You laugh and even the scavenger who you now feel is slowly actually becoming a friend, laughs too.

You can’t thank this pair enough for what they have done for you. They gave you shelter when you were lost and aimless and a home when you had nowhere go. They became almost your strongest support system besides Monoma. Your heart would hold them tight together.

And when you bid them goodbye you hug the two of them just as right. You vow to contact them when you return to Mandalore.

Just because you are married now did not mean you would abandon any of your friends or the task of finding who attacked the temple.

As you watch them take a speeder bike to head out to the other city here on Tatooine you say a silent blessing to the force to keep them safe.

“When we get back home,” Katsuki mutters. “We’ll start figuring out what leads we can track.”

Seems like you would not be alone in your search.

Then the word hits you gently.

Home.

Mandalore would be your new home. Or mainly, Katsuki is your new home now.

Overwhelmed with emotions you turn back to stare at your husband.

Katsuki wears his helmet now but you can so clearly picture his handsome face composed with determination. You even itch to lean forward to just kiss the side of his curved helmet cheek. Instead you playfully nudge your armored husband who stiffens at your playful action. Then he nudges you back harder.

You snicker amused at how childish he can be.

“Damn weirdo.” He even mumbles out annoyed.

But his fingers continue to brush against yours as if to simply chase after your presence or simply remind him

how close you are.

The markets once again liven up the streets of Mos Eisely. You wanted to do one final look through the shops and vendors before your trip back. You even mention finding something for Monoma, specifically maybe that satchel he hinted about wanting.

“Fuck you and him are gonna be damn headaches together.” Katsuki even sounds as if the thought stabbed his side.

“Oh hush.” You chide him gently as you scan the market place.

That’s when you spot the familiar jewelry stand. The same elderly twi’lek woman is there working. Her eyes grow wide seeing you and then they eagerly flicker to the mandalorian with you.

Naturally you walk back to the stall.

“I’m thinking you might need that necklace now huh?” She grins wide and your face heats up.

“I was worried when I saw him chase after you but I should’ve known it was a lovers quarrel.” She adds and the thought of her being worried is endearing.

“Ha?” Your mandalorian asks so rudely and you lightly shush him as you buy the necklace.

The sweet elderly twi’lek giggles the entire time. Especially when Bakugou swoops in to hand the vendor credits.

“I could’ve paid for it.” You huff.

“No, cause that’s my job now.” He bluntly tells you like it’s the most obvious thing in this galaxy and you don’t even want to argue with him.

“Besides, s’nice.” He admires low, only for your ears.

“It’s an engagement pendant.” You explain. You even add how you’re just holding on to it until you can give it to him later.

“To mark our engagement and all that.” You casually and a bit cheekily say.

“We’re married!” He snaps back insulted and horrified that you’d even make the mistake of even forgetting.

“Oh you’re married?!” You’re not that far from the stall for the vendor to catch that. Or it could be that Katsuki is just that loud.

Either way you and him turn back to her. Her warm eyes shine with excitement.

You sleepy grin back to her. “So he says.”

“We are!” Your poor husband cries back furious.

You think this is it. This is the true blessing of getting to be married to this mandalorian for the rest of your life and that is getting to tease and annoy him.

You can’t help but snort. Then the rush of footsteps on the sandy gravel come towards you. When you and Katsuki turn back your dear vendor approaches with something in hand.

“Here, the companion piece!” She warmly hands you the twin of your necklace.

“Once someone gets married the spouse is meant to come back to retrieve the matching necklace so that the two are now together forever.”

It’s a sweet tradition and you happily hold the two necklaces together as you ask how much for both.

“Oh no young one, it’s fine.” The vendor waves you off warmly. “Think of it as a wedding gift from me and the city.”

You’re overwhelmed by the gesture, the pure genuine sweetness of it and the force even dances beautifully in the air.

“You’re too kind please let us-”

Before you can finish Katsuki moves beside you and places down two solid gold credits on the stall’s counter. That’s triple the amount that you paid and you’re pleased at your husband’s action.

The vendor exclaims in huttese and almost looks petrified seeing the money on her stand. She tries to sputter out something but you simply give her a warm thankful nod.

“Think of it as our thank you for the gift.” You tell her earnestly and even Katsuki beside you nods in quiet agreement.

With her heartfelt thanks you find yourself already walking back to the ship. Monoma’s satchel would have to wait for another day. Your eyes are focused on the two necklaces sitting in your grasp.

“I’m counting this as my wedding gift to you.” You say matter of factly to your husband.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yup, deal with it.”

He chuckles low at your reply.

“Moron.” Is all he says but you hear the truth happily buried beneath it.

Thank you, it’s wonderful. I'll cherish it forever…

You glance down again to look at the two necklaces with a fondness before you move to place them in your bag

“You’ll get your gift when we get back home.”

Then his words almost make you trip and drop your precious jewelry pieces.

“What wedding gift?” You ask again as worry leaks into your voice.

Even with the helmet on you know he’s staring dryly at you.

“What? You can get me somethin’ and I can’t get you shit?”

“You know that’s not what I mean!” You reply back huffy.

He stays quiet.

“What did you get me?”

Again he stays silent and doesn’t answer.

“Katsuki.” You hiss out and you believe this ridiculous mandalorian is now grinning at you victorious.

“It’s meant to be a surprise, shitty Jedi!” He barks back and you’re too wrapped up in this conversation to even correct him.

“Shit…thinking about it, it won’t be a surprise when you gotta get measured.” He mutters mainly to himself as if he realized this fact.

The words stop you dead in your tracks.

You stare at him a bit petrified and confused. So all you can do is ask him again, low and even a bit serious about what he got you.

You’re thankful to have made it to the edge of the market and it is mainly vacant.

Because your spirit leaves you the moment you see Katsuki move to tap at his beskar shoulder pauldron.

And it clicks.

Armor.

He means to give you beskar armor.

[moni-logues]

What the cat dragged in

Pairing: Lee Know x reader (afab, she/her)

Genre: smut, angst, strangers-to-lovers (kinda); 5+1

Summary: You followed Minho home because you had nowhere else to go. Then you kept following... all the way into his heart, but not his bed.

aka five times you and Minho don't fuck and one time you do.

Content: reader is 16yo in the first section (nothing sexual or romantic happens but there are suggestions of it), couple of references to human/sex trafficking; the gang are useless crime idiots but this is only barely relevant; interrupted foreplay; attempted car sex; unprotected piv sex; fingering; a lot of kissing tbh

Word count: 13.5k

A/N: SO this whole thing actually started HERE in JUNE (jfc, I thought I'd been thinking about this since like, October or something but, no no, a full ten months!!!!). It has drifted from that somewhat but that was its beginning and, honestly, I'm kind of stoked about this fic. I really like how it came out and it's my FIRST MINHO. It's taken me SO long to get around to my bestest evil catdad.

Huge thanks to @violetsiren90 for beta-ing! and also for reading it half-finished when I really needed some encouragment. AND for the title

*~*~*

FIRST 

“Why don’t you fuck off?” 

The voice came from behind you. It was low and cold and threatening. It was directed at Shindong, the man in front of you, whom you were sure was this close to offering to take you home. You whipped around to see who had uttered it. 

Your immediate thought was that he was too short and too slight to be walking up with that level of aggression. Your second thought was interrupted by the spark that shot up your arm when he grabbed your hand. You’d have pulled it back, but his grip was solid and your arm didn’t budge.  

“What the fuck do you want, Minho?” your companion replied, all the charm sliding off his face, replaced with a loathing, arrogant sneer.  

“I want you to fuck off.” 

“She yours? Might want to keep a closer eye on her; she was just about to come home with me.” 

The stranger’s hand squeezed yours, so hard it started to hurt. He offered nothing in response.  

Both men continued to stare at each other. Shindong had inches on Minho – both height and breadth – and you couldn’t believe your eyes when you saw him hesitating. He flicked his eyes between you and Minho.  

“What if I want to fight you for her?” 

“What if I told you she’s not legal?” 

Shindong hesitated, moved just a fraction backwards, no longer leaning in, looming over the two of you. He rolled his eyes and gave a heartless chuckle. 

“Not worth the fucking bother,” he muttered as he walked away.  

Minho, still a stranger to you, still holding your hand, who hadn’t even looked your way, pulled you sharply by said hand, storming off and taking you with him. You followed him into one of the warehouse’s many dark corners. He kicked out the couple who were two clothing items shy of a citation for public indecency, and only then did he let you go. Only then did he turn his dark, flaming eyes on you. 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” you asked.  

Shindong had been your lifeline. What did this guy think he was playing at? 

Your vehemence took him off-guard, surprise flashing across his face, until his scowl returned, worse than before. You understood now why he made Shindong hesitate. His gaze was fierce, penetrating, his jaw set, his mouth a taut, grim line. You would never show your hand to anyone, but a cold droplet of fear slithered down your spine. You straightened it, rolled your shoulders back, lifted your head. You wouldn’t let him intimidate you. 

“Do you know him?” he asked, voice still low, still threatening. 

Not personally. Not until that evening. But people like him came with a reputation that preceded them. A reputation that you were relying upon being based in fact. A reputation that had spread all around your school and beyond, but that you had heard from a source close to the truth. It was close enough that you were able to find him here, in a part of town you’d never been to. It was close enough that you were able to pick Shindong out from this crowd. Close enough that when you approached him and he laughed at you – young, naïve, foolish, all of those things you were sure he thought – you were able to drop his cousin’s name and he suddenly took you seriously. That was what you had been hoping for. A connection was all you needed to keep you covered for a night, at least. Just one would be something. 

And then this guy showed up. 

“I was about to.” 

Minho’s top lip curled, just a fraction, his nose barely wrinkling with the movement, but you got his meaning. Disgust. He could be as disgusted as he liked; that wasn’t your problem. Your problem was that his disgust had led him to chase away your only lead.  

Or was he? Was Shindong your only option? 

You changed tack. Realised that maybe you had another now. Minho, whoever the fuck he was, had approached you as if he knew you and scared off the competition. That must have been it. Despite the way he glowered at you, absolutely no interest or desire lurking behind his dark eyes, you figured you had nothing left to lose.  

You relaxed a little, pouted your lips, played up to the damsel in distress he might have thought you were. 

“But if he’s so awful, I guess I can only thank you,” you said, making your voice soft, your eyes a little wider. You lifted your lips in a tiny, shy smile and then put a hand to them, your thumb and index finger tugging a little on your bottom lip, hoping it made you look small, nervous, sweet.  

He gave you no reaction. He continued to glare, his stance unchanged, unmoving. So you moved. You stepped towards him: shy, little bird steps, until you were so close that he moved backwards. 

“Thanks for looking out for me. Your name’s Minho, right?” 

His eyes tightened minutely. He didn’t reply.  

“I’d like to thank you properly,” you said, sliding your body into his, pressing just one finger against his chest. You fluttered your lashes up at him. 

His face changed immediately. Eyes wide, mouth dropping, and he was stumbling backwards, pressing himself against the wall. 

“What the fuck are you doing? What are you, fifteen?” 

Embarrassment licked your cheeks like flames and your scowl returned. 

“I’m sixteen!” 

“Wow, big age. My mistake. By all means, let’s fuck, Sixteen.” 

His sarcasm was biting but you hadn’t given yourself up yet. 

“Don’t you want to?” you asked, innocently. “You must have sent Shindong away for a reason. If not this, then what?” 

He let out a sigh so aggrieved it was almost a shout. He rolled his eyes.  

“Jesus Christ, where are your parents?” he asked, but it was muttered, almost under his breath and you didn’t know if you were supposed to answer. You did anyway. 

“Dead.” 

His lack of reaction grated. He didn’t flinch. There was no surprise, no guilt on his face. He had robbed you of Shindong and now he had robbed you of your fun: getting a reaction out of people as a poor, orphaned, little Annie was as close as you got these days. Then again, he wasn’t a well-meaning aunt or nosy teacher. He knew what this place was; he knew, or at least knew of, Shindong. Maybe your hand-grenade was, here, little more than a snap. 

“And this is your great life plan? Offering sexual favours to predators?”  

He gestured widely to the room behind you, and you could only assume he did not mean to include himself in that group.  

Actually, it was your plan. Kind of… Insofar as you had any sort of plan at all. You would not be telling him that. You kept your mouth shut tight and jaw clenched, refusing to look down, to be the one to break the eye contact.  

“You know he’s a fucking bad guy,” he said, more softly than he had said anything so far but the hard edge remained.  

“And what are you, my hero?” 

“Absolutely fucking not. I do not want to have anything to do with whatever mess you are making of your life, but I’m not about to let that cunt take off with a child.” 

“I am not a child!” you shouted, right in his face.  

He took it, impassive, unimpressed even.  

“That’s exactly what a child would say.” 

You wanted to hit him. You wanted to smash him in his beautifully sharp jaw, or break that perfect, delicate nose of his. You were just about not stupid enough to try. How did he even know you were young? You knew you didn’t look it; you were always getting told you looked older than you were. How did he know? Why did he care? 

“Go on then,” you said, darkly. “Leave. If I’m not your fucking problem, why don’t you fuck off?” 

He didn’t answer, but he didn’t move.  

“Worried I’ll get murdered?”  

You lifted your hands to your open mouth, eyes widened, a mockery of fear.  

His face and tone were flat when he responded.  

“There are things worse than death.” 

Then he pushed past you and out of the door.  

You took one shaky breath and walked after him before you could talk yourself out of it. You decided that, one way or another, this guy owed you and it was time to collect. 

You followed him, not too closely, but not exactly hiding it, for over a mile. You wondered, at one point, if he was trying to lose you, if he was actually heading to his destination or just trying to outlast you. You’d show him. You were a long-distance runner at school; you were extremely confident you could keep up. 

So confident, in fact, so determined were you not to lose him, that you were too slow to notice him slowing, to notice him stopping, to very nearly not stop yourself walking into him.  

“What the fuck are you doing?” he asked, not turning to look at you. 

“I’m walking here.” 

“Stop following me.” 

“I’m not following you.” 

He raised his eyes skyward. He stood for a moment and you stood, too, waiting for him to continue – walking or talking, you didn’t know which. He finally turned around and looked at you, everything about him a little softer than before. Not soft, but softer.  

“You can’t follow me,” he told you slowly, emphatically. “I am not looking after you. I am not your fath-“ 

“I don’t have a fucking father.” 

He scoffed. 

“Yeah, that much is very clear, Sixteen.” 

“I’m not sixteen!” 

He frowned. 

“That’s what you told me.” 

“That’s not my fucking name! Stop saying it like I’m a child. How old are you anyway?” 

“Old enough to know better.”  

“What does that mean?” 

“Go home, Sixteen.” 

“I don’t have a home.” 

“Well you can’t have mine.” 

He turned on his heel and continued walking, a little faster this time, increasing his pace to a jog as he crossed the road. You knew he hoped you wouldn’t be able to follow, that the flashing green man would disappear before you could make it, but you’d been underestimated before.  

After another mile or so, you saw him take his phone from his pocket and put it to his ear. You couldn’t quite hear what he was saying but you thought it sounded like Japanese. Was he Japanese?  

It hadn’t missed you, the knowledge that you had no knowledge of this man. You understood that you were, as far as you knew, in as much danger following him home as you had been going with Shindong. But you literally had no other options. It was follow this guy somewhere or wander around on the street all night; it was too cold to stay out. You hadn’t thought beyond that when you’d left your house earlier that day. Hadn’t thought much at all, except about getting out.  

Now you were out. Mission accomplished. And you had no idea what to do next.  

You almost missed him ducking into a narrow side street, but you caught the door he rushed through just before it shut. He disappeared from view through another door, off to the left of the dingy, dimly lit corridor you found yourself in. You stalked up to it – it wasn’t even fully closed – but something made you hesitate.  

Suddenly the fear that you had been suppressing all night raised its head. Was this a lion’s den? A serpents’ nest? Was Minho playing some kind of long game, saving you from Shindong so you would trust him, so you would follow him here, so he could…? 

“Are you going to fucking stand out there all night?” you heard a voice call from inside. It had to be Minho’s but you wouldn’t have bet on it.  

You fixed your face, your scowl reappearing, and kicked the door open with excessive force. 

It was just a bar. Just him, sitting on a stool with a beer in his hand, and one other guy, standing opposite, looking at you with his eyebrows raised in the way a parent does when they catch their child doing something naughty. 

“You break that door, I’m going to make you pay for it,” he said, in an accent that you knew wasn’t local.  

And, just like a defiant child, you slammed it shut without breaking eye contact. He turned to Minho. 

“Thanks, man. You had to bring home a fucking streetrat.” 

“I am not a streetrat,” you spat. 

“No?” Minho chimed in. “Then where’s your home?” 

“Fuck off.” 

“I really wish you would.” 

You sat down in a booth just off to your left and stared him down.  

“She can’t stay here,” the stranger said to Minho, as if you were no longer there.  

“I didn’t bring her; she just came.” 

He, the newest stranger, looked between you and Minho for several seconds. He was looking at Minho when he spoke again. 

“One night. That’s it. And she’s your responsibility.”  

He heaved a box full of empty glass bottles into his arms and wandered away, through a different door, mumbling something about ‘strays’.  

“Who was that?” you demanded as Minho continued to sip at his beer.  

You realised that you hadn’t actually been introduced to him either. And he hadn’t asked for your name. You wondered if he would now. 

“None of your fucking business,” he answered, finally moving from the stool to walk behind the bar.  

He opened the cash register and took bags from a cubby just below it. He produced a tiny pencil from his pocket and tore off a strip of the receipt roll. He took out the cash and started to count. You watched his lips move silently as he flicked quickly through the notes, pausing to drop a stack onto the bar and write a number down. He picked up the next stack and repeated.  

“Don’t even think about it,” he warned, not looking up, not even, apparently, pausing in his counting. “Even if you got your urchin mitts on it, you wouldn’t make it to the door.” 

You believed him, but you weren’t planning some kind of move. You didn’t need his money. You were just watching.  

You watched until all the notes and all the coins were accounted for, until they had been put into bags and those bags into a box and Minho turned to follow his friend. You stood from your seat and went after him.   

There were two doors, you realised. Minho took the left. It led to an office. The other guy must’ve taken the right because the room was empty except for furniture and, in the corner, a safe. Minho dumped the box before it and turned to you. 

“Turn around.” 

“Worried I’ll crack the code?” you asked with your eyes rolling back in your head. 

“Just turn around.” 

You did as you were told without a fight because, at that point, there was nowhere else to go. You couldn’t admit defeat and walk out of there; you weren’t sure that Minho wouldn’t make you do just that. It was a knife-edge, being the obnoxious, vile brat that you were. You’d stormed past boundaries before but, well, look where it got you. You were tired and worried enough now to decide you would stop pushing your luck. It had been stretched far enough already. 

There was a second of silence before you heard the beeping of the buttons pressed and the shuffling of bags, the clink of coins, the thunk of a bigger, metallic something against the walls of the safe. He didn’t tell you when he was finished, didn’t say you could turn back around. He just walked past you, out of the office, turning the light off as he went. As soon as you were out of the door, he shut and locked it.  

You followed him back to the bar and he did the same thing: turned off the lights and held a door for you (not politely, not because he was being nice), following you through it and locking this one behind him, too. You walked to the end of the corridor and he gestured you down some wooden stairs that creaked as if they would break under your weight. He turned the corridor light off, too, and locked the door at the top of the steps.  

This was it. You were locked in. There were at least two locks between you and escape. When Minho shoved past you to the left and opened yet another door, your stomach sank a little further. Three locked doors. He didn’t hold this one for you but he didn’t slam it in your face either, so you rolled your shoulders back, put on your game face and walked through.  

You almost regretted it when you saw where it led. It was possibly the worst place you had ever seen. It wasn’t messy, but there was something dirty about the room anyway. Outdoor furniture inside; everything vaguely brown in a way that you didn’t think it had been fresh out of the box; everything tired and worn and sagging; the naked lightbulb dim and humming as it shone; the fridge, scratched and dented and shoved into a corner, also hummed, managing to sound as well as look tired. It was bleak. It was grey. It made you feel like things were crawling on you and you’d only just stepped foot in it.  

You half expected your feet to stick to the floor when you took a few steps forward. They didn’t but the carpet was so old and worn that you had no idea what colour it was originally; in places, you could see the floorboards clearly through the threads. 

Minho pointed to the sofa.  

“There,” was all he said.  

Then he disappeared out of the room. You gingerly sat on the edge, wondering if you should be more concerned about your health or your safety. Maybe you were sheltered here, but you pictured a thousand and one diseases squirming on the cushions. It wasn’t fair to, because you could see that it was cleaned. The room wasn’t filthy; there were no crumbs or water rings on the coffee table; there was no rubbish littering the floor; the sink was empty and a stack of plates and bowls stood beside it, washed if not yet dried. Minho was clearly diligent.  

Minho and whoever else lived here. There were too many doors leading off this room for him to be here alone.  

Your curiosity was stopped in its tracks when he reappeared with a pillow and a towel. He threw the pillow wordlessly at one end of the sofa and then he raised the towel a little. 

“I don’t have any blankets. Don’t get cold.” 

You scoffed a laugh and were grateful that he ignored it. You weren’t indignant; you weren’t being a brat this time. You were dismayed. You couldn’t believe it. A house with no spare blankets. You were going to sleep under a towel. You glanced around you for a final time, tears pricking in your eyes, fingers at your lips, picking nervously. You weren’t going to die here, you told yourself. Probably. You were probably not going to die here and that was all you needed.  

You stood up, turned off the light, tested the door handle (not sure if you wanted it to be locked or unlocked), then returned to the sofa. You took off your shoes, took your bag from your back and hugged it tightly to your chest. You lay in the dark, in a stranger’s horrible house, alone, tired, more vulnerable than you would ever admit. You cried silently, reluctantly grateful for the towel, until you fell asleep.   

SECOND 

“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to everyone! Happy birthday to you!” 

You only got one birthday a year. The whole group of you. There wasn’t enough to stretch to everyone getting an individual birthday, an individual cake, a day off. So the middle day of the year, 2nd July, was chosen and you all had a birthday together.  

One cake, one candle each, six people blowing them out. Most unsanitary, but, by now, there wasn’t much you hadn’t shared so a little spit didn’t even register.  

You were too drunk by far, which was stupid really. It wasn’t even your first time drinking legally (because your real birthday wasn’t until later in the year), so there was no reason for you to behave as if you had never had a drink before. You should have learnt a little self-control.  

But it was your birthdays. So you kept having one more and one more and one more. As did everyone else.  

“Nineteen!” Minho called as he fell into the booth next to you.  

“I thought I was Sixteen?” 

He shrugged. 

“You do still act like it.” 

You shoved him, almost hard enough to push him off his seat completely. He shoved you back. 

“Shut up, Minnie.” 

He narrowed his eyes at you, plotting death for using the nickname he loathed above all others, and you sent a simpering smile back at him.  

“You’re a little squirt, anyone ever tell you that?” 

You rolled your eyes. 

“You, literally all the time, because you are for some reason desperate to sound like the oldest grandpa in the room.” 

He let out a growling sort of cry, dramatic because he’d also had too much to drink. Then he stood. 

“BYE, Sixteen!” 

If someone didn’t know the two of you, it would seem as if nothing had changed in the time since you met: both antagonistic, unlikable, as hard as you could make yourselves, forced together and barely tolerating it.  

Those who did know you, however, knew that things were very different now. Minho had, reluctantly, taken responsibility for you and, when you had grown up just enough to realise what that had meant, you felt all your hard resolve melt.  

They had very little, this ragtag bunch of kids (barely older than you) but they shared everything between them. Never quite enough to go around, money from legitimate enterprises never stretching far enough and having to be supported by money from less than legitimate means. You were a liability. In every sense. The only girl, a stranger, certainly not (at that time) a criminal. But Minho took responsibility and the others let you in.  

When you had learnt to see past your own nose, you saw the myriad ways in which they took care of each other. The silent, invisible way Minho cared for his friends. For you. You hadn’t forgotten the sting of electricity you’d felt when he held your hand way back when. Before you’d even seen him, before you knew his name, before any of this. You felt it all the time now. You were a live wire for him.  

No one in the group was stupid enough to refer to you as siblings or even joke that you acted like them. Your feelings for Minho were your most closely guarded secret but that didn’t mean everyone didn’t know. You were pretty sure even Minho himself knew. Not that he would ever act on it. He pretended not to notice, you thought. You had pushed close to the edge of being kicked out enough times to know that some things were still precarious. To know that he would never risk his weird family by acknowledging there was anything more than friendship between you. If it even was between you. He had given you very little reason to believe your feelings were reciprocated. So you did your best to ignore them.  

They became a fact of life. Like the fact that Minho was the only one Chan trusted to count the cash (not because the others weren’t trustworthy; they just weren’t accurate). Like the fact that Chan had the final say on everything. Like the fact that he would never abuse that authority and act for anything other than the wellbeing of the entire group. It just was.  

And it wasn’t like you were stupid enough to pine. You had some pride. Plenty, in fact.  

You stood from the booth and sauntered to the bar where your sometime-boyfriend, Johnny, was getting another drink.  

