#when we were brainstorming this idea I knew we were on a winner

[demi-moore-cheat-9g]

demi moore cheat trainer ZXZX+

💾 ►►► DOWNLOAD FILE 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 Moore never addressed rumors of her cheating on Willis during their marriage. However, she did admit to cheating on her first husband, Freddy. Ashton Kutcher's marriage to Demi Moore was one of the fairytale marriages. They fell in love, married, but finally fell apart. Demi Moore is admitting to a past “infidelity” in her revealing new memoir Inside Out. In the book, the actress, 56, recalls her whirlwind. Demi, 56, and Ashton started dating in and were married in They announced their split eight years later, in In her memoir, Demi. demi moore ashton kutcher. MILA Kunis joined forces with her husband Ashton Kutcher's ex-wife Demi Moore for a new ad after she revealed that the actor was unfaithful during their marriage. The year-old actress opened up about her marriage with the That 70s Show star in her autobiography released in Despite their rocky past, there seems to be no bad blood between the exes, or between Demi and the actor's wife Mila - who are starring in a new commercial together. Mila, 38, and Demi both play themselves in the funny ad as they attend their high school reunion. Ahead of the announcement of the winner of the "Most Admired Alum" award, both girls believed they snagged the victory as they made their way up on stage. The two acted shocked when they spotted each other attempting to claim their prize with Mila asking Demi: "What are you doing here," in which Demi responded with a shrug of her shoulders. However, both were surprised when a fellow alumnus won the award instead, leaving them dumbfounded as they awkwardly shared the stage. As they looked out into audience, Demi commented to Mila: "I had no idea we went to the same high school," leading Mila to reply: "We have a lot in common. Turns out, the ad was loosely based on the actresses real-lives as they both went to the same high school, Fairfax High School in Los Angeles. In fact, it was Mila's idea to involve Demi in the skit while she was brainstorming ideas for the commercial. I reached out to her and was so delighted she jumped on board. Now we're just working on becoming gigillionaires," she added. Demi reciprocated the feelings telling the publication: "Who knew being a Fairfax alum would have brought this unexpected opportunity, to come together with Mila in such a fun and playful way? Demi was married to Ashton from , beginning their romance when the she was 41 and the Two and A Half Men actor was just Demi talked about their open relationship in her autobiography, Inside Out, where she revealed she had agreed to having a threesome, but added: "It was a mistake. Demi, who shares three daughters with Die Hard actor Bruce Willis, then blamed the openness in their marriage for his alleged infidelity. She said: "Because we'd brought in a third party into our relationship, Ashton said, that blurred the lines and, to some extent, justified what's he's done. Ashton, who married Black Swan actress Mila Kunis in , responded by tweeting: "I was about to push the button on a really snarky tweet. Then I saw my son, daughter, and wife and I deleted it. He also tweeted fans his phone number, implying Demi was lying by telling them to reach out to him for the "truth. Email us at exclusive the-sun. Like us on Facebook at www. Jump directly to the content. Sign in. All Football. Entertainment Celebrity Courtney Ciandella. Courtney Ciandella. Most read in Celebrity. We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The US Sun team?

[artgroves]

“To first blood?” Nicolo asks, but even as he says the words his mouth pulls down, rueful, at Yusuf’s raising brows. What is first blood to people like them?

For so universal a mixture by @wrenaspun - In which duelling to the death becomes the most intimate engagement in the world.

Thanks to the @theoldguardevents Reversebang <3

[dream-a-little-bigger-x]

End Up Here | Owen Patrick Joyner

Requested:  Yes/No

hi!! could you please write a fic where the reader is an actor on jatp and the cast have a sleepover and some of them decide to play seven minutes in heaven, and the reader ends up in the closet with owen who they have a massive crush on and they end up making out in the closet? love your writing!!

A/N: Special thanks to @calamitykaty and @vrthngiwnt for letting me bounce some ideas off them and giving me some of their creativity. Love you both! 

Pairing: Owen Patrick Joyner x Reader

Song(s) used: Into The Unknown - Frozen II / Drag Me Down - One Direction 

Warnings: It’s just light and fluffy. 

Words: 6,411

How in the holy hell did she end up here? Here. In Savannah’s closet, kissing one of her best friends whom she’d had a crush on for weeks now. Kissing Owen Joyner. It was only this morning they were still bullying each other playfully during dance training. It was only a month ago the two had met. 

A month ago she got the call from her agent that she got the gig. She was going to be in a Kenny Ortega production. A freaking Kenny Ortega production. After being a fan of his work since she was literally a child, she finally got the honor to work with him on a project. Albeit as more of an extra, but still. 

A member of popular girl Carrie Wilson’s band. Dirty Candy singer #3. Member of Dirty Candy. No matter how she put it, it still all seemed so surreal. 

The first day of bootcamp, y/n was extremely nervous. This was her first ever project and she wanted to do it right. This was something so close to her heart as she, herself, had lost her mom and lost the love to dance and sing for a while too until she found the strength again through friends and family. 

Besides, getting to play a mean girl did seem a lot of fun. 

“Oh, hey,” a girl greeted. She had long blonde hair that cascaded into curls down her neck and shoulders, and big brown bambi eyes twinkling at her. “I’m Savannah. You’re a Dirty Candy member?” she introduced herself and asked you, in one go. 

“Uh, yeah! I’m member number three,” she chuckled awkwardly before reaching out her hand towards her. “I’m y/n,” she said with a smile that reached her ears. Savannah looked at her hand and then grabbed it, and pulled her in for a hug. 

A surprised shriek arose from member number three before she wrapped her arms around the 5 foot something specimen that clung to her for a while. 

“I can’t wait to get started!” Savannah clapped her hands excitedly when she had pulled away from the hug. 

As time went by, a lot more people filed into the room. Some of them y/n recognized, like Jeremy Shada, but also some of the fellow dancers seemed very familiar. Probably from dance classes back in High School or College, she thought. 

“Okay, let’s get this started!” A man of medium-build with a baseball cap on his head and a smile on his face clapped his hands, and rubbed them together as if planning some sort of scheme. “I’m Paul Becker, I’m the choreographer and along with Tori and Louise, my assistants, I’ll be getting you prepped for all dance rehearsals.” He pointed at the two girls on the first row. One of which y/n knew from college, Tori. A petite brown girl who was so sweet and kind, and a masterpiece of motion. Y/N remembered how she always outshone everyone in class. 

Kenny Ortega stood next to Paul, smiling at the group of talent he’d accumulated, and said, “We’re just gonna start with some icebreaker games today to get to know each other better and then really get to work.” Y/N glanced around the room to check if she was the only one that seemed nervous. Halfway through the room, she made eye contact with a tall blonde boy with what she thought was the most adorable smile ever. She shot him a smile back before focusing on Kenny again. “I’m assuming not everyone knows each other’s names yet, so I suggest we start with the name game?” he looked at Paul, who gave a nod of assent. 

“Let’s all sit down in a big circle,” Paul said, rotating his finger to indicate the circle. Savannah, standing closest to Y/N, grabbed the girl’s hand and brought her closer to the rest of the group before they both sat down, along with the others. 

“The premise is to remember everyone else’s name,” Kenny began, “So, for example. I’ll start and say Kenny, then Paul, who’s sitting next to me goes ‘Kenny, Paul’, then Tori has to go ‘Kenny, Paul, Tori,’ and so on and so forth. Got it?” All participants nodded their heads. 

A groan is heard from the other side of the circle, “I’m gonna have to remember so many names!” The blonde guy with the cute smile from earlier whined. The group burst out laughing at his annoyance. 

“Well, let’s hope you remember the names better than the lyrics to your audition song, huh, Owen?” Kenny retorted teasingly, sending the rest of the group into another fit of laughter as the blonde boy glared at the director. 

Y/N made a mental note to remember his name. Owen. When she looked at him at that moment, she recognized him from somewhere, but couldn’t put her finger on where or how. 

“Okay, so, I’ll start,” Kenny said and repeated his name. 

“Kenny, Paul,” Paul said, then looked at the girl next to him. 

“Kenny, Paul, Tori.” Everyone then averted their eyes to the blonde girl sitting next to Tori. 

“Kenny, Paul, Tori, Louise.” Everyone’s eyes then went to the girl sitting on y/n’s right, who she’d met before. 

“Kenny, Paul, Tori, Louise, Savannah.” 

Her heart beated faster as everyone’s eyes were focused on her as she repeated the names, “Kenny, Paul, Tori, Louise, Savannah, y/n.” 

She looked around the circle with a smile as the girl next to her continued. Her eyes stopped at Owen, who was looking at her too with a tender smile on his face. Instead of simply shooting a smile back, she mimed “Pay attention”. His shoulders jolted from the soft chuckle that came through before he focused on the next person. 

The game went on for a while until it reached Owen. Y/N could tell from the look in his eyes that he was struggling to remember them all. There were a lot of names to remember, that’s true, but y/n thought it was pretty simple to remember. 

“Kenny, Paul, Tori, Louise, Savannah, y/n,” he halted his gaze on her for a split second before continuing, “Sacha, Jadah, uhm…” His eyes flicked back to y/n, begging for help. She started mouthing the names along, and even though he couldn’t really lipread, the help was welcome. “Kyra, Halle, Jeremy, Madison, Owen.” 

Of course, he knew the last two people before him, but Kyra and Halle seemed difficult names for him to remember.

“That wasn’t so hard, now, was it?” the boy next to him slapped him on the shoulder as the group burst out into laughter. Owen, however, couldn’t help but smile as he looked at y/n. 

“Yeah, it wasn’t that bad,” he mumbled and shot her a thankful wink. 

Charlie then ended the circle, and though Kenny wanted to go around the circle once more, the contradictory moans and complaints made him finish the game and tell everyone to get up off the floor. Paul grabbed a rope from the ground near the wall-covering mirror and handed one end to Kenny. The latter looked around the room for a second before calling out y/n’s name, beckoning her to come over. Confused and a little embarrassed, she walked over to the director. 

“You’re about the average height of everyone here, so we need your waist,” he told her, chuckling. The soft caress of his hand on her shoulder made her calm down a little as he guided her to the middle of the room. Paul and Kenny then secured the rope at the height of her waist. One side on the barre, the other on a hook in the wall. “I’m gonna split you into two groups and make it a competition,” he then said and looked around the room to see who could make a great team. 

“Let’s do Dirty Candy against Julie and The Phantoms?” Paul suggested, “Jadah with the Phantoms team and Sacha with the Dirty Candy team? And Louise can join the Phantoms team too, to balance it out.” Kenny let his eyes wander over the two groups as they scattered towards each other. 

“Yep, I like that,” he then said and clapped his hands. “Premise of this game is to get across the rope together. There’s no going under it, it’s not a game limbo dancing. Okay? You gotta brainstorm and get across using teamwork.” 

“What does the winner get?” Owen asked, a smirk playing on his lips as he and his team huddled together on one side of the rope, closest to the mirror. 

“If Team Dirty Candy wins, they get to see your audition tape,” Kenny promised, immediately wiping off the smirk on Owen’s face as everyone on team Dirty Candy cheered and giggled. “If Team Phantoms wins…” 

A boost of confidence rushed through y/n as she exclaimed, “No need for that, Kenny. Team Dirty Candy is gonna win!” Sacha and Halle lifted their hands, so y/n hit hers against them in high fives. 

The director laughed at that while Owen kissed his teeth, an amused smirk playing at his lips. “We’ll see about that,” he said. “Kenny, what’s in it for us?” The director’s eyes darted from y/n to Owen and back, picking up on the connection that had formed between them with just non-verbal communication. 

“What would you say if I could get into possession of home videos from when y/n was younger.” Y/N’s eyes widened at this. She had almost forgotten her parents used to be buddies in college with Kenny, and he and her dad worked together on a couple of projects. 

“Yep, okay, you’re going down, Dirty Candy!” said Owen threateningly. “How is that fair, Kenny?!” y/n exclaimed, glaring at Owen as he cackled.

“About as fair as you seeing my audition tape!” he yelled, but still had that amused smile on his face that told her he wasn’t actually mad at her. 

She pressed her lips together into a tight line before turning to her team. “We have to win this thing, guys.” All four other Dirty Candy singers and Sacha nodded their heads determinedly, and threateningly turned back to their opposing team. 

“You’ve got half an hour to get everyone across. Every time a person touches the rope, everyone who’s already crossed over has to go back,” Paul explained in a stern tone. “Teams ready?” Both teams huddled up into a group, ready to brainstorm quickly. Y/N looked up, locking eyes with Owen straight away. He glared at her as she pointed two fingers at her own eyes, then pointing them to him. “3-2-1… GO!” Paul pressed the timer on his phone as the two teams began frantically discussing. 

“I used to be a gymnast,” Kyra started in a hushed tone. “If I can get onto someone’s shoulders, I can summersault my way off?” 

“Don’t you need a mat for that on the other side so as to not break your ankles?” Halle asked, her eyebrows knit together in confusion. The gymnast of the group shook her head, and so the discussion continued. 

On the other team, Owen was taking the lead in their discussion. He seemed to just have a game plan ready in his mind. There was no way the other team would ever be allowed to see his audition tape. It was way too embarrassing. 

“We’re gonna start with Charlie and me on our knees in front of the rope. Louise or Jeremy, one of you is gonna stand on both our knees and hop over. Then, whoever went over is gonna mirror us on the other side, so the next person has to step onto your thigh as they step over. We’re just gonna continue like that until I’m the last one here. I’m able to just jump across.” His teammates looked at him as if he’d just spoken Chinese. Blinking eyes and mouths ajar. 

They had five minutes left and on both teams, the second to last person had just gone over. Now, only Owen and Y/N were left standing on their side. Glaring at each other when they noticed this was match point, both of them stepped back for the run-up, and leapt over the rope at exactly the same time. 

Their teammates cheered as both teams huddled into a group hug. Kenny and Paul stood on the sidelines, applauding both team’s efforts. 

“I think we have a tie,” Kenny announced once the cheering had died down. 

“So, what does that mean?” Owen asked, glancing over at y/n anxiously. It would be fairest to have both their prices or no prices at all. 

“I think our two team captains can decide that,” Kenny said, pointing at both Owen and y/n, who had started this little war in the first place. “Do you wanna see each other’s videos, or is no one ever gonna see anything at all?”

Y/N and Owen glanced at each other, trying to communicate what each of them were feeling in that very moment. Owen’s eyes searched her face as she bit down on her lip. It wouldn’t be fair for me to see her old family videos. Those are kind of private, he thought. 

“I think we’re good,” Owen replied and offered the girl a smile as she nodded her head agreeingly. “This was a fun game, I don’t think it needs a price.” 

“Agreed.” 

Kenny and Paul told them to take a break before they got to the real dance training. Before y/n could join Savannah to their bags, Owen stopped her with a wide smile plastered on his face. 

“Nice job, y/n,” he said, opening his palms and holding them out to her. Y/N hit her hands on his in a double low five as a giggle escaped her lips. 

“You too,” she said. 

The rest of the day was spent dancing, or at least for Y/N. The first two hours, they had dance training together, but then they were split up into groups again. Y/N had more dance rehearsals with the girls from Dirty Candy while Madison and the boys went to try out some songs they were going to sing on the show. 

From that first day on, y/n knew that this wasn’t just going to be a work relationship she was building up with these people. She felt in her stomach that these people were going to become her best friends, her family. And she wouldn’t want to change it for the world. 

At the end of bootcamp, y/n was proven absolutely right. They had become the best of friends, and almost like a family. And they had yet to start filming. The next few months were going to be even more fun, especially that final night of bootcamp since Savannah had invited everyone to a sleepover at her place. 

Though y/n was half certain Savannah only did it to get her and Owen together, she was still excited about it. The blondie knew y/n had a thing for the tall blonde man ever since the first day, but she hadn’t done anything about it as she wanted to keep it professional. 

But of course Savannah didn’t quite agree to that.

The night of the sleepover, Savannah invited a few of the closest people over to her place. She literally went all out on this night. There were bowls of different varieties of chips scattered around tables, stacks of red cups on her kitchen counter, candles and fairy lights everywhere. Though, y/n was kind of apprehensive about the candles being a danger, she didn’t really say anything about it. It wasn’t going to be that kind of night, she thought. 

She even got them matching PJ’s. On the backside of six of the white T-shirts was TEAM DIRTY CANDY printed in a bright pink while the other five -- since Louise couldn’t make it -- read TEAM PHANTOMS in purple. She bought pink shorts for the girls on her team, purple ones for the girls on the other. For the boys, she brought grey joggers. 

Y/N appreciated the effort Savannah put into tonight. It was something she would do, too. She was a sucker for an over-the-top party and went all out herself on every occasion. 

“I made a non-alcoholic Sangria punch for everyone,” she said as she pointed to the large glass bowl on the kitchen counter near the stack of cups. “Who would like some?” 

Team Dirty Candy was complete while Team Phantoms missed two people. Two people who were often late for everything. Charlie and Owen. Of course they hadn’t arrived yet. It didn’t surprise y/n very much. Half an hour late. They were half an hour late. 

“We’re so sorry,” Charlie apologized to Savannah, “But this one over here was taking so long to get ready.” The brunette boy rolled his eyes as he thought of the dallying of the blonde one next to him. 

“You were barely ready when I was,” Owen countered and gladly took the punch-filled cup Savannah handed over before making a beeline towards the others who were gathered on the couches in the living room. 

His eyes immediately landed on y/n and his smile grew wider. “Well, look who finally showed his face, Dorian Gray.” His eyebrows knitting together made y/n realize he hadn’t the slightest clue about English Literature. “The Picture of Dorian Gray? No? Never read it?” Owen slowly shook his head as he slid down on the couch next to her. “OK…”

Y/N turned to Jadah, who was sitting next to her, completely ignoring Owen’s confused eyes. “Who the fuck is Dorian Gray?!” he yelled at Charlie, his eyes wide as he grew more and more annoyed. 

“Read a book!” Halle and y/n yelled in unison, and Halle even threw a pillow at him, reminiscent of that scene in The Heat where Melissa McCarthy threw a book at Michael McDonald’s face. The two girls fell into a fit of laughter, along with pretty much everyone else but Owen. He was too busy wiping the Sangria punch that had spilled with the impact of the pillow, off his jeans. 

“How about we get into our PJ’s and get this party started!” Savannah suggested, followed by an excited whoop. The girls all got up quickly, following behind Savannah while the boys stuck around the living room. They decided they needed to give the girls some privacy and would change after. 

“So…” Madison started when they were in Savannah’s bedroom, changing from their cute outfits into even cuter pj’s. “You’re gonna tell Owen how you feel tonight?” she asked y/n, her eyebrows wiggling suggestively up and down. 

“Feel about what?” y/n asked as she tucked her Team Dirty Candy shirt into her pink shorts. 

“About him!” Jadah exclaimed with wild eyes. “It’s clear you have a massive crush on him, girl!” Y/N looked around the room at the other girls, who were all just nodded their heads in accordance. 

Y/N scoffed after a few seconds of silence. She was thinking about confiding in them and telling them the truth, but it was no use. There was no way she and Owen could ever become a thing. She was supposed to be strictly professional as it was her first job. 

“I don’t have a crush on Owen,” she stated, grabbed her stuff and left the girls in the bedroom. After neatly folding her jeans and the top she had been wearing that day, and putting it into the backpack she’d taken with her, she made her way into the kitchen for some more punch. All while her mind went crazy. 

Sure, she had a definite crush on the blonde actor, but there was no way she was ever going to act up on those feelings. Owen probably didn’t even feel the same way about her anyway. Besides, she promised herself she would focus on her career instead of dabbling into relationships that probably won’t even last. 

The girls re-entered the living room at the same moment y/n went back with her full cup of Sangria. “Alright, boys, the bedroom is yours. It’s just around the corner,” Savannah told them, pointing to the door she’d left open. 

The four boys got up and, after receiving the pj’s from Savannah, disappeared into the bedroom. The complete quiet returning in the room. It made y/n a little anxious that the girls weren’t even talking. Mostly because she knew what they were thinking. They had told her a bizillion times already. 

“You could at least ask him!”

“He might say yes!” 

“You should act on your feelings!”

“This is gonna make you crazy!” 

She’d responded to that last one with, “If it doesn’t, you ain’t doing it right.” It shut them right up for a while. Until now, it seemed. 

“Let’s put some music on and get this party really started!” Tori suggested, hitting her hand against the red cup she was holding, excited to get dancing. Savannah agreed and grabbed her phone from the coffee table, connecting them to the speakers. It didn’t take long after that for music to begin filling up the silence. 

Into The Unknown from Frozen II chimed through the room. All the girls gasped. All but one. She cursed at herself for feeling this way and basically being a buzzkill right now. She didn’t want to be this way, but the thoughts about Owen kept consuming her. 

“I can hear you but I won't Some look for trouble while others don't There's a thousand reasons I should go about my day And ignore your whispers which I wish would go away, oh Whoa”

Tori and Madi turned to y/n as they sang along with Idina Menzel, trying to convince her to get up and belt the song with them. 

“You're not a voice, you're just a ringing in my ear And if I heard you, which I don't, I'm spoken for I fear Everyone I've ever loved is here within these walls I'm sorry, secret siren, but I'm blocking out your calls I've had my adventure, I don't need something new I'm afraid of what I'm risking if I follow you”

The other four girls now sang to y/n as well, in an attempt to persuade her to party along with them. She wanted to, she really did. But y/n wouldn’t be y/n if she wasn’t a little stubborn at first. 

“Into the unknown Into the unknown”

Madison reached out her hand, but y/n slapped it away and got up on the sofa, belting out the last line of the chorus while the girls looked at her in awe. They knew she could dance and act, but they had no idea the girl had pipes. 