“Babe,” you whined, draping yourself over his back, hooking your chin over his shoulder.  

“Babe,” he whined back, copying, mocking.  

“Entertain me, I’m bored.” 

“It’s your party.”  

You pouted and forced him to join you on the makeshift dancefloor. You refused to notice that Minho left it as soon as you joined, his face dropping, looking only at Johnny and never once pleased about it.  

* 

Chan had cut off the booze supply hours ago and the sun was thinking about raising its head above the horizon, which meant that, far from being wasted and happy and giddy and passing out in your bed, your hangover was already crawling in and you were tired and irritable. Johnny had pissed you off sometime before the booze dried up and then pissed off entirely before you’d begun to sober up, so you’d spent the smallest hours of the morning making your bad mood everyone else’s problem.  

Everyone except Minho. Because whilst you were always determined, at these moments, to needle him, to want to get under his skin, to want to scrape it back and spit on it, he was never there. He managed to avoid your venom and, even when he didn’t, seemed immune. He would just slow-blink at you as if he were looking through you and turn away. It boiled your blood and he knew it.  

You stomped downstairs to the same shithole basement you’d walked into two years ago. Everyone else had either left or gone to bed already, you thought. You expected it to be empty. It wasn’t. 

“Fuck sake, Mouse,” you spat, using your usual nickname, his preferred one (… preferred being too strong a term; it was the one he allowed you to use without retaliation). “Why are you sitting on your own like a fucking loser?” 

“You know he treats you like a fucking loser?” 

He turned to lean over the back of the sofa, looking tired under his eyes but energetic within them.  

“Fuck off,” you returned. “As if you give a shit who I date.” 

“Date? That’s what you call it?” He scoffed, deliberately, exaggeratedly, as if you wouldn’t otherwise have recognised his scorn. “He treats you like dirt.” 

“You would know.”  

He was on his feet and in front of you before you could blink.  

“The fuck is that supposed to mean?”  

You’d had about enough of it, you decided at that moment. Not enough sleep, too much alcohol, and just enough of this bullshit. You grabbed the front of his T-shirt and pulled him with force towards you. You took him by the back of the neck and kissed him, hard and like you meant it. Because you did. It only took him a second to push you back, hands firm on your shoulders, holding you away from him. His face had lost his usual mask – the blank, passive, flat-eyed one that he used to stare people out with unnatural stillness – but he was still keeping you out; it was guarded, flashes in his eyes being stamped out with every blink, his jaw held tight and his mouth shut.  

“That’s what I fucking mean, Minho,” you hissed.  

“How dare you?” he hissed back, voice so low in his throat you almost couldn’t hear it. “You have no fucking idea.”  

His blinks weren’t quick enough this time to hide all the anger burning in his eyes.  

“No idea of what? What?!” 

His lip curled and he let you go. He let his guard down around you more than he should have: shrugged you off and turned his back on you. You took both palms and pushed him. He tumbled forward, catching his foot on a side table, pulling it down with him as he hit the floor. Cat-like in his reflexes, he was on his feet before the table had stopped rocking. He charged straight at you and continued until you were pressed up against the door, until he was pressed up against you.  

“You want a kiss?” he asked and every part of you should have been screaming yes, because you did.  

You did want a kiss, but nothing about this was how you wanted it. It was a threat, not an offer. You’d been threatened with worse. You jutted your chin out a little, always standing up, never backing down. 

“You going to give me one?” 

His eyes flicked towards your lips, hovered there a second, like he was really thinking about it. They stayed there a little longer and doubt was picking up speed on its race to your consciousness. You thought he wouldn’t. You thought he would. You still couldn’t predict his behaviour. You thought you had him pinned and then he flipped you. You always thought you had him on the ropes, but you never really did.  

You were impatient, tiring of this, doubt and insecurity and embarrassment swelling up inside you and you opened your mouth to tell him to go away, to fuck off and die, to do something vile to himself. It was at that moment that his eyes met yours again, for a split second that sent a streak of ice through your blood, and then his mouth was on yours.  

You had never once looked a gift horse in the mouth, but even if you had wanted to, even if you had decided before he did it that you would push him off, return his rejection, you couldn’t possibly have done it now. His lips were soft, his hands still tight around your arms. He crowded you further against the door, your bodies pressing together as he swiped his tongue against your bottom lip, asking for entry. You gave it to him. Your hands snaked up his chest and into his hair; it was softer than you’d expected, silky. For a moment, you were disarmed by it. Soft. He never let his softness show if he could help it. Only rarely. Only when he felt safe enough to let his guard down did it ever come creeping out from its hiding place. But here it was, sprouting from the top of his head. Here it was, pressed against your lips, brushing your tongue. You felt weak at the knees. 

As far as kisses go, it was the best you’d had. Fire and ice fighting: goosebumps erupting on your skin as it flushed hot, making you shiver. His mouth was warm and wet and sweet and you were desperate for more, knowing that he was kissing you just right and that you weren’t doing the same. You were too eager, too greedy, too needy. This wouldn’t be enough. Couldn’t be enough. Just his lips on yours, his tongue rolling with yours, his hands still pinning your sides. You couldn’t stop here. You had to have him. All.  

You whined when he pulled back, when his grip on you loosened, and you opened your eyes expecting his to be soft and liquid, to be those sweet, round boba eyes he didn’t show enough of.  

They were hard and flat. He moved away from you in one, long step and back was that impassive blankness he loved so much. 

“Happy fucking birthday,” he said. 

He stalked off to his bedroom and shut the door.  

You stayed, glued to the front door, shaking. With anger, probably. With embarrassment, maybe. With something akin to heartbreak, but you would never admit it. The roaring in your ears, the screaming of invective at both yourself and Minho in your head so loud that you didn’t hear the sound of a key in the lock, weren’t aware that someone was trying to get in until they were shoving at the door, pushing you with it. 

“What the fuck?” came a quiet whine from the other side of it as he slowly pushed you away and got the door open. “Why were you trying to keep me out?” 

Jisung’s hamster cheeks were full of kimbap, the other half of the roll still in his hand, and his eyes were wide with that cute, pitiful look he carried off so perfectly. 

You ignored him. You stomped into your bedroom and slammed the door as hard as you could. 

THIRD 

Despite having your own bedroom (graciously offered up by Changbin and very ungraciously accepted by you), privacy in the small basement flat was an issue. Which is why you were huddled in the farthest corner of it, fists stuffed in your mouth, crying as quietly as you could in the dead of night.  

You lived with five men, but you had not yet found someone to date who would take the threat of them seriously. They did make threats, on occasion, when they had to. Because you had not yet found a man who could treat you as anything more than shit but you had, apparently, found the least bothered and most unfazed men in the city. The one before last had barely flinched when all five of them had battered down his door to come for you, when you had finally managed to get a message out that he was keeping you there.  

You never found out what happened to him. You didn’t ask and no one told you.  

This one hadn’t been that bad. That was the problem. You had thought he was nice. You had thought (as you had so many times before) that he might actually be the first to treat you right.  

You were wrong. So, you were crying in the corner of your room. You didn’t always cry. In fact, you didn’t often cry. Rarely, even. It meant that, when you did, the floodgates opened and you found it hard to stop. You found it almost impossible to breathe, desperately snatching air between sobs. Your head was already pounding, your face aching. It was total and complete the way it overtook you. So much so that you didn’t notice the presence of another person until they sat down beside you. 

You gasped, as much as you could amongst your shaking, shallow breaths, and were only slightly comforted that it was him. He said nothing. He pulled you towards him and held you like that until the storm had passed. 

You continued to sit in silence as your tears dried on your face, as your heartrate settled and your breathing became even. He didn’t make a move to let you go and you didn’t make one either. You were tired. You were sad. You were, though you wouldn’t admit it, a little bit heartbroken. This bit of comfort was exactly what you wanted.  

You didn’t want him to say anything. You didn’t want to hear it. That you’d done it again. That you’d never learn. That, somehow, you were gullible and easy to fool despite the fact that you had been hardening yourself against vulnerability of every kind since you were a child. That men just found a way to get beyond your defences—that bad men found a way. The good ones didn’t find you at all.  

“His loss,” was what he said. 

You lifted your head, tears still clinging to your lashes, drying on your cheeks. He had that look on his face that he saved for you: the soft, sweet one he gave you when you’d earnt it or when you needed it. The one that made your insides curdle, that even now made your heart skip a beat, that you wanted to fall into forever, that had sealed your fate so many years ago now. He blinked slowly at you, cat-like as always, and brushed your hair from your face.  

You opened your mouth to speak but nothing came. Your voice was trapped in your throat because he was still looking at you like that but his eyes kept flicking down, then back up, then down again at longer and longer intervals until he closed them completely and brought his lips to yours.  

You didn’t have to think twice. Didn’t have to think at all. Your body did the thinking for you. Your hands pushed into his hair and your legs pushed you up so you could slot them down either side of his hips. His hands found your waist and then the soft skin on the other side of your t-shirt. 

This was nothing like the first time. You remembered it all too well: the electricity, the anger, the volcano of feelings you’d tried to suppress rumbling and threatening to erupt, to blow the lid off the equilibrium you’d found. The hunger, the desperation, your own neediness spoiling it all.  

You weren’t desperate anymore, for his approval, for his love, for whatever he would give you. You wanted it all, would lay yourself on the floor and kiss his feet if he asked, with no hesitation, but you always knew he wouldn’t ask. You’d got used to that.  

Except now he was kissing you – he had kissed you – and his hands were squeezing at your waist and it was slow. Controlled. Deliberate. There was nothing accidental about the way his tongue rolled over yours, the way his teeth bit at your bottom lip, the way his hands pulled you lower on his lap, pulled you closer to him until there wasn’t so much as a breath of air between you.  

“Mouse,” you murmured, quietly into his mouth. 

He shook his head minutely, a tiny hum swallowed by you when he pressed your lips together again. No talking. Fine. You didn’t need to talk. If he kept kissing you, kept touching you, you wouldn’t need to utter another word again. But you couldn’t stop the little gasp when he sank his teeth into the sensitive skin of your neck, the moan rising in your throat when he ran his tongue over the same spot, hurting then soothing. Like always. 

It made your brain turn fuzzy, static wavering in your mind, as all your conscious thoughts turned to liquid, melting into Minho’s mouth, swallowed down by him, eaten whole.  

Then the front door slammed hard. 

“Guys!” Chan shouted, in a way that he never did.  

You heard him pounding on doors, opening them, starting with Changbin and Hyunjin’s on the right.  

You sprang apart like two north magnets, instinctively repelled by one another, just in time for Chan to burst through the door and scan the room for you, too wired, too stressed to register that it might have been weird for you to be sitting on the floor like you were, certainly not noticing your kiss-bitten lips or heavy breathing or the way Minho’s hair was ruffled like it had just had a fist in it.  

“We’ve got to go,” Chan announced. “Like, right fucking now.” 

FOURTH 

No one wanted to up the ante. No one wanted to start getting involved with the organised crime lot. Your crime was… disorganised. It was local. It was just you doing the things you needed to, skirting around the law to survive. It wasn’t really crime, not if you squinted hard enough. Then the police raided the bar (which was illegal in pretty much every way that mattered) and you had nowhere left to go.  

There was just enough of the trust your parents left you (which you got access to at 21) to secure a new apartment (one that was not underground) and a small buy-in with a group of much larger, older, more experienced criminals. There was very little else you could’ve done at that point. Or so you all told yourselves.  

The apartment was an upgrade in every way but size. It was newer and above-ground which meant it stayed warm and didn’t get damp. It had windows which let the sun in. It had enough room for two sofas so everyone could sit comfortably. It had a gas hob which really only Chan and Minho cared about, but they cared a lot. It had two bathrooms with reliably hot water and good pressure. It did not get power cuts. It did not always smell musty. It was not brown and beige and grey. But it did have fewer rooms to be parcelled out between you all.  

The last one had four rooms that served as bedrooms. This had three. Between six. There had been furious arguments and endless straw-pulling and no one was happy with the results. It took a few weeks but eventually things shook out as they always should have.  

You shared with Minho because he was the only one who was willing. You both had reputations for being scary (in totally opposite ways: you the raging bull to his still, fathomless water); you loved to take your bad moods out on one another; he was the only one you ever willingly let see you when you were sad and small and vulnerable. Besides which, no one else would dare try to take the space at your side from him. So you shared a bedroom: two twin beds on opposite sides of the room, because Minho refused to sleep in a bunk bed and you refused to sleep together in a double. There was little room for anything else.  

You complained about the sleeping arrangements almost daily. You loved the hot water and the sunlight and the not-mouldiness of the apartment, but some days, you couldn’t bear the way you couldn’t get away from Minho.  

You’d thought you had it bad. This was even worse. 

Four days. Four days, so far, staying (squatting) in a vile, empty, dilapidated villa apartment, staring out of a window, waiting for something to happen. Just you and Minho and one room. For four days and counting.  

It was Minho’s turn to watch and he sat at the monitor, diligent, hard-working, as always, whilst you were supposed to be catching up on sleep. Instead, you were lying on what passed for a bed, tossing an apple into the air and catching it, over and over and- 

“You going to stop that?” Minho asked, with his trademark tone: both light and threatening.  

“Nope!” 

“Want me to make you?” 

You flicked your eyes over to him: he was studying the monitor seriously, but you were sure he had been looking at you.  

You hadn’t spoken about that night. Partly because you hadn’t had the time. You’d jumped up from the floor of your bedroom, grabbed as much stuff as you could fit in the first bag you could find and the six of you had legged it, making it out just in time to watch the police cars roll up and trash the place.  

“There was so much fucking money in that safe,” Chan had said, plaintively, staring at the sky. That was when you’d offered up yours.  

You had had to find somewhere to live, and fast. You’d all had to find jobs, something to do, some way to make money that wasn’t connected to the bar. You had been passing like ships in the night, meeting only to argue about shower time and sleeping arrangements. Then Changbin had come home with a suggestion. You’d argued about that, too, but in the end, it was unanimous. Go in with the bigger boys or – well, there was no ‘or’. That was the point. 

So you and Minho were working recon. You’d pulled the short straw in more ways than one. It was the longest you had spent together. Ever. Confined for days in this space. 

On the first day, he refused to talk to you at all.  

On the second, you made everything into an argument because at least you could get a rise out of him.  

On the third, he had seemed to thaw. Something had softened and you talked, like friends, like you used to. You laughed and joked and it wasn’t so bad. 

Now it was the fourth day and that ice had returned. He had frozen over, doubled-down on silence. No sooner had you had warmed up than he was giving you frostbite, chilblains. Whiplash. Those ten words were the first he’d spoken to you all day.  

“No,” you answered. “I don’t want you to make me.”  

You paused, wondering if the words you were considering were a sign that you were going mad, that being cooped up in this space had sent you a little doolally. The unbearable nothingness of your days passing like sludge forcing all those hidden thoughts forward, with nothing to distract you from them. The words were certainly risky, but Minho had shown his hand. He had kissed you. Like he meant it. And you knew he would’ve continued to kiss you had Chan not interrupted. He’d have continued to do a whole lot more than just kiss you. 

And you were bored.  

“I want you to fuck me,” you said plainly, catching the apple in front of your face and turning to look at him.  

He was still studying the monitor. Nothing on his face gave anything away: surprise, disgust, lust, laughter. Nothing. You were used to that. 

“We’re on a job.”  

“Yeah, and it’s boring and nothing is happening and who fucking cares? I would rather have sex.” 

He sighed and rolled his head to look at you. 

“Really, Sixteen? Now is the time you want to bring this up?” 

“Stop calling me Sixteen.” 

“I always call you Sixteen.” 

“You always call me Sixteen when you want to put me in my place or make me feel like a child. I’m not a fucking child anymore.” 

“I know you aren’t.” 

“Then why won’t you fuck me?” 

He laughed and your blood began to simmer.  

“There’s more that I look for than just ‘is not a child’.” 

“Don’t try to act like you don’t want to.” 

“I didn’t say I didn’t want to.” 

“Well then, shall we?” 

He smirked and the glint in his eye was new to you.  

“We’re on a job.” 

“Stop saying that!” you cried, stalking the three steps from your side of the room to his.  

You manoeuvred yourself into his lap, blocking the monitor from his view, and took his face in your hands. 

“We’re on a job and nothing is happening and nothing will continue to happen for ages yet, so why don’t we make it a little less fucking boring?” 

You knew he wanted to. Could see his pupils dilate. Watched his eyes flick to your lips and your chest and back up. This might have been all he wanted: sex and nothing more. You didn’t know. Weren’t interested in having that conversation. Were convinced that it didn’t matter either way. If he only wanted sex, you would give it. Give it until it was too late and he was in too deep to come back out. Hadn’t worked before but there was a first time for everything. 

But even that was beside the point. You were desperately bored and bored of being desperate for him and there was one stone that would kill both those birds.  

“Mouse,” you said quietly, keeping your voice low, as you placed a kiss on his jaw, as you spread your knees a little wider, sinking lower into his lap. “Come on.” 

His hands were on your thighs, neither encouraging nor discouraging, just holding tight. He didn’t respond as you continued to press kisses to his face, to his neck, grinding your hips over him slowly. You could feel his pulse beat fast, noticed the way his breathing was getting heavier, his fingers dipping deeper into your skin, until it hurt. Until he stopped pretending he was going to continue to work, stopped pretending that he could resist you.  

“Fuck,” he gasped, his voice hoarse. 

He gripped the hair at the back of your head and pulled you from his neck, tumbling you both to the floor. You didn’t want it to be fast, but you’d take it any way he’d give it. So when his hands pulled at your t-shirt, you let him take it off as you unclasped your bra. He didn’t give you time to fumble with the hem of his top, to discard it for him; he dipped his head straight down, swirling your nipple with his tongue, sucking it into his mouth; he rested his weight on one elbow and his other hand descended. You were grateful you had no buttons, no zips to contend with, just the loose, elasticated band of a pair of leggings that had seen better days. Minho’s fingers slipped beneath it and he circled his fingers around your clit, the fabric of your underwear dulling the sensation only slightly.  

This was moving even faster than you’d expected but you’d been waiting so long already. Blood rushed to the surface of your skin and your breath began to shudder. Underwear now pushed to the side, you gasped when Minho ran a finger through your folds, shivered when he moaned at what he found there. He brought his lips back to yours but you turned away to let his name drop from your open mouth. 

“Mouse...” 

“Shut up,” he said firmly as he sank two fingers into your slick cunt and stole your breath with another kiss.  

You couldn’t talk but you could moan. Could whine. Could whimper as his fingers moved inside you, as he ground his palm against your clit, as he made your thighs twitch and walls spasm. You tried not to lose your mind completely, to stay grounded, to stay present now that this was finally, really, actually happening. You reached your own hands down to Minho’s trousers; he hadn’t got the no-buttons, no-zips memo and your fingers fumbled with both. They shook with adrenalin as you popped the button through the hole and dragged the metal zip down. You pushed them away from you, off his hips, and had one hand in his boxers when the crackle of the walkie-talkie cut through Minho’s moan. 

You both froze.  

“Minho? What’s happening? Chan said they’re on the move?” 

You glanced at each other, for one more frozen second, and then the world lurched into overdrive. Minho clambered to the monitor with his trousers around his ankles and, as soon as he saw the screen, started swearing viciously, tugging at his clothes and throwing your t-shirt back at you.  

“What’s happening?” you asked, breathless for all the wrong reasons now.  

“They’re clearing out,” Minho reported into the walkie-talkie, ignoring you but answering your question anyway. “Two loads have left, a third on its way.” 

“Shit! How did you miss it? What the fuck were you doing?”  

“Nothing! We lost the feed for a minute but it came back quickly and then they were already moving.” 

He shot you a glance, something between panicked plea and angry admonishment. It wasn’t often he was caught on the hop, wasn’t ever. You, however, were used to being on the wrong side of things, so you re-dressed quickly and had already started packing your shit up. No matter how sideways this went, you could take two positives from it. One, you wouldn’t have to stay locked up here with Minho any longer. Two, he definitely, definitely wanted to fuck you. 

FIFTH 

You still hadn’t talked about it. You continued to share a bedroom, sleep there every night, wake there every morning but you had not once discussed the twice now that you had almost had sex. You were waiting for him to bring it up, even though you knew he never would. He wasn’t a coward, not ever, but if there was one word to describe him it was loyal and you knew he would protect your group with his life. And that also meant not pursuing whatever it was that was between you. Because it was a risk. It could jeopardise the stability of what you had established—what Chan had established long before you ever came into the picture.  

But you were digging your heels in this time. You’d already come on too strong. Your pride was being wounded with each day that passed, with each day that he continued to pass you up. You’d crack first. You knew you would. You always did. Minho was unbreakable. You weren’t. But you wanted to pretend, for at least a little while, that you could be. That you could be impenetrable, too.  

* 

“Shit shit shit shit shit,” Junho repeated as he slammed into the car, instructing Minho to drive before the door was even shut.  

Minho didn’t need telling twice.  

“Where to?” 

“Safe house,” he gasped, ragged breathing setting your teeth on edge. 

You didn’t ask what had happened. What had gone wrong. That didn’t matter as much as getting out. Getting Junho out. You were disposable, still. You knew that. Even Minho. You were runts; you also still had something to make up for given what happened on your last assignment. So you travelled in silence. Junho in the back, breathing heavily; you didn’t turn around to see if he was ok. You didn’t want to know. You assumed he wasn’t but as long as you could hear him breathing, you knew he was alive.  

Minho was facing forward, eyes scanning the roads ahead, reflexes allowing him to run red lights without accident – in this part of the city, no one would stop a flashy car like this for speeding, for driving recklessly. That was what they all did. His jaw was tense, eyes tight. He looked calm but you could see his little legs kicking under the water. You knew him well enough by now.  

You didn’t keep your eyes on the road. You kept them on him. Felt like someone needed to be watching out for him, too – not that there was anything you could have done to be helpful anyway. There were always two in the getaway car. That was the rule and you didn’t ask why because you didn’t want to know the answer.  

As a teen, you had thought you knew everything. You were old enough now to know not only that you knew nothing but also that you preferred it that way. Need to know basis. For everything. All the time.  

Minho slowed, driving more carefully as the car left the city, winding across hills, negotiating turns that you’d have driven straight over, plummeting you all to a miserable death. He turned the headlights off at the mile marker he’d been told about, one that you’d already forgotten, and crawled, slower still, up to the house, blanketed in darkness, hidden by an overgrown and untended garden.  

Junho grunted. 

“Thanks. Wait until I give the signal then get the fuck out of here. Do not go anywhere you’ve ever met with us. Ditch the car when you can; destroy the plates.” 

He didn’t wait for a response. You watched him stagger away and then waited until the light in the top right room flicked on and off and on and off again.  

Minho put the car in reverse and slowly backed out. At a further mile marker, he turned the lights on. He continued to climb, driving away from the city still, until the car reached the top of the hill. The lights from the city were so bright you almost didn’t need the headlights at all. It didn’t feel a safe place to stop. Too visible.  

Then Minho slowly and quietly backed the car into nook on the hillside. No doubt worn away from years of cars trying to pass each other on the narrow road, it barely contained the car, but it put it in some shadow and no one would hit you.  

He turned the engine off and let his hands fall to his lap. His head tipped back against the headrest and he sighed.  

“You ok?” 

You asked him all the time and he never gave a serious answer because he always was. And if he wasn’t, he certainly wasn’t going to talk about it. But you asked all the same.  

He nodded then turned to you. 

“You?” 

You laughed nervously, suddenly feeling the last twenty minutes as the adrenalin began to drain. 

“Kind of feel like I could hurl.” 

He laughed too and nodded again.  

“I feel like I want to sleep for a thousand years but also like I could run a marathon,” you continued.  

“I feel half-dead already but also fucking invincible.” 

He held his hand out and it trembled. You clasped it between yours and held it tight. He smiled; from where you were sitting, it looked like a smirk, but then he turned more fully towards you and it wasn’t. It was sweet. His eyes were gleaming. Your mouth dried.  

“Half-dead, huh?” And you knew you were going to say it. You always knew you would be the one with which it would raise its head. “How about a little dead? A little death, even?” 

“Sixteen…” 

His voice had that warning tone to it but the gleam in his eyes remained and you’d broken the seal now. Were going to push this as far as he’d let you.  

“Mouse…” 

You saw him waver. Absolutely, definitely, were certain that he was considering it. Until a car came over the crest of the hill and its headlights flashed in at you; at the same moment, Minho’s phone buzzed from the cup holder it had been thrown in. You jumped. He jumped. Whatever moment there had been was gone now.  

Minho took his hand from your grasp and checked his phone. Then he put the car in gear.  

“We’ve got to get out of here.” 

* 

You expected it to be quick. Expected it to be simple. It turned out to be neither. You had managed to destroy the plates and were very near clear of the car you’d now abandoned when you, once again, found trouble (‘why did it always have to be you?’ you had asked yourself fleetingly as Minho shoved you towards your own piece of shit car that had been waiting for your getaway; he had not waited for you to be fully seated or your door to be closed before he slammed a foot on the accelerator and squealed off). The two of you were screaming around corners, tearing out of the city in whichever direction provided the easiest escape. With the headlights off and the city lights streaming into the distance, you could barely see the road in front of you, had no idea how Minho was still driving straight. You trusted him with your life and it was just as well, because it was in his hands. His, yours, and potentially everyone else’s, too. 

The summer sun was minutes away from popping its head above the horizon when you were finally able to return home. 

You sat in silence for a few moments. You had moved beyond exhaustion into this kind of frayed, wired alertness. You felt your eyelids dropping even as your heart still hammered. Minho’s hand found yours.  

“Mouse,” you said, letting the rest of it fall away unspoken.  

“Yeah,” he replied but you didn’t know if that was his answer. “Just give me a minute.” 

You were too tired to argue so you let silence fall again. You were almost dropping off, head just beginning to nod, when he tugged on your hand.  

“Come here.”  

You turned. You leant. His other hand cupped the back of your head and pulled you closer. He kissed you. Electricity crackled and a surge of energy rushed through you. It was happening again. He was kissing you. You couldn’t let this time pass by.  

You scrambled in your chair, forgetting to undo your seatbelt, being pulled back by it and swearing coarsely when your lips broke from his. You clambered over the gearstick and the handbrake and fell with one foot heavily in the footwell as Minho slid his seat all the way back. You didn’t have time to care about the jarring in your knee or the bump on your head as it hit the roof. Could barely feel it. Didn’t matter.  

Well, it didn’t matter until it did. Until there wasn’t really room enough for you to straddle him. Until you were pressing yourself up against the roof so there would be room for him to get his hands to his belt. Until you lost your balance and fell backwards, landing with bump on the steering wheel, which blared out into the dark dawn street.  

“Fucking hell,” Minho muttered. “Get in the back.” 

More willingly than you ever had, you did as you were told. He moved his seat forward again, all the way, and you watched him climb through to you, hands reaching for him. It was no less awkward. Not enough room to lie down. Still not enough height to sit. Not space enough between the back and front to kneel. It was messy and uncoordinated, grabbing for anything, taking what you could get, knocking into the window and falling off the seat, kicking and elbowing each other in a tangle.  

“Jesus fucking Christ!” Minho roared, in an uncharacteristic display of frustration. “No use. Not happening.” 

He sat back and sighed, trousers undone but still around his hips. He pushed his hands through his hair and you tried to settle demurely next to him, smoothing your own hair, zipping up your jeans, swallowing hard as you fought to accept that he was right. It was not happening. Not here. Not now.  

You stared through the car window and were sure you could’ve punched straight through it. You wanted to. It was the window, Minho, or yourself. Couldn’t effectively punch yourself. Knew you wouldn’t dare hit your mouse. Your fingernails pressed sharply into your palm as you squeezed your fists tightly.  

A hand covered yours. Gentle. You looked at Minho and there he was: your secret, soft guy. You unfurled your fingers and he linked them with his own. 

“Come on,” he said quietly. “Let’s just go home.” 

FIRST 

You tramped into the apartment, bringing your bad mood with you. Everyone was sick of it by now – you were sick of it, but you couldn’t shake it.  

Minho was avoiding you. That much was clear. He had been avoiding you since you tried and failed to fuck in the car. You didn’t know why because you didn’t care. You had reached the end of your tether with the universe. Three times now. But still no cigar. You wondered – asked yourself a hundred times a day – what it was going to take to make this happen.  

Frustrated didn’t even begin to cover it. You could go out and hook up with whoever you liked. You could get yourself off just fine. But it ran so much deeper than that. If you pulled at the thread, it tugged on your heartstrings, all tangled up in knots. It hurt. It pulled at something so deeply interwoven with your very being; all anyone had to do was follow it to its source and they could destroy you. All anyone had to do was cut it and they’d cut you, too.  

You didn’t like that. Hated it, in fact. Hated that all this tugging and wiggling had opened up a hole and you could feel your vulnerability exposed. You could feel weakness leaking out of you, seeping from your pores, visible to the naked eye, for anyone to see.  

It made you bitter. Made you angry. Made you lash out even when you shouldn’t have. Because you were always on the defensive. Even now. Especially now. 

You knew the others were talking about you. About Minho. About the two of you. Knew it from the awkward silences when you walked in a room and the furtive glances and the group chat that had grown curiously quiet, leaving you to assume that there was a separate one you weren’t a part of.  

You were beginning to lose your patience and you were not starting with a plentiful supply.  

You lay on your bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to calm your rage. You had woken with it, just like every other day this week, and it would not leave you. You breathed slowly and carefully and tried to think of difficult and boring things.  

You thought only of Minho.  

Then he opened the door. He hesitated – you could feel him standing there, assessing – and then shut it, leaving you alone. As the door clicked, you felt that tug. You felt the knots tighten, so impossibly tight now that the joins weren’t even visible. You jumped up and threw yourself through the door. 

“Stop fucking ignoring me!” 

You hadn’t meant to shout.  

Minho turned and looked at you. His stillness enraged you further. He didn’t say anything. 

“Are you going to fucking say anything?!” 

“What do you want me to say?” 

“ANYTHING! You haven’t spoken to me for weeks! You literally walk out of rooms if I’m in them! What the fuck is wrong with you?”  

“You think this is easy?”  

His voice was cold and sharp as steel. His head cocked lightly to the side and his eyes narrowed, peering at you, looking inside you.  

“You think I want it to be like this?-” 

“I don’t know what you fucking want!” 

His nostrils flared. This delighted you. He was annoyed and you loved it. 

“Not once,” you continued, still shouting because you couldn’t rein it in, “have you ever fucking told me. Not once have you ever actually said what you want! That you want me. Do you? Fucking do you? Because I don’t fucking know anymore! Every time we get close, you get further away from me! I’m not a fucking yo-yo, Minho. You can’t play with me-” 

“Play with you? You think I’m playing? What part of this is a game?”  

His voice was rising now, too, his perfectly blank mask slipping. 

“It’s never been a game, Sixteen! Not once in the entire time since we met has it been a game! How are you still not getting it? Junho almost fucking died and if he had, it would have been our fault! We all almost ended up in prison because of the fucking bar. The night we met you almost got yourself trafficked! It’s not a game! You act like life is so fucking simple! It’s not!” 

“IT IS! It can be that fucking simple! Stop overthinking! Stop taking everything so fucking seriously!-” 

“It is serious! That’s what you don’t get!” 

He was close now, had been inching closer and closer, and he was looking down at you, his eyes black as pitch, his jaw tight, his breath struggling through clenched teeth.  

“You don’t get it and you never have.”  

His voice was quiet, back to that steel that sent a chill down your spine.  

“Everywhere you go, I look out for you. Everywhere you are, I am responsible for you. It’s been nine fucking years, Sixteen, and you are everywhere I go.” 

Your vision tunnelled, stomach fell to your feet. You had to look away and hated yourself for it. You never flinched. You never backed down. You were never the first to retreat. Except for him. You couldn’t bear to look in his eyes, to see what loathing and disdain they held for you. Your embarrassment was on your cheeks already and pricking in your eyes.  

Then his nose nudged yours and he took more steps forward. He pushed you slowly against the wall and you cursed yourself for retreating to it. 

“You are in my life and in my bedroom and in my fucking head,” he whispered. “All the time. All the fucking time. And I haven’t been able to do shit about it because you are my job. You are mine to protect. Everyone knows it. Everyone knows I would burn this place to the ground for you. I would scorch the earth. I would drain the sea. For you. Don’t you get it? When it comes to you, I’m a fucking liability.”  

You risked it. A glance. Lifted your eyes for less than a second but you had to do it again. Had to stop there, be sure you were really seeing what you thought you were.  

Soft, round, liquid eyes. An openness in his face that he hadn’t let you into before. His mouth was still a grim line, turned down at the corners so slightly, had it been anyone but you, it would have gone unnoticed.  

“Mouse...”  

You tried to whisper but could barely manage that, his name creeping out on a hoarse gasp.  

He moved his face closer to yours, lips almost touching.  

“Don’t you get it?” he repeated.  

You got it. Because everything he said was true for you, too. You’d started out as a liability, for sure, but you had continued to be one because Minho was your north star. Not Chan. Not the group. Not whatever sense of purpose you might have derived from the life you had cobbled together. If he said jump, you wouldn’t ask a thing. You would jump. You’d been following him since day one and, then, it might have been desperation, a lack of options. Now... well, there was still desperation: a desperate need for him, a desperate desire to be wanted by him, kissed by him, touched by him. You had other options. Options you would never take, not as long as he existed. You would stop existing before you ever thought of leaving him.  

You nodded, feeling more like a foolish, vulnerable 16-year-old than you had when you were foolish and vulnerable and 16.  

He sighed, breath sweet with the pudding he could never resist, and you were closing your eyes, tilting your chin up, expecting him to give in.  

He turned away. You watched him, mouth agape in disbelief, as he pushed his hands through his hair.  

“FOR FUCK’S SAKE!” you screamed, bringing your hands down on his back in something that was half-shove, half-slap.  

He had whipped around before you could lower your arms and you found your wrists caught in his hands.  

“You don’t fucking stop, do you?” he hissed.  

“Why would I stop?! I don’t want to stop, Minho! And nor do you! You can’t say you don’t! Because I KNOW. I KNOW you want it. I know you want me. And I’m fucking throwing myself at you. Take me! TAKE ME!” 

His eyes were hard and dark. His fingers pushed so tightly into your wrists that you could feel your pulse against them. He was breathing heavily, nostrils flaring but lips shut tight, pressed together in a thin line.  

“Take. Me,” you repeated, level and firm, not sure if he would, but sure that, if he didn’t, things would never be the same again.  

You couldn’t do this a fourth time. Couldn’t put yourself in his hands, have him take you, and then... Not. And then stop. And then act as if you didn’t exist. That thread between you, tied up in your heartstrings, was taut, stretched, at its limit. And so were you. 

The pause was painful. Excruciatingly long. Adrenalin coursed through you, making you hot, making you shake, making your heart beat so hard against your ribs you thought they might break. Thought your heart might break. Hadn’t been willing to admit how fragile it was but it felt like venetian glass now. You could already feel the cracks forming, the web extending, the shards- 

He kissed you. Pulled you roughly towards him by your wrists and kissed you. Put his hands on your hips, then slid them under your top, and still kissed you. He was kissing you. It took a few seconds to slip back into your body, to feel it, the soft petal of his lips against yours, the sharp bite of his teeth, the wet warmth of his tongue. You forgot your shattering heart and grabbed his T-shirt, using it to pull him closer, to drag him into your shared bedroom. 

Not that he needed dragging. You stumbled over each other’s feet as you tried to kiss and walk and grope all at once. You tumbled backwards onto his bed and took the brief separation as an opportunity to lose your top, to unclasp your bra. Your hands were in the waistband of your joggers when Minho climbed over you, topless now too, breathless as he mirrored your actions, pushing his trousers and his boxers over his hips. He huffed a frustrated sigh as you giggled, as he stood back up to take them all the way off, to kick them off his ankles and take yours away, too.  

He didn’t give you time for admiration, for appraisal. He lay his body over you and his lips pressed against yours, quickly, firmly, before trailing them across your jaw and down your neck. He was every bit as vicious as you thought he would be, teeth nipping at your sensitive skin, sinking into your soft flesh. You wanted him to mark you, wanted the proof of it to last. You scraped your nails down his back and he hissed when you broke the skin. Hissed but didn’t complain. Hissed and moved his mouth lower, swirling his tongue around your nipple, sinking his teeth into that, too.  

When you tugged on his hair, he pulled off, looked at you, his face an open question. You shook your head. 

“It’s fine,” you panted. “I like it. I just want to pull your hair.” 

He laughed and clamped his teeth over your breast again, harder this time, so you keened and your back arched into him. You twisted his roots in your fist and he moaned, eyes flicking up to yours as he kissed across the valley of your chest.  

“Do that again.” 

“Fuck,” you gasped, tipping your head back, doing as he had asked and tugging hard.  

The ache you felt for him had ballooned inside you, taken up all your hollow spaces. There was your flushed skin and your fluttering heart, your rushing blood and your deep, persistent ache for Minho. Nothing more. Nothing less.  

“Mouse,” you whispered, voice tight with desire. “Touch me, please.”  

You never asked. You didn’t beg. If you liked a guy, you let them do what they wanted with you, and if you didn’t, you took what you wanted. It was always one-sided.  

But this wasn’t. It was Minho. It was the fathomless depth in his eyes as he lay his mouth all over you. It was the slip of his fingers through your soaked folds as he sucked sweet bruises against your neck. It was the sound of a moan caught in his throat when you wrapped your fingers around his hard, leaking length. It was mutual. It was reciprocated.  

It was burning you up, hotter and sweeter than you’d ever felt before. His fingers sinking into your core made you shudder with delight. The twitch in his cock as you brushed your thumb over his head made your mouth water. The sound of his mumbled sweet nothings pressed against your skin, whispered in your ear, licked straight into your mouth, made you dizzy.  

“So soft,” he said. “So wet... Fuck, you’re so fucking beautiful... I’ve wanted this for so long... Wanted you...”  

He used your name, your real one, the one he didn’t learn (didn’t ask for) for months after you met. You returned the favour, ‘Minho’ tripping from your lips, until he shook his head. 

“Mouse,” he murmured, mouth still pressed against yours. “‘Mouse’ is yours.”  

“Mouse,” you echoed and he nodded before kissing you so that you could say nothing at all. 

* 

You barely spoke, couldn’t catch your breath enough to form the words, couldn’t engage your faculties to find any to say. Minho spoke, though, more than you had ever heard him speak: praise and exclamation and remembrance and, yes, even admonition, but it was all so sweet, syrupy, dripping from his tongue like honey. You’d never heard him speak like this before, never had him melt in your hands or in your mouth, never felt him as easy and pliable as this.  

It wasn’t just his body. It wasn’t just the perfect smoothness of his warm, soft skin. It wasn’t just the stretch, the fullness, he made inside you, the insistent rhythm of his hips thrusting his cock tightly into your slick, waiting warmth. It wasn’t just his wet, sugary mouth, at your lips, at your jaw, at your clavicle. It wasn’t just all these things he was doing to you, all the things you were doing to him. 

It was his open eyes, round and shining and fluttering closed as your walls clenched around him. It was the tenderness in them, the depth he was letting you see, for more than just seconds at a time. It was the gentle tracing of your face with his fingers, even as he fucked into you, even as his teeth drew blood beneath your skin. It was Minho, the entirety of him. Yours. Finally yours. Finally giving in to you, giving himself to you.  

You got it. You had said you did and you had, but now, beneath him in his bed as he loved you, you actually understood the magnitude of it. His feelings for you. Yours for him. Held back behind a dam for so many years and now, the dam had broken. Now came the deluge that would flood the world, could drown everyone in it.  

To hell with them, you thought. To hell with anyone else. You found what you needed almost a decade ago. He found you. You found each other, somehow, by some miracle.  

When the pleasure swelled up in your core, toes curling, back breaking, you cried out with all the breath you had in your lungs, felt tears sting in your eyes, and the following inhale wobbled and shook. Minho paused, pressed his forehead against yours, kissed you lightly, didn’t have to ask the question out loud.  

You nodded and kissed him again, then again, each time hungrier than the last. You didn’t want to stop. Didn’t want to feel anything but this, but him. He moved slower now, though, hips rolling smoothly, lips not leaving yours, even when he spoke, even when he murmured how fucking good you felt, how much better than he’d imagined, how hard he was trying not to come, how he didn’t want this to end.  

You couldn’t take it. Thought you really would cry, thought you would collapse entirely under his weight, under the weight of everything you’d been carrying around, all these feelings: all this love and fear and frustration. He pushed you to the edge again without even trying, your red thread thoroughly tangled, inseparable now, and pulling a greater ecstasy from you than you had ever known.  

He couldn’t hold out either, his final, sharp thrusts filling you with his sticky release. You held him there, as close as he could be. He kissed you, so light it was barely there, his fingers grazing your face as he pushed the hair from your brow. 

“Mouse,” you choked, tears threatening your waterline.  

He kissed you again, that little butterfly kiss; you’d never seen him be this gentle.  

“Sixteen,” he whispered and, for possibly the first time, it didn’t sound like disdain, didn’t come accompanied by a smirk or an eye-roll; it was hushed and secret and just for you.  

As it had always been.  

* 

You lay on his chest, bodies pressed together in the small, single bed, as they would have been even if the bed were bigger.  

“I want some water,” he said, lips against your forehead before he manoeuvred himself out from underneath you. “Want a drink?” 

You nodded and he smiled down at you as he fetched clean underwear and pulled a T-shirt over his head.  

You watched him go, watched him open the door, and then heard the sound of party poppers, whoops, and applause.  

The apartment was empty. Had been empty when you entered your bedroom. In the midst of everything, you had failed to notice the gang return home. They had not failed to notice you and Minho.  

“Fucking finally!”  

“You mean, they finally fucked?” 

Laughter resounded from the living room. Minho turned around, closed the door, and climbed back into bed without a word. 

[theemissuniverse]

“I WALK THE LINE” JAVIER GARCIA X TOUGH FEM!READER

SUMMARY : You are the leader of The New Frontier and you’ve won the heart of both brothers but you’re only interested in the baseball player.

ADDITIONAL : So that there is no confusion, this takes place after the events of killing Joan only that then you became leader. Also Clem never got kicked out and lives with you and AJ. Mariana never died. And there’s just things that are tweaked in the story but will make sense as you read.

WARNINGS : Cursing, suggestive content, talks about religion, and maybe more

There was something about you that made you so intriguing yet utterly horrifying to Javi. Maybe it was because you acted somewhat like his brother and were in a solider mindset. Or maybe it was the way you spoke about death like you weren’t afraid of it. Maybe it was because you were so beautiful yet so deadly. Or maybe it was just you period.

Javi had met you when he came into the New Frontier seeing as you were the leader and David was your second in command. His first impression? You were hard to impress. You didn’t care about anything really other than the mission at hand but Javi saw more through you.

You caught on to the fact that Kate had feelings for him and would relentlessly joke about it to Javi which irritated him to no end. He didn’t have feelings for her. He never did. Not for his brother’s wife.

He saw how history may soon repeat because even though you were not with David romantically, it was clear he wanted to be with you romantically. Though, he would never admit it. David took pride in his reputation and him falling for you didn’t look good considering he technically already had a wife.

Javi was after all, a man at the end of the day and could tell by just looking at the two of you. The longing looks David had for you. How he would at least try to control his temper around you. How you were the only one to keep him in check.

And Javi hated it.

He just couldn’t tell if you felt the same way back and until he did so, he would keep hitting on you. Even in front of his brother.

Javi played with the ring on his finger that belonged to his father while watching you. You were looking over some papers to see about your supply chain in the doctors office alone. Javi took it as his chance to stroll over to you.

He watched you look up from your papers and down. “What do you want twenty five?”

Twenty five was the nickname that was quickly given to him while you discovered of his baseball history. He didn’t mind it though. He thought it was cute. And he thought more that you liked him. At least a little.

“I can’t come in a check on you?” Javi asked fake offended.

“I don’t need you to do that. I already have David breathing down my neck.” Javi watched as you winced and held your stomach.

You gotten a pretty bad gash on your stomach from Badger and it wasn’t looking so good. Usually David was tough around everyone but the wound was so bad that he was starting to worry.

And if David of all people was worrying than it had to be that bad.

Javi took the papers out your hand and made you sit on top of the desk. “Hey, sit down.”

You sighed in annoyance. “Not you too.”

“Hey, if the big bad wolf is worried…then it’s gotta be bad.” Javi noticed your eye roll and chuckled.

You leaned back a little. “I don’t know what’s gotten into him. He’s been acting weird. I can’t put my finger on it.”

Of course, Javi knew exactly what was wrong. The problem was David wanted you but he didn’t want you. He wanted you in the best possible ways but he didn’t want the baggage that would come with that.

Lucky for Javi, he didn’t mind baggage. “David isn’t used to caring about something.” Javi put it into simple terms. “Just give him a second.”

“You’re too nice to him. Because the way he treats you…if I had a sister and she did me the way he did you…she wouldn’t be breathing.”

Javi laughed. “Well…Clementine’s kinda like your sister isn’t she?”

“Well yeah. But she doesn’t tell me how much of a failure I am every second.”

That was true. For Javi, it was hard dealing with David but he had gotten so used to it that it didn’t even affect him anymore. “It’s like wired in my brain. I know he loves me he just…has a funny way of showing it.”

“Yeah. You’re telling me.”

Javi noticed that you clutched your stomach in pain again. “Let me see.”

You gave him a look. “Is this your excuse of trying to see me shirtless.”

“I would’ve came up with something better if that’s the case.”

The statement made you laugh a little and you lifted your shirt for Javi to see the scar.

It was bad. A stab to the right and it would’ve been over for you. The stitches were nicely done. “Who did these?”

“Clementine…still don’t know how she knows how to do that.”

Javi nodded in agreement. “That’s one tough kid.” His hand gently went to caress the scar. He was so glad that badger was dead.

You watched as Javi’s expression went from worry to anger. A similar expression you had seen on David. You took Javi’s hand and held it. “I’m fine. Relax. It could’ve been worse.”

“Yeah. That’s the problem. It could’ve went worse.”

“Luckily you shot him in the head huh?”

“I wish I could do it twice.”

It was moments like these you saw the similarities to Javi and David and you couldn’t help but laugh because it was something you expected from David but not Javi.

You got off from the desk and Javi helped you off. You were about to fall but Javi quickly caught you and held you close. “Careful.” He told you. “That supply chain isn’t going anywhere.”

“You know if I don’t do it, David is definitely not doing it.”

Javi chuckled and helped you stand to your feet. “That’s one thing about him. All about the action. Hates the paperwork.”

“You know what else David is gonna hate?”

Javi looked at you curiously. “What?”

You covered your mouth as sort of a playful whisper. “You banging his wife.”

Again with the joke, Javi watched you laugh as he groaned out of annoyance. You walked out the room and Javi followed in pursuit. “How many times do I have to tell you, nothing is going on between me and her.”

“Well obviously she wants you.”

“I don’t want her.”

You playfully gasped in shock to him and stopped walking making him stop. “You don’t want thee Kate Garcia?” Javi rolled his eyes. “What will the world do if they didn’t have twenty five in their life?”

You went back to walking and Javi followed in pursuit. “Hey, I had a lot of women wanting twenty five in their life thank you very much.”

“Oh yeah? Were they all offered to hitch a ride to the psych ward afterwards?”

“Oh very funny.”

“I know. I’m a true comedian really.”

Javi had never seen you this way around anyone really. You were always so cold. So negative but with him you weren’t like that.

That made him believe you two had something.

Javi walked right in front of you to stop you in your tracks. “Busy tonight?”

“Actually, I was totally looking forward to my nail and hair appointment.” You said sarcastically. “Ooh! Or maybe go sight seeing with walkers!”

“Taking that as a no…” He trailed off before speaking again. “I need help with the count on food for next week.”

“Oh and you’re just so helpless that you need me?”

“Exactly.”

You rolled your eyes playfully before nodding. “Sure. I guess.”

You went to take another step but the sudden pain pinched at your gut and you clutched your stomach. Javi immediately held you by the waist and brought you closer. “You okay?”

“Yeah. I’m fine.”

Javi knew you weren’t fond of touch but you never seemed to mind when he held you.

The two of you heard footsteps coming from down the hall. Javi was about to remove his hands from your waist but you placed your hands on top of his, keeping them firm in place.

The person stopped in their tracks and you two recognized it was David.

He gave the two of you a look of disgust before looking at his brother in anger. “What the hell is going on?”

“Nothing.” You stated calmly. “Just slight pain.”

David immediately walked over to you and grabbed the papers in your hand. He looked at them before getting annoyed. “I told you I would do this.”

“You’re not going to do it the correct way.” You told him.

“Yes I will.” He looked over at Javi. “What are you doing here?”

Javi, knowing the reason why David was being like this, rolled his eyes at him. “Just helping, (Y/N). Relax.”

“Don’t tell me to relax.” When David said that, you gave him a good hard smack on his chest.

“Shut up, you idiot. You’re so annoying sometimes.”

Javi watched as David took a deep breath in and out. He noticed his brother was trying to control his temper and it was working. Once again, he controlled his anger for you.

“Look, come on. I’ll help you.” He practically pushed Javi off of you and held onto your waist as you started walking away.

“You’re being ridiculous.” You grumbled.

“I’m not being ridiculous. You are.”

Javi sighed slightly watching him walk away with you but he wasn’t worried. Not even in the slightest.

When Javi turned around, he jumped back a little. He wasn’t expecting for Clementine to be there. “Ay’ dios mio, do you always sneak up behind people?”

“I wasn’t sneaking.” Clementine defended. “I was going to talk to (Y/N) but I see your brother already hauled her off somewhere.”

“Yeah.” Javi crossed his arms. “He hasn’t let her breathe ever since…”

Clementine nodded. “I think it’s because he’s mad.”

“Mad?” Javi questioned. “Why would he be mad?”

“Mad at you.”

“Me? What did I do?…This time?”

Clementine smiled slightly before shaking her head. “You saved her. I think David wanted to be the one that was there.”