“Into the unknown”

As the girls belted out the rest of the song, the boys walked into the living room again in their Team Phantoms and Team Dirty Candy shirts, stumbling upon the scene of y/n on the sofa and the girls surrounding her as if they were her fans at a concert. All seven of them were singing the song at the top of their lungs. 

Owen couldn’t help the smile finding its way to his lips as he watched y/n in her absolute element. Though she be but small, the girl took up a large part of his heart. Ever since they met a month ago, her snarky remarks and her hunch for competition made him fall head over heels in love with her. And as the month went on and they became closer and closer, he kept avoiding asking the one question that was on the tip of his tongue. 

For now, being friends was enough for Owen if it meant watching her do stuff like this. 

“Are you out there? Do you know me? Can you feel me? Can you show me?”

Charlie’s voice made Owen snap out of his thoughts as he asked, “When are you going to ask her out, man? This whole ‘just friends’ thing is killing you.” Owen sighed at his best friend’s words. It wasn’t that he was wrong as much as he just didn’t like hearing the words out loud. 

“I’m fine, Charlie. There’s no way we could ever be together. Y/N is way too professional for that. And she might be right, you know? This is her first gig, if she wants to pursue this acting debacle, she has to be.” Owen didn’t even believe any of the words that rolled off his lips, but it’s what he’d settled on to ease his own mind. 

“Not with that attitude,” Jeremy mumbled. 

“I just don’t know what to do, okay?” he said and headed over to the concert y/n was giving the girls. The moment he came into her range of vision, she turned to him and sang the very last lines to him, and him alone, causing butterflies to well up in his belly.  

“Where are you going? Don't leave me alone How do I follow you Into the unknown?”

“Woah, y/n!” Halle exclaimed as she shook her head in disbelief. 

“Yeah! Woah indeed!” Savannah added, “Your voice! Girl!” Y/N chuckled, and grabbed the hem of her pink shorts as though she was wearing a dress and curtsied at the praise. 

“Thank you,” she said, and though she was playing it off coolly, her cheeks colored pink.

The next song started to play, which was Golden by Harry Styles, and the other three boys joined the rest of the group. Charlie, Sacha and Tori hopped onto the couch with y/n, belting out the song and sipping from their punch. 

This was what the sleepover mostly consisted of; singing along loudly to whatever song was playing, sipping from the punch and munching on the snacks Savannah had laid out for them. For at least an hour, they sang and danced until their feet started to ache. Up to the point where only y/n, Savannah and Madi were left standing. The boys and other girls had taken a seat on the couch, watching the performance they were giving them. 

Y/N had enough of their lame asses, so when her favorite One Direction song came on, she made her way over to the couch and took a hold of Owen’s hand first. “Come on, Golden Boy! Sing with me!” Little did she know everyone glanced at each other knowingly upon seeing this. 

“If I didn't have you, there would be nothing left The shell of a man that could never be his best If I didn't have you, I'd never see the sun You taught me how to be someone, yeah”

Owen finally caved in and sang along with the girl in front of him, eyes locked and filled with absolute admiration. 

“I’m… gonna…” Savannah muttered, but when she realized they didn’t even hear her, she ushered everyone out of the living room and into the kitchen, leaving the two alone in hopes they would confess their undeniable love for each other. 

The boy twirled her around a few times, making her giggle before they fell into song again, making up some moves as they went. Neither of them even noticed the rest of the group was gone and watching them from the kitchen. 

“Anyone wanna bet nothing’s gonna happen?” Sacha muttered and frustratedly sipped his drink. He’d seen the way y/n looked at Owen that first day and just knew something would blossom between them. Everyone could see it. The sparks were ignited that very first day, and now they were just waiting for them to fan the sparks into a flame. 

“If I didn't have you there would be nothing left” 

Y/N reached her half empty red cup towards Owen like a microphone as he echoed part of the line. His green eyes never left y/n’s face. It almost felt reminiscent of the way Madison and Charlie sang at bootcamp as Julie and Luke. 

“Nothing left”

“The shell of a man who could never be his best” 

“Be his best”

“If I didn't have you, I'd never see the sun”

“See the sun”

“You taught me how to be someone

Yeah”

“I’ll give you ten dollars if Owen doesn’t stop at the end of the song when y/n hits those high notes,” Charlie told Sacha. The latter nodded his head in confirmation of the deal. 

At the end of the song, during the very last chorus, Owen had to stop singing in awe of y/n’s voice as she hit the high notes Harry Styles reverberated in between the other boys’ voices. She had the most unique voice he had ever heard. It had a bit of a rasp to it, and it quickly became his favorite sound in the whole world. 

Charlie chuckled, shaking his head at the couple as he exclaimed, “Called it!” and held his hand out for Sacha to give him the ten dollars. The blonde guy gave the older one a puzzled look. “I said I’ll give you a tenner if he didn’t stop. But he did, so. Hand it over, buddy.” 

Sacha rolled his eyes but went to grab the last ten bucks from his wallet and handed it to Charlie who happily socked it away. 

Another song started playing, making y/n gasp as her eyes averted from Owen’s to the kitchen where the rest of her friends were seated, watching the entire scene. “Tori! Do you remember the choreo to this one?!” she shrieked out. Tori offered the rest an apologetic smile before joining y/n in the living room and getting into the steps with her while Owen staggered into the kitchen. 

Madison and Savannah exchanged glances, deciding to put their mischievous plan in motion with a simple nod of the head. “Alright! Let’s play truth or dare!” Savannah called out and beckoned everyone into the living room where y/n and Tori whined at the disruption of their dance. 

“Oh, shut up, you guys do that dance almost every day in rehearsal!” Kyra countered while she jumped over the back of the couch. With a chuckle, Tori and y/n joined the others on the couch. Tori took a seat next Jadah while y/n went to sit on the end of the U-shaped couch, next to Owen. 

“I’ll start!” Madi shouted, raising her hand. “Jadah! Truth or dare?” Savannah and Madison agreed to handle it subtly and not get to Owen and y/n straight away. 

“Dare,” Jadah replied courageously, a wide smile on her face to show off her pearly white teeth. 

“Call one of your contacts in your phone and tell them you had a pregnancy scare,” Madi said as a smirk tugged at one corner of her mouth. Jadah grabbed her phone and opened her contacts. “Just scroll through and we’ll say stop,” Madison added. 

“STOP!” Madi and y/n shouted in unison. 

Jadah looked up with her eyes wide, “It’s Sarah Jeffrey,” she giggled and pressed the name before putting the device at her ear to listen. A silence fell over the room as they all watched Jadah carry out the dare. 

A smile played on y/n’s lips as she watched the young girl talk, but couldn’t help but zone out. She was suddenly incredibly aware of how close she was to Owen. He had one leg tucked under the other as she rested her forearm on his knee, leaning into his body as his arm laid on the back rest behind her. She could feel his heart beating against her ribs and his fingers softly graze her arm every now and again. 

“Jadah, your turn,” Savannah said, making y/n realize she had missed that entire conversation. It didn’t seem like Sarah Jeffrey said something too incredulous since everyone seemed to act quite normal. For as far as normal goes in this group. 

“Sacha! Truth or dare?” 

“Dare!” 

“Uhm…” Jadah pursed her lips as she thought. “Try and seduce the person next to you.” Sacha looked to his left, at Jeremy, and then to his right, at Charlie. He thought about it for a moment but turned to Charlie in the end. 

“I have too much respect for Carolynn,” he told Jeremy, which made the engaged boy chuckle as he played around with his ring. He definitely missed Care. 

Sacha cleared his throat before placing his hand on Charlie’s cheek and forcing the boy to look him in the eyes. Charlie’s smile faltered just before Sacha spoke, “You… Are so beautiful, you made me forget my pickup line.” His voice was hushed, barely above a whisper. Charlie visibly swallowed at the pretty boy in front of him. Before he could register it, Sacha had kissed his own fingers and placed them on Charlie’s lips. The older boy coughed, blinking his eyes rapidly as he turned to the group again. 

“Woah-kay! Next!” 

The group burst out into laughter until Sacha called out Savannah’s name. 

“I’m gonna pick ‘truth’,” she said with a smile, which vanished almost straight away when she got booed. “What? Somebody's gotta pick truth!” 

“Who is the sexiest person here?” Sacha asked, wiggling his eyebrows. 

“Easy, all of you,” she uttered, shrugging her shoulders, “Y/N!” She pointed at the girl to her right. 

“Let’s go dare,” the unknowing girl answered with a smile as she shifted in Owen’s arms. 

“7 minutes in heaven with the person to your right.” The sentence flowed out of her mouth a little too easily. Y/N knew Savannah had done this on purpose, and now she wasn’t sure if she should hate her best friend or be thankful for the little push in the back. 

Y/N slowly turned her head to face Owen, only to find out he’s already getting up. Her arm fell from his knee and she tried to keep her balance from the sudden lack of support of her body. He held a hand out to her to help her up, but y/n wasn’t sure if she should do it. This could just about change everything in their dynamique. 

“A dare is a dare, y/n,” Madison added innocently, egging the girl on. 

The girl inhaled deeply before gently placing her hand in Owen’s and letting him pull her up. Savannah led them towards the closet where they kept their coats, and opened the door for the couple. 

All the way down there, y/n’s mind couldn’t stop racing. What was she going to do? Were they actually going to kiss? Or was this his way of telling her in private that he didn’t feel the same? Maybe she should just not give him the chance to say anything and break her heart. Maybe she should just kiss him to have at least experienced having his lips on hers so she could stop daydreaming about it. 

The closet door shut behind her, and she was left in the dimly lit cramped space with just a bunch of coats and Owen’s silhouette. Now’s her time to figure out what she should do. Now’s her time to decide. 

“We don’t have to if you don’t want to, I--” before Owen could finish his sentence, y/n attacked his lips with hers, pressing them together in a short, but sweet kiss. When she pulled away, she felt a heat rising to her cheeks. His lips taste better than she had ever dreamt of. How was she now supposed to forget about that? This was a terrible idea. 

Or at least she thought it was until he took this as permission to go forth with the whole seven minutes in heaven thing their friends wanted them to do. Hell, he wanted them to do it. 

He kissed her feverishly, his hands gripping at her waist as he tried to pull her closer and closer, even if that was almost impossible since her body was already pressed against his without any space left for imagination. 

She kissed him back as if her life depended on it, her fingers tangling up in his blonde hair. This was something she had fantasized about for a month. Every time they talked, she couldn’t help herself but glance at his lips and wonder what it would feel like to press hers to his. Since that very first day of bootcamp, she knew there was something about him that she couldn’t put her finger on. But now she did. It was an attraction. Pure attraction. The way metal attracts a magnet. 

“I’ve wanted to do that since you so confidently told Kenny you were gonna win that game,” he panted, pressing his forehead against hers. “I didn’t think you felt the same.” 

“I have had a crush on you since you smiled at me that first day,” y/n admitted, a smile forming on her face as she stared into those beautiful eyes of his. They reflected back in exactly the same way they did after those ice breaking games on day one. 

He lifted his head to get a better look at her, raising his eyebrows, “That’s all it took? OK…” Y/N let out an airy laugh as she hit him on the chest playfully. “So, what do you say to a date?” 

“Nothing, ‘cause a date can’t speak,” she wittily answered. Owen scoffed and rolled his eyes, but couldn’t withhold a smile reaching his cheeks. “All jokes aside, I think I would say yes to a date.” She reached up and stroked a strand of his hair from his forehead. 

“You think?” he asked. 

“Mmh, no, I’m pretty sure.” 

That just widened Owen’s smile before he dipped down to meet her lips again. A loud uproar was heard from the other side of the door at that moment. The couple in the closet giggled upon hearing this, knowing exactly that their friends had been eavesdropping. 

“Can’t believe they set this all up,” y/n said, shaking her head and placing her forehead against Owen’s chest. She inhaled his fresh scent of musk and sandalwood. A calming smell she had come to love. 

“Yeah... me neither,” he chuckled, “How did we end up here?”    

*

*

*

JATP taglist: @hannahhistorian92 @marinettepotterandplagg@thequirkybookaholic @bookdealer5 @tenaciousperfectionunknown @hemmingsness @iainttakingshitfromnobody @ifilwtmfc @angryknightstatesmantrash @kiss-themoongoodbye @rudysbay @thedarkqueenofavalon​ @caitsymichelle13​ @calamitykaty @wiselight @kcd15​ @vicesvsvirtuesfanfic @stars-soph @kinda-really-lost @notasofti 

[centerofreality]

Doya, BB-chan? remember your Kiryu with Kiryu-Fan after him? it's hilarious! I love it! Can you do a Majima version? This time have Nishitani and a Majima-fanatic after him? gotta have Majima get a taste of his own medicine [you don't need to prioritized this requests, take your time, please]🧡 thank you

You had a crush on Goro Majima for so long that you’ve become his one and only fan. You knew so much yet so little. Even with your infatuation, you didn’t know how to express your feelings to the mysterious eye-patched man working at the Grand Cabaret. Nishitani, being the kindhearted man he was, decided to lend a hand in one of the many ways he knew how. Being competitive. 

UHHHHHHH- 70+ FOLLOWERS???!! YOU ALL ARE WILD!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! I know I’m not active here as much but I’m grateful for all of your support!! Modules are really taking most of my time so I never got around to Tumblr. As a gift, I took the chance on what anon requested me and decided to make a oneshot! I’m not good at writing stories but hopefully, I can make it work!

Reader will be more feminine here but I will be writing they/them pronouns. Sorry about that!

Includes: Nishitani flirting with both Y/N and Majima because he has no shame, Suggestive Themes (because Nishitani), Cursing and Explicit Language, Fluff and semi-crack? Me not knowing how to write a story.

                                                  ============ 

“How old are ya again, Y/N-chan? Majima-chan is an old man, ya know.” “At least he looks like he’s actually in his 20′s, unlike you.” “I look younger than I look!”

You sigh and look at the man sitting across from you. Nishitani only had a smirk as he bounces his legs, a hostess sitting beside him and serving the both of you. “Are you here to annoy Majima-san again?” You ask him with your eyebrows raised.

“Of course!” Typical.

You, Y/N L/N, were friends with the horny criminal, Homare Nishitani. People didn’t know how or why you were friends with him, and truth be told, you didn’t know either. He had suddenly approached you one day and asked if you ‘had the hots for Majima-kun too.’, and that the both of you go to the Cabaret Grand to annoy him. He was wild and didn’t care if he was being loud. You thought he was going to throw you in the river when you had rejected his advances of ‘leaving Majima-kun and have fun at my place’ but surprisingly, you stayed alive and have been friends ever since.

One of the perks of being with Nishitani was-

“Heyyyy, Majima-kun!!!” Nishitani waves maniacally to the approaching man who looked less than pleased, even if he had a polite smile.

Yep, Nishitani’s perks were that you get basically free access to the Grand. You always spend your money on this place and even then, Majima doesn’t really show up much.

“Nishitani-san.” Majima’s face was stoic as ever but when he turned to you, his eyes got softer and he even let a small smile appear on his face as he bowed politely. “L/N-san. Thank you for coming to our establishment again today.” Had you not been anywhere but around Majima, you would have screamed at the top of your lungs. Instead, you internally squealed and bowed your head. “G-good work again, Majima-san!!”

“I’m the one paying ‘ere, ‘ya know!” Nishitani rolled his eyes before he looked at Majima, “How lucky are we though that we have the famous manager himself to attend to our table!”

“You are not harassing any of our hostesses here, I presume. I wanted to check if my guess was right.” Your eyes widened and you glare at Nishitani, “Harass?!?! Nishitani!!” The man immediately held his hands up and sat a few inches away from the hostess that he was so close with, “I ain’t doin’ nothin’!! My hands are clean!”

Majima watches the both of you interact, he was confused about why the two of you were friends to begin with. No, he wasn’t jealous that the two of you were always together, and even if you were a couple - which he could hardly believe - it wasn’t his business to know. 

“It’s all good, manager!” One of his girls said with a smile and he nodded, “I’ll be going then, please continue to enjoy your stay here.” You let out a dreamy sigh as he walked away.

“Majima-kun would ace being in a maid cafe. With the frilly dress and the cat ears and everything, that’d get me rock hard on the spot.” Nishitani randomly said, picking his ears with his pinkie as the hostess giggled at your red face, “L/N-san, do you perhaps...” “Have a mad infatuation with the guy? Hell yeah, they are.” You only looked away bashful. Were you really that obvious??

“I have a feeling Majima-san likes you back too! He treats you as his favorite customer as much as I know!” “Doesn’t he do that to all customers?” You meekly asked, watching her think and shrug. “I think he’s much more genuine to you than anyone else.”

“Not even me?” Nishitani pouted while you look at the large signs of Cabaret Grand with wide eyes. Really?? Majima...likes you back? You shake your head. No, you shouldn’t hope. There weren’t any chances that you and Majima would end up together anyway.

“Ahh, look how fucking in love they are. Why can’t I have that? I’m a handsome looking guy.” Nishitani asked, leaning back on the soft cushions of the seats as the hostess poured him another drink. “It isn’t just about looks, it’s like..it’s like, he may look intimidating but I know he has a good heart. He’s kind and respectful and I admire him a lot..” You ranted before you grab the glass of juice (because Nishitani took all the alcohol, as much as he wanted to see you drunk on broad daylight) and drank it in one go. Nishitani whistles.

“Why don’t you confess to him then? It’s worth a try, right?” The hostess suggested, pouring your glass. “What if he rejects me? I wouldn’t be able to go here again because of the embarrassment!” You cover your face and groan, dragging your hands down while Nishitani laughed at your pitiful state. “Stop laughing! It’s not funny!” “It’s a little funny!”

You look at your phone and seeing the time that’s passed, you curse under your breath and quickly finish your glass, standing up. “Eh? Going already, sweetcheeks?” Nishitani tilted his head. “Yeah, I still have work to do. I’ll be back again tomorrow!” You wave at him and the hostess who waved back as you left.

“Those two need to get a room, I’m getting blue balls just by watching them.” Nishitani groans before he pauses... then he smirks. He had just the idea.

The next day, you went to the VIP and paused, watching Nishitani flirt with a disinterested Majima. As soon as his eye had spotted you, it lit up as he bowed at you, jerking his hands away from a sulking Nishitani. “Hello again, L/N-san. VIP again?” He approached you as you played with your fingers, grinning. “A-ah, y-yeah! Here to support you and everyone else here as always!” You thanked the heavens that your voice didn’t crack as Majima smiled, “You have my utmost gratitude.”

You watched him walk past you, smelling a whiff of his cologne. You immediately sat next to Nishitani and squealed on his shoulder. “Watch the merchandise!” Even with Nishitani’s protest, he let you be.

“Even he smells good!” You shake him as he tried to balance his glass. “Guy’s stubborn as hell. Wouldn’t take my offer.” You stopped moving him around and looked up at him. “What offer?” “Just me and him on a date, no biggie.” He shrugged.

“A-a-a da-date?!?!” You exclaim and hide back when a few people in the VIP glanced at the both of you, only to look away, seeing Nishitani. “Are you serious?!” You whispered to the giggling man.

“Look, we didn’t make the fucking Majima Fanclub for nothing, aight?” The Majima Fanclub consisted of You, Nishitani, and his family who were just there because their boss told them to. 

“If you’re not going to ask him then I’m going to take my chance. Finders Keepers.” He stuck his tongue out at you as you looked almost betrayed. Somehow, that made you fired up and more confident. You were going to beat Nishitani and confess to him! 

“W-well, I’m going to ask him on a date too!” “Oho, you’re challenging me?” Nishitani leaned forward, a competitive glint in his eyes. “Exactly, Whoever gets accepted first is the winner.” You told him, head up and straight posture. He laughed, “I like your words, darling.”

It had taken you several hours to brainstorm. But you had finally thought of something..

--

“Out of all the things, you pick Letters?? Boooooring.” “Have any ideas, smart guy?” You rolled your eyes at Nishitani who was lazily drawing scribbles on a piece of paper, his glass of alcohol showing a mark on his paper. “Ah, shit- fuck-” He cursed, having broken yet another crayon.

“I told you, you should have picked the markers instead.” You shake your head, laughing a little. The two of you were at one of the most popular Cabarets in Sotenbori yet the two of you were writing and drawing love letters.

“Why did you pick letters anyway?” The man beside you asked, cutting a choppy heart with a piece of paper. “Letters are a lot more genuine than gifts, you know? It’s heartfelt and simple, but means a lot to both you and to the one you’re sending it to.” You smile and Nishitani stifled his laughter, “Are you still in high school? That sounds so fucking cheesy, I love it.” You tried your best to make yours look neat but due to how nervous you were, the handwriting ended up a little messy. “You send it to him!” You exclaim, shoving the folded note. “Like hell I am!” Nishitani moved back and called for a hostess who so happened to be the same hostess from before.

“Is your manager available right now, pretty lady?” “Yes, actually. He’s at the rooftop and taking a break. Is there anything you need from him?” The hostess answered and blinked when the both of you handed your letters to her. “Can you give us a favor and give ‘im these? You can throw Y/N’s in the trash.” “No, you throw his in the trash!” The hostess grinned and shakes her head before taking them. “I’ll give these to him then, I’ll be back.”

As you waited patiently, playing with your glass, you thought if your letter was good enough. Nishitani looked pretty confident and to be honest? You were starting to lose the fire in you. This was a bad idea. You would just make a fool out of yourself to the guy you like!

“Nishitani, I shouldn’t have given away that letter.” You only got a smack on the back of your head as Nishitani groaned, retreating his hand away, “You dumbass. This was your idea. You gotta suck it up and own up to it.” “That’s not a good thing to say to your friend.” You pout as you rub your head. 