It made sense in some way but Javi still couldn’t understand. You were safe now. Why did it matter? “But she’s alive? Shouldn’t that be all that matters?”

“Not if it’s you involved.” Clementine walked over to the window and Javi followed her. There, they watched as David sat you down in a chair. “I’m not blind. I know he likes her. And I know you like her too.”

Javi wasn’t going to deny it. Especially because Clementine was already a smart kid. “You think it’s not worth it?”

“I think if you love someone, anything is worth it.” She said. “But is it worth losing your brother?”

David already lost Kate because of Javi. Was it fair he’d lose you to? Because of him?

This wasn’t fair. He didn’t ask to have feelings for you. They were just there. And he definitely didn’t ask for Kate to have feelings for him which David didn’t even know that he was the real reason they weren’t together anymore.

But you were worth everything.

When the stars shined in the sky, Javi put on his jersey and opened the door to walk out of his room. What he didn’t expect was to see Kate standing right there. “Oh…hey, Kate.”

Ever since Kate confessed her feelings for Javi and he rejected her, Javi felt it was best to keep his distance. If she was any other woman than it wouldn’t have been a problem. But she wasn’t just any woman. She was his brother’s wife.

“I was going to knock…where are you going?”

He really didn’t feel like getting into an argument with her as you and Kate did not get along but he also wasn’t one to lie. “Going to count the food supply with (Y/N).”

Kate scoffed. “She can’t do it herself?”

Javi suppressed an eye roll. He stepped out the room making her take a step back and closed the door before walking. “You know it’s my job right?”

“That doesn’t mean she needs to be with you. God it’s like ever since she got hurt you and David…”

“Hey I’ve been letting her do her own thing. David is the one that’s not letting her breathe.”

“It’s like he likes her or something…”

Javi caught the attitude in her voice. He wasn’t fond of David liking you either. Well that was because of his own feelings but why did Kate have a problem with it. “Does it matter? You broke up with him.”

He watched as Kate’s head went down in shame and she sighed. “Yeah. Look how that turned out.”

That made Javi stop in his tracks. He turned around and faced Kate, also making her stop. “Listen, I’m sorry how things turned out and I don’t mean to sound harsh but you got to let it go.”

“Let it go? You’re telling me to let my feelings go?”

“Yes. It’s wrong and I don’t want to be any part of it when David finds out the real reason you broke it off with him.”

Kate grabbed Javi’s hands and brought them to her. “So you’re saying if David wasn’t your brother you would be with me?”

Javi shook his head and took his hands back from her. “No Kate. Brother or not, I don’t feel anything for you. I care about you but I don’t love you. I’m sorry.”

Before Kate could get out a response, Javi’s radio started to sound like static. And then he heard your voice over it. “Twenty five. You ready?”

Javi grabbed his radio and pressed the button to speak. “Yeah. Where you want me to meet you at?”

“Just meet me at the warehouse. Also I like roses.”

Javi smiled knowing you were half joking. “Copy that.” He placed the radio on his belt and when he looked up, he saw Kate had an angry expression. “What?”

“You’re in love with her? Are you serious?”

“Kate…” Javi sighed out. “I’m not having this discussion with you.”

When Kate looked into his eyes all she saw was someone that didn’t care about her. “Unbelievable…” She mumbled before turning around and walking away.

“It’s like I’m in high school all over again.” Javi said to himself.

It didn’t matter if you were half joking, Javi still picked you out the prettiest rose from the garden you all were growing.

You were in the warehouse already counting the food while sitting on the ground. You had the burden of being leader ever since they took down Joan and the others which meant the responsibility of everyone fell on you.

Javi could tell you were stressed but you were good at not showing it. That’s what he loved about you. About how big your heart was despite you trying to act otherwise.

He walked over towards you and held out the rose. “This wasn’t my ideal date.”

You looked up and were surprised that he had gotten you a rose. You took it before looking up at him. “What was then?”

“You know…” Javi sat in front of you and grabbed one of the clipboards. “Dinner and a night out. Not being inside counting our dinner.”

You chuckled a little before resuming your count. “You know I don’t really miss how the world used to be.”

Javi raised a brow at this. “Why? What could be worse than people trying to eat you?”

“At least they can’t control them being monsters. But us…we can control that.”

Javi got what you were hinting towards. “Yeah, that’s true.”

You hit your pen on your clipboard, deep in thought. “Do you believe in God, Javi?”

“Yes…but I can see why someone wouldn’t.”

You nodded at his opinion. “I never did. Everyone always told me that God was always watching me…then why did he watch me as my father beat me? Or when my mother lit her cigarette on me? Or when my Uncle John forced me to drink liquor? Or when my cousin Rob killed my cat? Why did he always just watch and never do anything?”

“It doesn’t matter if I’m in my old life or this life…either way…it sucks both ways. Mind as well take the one that sucks less.”

Javi wasn’t surprised to hear what happened in your life only because it explained why you were the tough woman you are now.

He knew what you felt about sympathy and he knew you despised grievance so he took another approach. “Maybe God wanted you to suffer.”

At that, you looked at him, extremely confused but laughing. “What?”

Javi laughed with you. “Yeah, maybe he picked you because he specifically hated you and wanted you to suffer the most.”

You laughed hysterically and hit him with your clipboard. “Shut up.”

“I’m serious. He’s probably looking down right now and thinking, ‘damn I probably didn’t do enough.”

“You’re so stupid.” You said with a laugh.

Getting you to smile was one of the best things Javi could accomplish. You smiled like you were the happiest person in the world.

“I wish David could be like this. He’s too serious.”

When you said that, Javi decided to rip the bandaid off. “That’s because he’s in love with you.”

When he had said that, you looked up to him completely shocked. “What? No he isn’t…”

Javi nodded to confirm. “Yeah, he is. Come on, (Y/N). You’re the only person besides his kids that he checks up on constantly. Always worrying. The overbearing protectiveness. I mean he obviously has some feelings for you.”

You never really thought about it but now that you were, it was strange the way David would act around you. So strange it could come off as he had feelings for you.

You groaned and rubbed your temples in annoyance. “Oh no…”

Javi laughed as he had not expected that reaction. “What? You don’t like my brother?”

“Please. David is not anywhere near my type.”

“So what is your type?”

You saw how eager Javi was to know which made you thump his head with your thumb. “Not you.”

Though you were lying. Although Javi maybe wasn’t your ideal type, you sure wouldn’t complain if you had rode into the sunset with him. He was smart, handsome, emotionally intelligent while also having a sense of humor.

Javi looked back to his clipboard. “How do you want me to do the rations this week.”

“I say we stop doing those. They already get 3 meals a day without labor. A lot of them aren’t seeing the use of even working. If they want any extra food, they have to work harder. We’re giving out food and wasting it when we really don’t have to.”

Javi nodded. “That makes sense…how do you think David will feel about it though?”

“Not great when he finds out the rules also apply to his kids.” You say. “Look I love Mariana and Gabe but they’re old enough not to get any special treatment. The only one that is getting any special treatment is AJ and that’s only because he’s still a toddler.”

“Hey, I got your back if he says anything.”

“He shouldn’t. It was his stupid idea for me to be leader anyway.”

Javi hated when you spoke badly about yourself. After all the hard things you had to do, you didn’t deserve that. He gently grabbed your hand which made you look at him. “It wasn’t stupid. You’re a great leader. You’re the only one willing to make the hard calls.”

You sighed a little. “That’s what I hate about this. Help me up.”

Javi stood up on his feet first. Then he helped you slowly get up. You were groaning in pain. “I can get a wheelchair from the hospital you know?”

You hit his shoulder lightly. “Stop talking stupid.”

You tried to walk but the minute you did, your legs gave out from the pain. Luckily Javi was fast and caught you before you fell. “You are so stubborn.” He said to you.

He handed you his clipboard. You looked at him confused but took it. He then picked you up bridal style.

“Javi!” You gasped out in shock.

“Which way?” Javi asked, ignoring your shout.

You shook your head before pointing. “To the left…by the way you’re aren’t cool for doing this.”

“I think I’m very cool.”

The next day, Javi made sure to prepare himself. He was going to confess his feelings for you. He honestly didn’t think it would go bad. Whether you accepted him or rejected him, he wasn’t like Kate or David. If all he could do was be your friend then he would be just that.

It was early in the morning. Breakfast time which meant the community was in the dining hall eating.

He knew that usually at this time you were in your office by yourself so he made his way towards the room.

The door was wide open and there he saw David. It appeared to be that the two of you were arguing.

“My kids need food, (Y/N) and are used to eating the rations. Making the rule apply to them won’t help anything.”

“I hate to break it to you David, but they are not kids anymore. Far from it. If the people figure out you and your family get special treatment then I’m the one that gets all the angry people in this group at me. Not you, me.”

“This is stupid!”

Javi decided to make himself known. He walked into the office while looking at his brother. “David, Mariana and Gabe are both capable of going without the rations. They gotta work for it like everyone else.“

David turned to his brother in pure anger. He shoved Javi in the chest. “Stay out of it.”

You pushed yourself in between the two and faced David. “You just don’t want him in it because he’s the only one on my side.”

“I don’t want him involved because last time I checked, I was your second in command - not him. What the hell do you care for anyway? He’s pretty much useless.”

Javi wasn’t fazed at all by David’s comment as he was used to his behavior. You didn’t like it. Not at all. Javi saw your expression turn sad. You took a couple steps back from David. “Then maybe you shouldn’t be second in command anymore should you?”

David’s eyes widened at this. “Wait no. Come on, (Y/N). You don’t mean that.”

“Everywhere I go, you’re breathing over my shoulder and you’re suffocating me. And then the way you treat your brother just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.”

“I don’t treat him like anything! I-“

David went to grab your hands but you quickly pushed them away and continued your rant. “And then you’re always mad all the time. Mad at me.”

“I’m mad at you because I love you.”

Silence. Neither Javi nor you were expecting that. You didn’t even think David himself was expecting himself to say that. Javi was just thinking if he should just walk out the the room slowly and leave the two of your alone at this point.

“I don’t love you.”

Javi saw the expression on David’s face. It was hurt. A hurt he had never seen on his face. The type of hurt that was heart breaking. If David was capable of tears, Javi bet that David would be crying by now.

David held his head down as he walked out the office. You waited until he was completely gone before shutting the office door.

“That was…rough…” Javi said breaking the silence.

You sighed, rubbing your head. You felt a headache come in quick. “I can’t keep doing this with him. Walking on eggshells at every turn. I mean I know I’m not the best with emotions but at least I don’t spaze out on people every five minutes. It’s just…too much.”

It was pretty hard having a brother like David but Javi always made sure to not give into the hate and always have hope for him. “His brain isn’t wired how ours is. It’s like…you’re driving at 30 miles per hour. All the time. You’re safe and cautious of your surroundings. With him? He’s driving at 90. Full foot on the gas and not even bothering to hit the break…until he’s about to crash…and then it’s too late.”

You looked at Javi curiously. “Why do you do that? Your brother treats you like shit every single day and you defend him without blinking an eye.”

Javi walked over towards you before leaning on your desk right next to you. “Because…it’s just not worth it. Him being mad at me…me being mad at him…it’s a never ending cycle and I don’t want to partake in any of that.”

You nodded at him before sitting on top of your desk. “I don’t ever miss the old world exactly. I just missed what we could do in it….like eat a pizza, or go laser tagging, or watch tv…or get married…”

When you mentioned the last part, Javi turned to look at you interested. “Married? You wanted that?”

“I know it sounds corny but…I wanted a marriage and a kid…I wanted to have a family because well…I didn’t quite get that during my childhood.”

It made Javi a little upset that all the things you wished for, you couldn’t have because of the apocalypse. But then again, he was sort of glad this all happened because he probably wouldn’t have met you.

Javi looked at the ring on his finger before taking it off. He stood directly in front of you, grabbing your left hand. “I always thought that the marriage thing was for my brother.” You watched as he carefully slid the ring on your ring finger. “But I guess when you really love someone, the idea to you isn’t so crazy.”

You caught on to his confession and you were surprised. Javi chuckled at your surprise but didn’t take it as rejection. “Oh come on, mi amor. You had to of known I at least liked you a little.”

He didn’t wait for your response. He leaned down and kissed you. When Javi kissed you, you felt safe. Like it was home.

You brought your hand to cup the back of his neck. He kissed you lovingly. Like he had loved you for a century.

His lips were like cotton candy. Soft and delicious. His hands were rough but felt so good going along your thigh.

Javi moaned in your mouth when you gripped his hair. He felt your other hand reach the belt of his pants and when he felt that you were about to undo it, he stopped.

He placed his hand over yours while resting his forehead on yours. “You still haven’t healed yet.” He said, reminding you of your wound on your stomach.

You giggled. “What? Are you trying to say that thing can hurt me?”

“Maybe…” Javi gave you a sweet kiss on the lips before sighing. “David is going to be so pissed at me.”

You made Javi look you in the eye. “Stop worrying about what he wants. Worry about what you want.”

Javi always put everything he’d ever wanted to the side because of his brother’s jealousy and insecurities. He was done doing that. He didn’t want to keep living the life of pleasing him.

He just wanted you.

“How do we tell him?”

You shrugged. “It’s not ours to tell. You don’t owe him anything, Javi.”

Javi felt you press your lips onto his and suddenly he was back to his safe home.

The only thing was that the blinds to the window was opened and someone saw the two of you.

It took a lot for David to be heartbroken. He was a strong man. Not just physically but emotionally. He barely felt sadness. Just anger but he was tired of feeling it.

He should’ve known you didn’t feel the same way. Why would you? He was the guy always mad at the world. Who would want to be with someone like that? It was the reason Kate left.

First his first wife, then Kate, and now you.

He couldn’t catch a break.

David couldn’t sleep as the guilt was surfacing. Everyone he did or has ever done just wasn’t washing away. Not this time.

He was sitting at the kitchen table, just staring off with his thoughts.

That was until there was a knock on the door.

David peaked up from his seat. It had to of been ten at night. Who would come to him at the ungodly hour? Maybe you?

He stood before walking over to the door. He opened it and there he saw Kate. Someone he hadn’t expected.

“Kate…are you okay? Why are you here so late?”

Kate looked the same. Heartbroken as well but he couldn’t really put a finger on why she was. She didn’t give him another word before pushing herself inside his house.

“Okay…” David closed the door to his house and looked back at Kate who had her back turned to him. “You wanna tell me what’s going on?”

He heard her breathe in and out like she was trying not to cry. “I need to tell you the truth. The reason why I actually broke things off.”

“The truth?” David was confused. Was what she told him before not the truth? “Why are you just now telling me?”

“Because you need to know. You deserve it.”

There was something about her voice that made it seem like she was more so doing it for her and not him but regardless it was late at night and he couldn’t care less. “Kate it’s done and over with. Whatever it was…I don’t even care anymore.”

“It’s Javi.”

It was like she knew that would spark his attention. His eyes widened and he took steps towards her. “What do you mean by that?”

Kate sighed and turned to face him. “When me and him were on the road with the kids for so long…I really saw a different side to him. Not the same one obsessed with gambling and laying on your couch hoping for the next bag of money to roll in. I saw someone who was brave, and protective, and over all one of the best people I’ve ever met. I fell in love with him.”

David bit his lip. The same way he tried to control his temper with you, he was trying to control it now. “What? My brother? Are you serious Kate?!”

“I know…I know…it doesn’t matter because he doesn’t feel the same way. It’s just…I thought you should know.”

David cared but only a little. He wasn’t in love with Kate anymore. There wasn’t really anything for him to be mad at. “I can’t believe this..”

Kate looked into his eyes before stepping forward. “There’s something else…I know you care about, (Y/N).” Before David could get in a word, Kate held her hand up. “Let me finish. I know you do…but there’s something you should know so you don’t get caught off guard…I saw her and Javi kissing. I think they’re together now.”

David stood there, completely in shock. He would have never imagined it’d be you. That you’d fall for a guy like Javi. A guy that was his brother.

He couldn’t imagine Javi even having any feelings for you. He was just in shock.

Kate knew him too well and knew what was coming next. “I just thought you should know…” She opened the door to the house before leaving, closing it behind her.

It was at that point David grabbed a vase and smashed it into the wall.

There was no controlling his temper anymore. Not even you.

A/N : part 2???

[exhaslo]

omg i like love ur writing so much its like not even funny i look forward to each thing you write

so im thinking: Miguel as like ghost from modern warfare and clumsy new recruit reader whos actually super good at what they do but the twist is that she uses the art of catching people off guard to fight aka flashing enemies her bewbs

so Miguel’s annoyed over that because its such an “indecent” tactic but it works because even he gets caught like a deer in headlights when she does that. So like ig like in the middle of a mission she does it again and miguel straight up challenges her to to it to him and things get steamy ???????????

Aweeeee, thank you!!! It means a lot to me that you read and like my writing!!! Also, I suck at FPS games, so I never played COD MW, but I can try my best with this one, haha

So sorry that I got to this so late! I'm still catching up to so many requests from last month! But I can totally do this! Sounds really fun haha!

Warning: MINORS DNI, smut, breast play, flashing, semi-public sex, grinding, oral (male receiving)

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

This was supposed to be a serious game of friendly fire. This was supposed to be preparing everyone for the competition that was coming up with their rivals. This was supposed to be taken seriously as if everyone was really in the middle of the battlefield.

So why couldn't you?

Miguel was in awe as he read your stats and files. You had nearly a perfect score when shooting down the enemy team. Hell, you even had some military background, but yet you left there and applied here, which made him a little curious.

Miguel was also from the military, so he knew the rules and procedures. The only way he was going to find out more about you was the join you in action. Perhaps you were hiding something and could be used when Miguel had to get called onto the military again for a mission.

"We'll see tomorrow," Miguel hummed to himself, placing your file next to his usual ghost mask.

--------

This was a first. Miguel was impressed with you when you first came into the shop, gearing up and grabbing your weapons. You gave off a professional aura. Miguel was going to enjoy this fun little game and who knows, perhaps he could enlist you.

At least the thought last for a solid five minutes until the game actually began. You all split up, but Miguel stayed somewhat close by to you to watch you in action. You had everything set up and kept your focus for the enemies, but once you spotted one.

"Haha!" You yelled as you flashed your tits.

Miguel's eyes widen at the sheer shock of the action, but once you revealed your boobs, you immediately fired at the poor soul.

"Sucker," You said with a grin before fixing your shirt.

"What the hell are you thinking?" Miguel hissed as he stormed over to you. Your eyes glanced over at his tall dementor, knowing that he was hiding his anger behind his mask,

"Hm? It's friendly fire, all that matters is who wins." You said with a sweet chirp.

All Miguel could do was ask you to not do it again. You gave him a cute pout, apologizing before grabbing your gun and running off. Still not trusting your words, Miguel followed you to keep an eye on you.

---------

Miguel was beyond frustrated. While team did win with an overwhelming victory, the shame behind it was what made him mad. You had the most kills, all thanks to your little trick. It was a shame to the game, but there was no one else complaining but Miguel.

"Yai! Good game guys!!" You cheered, jumping in place.

"Hehe, good game." The enemy team chuckled, staring at your breasts. You smiled and made your way to Miguel,

"Aren't I good?" You said with a grin. Miguel glared at you, but you couldn't tell because of his mask,

"If this were a real war, would you even consider doing it?" He had to ask. You raised a brow,

"As much fun as it would be, there is no chance a real enemy will be swayed by my boobs."

"Hn, there's another friendly fire match in two hours. Can you join, and if you do, don't use your trick."

"Yeah!" You smiled brightly before giving another pout, "Fine. I suppose I could show you that I'm still a good shot."

"Good." Miguel said with a heavy sigh before leaving to his office.

You waved towards him, resisting a chuckle. At least he wasn't complaining about the size of your breasts. Besides, Miguel was fuming with anger, so he must be silently liking the trick too. At least you hoped he did.

----------

Miguel cussed quickly as he gripped the edge of his desk while pumping his dick in his hand. How frustrating it was to watch you carelessly show off those perfect bouncy breasts to other men like it was nothing.

It felt shameful to Miguel for even thinking about how perfect those breasts would look under him. His hands grouping them, giving you a reason to behave next time. You just looked so innocent and cute, to think you did something so daring.

Groaning as he cam, Miguel took a moment to compose himself. He was going to see you in proper action in the next game. Hopefully, your shots would still be up to par even without your little trick.

----------

You were doing good. You had kept your focus and still aimed perfect at each of the enemy team. Although, it did feel a little weird without having a laugh about your fun little gimmick. It just wasn't as fun without you giving the others a good laugh too.

Firing against another enemy, you stopped to reload. You felt a little frustrated. Right as you reloaded, you heard someone yell to show them your tits. Gripping the gun, you let out another sigh before hearing a gun go off.

"I'm confused. Do you, or do you not like to show the enemies your boobs?" Miguel questioned as he appeared beside you. You leaned against the wall, sighing softly,

"It's a long story of self worth and shit that I rather not get into. I left the military for a reason, and I personally think it's fun to throw people off guard, but then they start demanding it...I just, don't like it." You admitted. Miguel glanced at you,

"You're a good shot even without your trick."

"It's a fun stress reliever. I'm sure you would still be a good shot if you had something similar done."

"As if." Miguel replied coldly before shooting another enemy. You glanced at him with a devilish smirk,

"Is the famous ghost afraid of losing his kill streak?"

"Hn," Miguel grunted, not wanting to give you the satisfaction, but hell, he also wanted to prove you wrong, "Don't think they'll care about my chest." He teased.

You laughed and scooted over to him, "Not that kind of distraction." You cooed and saw his hard on through his pants, "Maybe I can help you do both?"

"Both?" He grumbled and hissed as you sat in front of his dick, "(Y/N), now is not the time."

"I read your file, Ghost," You hummed, undoing his pants, "Always perfect with everything you do, but such a hardass. When was the last time you relaxed?" You asked, glancing at his large dick that sprung out.

"Tch, now is NOT the time, (Y/N)" Miguel hissed, feeling himself lose concentration. You lifted your shirt, wrapping his dick between your breasts,

"I think it is the time," You hummed, holding your breasts as you started to massage his dick with them, "When was the last time you got to relax?"

"Fuck, I'm going to miss my shot."

"I thought something like this wouldn't affect your score?" You teased, leaning forward to lick his tip.

"(Y/N), you really...hn...really need to stop," Miguel groaned lowly, enjoying the feeling of his dick wrapping between your breasts.

"And leave you this hard?" You teased, gently sucking against his tip as your breasts did the rest.

"Fuck,"

Miguel cussed lowly as he fired his gun, shaking slightly from the pleasure you were giving him. Daring indeed. You had been single your whole life, so to do something like this, was surprising, but fuck, Miguel wasn't going to complain anymore.

Moving away from the window to reload, Miguel was panting and moaning as you kept sucking and pumping his dick with your breasts. How soft they were. Miguel felt the urge to pin you down and give you a reason to stop.

-------

You glanced up at Miguel, watching him melt under your touch. Honestly, you weren't planning on being this slutty, but you had to take the risk. You heard all about Miguel during your time in the military. You've seen his face and you knew that you wanted him.

But he was so difficult to approach, all the more reason why you came here. You wanted to be risky. You wanted him to notice you, and now here you were. His dick between your breasts and in your mouth.

Feeling his cock twitch in your mouth, you quicken your pace. Your panties were getting damp, eager to have this cock inside your cunt. Sucking against him more, you whimpered as Miguel started to grab your hair and move his hips along with you.

"Fuck, I'm c-close." He groaned.

You winced, tasting his precum first. His cock twitched against in your mouth, fucking himself deeper down your throat. You moaned from the feeling, and shook as you felt his hot, sticky cum flood your mouth. With a swallow, you coughed as Miguel pulled out of your mouth.

"How's...your shot?" You asked with a low chuckle. Miguel panted and picked you up, placing you towards the window,

"Why don't we test your shot now?" He asked, lowering your pants in the process, "Or can you only show off your breasts?"

"Mhm~"

You rested against your sniper gun, ass pressed up against Miguel. You shivered as you felt Miguel's dick rub between your thighs. His cock just rubbing against your damp panties, causing you to get even wetter. Oh how you wanted him inside you.

You went to fire against an enemy, moaning loudly as Miguel held your hips. The friction he was giving you was starting to burn. You moved your hips in response, nearly begging for him to stuff you full. Miguel must have noticed as slid his dick inside your panties, directly rubbing his dick against your folds.

"So wet. Don't miss your shot," Miguel groaned, trying his best to not shove his cock deep inside you.

No, that was for another time. There was only a few minutes left of the match. If Miguel was going to fuck you dumb, then it was going to be in the comfort of his own office or bed.

"Hah~ Ah~ M-Miguel," You moaned, attempting to fire your gun again, "R-Right there~ Ah~" You cried out.

Your body twitched as his cock feverishly rubbed against your wet walls and clit. Your vision began to blur as you felt yourself cum when he kept hitting your clit. Your panties were such a mess and you knew it.

"See me in my office after this match," Miguel whispered in your ear as he grunted lowly, "We need to go over your score for this round."

"Y-Yes, sir," You moaned as you felt him cum all over your panties.

You were a panting mess as you felt Miguel move away from you. He quickly fixed his pants as you did yours. You shivered at the feeling of his cum all over your pussy and not within. Glancing at his mask, you huffed your cheeks out and removed it.

"(Y/N)-"

You pecked his lips before fixing his mask again. A small smile against your lips as you trailed your hand down his chest,

"See you in your office."

"Match over. Top Score (Y/N)." The game spoke. You chuckled lowly and glanced at Miguel,

"I think I deserve an award for winning, again."

"Once I'm done with you, your winning streak will end next round."

You shivered in delight at his low, rumbling tone. Your pussy clenched at the thought, sitting right on your mess of underwear,

"I'm looking forward to it."

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

Sorry if it's nothing like COD. Maybe one day I'll try and play the games, but I hoped you like the story none the less!!!

[extractedvanilla]

A General In Service!

cw: sub!gorou, virgin!gorou, dom!reader, reader has a cock, biting, scratching

summary: things take a turn when you discover that ms. hina was none other than the general of the watasumi army

a/n: hi, yes. it’s me.

You really didn’t mean to look through the things of the General. Still, the curiosity bearing over you was too much. 

You were simply on a late-night walk when you noticed Gorou in his tent, deep in thought, a quill to his head while his tail was wagging back and forth. You’ve never seen him so serious to the point that you worried about whatever he’s pondering on at the moment. With the current affairs of Inazuma, even if things are slowly going back to normal, most would probably assume the same worries.

So once he left the tent, you sneaked in and skimmed through the contents of the letters just in case someone were to catch your endeavor. 

“This is…from the Shrine Maiden.” You uttered quietly, confused about the relationship between the two, especially since you didn’t think the maiden was interested in men.

You glanced outside to see if he was coming back before reading what was written in it.

“Ms. Hina, I do hope you didn’t forget to finish this week’s column. It’d be a shame if that happens, wouldn’t it?” You read out loud.

You squint your eyes, checking if what you were reading was real.

Ms. Hina…is the General?!

You hurriedly left his office, unable to contain the new information you had brought upon yourself.

“It could just be a joke! Ms. Miko is often very playful.” You calmed your thoughts. Surely not, right?

…

You sighed, returning to your tent and going to sleep.

“(Name)? Could you give these letters to the General?” A fellow soldier said, handing you a pile of letters.

You swallowed, remembering what you read that night. You checked the sender’s name again and there it was, the Shrine Maiden.

You swore. You were a soldier, you shouldn’t bother yourself with such things. You supposed it didn’t seem far-fetched, the General’s always been good at giving advice. Besides, isn’t this just another way of helping out the people?

You entered Gorou’s tent and saw him getting dressed.

“Oh sorry, I didn’t realize you were changing.” You blurted out.

You’ve always wondered how the general’s skin stayed smooth, there were no scar markings or blemishes in any area. 

Gorou’s mouth gaped open, not expecting you to be at such a close distance. “I-Hello. Uhm.”

“Ah, I apologize. Although, it’s not much of a change than usual.” You said, bringing up the fact that compared to you and the other soldiers, Gorou didn’t wear much when it comes to armor.

His ears downed as they followed the direction he was looking at. 

“I have some letters for you General. They came from uh-Miss Yae Miko.”

Gorou ran towards you, snatching the letters from your hands.

“Y-Yes! Thank you for your work!” He spat out, pushing you out of his tent.

With the way his nervousness was through the roof, you couldn’t help but believe that he really was Ms. Hina.

You walked away, scratching your head because of the whole thing. “I should just forget about this, It’s not my business–”

“It smells like (Name).”

You turned your head, wondering if what you heard was right, but you eventually left the area thinking that your mind was playing tricks on you.

“Here.” The same soldier from the other day said, giving you another pile of letters.

“Oh. For the General, right? Why do you keep giving me these, you could just hand it over yourself.”

He looked at you concerned. 

“What? That’s because the General likes you.”

Huh. “The General likes the Divine Priestess, not me.”

“Dude. He likes Miss Sangonomiya, sure. But he adores you. His face literally brightens up whenever you call him.”

You argued with him, telling him that there was no way he viewed you like that.

“You know what? I’m bad at this. If you want actual advice, you should send something to Ms. Hina. Five-star rating for sure, did my wife and me a solid one.”

You didn’t really want to involve yourself in such matters anymore but writing to Ms. Hina meant you could solve either one or both of your problems. One, you could get yourself solid advice on the unbeknownst attraction Gorou had for you. Two, you could finally figure out if Ms. Hina was Gorou.

So, with paper and ink in hand, you got to writing.

You went quickly to the columns when you received the magazine for that week. 

“There’s really nothing wrong with taking a leap. You should try to talk about it with this person instead of listening to rumors and forming your own conclusions about that. If he won’t make the first move, then who will?” You read.

You sighed, you were now sure that this was definitely him. You knew firsthand how the General would give advice to the other soldiers. This was just like it.

You needed to go.

“General, can we talk about something–oh. Do you need any help?” You asked, seeing the general with a brush and comb in his hands.

“(N-Name)!” He called out, grabbing his tail before it could start wagging because of your appearance. 

You didn’t understand how you were so blind to his fondness for you.

“I apologize, I forgot you didn’t like when others touch your tail and ears.”

He shook his head, blushing.

“No…It’s okay if it’s you.”

You sat down next to the General who looked like he would explode at any moment. “General, I can’t brush your tail if you keep moving.”

“Ah–I’m sorry.” He said, saddened that you might be annoyed at him.

You two sat in silence as you groomed his tail, bringing it back to its pure fluffiness. It was so soft, running your fingers through it felt satisfying.

“Hn—!” The General let out.

You stared at him, stunned at what you just heard.

“Sorry! It’s just that–”

“General Gorou, are you Ms. Hina?”

He laughed awkwardly, his face looked like he had just seen someone die right in front of him.

“No? I mean, No! W-Why would you ask that?”

Was this really the right move? You thought to yourself, were you coming off too aggressive?

He stood up, ready to leave and wanting to escape the confrontation.

“Aha–I’ll get going now—Hah!” He moaned out, still forgetting that his tail was still in your hands which caused you to accidentally pull it.

He fell to his knees, trembling.

“General? Are you alright? Should I go get a medic?” You asked frantically, worried you may have injured him.

“N-No. Stay here, it hurts.” He said.

“Your tail? I’m so sorry, is there anything I can do to help?” You offered some reassurance.

“It’s…not my tail that’s hurting.”

“What?”

“D-Down here. It hurts again.”

Down?

You gazed down at him and your eyes widened. You pushed back your questions for the meantime, the task at hand being too much to ignore.

“I–Would you like some help?”

He nodded at you, ears twitching.

You gently pushed him to the ground, pulling down his pants to reveal his tiny cock. It was swelling up, some precum already leaking.

“When was the last time you had a release?” You asked.

“I’ve never…” He said quietly.

“Never? What do you do with your heat then?”

He stayed quiet. Right, it must be difficult talking about that with someone.

You touched his cock, already making Gorou’s back arch from the sensation. “Ah–”

He whimpered. His tail wagging from behind. 

You haven’t even done much but he looked like he was ready to burst any second now. You slowly stroke him, not wanting him to get overwhelmed. His hips pushed out, seeking the warmth from your hands. 

Gorou was very expressive, each touch from you giving him pleasure that he hadn’t realized was possible.

“C-Can’t, It’s coming out–” Gorou came with a shiver, his cum splattering all over his chest. 

Still, he remained hard. You figured that it must be because everything’s been building up inside him.

“You’re really loud, General.”

He blushed deep red, embarrassed especially since it was coming from you. “I’ll keep it down…”

“No, I like that about you. You don’t have to worry. Open up.”

“What–?”

You inserted your fingers into his mouth, allowing Gorou to suck on it while pouting. 

“I never realized that you were this small, your cheeks are already full. I wonder how you’d look like something else other than my fingers.” You said.

He tried to reply but you weren’t able to understand his words.

You pulled your fingers out, his drool all over them. 

“General, do you actually like me?” You asked, raising his legs over your shoulders.

Gorou nodded shyly. He never expected you to notice it after all the times he’s ignored your advances. 

“I thought you hated me,” He admitted.

“You don’t even call me by my name…” Gorou said quietly.

“Gorou.”

It felt foreign to call him by his name. You’ve never done it, seeing as it seemed a bit too informal.

You penetrated his walls with your middle finger, sending Gorou whining. You wanted to take it slow, not wanting him to get overwhelmed.

“Mhm!”

“Just enjoy it Gorou, no need to hold yourself back.”

You noticed how Gorou’s ears moved whenever he did.

Gorou squirmed on the ground as you went deeper inside of him, eventually reaching his prostate. 

“Nghh! (Name)–” He reached another climax just as quickly.

“You’re so tight, Gorou.” You insert another finger inside him, opening his entrance even more.

His legs were shaking as you probed him deeper.

Once you figured that it would be good enough, you pulled him towards you, his ass laying on your lap.

“Hold onto me,” You warned him, helping him insert your cock inside his walls.

“Don’t move too much, it’s best to go slowly.”

He flinched, feeling the tip of your cock probe his entrance. His arms were around you, hugging you tightly.

“Haah–” He breathed out, unused to the feeling of something inside him.

Your attention was back to his ears again that was now only centimeters away from you. You reached his ears with your mouth and nibbled them when Gorou yelped, his nails scratching your back and sending your cock deeper, to the point of it being almost all the way in.

He came again because of it, moaning as he hugged you tighter. 

“W-Warm…” He said.

“I told you not to move too much…” You reminded Gorou.

“M-My ears…sensitive.” He whined as he slowly moved up and down, feeling you in and out of him.

“Good boy.” You praised him, causing Gorou to become even more flustered.

Having Gorou on top of you meant you could see every movement he made and the expressions that showed on his face as he did. Seeing him pleasure himself like that made you pat his head, sending a wave of pleasure to his head.

Gorou orgasmed, his thighs quivering as his seed spurted out onto both of you.

“Are you okay?” You questioned the exhausted General.

“Mhm. You’re not going to finish?” He sadly replied.

“Next time, Gorou. You have patrol tomorrow, don’t you?” You reminded, wondering if he would even be able to walk around straight with the way he is right now.

“You promise?”

“What?” You squeaked out, my god. Your General was so adorable.

“Of course, Gorou.” You answered.

You sighed, contented. Your questions about his alter-ego being left for next time.

[lovegrowsart]

the argument i keep seeing that the choice qimir gives to osha to leave the island in episode six isn't a "real choice" because in the real world it'd maybe be realistically logistically/physically difficult to cross that body of water is driving me up the wall because it's such literal thinking when star wars has never been and will never be concerned with what's realistic or logistically plausible. there's fire in space in the first episode of the show, because fire needed to be there to give osha that moment of flashback to the trauma of her childhood and help further establish her character - it's entirely in service to the story, doesn't matter that that's not how it works irl.

the reason the ship is there is because it needed to be in the distance to facilitate the visual storytelling - osha looking back at the ship, her chance to flee/escape the underworld, then looking back at qimir walking away off screen and making the choice to follow him. that's literally (heh) it. he even suggests waiting for low tide if she wants an easier time of it if we're gonna be that concerned about how oh so terribly hard it'd be for osha - who is an adult ex jedi and a mechanic that does such dangerous jobs on space ships that the republic legit made it illegal for anyone but droids to do them - to manage a bit of a difficult swim :(

ymmv on the qimir being manipulative angle, but i think it'd benefit a lot of people's understanding of the dynamic between osha and qimir in episode six to remember that star wars is fairytale - it is metaphorical and psychological mythology. it is not realistic or grounded in reality, nor is it meant to be read with realism in mind, because then you're simply analysing/critiquing from a position that the story isn't operating from.

you don't have to take a creator's words into consideration when developing your own interpretation, but such things can be helpful and valuable. leslye headland's made her intentions re: osha and qimir's dynamic pretty clear - that it's not meant to be manipulative, that one of the purposes of episode six was to explore qimir's "lighter" side and osha's "darker" side (hence the wholly unsubtle costuming choices, him in natural-looking off-white and osha entirely in solid grey). while qimir isn't being wholly honest with her right off the bat (cause why would he be?), he also isn't deceiving or tricking her about anything re: who he is and what he's about - how could he? she knows his face. she knows entirely what he's capable of and what he did in episode five. he can't play the master and the fool the way he did with mae, he can only be as honest as a man like him can be if he wants her to listen to him. i don't think she's naive about him at all, and i think people struggle with understanding that - that she doesn't have any illusions about his morality or lack thereof - and understanding that she still has the agency and desire to listen to what he has to say. you can believe it isn't "good" for her to listen to him, sure, but that doesn't mean she's being maliciously manipulated maliciously.

[visceravalentines]

a different kind of hang-up

Randy's mom calls while they're in the middle of something, again. Benson tries his best to get Randy off the phone.

2.6k words. canon divergence, boys on the run. established relationship. blowjobs. smoking. Benson being a menace lol he can't handle not being the center of Randy's attention. read on ao3 here if that's more your speed.

Benson just can't keep his hands off him, even when his mom calls.

The phone rings for so long, so long, before Randy can get to it. The second it starts up Benson recognizes the ringtone and tightens his grip on Randy's hips, sags on top of him with his full weight. He pushes his tongue into his mouth with intentional fervor because he likes fucking around with fire and Mrs. Bradley is a five-alarm inferno.

Randy makes a panicked sound and tries to wriggle free to no avail. He taps Benson's chest, but Benson takes the hint and throws it away unopened, snags Randy’s wrist and pins it to the bed.

Randy twists his arm out of his grip and gives him a shove, leans his head away. "Benson–please–I gotta get this." He makes a grab for the phone on the nightstand.

"You really don't," Benson murmurs, taking hold of his jaw with one big hand and pulling his lips back into range.

Randy lets out a frustrated grunt that gets lost in Benson's mouth and shoves him again, harder, with both hands and a knee for good measure. Benson relents, topples lazily to the side and gives him this goofy, satisfied smirk that makes Randy’s stomach do a flip and he just can't deal with that right now.

"You're gonna get me in trouble," he complains as he sits up and snatches the phone.

"Aw." Benson stretches like a cat, folds his arms behind his head, all ribs and armpit hair and lean lines of muscle. "Now wouldn't that be a shame."

"Hi Mom," Randy says, hoping he sounds perfectly even-keeled and normal and not like he's been rolling around with another man in a motel bed. He remembers his erection at that moment, the worst possible moment, and blushes so hard he can feel the blood trading places. He grabs a pillow and shoves it over his lap like she can see through the phone.

"Randy, I don't like this." His mom starts every conversation like this these days. 

Randy bites back a sigh. "I know, Mom."

"This isn't a normal thing. Friends don't ask friends to help them move across the country last-minute without a plan."

They've been through this so many times he's lost count. At least his story gets more solid every time he repeats it. "I told you, Brian doesn't have a support system. I'm just trying to do a good deed." Brian is Benson, because Benson can't be Benson, because Benson is wanted for murder. 

Randy feels the mattress shift behind him and stiffens when calloused fingers brush against his skin. His mother's list of grievances fades in his ears as Benson worries at the waistband of his jeans. 

"Randy," Benson sing-songs softly at his hip. "Tell her you're in the middle of something."

Randy waves him away, tries to ignore the scratch of his beard and his lips on his skin and tune back into the conversation at hand. "You’re a kind and responsible boy, honey, people will take advantage of that." 

"I understand, Mom, but I'm–"

He feels the pinch of teeth on his waist, jerks and bites back a yelp. 

His mother is alarmed. "Randy? Are you okay? What happened?"

Randy scoots down the bed away from Benson, shoots him a dirty look. Benson rolls onto his back, runs a hand through his hair and flashes Randy an upside-down grin. 

"I'm fine, Mom. Stubbed my toe."

"Sorry," Benson says innocently. "You look fucking delicious, what do you want me to do about it?"

"Are you walking around barefoot? I raised you better than that, Randy. Where are you even walking, aren't you still driving?"

"Yeah, we just–we stopped to grab some food and…stretch our legs a little bit." 

Benson sits up suddenly and Randy flinches in anticipatory distress before he even speaks. "We can stretch something else if you want," Benson offers with a wiggle of his eyebrows.

Randy grits his teeth and ignores him, picks frantically at the seam of the pillow in his lap. 

"I bet you're eating like absolute garbage. All that fast food isn't good for your long-term health, you know. God knows you had plenty of that at–well. God knows you've had plenty of that." 

She clears her throat, recovers from the near-miss of mentioning the incident. The new incident. She’s had years of practice at sidestepping the elephant in the room, but nobody’s perfect, and this is a much bigger elephant. Randy has to admit that it's convenient, not having to dodge questions because they aren't being asked. 

"Where are you now?" she says by way of a subject change.

Benson crawls across the mattress on his knees and winds his arms around Randy’s waist, leans heavy against his back and sets his chin on his shoulder. He smells like sweat and nicotine. Randy grips the pillow like a lifeline. 

"We're, um…well, I think we're–"

He knows where they are. He knows exactly where they are. Eighteen miles outside of Glasgow, Kentucky. He knows where they're supposed to be, too, according to the fake route he mapped to sate his mother's anxious curiosity. He just can't quite remember what he told her last time, because his brain's still sloshing around in oxytocin and Benson’s kissing his neck, rubbing his chest, thumb catching on his nipple again and again. 

"I-I think we're about 40 miles from Benson," he says loudly, as though the volume adds certainty. 

"Benson?" his mom repeats, sounding alarmed, and Benson chuckles in his ear. 

"Careful," he mutters. 

"Branson!" Randy elbows Benson off of him and stands up, stumbles away from the bed. "I meant Branson. Sorry, I fuc–I messed up." He cringes.

Benson laughs, delighted. "Randy Bradley," he says in a mockery of Mrs. Bradley’s disapproving tone. 

"Randy Bradley," his mom says like an echo. "Watch your language." 

"Sorry. I’m sorry." Randy stalks away, pacing the length of the tiny room, shooting Benson a look of combined irritation and desperation that ultimately reads as pain. "It’s been–I didn’t sleep well last night." 

"You gonna tell her why?" Benson asks slyly.  

Randy flushes red hot, throws the pillow in his direction and misses by a mile. 

Benson winces. "Yikes, babe." 

He flops on his stomach and reaches for the cigarettes and lighter on the nightstand. His back is crosshatched with pink scratches, a familiar set of eight nail marks etched into his love handles. Randy feels a detached sense of something like pride in spite of himself. 

"We gotta work on your aim. Tone up those arms." Benson makes a jerk-off motion to help paint the picture. 

Randy drags a hand across his face. His brain is fraying at the seams. "You can’t smoke in here," he mouths at Benson, who looks him dead in the eye as he lights up and smiles around the cigarette. 

His mother is waxing vitriolic about the dangers of sleep aids. Randy heaves a harried sigh. "No, Mom, that’s–I don’t even know where to get benzos." 

"I do," Benson says helpfully. Randy shakes his head. Benson apparently takes this as an expression of doubt rather than exasperation. "I do," he insists. 

"So how many more days until you get to San Diego, hmm?" his mom says. "You’re not making very good time, honey. Just because you don’t have a job to come back to doesn’t mean you can just roam the countryside like some deadbeat hippie." 

"I know, Mom. It–it’s about the journey." 

"Fuck yeah it is," Benson agrees. 

"Brian’s never been out of Louisiana and neither have I, so we’re…we’re just seeing the sights together." 

"And how long will you be seeing the sights?" 

Randy leans against the wall, knocks his head back against the plaster. "I guess…I don't know. I’ll keep you posted, but…we’re not really on a schedule." 

Benson gets up from the bed and pads over. He invites himself into Randy’s space, boxes him in against the wall, touches his face, touches his ribs. He blows smoke out of the corner of his mouth as he looks him up and down. 

Randy can feel his own heart thudding in his throat, suddenly hyper-aware of his body and its proximity to Benson’s. It’s Pavlovian, almost, the way he draws him in like that. Derails his thought process like a punch to the gut.

"So what, this road trip just goes on forever?" 

"No, Mom." Benson hooks his fingers into Randy’s waistband. Randy meets his gaze, kind of forgets what he was saying. "Just, uh…just until we get to California, and then…and then back again." 

Benson takes another drag and exhales slow, opens his mouth and lets the smoke curl up and out. Randy breathes it in on reflex. His mouth waters. 

"Hang up the phone," Benson murmurs. His dark eyes are on fire. 

"It–I–I’ll be home before you know it," Randy says. 

Benson leans in and sideswipes Randy’s jaw with his chin, worries at his earlobe with teeth and tongue. "Randy." His voice is gravel and satin. The cigarette glows between his fingers in Randy’s periphery. He reaches further into his pants. "Hang up the phone," he whispers. 

"I hate to say it, but I just don’t believe you, Randy," his mom says. Her voice drips with disapproval, cold around a core of genuine concern. He knows she’s biting back so much more that she’d like to say, and he loves her for that. For trying to give him an inch even though he’s taking miles and miles. 

"I promise I’m okay, Mom," he says, tilting his hips towards Benson, who puts the cigarette between his lips and starts unbuttoning Randy’s jeans. "I would tell you if I wasn’t. I just…this is just something I need to do. Something I–I want to do." 

Benson catches his eye, winks at him. "Hang up," he mouths as he sinks to his knees. 

"Randy," his mom sighs. He closes his eyes and can picture her shaking her head. "I just worry about you, sweetheart." 

Benson’s pushing his shirt up and tugging his pants down and dragging his tongue up the ridge of his hip. Randy can feel the heat on his waist from the cherry between his fingers. In another life, that would scare him so bad it'd make him sick, the chance of getting burned. He feels differently about it now. Knows Benson won't hurt him, not without cause. Knows he could take it if he did. There’s something seductive about that, the power of that. The trust.

Of course, Benson’s hand on his ass and spit on his skin count for something too.

"Randy? Are you there?"

"Yeah…yeah. Sorry. I know that, Mom, I know you worry," he says. "And I’m sorry about that." 

It sounds hollow, even to himself, but he means it. He wishes it was different. That he didn’t have to lie. But that’s not an option, not for Benson, and he can’t be without him. They’re a package deal now and he likes it that way. Wants it that way. Wants him.

"Please, baby," Benson mumbles against Randy’s stomach. He sounds as desperate as Randy feels.

He bites his lip, combs his fingers through Benson’s greasy hair. "I gotta go, Mom. I’ll call you at the next stop." 

"Promise me." 

Benson takes one last drag on his cigarette before he holds it up for Randy to take. He blows soft and slow along the length of Randy’s dick, runs his hand down the back of his leg. 

The smoke wafts up to his nose and Randy white-knuckles the phone. He’s so hard he can’t think, can’t possibly wring one more coherent sentence out of his lust-addled brain. "Yeah, I–I promise, Mom. I love you." 

"I love you, honey." 

Randy ends the call and throws the phone in the direction of the bed. He misses again, dimly registers the thunk as it hits the wall. 

"Fuck, Benson," he breathes at the same time Benson says, "Fucking finally," and wraps his mouth around him. Randy groans and slumps against the wall, lets Benson pull his hips closer. He likes being put where he wants him. 

"You're gonna get me in trouble," he says again, bringing the cigarette to his lips. He needs it bad after all that. He thinks he can taste Benson’s spit in the filter and he closes his eyes, lets his brain go blank. 

Benson comes off his cock with a pop and looks up at him. "But I always get you back out, right?" His tongue slides in circles. 

It's miraculous every time he does this, puts his mouth on him like this. Randy's wished for a miracle for a long time. This wasn’t exactly what he had in mind, but who is he to turn it down, with its long lashes and bad language and hands all over him all the time?

"S-so far so good." 

Randy takes another drag, feels the high sweep up and over him. It makes him dizzy, makes him giddy. Erases any guilt about lying to his mother and makes him feel good, better than ever, or maybe that’s the man on his knees in front of him. 

Benson tilts his head, takes him in. "You’re hot when you smoke, by the way." 

Randy chuckles weakly. "Yeah?" He doesn’t do it, not often, usually can’t let go of the voice in his head screaming cancer. But Benson showed him how and he doesn’t cough anymore and in fact, he likes it more every time he tries it. "My mom would lose her mind." 

Benson pulls a wry face. "About the smoking, huh? Just the smoking?"

Randy smiles shyly. "Maybe some other stuff too."

"What can she say, she raised a fucking degenerate. And I, for one, am glad she did." 

With that, Benson decides the conversation is over and puts his mouth to better use. Randy gasps and moans as he takes him slow, inch by inch, hot and wet and relentless. 

He braces himself against the wall. He can barely stand, legs already shaking. Benson’s always telling him he’s easy, and he can’t tell if that’s supposed to be good or bad, but either way, he likes being the way he is. Benson’s fingers dig into the meat of his ass and hit a bruise, sending a sharp thrum of that off-key pleasure straight to his dick. Benson might be right. He might be a degenerate.

He flicks the cigarette butt into the nearby sink and makes it, which is lucky. Maybe his aim isn't that bad after all. Benson has him down his throat to the hilt, which is also lucky. He knows that someday their luck might run out, like gas, like cigarettes, like his mother’s patience, but it sure doesn’t feel like it, not now.