“Still, I don’t think he’ll even look at mine.” The yakuza sighs and pours himself a glass. “If he does, I’ll beat him up. There, does that make you feel better?” “That would just make me feel worse!” You scold but you had a smile on your face, making Nishitani grin, showing his slightly sharp teeth.

A few minutes later, the hostess came back, and much to your surprise, Majima was with her. He looked almost bored as the hostess pulled him in front the both of you. “I wanted Majima-san to personally give them to you!” Majima sighs and watched you sheepishly apologize before he handed back your letters. “Thanks so much, Majima-san!” The hostess looked delighted as the man quickly walked away to another table, almost flustered.

“He’s gonna love my drawing! I’m gonna keep this forever!” Nishitani cackles before he opened his letter with a grin. You then took a deep breath and opened yours, seeing if he said something too.

To Majima-san,

I know that I’m just a customer but I want to say that I like you and I admire you a lot. I have been for a long time, and only now did I got the courage to express my feelings. At first, I thought it was a simple crush but as time passed by, that feeling never went away. In fact, I think I like you a lot more now. Would you mind going out with me at Osaka King sometime?  I completely understand if you don’t like me back and if you don’t want to go out, no matter what happens, I will continue to support you and the staff here in Cabaret Grand as your loyal customer!

“Ah man, he only gave a note about how I sucked at drawing him! That asshole!” Nishitani grumbled, “What about you?” He looked at you only to see that you were practically frozen in your position, staring at the letter with wide eyes. “What?” He blinked and went for a peek. “He said yes..” You gape and cover your mouth, letting him read it as you were too speechless to even do anything.

             -L/N Y/N

Sure, I would love to. What does 10 am tomorrow sound like? : )                                                   - Goro Majima

“The fucker actually did it,” Nishitani mumbled and you looked around for Majima, seeing that he was still in the VIP room. Like he had known you were looking for him, he turned around and the two of you made eye contact. You beamed at him and he smiled, chuckling a bit before he went on his way. You were breathless, holding your cheeks together with bright eyes and a lovestruck smile.

That was a date.

[lifesabe-ch]

full scoop - jj m.

summary: after returning to the outer banks for spring break, you’re pleasantly surprised to see JJ again. Apparently, he missed you more than you thought

request: I love ur writing it’s so good :’) if ur taking requests, can u do #4 from the prompt list with jj 💕 “Are you flirting with me?” “You finally noticed?”

pairings: jj maybank x reader

warnings: spilled ice cream

a/n: reposting this bc it got no notes and I absolutely love this so ...tumblr do better

“Hey, sorry to bother you, but I was hoping you could tell me where the beach was?”

As you turned, you extended a hand towards the direction of the pier, “Yeah, it’s just down… JJ?!”

The boy in front of you grinned at your shocked expression, eagerly returning your quick hug. You hadn’t seen him since the summer the two of you had gone your separate ways.

After graduation, JJ had decided to take a gap year. Or a couple. He wasn’t sure. He had always assumed you would do the same, or at least stay local, but your plans had changed. You had applied for a school in the North East without his knowledge earlier in the year, assuming you wouldn’t even get in. But you did, and they offered you a scholarship. Even if you wanted to, your parents wouldn’t let you pass up the opportunity.

The day you had told him had been one of the worst for the both of you. It felt like when JJ had lost John B. to Sarah. Except, with that, he had gotten the chance to know Sarah. He wouldn’t be able to follow you to your school, nor would he get to meet all the people you met.

You had tried keeping in touch after you had left, but it hadn’t lasted for much longer than a few phone calls. You were busy with school, and JJ was busy with the other Pogues. You both knew during that last phone call that things wouldn’t be the same. The two of you felt like instantly, in that moment, you were shifted worlds apart.

It has been just over a year now, with you having just returned from college for spring break.

As the two of you pulled away, you tucked some hair behind your ear, subtly taking him in. He looked the same, but somehow different. Happier.

“Long time no see,” He teased. “How’s that fancy college treating you?”

You laughed as you responded, your words accompanied by a small shrug, “It’s nice. It’s big and I love it but…”

“It’s not the Outer Banks,” he finishes, gauging your expression.

“Exactly.”

The silence that followed was awkward. It wasn’t that the two of you weren’t brainstorming ways to continue your conversation, it was that you both couldn’t seem to decide on how to keep it going.

Clearing his throat lightly, he beat you to it.

“I was heading down to the beach… if, you know, you wanted to join me?”

You weren’t busy. That much was obvious. But you still took the time to think over his offer. You weren’t sure why you hesitated, but you did.

“Okay,” You nod, flashing him a tiny grin, “I’d like that.”

TIME slipped away from the two of you much too fast for your liking. You had spent the day trying to learn how to surf. It was a lot of falling off the board and getting made fun of by JJ, but you had fun. It felt easy between the two of you, the remaining awkwardness fading almost as soon as you had gotten into the water.

He’d even bought ice cream for you both.

You smile as you remembered the encounter from just hours earlier, and the way he had mentioned the hangout you two had first had in the same place.

You were both so awkward around each other. And by both, you meant you. JJ was his charming self.

“No, I swear, I was super nervous when I took you there!”

You shook your head at the boy in front of you, shoving a spoonful of your ice cream into your mouth, “Nu uh! I was nervous. I thought we were on a date the entire time and then you just mentioned that we would be really great friends at the end of it!”

He groaned at the memory, eliciting a laugh from you as you watched his cheeks tint red in embarrassment, “I can’t believe I said that. I had planned to kiss you but then I chicken out and—”

“And friend zoned me.”

“Yep,” He solemnly nodded, an apologetic look on his features, “I’m sorry.”

Waving him off, you shrugged, “JJ, don’t even worry about it, we were kids. It’s water under the bridge now. You were right, anyway.”

“Yeah,” he speaks, before pausing.

“Right about what, exactly?”

“Us being good friends,” You smile at him, gesturing with your hands as the two of you walk along the sand.

“I didn’t think we would at first, if I’m being honest. But we were. You were my best friend.”

“Were?” He nudged you, chuckling.

“Hey, you were the one who stopped calling me!”

“Only because you were always too busy with your new college friends.”

“Not true,” you reprimanded, clicking your tongue.

“I made new friends, but I always liked my old ones more.”

“How was that, anyway? Making friends and… stuff.”

Ignoring the weird infliction of voice when he said stuff, you just shrugged, “It was okay. My roommate was the one who introduced me to people, mostly.”

JJ nodded, smirking at you, “I bet you managed to land all of the boys up there. That’s why you never called, you didn’t have time with all of your new boyfriends.”

You laughed loudly, shoving his free arm with your own, “Don’t even. We both know that out of the two of us, you’re the one who pulls.”

You watched as he stumbled dramatically from your push, flashing you a smile that caused those all too familiar butterflies to flutter in your stomach.

“We both know there’s only one girl for me.”

Ignoring the way his stare burned into you, you glance down at the sand before looking back over at him. A smile instantly erupted on your features at your own idea, as you took off.

“Race ya!” Was all you could manage to call back, laughing as you heard JJ’s groans of protest as he hurried to catch up.

Naturally, you had won. You had made it to the small tree further down the beach seconds before JJ, jumping in excitement for your own victory.

“Hah! I won!”

As you hopped around, you topple over your ice cream, gasping loudly as it spills onto the sand. Just your luck that it would spill not as you were running, but rather right after you stopped.

Still trying to catch his breath, he laughs as he watches you kneel besides the mess, hurriedly scooping whatever you could back up with your spoon.

“Bet you don’t feel like a winner now.”

You frowned as you glanced over at him, still hunched over, clutching his own ice cream protectively.

“JJ… it’s ruined!”

“Just wipe the sand off.”

You stared at him in disbelief, scoffing lightly, “Right, maybe I should just wash it off in the ocean while I’m at it?”

“That’s honestly not a bad idea! It’d wash away the sand.”

He wasn’t joking. In fact, he was the most serious he had been the whole day.

“And the rest of the ice cream! It’s water. Salt water.”

JJ has to ponder your words. He was playing out different ice cream washing scenarios in his head, trying to figure out which would cause the least damage. He didn’t think you were right, but he pretended that you were, for your sake.

Sitting down besides you, he offers up his own, smiling, “Have mine, then.”

“That’s not fair to you.”

He shrugged, smiling sweetly at you, “It’s fine, Y/N. You want it more anyway.”

Taking the cup he was practically forcing into your hand, you pout, “I feel bad.”

“Don’t, it’s fine. And stop pouting, it’s cute but it won’t work.”

Blushing slightly, you roll your eyes, grabbing a spoonful and holding it out for him, “Whatever. But we’re sharing.”

Gladly taking what you were offering, JJ smirked as his lips wrapped around the spoon before pulling away, causing your blush to darken even more.

Dipping it back into the ice cream, you twirled it around before bringing it up to your mouth.

“This is kind of gross. We’re swapping spit right now.”

JJ laughs at your comment, leaning back against the tree bark as he watched you, “Too bad it’s like that. I could think of a better way.”

His response sent you into a stunned silence, your eyes staying focusing on the grains of sand in front of you. If you had to pick between counting out every grain of sand on this beach and feeling as awkward as you currently felt, you’d immediately start counting.

“I… are you flirting with me?”

“You finally noticed?”

You felt like your heart would simultaneously beat out of your chest and stop altogether. Had he really just said that?

“What?”

Moving forward to tuck a strand of your hair behind your ear, it was JJ’s turn to blush, “I’m always trying to flirt with you. You just never respond. I was starting to think you just really didn’t like me.”

“I… I thought you were joking! I didn’t think you could be serious, I’m not your type.”

He rolled his eyes in response, shaking his head, “You’re the only person who’s ever been my type.”

It was quiet for a moment between the two of you, gazes flickering from lips to eyes, back to lips. You both leaned in slowly, careful not to move too fast in fear of making the moment disappear.

When your lips finally touched, the kiss was soft. JJ’s hands found their way to your face, cupping your jaw as he held you close to him. Your hands stayed in your lap, desperately clinging to the small ice cream cup in your hands, your body leaning forward to keep the space between the two of you minimal.

You were the first to pull away, grinning widely at the boy sat across from you,

“That’s really cheesy.”

“You know what else is really cheesy? This dick!”

“JJ, I cannot stress this enough, I find you utterly repulsive.”

With a wide grin, he pulls you the rest of the way to him, resting his forehead against yours, “Fine, then I’m taking my ice cream back.”

Gasping, you pull yourself from him, holding the cup out of his grasp with a glare, “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me.”

As you get up, he follows, chasing you around the sand as the two of you laugh. Eventually catching up to you, he wraps his arms around you from behind, lifting you off the ground and knocking the cup over in the process.

“JJ! The ice cream!”

“Next time I’ll buy you two,” was all he muttered, lips already finding their way to your cheek.

[gemstoneconstellations]

I’m Sorry I’m Nervous

Summary: First date jitters happen to everyone, even Red Riot.

Wordcount: 2800

A/N: This is a direct continuation of Hero By Another Name

“Okay, so I’ll…um, see you Friday,” Kirishima nervously chuckled in front of you, holding your hands as he stood in your doorway. 

You smile up at him. “Promise?”

He bent down and pressed his lips to yours. “I promise.” One more kiss turned into two, which turned into him with his arms tightly around your waist, your body pressed against the doorframe as he practically devoured you. Finally, the two of you said your  goodbyes, a little out of breath and flushed down to your necks. 

“We’re dating. We got a date on Friday,” Kirishima mumbled to himself as he got in the elevator, a dopey smile on his face. He threw a fist in the air, proud that he’d finally come out and said it. He needs to call Bakugo for saving his ass yet again. Who knew Bakugo was such a great wingman? Finally, Kirishima had made you his girl…his girlfriend. He hasn't felt like this in such a long time. Since, like, high school. His eyes went wide. He hasn't dated since high school! “Oh shit, we’re dating. I got a date this Friday.”

In a panic, he called the only Bakusquad member that knew the meaning of the word chill. “Hey dude, what’s up?” Sero answered lazily.

“Code Shitting Myself! I have a date on Friday!” Kirishima practically screamed into the phone as he rushed out of the elevator into the lobby, making a small woman who was entering at the same time jump back. 

Kirishima waved apologetically as he scurried away to possibly go bury himself somewhere. 

“Uh, congrats? Why are you panicking?”

“I don't know what I'm doing! What do people do for dates now?” He gripped at his hair, for all he knew, Netflix and Chill was the new norm!

“Bro,” Sero snorted at Kirishima’s distress; the red-head was overthinking the entire situation and Sero found it refreshingly funny.

“I haven't been on a date since high school, I don't know what a mature adult does for a first date. I’m not mature! I still watch cartoons in the morning on my days off!” That threw Sero over the edge; he bursted out into a fit of laughter, wheezing and coughing as he tried to compose himself.

After a solid five minutes, he was able to speak again. “Okay, relax dude. I’ll call the squad and we’ll brainstorm over some beer while Bakugo lectures us on the amount of sugar and calories we are putting in our bodies. Sounds good?”

“Yeah, yeah, that works.”

“You okay now?”

“Yeah….I have a girlfriend,” Kirishima let out a bashful giggle, looking back up to your apartment complex. 

“Good for you, bro. I’ll see you later.”

~

“I fucking told you extras. Pay up, assholes.”

The whole table groaned as everyone started slamming their money down on the table, Bakugo cackling unapologetically as he swept the pot of money over to him. “The hell? Guys?” Kirishima looked at them all, appalled. 

“We started making bets after you randomly became a junior firefighter,” Ashido frowned as she handed her money over to Bakugo, who snatched it from her and started counting it. 

Kirishima pouted; he didn't think it was that obvious. Ashido reached over, reading his mind and patting his arm. “Honey, we all know how considerate you are of other people but seriously? Yeah, we all saw it coming.”

Kaminari cut in, holding up a folded up piece of paper. “Alright, so I pulled up a list on the internet—” 

The whole table groaned, but Kaminari cleared his throat and spoke over their complaints. “I compiled a list of manly first dates and this is what I got.”

Sero swiped the paper from the electric blonde and glanced over it. “Museum? Does she like art?”

“Not all museums are just art. There is this really cool toy museum...” Kaminari took the paper back, smoothing out imaginary wrinkles.

Ashido rolled her eyes. “Is she even into video games?”

The red-head only shrugged as he took a sip of beer. Honestly, he couldn’t really think of anything that you were interested in outside of work. “I don't know? She’s kind of a workaholic. Only thing she collects is…”

“She's a creepy mega-fan of his and covers her entire apartment in Red Riot merch,” Bakugo chimed in nonchalantly, still counting his money. All eyes were now on Kirishima, eyebrows raised.

“Moving on!” Kirishima launched his body across the table to grab the list, trying to change the subject.  “A picnic, that sounds nice.”

Sero shook his head. “Uh, you might have to go where there are no people. Both of you are still pretty popular and with that gossip rag around, you might attract a crowd.”  The note was passed to Ashido; it was probably best in her hands since she’s the only girl in this group.

Ashido took out a pen and started crossing things off. “So anything with crowds is probably out. That means no to sports games and amusement parks…” Kaminari started to pout as he watched so many of his ideas get crossed out.

“Cross off crappy pottery painting. That shit is for some old married couple, or ones with little kids.” Bakugo finally joined the conversation only to scoff at Kaminari. Seriously, pottery? Ashido nodded in agreement at what the ash blonde said, tapping her nose as she scribbled that out.

Kaminari threw his arms in the air. “Let’s just cross off all my ideas!”

“Rock-climbing would be cool. She had fun doing that while we were camping. Maybe we could go on a hike.” Kirishima tried to be the positive one of the group. That camping trip had really helped change your relationship; something outdoorsy might be good.

Sadly, Ashido waved him off and started giving her “girl advice”, which really sounded more like a lecture. “No. You need to do something together that you haven't done. The first date can set the tone for the entire relationship. Plus, rock-climbing is more of a third date activity. First dates are when you need to have lots of face-to-face conversations. You are getting to know each other in a romantic sense; rock climbing isn't going to give you a lot of opportunities to do that. Also, no sex or too much kissing. Focus on talking to her as a person so she doesnt think you’re only after her body.” Kirishima’s face instantly flared up at being called out like that. Damn, Ashido can pick up on the slightest hint of anything that is remotely romantic. If only she had put that much effort into her studies when they were in school.

“Fine! All I got is one thing left. Tell me how that can go wrong so I can throw this stupid list away.” Kaminari was completely fed up, taking the list back and writing one more thing on it before thrusting it back into the center of the table. He crossed his arms as he slouched in his chair.

Ashido looked up at Bakugo and Sero, who both nodded with a look of surprise. “Actually….” 

“That’s not a bad idea. Good job, Dunce Face.” Bakugo waved over a waitress to order some wings for Kaminari as a reward for using so much brain power. 

“Wait, what? You guys like one of my ideas? Yes! And you guys doubted me. Just call me the love doctor from now on.” Kaminari leaned back in his chair, rubbing a finger under his nose as he bragged smuggly. Ashido reached over and pressed a finger to his forehead, causing him to fall back. “Fuck!”

~

“Miniature golf?” you questioned as the two of you walked up to the indoor miniature golf course. It was perfect. It was less in the open, they controlled the amount of people on the course, and with a little extra cash, the attendant held back on letting in more people so the two of you could have plenty of time alone together.

Kirishima cleared his throat nervously. “You don’t like it?”

You linked your fingers through his, shaking your head. “No, that’s not it. I just haven't done it in years.” His heart nearly launched into his throat. How do you do that so easily?

“Oh, I guess that means I'm a shoe-in to win, then?” Keeping his cool, he teased you as he pulled you into the building.

That competitive nature of yours came in full-throttle, jumping at the bait. “Is that a challenge I hear?”

Kirishima looked down at you, leaning in with a smirk on his face. “Yup. The winner decides where we go for dinner.”

You leaned in closer, whispering, “You’re on.” Oh, he wants to kiss you so bad right now.

After paying admission and slipping the teen a few more bills to keep the crowd away from the two of you, you were picking out what color club you wanted to use. Of course, Kirishima chose red. He was leaning back, watching you as you narrowed in on a neon green club. You bent down to see if it was a comfortable height for you and that's when he noticed the curve of your ass in those jeans. He felt himself totally zone out, leaning more heavily on his club when he stumbled.

You looked back at him as he straightened up. “You okay?”

“Yu-Yup! Go ahead to the first hole to save our spot. I changed my mind about what color to use.” He hid his now bent club behind his back, praying you wouldn’t notice or argue with him.

Lucky him, you nodded in agreement. “Oh, okay.”

Kirishima sighed in relief once you were out of view. He held up the bent club; the poor thing didn't have a chance under his weight. He held it up to the attendant, who saw the whole thing transpire. “I’m so sorry, I’ll pay for the damage.” He can already hear Mina telling him off. I told you not to think about sex or kissing too much! Focus on getting to know her! Easier said than done...

Now with a new club that was a darker shade of red in his hand, he met you at hole one. You were tossing one of your golf balls in the air as you waited. “Ready?” Your smile helped him forget the incident; he silently promised himself that he wouldn't embarrass himself anymore on this date so that you wouldn't regret going out with him.

Around the third hole, you were starting to giggle as he was about to take his shot. “What?”

“Just watching you play. Compared to you, everything on the course looks child-sized.” True, he is pretty bulky and it was even more apparent next to a mini-Eiffel Tower. He pulled back the club to take a swing. “You’re so big.”

His face instantly turned red and he lost his grip; his second golf club was sent spinning four courses away. You held both hands over your mouth, trying to contain your laughter. He glared at your shaking back. This was your fault this time. He sighed, his head down dejectedly as he started walking. “I’ll be right back.” 

Club retrieved, you continued to play. He was extra cautious with the club, making sure to keep a firm grip on it and his sanity. Why is he so nervous? This shouldn't be that big of a deal; the two of you had hung out before. You skipped beside him, spinning your club in your hand. “I’m winning by four strokes.”

Kirishima looked over the course; it was set up so if he hit a corner just right, he could get it in one stroke. After you tried but didn’t manage to get very close to the hole, he felt like he had this in the bag. Time to show off. “I’ll get a hole in one on this, just you watch. This is basic geometry. Bakugo tutored me for hours til I was a master of it.”

You giggled, stepping to the side as he set his ball up. He hit the ball…but he may have hit  a little too hard. Instead of just bouncing off the wall and going back towards the hole, it went into the air and straight for the small Great Wall of China. He rushed over to see the damage he’d caused now. “It’s stuck in the wall….I must have hit it too hard.” The ball was lodged inside the plaster and everytime Kirishima tried to get it out, more cracks formed. “I can’t get it out without wrecking it any more….”

“Pfft.” He looked back to glare at you. “This counts as a stroke.” Your competitive streak was showing and it was not playing nice. 

Before he could protest, you went to your ball and tapped it gently. You smirked at him triumphantly as it came within an inch of the hole. “Well look at that, I’m going to get a birdie.”

“So much for looking cool….” Kirishima sighed to himself for like the millionth time. You were kicking his butt at this while he was stumbling all over the place. What the hell? He’d played this before and he was never this bad.

“Last one, the windmill.” The final boss of miniature golf stood on top of a small hill, paper mache blades spinning slowly. Kirishima was taller than it but it felt like it was towering over him. He swallowed. 

“I’ll get this one no problem.” Kirishima pumped himself up, stepping up first. He watched the blades swinging around, waiting with the club in the air for the perfect moment. Quickly, he swung at the ball and it zipped through the air. It looked like it was going to make it. Finally!