Randy puts his hands on him carefully, the way he showed him, cups his skull and scrunches his hair gently like he's precious, because he is. Benson makes a sound that strikes at his core and he almost loses it right then, but he doesn’t. Not yet. For a second he thinks about miracles, and then he can’t think about much of anything anymore. 

The list of things he can't mention when his mother calls gets a little bit longer. 

[ghostgirl101]

hey, i really like ur writing and idk if ur working on something rn but when you can and if you want to, could you possibly write some ben drowned x reader kissing headcanons? (only if u r comfortable w/ that ofc!) ur literally my favorite writer on this app nd i literally read everything u post lol so even if u don’t do this ty anyway and have a nice day/night and take care of urself!!🩷

Kissing BEN Drowned Would Be Like This:

A/N: Sure, I'm comfortable with that; this is kind of a whole affection headcanon thing, which I've only just realised now I'm reading it over 🙃 I'm glad you like my writing, hope you enjoy this one, take care of yourself too 😀 Also, should I start making a taglist for my creepypasta posts? If you're interested, let me know.

🎮• So. If you're expecting BEN to be an absolute gentleman who asks for your permission before giving you any form of affection, or is a bit bashful to initiate it...

🎮• Haha. Sorry.

🎮• I mean, he'd never push your boundaries or deliberately make you feel uncomfortable when you guys are being intimate somehow, but he's not gonna be shy about it. That's because it takes a bit of time for him to warm up to the idea of physically coming out of the screen and materializing himself enough for you to hug him and everything safely, without getting electrocuted or whatever.

🎮• Another factor is that after all he's been through, the idea of letting himself be that vulnerable around people is a bit of a daunting one, even if it's you, someone who he's learned to trust and get close to until it gets to this point.

🎮• So, well done to you, for earning the ultimate sign of trust from this maniac virus boy. Chances are that after you hint at wanting to be able to kiss him or something, he's gonna act all teasing and dismissive about it, but what you don't know is that the thought stays in his mind after you've finished up on the computer and gone to bed. He watches you silently from the camera on your open screen (that he's insisted you keep open for him to check in on you) and lets the idea of it grow into a nice, tempting one.

🎮• So get ready for yet another burst of an adrenaline rush as BEN gives you the scare of your life when he comes crawling out of the screen as you wake up in the morning, scattering your desk trinkets and stuff all over the place in the process. BEN has very pale blonde hair in his humanish form, almost white, and even paler skin, with empty black and red eyes, sometimes glitchy... you probably know already. BEN's eyes bleed lightly even when he's not upset, but seem to gush blood when he is. But even with the whole horrifying appearance, somehow, he manages to make himself look handsome. Don't tell him, though, or he'll tease you about it and probably won't ever forget it.

🎮• When you get over the initial shock of him literally just spawning into your room, he stays completely indifferent, if not a bit amused, because isn't this what you wanted? It's not like he bites. Unless you're into that sort of thing.

🎮• BEN is a bit apprehensive at first, because, let's be real, you're his first kiss. His life was twisted into an electronic form when he was really young, and so human touch is almost a completely foreign experience to him at this point, so he will start slow. He might flinch a couple of times, but dismisses it and tells you to go on, that he wants to get used to it. And he does.

🎮• When he does, that's when you've got his chaotic bursts of affection energy to deal with. He loves catching you off guard; you could be doing anything, working or hanging around or whatever, and then he's suddenly there behind you, and you get the tiniest of electric shocks as BEN grabs you effortlessly and refuses to let go for a solid five minutes while you fidget in his glitching but strong arms and glare at him.

🎮• The first thing you'll end up doing is hugging, because he likes the feel of being close in somebody's arms in a way he didn't think he could be before. You're warm and he's consistently cold, leading to you having to slap at his hands when he slides a hand down your back or something bratty just to make you squeal and shiver. They draw out into cuddle sessions, another thing he likes, and will ultimately go soft over. There have been many times when you've managed to fall asleep in BEN's arms, and that's one of the rare times where he'll let all his guard down and fiddle with your hair or play with your jewelry or just stare at you with a newfound feeling of protectiveness and fondness.

🎮• Now for the actual kissing part 🙃 I need to say that it really isn't a first "kiss." It's the first of many long makeout sessions, because BEN will drag it out as much as he can, and then stop abruptly when you least expect it, just to be a tease and wanting more. I see it happening when you're rambling about something or other, and he's out in the real world instead of in a screen, when you realize that your faces are inches apart, and he has a blank, frustrating unreadable look on his face.

🎮• And, before you can say anything, he'll take the plunge before he can think about it any more, leaning in and brushing his lips against yours, but waiting for you to accept it and move in too. It starts off surprisingly soft and sweet, until BEN starts getting addicted to the new, intimate sensation, and tries deepening it. Then it's less sweet and more intense, and (sorry for the cliche lol) electric. He tastes kind of appley, and his lips are cold and soft. BEN will carry on going, further and further, to the point of you ending up breathless and him pulling away with a stunned look on his face. That look morphs into his usual mischievous smirk after he recovers in a few moments, and he raises a brow in amusement at your wide eyes and swollen lips, probably with a snarky little "Not bad."

🎮• After you've done it once, you're gonna end up doing it a whole lot more. There are hardly ever any proper warnings apart from BEN gradually moving in closer and being more teasing and flirty, or on sadder days where painful memories of the past come creeping back to haunt him, a source of comfort and reminder that he's still here and has another reason to be alive and basically immortal. It's not just to drive people to insanity and infect their systems with disturbing things until they crack, or whatever other motives he has. Now, there's you, someone who he's decided he needs to look out for and be with in any possible way.

🎮• Like I said, kissing BEN Drowned usually ends in suggestive makeout sessions and the like, because that's just BEN all over. But they're one way he's discovered he can show he cares, and so he'll keep doing it if you want him to, without any hesitation. Realistically, the boy is beyond touch starved, and so that all pours into the affections he gives you. To anyone else, he's a twisted, demon-like boy who makes peoples' lives hell by getting into their heads through ways they can't control, but to you and you only, he'll let himself become more and more vulnerable, until you see that really, he still was and is Ben.

[aka-indulgence]

Knocking (on your window)

It’s Ravioli time :]

When one night you find the aptly named “Smiling Man” out your window, you call a friend for some help.

CW: home invasion from a wobbly guy

—————

“Are you sure that’s the smiling man?”

You look out the window. A long, lanky ‘man’ stands outside, just under a streetlamp, spotlighted by it. He’s waving at you in a way that makes it look like his arms have no bones, or any other solid structure inside it.

“Yeah… pretty sure,” you grimace.

Its smile was so… unsettling. Just teeth. No lips.

“You sure it’s not just someone in a costume or something? There are some weird people in this town, or those college kids messing about,”

“Sarah!!” You cry desperately, “What guy stands over seven feet tall and looks like he’s only slightly more solid than those used-car salesman balloon thingy?? He doesn’t have skin! His face is just… shadows! And some eyes and teeth!”

“Some reports say he’s over seven feet five inches,”

You make a sound akin to a steaming kettle.

“That! Really doesn’t help!”

“Sorry,” you can hear Sarah’s apologetic grin through the phone. “You’re right, that’s probably pretty hard to fake. So he’s stretching his arms?”

You squint.

“Yeah… he’s stretching his right arm right now,”

“Uh oh. What’s he doing? Is he trying to grab you?”

“Um…” you look back at the cryptid. He hasn’t stopped waving or smiling at you. He might as well be some highly advanced floppy car salesman balloon with how consistently he’s doing it, except his mouth keeps moving. His teeth waving like they weren’t set in gum. You feel goosebumps travel up your back.

“Not… exactly? He’s just. Standing there. Looking at me. And… waving.”

“... Is it a threatening wave?”

“I don’t know?? He’s smiling. Is that a bad or a good sign?”

“Hm. Could go either way, honestly. You’re not looking him in the eyes are you?”

“What?!” You jump, your skin turning cold. You were looking for comfort when you called Sarah, some way to deal with a cryptid looking at you through your bedroom window, but this was having the opposite effect. You look down at the carpet, just to be safe.

“Is- is that a bad thing? I’ve been looking at him this whole time!”

“Uh… probably not great…” Sarah sighs, (while you scream internally), “Generally you don’t want him to notice you. I mean, most cryptids I read up on says that, just a general ‘don’t bother the weird creature just in case they’re dangerous’ sort of thing. From what I read he’s dangerous based on his mood? It looks like he mostly just hangs around an area and looks creepy. Sometimes asks for candy.”

There’s a confused noise on the other end, then a pause. A tap.

“Here it says ignoring him when he wants attention might make him more pushy so maybe it’s ok…?”

“What? So do I look at him or not?”

“Hang on! It’s a bit contradictory,”

You make a noise of discomfort, balling the ends of your pajama shirt in your hand.

“Ok if that’s… whatever, is there anything on your creepy spooky books that tell you about how to drive him away?”

“I’m looking this up online. Also… one sec I can’t find anything that says how to get rid of him… I think they mostly just tell you t-”

You blow out your phone’s mic and Sarah’s speaker when you scream, because- the smiling man was at your window now, his hand rap-tap-tapping on your window, long spindly fingers scratching down the glass and making your hairs stand. Ochre eyes peer at you over the sill. Did he get taller…? His pupils were wide… and blank.

“What, what?!”

“HE’S HERE!”

“What do you mean-”

“HE’S AT MY WINDOW. YEP. He’s definitely noticing me, a lot right now, hahaha- whatdoIdo.” You laugh manically, death gripping your phone.

“Uh-” You’re pretty sure Sarah could hear the sound of scratching on her end, “well did you lock everything?”

“Yeah-” You say confidently until you see that your window is in fact not locked. At the same time the smiling man sees where you’re looking and- you slam the window shut with your body before he tries anything, locking the window.

… The smiling man looks like he isn’t smiling. His eyes looked… furrowed? Though there are no evidence of eyebrows. He scratches more on the window.

“Iiin…. iiiiiin….” It moans.

Hahaha, nope! You smile panickedly.

“I… I think I locked everything,” you say, though now… you’re not so sure.

And even more concerningly, the smiling man was walking away from the window.

“Did you?”

Your back was starting to soak from the sweat.

“I… don’t know,”

“(Y/n)!!” Sarah shouts.

“Hold on I’m- I’m gonna check don’t hang up!”

Ignoring her sounds of confusion, you open your bedroom door, (just barely covering your scream when you see a spider run by into your room. Normally that was enough to send you into a panicking spiral, but you had bigger fish to fry.) You practically fell down the stairs to check on your doors and windows, turning every light on.

The perks of having a house: Having a house, in this economy!

Cons of having a house: Not great if there’s a inhuman monster waiting outside while living alone.

You don’t open your windows too much downstairs, but you thought the same about your bedroom window. You slip your hands under curtains to double check that they were locked…

A pair of gangly legs walk by as shadows on the curtain. You hear the smiling man, muttering… something. It sounded like he was saying words, but you couldn’t make them out. Sometimes he sounded like there were two voices talking over each other, as if he had a second mouth (god, you hoped not). His voice sounded both like an abyss deep rumble and distorted high pitched sighs.

You wished you were back in your hometown, when cryptids were just funny, probably-not-real things you’d hear about online. Far away from you.

Can he hear you in here?

Having the utmost caution, you tiptoed over to the door and quietly click its light on.

It was closed.

Phew. Ok that’s good.

No entry points for him.

Clicking it off, you skipped your way back to the stairs, doing your best to reassure yourself that he probably can’t get in now, turning on your phone’s flashlight before turning the rest of the lights off. You felt like a kid again, running up the stairs as soon as the lights turn off, and- oh god he’s scratching the door.

You race to your room and lock the door, letting out a long sigh as you lean against it.

“Sarah, you still there?”

“No way am I leaving you while you’re having a horror experience.”

“Thanks.”

You wander over to the window and close the curtains. Don’t want the smiling man to be peeking at you. You turn the lights on and sit on the bed, smoothing your forehead and controlling your breathing. Now that you calmed down a bit, you were feeling a lot colder.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep tonight,”

“Hah, I don’t blame you. Who would?”

“You alright with me calling you for a bit longer?”

“Yeah,” Sarah responds, though you could hear her yawning on the other end.  “I’m getting a bit tired but I can call for probably another half hour.”

You never thought Sarah’s cryptid research was going to be anything more than ‘wow these folktales are really neat’ conversations, but you’re glad she knows. You don’t know how you’d hold up if you were completely alone.

“You think I should call the police or something?”

“About a cryptid? They’d probably laugh at you. Something about only calling them for emergencies. I tried when I was twelve-”

Your smile while you listened to Sarah disappears when you hear a click. Very quiet- you wouldn’t have heard it if you weren’t so alert right now. Slowly, you turn your head around and…

Your window is open.

Your freeze. How…?

“No one fucking believed me when I told them I saw the Geyser bat. Yeah like I didn’t hear him stomping on my-”

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!” You screech, your phone dropping to the carpet with a thunk. Inside your room was the smiling man, his head bent to the side- the ceiling was too short for him.

“Hee….” the creature smiles, his teeth going up as high as beside his eyes. “Hhh…. hi…”

“(Y/n)? What’s happening?!”

“HE’S IN MY ROOM!” You yell, looking at the device on the floor while you fumble with your door’s lock.

Fuck- my phone! You reach for it, but the creature grabs it with his dark hand, examining it… then hangs up.

He throws it behind him.

Fuck your hand’s so sweaty it keeps slipping on the-!

“No… escape.”

You scream. He’s grabbed your wrist and your other hand, and pulls you to him- like his arms were made of rubber band, snapping you towards him.

“Nononono NO!!”

You’re spun around, and when your head stopped spinning, you realize you’re tangled in his rope-like arms. He leans in close to you, his void-black face staring at you, too close.

“Hiii…. girl…friend.”

[dotster001]

im not certain if you're taking requests or if you even write crowley so if you don't, please ignore this and have a lovely day :)

reader who has a crush on crowley and shows this by stealing his coat and top hat at any oppertunity, because thievery is my love language and also his coat looks really nice and comfy.

Crow(ley) Brain

A/N: I really liked how this came out. Hope it was what you were looking for 😁

3k followers masterlist

CW:It's in my pinned post, and I've mentioned this in a couple posts, but if this is the first of my stuff you've read, I view NRC as an actual college, so reader here is 18+. If it makes you more comfy, imagine it as grad school age.

Present Day

Dire was getting ready for his work as headmaster, but he couldn't find his mask. He'd taken it off the night before so that he could turn your cuddle session into a full on makeout session. He could have sworn it was on the side table, but it was just…gone. 

"You haven't seen my mask, have you?" He asked as he started lifting up blankets and pillows and his various shiny things he kept on the floor.

"No," you said simply.

He turned back around, and you were fully dressed in his hat, mask, and coat, the coat hanging haphazardly off your shoulders.

"You're certain you haven't seen my mask?" he said with a smirk.

"Nope."

He walked up to you, lifting the mask slightly off your face so that he could kiss the tip of your nose.

"Well, you know, if I don't have my stuff, I can't go to work, and you can't go to class, cause I'll be lonely."

You gave the fakest gasp he's ever heard. "Oh no!"

He sighed.

"I can be generous with my lover. Five more minutes together, then you'll give me back my stuff."

You pouted. "25 minutes."

"Deal."

He really should not even bother looking anymore. Long before you'd started dating, you'd shown your hand. He just could forget all about it when you smiled at him so innocently.

6 months prior…

"Listen, prefect, the rest of the boys and I are starting to get suspicious," Ace whispered as you cycled through your keys. You'd bought a lot off of Sam, so you couldn't be sure which one was the one you were looking for.

"About what?"

"Well, you said that we were doing this to prank Crowley, but we aren't sure if that's true."

"Huh?"

"Look, the rest will never say it to your face, but you spend far too much time hanging out with the headmage for it to be a normal thing."

"I'm not following your logic."

Ace exhaled heavily. "Well, some of the guys think, not necessarily me, but some of them, think that-"

"YOU'RE IN LOVE WITH THE HEADMAGE, HENCHHUMAN!" a gray blob shouted as it rammed into you, making you drop all the keys and lose your place.

"Sevens! Grim! You're supposed to keep watching at the end of the hall!"

"You don't need six people guarding a set of stairs and a hallway that doesn't spawn more than 40 feet," Grim folded his arms with a harrumph.

By sheer luck, you found the key you needed on the first try, and opened the headmage's office.

"What makes you think I'm in love with the headmage?" you asked with a scowl. "Nevermind, just watch the door. We'll discuss your idiocy later."

You stomped into the room, Grim right behind you.

"Grim! I said-"

"Ace can watch the door just fine! You can't avoid this conversation! Even Jack and Deuce are suspicious, and they don't notice anything!"

You glared, before digging through Crowley's desk, looking for something, anything, to take.

"That doesn't make any sense. If I loved Crowley, why would I rob him?"

"Perhaps to get his attention," the devil in question boomed directly behind you. Both you and Grim froze, and you stared at the open door.

"Ace!" You whined.

He peeked in, saw Crowley, and grimaced, before giving a half hearted,

"Um, caw caw…."

"Too late, Ace!" You snapped.

"He didn't come through the door!" He snapped back.

"Correct. In my geniusness, I laid a trap for you!"

You pouted. Sam must have sold you out. Your crew was stupid, but they were rock solid.

You turned to Crowley, putting your most innocent grin on.

"What can I do for you, headmage?"

"I'd like my things back, my darling crow," he hummed.

"Things?" Sweet, innocent, give him nothing to work with.

"You got sloppy, darling," he smirked, hooking a clawed finger under the chain you were wearing, revealing your gold pendant.

Or, more accurately, his gold pendant.

"I'll admit, you had me fooled for a while, but even the dimmest will notice if you literally flaunt your stolen trinkets. Although," he paused, tilting his head to the side, "it does suit you." He hummed for a moment, then, "Keep it."

"Huh?"

"I want you to keep it." He seemed to remember Ace and Grim were there, and he gave a cough.

"You two. I have the mastermind. Get out of here before I change my mind."

Ace and Grim sprinted away without a glance back. Cowards.

You pouted, until you felt the claw from earlier tilting your chin up.

"What am I going to do with you, prefect?" He muttered, and in a way that you felt like you weren't actually meant to hear.

"I suppose all I can do is give you the attention you seem to crave." His smile would light up your world anyway.

4 months prior….

But it wasn't about attention. Which is why, even though you were Crowley's partner of two months, you still stole his stuff.

But today? Today was your masterpiece! You'd somehow managed to steal his cloak. You felt bad as hell.

And, since you two were dating, you were going to get away with it! Everyone assumes it was a sweet gesture, intended to keep a cold partner warm, or a possessive gesture, intended to show everyone who you belonged to. Either way? No one questioned you.

No one but the man himself, who had snuck up behind you in the courtyard and placed both his hands on your shoulders.

"Morning, my radiant prefect," he hummed, clearly grinning at how stiff you'd gotten. "I thought we had fixed our little thieving issue. Have you felt I've been neglecting you?" He nuzzled into your neck, pressing a ticklish kiss there.

"Nope. Just wanted to take it," you answered. You decided that honesty was what would make this relationship work.

"Oh? Any reason?" He asked, gently attempting to take it off your shoulders, while you sidestepped. To an outsider, it would look like two lovers doing a dance, not a headmage trying to steal his coat back.

"If I told you, it would spoil the fun of the mystery for you!" You sang as you expertly freed yourself and skipped away.

2 months prior…

"You're dating the man. Literally, you want his hat, ask for it!" Sebek growled. 

Ace was no longer your lookout when robbing your boyfriend. And Jack's new job was distracting Grim. You'd learned your lesson.

And you were thinking you were learning a new one. Sebek was too loud to be a lookout. You'd have to promote Epel or Deuce next round.

"It's not as exciting like that!" You growled, using the key you'd stolen to unlock his room.

"I don't understand! It seems foolish!"

"I agree." Crowley was always a step ahead of you these days. It was infuriating.

"I am more than happy to just give you my hat," he said, plopping his hat on your head. "In fact, I love taking every opportunity to show your admirers that you are mine!"

Sebek raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.

You pouted. "It's not about that."

"Then what is it about?" He gave a booming laugh, pushing his hat over your eyes.

"How do I phrase this," you muttered, giggling as you pulled the hat back up. "You know how when you see something shiny, you can't resist the urge to take it?"

"And you feel like that about my stuff?"

"Sort of," you groaned in frustration, then perked back up, an idea in your head. "Okay, you know how when you see something cute, you just are filled with such joy that you want to squeeze it until it pops? Well, I see you, and I'm filled with so many emotions, and so much joy, that I just want to take your stuff and giggle!"

"That," Crowley breathed heavily, "is the sweetest thing I've ever heard!" He started sobbing, scooping you into his arms and holding you there, his hat falling to the ground.

"I shall, uh, take my leave," Sebek said with a cough as your boyfriend clung to you.

Present day…

"Twenty five minutes up," Crowley groaned. "Now be good, and give me my stuff back."

You pouted, but slowly removed the hat, mask, and cloak, handing them back with a growl.

He laughed lightly. "I know, dearest, but I need them for work. You'll have a chance to take them again tomorrow."

He pressed a kiss to the crown of your head, then your nose, then a long kiss to your lips.

"I hope I get to see you today."

"Me too," you whispered. Crowley left with a grin.

When you were certain he was gone, you put on your new ring. Or more accurately.

His old ring.

[fictionalmenxyn]

Incorrect quotes

—

Y/n: *watches sad movie with the boys* *sobbing quietly to themself*

Soap: Y/n are you crying?

*everyone looks at Y/n*

Y/n: what? Uh… no

Gaz: what’s that falling from your eye then?

Y/n: idk?? Sweat??

Ghost: eyes don’t sweat?

Y/n: I’m not crying you are!

Price: do you want a hug?

Y/n: *nods* that’d be nice.. thank you

—

Y/n: hold this

Gaz: no it’s going to be rubbish cause your too lazy

Y/n: no it’s not just hold this for me

Gaz: fine

Y/n: *places hand on his*

Gaz: you wanted me to hold your hand?

Y/n: maybe..

Gaz: why didn’t you ask?

Y/n: do you want me to stop? Cause I will if you want?

Gaz: no, never said that did I? Let’s go get some snacks and watch a movie

Y/n: *dies inside* okie

—

Y/n: *casually drawing in the break room*

Random solider: look at her drawing what is she five?

All the boys: *stands in front of the table your sat on*

Ghost: wanna repeat that?

*the random solider and his mates stay quiet*

Ghost: I suggest you all go some place else before things get out of hand

*the boys leave*

*all of your team looks at you*

*you look up*

Y/n: yeah?

Gaz: you alright?

Y/n: wait did something happen?

The boys: *confused*

Y/n: you know I was listen to music right?

Ghost: we’ll keep doing whatever if you need us let us know

Y/n: *smiles cutely* ok

(Love when people write about how y/n has ‘scary dog privileges’ with the boys)

—

Y/n: *rolls down car window* What seems to be the problem sir?

Price: your in my car and trying to drive off when you don’t have a license?!

Y/n: don’t think that’s the problem officer I think it’s the fact your a grumpy pants this afternoon

Y/n: GAZ! What did you do to Cap?!

—

Soap: What does this say?

Y/n: ‘this is war, time can go on but the war stays forever’

Ghost: you can’t read Greek?

Gaz: you can fucking read?!