RIIPP SHWOOP

“It went through the blade!” You dropped your club and ball to laugh as Kirishima rushed over in horror.

He scrambled over to look at the damage and find the ball but he noticed that it wasn't there. He looked behind the mill to see his ball coming out the back, rolling down the ramp all the way into the hole. He fist pumped the air, forgetting all about the other hole he’d caused. “Ha! See? Hole-in-one!” He pointed towards the hole and then leaned against the windmill, only for it to start tilting. “Oh, shit!” He caught it quickly and balanced it back out. Well, at least you were smiling as you crumpled to the ground laughing.

~

“That was fun, especially since I won by 10 strokes.” You stretch your arms up, taking in the fresh air after such a fun game. You turn to the side, expecting Kirishima to be standing beside you, only to see the street. He was behind you, dragging his feet out of the miniature golf facility, head held low. “Kirishima?”

“I’m sorry about all that back there. I was just so nervous that I kept messing things up and….causing destruction of property. Kind of messed up our first date, huh?” He walked up to you, eyes still downcast as he apologized for one of the best dates you’d ever had.

You reached out to him, gently taking hold of his hand. “Why were you so nervous? It’s not like we haven’t hung out like this before. If anyone should be nervous, it’s me. You already know all my dirty secrets in my apartment.” Maybe you should mention that you’d had Bakugo give you another “pep’” talk  about how you were being an idiot for panicking slightly before the date.

Kirishima sighed, taking both your hands in his and rubbing his thumbs across your fingers. “It’s our first date, pretty much the deciding factor of whether you want to stay with me. I didn't want you to think I was a waste of your time…” You tried not to laugh. How could he think spending any time with him could be a waste?

“It’s not over yet, right?” You let go of one of his hands, pulling him by the other. “The winner gets to pick dinner. I vote ordering take out and watching a movie at my place.”

He looked at you with a dazed look, completely confused as he let you pull him down the street towards home. You smile at him reassuringly. “For what it’s worth, I had fun. I always have fun with you.”

Kirishima’s face instantly lit up, his mood seeming to perk up. “Really? You dont regret it?”

You move your hand in his, making your fingers weave together. “I don't think I could ever regret being with you.” Honestly, you’ve never felt this happy before, and it’s all thanks to the red-head walking beside you.

He tightened his grip and smiled down at you sweetly, making you feel all gooey inside. “Same.”

[theycallmebecca]

So I’m in need of some tooth rotting fluff right now. Chris and reader having those late night talks about anything and everything, the conversations that make you fall in love 😍 Being all lovey and touchy feely. Just pure cuteness. FYI, love ya ❤️

Well you know what I like to write... haha all that tooth rotting fluff is right up my alley! Shout out to @nomadicpixel for her help with the brainstorming on this one. 

Title: Twenty Questions

Pairing: Chris Evans x reader

Rating: PG-13

Warnings: a couple f-bombs

Disclaimer: This work of fiction is not to be reposted, used or translated without my permission.

Because of how tumblr can be silly about links, I will reblog this post with links to the masterlist and the prompt list.

Chris and Dodger were already in bed when you came out of the bathroom; Chris with his nose in a book and Dodger stretched out at the foot of the bed. After turning off the overhead lights, you climbed into bed with them, but didn't bother to turn on the lamp on your bedside table since you weren't in the mood to read. Rolling onto your side in Chris's direction, you slid your foot over to his side of the bed, seeking the warmth his body always provided you.

He let out a yelp as your cold toes brushed his warm leg. You smiled innocently as he glared at you over the edge of his book.

"How is it that your feet are always cold when you get in bed no matter the season?" he asked.

"Magic?" you offered as you snuggled up against him. "Maybe it's because you're always so warm?"

Chuckling, Chris reached over and put his book on his bedside table before he turned and wrapped his arms around you. "That must be it," he replied as he caressed your back. "Too tired to read tonight?"

"Too tired of reading," you said, looking up at him. "I feel like it's all I've been doing for the last, I don't even know anymore. April feels longer than March at this point."

Chris nodded his head in agreement. "It's kind of too early to go to sleep," he said. "Did you want to talk or -"

"Ask each other random questions?" you suggested. "See who can come up with the most random one?"

"Is there a prize?" he asked once again proving that his competitive drive knew no boundaries.

"Depends on how good the question is," you told him.

Silence fell between the two of you as you both tried to think of a question to ask.

"What's your favorite thing to do on a rainy day?" you asked him and then cringed. "Ugh. Nevermind, that's basically what we've been living through for the last six weeks, isn't it? One long rainy day."

Chris chuckled, but answered it anyway, "Either reading a good book or curling up with you and watching a movie."

"See, that's exactly what we have been doing," you stated. "I have a better question, what single appliance could you not live without?"

Your head hit the pillow as he shifted his body, dropping you to the mattress while he rolled onto his side to stare down at you.

"Think you're funny, do you?" he asked in a tone that was full of mock annoyance. "Asking me what appliance I couldn't live without while knowing full well that I can't cook much." He leaned down and kissed the tip of your nose. "That's like me asking you what your favorite burner on the stove is."

"Front right," you answered automatically and laughed at the deadpan look you got in response. "What? It's the biggest and it's right there."

Chris shook his head in disbelief.

"What was your favorite food during childhood and why?" you asked him.

"Pizza, of course," Chris replied with a laugh. "Or my nona's lasagna."

He sobered in memory, you noticed, and you placed your hand on his chest above his heart.

"Does your mom have the recipe? Maybe we can try and cook it together some night," you suggested.

"And maybe something from your grandma, too?" he asked. "What was her best dish?"

"Most of what my grandma cooked came out of a box or a can," you admitted and smiled at your own memories. "Our lasagna growing up was spaghetti sauce and layers of lasagna noodles."

Chris let out a strangled groan and clutched his chest as if the idea was killing him.

Laughing at his antics, you swatted his chest and said, "Oh stop it. We didn't all grow up with Italian grannies who spent hours over the stove. But regardless, I don't really remember the foods as much as I remember the time we spent as a family. Whether it was a small group around the kitchen table, holiday dinners in the formal dining room or the kids table in the kitchen. That was the part that was special to me."

A few tears rolled down your face at the memories and Chris reached down to brush them away.

"The memories are the best part," he agreed with a soft smile. 

You nodded and then, inspired, asked, "If you could talk on the phone with anyone who ever existed, alive or dead, who would it be and what would you ask them?"

"That's two questions, cheater," Chis pointed out. Under the guise of thinking, he shifted the two for you back to your original positions, so he was on his back and you were resting your head on his shoulder, his arm wrapped loosely over you. "I'm torn between a president or a distant relative. And there are too many of either to choose just one. Fuck. That's a hard question." He shook his head. "I don't think I can answer those questions, babe. It's just too… " He moved his hands to mime an explosion going off in his brain.

"It was a pretty loaded question," you admitted, patting his stomach in empathy. "But don't forget, it's your turn to ask me a question."

He pursed his lips to think and finally asked, "What's the best advice your mom gave you?"

"Best advice from my mom," you repeated as you tried to think. Your mom had given you plenty of advice growing up, but none of them really jumped out at you in the moment. "I don't even know, probably something poetic like, haste makes waste. She said that all the time when I was growing up from people driving fast or one of us kids trying to finish our homework quickly to be able to go outside and play with our friends."

"I can totally hear your mom saying that," Chris stated. "In fact, I swear I have heard her say that."

"She loves that saying," you said with a small sigh. You normally didn't mind living far from your family, but the current quarantined status of the world only made that distance feel farther apart. You and Chris did video chats with your family weekly and you talked to your mom all the time, but it was still hard.

As if sensing that you needed a change of pace, Chris asked you another question, "What is the most interesting thing you could do with 400 pounds of cheese?"

"I think we have a contender for the winner of the most random question," you said with a laugh. "But fuck, that's a lot of cheese. I don't even know where to begin. Nachos? Cheesy potatoes? Mac n cheese? Fondue style entree for every meal?”

“My stomach is cringing at the thought,” Chris stated.

“It was your question,” you reminded him. “Staying in the dairy category, what’s the grossest ice cream flavor you can think of? Actual food only. No chemicals or anything.”

“Hmm,” Chris thought aloud. “It would have to start with a fish, I think. Something stinky or with a really bold flavor. Anchovy, maybe? Then a citrusy mint? Plus a tart berry? Topped off with those big, long oval shaped nuts that always get left behind in nut mixes. For texture.”

“For texture,” you echoed with disgust on your face. “And they’re called Brazil nuts.”

“Ah, well you learn something new every day,” Chris replied and then laughed. “That’s another piece of sage advice I’ve heard your mom say.”

You giggled and said, “I just thought of another, she used to tell us when we were doing our homework that if we couldn’t impress someone with knowledge, we should dazzle them with bullshit.”

Chris snorted with laughter. “That’s amazing!” He cried. “Your mom is a gem.” His eyes found yours as his hilarity subsided. “Like mother, like daughter.”

“You’re such a flatterer,” you said before tilting your head to kiss him on the cheek. “But it’s your turn to ask me another question.”

“If you could have an everlasting candle that could smell like anything, what would it be?” He asked after a few minutes of thinking.

“Christmas,” you answered without much thought and then explained, “because Christmas smells like so many different things all rolled into one. There would be pine, cinnamon, vanilla and a bunch of other scents that might not work together in theory, but combined, think of all the memories those scents would bring back. And if it was made like a marbleized candle where the different fragrances hit at different times, it would be magical. Like Christmas.”

“Is that even possible?” He asked, his interest seemingly piqued.

“Probably not, because eventually all the fragrances would mix together, but you have to admit it would smell amazing, at least initially,” you replied, looking up at him. 

“It would,” he agreed. “Maybe we’ll have to dig out your winter candles tomorrow and experiment burning them at the same time in their own jars.”

“And watch Christmas movies?” you asked as the weight of the day started to catch up with you. You tried to fight back a yawn, but it came anyway. “If the Hallmark channel is playing their Christmas movies, we can, too, right?”

“We’ll see where the day leads us,” he replied. “But you’re supposed to be asking me a question.”

“Oh right,” you said and then yawned again. You blinked your tired eyes and tried to think.

“Maybe this should be the last question,” he suggested, smoothing his hand down your arm.

You nodded your head. It was amazing how tired you got from doing so little. “What place brings you joy?” you asked, nestling yourself closer to him. 

“Being anywhere you are,” he answered almost immediately. “You bring joy into my life.”

When you didn’t answer, he looked down and smiled when he saw that your eyes were closed.

“Goodnight, Love,” he whispered before reaching over and turning off his bedside lamp. He settled back against the pillows with you asleep in his arms.

[captainxsassafras]

Angel Voice

Ok, so this is really the first piece of writing I've actually finished since I graduated from college. Haha, yeah. I've been a bit of an unproductive writer the past lil bit, BUT I'm here today and I finished this. Not gonna lie, I am hella nervous for this. It's nothing emotionally involved or really intense (ok, there’s not angst, but I get real emotionally involved in fluff, so maybe I’m a liar), but I read the idea of Shinsou doing ASMR from secondhand-trash and the anon over there and, ya know, magic happened! Haha, I kid. Just cuteness, a few saucy phrases here and there! Please be kind to me!

(Also, I’m so sorry. I will figure out how to put stuff under the cut. Please be patient with my tech illiterate ass!)

@queensynderella

@secondhand-trash

Angel Voice

Shinsou x Reader

Warning: lots of fluff?, attempted assault (not Shinsou!), suggestive comments, a hot mess of a reader!