Y/n:… bold of you to assume I couldn’t fucking read…

—

Hope you have a good day/night! :D

Request box is open feel free to ask just know I won’t post straight away! I will do it asap tho! :D

[openphrase123]

i just finished this fic! it's good!

and because it's all done i want to like... be a LITTLE self indulgent and talk under the cut about some miscellaneous things that i ran into while writing it. don't click the readmore if you're interested in the fic and haven't read it yet i'm about to spoil the Whole thing.

also there is an epilogue to this fic now - go read that before this post if you're getting to this before the update!!

so!! i haven't written fanfiction in like FIVE YEARS. it's been a while! part of that is because i was doing original stuff and part of it was i was in a creative slump. so isat kind of dug me out of that and i owe it my thanks. i've been able to do a crazy amount of original work since starting this fic, it's brought back my creative discipline. in like seven years when my video game comes out you can thank isat for that probably

i originally set out thinking this was the only fic for isat i was going to write. and then as i was writing this i fell deeper into it. i kind of got out of isat a little disappointed in how it ended?? but now that i'm here i'm like ah it's fine. just cause i would have done something different in dev's position doesn't mean it's bad. it does mean i can write a bunch of fanfiction exploring things i wish had been tackled more in the game though LOL

i said this in one of the chapter authors notes but i DID start out curtain call hating loop with every fiber of my being. (as in i liked them as a character UNTIL the act 6 reveal which i thought was lame) and then i played through the game a second time knowing the loop twist and went "oh nvm this makes sense" so a lot of the loop stuff in this fic was actually written twice. originally i was just gonna have them soulmerge with siffrin and not be present at all but then i was like. no. i do want to keep this lighthearted and that's too depressing of an end for loop. i do have a loop postcanon doc so i'll go repay them for their slapdashed involvement in curtain call someday

i'm in a weird position with curtain call in that i wrote the themes and major conflicts Directly After playing through isat the first time. before i could really marinate and analyze the characters fully. so there are a lot of scenes and points where i think i wouldn't characterize certain people like that if i were to rewrite this from scratch? however i don't disagree with what i've written either - it's just an interpretation that i don't necessarily think is my favorite anymore.

neither is any of the worldbuilding i did for any of this - it works for curtain call and i think it was nice but i don't necessarily think it's my current interpretation of what the culture and people were like? i like the wishes being permanent thing, i like the language stuff, but i'd probably go in a different direction if i went through this again

i do actually still think "the forgotten island was destroyed by a volcano" is my solid headcanon explanation of what happened to it. in my heart. i think like - with siffrin as a character especially it's very important that he's always missing something, that it's not idyllically happy for them at the end of everything. so even if he can remember more from their own past, it's - you know - there's no way to go back. only forward.

in the vein of this i probably could have killed siffrin/loop's entire childhood family but i did not. mostly because i did think it was fun for him to have to explain all of those cultural taboos they broke to survive. which, of course, was not a big deal - any good parent would rather their kid be alive than lawful - but what is isat other than a vehicle to make siffrin work through every moral compulsion and spiral they experience

i had a thought halfway through writing the fic that i was stepping on the very good and beautiful odile friendquest by making the island real and having a lot of siffrin's personality dictate how it went. but i ultimately decided on keeping siffrin very close to their country, more than odile is to vaugarde, because siffrin actually DID live on the island when he was a kid and that i think is a Different type of "longing for your country" trauma than odile's. i think they can still drink over the feelings together though

writing bonnie is very fun but very emotional for me. the bonnie&siffrin age gap (preteen to late-20s) is the exact age gap between me and my niece so every time i need to sit down and write something for them i think about her and how much she's a little baby growing up. this has nothing to do with bonnie it just makes writing bonnie really hard for me

if the entire history of my ao3 account was not an indicator, i'm a very big fan of writing romance, but i did not want it to take over curtain call at all. i also could have left out sloopis entirely and almost did, but thought "you know. with the way loop functions in this fic. i should at least let that be open ended" cause sharing a body with a version of you who is dating some other guy is gonna get messy no matter what. it's just not necessarily something i had time to or the urge to explore here. think of it as a fun spiritual nod to the fact that isafrin is technically open ended in isat (<- cop out answer)

i think i'm pretty vocal in how much i am absolutely insane for the flashback "happiest i can remember being" conversation. who let them do that. i think a lot of how i worked with mirabelle and siffrin's relationship in this fic kind of revolved around that. important to me that it ends with mira checking in on him and getting the answer she was looking for all along <3

overall i'm happy with curtain call. glad i am done with it though. there's so much that's running in with it at once. i'll probably wait a month and reread the whole thing to myself front to back before i start having fond memories of this. i mean it's always gonna be the fic my nephew was born during and i'll always remember having a panic attack in the airport right after posting chapter 7 but it's gonna be weird letting this one sail off into the ocean of the internet. however feel free to ask anything about the fic, i wrote this in a lil hurry on a bad day and probably didn't cover everything

goodbye, curtain call!! i love you!!!!! i'll miss you!!!!

[looks both ways, waiting for most people to leave]

also. if you've read this far. i hope it's not too gauche of me to link my personal project. if you've read over 100k words of this you might enjoy the game i'm developing? i've been working on it for almost a year but i just started the devlog last month. it's still in early baby stages as far as a full video game goes but if you liked this you'll like the game when it comes out (similar nickname culture, timeloop trauma, petty interpersonal drama, very stupid jokes, natural disaster angst)

also there isn't a lot on the devblog yet, i've mostly been doing programming on it, i JUST started visdev i'm sorry if it's uglyyyyy (FOR NOW)

anyway i'm trusting you with that link. i'm going to use my professional name on that project when it airs don't cross the wires pretty please just pretend that's a butch-y cis woman's game <3 guard the closet door babeyyyyy

[elisela]

you’re my only hope sterek, 1k, thanksgiving fluff

--

“Turkey hotline, this is Derek.”

“Derek!” Stiles says, looking frantically around the kitchen, phone shoved between his ear and shoulder. “I know that usually you’re supposed to thaw the turkey for days but last night I was nominated as the place to go for everyone who didn’t have a place to go and all the store had was a fifteen pound frozen solid turkey and I’ve left it out since I bought it but the damn thing is still frozen solid and I’m supposed to serve it in four hours. What the hell am I supposed to do?”

The wooden spoon he’d been looking for is balanced on the open refrigerator door. He snatches it up and spins to stir the gravy, the only thing he could think to make ahead of time that Lydia won’t kill him for nuking in the microwave right before dinner.

“You can cook it from frozen. It’ll take longer, about five hours, but serve some drinks and your friends will be fine waiting.”

Stiles looks at the compound butter he’d gotten—he can read recipes, thank you, he’s just in a panic—and frowns. “What am I supposed to do about, you know, seasoning?”

“Pull it after two hours and season it then. You’ll have to baste it, but you’ll be okay.”

“Great,” Stiles says, then curses when he realizes he’d laid his dish towel too close to the burner and it’s smoking. “Thanks!”

-----

“Turkey hotline, this is Derek.”

“This isn’t a turkey question, is that okay?”

The voice that comes through the line sounds almost amused. “We’re here to answer all of your Thanksgiving dinner related questions.”

Stiles taps the pie pan on the counter. He’s unsure if it’s necessary, but he’s seen people do it to regular cakes on YouTube, so why not? “Dangerous,” he says, “because I have a lot of questions. Like—why? How is this the thing you want to spend your time doing on your holiday? What are your qualifications, anyway? Because for all I know you could be making shit up, but I have to admit the turkey is no longer frozen solid under your possibly-sound advice. Which leads me to: can I bake a cheesecake at the same time as a turkey? The oven’s at 375 if that makes a difference.”

“If that—you shouldn’t be cooking your turkey at 375!”

Derek sounds affronted, and Stiles would find that cute—at least he finds his semi-outraged voice cute because for God’s sake, it’s a turkey—but he doesn’t have the time. “The cheesecake, Derek. Can I do the cheesecake at the same time?”

“Not unless you’re good with soggy turkey skin. The steam from the water bath will affect it too much.”

Stiles frowns. “Yeah, the … water bath,” he says, and hopes it doesn’t sound like he has no idea what he’s doing. “What if I don’t mind soggy turkey skin?”

“You mind soggy turkey skin,” Derek says firmly, and Stiles laughs.

----

“Turkey hotline, this is Derek.”

“Seriously, you’ve been at this for three hours,” Stiles says, because he had fully expected to get someone else on the line. Unless Derek is the sole employee—volunteer? He has no clue—he should have gotten someone else by now.

“Try eight,” Derek says. “Please tell me you turned the turkey down.”

“I’d feel bad lying to you,” Stiles says, grinning. “So it turns out I forgot the rolls, and I have a box of pancake mix but it says I need eggs, which I don’t have because I used them all in the cheesecake. Help me, Obi Wan, you’re my only hope.”

There’s a pause, and Stiles has a moment to hope he hasn’t broken Derek’s brain before he finally replied. “Oh, you’re thinking about making biscuits.”

“That’s what I said,” Stiles says, poking at the cheese sauce for his hopefully tolerable mac and cheese.

“You did not, but you don’t need eggs. Or pancake mix. Google a recipe for drop biscuits and so help me do not bake them at the same time as the turkey.”

“Aww, you know me so well, boo,” Stiles coos, and flips off the burner. “Why do you do this, anyway?”

“So people like you don’t give your friends and family food poisoning,” Derek says. “You’re safe, by the way, if you keep roasting the turkey at 375. It’ll be charred.”

“Drama queen,” Stiles mutters, and then puts his foot in his mouth by asking, “you’re not too busy cooking your own dinner?”

“My family’s across the country,” Derek says after just a moment. “My sister usually made dinner for us and her friends, but she just got married so she’s with his family.”

“Sucks, dude,” Stiles says, cursing when the doorbell rings. “Gotta go. Hopefully Scotty brought the alcohol or I’m gonna have a riot when they learn the food’s not ready. Thanks again.”

He hangs up, pauses, and calls right back.

“Turkey hotline, this is Derek.”

“Derek,” Stiles says, “you should come over here. We’ve got plenty of food. Some of it even edible, thanks to you.” He gives him his address before he loses his nerve, adds in a few key landmarks he’s near just in case, and hangs up before Derek can respond.

---

Lydia looks at him suspiciously when the bell rings, glancing around the room like she’s mentally counting the people in it and wondering who the hell else Stiles knows that’s not currently in the room, which, rude, but he’ll deal with that later.

Or not. He probably won’t bring it up at all, because she would have been right if he hadn’t been calling the turkey helpline all day, and he doesn’t want to get into it.

For now he sidesteps Scott, who had been helpfully on his way to the door, straightens his shirt, and flings it open.

Holy good Jesus.

He probably gapes—not his most attractive look, but he can’t be blamed when the man standing on his front porch is the literal definition of perfection. “Hi,” he manages to say, “Derek?”

It’s probably not Derek. It’s probably Jackson’s new boyfriend checking up on him, or a neighbor ready to yell at him for taking up so many parking spaces with his guest’s cars, or—

“I never caught your name,” the man says, and it’s Derek’s voice, it’s Derek, and Stiles is still standing like an idiot half-hanging out the door.

“Stiles,” he says, and waves a hand automatically to brush off the inevitable question. “I’m glad you came. Come in, come in.”

Derek’s shrugging out of his leather jacket, and if Stiles wasn’t already formulating ideas to make Derek fall in love with him, he certainly is the moment it comes off and reveals a soft looking maroon sweater underneath it. “Well, you said I was your only hope. Come on, Skywalker, show me your kitchen.”

[lumosandnoxwriting]

flashback to my mistakes || George Weasley

Title: flashback to my mistakes Pairing: George x Reader Summary: George never planned on proposing marriage. Not after he broke the heart of the only woman he ever saw himself marrying. But when he’s up for Captain and the only thing standing in his way is a less than stellar reputation, he’s willing to do anything to overcome that. So when Fred suggests a fake dating scheme like all the romance books his girlfriend reads, George immediately agrees. What better way to show people he’s a serious role model than a lifelong commitment? Too bad the only woman he could even stomach pretending to be engaged to hates his guts. Or does she?

A/N:And here it is! The first part of my new hockey!george series! Hope you enjoy!

-

“Weasley,” Coach Morris greets as George steps into his office. George nods in response, settling into one of the chairs facing Coach’s desk when the other man motions for him to sit. “Thanks for coming to see me on such short notice.”

“Of course, Coach,” George responds, keeping it brief. He’s trying to exude a casual, confident aura to hide the fact that he’s freaking the fuck out on the inside. Getting called into the Coach's office during the season is one thing, but having him schedule a last minute meeting a week before pre-season is utterly terrifying. The fact that his Agent and a representative from Legal aren’t in attendance is the only thing keeping George from a full on panic attack. 

As long as his spot on the team is safe George doesn’t care what Coach might have to say.

“I’m sure you’re wondering why I called you in today, and as much as I want to see you sweat a bit I’ll leave the torture for the ice,” Morris teases with a laugh. George doesn’t think he’s heard Coach laugh in the five years he’s been with the Rebels, so he manages to squeak out a chuckle. “As you know, Crawford retired at the end of the last season and the team is in need of a new captain.”

George clenches his fists, feeling like his stomach might fall out of his ass. As the center to Crawford’s right wing, George had been devastated when they lost in the second round of playoffs and Tyler announced his retirement in the locker room after. Losing a teammate is always hard, but Tyler had become like a big brother to George and he didn’t even think about the fact that he wasn’t just losing a good friend, but a captain as well. 

Until now. 

“I haven’t really thought about it,” George says honestly when Coach doesn’t continue. “I was more worried about who was going to replace Tyler on my line.”

Coach laughs again, shocking George just as much as the first time. “Well at any rate, the team is in need of a solid Captain. We lost a few other vets to trades and we’ve got a slew of rookies coming in who will need someone dependable to look up to as a role model. And to be honest with you George, your name has come up more than once.”

“Oh, wow,” George stutters out. “Just being considered for a position like that is an honor, Coach.”

George is not the most senior player on the team, so the fact that his name has been brought up in these discussions is truly a shock. He’s spent the last six years in the league working his ass off to try and make a name for himself playing the sport he loves. His rookie year he was placed on the third line, and every spare second of his time has been spent trying to improve in the hopes of moving up. 

It’s why he’s still around, even in the off season. Even when the team is on break George is training. Whether it’s in the weight room or on the ice, George is always working hard to stay fit and on top of his game. And clearly it’s paid off, since he was promoted to second line during his second season, and half way through his third Coach bumped him up to first. The feeling of being the first person on the ice is like nothing he’s ever felt, and George has worked his ass off to keep that privilege. 

And just the thought of having that capital C on his jersey as well has George feeling higher than any drug ever could.

“Final decisions haven’t been made yet, but I wanted to pull you in to let you know you were being considered because, well,” Coach pauses, and George thinks he might throw up. “Some of the administration thinks you’re still a little too fresh. You know I don’t like to listen to the shit some of those magazines publish, but not everyone who makes these decisions is the same way. And what you do or who you do off the ice is none of our business, but that doesn’t mean that the admin team likes hearing about the wild parties you go to and the girls you take home. Like I said they’re really looking for someone dependable and who can be a good role model to the younger guys on the team. We got so close to the Cup last year, and this year we’ve got the talent to get there, we just need the leadership to guide us.”

George nods in understanding. “Of course, Coach. I appreciate the heads up and the ability to show you and the rest of the admins that there’s no other man for the job but me. All that shit is in my past, I promise.”

“Good.” Coach starts to ruffle through the paperwork in front of him, and George takes that as a goodbye.

He shuffles out of the office and heads back down towards the parking lot, already trying to formulate a plan. 

Now that him being Captain is on the table, there’s no way he’s stopping until that capital C is his.

-

“So let me get this straight,” Fred starts, his familiar voice tinged with the tinny sound of a FaceTime call. “Coach said you’re on the short list for Captain, but some of the higher ups don’t think you’re a stable enough role model.”

George nods, taking a sip of his beer. “Precisely.”

“So now you’re trying to think up some kind of plan or scheme to convince everyone that your fuck boy days are in the past and you’re ready to be the team Daddy?”

“Yup, you got it.”

Even through the grainy call George can see the mischievous glint in his twin’s eyes. “Then you’ve come to the right place, little bro.”

George grins, but he knows it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. The only downside of his job and his dedication to it is that it keeps him from seeing his family regularly. When your job keeps you busy for eight months of the year and you spend the other four months training for that job there isn’t much time to fly across the country for a visit. His parents and siblings still live in the small town in Washington where they grew up, and not having them close by makes the big city feel even bigger. 

Under normal circumstances, Fred would be here on the couch with George. And they’d be sipping beers and scheming together. But a FaceTime call will have to suffice.

“So the partying has to stop, obviously,” Fred starts. “Or at least how publicly you do it. Same with the puck bunnies and trust me, I know, it wounds me to even say it. If I could get pussy that easily I would be fucking drowning in it, but if you want to project a new, focused and reliable persona you can’t be banging a new chick every night.”

“I came up with that on my own, genius,” George huffs. “But I don’t think that’s enough to really get through to everyone that I’m ready to be Captain.”

“And are you?” Fred asks. “Ready to be captain, that is.”

“Of course.” George is firm in his answer. “I know I can do it, and I’m just going along with some stupid scheme to show everyone else I can do it too.”

“Alright, bro, as long as you’re sure.” Fred pauses as they both think. An idea must hit him, because suddenly Fred’s eyes are lighting up. “Fake dating!”

George raises an eyebrow in question. “I’m sorry, what the hell did you just say?”

“Fake dating, it’s a book trope or whatever. Angelina is always talking my ear off about the newest book she’s reading, and it’s a pretty popular story line. You know, someone wants to make their ex jealous, or they need a fiance to get their inheritance. Bam, fake relationship.”

“Huh. That’s actually not the worst idea you’ve ever had,” George responds, his surprise evident in his tone. “A fake fiance would be the perfect cover. Shows my partying is behind me, and I’m ready to be serious and settle down. And then once I’m Captain and things have blown over, we’ll have an amicable break up and everything will be right with the world again.”

“And that little brother is how the master works,” Fred grins. “Now you just gotta find a girl. Maybe one of our past hookups.”

George frowns, shaking his head. “No, it’s gotta be someone I feel comfortable around and who I know won’t go blabbering to everyone about what’s happening. It has to be someone I might actually consider spending the rest of my life with. Some random puck bunny is not that.”

They both sit in silence, sipping on their beers as they try and figure out who that girl might be. And when they both suddenly make contact, there isn’t a doubt in anyone’s mind that they truly are identical twins. Because George can tell by the look on his brother’s face that they’ve both come to the same conclusion. 

“Y/N,” Fred is the only one brave enough to utter her name. 

And as much George wants to admit that his brother is wrong, deep down he knows that he’s right. Y/N is the only girl George has ever loved, and leaving her behind is the only regret he has in life. Fuck, even all these years later, just thinking about her makes his chest ache. Swearing off commitment and marriage isn’t something George ever even considered until he broke things off with Y/N. He only ever wanted those things with her, and just the thought of even pretending to feel those things for someone else makes him sick to his stomach.

“When’s the last time you talked to her?” Fred asks when George doesn’t say anything. 

“The day I left. I’ve tried to reach out a few times, but,” George shrugs, taking another long drag from his beer. “She never picked up or responded.”

“She still lives in town. If you just show up she’ll probably be so shocked she’ll have no option but to hear you out.”

George nods, reluctantly agreeing with his brother. “Looks like I’m coming home.”

-

“Everything looks the same,” George rumiates wistfully, his eyes roaming over the buildings they pass as Fred drives. 

He hasn’t been back home in nearly a decade, and yet his hometown looks as if it was frozen in time. The ice cream parlor on main street still has the same faded red and white awning, and George swears the chalkboard out front boasts the same specials it did when he used to take Y/N there after school. 

The memory of Y/N reminds him both of why it’s been so long since he came back, and why he finally did. Every inch of this town is covered in memories of Y/N, and every reminder of her cuts George down to the bone. Deep down he knows that letting go of her all those years ago was the best decision for both of them, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less. 

“Well here we are,” Fred announces, pulling George out of his thoughts. But once he realizes where exactly they are his stomach drops. 

Parklane Community Center, is still plastered on the front of the familiar building and George thinks he may actually throw up. This is where he learned to skate, where he joined his first PeeWee league and where he led his high school team to the state championship four years in a row. 

This is also the place where he first met Y/N, when they were both six year olds teetering on brand new ice skates. They’d held onto each other, rather than the orange traffic cones all the kids had been given, and that was the start of a beautiful friendship. Y/N never did anything with those lessons like George did, but she was sitting in the stands cheering him on at every single game he played on that ice. 

When they were in middle school George took Y/N to the community center for open skating on their first ever date. They’d held hands as they glided across the ice and every time she so much as stumbled George was there to catch her. After they got done on the ice they drank hot chocolate at one of the tables, their free hands still intertwined. 

Their first kiss happened here too, right before George tried out for the local travel team and he was practically vibrating with nerves. But as soon as Y/N’s lips touched his all those nerves melted away, and George became the youngest member of the team.

Every moment that lead to George playing in the NHL took place here at this rink, and Y/N was there for every single one of them. 

“Here? You’re sure?” George asks once he’s able to speak. 

Fred nods, giving his brother a sympathetic look. “Yeah, she teaches lessons on the weekend.”

Taking a deep inhale George closes his eyes, needing to take a second to center himself. Not only is he about to see the love of his life for the first time since he broke her heart, but he’s about to ask her for the biggest favor known to man. He can do this, he knows he can. He’s just not sure if he’s ready.

Once his eyes pop back open Fred claps him on the shoulder. “You got this, man.”

Giving his brother a nod in thanks, George braces himself, throwing the car door open and stepping out into the parking lot.  

Here goes nothing.

-

It takes George several minutes to actually make his way to the rink. 

Greg, the same janitor who was in charge of the facility when George was a boy, spotted him the second he came in the door, and pulled him over into a conversation. Which ended up being a good thing, because the morning lesson was just finishing up and while they were chatting a flood of parents with their kids came rushing out of the double doors that lead into the rink. So what started as an annoying inconvenience actually turned into a blessing in disguise, because George definitely did not want to see Y/N for the first time in front of her students and their parents.

With a promise to come back soon, George parts from Greg. He stands just outside the doors to the rink for a few seconds, just taking a few more deep breaths. He’s hit with a wave of nostalgia as he approaches the rink, and it almost brings him to his knees. 

There’s a long figure out on the ice, and George doesn’t need to look for long to know it’s Y/N. He’d recognize the outline of her body anywhere, and she’s just as beautiful as he remembers. She’s just gliding along the ice, not really doing anything fancy and George creeps closer to the boards. He’s drawn to Y/N, and he’s far too weak to resist the pull.

Suddenly Y/N turns on her skates, and George is face to face with the woman he loves. 

Y/N stops, a strangled gasp leaving her lips as she takes in the man standing less than ten feet away. Anyone else in her position would assume that it’s Fred just stopping by to be annoying. But Y/N spent years studying the slight differences between the twins, and there’s no doubt in her mind that George Weasley is standing there. At the rink. Looking right at her. 

Holy fucking shit. 

He looks older, more mature and even in the faint light she can see the slight crook in his nose after it got broken in a game last season. All the times she imagined this moment, never did Y/N actually think it would ever occur. She’s spent years wishing George would come home, but now that it’s here she’s not really sure how to feel. 

Especially considering the way things ended between them. It almost feels like some weird twist of fate, that George should show back up in her life here at the rink, considering it was this very spot where he left her all those years ago.

-

“There you are,” Y/N greets as she steps up to the boards, a wide smile on her face. She’d been trying to get in touch with George for the last few hours, and when he wasn’t at home she knew there was only one other place he’d be.

The rink.

When George just keeps skating Y/N yells out. “Hey! I’m talking to you, George!”

Ice sprays out as George comes to a sharp stop, giving up on whatever drill he’d been running. He doesn’t even bother to mutter an apology, but he does slowly make his way over to where Y/N is standing. 

“What’s up?”

She frowns at him. “What crawled up your ass and died?”

“Nothing, I’m just in the middle of something.”

“Oh, excuse me,” Y/N bites. She hates getting short with George, but it seems almost necessary lately with how moody he’s been. In all the years they’ve been together George has never been this distant, and it’s starting to worry her. After they managed to survive freshman year of college apart, Y/N figured the next three years would be a breeze. But now George is about to leave after Spring Break and she can’t help but feel like she’s about to lose him for good. 

Softening her tone, Y/N reaches out to grab George’s hand. “I can’t help you deal with whatever’s going on in that head of yours if you don’t talk to me about it, Georgie. You and I against the world, remember?”

“Do you remember that guy Jameson? The Agent who signed me at the end of the last season?” George asks instead of responding to Y/N’s concern. He’s been torturing himself for days on how to have this conversation with her, and even still he’s not ready. 

Though George isn’t sure he’d ever be ready to break up with the only woman he will ever love. 

“Yeah,” Y/N answers skeptically. 

“He called me, the other day. Said some teams have been interested. Chicago’s going to draft me next week.”

“George, that’s amazing!” Y/N cheers, jumping up and down in excitement. But when she goes to hug George and he steps away from her embrace, all that joy drains from her body. “George?”

“It’s still not a guarantee, they’re offering me a contract for after graduation,” George explains. “It’s provisional, if I let myself slip they can still withdraw, and then I’ll have to reenter the draft as a free agent after graduation.”

“Okay,” Y/N drawls, a sinking feeling in her stomach. She has a feeling that she knows where this is going, but part of her is still hanging on. 

“I need to focus on hockey, Y/N. This is my only opportunity to prove to myself and everyone else that I’m good enough. That I can compete on a professional level.” George exhales sharply. “I don’t have time for distractions.”

“Distractions?” Y/N squeaks out, her voice already thick with emotion. “That's all I am to you, George? After everything we’ve been through together? I’m just some stupid distraction.”

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” George apologizes, but he can’t even look her in the eyes. “But this means everything to me, you know that.”

“Of course I knew that,” Y/N says defeatedly, her voice breaking. “I just thought I meant more.”

George keeps his head down as Y/N leaves him behind, both of their broken hearts spread out on the floor.

-

“Hi,” George greets, breaking the silence. 

“Really?” Y/N asks, voice firm. “Eight years and all you can say is ‘hi’?”

Her tone stings, but George knows he deserves it. He spent so much time thinking about what it would be like to see her again that he didn’t even consider what he might say to her once he did. Just add it to the list of fuck ups he’s been accruing since he walked away from Y/N all those years ago. 

“I’ve never been good with words,” George explains with a shrug. “And unfortunately there isn’t a book out there called ‘what to say to your ex-girlfriend when you come to ask her for a favor eight years after you broke her heart.’”

That intrigues Y/N and she skates closer to George. “You finally came home after all these years to ask me a favor? What are you, dying?” When George doesn’t say anything Y/N feels her stomach sinking. “Holy fuck, George are you dying?”

George is ashamed at how good it feels to hear the genuine worry in her tone. Having her worry that he’s dying is the actual bare minimum, but he’ll take anything he can get. 