Word Count: Just over 5000... I think.

~~~*~~~

Fucking fuckity fuck fuck. You had not slept at all. Not a single wink.

Sorry, kind sir. I have no spare winks to give. No winks here.

This had been going on for months. Months!

It was starting to affect you.

Hahahah… That was a lie. It had been affecting you. You were just adaptable and great at lying so nothing was really wrong! 

…Ok, that was a lie too. Your sleep schedule was shot. Your brain was shot. Your work was… by some miracle still ok, but you weren’t about to keep betting on that.

So, here you were. Finally off work and almost falling asleep waiting for the train in the humid, afternoon heat. 

This is probably what Hell feels like. Sleep-deprived, foggy, humid, and full of sweaty humans.

You jolted fully awake from a doze as the train arrived and people began crowding against you.

Yippee. A crowded train with strangers pressing in close on absolutely zero sleep.

Nevermind. This was Hell. Waiting for the train was just the appetizer.

Your phone buzzed.

It was your best friend. She knew that you'd been having trouble sleeping and had been your solid rock. She'd been your support when it started and had helped you brainstorm remedies when it had continued. So it wasn't really a surprise when she sent you a link to an asmr video with the message, 'he has the voice of an angel! 😇 if this doesn't help you sleep, nothing will! luv ya boo! good luck!!! ❤❤❤❤❤' 

She was right. 

His voice was deep, but soothing. He spoke in a soft, calm cadence that immediately put you at ease.

The video in question was a request from a viewer. It was a description of a calm hike through the woods on a nice day. 

It was heaven.

You had your first night of decent sleep in months.

(And if you were being totally honest, you did actually cry a bit when you woke up feeling more rested and clear-headed than you could remember.)

From that point on, you fell asleep listening to 'Angel Voice' every night. 

And quickly discovered that you couldn't listen to the more...exciting rp videos before bed! They sent your poor, stupid heart wild and kept you wide awake plus some tasty adrenaline! Definitely not the desired effect! Not unpleasant. Just kinda detrimental to the whole helping-you-sleep thing.

But his calm, descriptive videos and dulcet voice sent you straight to dreamland. 

For a month straight you fell asleep to his tones and barely bothered to look at the voice artist's name.

Angel voice worked!

***

Ok, now you were tired. 

A frantic call to work this afternoon had you covering your sick coworker’s shift. This meant you were both awake way later than you had recently been staying up and you were working with a double shift's worth of leftover energy.

Ok, you were dead. Running on empty. There was no leftover energy.

You dumb, tired feet trudged along the stupid, dark street and your dumb, heavy purse cut into your stupid, aching shoulder.

But despite your exhaustion, you still held a canister of pepper spray--safety off, thank you--clutched tightly in your hand. 

The hackles on the back of your neck rose. The hair on your arms stood on end. Chills ran down your spine.  

You could feel eyes on your back.

Someone was watching you.  

It was a very unpleasant feeling this late at night all alone on a half lit street.  

Ugh, this street was so different after dark! 

You normally made your way home during rush hour when the street was busy with foot and vehicle traffic, well-lit by the sun, and full of chatter and life.

It was almost lifeless and eerily quiet now. 

Creepy. 

It needed more streetlamps. 

Humming very quietly to yourself, you tried to keep your mind off of the intense foreboding grabbing at your chest.

That same shivering chill ran through your body right before a harsh hand clawed at your arm, jerking you back. You cried out as your sore shoulder twisted and adrenaline-fueled panic surged through your entire nervous system.   

You whipped around, pepper spray at the ready and a fierce scowl on your face, to empty the canister straight into the guy's eyes.

You wrenched your aching shoulder out of his hand. Without conscious thought, your foot rose and met his groin in a beautifully placed front kick. 

Ding! Ding! Ding!

We have a winner!

He fell.

A convenience store! There was a convenience store nearby! 

Heart pounding, you fled to the little 24 hour convenience store across the street and, from the safety of the front counter, called the police.

Your frantic eyes scoured the area near the man, waiting to see if he would rise and run. 

Although, you did get him pretty good. You hoped he wouldn't run away. That'd be a) frustrating because you didn't really have a way to identify him so he'd probably get away and b) scary because you kicked him in the nuts! Guys held grudges for things like that! 

Was that movement?

It… didn't seem like the attacker was moving… 

Oh! It was another guy and it looked like he was wearing a costume!

A hero?

Looked like it! He was tying the felled grabber up with… not sure, but it was incapacitating the guy who grabbed you, so yay!

You left the store and slowly approached the man. 

"Um, hi," you said with a hesitant wave. "This was me." You bashfully gestured to the man still lying (now tied up) on the ground.

"Hey, there. Thanks for doing my job for me," he replied with a bit of a smirk. He had a deep, slightly rough voice and up close you could see dark, wildy messy hair.

Uh-oh. You needed to explain. This was absolutely self defense!

"He, uh, grabbed me from behind and I kind of panicked and, well…"

"Don't worry. I saw what happened. He started following you a few blocks back, but I couldn't do anything because he hadn't done anything yet."

Oh.

Oh, damn.

You felt sick. He had… he had been following you?

Your knees trembled.

The hero noticed and stepped forward to you.

"Hey, hey. Come here." 

He led you to the curb and sat you down, a hand rubbing comforting circles on your upper back. "It's gonna be ok. You clearly know how to defend yourself, so I wouldn't worry about.."

His soothing voice soon began to pull you out of your fear and calm your racing brain. His hand continued rubbing your back in rhythmic motions and soon your shaking began to slow and finally stop. Your thoughts came back to the moment and you noticed something. Something very familiar...

"Holy shit. Angel voice!"

The hero stopped his rambling speech, one eyebrow raising in an amused arch. He didn't say anything else, just waited for you.

"Do you do asmr?"

"Uh… yeah?"

Boy, you wish you could've captured his face.

Befuddled?

Was that the right word?

Yeah. Pure befuddlement.

Then blushing. 

Holy hell! He was blushing! It was really hard to see, but the slightest bit of red colored his cheeks in the dim light.

"Thank you so much!" you cried, maybe a bit loudly. He flinched just a little, looking surprised. "Ah, sorry. But seriously! You're the reason I've been able to sleep for the past month! I've been having sleep issues for almost a year and a friend sent me one of your videos and, well, tada. Sleep happened!" It was your turn to blush. 

The look he was sending your way now was… hella cute. He looked delighted. Elated. Even in the dark, his eyes were shining and he had a goofy little half smile that lit his whole face with happiness. 

The smile highlighted the bags under his eyes and you briefly wondered if that had something to do with his decision to make asmr videos. The thought fled when he raised a self-conscious hand to rub the back of his neck and started speaking.

"I'm glad they've been helping you!" The very corners of his eyes crinkled just a bit. "It makes my night to hear that!" 

His deep voice wasn't loud or overtly excited, but it was warm and full of sincerity. 

Your stomach did a stupid flip.

Nope. Not happening. You refused to be a hero groupie. Too much drama. Too many fans picking each other apart. Too much shade. You needed sunshine and most groupies you knew threw shade like confetti.

Also, he was a professional at work. This was his job. You needed to respect that.

A deep internal breath had you back where you should be. Thanking a professional hero for helping apprehend a man who had attacked you and thanking him for his generous work that helped you sleep well. 

The two of you talked quietly for a few bit waiting for the police to arrive. It was nice. You asked about hero work. He asked about your job. You two chatted about a couple of random things and by the time the police arrived your chatter was comfortable and easy. 

Everything after was a whirl. You had to give a statement. They needed to take you to a hospital just in case. The hero gave his witness statement and then had to leave to help out with a robbery in a different neighborhood. 

You left for the hospital looking back and feeling little starbursts of melancholy disappointment needling your chest. 

You'd probably never see him again.

Ah, well. Guess he'd stay Angel Voice. 

***

Shit.

Crap. Crap. Crap. Crapcrapcrapcrapcrap. 

This was stupid. 

You had barely talked to him for a half hour. And, yeah, he was sweet. Ok, he'd been crazy nice. And so fucking attractive. He'd been easy to talk to and the conversation between you two had been entertaining and full of wit. 

But you had no way of directly contacting him. You'd looked him up, but hadn't gotten much info on him. It looked like he was an underground hero, so that made a lot of sense. It, however, did not make it any less frustrating.

You didn't know what you'd do if you managed to get ahold of him anyway!

"Hi! You sorta bagged a guy who tried to assault me (but I took down first) a few weeks ago and I haven't been able to stop thinking about you since then even though we had like a half hour conversation, half of which was you coaxing me out of a panic attack. Want to go on a date?"

Of course, you could always comment on one of Utube videos, but that had about a 1 in 1,000,000,000 chance of working and felt a little too…. Stalker-fan.

There was also the raging guilt and embarrassment you felt over crushing on a hero who had just been helping you as part of his professional work. He had been at work! It was part of his job to comfort you! He was literally in the business of saving people and making sure they were ok. And that was exactly he had done. He didn't need to be harrassed because your dumb brain said, 'Oo, shiny!' when he smiled. He had been at work. You shouldn't read anything into his behavior, because there really wasn't anything other than a pro hero doing his duty.

Nope! You needed to get over this.

A notification buzzed and you checked your phone.

Mind_kitty has posted a new video! Watch now!

With a defeated sigh, you deferred the notification for later. You could listen and relax on your way home from work.

A movement out of the corner of your eye caught your attention and you snapped your head up as a coworker hustled over with a look of panic on their face. 

Uh-oh.

***

And now, here you were, sitting wearily on the train and hurtling towards home.

Ugh, what a day.

After everything that could go wrong had miraculously (horrifically? Fiendishly? Miraculously seemed too positive…) gone up in flames at the same time, you had spent the rest of your work day running around like crazy putting out all the fires (only one of which was, in fact, a literal fire so not actually a terrible day).

Your feet were sore and a headache that had started with your coworker's news and grown from there threatened to overwhelm you.

There were still a few stops until yours, so you slipped your headphones out of your bag and opened your Utube app. 

Thank you unlimited data!

You found Angel Voice's latest video and began to play.

(Ok, you now had actually figured out his Utube username and finally bothered to remember it, but he'd started as Angel Voice to you and it just worked in your mind!)

Ahhhhhh…

Why does he have such a great voice? It was perfect! Deep and smooth and perfectly made to whisper sweet (or not so sweet) nothings in your ear while you gently played with his wild purple hair. Fuck, his hair was so pretty! You'd bet your left buttcheek it was soft as clouds…

Ugggghhhhh... Fine. 

You were crushing on a pro hero. 

Are you happy, universe? 

Your fated journey to become a groupie had begun. Might as well accept it and focus on more important things… like Angel Voice's hair.

Or, you know, his voice…

You fell into the sound of his speaking.

Hah, it was like an automatic reaction at this point. Your shoulders started to unknot and that stereotypical breath you didn't know you were holding in rushed out in a grateful sigh.

However, it didn't take you long to realize that he hadn't started into the asmr immediately as you were expecting. Paying more attention, you rewound the video to the beginning and actually listened to what he was saying.

"I'm not sure exactly how to do this." He let out a dry half chuckle. "I haven't completely convinced myself I should. But, um…"

He paused with a frustrated sigh, then seemed to take a deep breath. 

"Ok, to hell with it. I'm doing this. Dear, girl I met the other night who took a guy out by kicking him in the nuts."

Was he talking about you? Was there another girl who kicked a guy in the nuts on his patrol? Damn, he met a lot of kickass girls on patrol! Good for her! She was getting a personal shoutout from Angel Voice! 

"I know it might seem kind of weird to be doing this over Utube, but I missed my chance at first, then the police arrived and everything was crazy and I had to leave to help out another pro."

Wow, sounds intense. Bet that was stressful. Oh, wait. Hah. You knew it was stressful.

"So I blew my chance to ask for your number."

He wanted her number? Damn! Super lucky girl!

Wait, this wasn't an rp video was it?

You pulled out your phone to check, but the title and description didn't mention any kind of rp. Aww! This was real! And it was adorable!

A tiny piece of sad ripped itself free of the fuzzy feelings you were experiencing. He had been so kind and you'd had such a fun time conversing. It would have been really amazing if this were for you. You had really liked the piece of personality you'd been able to see.

"I'm really hoping you'll hear this video, and hear it in time, because I'd love to go get coffee with the girl who accidentally body-slammed her coworker on her birthday."

Holy.

Shit.

That…

THAT WAS YOU!

That had been you! Your stupid coworker had snuck up behind you at the end of the day in a semi-dark area of work and shouted in your ear to scare you.

It had worked. 

You'd been so scared that you'd grabbed him, flipped him over your shoulder, and body-slammed him into the floor.

And… and you'd told Angel Voice that night as you sat talking about some of your more notorious takedowns. 

This was for you.

This video was for you!

What the fuck?!

This video was for you!?

You had to rewind a hot second to hear what came next.

Then you had to pause and go back yet again, because your mind was in such a frenzy and your heart was beating so loudly in your ears you couldn’t concentrate on what was being said!

“So if you hear this and, um, you’re interested at all, girl who took down a fully grown man in five seconds, I’ll be waiting at the spot we first met at five pm today. I, uh, really hope I’ll see you there again.”

The video ended. 

Your heart was still aiming for professional drummer in your chest.

You could see him raising his hand to rub at the back of his neck with that last statement. He’d done it that night and you could picture it in your mind. 

Wait! What time was it?

4:50 pm.

No.

Nonononononono!

You were going to miss the meeting.

You were still six train stops away from yours and that alone would take you fifteen minutes! Not to mention the next fifteen minutes it’d take to get to the meeting place! 

Of course, that was walking speed. You could run.

Frantic eyes looked down at your shoes. Not exactly running shoes. 

Whatever, you’d make do.

You wanted to see him again.

You could just imagine the disappointment on his face if you didn’t show and that melancholy from earlier reared its weepy head and cried out in frustration because you didn’t want to hurt him!

And you really wanted to see him again!

The next fifteen minutes were the most agonizing you could remember enduring in recent history. This was worse than the time you spilled coffee on your favorite author and his manager had yelled at you for five minutes while they changed! I mean, that had been pretty bad, but the author had been incredibly nice about it after getting back and even mentioned it humorously in the book you had asked them to sign. It was still easily the most awful you'd ever felt and you’d really wanted nothing more than to run away.

This. Was. Worse.

So much worse because you couldn’t actively work towards your quickly approaching deadline and destination. You had to sit there… waiting.

Your leg was bouncing up and down and a few fellow train riders were giving you slightly concerned looks. You were too wound up to care.

Finally, finally!

You arrived at your stop, hurried off the train as quickly as you could without being the absolute worst human ever, and ran.

Your shoes remained on your feet until you almost killed yourself stumbling over them, then they were in your arms.

Decorum be damned!

This was a matter of life or date! (And preferably not death by shoe!)

You made it to the spot where you’d met him at exactly 5:12 pm.

You were sweaty. 

Hell, that was an understatement.

You were pretty sure you’d left a trail of sweat behind you and you could feel it running in rivulets down your back. There was probably a stain back there… And on your armpits… and on… everywhere.

You knew your hair was an absolute mess. 

But as bad as you knew you must look, you felt worse.

Your lungs were on fire. You had absolutely no breath left in your entire body. It felt like you had a knife in your side. In both sides actually. Your entire body was trying to imitate an oven with the level of heat radiating off your skin. Your legs were simultaneously wobbly and shaking and you weren’t sure you’d trust them taking another step at the moment.

And now you had sweat in your eye. Stinging.

But none of that even mattered. 

All of that was stupid and trivial and inconsequential because he wasn’t there.

You’d taken too long.

He was gone.

No vibrant purple hair and sleep-deprived eyes.

No stupid half-smile.

That melancholy came back and instead of quietly tugging at your heart, it hit you square in the chest with an emotional cast-iron frying pan. 

No.

No!

Damnit!

You’d really wanted this.

He was… he was so fucking witty and kind that night.

He’d been soft and understanding and hot. And fucking adorable.

And… and… he wasn’t there.

Fuck.

You slumped in place.

Every ounce of your physical exhaustion caught up to you in an instant and you felt the mortifying sting of tears trying to sneak their way out of your eyes. 

Talk about adding insult to injury.

It wasn’t that bad. This wasn’t that bad.

So, you didn’t get to meet up with a cute hero for coffee. Big deal. Poor unfortunate soul. It was nothing to cry about.

But you’d really wanted to see him again.

Guess it didn’t matter anymore.

You turned, ready to march across the street to that convenience store and buy half of their ice cream, but something tickled your brain.

Something out of the corner of your eye.

Your head whipped around.

There!

It was a flash of purple down the street.

Your eyes snapped to that portion of the sidewalk. 

It was purple hair.

Crazy, wild, tousled, purple hair!

You knew that hair!

But your stupid legs literally wouldn’t run anymore. And he was far enough away that you wouldn’t catch up if you could run.

You reacted without thinking.

You really acted without thinking.

“ANGEL VOICE!”

You shouted his name at the top of your lungs.

Sorry.

You shouted your own private, very personal nickname that you had only spoken out loud to your very best friend and, unfortunately, him.

In the middle of a crowded street.

During rush hour.

Your brain was an utter masterpiece of stupid.

You stood there, frozen with the realization of your own idiocy, as the head of purple hair stopped, looked to the side, looked to the other side, then tuuurrrnnned around.

Made eye contact with you through the busy crowd.

Then doubled over laughing.

You couldn’t hear him from where you stood, but you could feel him laughing.

You could see it in the way his bent shoulders shook and his torso convulsed, nearly spasming with the force of his laughter.

And there you stood, still stuck to your spot.

You’d called him Angel Voice out loud in a crowd out loud in front of a bunch of strangers out loud.

And as much as you wanted to run, you couldn’t even twitch.

Not as you watched him finally finish laughing and fully turn to face you. Not as you watched him begin to walk toward you through the throng of people (just beginning to turn back to their own business in the aftermath of your outburst). Not as he stopped directly in front of you, a delighted smile on his sleepy, stupidly attractive face and the corners of his eyes still just slightly crinkled with laughter.

“Hey there,” he said and it felt like the softest slap to the face you’d ever received.

Your frozen body finally remembered its fight or flight reflexes and, wouldn’t you know, you suddenly learned how to fly.

As you turned to bolt, Angel Voice reached out, calling to you.

“Hey, wait! You’re just gonna run after all of that?”

He didn’t grab you.

That detail broke through the panic.

Even though he reached out with his hand, he didn’t grab you.

You stopped.

“I wanna run because of all that!” you blurted.

His chuckles sent a wave of heat down your spine, both embarrassed and… otherwise. Ok, fine! He had a sexy voice! And it turned you on more than you liked to admit! 

Who let him have a voice like that?

It was not freaking fair!

“I’d rather you didn’t.”

Fuck, he sounded sincere. 

You slowly turned around, face still burning.

You two stared at each other for a minute.

A smile crooked your lips.

“So, uh, what’s a place like you doing in a voice like this.”

Silence.

“Fuck.” 

Your hand came up to rub at your forehead as he began laughing again. A full, big laugh instead of a chuckle.

“I should probably just give up on the talking thing, shouldn't I?”

“I hope not. I could listen to you all day,” he said with a small grin.

And now your heart it was afluttering.

“I feel like that should be my line,” you mumbled, watching him catch his breath from all that big old laughing through the fingers splayed across your face.

There was a pause in the conversation. It wasn’t uncomfortable, but it hadn’t really achieved comfortable silence.

“So, um.”

You looked up from your hand.

Good fuck, he was doing the rubbing the back of his neck thing again. Illegal. Freaking illegal is what that was. No man should possess that level of cute.

“I mentioned grabbing coffee in the video. I’d like to assume you being here means you’re interested?” The sentence ended with a slight upturn, indicating a question. He looked up at you, uncertainty in his gorgeous violet eyes.

Why the hell was he uncertain?

This mortherfucking hottie with a voice made for swooning (and spooning) was nervous about asking you to coffee (adateadateadateadate).

Without thinking, you voiced this exact thought out loud (sans the date portion... and the spooning. Spooning was for non-dumbasses). 

Angel Voice looked absolutely floored.

“I’m sorry, but do you own a mirror?” he asked. There was a tension in his voice that almost had you shrinking into yourself.

Ouch.

Damn.

Ouch.

Well, at least he was blunt.

“You’re fucking gorgeous.”

You met him on the floor.

Dead. Ass.

He just called you gorgeous.

There was a set to his jaw now and a sort of light in his eyes. He looked very… determined. Set, was what you’d call it. He seemed very set on a decision.

"It was great talking to you the other night. I can't get out of my head how funny and smart you were. And you're so fucking cute I want to wrap you up in my jacket and stay there forever."

His face was blazing red now. His ears too. Ok, that was hella adorable. You felt your own self flush with happy bashful feelings. I mean, he himself had just supplied you with the sappiest, schmoopiest mental image you’d really ever conceived.

“I’d really like to go get some coffee together.” He went quiet for a minute, seeming to mull something over in his head, and that stupid hand came up to rub at his neck again.

Ugh, he was gonna kill you with that! 

“Would you go on a date with me?”

If your heart was fluttering before, it was nearly palpitating now!

“Yes! Please! I mean, yes I want to go on a date with you!”

He smiled, a breathless, bewildered, almost (dare you think) dorky smile. It was fucking beautiful.

"Wow," he exhaled.

A snort escaped you. "Again, I feel like that should be my line."

But you smiled back.

And there you both stood, almost dazedly smiling, little happy thoughts buzzing through your minds. 

“We should probably head to a cafe if we’re going to get coffee,” Angel Voice finally murmured.

You started.

The both of you were standing like idiots in the middle of the sidewalk, just staring at each other.

“Coffee, right. Anywhere in mind, Angel Voice?” The nickname slipped out almost by accident.

He held out his hand to you and you took it gently. 

“Angel Voice, huh?” he laughed quietly. “I think I can go with that.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault! You still haven’t told me your name.” You sent a playful tug along the arm you held by the hand and felt a little thrill of joy when he returned it just as playfully. "You're officially Angel Voice until you enlighten me."

The two of you had started walking. He seemed to have a destination in mind. Man with a plan. Nice.

“I know a cafe nearby. Do you mind?” he asked, softly pulling you along in invitation while leaving enough slack for you to object if you wanted.

Man with a plan who asked nicely. Nice.

“Not at all, Angel Voice.” You had a point to make and a guy to tease!

He chuckled again.

“My name is Hitoshi. Hitoshi Shinsou.” That slightly devious grin crept back onto his face. “But Angel Voice works for me.” He snuggled in close to your cheek, the side of his body leaning comfortably into yours. Then he whispered in your ear and you nearly fell over. "Especially if you're screaming it as loud as you did earlier."

Good lord, your knees nearly collapsed. 

His voice, his stupid voice, saying such a frisky thing so close did such a number on you that you couldn't respond for a moment. It was all you could do to keep breathing.

His voice was going to be the death of you! You couldn’t think. Should you respond? What did you say to that? Something equally as frisky! But his voice!

He tensed a bit at your lack of response. 

"Was that too much? Did I cross a line?" he asked, still speaking low right in your ear.

"Son of a bitch, if you don't stop that right now, I'm gonna jump your fucking bones right in the middle of this street." Your voice was full of urgency, but if he didn't stop you really were liable to unleash every single ounce of wild attraction you felt towards him at that exact moment, street full of people be damned!

He stopped walking.

Oh, shit. You could hear the Cheshire grin.

"You mean, like this?"

You sagged against him, letting your knees tremble. Your hand, still tangled, clutched his tightly.

His chuckle this time was less… benevolent than before. "What? You called me Angel Voice." His thumb ran soothingly over your hand. "I had to see if I could tempt you."

You couldn't help it. You turned your face to bury it in his jacket. What a magnificent, teasing butthead you'd just gotten yourself tangled up with. It was amazing!

"That’s going to come back to bite me, isn't it?"

“All the time.”

A tiny little butterfly crept into your stomach. You didn’t want to read too much into it (although after his teasing, you didn't really feel like it was reading into things), but ‘all the time’ sounded like there was going to be, well, plenty of time. It was a very welcome, warm idea.

As soon as your legs de-noodled (Hitoshi making snarky comments like a brat the entire time), the two of you continued on in an easy silence, exchanging teases every so often. The sun was setting and the entire world was covered in golden tones. Rush hour was winding down and the foot traffic in the area was dissipating, leaving a much more comfortable number of people around.

Your brain focused on the soft, warm quality of the light, the muted shocks of excitement zipping through your lower back, and the soft weight of his calloused hand surrounding yours. 

You gave a little, light squeeze.

"I'm so happy I ran, Angel Voice.”

He just chuckled and squeezed back.

[ddagent]

you: # I really need to write some red carpet jb me: hell yes please give me that here's the prompt in case you need one I definitely need one (or 50)

So a) this taps in really nice with an idea I’ve been toying with, of Brienne playing Jaime’s role in a reboot, b) shout out to @angel-deux-writes, who needed some fic today, and I hope this fits the bill, c) this is Brienne’s dress, and d) prompt #99!

“Brienne! Brienne, over here!” 

He’d barely stepped foot upon the red carpet at the Crimson Kingdom awards, but already the vultures had turned their attention towards his replacement. Brienne Tarth. Tall, ungainly, a passable actress at best. Yet the photographers clamoured for a shot of her, the lead of Oathkeeper; nominated tonight for the very first time. The fact that Jaime had not been nominated – also for the very first time – was only part of his frustration. All this attention, all this fuss, for a role that was essentially his. 

“Jaime, Jaime, can you spare a moment to talk to us!”

Melara Hetherspoon, one of the gossip reporters for Ice and Fire magazine, thrust both a microphone and a camera in his face. He adjusted the line of his burgundy tuxedo jacket and offered Melara one his charming smiles. As expected, she practically pooled at his feet. 

“So, Jaime,” she said, teeth toying with her pink bottom lip. “Tonight is the first Crimson Kingdom awards you haven’t been nominated for since your very first at sixteen.”

“It is,” he said, with a slight shrug. “The competition grows fiercer every year; just means I have to step up my game.” 

Melara continued to swoon. “Brienne Tarth is nominated for best actress this year for Oathkeeper, a reboot of your first major success, The Dragon King. Brienne’s character shares many similarities with your original role. Any resentment that a reboot of your character is getting such acclaim, especially after your plans for a reboot fell through?”

If there was an award for best forced smile, Jaime certainly would have won it. “No resentment at all. In fact, I wish Brienne Tarth good luck tonight. She’s in a tough category, but hopefully, she’ll come out on top. That is, after all, how she likes it. Lovely to see you, Melara.”

She made to ask another question, but Jaime was already walking away. A few flashes went off in his face; he waved his hand in the direction of a couple of photographers. But his gaze quickly fell back towards Brienne Tarth. She was wearing a dark blue dress that fell across her body; silver stars pinned to her shoulders. Her hair was short, yet she kept fiddling with the blonde strands. Her smile was so innocent; her face completely devoid of guile. Yet Jaime knew her sort. He knew her sort very well. 

When a reboot of The Dragon King had been floated by Jaime, he’d practically bitten the production team’s hand off. Years of working on obscure but award-worthy films had left him with a full mantle but feeling rather drained. He wanted to do something fun again, and he loved the idea of returning to Arthur Westford, the youngest knight ever elevated to the Kingsguard. He’d brainstormed many an idea of a fresh take – of Arthur’s future – until he was told they were going in a different direction. Similar plot: young knight, mentally-ill monarch, intrigue and drama. Only Arthur would now be Alysanne. Only he would be out, and Brienne Tarth would be in. 

"Brienne! Brienne! Just one more!”

She was flagging. Jaime could see the slight crease in her forehead; the falter of her mouth. Amateur. The PR assistant, a redhead who should have been in front of the camera rather than the giant from the Stormlands, noticed it too. She then noticed Jaime. With a speed he had not imagined she would possess, the girl grabbed his arm. 

“Come with me, this will be a great press opportunity!” 

And suddenly Jaime was stood next to Brienne Tarth in front of a television camera, with a microphone thrust at both of them. The journalist grinned at the pair of them, and then into the camera. “Look at this, TV fans: the youngest knights ever sworn into the Kingsguard!” 

Both he and Brienne laughed politely, as if the tension between them wasn’t so thick that not even valyrian steel could cut through it. “Arthur Westford and Alysanne Swann. TV history is being made tonight! Is this the first time you both have met?”

“Yes, it is,” Brienne said, fiddling with her hair again. 

“Not for lack of trying.”

“Oh?” The journalist asked. “Does this mean we might get an Arthur Westford cameo on the show?”

Jaime snorted. “Doubtful. I thought I might have been asked, but I was informed no one else can fit in Ms Tarth’s spotlight.” He turned to her, decorum and public opinion out the window. He was a Lann Award Winner for fuck’s sake. He wouldn’t prop anyone up, least of all her. “I imagine it is hard for anyone else to fit in it.”

Brienne’s facade in front of the cameras faded just as quickly as his. “How dare you accuse me of such a thing? You don’t even know me.”

“Exactly. No one knows who the fuck you are, but you’ve still got enough clout at the network to cut me out of the project.”

“I have no idea—”

“—oh please. This naive little facade might work with studio execs but I’ve been in this business long before you were ever in your first school play, Ms Tarth. I imagine as a tree.”

“Well, I’d rather play a tree than any of the roles you’ve played lately. You looked like you were half asleep in The Blackwater Connection. It’s no wonder the producers didn’t want you to have anything to do with the new show.”

“Yes, because—”

“I wish I hadn’t bothered fighting for you.” Her shoulders dropped. “Arthur was my favourite character; you were...” Brienne trailed off. “But you’re just a huge disappointment."

With the sweep of her dress like a knight’s cloak, Brienne Tarth left to continue her journey down the red carpet. Jaime stood there like the biggest arsehole in all of Westeros. He was now left with two options: either Brienne Tarth was the greatest actress he had ever seen, or she truly had fought for him to be included in the show. 

Either way, he was wrong, and Jaime felt the sudden urge to discover what was right. 

[asteriusx]

⌜MAXENCE DANET-FAUVEL, MALE, HE/HIM⌟  welcome to chatsworth academy, ASTERIUS NOWAK. it says here, that you are TWENTY-THREE, in THIRD year and that you’re here for your ARCHERY skills? is it true high school you were voted most likely to OVERTHROW THE GOVERNMENT, well, that’s interesting.╱  SILENT ARROWS FLYING DANGEROUSLY CLOSE TO YOU, THE EERIE FEELING WHEN YOU KNOW YOU ARE BEING WATCHED, RIPPED PAGES FROM BOOKS ╳  ◤ Lis, 26, cst, she/her. ◢

alcoholism tw

Born to a middle class family, Asterius saw little of the mid-class comforts because when he was three, they lost everything they had.

Mr. Nowak was the employee of a very powerful businessman, one that drank expensive champagne with the royalty and elite. Asterius’ father was nothing but a loyal and obedient man to a boss that pretty much only cared about making his next million ( no matter the destruction left behind ).

A business didn’t go well and instead of sacrificing a couple of millions, the rich man gave away Mr. Nowak’s head and properties. Poor man, little did he know his own money and properties were also being fiddled with when he signed a bunch of contracts with little clauses.

The family was left in the street and had to move to a dangerous neighborhood that was pretty much forgotten by the gods. Mr. Nowak threw himself into the arms of cheap booze while Mrs Nowak did as much as she could to take care from Asterius and his little sister, but the desperation to have a better life and the lack of motivation from her husband usually started heated fights between the couple.

Asterius, of course, grew up with the worst company and quickly falling into thievery and little crimes to bring some food to the table and some fun into his own life. One talent that he always possessed was a strategic mind and a really good aim, something that would come in handy some years later.

He spent his life in and out detention and then in and out the police station where he would sleep a couple of nights since his family had nothing to bail him out. A busted lip and black eyes were usual on him to the point that his mother stopped asking, but remained worried nonetheless when Asterius would bring in jewelry for her that was clearly out of their reach, but he never gave any explanation.

The boy grew up hating anyone privileged and rich upon receiving nothing but patronizing looks and horrid jokes towards him and anybody who was less privileged, specially from those who knew his father’s story.  EAT THE RICH  . One night, after getting drunk and grabbing his archery kit ( you are right, it wasn’t damn cheap, but he had stolen saved enough to get one ) and some sweet words to the daughter of the range field got him some useful lessons ), he walked towards the main building of the businessman that ruined his life in first place. Poorly-made molotov bombs that never exploded, messages attached to arrows and rocks broke the crystals and he was quickly captured by security and sent to a cage for some time ( with the low risk prisoners, thank gods ).

His mother left Mr. Nowak in the meantime and after going out, Asterius went low profile for a while and pretty much decided to give it up, get a horrible job and die at 28, but OH! Hope and second chances come in the weirdest of ways. He was walking around downtown when he came across a tv add about a competition and the winner would be eligible for a scholarship in the prestige Chatsworth Academy. The idea originally disgusted him, but then his brain started to work and oh, imagine how many things he could get his hands on in there, imagine how many spilled secrets and ignorant royalty he would stumble upon; the amount of POWER he would get from gathering so much information from these dumb rich kids. The best way to destroy an enemy is to do it from the inside.

So he goes, participates and wins. Surprise surprise! One of the men in the jury was the same businessman that left his father in absolute misery; still, the man seemed oddly thrilled to throw this dirty kid into a school full of polished nice young people that would probably devour him alive. So a silent challenge is accepted: How long can Asterius Nowak last in a privileged school?

PERSONALITY

No filters whatsoever, very filthy mouthed. Never says no to a challenge even if it might kill him. Friendships weren’t very common, but he is one loyal mf and so, betrayal is the worst for him and a deal breaker in any scenario; one to sleep around if the opportunity arises, though, sweet tongue if necessary, but he will be gone by the morning and then most likely deny the fact that you guys had anything to do with each other. Asshole and one to get into petty fist fights with everybody for whatever reason. Trashed out James Dean that is secretly amazed by all of the pretty things given to him in the academy and the bed? Damn, he has never slept so well. Still hates the rich though, if you are wealthy, he is not giving you his time ( yeah, sure ). Member of the chess and martial arts clubs because you gotta keep both your mind and body trained, right? A very ANARCHY kind of mindset, always willing to make a car explode and to get in trouble.

PINTEREST

CONNECTIONS

Friends?? I guess?? He gotta get them at some point.

Flings / One night stands / fuck buddies. A d*ck with legs, that’s what he is.

People that recognize him from the archery competition maybe? Either his name moved around or your chara was in there either participating or watching.

Unrequited crushes from either side

Maybe the businessman that played his family dirty has his children in here as well? I would love to see that aaahh!

Anything else we can definitely brainstorm!

[jesussavedevenme]

Cooking Shenanigans

A fic for @aerinmelina whose birthday was a few days ago. 

Everyone at Fablehaven knew what Friday nights entailed. Friday nights were the nights they all gathered together and played games until everyone either passed out or decided on a movie. It also seemed to be the only night of the week they could get everyone in one place at the same time nowadays. Between missions, trips to the fairy realm, duties around Fablehaven and everyone's separate living arrangements all of them truly spending time together  had become a rarity. The clock in the hall could be heard chiming through the halls informing anyone awake to the early hour. Kendra, Seth, Warren, Bracken, and Vanessa sat in a circle trying to quiet their laughter as they were the only ones still awake. 

“Kendra, truth or dare.” Seth asked a mischievous glint in his brown eyes. Kendra groaned quietly before replying,

“ Truth.” 

“You’re no fun.” Seth grumbled scrowling playfully, “ umm, name the worst dressed person in this room.”

“ Says the boy who wore Iron Man pajamas until he was 16.” Kendra replied, smirking.

“ Yeah and you wore unicorn pajamas until you got married.” Seth retorted a slight blush dusting his cheeks.

“ Bold of you to assume she doesn’t still wear them,” Bracken said, earning a smack on the arm from his wife.

. “Bracken, you traitor!” Kendra exclaimed, blushing as everyone dissolved into a fit of laughter. “Van, Truth or Dare?” she asked once everyone had settled back down. 

“Hmm, Truth.” she replied, earning an eye roll from Seth.

 “You guys are so boring.” he said sighing in exasperation.

 “It is way too late for me to do whatever it is you would have me do.” Vanessa replied before looking at Kendra expectedly. 

“ If you could change one thing about these Friday get-togethers what would you change?” Kendra replied after a minute causing Seth to groan 

“ I mean I guess I wouldn’t mind not having to cook every Friday.” Vanessa replied jokingly and Kendra nodded in agreement. 

“Yeah well we’ll go hungry otherwise.” Kendra replied with a smile.  

“Hey, wait just a second, are you saying we can’t cook? .” Warren asked , causing Kendra and Vanessa to muffle their laughter.  

“Fablehaven would end up in shambles with the three of you in the kitchen.” Kendra laughed 

“ Is that a challenge?” Warren asked, narrowing his eyes. “ I bet we could do just as good as you could.” He replied gesturing to Seth and Bracken. 

“Ok, it’s a bet.” Vanessa replied, narrowing her eyes at Warren “Next Friday you boys plan and cook the meal and snacks for the night, loser owes the winner a favor. 

†††††

"Come on, guys, we have slayed demons, cooking can't be that much more difficult." Warren sighed as the brainstorming session  thirty minutes with nothing to show. Normally the lack of answers wouldn't bother him, but he refused to let Vanessa win again. The next Friday seemed to roll around quicker than usual, leaving the three boys standing in the kitchen completely unprepared for the big job that lay ahead of them.

 “I can cook a pretty decent entrée from the Fairy realm.” Bracken offered when Warren's request for ideas received no reply. “ I’d just have to make a quick ingredient run.”

“ Great, maybe we’ll get extra points because it’s exotic.” Warren replied, turning to look at Seth,” Seth you’re on desert duty, it can’t be that hard to mess up a pan of brownies. And I'll cover the snacks, sound good?” and with that the three boys split up Warren to the cabinets, Seth in search of a brownie recipe, and Bracken out to get ingredients.

“Why are there no individual microwavable popcorn bags in here?” Warren asked after about  ten minutes of searching the cabinets and coming up with only a giant bag of popcorn kernels.

“ Because we live in a family that believes everything is better homemade. Which is amazing, until you’re the one making it.” Seth replied, not looking up from his phone as he continued to search for homemade brownie recipes that weren’t overly complicated. 

“True but what do you expect me to do now? I have a feeling you can’t stick these in the microwave and call it done.” Warren asked.

“I don’t know. At least not knee deep in brownie recipes. I didn't know there were so many ways to fix brownies.” Seth replied, rolling his eyes.

“Oh come on, it can’t be that bad.” Warren said peering over Seth’s shoulder at the recipe he was currently looking at. 

“Seriously, I've started to read these like I read science fiction, I get to the end and think well that's not going to happen.” 

“ Seth you live in a world where dragons are real and your sister is married to a unicorn, I don’t think science fiction should surprise you anymore.” Warren replied through his laughter.

“Dude, That's fantasy.” Seth said, smiling and finally seeming to settle on a recipe as he headed to the fridge for ingredients.

“Whatever. That still doesn’t fix the problem of this popcorn though,” he pointed out, gesturing to the bag of kernel still in his arms. "pretty sure the girls aren't going to let us squeeze by without it. It's like the go to snack. Right after chips and dip."

“You need one of the popper things.” Bracken replied, walking into the kitchen with an armload of ingredients most of which were completely foreign to anyone but him. “It’s kind of circular with a clear top. I've seen Kendra use them before. ” He continued when his comment was met with blank stares. Shrugging his shoulders Warren began to once again search the cabinets, this time in search of a device that matched Bracken's description. Bracken set his ingredients on the counter closest to the stove and Seth claimed the one opposite to begin working. The two men worked in silence until Warren returned with popcorn popper and set it next to Seth triumphantly.

"Hey! I'm working here." Seth said, pulling an impressive new York accent. "Find your own counter."

"Make me, Sorenson." Warren joked regretting it when Seth's eyes flashed with mischievousness and his smirk turned lethal. Before he even had time to react, he felt the slimy cracking sensation of an egg cracking in his hair. "Oh, it is so on." He said, grabbing a fist full of flour and tossing it in his direction. Seth ducked instinctively causing Bracken, who had moved from his post by the stove, to receive a cloud of flour in the face. 'Yeah, this is going to take a while' Warren thought as Bracken stalked toward them with the spoon previously found in the brownie batter. 

†††††

“ So, what kind of pizza are we ordering?” Vanessa asked when she and Kendra wandered into the kitchen later that evening.

“ Oh, now we are doing this. We’ve got dinner, desert and snacks, so get ready.” Warren replied, gesturing to the oven and a pan of what appeared to be brownie batter beside a tray of assorted snacks on the counter. 

“ Wow, I’m impressed!” Kendra said happily, choosing to ignore the brownie batter on Bracken's face, the egg in Warren's hair, and the flour that covered most of the kitchen. As well as the many popcorn kernels that were sprinkled across the floor and counter. Evidence that someone had forgotten to put the lid on before popping it.

“ Wonderful, now as you’ve told me so many times, get out of the kitchen, go bother someone else.” Seth said, placing one hand on his hip and raising his voice in a horrible impression of Kendra  while waving a nearby spoon threateningly in their direction. Warren and Bracken dissolved into laughter while Kendra rolled her eyes and smiled at her little brother's antics before leaving with Vanessa in tow.

"Tell everyone that we are about ready to start" Bracken called after her while pulling the finished meal out of the oven and replacing it with the brownies. " Well, that's about it." Bracken declared with a smile, receiving nods from Warren and Seth.

"Yeah, all that's left to do is clean up." Warren replied before looking around and the chaos that surrounded them. Well, maybe they shouldn't have celebrated just yet.

†††††

Behold from chaos, order, from ugliness, beauty, from basic ingredients and an oven, brownies.” Seth announced proudly emerging from the kitchen a few minutes after everyone had finished eating. The brownies were lopsided and they looked a little underdone in the middle, but the thought still made Kendra smile. She had to admit the boys really had outdone themselves. The main course melted in your mouth, delicious despite its appearance. And they had even miraculously been able to clean the kitchen by the time it was time to eat, though she was pretty sure that Bracken played a major part in that. Kendra watched as Seth beamed at the compliments he got for his brownies. She couldn’t deny that they tasted incredible. Just gooey enough to melt in your mouth without becoming too overwhelming and the scoop of ice cream he served it with only served to make it better. The bright smiles and empty plates seemed to prove that everyone else agreed with her.

“So did we win?" Bracken whispered once their group had finished eating and retired to the living room to watch, or rather argue over, a movie.

“Yes, yes you did.” Kendra said, thinking back to the delicious meal and obvious fun the three men had shared.

"This means you now owe me a favor, princess." He mumbled mischievously.  Kendra hummed quietly content to snuggle closer to his side as a movie was finally decided on and the lights were turned off.

[j-wonwootrash]

Joshua || It’s the Same Pt.3

Word count: 3.8k Genre: Prince!au, Romance, Slice of Life, Fluff, Drama, Classical!au A/N: Finally an update! ;-; I hope you like it! Enjoy reading

“My instincts did!”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The letter in your hand was from the Prince himself. Of course it made you nervous but you were happy for this opportunity to showcase your dishes. You picked up a pen and brainstormed on the possible dishes the castle would enjoy.

The whole idea of the assessment was to look for young chefs with potential. You were aiming for a new chapter in life and obviously couldn’t stay in the restaurant forever. And the restaurant was something you established with the help of your Uncle, but you knew in your heart, the accomplishment wasn’t enough.

Your appetizer for the first round is a given- your restaurant’s borscht soup with toasted garlic bread. And the practice round given to all were only three times, it meant you only got to practice for each round for a day.

Free time came and you met with Umji and Yerin. “Did you come up with the dishes for upcoming rounds?” you asked them.

“Yeah I got everything planned out, but I suddenly felt lazy. Since we got here, do you want to explore the Royal Palace?” Yerin started to pull you without hesitation.

“I don’t know. It seems strict here. I won’t risk my chance when we came all the way here.” you sighed as Yerin stopped from your hold.

“Come on y/n,” Umji hugged you as she always did. “Just for a while in the garden. We could see their plantations and other things they had for ingredients.”

True enough, the Palace has all ingredients and especially the rare ones. So rare that it got you curious. You couldn’t resist her plead and just went along with them. “Alright, just for a while.” you repeated her words, letting them pull you to places the walked.

They continued to pull your arms and went down the stairs of the courtyard. It was like a maze as you all ran to the garden. There was an area where the rest of the girls were. Most of them chilled at the grass and some dared to sleep. You needed rest, and it was today. All the other participants recognized you and soon approached to where you were.

“It’s y/n!” “The girl who made business already?” “Aw I’m happy to be able to see her!”

You shyly smiled to their comments. As humble as you always were, you shook their hands when they grabbed them. However there were some whispers, disagreeing to the fact someone with experience would join the assessment.

“Can’t believe someone like her has the guts to even come here. Don’t you think it’s unfair?” Sora nudged her friend, who had her eyes on you since.

“Quiet Sora. It’s better to keep silent, as it’s always the best weapon. Right Y/N?” Hayoung raised her brow. The sarcasm in her voice got into you. “If she thinks this platform will make her restaurant more known, go ahead. No one is stopping her anyway.” she left with her arms closed.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Noon came, you queued at the Royal Canteen with Yerin and Umji, along with few other new friends who sided with you after Hayoung’s confrontation.

“Why would she do that?” Bona slammed her fork with her fist, nearly causing the tray to fall. “That’s too mean!”

“So what if you’re experienced? It’s not like you intend to boast what you know.” Jinri stared at Hayoung.

“Calm down girls. Let her be. I’m not affected,” you chuckled as you slurped from the soup. “She can say whatever she wants to say.”

“How can you not be mad? She literally insulted you.” Yerin rolled her eyes.

You didn’t want to waste your time and for sure you didn’t come all the way to the Palace to pick up a fight with anyone. “No matter which way you think of it, we all have the same goal. And I just wanted to challenge myself that’s all.”

It was amusing to see your friends react like that. You looked around and everything was grand and gold. All the way from the chairs, tables, decorations. High quality food too. The meals for the day were fixed. There were reminders stating that those dishes created by participants are of similarities with the Royal Kitchen’s will be disqualified.

You wondered if there would be a winner from the boys and one from girls, or one overall. What was the prize? Money? A chance to showcase your dishes in the Royal Palace and eventually the country? Perhaps the world? It was a big scale and you knew you wouldn’t mess up.

As you sat at one table, you felt eyes were on you, just like earlier. Intimidating, you thought. You wanted people to know you as an ordinary girl, not as some known chef whom everyone knew was successful. You tried to keep humble as possible, but giggles and light squeals were heard when you barely look at their direction or wave at them. You spotted Hayoung and her group, four of them, which one you knew by the name Sora. She squinted her eyes at you when you locked you gaze with her.

“Look at that angelic face she put on.” Sora grunted. “Ah so annoying.”

“Keep it low,” Hayoung started. “We just have to see the results at the first round.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Jun knocked nonstop onto the door for around ten minutes. Joshua grunted on his bed with the blanket all wrapped over him. No give me 5 minutes.. Insomnia attacked me again.. It was true, the Prince had sleepless nights from overthinking. And it got the best in him.

“Your Highness,” Jun called the boy for the tenth time. “It’s past noon and I have news for you.”

“Oh what could be so important that you have to knock on my door continuously for five minutes?” Joshua opened the door and his aides waited for him, smiling as they entered his room without hesitations.

“So important that you really have to know.” Seungcheol touched the prince’s shoulders and sat him onto the couch. “Is there a missing staff? Should I assign one for it? Does Her Majesty need me to run errands to the neighboring city at the West? Or do-” Joshua started to blurt out the possibilities of his aides’ news.

“I heard from a week ago at the Girls’ courtyard that there was a heat up among two girls. Nothing serious though, but I did hear one of them is known all over downtown.” Jun sat with his elbow rested on his knees, excited to see the smile from the prince’s face.

“Some even thought it was unfair of her to join this assessment.” Wonwoo fixed his glasses.

“Why? Anyone could join, even those with experience. It’s all open to everyone.” The Prince combed his hair as he finished dressing up.

“Well apparently some don’t have a broad understanding.” Wonwoo sighed, reading his book again.