“No, nothing like that,” he assures with a grin. “Just hear me out, please?”

Despite the million reasons why even entertaining George is a bad idea, Y/N finds herself nodding in agreement. Because she’s felt a lot of things for George Weasley since he broke her heart, and unfortunately for her love seems to be the strongest. She never stopped loving him, and even after all the years she has a hard time denying him anything.

Once she’s off the ice George helps her put her skate guards on, a simple action that has her cheeks flushing and butterflies threatening to erupt from her tummy. Y/N also takes the hand that George offers, letting him lead her over to the bleachers. Once they sit Y/N keeps her distance, sitting far enough away that they aren’t touching but so she can still feel the heat radiating off of him. 

“There’s a strong possibility that I’ll be the next Captain of the Rebels,” George starts slowly, trying to find the right words. “Morrison, my Coach, said I have a lot of support. But some of the other higher ups don’t know if I’m the best role model for the team.”

“Okay,” Y/N says, her tone questioning. Clearly she’s not as devious as George and Fred, since she has no idea why George is telling her all of this.

“So I’ve been trying to clean up my image, you know? All the partying and stuff.” A knot has lodged itself in his throat, and George swallows thickly. “But I don’t know if that’s enough. Captain is a serious job, and I want everyone to know that I’m serious about it.”

“And that requires a favor from me, how?”

George sighs. “Well Fred and I were talking,” he stops, unable to keep from chuckling when Y/N mutters a quiet "this can’t be good.” “And he suggested this uh, fake dating scheme. He said Angelina reads a lot of rom coms that include it. Basically, Fred said that the best way for me to showcase that I’m a serious guy and a good role model is to uh, ask someone to be my fake fiance.”

Y/N is silent as she lets George’s words soak in, and once they do her jaw nearly drops. “Are you seriously sitting here right now asking for me to pretend to be your fiance? After everything we’ve been through?”

“There’s no other woman in the world I’d ever imagine wearing my ring, Y/N. When I think about marriage, even fake marriage, you’re the only woman that comes to mind.”

The honesty in George’s voice punches her in the gut. This is such a bad idea, and yet Y/N finds herself considering it. Because despite the pain and the years apart, sitting here with George still feels like home. All of her efforts to push him from her mind, to date other people and move on have always failed. Everything has always come back to George Weasley. 

Realistically she knows that this is just going to end in heartbreak again. As soon as George gets what he wants their little charade will be over, and she’ll go back to having a George shaped hole in her life and in her heart. But the smallest part of her, the part that has read those same rom coms and knows the fake dating always turns into real dating, holds out hope that this may be their second chance. 

Either this is the way she rids George from her system for good, or this is the way she keeps him in her life forever. 

And Y/N will never forgive herself if she doesn’t find out which it is. 

Taking a deep breath, Y/N gives George a curt nod. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

The smile that takes over George’s face takes her breath away. “Really? You will?”

“Yes, George. I will.”

Immediately George drops down to one knee and Y/N lets out a sharp gasp when he produces a small velvet jewelry box from his pocket. This is not how she ever imagined a proposal from George, but if this is all she’s ever going to get Y/N will take it. 

“In that case,” George starts, opening up the box to reveal a gorgeous, simple diamond ring on a white gold band. “Y/N, will you pretend to be my future wife?”

[atlafan]

1963 - Part 1

a/n: I have been dying to share this with yall and I'm so excited to finally be doing that. As per usual, this is the only part that will be posted here on Tumblr.All other parts will be posted on Patreon. In fact, Part 2 is already up! And Part 3 will be posted Friday.

Please consider joining my Patreon. It's only $5 a month, and it charges you the following month on the date you joined. So, if you signed up today, you wouldn't get charged again until January 10th. I post 2-4 times per month. If anything is under 10K words, that's usually when I'll post more. I depend on this extra income to help pay bills for essentials. The community there is also incredible and I write and post some of my nastiest smut on there, so if that's what you're looking for, you'll get it!

Warnings: mentions of infertility

Words: 3.8K

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“Every month I keep hoping I’ll have different news for you two,” Doctor Simmons sighed, “unfortunately, I have the same news. Beverly still isn’t with child.”

“We’ve been trying for five months, we’ve been doing everything you’ve said. Beverly drinks the teas, she lays with her legs up after we’re done, I don’t know what else we can do.” Robert was exasperated at this point. He was squeezing his wife’s hand, desperately trying not to let any tears escape his eye ducts.

“You two have exhausted all natural remedies, so I think it’s time we consider IVF.”

Beverly’s eyes widened, and she squeezed Robert’s hand back. She looked at him, panicked.

“Beverly is terribly afraid of needles.”

“You don’t need to decide on anything right now. Take these pamphlets and look over the information. If you two want to have a baby of your own, then this may be the next step.”

“We’ll look it over and have an answer by our next appointment.”

Robert and Beverly are silent on the drive home from the doctor’s office. They’re silent on their way back into their home. Beverly goes right to the kitchen to get started on dinner. Robert comes up next to her and puts her hand over hers.

“We should read the literature on IVF.” He said.

“I have friends who have done it, and all it has done is make their hormones crazy, and not in a fun way. I really don’t want to, Robert. I’ve done everything else, please don’t make me do this.”

“It feels like sometimes I’m the only one who wants to have a baby.”

“How could you say something like that to me? If I’m infertile-“

“You’re not, though. Doctor Simmons has run every type of blood test on you.”

“I know, I was there when the nurse was drawing it after you accused me of secretly taking birth control pills.”

“Well, with how apprehensive you were about having your diaphragm removed, I had to make sure you weren’t doing any self-sabotage.”

“Maybe I’m not getting pregnant because my body knows you don’t trust me.”

“I do trust you, you just weren’t exactly thrilled to start trying.”

“You sprung it on me, I was surprised. We never really discussed having kids before we got married.”

“Sweetheart, why would two people get married if not to have kids?” He chuckled.

“That’s not why I married you. I married you because I love you and I want to be with you.”

“I love you and want to be with you too. But if I hadn’t wanted kids, we could have just shacked up in an apartment in the city. I bought us a house in the suburbs so you could keep house and raise our kids. You like being a housewife, you’ve told me as much.”

“I do. I like making your meals and keeping things tidy, but I also like my free time. I like to go have brunch with the other ladies, and I like going to the library to check out new film analysis journals, and I like being able to go to the movies in the middle of the day. Having a baby means I can’t do those things anymore. At least, not until it’s old enough to go to school. That’s five solid years I’d be putting on hold. And within that five years, I could have at least two more kids. So, now I’m thirty-one with three kids under the age of five, and oh yeah, I’ll still be expected to keep the house clean and cook all your meals and pleasure you even though everything between my legs will feel like sandpaper.”

Robert eyes his wife, then puckers his lips in thought. “Is that how you’ve really been feeling? You haven’t said a word.”

“I didn’t want to disappoint you. You’re not easy to talk to these days. Every time I reach for my clip-belt for my sanitary napkins, I can see you watching with such sadness in your eyes. Motherhood is scary. My friends tell me these horror stories about childbirth. Their husbands barely take a week off from work to be home with them and the baby. So, we’re expected to push these kids out, then get up the next day and get back to our usual routines.”

“Beverly, you’re worried about things women have been doing since the beginning of time. Don’t be such a child. The fear of needles I can understand, but the fear of being a mother makes no sense. I know you and your mother have a strained relationship, but that doesn’t mean history will repeat itself.” He placed his hands on her shoulders. “If we’re not pregnant by our next appointment with Doctor Simmons, then I would like us to start IVF. Have I made myself clear?”

“Yes, dear.”

“Good.” He looked at the ingredients on the counter and grimaced. “I don’t want meatloaf tonight, make something else instead.”

“Yes, dear.”

“I’m gonna go to my office, have a beer, and listen to the ball game. Let me know when dinner is on the table.”

“Yes, dear.”

Robert smiled, grabbed a beer out of the fridge, and walked out of the kitchen. Beverly took a deep breath and rummaged through her cabinets to see what else she could possibly whip up for dinner. It needs to be something heavy enough that Robert won’t feel like making love before bed. Beverly doesn’t have it in her to put on a performance tonight.

**

Most people get married to have kids. Beverly married Robert because she loved him. He wanted to take care of her. But when the honeymoon phase ended, and he stopped saying thank you to her for all of the things she did to take care of him, she grew resentful. She never let on about it. Robert didn’t need to know how she really felt. Opening up the way she did the day prior wasn’t normal. Things had been good between them for a long time. Beverly didn’t mind stepping into the role of a stay-at-home wife. She was college educated, but it wasn’t like she’d ever be able to carry a position in the profession of her desire. And since she didn’t want to be a schoolteacher or a nurse, Robert asked her to stay home to tend to the house he had bought for them.

At twenty-three, she really hadn’t minded. They met in college, as so many young couples do, and it was love at first sight. Their courtship was disgustingly romantic, and their wedding was a dream come true. The honeymoon phase was so sickly sweet. Beverly enjoyed making breakfast for Robert before he left for work. She enjoyed sending him on his way. She had the whole day to herself. She’d tend to her various gardens, and she’d make sure the house was clean. She’d meet up with friends for brunch. She did everything a good wife was supposed to do.

At twenty-six, Beverly feels like she’s on autopilot. She can’t help but wonder if the reason why older couples have designated sex nights is because the wives must need the six days in between to psych themselves up. She also can’t help but wonder if this is why so many older couples opt for twin beds that can be pushed together or pulled apart.

And it’s not that Beverly doesn’t want kids, she thinks it could be fun, but she’s petrified of essentially raising a child by herself. Robert will stroll in from work, bounce the baby on his knee for all of two minutes, and call it a night. She’s scared for all the reasons she tried to explain the day prior. Robert also didn’t give Beverly a choice five months ago…

“I was thinking of maybe enrolling in graduate school.” Beverly brought up one morning over breakfast. Robert had nearly choked on his toast. “I know what you’re thinking, but you wouldn’t have to pay for a thing. They have stipends for students. I could teach while I learn.”

“I thought you didn’t want to teach.”

“I didn’t want to teach children, but something about having high level discussions with college students makes teaching sound like fun. I miss being in school.”

“What’s the point of a graduate degree in film and media? It’s not like you can do anything with it.”

“A graduate degree could lead to a doctorate, and I could keep teaching. I know female professors are few and far between, especially in the world of film, but it is possible.”

“So, you want to be a career woman, is that what you’re saying?”

“Not exactly. Classes wouldn’t take up all my time. I’d still be able to cook and clean and do everything I’m doing now. Except now when I go to the library, I’ll be doing schoolwork instead of reading for leisure.”

“Seems like you have it all figured out already.”

“Well, I wanted to show you I had thought it all through, that I was serious. You got your graduate degree. If you hadn’t, we never would have met.”

“Exactly. What if some older professor comes on to you? You’d have no way to protect yourself.”

“Oh, Robert, I’ve gone this long without something horrible happening to me on a college campus, I think I’d be fine. Besides, all I’d need to do is show off the lovely rings on my finger.” She grinned. “No one would mess with a married woman whose husband can afford a diamond like this.”

“Did you already sign up for a course?”

“Of course not. I wanted to speak with you first.”

“Good.” He finished his breakfast. “Let me think on it.”

“Alright. Anything in particular you want for dinner tonight?”

“Actually, I was thinking we could go out tonight. I wanted to take you somewhere nice.”

“Oh? For what?”

“Does a husband need a reason to treat his wife to a romantic evening?”

“No.” She giggled. “I’m just excited at the prospect of a spontaneous date night. I’ll pick out a dress I haven’t worn in a while, so it feels like new.”

“I think that’s a great idea.” He stood and kissed the top of her head. “I’ll call you before I leave work, so you’ll know when to expect me.”

“Okay, have a good day, dear.”

Beverly was excited. A night out was a positive sign. Robert wouldn’t take her out just to give her bad news. He was going to say yes to her going back to school.

The restaurant Robert took Beverly to was ritzy. He danced with her, ordered an expensive bottle of wine, and kissed on her shoulder and neck while he sat next to her in their booth. That sickly sweet feeling Beverly thought might be gone was sparking again. When the cheesecake came out, they fed each other bites. It was adorable.

“Are you having a good time tonight?” He asked.

“Yes, this has been such a wonderful evening. Thank you for taking me here.”

“You’re welcome, Bev.” He put his hand over hers and gave it a squeeze. “I’ve been thinking about a lot of things lately, and our conversation this morning was the kick in the pants I needed, so I’m really glad you brought up graduate school.”

“I’m glad it was a positive conversation.” She smiled. “What’s been on your mind?”

“I think it’s time we started trying for a baby.” All of the color drained from Beverly’s face, but her smile never wavered. She couldn’t let on how disappointed she was. “You’re clearly bored with the amount of free time on your hands. I know school seemed like a fun thing to do to pass the time, but I think we’ve waited long enough. We’ll be married almost four years soon, I think we know what we’re doing in the bedroom by now. So, next week, I’m taking you to the doctor to have your diaphragm removed-“

“You called my doctor about something like that?”

“I know it’s a bit awkward, but it’s not a secret that you have one. I went with you when you got it, I should be with you when you have it taken out.”

“Robert…I don’t like that it feels like you’re not giving me a choice. What if I’m not ready?”

“It’s not that you don’t have a choice, I’m just stating that it’s time. You take care of me just fine, you’ll be a great mother. This is what I would rather you do than go back to school. Besides, think of the fun we’ll have while we’re working at it. I got excited at work today thinking about it. I was hoping tonight could be a test run.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “I love you so much, Bev, I wanna turn that love into a physical being.”

“Yeah, um, that makes perfect sense. Let’s…let’s make a baby.”

“Really?” He asked, elated.

“Yes, dear.”

Robert kissed his wife. He kissed her in the car. He kissed her on the way into their home, up the stairs, and into their bedroom. He made love to his wife, then called it a night.

After getting her diaphragm removed, they waited until after her next period was done to start trying. This gave Beverly plenty of time to figure out how she could avoid pregnancy. She needed to keep some semblance of control over her own body. Robert wasn’t going to tell her when she was ready. She could decide that on her own.

Lysol douching didn’t work, she knew this. Her sister told her as much. Some of her friends offered her their birth control pills, but she knew they’d show up on a blood test, which Robert made sure she had after the second month of her still not having gotten pregnant. Beverly may have studied film, but she was an excellent student in biology and chemistry as well. She knew how condoms worked. They were coated in spermicides. She just needed to figure out how to coat her vagina with it. She bought condoms and squeezed all of the lubricant and spermicide off them and got a good amount into a bottle. She mixed it with olive oil, what ancient Greeks used to use, and douched with that before having sex with Robert. She knew it would be a long shot if it worked, but she had to try.

When the third month came along, and she still wasn’t pregnant, she took solace is knowing her little concoction was working. And because Robert never went down on her, he’d never smell or taste a thing. When he used his fingers, he just thought she was extra wet, which made him feel proud of himself.

She was perfectly content with her plans until the topic of IVF came up. Even the harshest of solutions couldn’t stand up to IVF injections. She never felt bad for lying to Robert because she didn’t like that he had become so controlling, but she also didn’t think she’d be doing this for so long. The thought of her giving her body up didn’t sound any more appealing five months later.

What was she going to do?

**

“I really think that one is gonna be a winner.” Robert sighed happily as he relaxed into the bed, looking over at Beverly as she lay with her legs in the air. “I’m glad we waited a couple of days in between, feels like my boys swam stronger.”

“Yes, dear.” Beverly closed her eyes and tried to breathe steadily, counting down the minutes until she could go use the bathroom and cleanse herself.

“I had an idea today. I really want to spare you from having to be injected with needles. I’m a good husband, and good husbands protect their wives. So, since we have about five weeks until our next appointment, I thought we could try one last natural method.”

“I’m listening.” She turned her head to look at him, intrigued.

“I overheard some ladies talking in the break room this morning. It’s the one good thing about having so many female secretaries. Anyways, they happened to be discussing various issues with conceiving. One of them said they had a friend who got pregnant the second she and her husband stopped focusing so much on it. The wife threw herself into different projects, and a month or so later, she was pregnant.”

“Wait.” She sat up on her elbows. “Are you saying I can enroll in a graduate course after all?”

“What, no.” He laughed. “No, I was thinking we could finally redo the patio and have that pool you’ve wanted put in. You’ve been talking about wanting to host more parties for our friends. You always do so well with the workers when we have something done here, and you love gardening. I think you’d really enjoy overseeing a landscaping project.”

“Let me get this straight: you would rather pay thousands of dollars to have our backyard redone, than pay a couple of hundred for me to enroll in a course?”

“I think school would be too stressful. If you’re stressed, then you definitely won’t conceive. Overseeing a project that puts you outside in the sun will be a win-win. Not to mention an old friend of mine is willing to give us a deal on the work.”

“You have a friend that’s a landscaper?”

“Yeah, this guy from my old neighborhood took over his father’s business. He said he could swing by Saturday to take a look at things.”

“It sounds like you’ve already decided that this is what we’re doing.”

“That’s because I have.” He grinned proudly. “Bev, when we got married, I promised to take care of you. This is me taking care of you. Not all husbands would do something like this for their wives. You could at least pretend to be grateful.”

“I am grateful, I’m sorry if my tone suggested otherwise. What time Saturday is he coming over?”

“That I left up to you. I didn’t know if you had any errands or plans with the ladies.”

“Oh.” Well, at least he was trying to be considerate. “Maybe around three? That would give me time to pick up the dry cleaning and stop at the market.”

“Three is perfect. I’ll give him a call tomorrow to let him know.” He looked down at his watch. “You should be good to use the bathroom now.”

“Yes, dear.” Beverly lowers her legs and slings her robe on. Once she’s in the bathroom, she locks the door and flips on the fan. She rummages around in the back of the sink-cabinet until she finds her douching solution. She used some prior to having sex with her husband, but she likes to use it after for good measure. She bites into the heel of her palm as she cleanses herself. It tends to sting from time to time. When she’s done, she looks at herself in the mirror. She knows she can’t keep doing this to herself. She just doesn’t know what else to do.

**

Beverly loves her weekend clothes. There’s something so freeing about slipping on a pair of high-waist capris, a sleeveless button-up that ties in the front, and a pair of flats. She usually gardens after running her errands, and this is what she typically wears to garden. Robert hates it when Beverly wears pants, or anything form fitting, in public. Why should anyone else be privy to how round her bum is, or how full her thighs are? She’s got a body like Marilyn’s, and that’s something he prefers to keep under wraps.

When the landscaping van pulls up out front, Beverly is in the front yard, planting and mulching. She has the radio going, so she doesn’t pay any mind to the sound of an engine turning off. The man in the landscaping van tilted his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose, getting a better glimpse of Beverly. Robert starts walking over, so the man gets out of his van, rounding it to meet his old friend.

“Harry.” Robert smiled and shook the man’s, Harry, hand. “Can you believe it? Got a nice house in a suburb just like the one we grew up in.”

“I never doubted you’d get everything you wanted.” Harry smiled back.

“Seems like the Navy treated you well.”

“Yeah, I can’t complain too much. I didn’t get blown up or lose a limb.”

“And now you own your father’s business. Sorry for your loss, by the way. That’s the drawback of inheritance.”

“Yep. You working for your father?”

“Yes, and proud of it. I’ve got an office with a view, and I can afford to live more than comfortably. Got a beautiful wife, too.” Robert looked around. “Beverly, c’mere!” Beverly stood and dusted off her trousers before making her way over to the two men. “Harry, this is my Beverly.” He put his arm around his wife’s shoulders.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Clark.”

“Likewise, Mr…”

“Styles.” He points behind him with his thumb. “Of Styles Landscaping.”

“Right, of course.”

“Your husband told me you were hoping to have some work done in the backyard.”

“Yes, we’d like the patio redone and to have a pool put in, if possible.”

“Let’s show Harry to the back.” Robert said as he led his wife to the back. Harry followed close behind.

As Beverly observes Harry observing her yard, she can’t help but feel confused. How is this man a friend of Robert’s? Harry’s t-shirt is stretched tight over his chest, not to mention how beefy and muscular his biceps are. His arms are also littered with tattoos.

It takes about twenty minutes for Harry to look around, take some measurements, and get a feel for the land.

“Alright, I can come back on Tuesday with some different mockups of what can be done back here. I can bring my portfolio too, so you can look at some of my past projects. Does Tuesday work for you, Mrs. Clark? I’m assuming you’ll be the one home.”

“Yes, the early afternoon works for me, Mr. Styles.”

“Perfect.” Robert clapped his hands. “H, come in for a bit. We can have a couple beers and catch up while Bev does her gardening out front.”

“Sounds good to me.” Harry nodded, and Robert started to make his way inside. For a split second, Harry tilted his sunglasses down to look at Beverly. “It was nice meeting, Mrs. Clark.” He winked and smirked before catching up with Robert.

Beverly felt her cheeks heat up. She turned and watched Harry walk into her home. Why did he wink at her like that? And why did it make her feel like she just got a B-12 shot?

She shook it off and made her way out front. Gardening will help her clear her head. She’s a married woman. A friend of Robert’s wouldn’t flirt with a married woman…would he?

[airas-story]

Doctor's Note - Prelude

“I need a doctor’s note,” Tony said as he entered the room he knew Stephen was in. Or was at least guessing that Stephen was in since this was where the sanctum had brought him.

“I’d know if you were sick,” he heard Stephen say. Tony followed the sound to find Stephen settled comfortably in a little reading nook within a window well that Tony hadn’t been aware the sanctum even had. “You’re not sick, therefore you do not need a doctor’s note.”

Tony nudged at Stephen’s feet a little and Stephen shifted enough so that Tony had space to sit across from him, their legs tangling a little, the touch comfortable and easy.

“I could hide it if I wanted to,” Tony argued.

Stephen glanced up from his book long enough to stare at Tony judgmentally.

“Not that I would,” Tony added hurriedly. “I’m just saying that I could.”

“Not from me,” Stephen said with absolute certainty.

Tony considered that, because he’d had some pretty solid luck on hiding declining health from people in the past, but he’d never tried to hide it from Stephen. So, maybe Stephen was right, maybe Stephen was the one person Tony would never be able to hide something like that from.

“Fair enough,” Tony decided. “But that doesn’t change the fact that I need a doctor’s note.”

Stephen glanced down at his book and then back up at Tony. “No.” He returned to his book.

Tony leaned back against the wall, staring at his husband intently as his husband kept reading. Stephen was pretty good at ignoring him when the situation required, but Tony also knew that he was annoying—which Stephen, fortunately, seemed to mostly love about him—even without trying, which meant that when he did try he was amazing at it.

Stephen lasted five minutes of Tony staring intently at him before Stephen sighed and looked up. “What do you need a doctor’s note for? You realize that a) I was a neurosurgeon, and b) I’m not a practicing doctor anymore?”

Tony waved his hand. “Details. You’re a doctor, always will be.”

Stephen looked reluctantly pleased at the words, as though he knew Tony was buttering him up but was helpless to resist it.

Tony wasn’t buttering him up, it was simple truth. Stephen being a doctor was simply a part of him; it always would be.

“Anyways, I need it because doctor’s notes are apparently ‘get out of jail free’ cards. I need one. Pepper’s been making me go to too many meetings and galas lately and I need a way to get out of one the next time she tries.”

Stephen rolled his eyes. “You’re ridiculous, you know that right?” 

“Yes,” Tony said, because it was true and he had no shame.

“I’m not giving you a doctor’s note to get out of work.” Stephen returned to his book and Tony returned to his staring intently at Stephen.

Stephen lasted a good seven minutes this time. “You know I love your attention, but I’m going to portal you somewhere far away if you keep that up.”

He absolutely would, Tony knew. His husband didn’t make threats he didn’t mean. But it would be somewhere safe and convenient like his lab at the compound or—if he was particularly lucky—their bed.

“I’m not doing anything,” Tony pointed out. “In fact, I’m being perfectly well-behaved.”

Stephen just glared at him. “You know exactly what you’re doing.”

“Gazing admiringly at my beloved husband?” Tony put a hand to his chest. “How dare I.”

Stephen sighed. “Fine, grab the paper you are undoubtedly carrying with you.”

Tony grinned and immediately pulled out the folded paper with Stephen’s credentials printed in fancy typeface at the top. Tony might have had FRIDAY design it just for this purpose. He pulled out a pen as well and grabbed a spare book to use as a table and waited for Stephen to dictate his note. He knew writing was painful for Stephen and he might want a doctor’s note, but he wasn’t going to make Stephen actually write it.

“Dear Pepper,” Stephen started and Tony immediately started writing. “Tony is driving me up a wall. Please consider the fact that his entire being is an ailment—“ Tony smirked a little as he wrote that down, ”—and that whatever function you are busy attempting to make him attend may indeed be better off without him there.” Stephen paused. “Now hand it here so I can sign it and you can go be annoying somewhere else.”

Tony laughed it as he handed the paper to Stephen for him to sign. God, he loved his husband.

Tony waited for Stephen to sign it before shifting so that he could lean forward to kiss him.

“Best. Husband. Ever,” he whispered when he finally pulled back.

Stephen snorted. “And don’t you forget it.”