“Girls.” Seungcheol and Jun said in unison.

Joshua chuckled at his aides’ reactions. When he finished his preparation, he unbuttoned his collar. His aides stared at him with furrowed eyebrows. “What? It’s choking me. You guys wouldn’t want me dead right?”

“No, of course not, Your Highness. It’s just,” Jun pursed his lips before breaking into a smile.

“Just what?” Joshua asked him sternly. “You look so confident now, unbuttoning the collar. All because you believed in the possibility she might be here in-” Jun smacked the prince’s shoulder lightly.

“Again with her!” Joshua reacted that his echoes reached Sir Hwijae at the end of the corridor. Why must he always bring her up? 

“We just had to see your flustered face before you head to the first round.” Seungcheol laughed, stomping his foot in emphasis.

“I’m not blushing!” Again his echoes made Sir Hwijae’s steps faster to the approach the prince.

“Your Highness, I believe your voice is too loud.” he bent slightly as he whispered to Joshua.

The young man gestured that it was not his fault that he reacted in such way, rather it were his aides. Sir Hwijae was not convinced at the prince’s reason and treated it as a mere excuse. Joshua sighed heavily when he walked away from the boys. He fingered ‘I’ll keep my eyes closely on you all’. Seungcheol, Wonwoo and Jun just laughed, waving to the blushing prince.

Sir Hwijae was interested on why Joshua’s aides made fun of him. It was the first time he’d seen such an expression from the prince, and clearly he wouldn’t let him get away with it until he hears the reason. “So. Why were you all red, Your Highness?”

“Even you Sir Hwijae? You know me better than them and I wasn’t red!” Joshua stopped in his tracks, tempted to bring out his sword. If he knew this day would come to teasing him, he would’ve stayed in his room all day, away from his aides, and away from the new addition- Sir Hwijae.

“Lies. I see lies written all over you, Your Highness.” Sir Hwijae smirked as he noticed the young man’s onto the sword. “And you might want to release your hold onto your weapon. It’s not a good self-control.”

“Well what do you think made me lose my self control?!” he rubbed his face with his fabric gloves. “Nevermind, bring me to the Royal Hall.” 

“As you wish.” 

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The doors of the Royal Hall were huge, and you stood in front of them made you and the rest of the participants looked tiny. You never felt so nervous your entire life- exclude the fact that you accidentally put too much salt onto your Uncle’s favorite dish, and Prince Joshua’s visuals that sent you to cloud-nine. Here we go..

Once the doors opened, you gave your friends a ‘thumbs up’ for a good performance and appetizer. You were given numbers for the preparing station and all participants were not separated in genders. You thought of how on earth would the Royal Family eat all one hundred dishes. Obviously it wasn’t a matter for you to be bothered but a hundred- oh wow. Before realizing, the bell chimed, marking the start of the gathering all ingredients.

The hall divided into four sections, north, south, east and west. All have their own areas of ingredient stalls. It was overwhelming, the crowds who rushed at the stalls you couldn’t even get through, they grabbed most ingredients and you were afraid that there wouldn’t be enough for your recipe.

You managed to get the basics- onion, garlic, potatoes, carrots, mushrooms and white cabbage. Bread for the sides. The main ingredients- a combination of beef and pork and some brisket to add more flavors. All you needed right now were the important ones- tomatoes and parsley roots.

As soon as you reached the almost-empty stall, you ran into Sora, grabbing the last of tomatoes and parsley roots. She waved them at you, mocking you as she left for her station. Ah crap I needed those.. Wait did she just stuck out her tongue to me? The bell chimed again, marking the end of ingredient preparation. So you just grabbed whatever that was left.

You ran back to your station as you started to cook. You needed to make meat stock because it usually took a few hours to settle, so you started to julienne the basic ingredients and figure out the flavor of the borscht. As you waited for the meat stock, you rechecked the ingredients you took. They were all there and the only problem were the tomatoes and parsley roots.

Oh gosh.. I just hope this works.. Fingers crossed. 

With hours of ached necks and hands, and all parts of your body. The first round finished and you needed to wait for another hour for the results.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

You walked back and forth at the Royal Canteen, your friends were bothered by the way you behaved. They’ve never seen you so agitated before and it worried them. You bit your lips and shook your wrists alternatively, even though they hurt from earlier.

“Hey, what’s troubling you?” Yerin asked, trying to calm you.

“That Sora is starting to get onto my nerves.” you sighed.

“Why? What did she do?” Bona twitched her nose.

“That blabber-barbie pig-squealing mouth of hers! I’m gonna kill-” Yerin and Jinri prevented her from moving.

“She took the last tomatoes and parsley roots. And I really needed those for my dish.” you tried not panic, but Jinri’s reaction wasn’t helping.

“Oh my gosh y/n I just really hoped it turned out well!” her high-pitched voice muffled by Umji.

“It’s okay y/n. I believe your instincts are great.”

Sigh at least Umji understands how I feel.. Time seemed to pass by quickly and the results came as the Royal Guards posted onto the bulletin board. You friends pushed you from behind, afraid to look at the results. You closed your eyes halfway as you were approaching the posts.

3.. 2.. 1.. Your friends’ screams went ahead of your eyes. “We got in!” When you opened your eyes, they all hugged you. “Y/N it’s a miracle that you got in!”

You skimmed through the lists of names and when you stumbled across your name, your heart raced. “I got in?” Soon you sat down, jaw-dropped at the results.

“YOU got in?!” Sora’s voice rang the kitchen. “I was so sure there were no ingredients left for you! I even mocked you!” she pointed a finger at you.

“So you had it all planned out?” you spoke sternly. “I should’ve known you had that kind of attitude in you.”

“I made the exact dish you did but you- you unfair experienced jerk, how dare you get in!” she practically inhaled and exhaled heavily.

“Gladly there were tomato paste and parsnips at the very back of the stall. In case you didn’t see it, well, I feel sorry for you.” you smiled at her as you were about to leave.

“You- you maniac!” she jolted as you suddenly turned around, a different look from before.

“Fresh tomatoes are great for borscht, I gotta admit. But tomato paste are commonly used nowadays and it makes it slightly better. And don’t think I didn’t see you sneaking into my room to look for my plans for the rounds of assessment..” Her eyes widened, gulping with all her might.

“You s-saw-”

“I saw you.” you paused.

“But you were-” she quivered.

“Wide awake.” your eyebrows raised, immediately taken Sora aback. She left with embarrassment all over her. The stares towards her trailed until she left the Canteen. Hayoung went up to you, and she stuck her arm out. “It was nice to know your quick thinking got you substitutes. Good work.”

There wasn’t sincerity in her voice, but the acknowledgement was enough. “Thanks and, it was nice to know that you cooked gumbo with a touch of Tabasco. Good work too.” you shook her hand.

Hayoung gave a quick smirk. “Hawk eye. Nice. Just you wait, Y/N.” Her comment left a lot of curiosity on you as she twirled around to leave.

“I’ve never seen y/n so badass! In a good way though!”

“Only when needed.” you nodded, the girls hugged you as they assumed you took victory.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Joshua and his aides did rounds of patrols at the Royal Garden. He couldn’t wait to stand up after hours of waiting and only to get a few sips and bites from the appetizers. Jun started with his teasing again, where his chin nearly got cut by Joshua’s sword. “How was the food, Josh?” Seungcheol armed the guy.

“It was great.” he gestured how intense it was and the participants were all focused. “They have attitudes we need for the Palace. So far I saw-” he paused, brushing through Wonwoo and Seungcheol. “Her..”

Wonwoo looked back to where Joshua was looking. “You saw her? Where?” The Canteen was full of people that he thought it was impossible for Joshua to spot the girl he met downtown. “I don’t see her.”

“I thought I did see her.” Joshua mumbled in a low voice, quite disappointed to not be able to see you.

They continued to walk around the Garden for fresh air and sat down at a glass house where it was only exclusive for registered members of the Royal Palace. Joshua took out his guitar, tried to compose a few bars to kill time before heading to another errand.

They heard screams from the Canteen and they immediately got up to see. Joshua, despite of wanting to see you, couldn’t accept the misbehavior within the Palace. He placed his guitar on top of the case and as he started to walk, a hand stopped him by the shoulders.

“Your Highness,” Wonwoo called him in a low voice. “You can’t go in there. You can’t expose yourself to them until the end of the assessment. You know what will happen if they see you.”

“I’m not against Joshua into going to the Canteen.“ Jun peeked from behind Wonwoo. “He will see her.”

“On second thought, I won’t go.” Joshua put his finger up, his eyes trailed to Jun as he pointed to him. “I’d rather die in secretly than to die in front of her.” He took his guitar and headed to the ranch.

Seungcheol, Jun and Wonwoo stood still in silence, not sure what to say after the Prince’s remarks.

“Did he just admit his feelings?” “Nah I think didn’t.” “Dude he clearly likes her.” “You did record that in your tape, yes?” “Thought you’d never ask.”

“Guys? I got an errand to do! Escort me!” the prince called, not a single hint of what his aides have witnessed. 

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“Prince Azel of the Southern Seas will be informed as soon as he gets this letter. I bid you farewell, Prince Joshua.” a messenger bowed 90 degrees, Joshua and his aides soon later left with their horses.

Joshua knew as the next heir to the throne, fulfilling his duties were of manners and reputation. Not only because he was obliged to, but because it was already part of his nature. They stopped by a forest and rested their bodies out. Riding for two and a half hours was tiring and if there was one thing they’d do as they rested, they’d eat.

“You still have that basket from the girl downtown?” Seungcheol laughed as he drank from the juice box.

“It comes in handy.” Joshua popped a grape into his mouth, his smile visible to the others.

“It is for keeps, right Your Highness?” Jun yet again started with the teasing.

“Yes, it is for keeps. Wait wha-?” he looked to his aides and they were all grinning.

“Stage one of knowing if he’s in-love: Keep him busy during a conversation and he’ll eventually repeat or agree on what was said.” Jun high-fived the boys with his hands.

“You guys set me into a trap!” Joshua threw pieces of bread, the others shielded themselves with paper plates.

“Manners, Your Highness!” “Where’s your courtesy?” “Your Highness, I believe our plan was indeed successful.” “No! You all planned this! I should’ve known when you were walking slowly behind me!” “Busted aren’t we?” “Dead meat you say!” 

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Another week came by and you were at the Preparation Room for experimenting the dish for the second round. You wiped your sweat that rolled down at the temples. It takes time and effort to perfect the dish and you made sure to move faster at the time of gathering the ingredients.

How long has it been since you practiced. The only thing that told you the time was the sunset behind the glass window. You’ve been there for nearly twelve hours and you have skipped breakfast and lunch. Well it does happen when you focus too much on something. You decided to call it a day and head back to the dorms.

As you walked past the small pond of the Preparation Room, you head spun and felt someone’s chest hit your forehead. “I’m sorry!” the voice cracked, making you smile as you looked up.

“Nah it’s alright.” you chuckled, your eyes locked to his. “Oh I know you!” he said, gesturing the all of you.

“Pardon? Have we met?” you tilted your head and fixed the bag that hung on your forearm.

“Nope, but you’ve been the heated talk at the boys’ dorm. It was a great comeback you did to Sora.” he scratched his head and brought out his arm for a handshake. “I’m Mingyu, #46 at the station.”

“Oh wow, I never thought it’d reach there but thanks. I’m y/n, #30 at the station.” you shook his hand, questioning yourself how he knew Sora.

“By the looks of it, you’re probably wondering why I know Sora.” he gestured you to walk with him out the small pond. “She’s my cousin. I know she could be all annoying but it’s the way she is. Meanwhile me, I just pretend I didn’t know the girl.”

“Well she did sneak into my room to find out what I planned for the first round.” you nodded your head not trying to remember it again.

“Yeah I heard! Ah that’s kinda embarrassing on my part.”

You both talked until he dropped you off by your dorm. He didn’t have to, but you figured it was just his way of being friendly. “I hope to see you at the last round.” you waved him a good night.

“What made you say that?” he cupped his mouth to increase volume.

“My instincts did! You seem a great chef!” He waved back and you headed to your room. Upon unlocking the knob, you saw Yerin and Umji on your bed.

“Oh y/n~” they both said in unison.

“Hm? Why’re you two here?” you placed your back and immediately hugged them back. “Our rooms are in the middle of renovation. So they asked us to stay at one room, and we chose yours.” Yerin wrapped a blanket around all of you. “It’s just like back at the restaurant that we’ve been like this.”

“Yerin, it’s only been a week and you act as if we left home since a year ago.” you hit her forehead with a notebook.

“Yeah yeah, a week has passed and there’s already drama.” she rolled her eyes.

“Can we not talk about it?” Umji pleaded as she was not the type to meddle into fights or confrontation. “It’s just a small one.” 

“C’mon, we got a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

A long day indeed. Time passed by quickly and it was hard to believe the second was already tomorrow. Whatever happens, you all decided to give the best you got.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

i.t.s masterlist

>> new beginnings, new encounters and new discoveries in a completely new world. you were suddenly signed up for a cuisine assessment for the royal family of the country. how will you do? <<

< prev. || part three || next >

[illbeyourreasonwhy]

So Much I Think It Must Be...

Chapter 9: The feud is still alive and well

“I’m sorry, am I interrupting?”

Andi’s head shot up. Amber was standing in front of their table, ready to take their order, arms crossed and looking furious.

“Amber!” Andi forced a smile, glancing between Amber and Walker and feeling somehow guilty although for the life of her not understanding why.

*

Chapter 9 of my Ambi Enemies to Friends to Lovers fic! You can read it on ao3 here, and find the first chapter here. Hope you like it!

*

Andi sighed, staring up at her ceiling, before sitting up. TJ and Cyrus had left with Cyrus’ family for three weeks, meaning that until Jonah came back two days from now, the only two people from their friend group left in Shadyside were, ironically, Andi and Amber.

And Andi was bored. So bored, in fact, that she had almost considered texting Amber and asking her if she wanted to meet up – she had shot the idea down almost as soon as she thought of it, though. Even if they weren’t at each other’s throats anymore, they still weren’t on good enough terms that the two of them hanging out would be anything other than weird.

Instead she ended up going to an exhibition thrown by Art-By-Me, an association dedicated to promoting art in Shadyside. They were actually very well-known and influential beyond Shadyside, and often organised art shows and found new places for artists to express their creativity – the mural she had painted with Walker, he had told her, had been provided by Art-By-Me.

Speaking of Walker, she was pretty sure he had a painting here. She was in the middle of thinking that she would have to ask him how to get a slot in the next exhibition when someone tapped her shoulder and she turned around.

“Walker,” she grinned. “I was looking for your painting.”

“It’s right here,” he smiled, pointing it out to her. Before she could say anything, he beamed. “I was actually going to call you. You know that big project I told you about?”

She nodded, suddenly feeling excited. “Are you finally going to tell me what it is?”

He grinned. “You remember that mural we did two weeks ago? By the park?” When she nodded, he continued. “And you know how Art-By-Me throw art contests every now and then? Like Youth Inspi?” She stared, not daring to hope. Youth Inspi was the stuff of legends to aspiring artists; the winner got 600$ of prize money and lessons from a world-wide artist. “Well, they liked what we did with our mural so much they’re taking it an audition piece for this year’s issue.” Walker nudged her excitedly. “And we got it! They want us to work on a piece together!”

Andi’s mouth dropped open. “You’re kidding.” He shook his head, still grinning from ear to ear, and she felt excitement bubbling in her chest. “I’ve always wanted to enter an Art-By-Me contest, but I never thought I’d be good enough. And now they’re asking us to enter?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

Andi clapped her hands together, giddiness taking over. “Walker, this is amazing! Thank you so much!”

She threw her arms around him. He laughed and hugged her back.

“Okay, break it up, this is a public space.”

Andi pulled away, turning towards the familiar voice.

“Hi, Natalie.”

“Hey, Andi. Good to see you again.” Natalie was smiling lazily, and, to Andi’s surprise, she was accompanied by Amber. “Hi, I’m Natalie,” she added, turning to Walker.

“Walker,” he smiled. “Nice to meet you.”

“So you’re the artist, huh?”

Walker smiled modestly while Andi looked curiously between Amber and Natalie.

“I didn’t know you two knew each other.”

“Yeah, we met through the ‘Lesbians Who Dated Jonah Beck’ club,” Natalie said.

“Oh,” Andi answered, suddenly thrown back to the turmoil she had felt the night of the party.

Natalie burst out laughing at her expression. “I’m kidding. I’m dating her best friend, so of course we’ve met.”

“Right. Makes sense.”

Walker glanced between them, clearly feeling like he was missing something, before straightening up and saying, “Anyways, I was just telling Andi about our new art project.”

At once all the excitement came back to Andi and she beamed, unable to keep herself from gushing even if it was to Amber and Natalie. “We’re entering a contest organised by one of the biggest art associations there is! First place gets 600$ and lessons by a famous artist!”

“Really? That’s huge!”

“And it’s all thanks to a mural Walker asked me to do with him, so I owe it all to him, basically.”

Natalie raised an eyebrow, impressed. “Hey, if you ever want to hit me up to paint frisbees or something, I’m in,” she joked.

Amber didn’t laugh, looking between Andi and Walker with a slight frown, before settling on Andi.

“The mural? The one I saw the other day?”

“Yeah.”

Amber smiled. “Congrats. See, I told you it wasn’t that bad.”

Andi smiled back. “Yeah, thanks.” It came out fonder than she had intended, which was not fond at all, but she didn’t mind. That first mural was always going to be associated with Amber standing up for her in her mind, and she was grateful for that. Even if she still didn’t know why she had done it.

“Well,” Natalie said after a moment, making Andi realise she and Amber might have been staring at each other for a bit longer than necessary, “we should get going, we haven’t even seen half of the art here. Andi, do you want to come with us?”

“No, I’m going to stay with Walker for a bit,” Andi declined, surprised but touched by the offer.

Amber’s mouth twitched. Before Andi could read too much into it, Natalie smiled and said it was nice to see her, and then they were both gone.

 *

“So I sketched out a few ideas – get over here, we’ll work better if we can both see what we’re talking about – but feel free to add your own, we’re still in the brainstorming process and we should do something that speaks to the both of us.”

Andi switched booths so that she was sitting next to Walker, their arms brushing as they pored over the sketches he had brought.

“We can enter anything, a painting, a sculpture…”

“A mural?”

“They’ll provide the surface, so we’ll have to let them know in advance if we want to, but yeah.”

Andi pulled paper and a pencil closer, tapping the pencil thoughtfully. “Should we stick to a mural, then? Or do something completely different?”

“I don’t know. Stepping out of our comfort zone might be fun. Oh, and you’ll never guess who the artist giving lessons this year is.”

“Who?”

“Mitchella Omar.”

“No. Way.”

Andi felt a thrill of excitement run through her. Mitchella Omar was an up-and-coming environmentalist artist who was from Shadyside, but she hadn’t been in town in years, instead touring the world to showcase her art and give lectures on how to create beautiful things while still preserving the environment. Andi kind of adored her.

“This is so great,” Andi grinned.

They had started drawing various designs on sheets of paper when Walker said, “You know, I knew you would be excited, but I never thought you would be so into this.”

“Walker, this is the biggest project I’ve ever gotten to work on,” Andi told him. “Even if we don’t win, what we do is going to be seen by some of the greatest artists ever, including Mitchella Omar. It’s amazing. I still can’t believe I actually get to do this.”

“Well, in that case, I’m glad I asked you to do the mural when we ran into each other again.”

Andi smiled softly. “I’m glad you did too.”

They stayed that way for a few seconds, smiling at each other, and then –

“I’m sorry, am I interrupting?”

Andi’s head shot up. Amber was standing in front of their table, ready to take their order, arms crossed and looking furious.

“Amber!” Andi forced a smile, glancing between Amber and Walker and feeling somehow guilty although for the life of her not understanding why.

“Can I take your order?” she asked, eyes fixed on the table.

Walker removed his hand from where it was brushing Andi’s arm and said, “Actually, we haven’t decided yet.”

Amber put her notebook down, looking exasperated. “You do know you’re supposed to order something when you sit down in a booth, right?”

“Amber, relax,” Andi said, “we just got here. We’ll get something in a few minutes.”

“Would that be before or after you’re done wasting my time while I’m supposed to be working?”

“Amber –” Andi said, feeling out of depth.

“Two milkshakes,” Walker said hastily. “Uh, strawberry for me.”

“We’re out of strawberry,” Amber said without looking at him.

“There’s someone with a strawberry milkshake over there,” Andi pointed, not understanding what was happening.

“It’s okay, I’ll take vanilla,” Walker said before Amber could answer.

“Me too,” Andi added, trying to catch Amber’s eye, but her gaze was fixed on her notebook as she wrote their order, turned and left without another word.

Andi watched her leave, at a loss for what had just happened.

Eventually Walker perfectly summed it up:

“I see the feud is still alive and well, then.”

Andi felt a pang in her heart. “Yeah, I guess it is…”

 *

 Me: something weird happened

 Cyrus: define weird

 Me: amber was mean to me today

 Cyrus: how is that weird

 Cyrus: that happens every day

 Me: no, we were somewhat okay for a few days

 Me: this came out of nowhere

Andi bit her lip, waiting for Cyrus to answer. She couldn’t explain it even to herself, but Amber’s behavior at the Spoon wasn’t sitting well with her. Beyond the general confusion about what had brought this on, she was also inexplicably hurt because she had thought they were past this.

 Cyrus: set the scene for us

 Me: us?

 Cyrus: tj is here

Andi shook her head to herself, smiling slightly. All the better if TJ was there. Both he and Cyrus were the best people to help her work this out.

 Me: i was at the spoon with walker and she blew up on us when we said we weren’t ready to order

 Cyrus: walker was with you?

 Me: yeah why?

Andi drummed her fingers against the counter, waiting for them to answer. She got a notification for one of her games and ignored it. Still no text back.

 Me: guys?

Just as she was about to call Cyrus to see what was taking so long, a text came in.

 Cyrus: we’ll talk to amber

 Cyrus: don’t worry about it

 Me: no don’t

 Me: that will just make her more mad

 Cyrus: we’re not going to yell at her or anything

 Cyrus: we’re just going to try and understand what happened

Andi bit her lip.

 Me: ok

 Me: keep me updated

She set the phone down, more affected by this than she wished.

*

 Marty: ANDI

 Marty: ANDI

 Marty: ANDI

 Marty: I’m going to keep doing this until you agree

Andi huffed.

 Me: no

 Marty: Come on

 Marty: It’ll be fun

 Me: no

 Marty: ANDI

 Marty: ANDI

 Marty: ANDI

 Marty: ANDI

Andi turned her phone off and went back to playing cards with Bex.

“What was that about?” her mom asked her.

“Marty keeps pestering me about going to his movie night.”

“I thought Marty was on holiday?”

“He was,” Andi muttered. As glad as she was for him to be back, at this precise moment she kind of wished he had stayed away. “He came back yesterday.”

Bex put her cards down. Andi glanced over, trying to make out what she had.

“Why don’t you want to go?” Andi didn’t answer. “I thought you liked Marty.”

“I do,” Andi mumbled. “It’s just that Buffy, Cyrus, Jonah and TJ are still on holiday. Which means that it’s just going to be him, Iris and Amber at his place.”

Bex frowned. “But they’re your friends. Well, minus Amber.”

“Yes, of course, but they’re more Amber’s friends than mine,” Andi admitted. “Just like Buffy and Jonah are more mine. TJ and Cyrus are kind of middle ground. Which means it is going to be awkward if I go.”

“That’s never stopped you before.”

“Rude.” Bex laughed; Andi almost smiled, but her next words went back to souring her mood. “And honestly, I don’t want to see Amber right now.”

“Okay, what happened?” Bex asked. “Last week she was sleeping over, now you’re avoiding her like the plague. What’s up?”

“I told you, she just needed a place to stay. That’s all it was.”

“My point still stands.”

Andi didn’t answer, and Bex, taking the hint, took her cards again and went back to playing. It was quiet for a few minutes.

“I thought things were better between us,” Andi finally said. “But she still hates me, and I don’t feel like getting in a fight with her, especially with our friends there. So I don’t want to go.”

She didn’t know why she was so upset. Amber and she had been arguing non-stop for the past two years. Just because Andi had thought things were different didn’t mean that Amber did, which had been painfully obvious the previous day at the Spoon. Which was fine. Or, well, should have been fine. Andi was fine with it. She was.

“Alright, then,” Bex said. “I won’t make you.”

And yet hearing her say that only made disappointment bubble more prominently in Andi’s chest.

The rest of the evening was quiet. That is, until someone started knocking on the door so frantically Andi rushed over to see what the emergency was. Her face fell when she saw who it was.

“You turned your phone off,” Marty said, looking distressed.

“And you don’t know how to take a hint.”

He shook his head. “I’m sorry. That’s why I’m here, that’s all I want to say. I didn’t mean to make you upset.”

Andi blinked, surprised, before smiling. “I’m not mad, don’t worry. I just don’t feel like going.”

Marty looked relieved. “Is this because of Amber?”

“What do you think?” Andi deadpanned.

“I think you’re being an idiot,” he said, which wasn’t the answer she had been expecting. “I haven’t seen you in almost three weeks, and I’ve missed you. So I’m going to ask you, one last time, please come to movie night.”

Andi hesitated. “I just don’t want to ruin everyone’s evening if Amber and I get in a fight.”

“You know, this will probably shock you, but Amber doesn’t particularly enjoy getting into fights with you in front of everyone either.” Andi doubted that. “So if the two of you make an effort, it will probably be fine.”

“That is awfully optimistic of you.”

But she was starting to consider it, and he could obviously tell, because he pouted. “Pleaaaase?”

She laughed despite herself and shook her head. “Fine. I’m coming. You’re lucky I missed you too.”

He cheered and the next thing she knew, she was in Marty and Iris’ kitchen pouring popcorn into five bowls and throwing some at Marty when he was being annoying (which was every thirty seconds or so). Natalie was there as well, grabbing a drink and offering Andi a smile before joining Amber and Iris in the living room.

Everything was going well, meaning that she and Amber had not spoken a word since she had walked in; that is, until Iris connected her computer to the TV and announced that the show was starting, and Amber moved to squeeze herself between Andi and Marty on the couch.

“I know they’re just going to make out the whole time,” she whispered in answer to Andi’s quizzical look, pointing over to Iris and Natalie laughing quietly in a loveseat. “Sue me for not wanting to be a third wheel.”

Andi nodded and turned back to the screen, a small smile on her lips.

 From what Andi gathered, they were watching a show Iris and Natalie had discovered and wanted to share with the others, but Andi had no idea what it was about. For one thing, it was in Spanish, and the subtitles were too small for Andi to read correctly. Moreover, it appeared the girls had decided the best place to start would be in the middle of the second season, with only a brief description of what had happened prior for the others to follow along. Andi had forgotten all the characters before Iris even pressed play. She was pretty sure the main character was the blonde girl who laughed a lot and blushed easily, but other than that she was lost.

At that precise moment Blondie seemed to be upset with another girl, one with purple hair, and then – then they were kissing, and Andi knew she had missed something.

She turned towards Iris to ask her to explain what was happening, and stilled. Natalie and Iris were squeezed together in a love seat, looking so in their own world Andi’s words died in her throat. Natalie had an arm wrapped around Iris, her free hand bopping her nose while Iris playfully tried to push her away. They looked more than happy – content, and at bliss, and it tugged at something in Andi’s chest.

Instead she turned to the person next to her, expecting it to be Marty, and was met with Amber expectantly raising an eyebrow. Right, she had sat between them. Right.

“What is it?” she whispered.

Andi waved a hand at the show. “I thought they were arguing.”

“They were. They made up.”

“Yeah, obviously. I’m not sure I’m really following.”

Amber laughed, then quickly recapped the show in a hushed voice, shoving Marty when he complained that she was being too loud. Andi whispered thanks and tried to focus back on the TV.

It wasn’t easy.

She was suddenly hyper-aware of Amber being right next to her, which shouldn’t have affected her, but did, somehow. Then there was the fact that the two girls were now constantly making out on screen, and Andi was torn between staring and looking away; when she did look away, it was to see Iris and Natalie making out as well. Marty threw a pillow at them, and Iris yelped and threw it back at him; Amber stepped in before it could devolve into a pillow fight. She seemed to really like this show, Andi had noticed, and was following along just fine.

Andi turned to look over at Iris and Natalie again. Natalie was whispering something in Iris’ ear, and Andi felt the tug at heart again, except this time she understood it for what it was – yearning. She wanted what they had, she wanted –

The two girls on screen were lying in bed together, and Andi’s heart dropped.

She wanted that.

Andi felt something cave in her chest. This was it. After months of fighting it, of trying to deny it, the realisation was hitting her full force. She liked girls, really liked girls, and had no idea what to do with this information.

She took in a shallow breath, and suddenly Amber’s hand was on her arm.

“Are you okay?” she asked, concern written all over her face.

“I –”

Andi’s words died in her throat. She stood up, ignoring the worried looks the others were giving her, and grabbed her coat.

“I have to go. Enjoy the rest of the movie. I mean the show. I. Yeah. I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

And with that she rushed out of the house, too fast to even know if anyone had said anything back.

***

Hope you liked it! More coming soon!

[sonderatc]

Triumphs & Failures: The Life of Sonder ATC (as it is right now)

As the rebrand of Sonder ATC is happening, I want to use this blog more. So, as my first official post on here, I'd like to say a few words about the past, present and future of Sonder ATC.

Early Life

Sonder originally had many titles.

For year one, I was in a group where we just all just as a group decided we'd be "Bagel Productions," with no rightly reason. For my independent projects, I went by "Finite Productions" because I was edgy and cool. Later in the year, I became a part of another group, "Fanny Pack Productions" (we were 8th graders, give us a break) and helped them with their final video once we were done.

The Fanny Pack Productions slug had a horribly played flute cover of the Harry Potter theme music.

RT5 & Transmission into Sonder

The first recorded mention of Sonder is from late September, early October. During this time, I was a bored student waiting out the year. I knew I was planning to take the Film II class at my school, so I got to planning the branding for next year.

I was brainstorming for the following year, and at the time, four of my friends were planning to take Film II with me. So I made concepts for a brand called "The Red Table Five" (god, it just makes me tense up hearing it), because we always sat at a red table in the morning.

The whole name and logo always felt incredibly forced to me, so I quickly abandoned it and started work an another one.

As I started to flesh out the brand, I had realized a few things.

I didn't want to limit it to anyone, especially the amount of people. Everyone's welcome.

I wanted it to feel home-y, and cozy.

I wanted it to be natural, not forced.

So, continuing on and thinking of these three things, I found the word Sonder; the realization that everyone has their own life. That's one. Two, to me a hand drawn aesthetic and a nature vibe sounded the best, and that also includes three. This is the thought process that delivered the original, classic image.

Something about birds have always fascinated me, and finches are stunning. The birches are quiet, but tough visually.

Trying to find a matching font for the title, I stumbled across Papaya Sunrise, which is a lovely font I still use.

After pinning down the aspects and details of the style, I made some accompanying graphics and banners too.

I did make a few and came prepared, but in the end they just lied dormant for months. That is, until Film II.

Call to Action

It was finally time for Film II, and Sonder Films was ready for action. Creating School of the Future, Untitled., Monotony, and many others that we don't like to discuss. I'll breeze right past most of it because it's basically a year long crunch of scripts, shooting and editing. However there is an important detail.

Every year, the instructor of the class sets two requirements for all videos: they have to be shorter than three minutes, and they have to revolve around a theme. Why a theme, you might ask? Well, that's because of a little student film competition called Future Voices of New Mexico. Fire, 10, the future, for ten years they had a new subject. Ours, of course, was the future.

Nearing the deadline for submissions, it was one giant scramble for video submissions, especially for year two. Most of us didn't like some of the forced, awkward videos we made. And we did them as a group, so anyone could claim them, but we each had to turn in a video that no one else had. First come, first serve.

A little background on the School of the Future, our assignment was to create a video about school culture. Having no idea what this meant, we mostly did what we wanted and spat out some old-timey looking nonsense. We liked it. It wasn't great, but it didn't have to be. It was our first video of the year. Everyone liked it until the instructor ripped it apart. The way he worked was he had a vision of how he wanted it, and would arbitrarily give the students room to be creative, but in the end be angry when it wasn't what he wanted (even though he never said what it was). So we ended up scrapping it after the rough cut, that is, for a grade. On my own, I made a final cut, and let it sit on the YouTube page.

Now, come the deadline, I only had three things left to submit, two were over three minutes and one of the two wasn't about the future. So there it was, School of the Future. Yeah, I was proud enough to turn it in. I wanted to willingly, actually. But when I said I was going to, the teacher ridiculed me and said that I shouldn't. Multiple times. And sarcastically said "what do I know, I've been in the film industry for more than 20 years."

So I turned it in to the film competition,

And low and behold: first place winner. Of the comedy category, that is. And hey, something I helped write, edit, and graphics for also won third. So look at that! Two awards in one year.

Wrapping up the year, we all had a school arts showcase, where our videos would play among other things. There, I sold my book that I had been working on for three years. I was excited to finally publish it, and hey, I also had a following from my film brand. As I was advertising it, my old English teacher walked by and saw it, saying that she is going to have a creative writing class next year and I should join. I told her I would love to.

I know Film wouldn't last forever, so I slowly transitioned from Sonder Films to Sonder ATC near the end of the school year. The year quickly ended after that, and summer came.

The next year came,

And as it did, so did creative writing. Planning the next big thing, I shortly came up with the idea to publish a series of our works about a week into school. I made a proposal, gave it to her, and recieved it with overwhelming enthusiasm. We launched a Kickstarter, which you can visit at tiny.cc/atczine, and have raised ¾ of the goal in three days.

And that's where we stand right now. The near future is to make a book, but I can't tell what the far future is.

Eventually, I will leave ATC, and Sonder will become something of it's own. And by that, I mean I'll go to college, bring it with me, and just place the school name after Sonder. I'm hoping it'll become Sonder Ithica, but no one knows what the future holds.

And that's where I'll leave it. I know this was long, and probably no one read it, but maybe I will in the future. Or some historian, looking into Sonder's history will when it becomes famous. Who knows.

Thank you.

- Jonny

[aria-xue]

Chester x Ravenclaw Prefect! Reader | Please Take Care|

AU where the protagonist and (most) of their gang is in 5th year & Chester’s in 6th; because canonically speaking, a pairing between a 12 year old and a roughly 15-16 year old doesn’t seem like a good idea.

From what I know, there are six prefects per house; starting from the fifth year. There’s two prefects per grade - one female, and one male.

Summary: The strain of carrying Ravenclaw on your back and your prefect duties finally start to hit you. And with O.W.L exams coming up soon, the stress of everything starts to affect your physical health. Chester, the 6th year prefect takes notice of this and comes to talk things out with you.

Word count: 2,414 words. (aka, I ramble too much)

-----

The flames from your candle illuminated the space around you as you paused from reading to yawn. It was fairly late at night, perhaps too late to be relying on the light of a single candle to keep you awake for much longer. It was almost the end of 5th year, which meant O.W.L exams. You, being the overachieving Ravenclaw that you are, wanted to at least make it into just ONE N.E.W.T level class. Currently, you were brainstorming for your third essay by reviewing important points you’ve learned in class this year. “Damn, I’ve learned quite a lot this year….” You thought to yourself before rubbing your drooping eyes. It was getting late, and you occasionally dozed off. The uphill battle for your consciousness was ongoing…And soon, the winner of the battle was declared; you had fallen asleep in the common room, face down on top of Intermediate Transfiguration.

You felt something heavy on your body as you sat up from the desk - a blanket had been draped over your shoulders. On your head was a note stuck on your forehead that read: “Please take care of yourself (Y/N)”. The note was unsigned and written using clean and elegant penmanship. You heaved a sigh, tucking the note into your textbook, marking the line you last recalled reading.

Stretching your arms, you descended to one of the floors below to your dormitory. It was about time for you to get changed into your uniform anyways. The others were still asleep by the time you had changed. You heaved yet another sigh, grabbing your other textbooks. There was another half an hour until class, which meant that there was more time for you to study for your first class. You were sleepy, extremely sleepy. Just as your head made contact with the cushions on the couch, you, yet again, fell asleep. Today was just not your day.  

Your first class was Charms. Rowan was seated to your right, chattering about something; you tuned her out. The thought of sleep crossed your mind again, as your eyelids drooped down. You tried to rub your eyes to wake yourself up, but soon, sleep took over your body.

The bell finally rang, startling you awake from your slumber. The only word that was repeating in your mind was “Shit”. You had fallen asleep during class. Thankfully, nobody seemed to notice or even care that a prefect had fallen asleep during a lecture. It a was probably best for you to explain yourself to the professor, even if it cost you house points.  After all, you were the one carrying the house on your back - you had earned Ravenclaw a grand total of 230 house points last year (170 as of now) - losing ten or twenty points wouldn’t be that much of a hit, right?

Sheepishly, you made your way up to Professor Flitwick. He turned towards you with a smile.

“Ah, if it isn’t Miss (or mister)  (L/N), what can I do for you?” He chuckled.

“Professor, I wanted to know what I’ve missed.” Your heart was pounding, a prefect falling asleep in their class was unheard of! “I’m so sorry I fell asleep during the lecture, I’ve been studying a bit more than usual, as a result, I have been losing sleep.” You blurted out, hoping that the professor would understand the gibberish coming out of your mouth.

To your surprise, he gave you a reassuring smile. “Oh yes, I overheard Mr. Davies’s conversation about how he found you asleep in the common room. You must be working hard; on top of your prefect duties, you also excel in your classes.” He continued to smile.

Oh gosh, it was Chester who found you sprawled out on top of the pile of books! So he was the one who wrote that note stuck to your forehead.

“We discussed the compatibility between the wizard and the wand. Soon, we'll be diving deeper into the more complicated charms.” He paused for a moment.

“Are you going to take away house points, professor?”

“Normally, I would take house points away from Ravenclaw, but I would like to reward you for your dedication instead, ten points to Ravenclaw!.” He smiles at you again

“Th-thank you, Professor,” You bowed your head in appreciation. “I won’t let you down again!” You turned to leave the classroom. Potions was next, fun…

It was time for lunch, most of the students were gathered in the Great Hall. The dim lighting of the candles combined with the natural daylight seeping through the windows allowed you to bury your face in the textbook with ease. It was certainly better than reading in the dark like you normally did. Rowan was again, chatting away, and occasionally helping you with a problem or two.

You sense someone’s presence as they sat down right next to you. Looking up, your face met with his. Chester Davies, 6th year Ravenclaw prefect. You were on friendly terms with him, but it wasn’t always a smooth ride.

-----

You met him in the library, half-asleep over a textbook. The only other seat available was the one next to his. With a sigh, you mumbled a “May I sit here?”. The boy was studious, it was no wonder he was put in Ravenclaw.

You learned his name: Chester Davies; and he learned yours. The two of you became friends quickly. Then your fourth year rolled around. Chester was made the 5th year Prefect for Ravenclaw. One could notice the obvious change in Chester’s demeanor. He smiled less, became more focused, and grew distant from you. He began pestering you about the house points you’ve earned. At first, it was bearable; but soon, it became a drag -  every time he saw you - he’d ask you about house points.

Your interactions had been boiled down to: “How many points have you earned Ravenclaw, (Y/N)?” To which you replied: “125 points” and moved along with your day. You never understood why he became this way until your 5th year - you, along with another Ravenclaw became prefects.

It was hard work, keeping up with your studies and prefect duties - you had no time to earn Ravenclaw many points - But being prefect was well worth it. When you had trouble with anything, you went to Chester. Your interactions helped repair your relationship. He began to smile more…

The two of you studied together once every week - Chester would tutor you and would help you get ahead. From those sessions, you began to see sides of him others have not. With others, he was stern, constantly whining about house points. Your conversations had less to do with house points, and more with each other. You got to know him, his strengths, his weaknesses, you knew everything.

And that was where you two were now, close friends, and partners in crime. Of course, Chester would still pester you about house points, even if you were number one on the leaderboards.

-----

Chester smiled at you, “Studying hard, (Y/N)?” He remarked. You looked up at the owner of the voice.

“Yes, I want to make it into at least one N.E.W.T course next year.” you smiled at him, obviously proud of your ambition.

“Oh, which one are you hoping for?” He tilted his head in curiosity.

“Any one of them! I just want one!” you sheepishly laughed.

“I’ll leave you to it!” He said, looking to the third-year sitting across from him. He laughed with her about a joke. Gosh, his laugh was adorable - you felt your cheeks flush. He was too distracting; closed the textbook with a sigh, you rested your head on the table. Your position mimicked Felix’s when Slytherin came in 4th place last year. Chester looked down towards you with concern in his eyes. “Please get more sleep, (Y/N). I don’t want you to suffer just because of O.W.L.s, They’re more than 3 months away, you have time.” Chester looked you dead in the eyes. You could feel your cheeks heating up more. “And please, don’t rely on a single candle for light while reading late at night…”

“Thanks for worrying about me, Chester,” You said. “Oh, and I earned ten points from Flitwick, please don’t pester me about points right now...” Your voice was growing quiet; once again, sleep had enveloped you.

Chester chuckled to himself again, you were too adorable for your own good. He decided to let you rest for a while. He noticed how calm you looked while asleep, as opposed to last night, which was really this early morning, where your features were tense. You were truly stunning.

He decided to wake you up after a few minutes, you barely touched your food! Chester was worried about you, for the past month, you were barely eating; instead, you used the time to study and get ahead in classes. He failed to understand why you would sacrifice your health for your studies, which made him even more concerned.

“Mnnn…” you groaned at his touch, “five more minutes, Rowan…” You croaked out, causing Chester to stifle another laugh.

“(Y/N), you need to eat. How are you going to patrol the halls tonight if you don’t have any energy now?” No response. Perhaps he had to coax you out of it. An idea came to mind… “(Y/N), you have two choices; either I help you study tonight after our patrols, or I will force-feed you this mashed-potato.” That jolted you awake. The thought of Chester feeding you was embarrassing. You couldn’t even look Chester in the eyes during your weekly tutoring sessions ever since you two grew closer together this year! But you had to stay calm.

“Pfft, try me!” You smashed your head back onto the table, hiding your face in your arms. You just wanted to avoid eye-contact.

“(Y/N), I’m going to force-feed you.” His voice was stern and authoritative. You once again shot up. His expression was serious.

“N-no! I can feed myself!” You protested, but it was too late. In Chester’s hand was a fork loaded with potatoes.

“Say ‘ahhh’.” Your cries of protest were ignored as he gently laid the fork into your mouth. You could see his features clearly, his perfectly gelled hair, deep-set eyes, chiseled cheekbones, and a beautiful smile.

Taking the fork from Chester’s hands, you looked away and muttered: “Chester, you didn’t have to do that…” there was an awkward silence between the two of you. Chester was the one to break the silence with a chuckle.

“I have a proposal,” he said, “If you finish ALL of your lunch, I will take over your patrol for tonight. But you have to promise me that by the time I return, you have to be asleep in your bed.” Gosh, what was this? He was acting like a parental figure!

“You would do that for me?” Your entire face lit up.

“I’d do anything for you,”

“No promises, Davies!” You laughed again.

——

It soon fell dark, well past curfew. You were spending tonight in the common room as well. All of the students were in bed, dreaming about sweet nothings. You would normally be out on patrol, but tonight, thanks to a certain prefect, you could use this time to read.

Tonight was not productive. Your mind kept wandering back to Chester. ‘Say ahhh’ you remembered. You thought about the time he spent with you, the sacrifices he made for you, and he laughs he shared with you. It was strange, your heart would flutter every time he looked at you. And why did your heart skip a beat whenever he smiled at you or praised you?

You tried to focus, but you kept losing your train of thought. Halfway through the rough draft of your final essay, you heard someone come in. You could tell by their figure who they were.

“Chester,” you smiled. “Thank you so much for taking over my shift! I owe you big time!” You ran up to him for a hug. It was only then you realized what you had just done, you hugged Chester.

“It’s a little late to be studying, isn’t it?” He questioned, returning the hug.

“I know, I just didn’t understand something, and I just had to read up on it! I’m sorry,” You smiled at him again.

“What is it? I may be able to help you.” Chester made his way to a chair next to the table, taking a seat and gesturing you to do the same.

“Tell me what you don’t understand, I’ll do my best to explain it to you.” You sat down next to him, pointing to a section in your textbook. “Ah, that’s easy, here’s how you do it…” he went on a explain the basic concepts of the topic.

It was soon almost  1am. You were tired, yawning into your hands. “Chester, I’m going to take a nap on the couch,” you told him, getting up from our chair. He got up as well.

“Your neck will get sore if you sleep like that,” he came up to you. “Use my lap as a pillow, I don’t mind. Your health is important.” He sat down, patting his legs. Your cheeks grew red,

“You don’t have to do that, Chester,” you told him.

“I care about you, (Y/N). Your health is important to me.”

Heaving out a sigh, you made your way to him, laying down on his lap. You stared at his face. He was calmly staring back into your eyes. You took this as a chance to talk. “Chester, I wanted to tell you something,” You muttered to him. “I want to thank you for caring so much about me. You are a great friend to have around… but lately, I’ve started to want more. I want you to care about me, but as more than a friend would.” You covered your eyes with your arm. “I guess, I’m asking you out, Chester.” You had managed to choke out a confession.

He gently held your hand, moving it away from your face. “I’ve always cared about you, more than a friend would, (Y/N),” He smiled. “You’re very oblivious. I’d be honored to be your boyfriend.”

You began to cry, enveloping Chester’s face. “I’m so happy!”

“It’s getting late, get some sleep.” He stroked your hair. “Goodnight, Love.” You began to feel even more tired, closing your eyes, muttering “I love you,”

[zoibuu]

You are invited for a piece of Taart! Get the Taart to the table and make sure to save a piece for yourself. To share or not to share...

Grand Award winner at Global Game Jam Antwerp 2022 

Taart (translation: 'strawberry' cake/pie) is made with visuals made from watercolor pieces. Each part is hand-painted, scanned, and then cleaned up digitally! 

Play the game here: https://sandervanhove.itch.io/taart (PC only)

How it all started: 

I went to Antwerp to join the Game Jam there (thank you Pepijn, the organizer, for inviting me!) and it was the first time I traveled alone to another country, from The Netherlands to Belgium. 

I wanted to make a game where I could use my favorite technique, painting with watercolors and colored pencils. After hearing the theme Duality we did brainstorm sessions with all the participants after that we had time to pitch our idea. I wanted to make something about food, and about sharing or not sharing food.  

The image above is how I pitched the idea, it’s fun to see that the finished game still holds the same essence! I got Sander on board and that’s when Team Taart was born. 

The inner workings of Team Taart

Sander and I both knew what to do. The decorating (Art) was for me and the construction of the taart (Development) was for Sander. He was very willing to listen to my ideas and concepts, and he showed me how it would look together. The Friday evening was used for planning and sketching. The style was something I had total control of and asked Sander if he liked it, he did! 

Saturday was a day full of painting, scanning, and editing. I wanted to challenge myself with making traditional works for a digital game, and this turned out in our favor. The digital painting would have taken me longer, you have so much time to retry your strokes. But doing it traditionally you can see the imperfections and embrace them. All the textures that bloom with watercolors just embrace the feeling of the game.

Feedback from the other jammers: 

Piece by piece the game came together. At the game jam, we asked around to let people play our game. Some even compared it to a Wario Ware game, a small yet full of life minigame. On Sunday we had sound, effects and most things implemented. People liked the style and the handmade feeling of the game. The weekend was full of looking at everyone’s games and letting the others playtest our game. We, Sander and I, mostly discussed ourselfs and it just felt right. 

The assets were drawn like an assets pack. The pieces were made separately and added together digitally!

At the end of the jam, there was a small award show of the people who joined the Antwerp Game Jam, and to our surprise, Taart won the Grand Award. For my first time joining a Game Jam, this felt like an honor, and I can’t wait to join another one in the future!

Game trailer: