#without worrying about whether it's good or useful

[ao3commentoftheday]

i found a small fandom, less than 10 pages of works on AO3 (one of my past fandoms was Star Wars, that's why that seems tiny to me), and i want to be involved in this fandom. but, because the fandom is so small, i know that it's way more likely for me to be noticed, and i'm intimidated by that thought. with Star Wars, i was noticed but i was pretty much under the radar, because the fandom is huge. but with this small fandom, i know if i post something, i won't really be under the radar anymore, because there's so little fan content. how can i become less scared of this?

You're not alone in this, anon. I've been noticing it in myself, in recent years, that I'm more self-conscious about my online presence than I used to be. We could dig deep into that whole conversation another time if you're interested, but for now let's focus in on dealing with that state of mind.

What part of being noticed to you find scary?

There are a lot of possibilities, of course. You could worry about being deemed not good enough. Or you could fear that the things you want to write are not the things that people want to read. Maybe you worry that you'll be someone who creates one of those famous "fanon" ideas that everyone latches onto and later hates because everyone latched onto it.

An even deeper worry might be that, even with a small audience, you won't be noticed after all. Or that they'll notice and then reject you.

Posting your fanworks in a place where other people can see them brings its own kind of stage fright, sometimes, and it sounds like you might be experiencing that. The good thing about AO3, though, is that you can post any time that you want to, so you can wait until you're in a good frame of mind before you dive in.

There are a few things you could try out and see if any of them help:

Turn off comments when you post your work. If people can't comment, then you won't feel bad about not receiving any (if that's your worry).

Write your stuff without posting it at all. Get comfortable with your fics first and feel good about them on your own terms. Then, when you post you won't feel as nervous about whether other people like them (if that's your worry).

Reach out to other folks in the fandom, either by commenting on their works on AO3 or by finding them here on tumblr or on other social media. Make some acquaintances and maybe even friends, and that might make you feel more like a welcome community member than a stranger or an interloper (if that's your worry).

It all comes down to trying to pinpoint what the scary thing actually is so that you can find the best way to make it less scary. As someone who has been posting in a fandom with (one sec while I check) 4 pages of results on AO3, I'll just say that people are lovely actually and things are rarely ever as bad in reality as you fear that they might be in your head. ❤️

[queenofzan]

desertification is a word commonly used to decribe at least two separate things. one of these things is frankly mis-named, as the place being "desertified" is in fact being depleted of natural resources and turned into something more akin to a wasteland than a desert (which is a naturally-occuring biome that is important to the ecology at large)

the other thing desertification describes is a neutral process of ecological change, which may currently be accelerated or altered due to human-driven climate change.

the vast majority of times people talk about desertification they do not distinguish which thing they are talking about. and the vast majority of times people talk about deserts is to decry them as inherently inferior or bad, which should sound as insane as someone saying a particular color is inherently inferior or a certain element on the periodic table is bad. and yet.

many, many examples of people "fighting desertification" are in fact about people forcing ecological change on an area that is not actually being harmed, often through using european plants and landscaping methods regardless of whether or not there are native plants that would be more appropriate. many examples of "desertification" are, at their core, humans mad that a landscape is less convenient or exploitable for them than they think it should be. consider who claims desertification is happening and where. consider whether or not their explanations actually address the root problems.

the deactivated blog was not only right to be wary, but everyone on this chain who laughed or made fun of them should shut the fuck up and try being a little less credulous. like, nothing in this reblog chain has a source so it's all just hearsay anyway, but consider how one person's reaction to doubt that this is obviously good news was recieved versus everyone else's reaction to assume it is obviously good news was received.

if you're worried about human-driven land degradation, consider saying that, instead of the less specific and much more emotionally loaded, frequently inaccurate term "desertification". human-driven land degradation would be like the North American Dust Bowl, where significant changes to the great plains ecosystem without due consideration for the knock-on effects led to nutrients in the topsoil being used up and blown away into dust storms so bad they suffocated people and blotted out the sky. however, to call that process "desertification" is misleading, as the great plains are not and have not for a long time been a desert. "being dusty and infertile" is not what defines a desert, and using the term "desertification" for this phenomenon does impact the way people view desert biomes and how useful/worthy they are.

deserts are not inherently bad. "reversing desertification" is not always a good thing. there are no one-size-fits-all solutions for ecological problems. a thing that might help the American Southwest would be inappropriate, useless, or detrimental in the Saraha.

maybe this sounds like splitting hairs, to judge by the reactions on this post, but it's not. deserts are naturally occuring, necessary biomes that do a lot for the overall ecology of the planet, as well as providing the environment for many types of life that straight up cannot exist outside of them. to call the abuse of land by humans "desertification" both de-emphasizes the role humans have played in mismanaging this land and falsely equates an important, real-world, largely under-supported class of biomes to the negative effects human mismanagement has on the land. both of those are bad.

a: say what you mean

b: stop being so fucking rude about it when people have extremely fair reservations about shit

It’s crazy that countries on the edge of the Sahara desert are reversing desertification by just digging half circles

[angelsafa]

HELLO, THIS IS A SUCCESS STORY!!!

Right now, as I’m writing these words, I am crying tears of happiness. My biggest dream was to come back to Tumblr one day with a success story. I first learned about Void State in 2022 from an Instagram manifest blog called @/moncherry (whose account is now closed). Since that day, I became obsessed with it. (If there are people obsessed with Void State and as a result delaying their lives and sinking deeper, don’t feel alone because I was exactly like that.) From 2022 until June 14th, if you ask me how many times I truly tried Void State, the count probably wouldn’t exceed the fingers on two hands. “I’ll try tomorrow,” and “I just turned over and fell asleep” were my habits. But I realized that I was constantly postponing my life this way and decided to take the reins of my life back. Since the beginning of June, I stuck to one plan — ‘DON’T MOVE’. I know it sounds like a very limiting belief, but it worked for me. I chose the late hours when I wasn’t sleepy, between 9 pm and 10 pm, to keep my brain awake with caffeine, lying on my back in the starfish position, and I didn’t move after that time. Here’s what I did, step by step:

Wim Hof breathing technique (about 10 minutes)

Any Yoga Nidra meditation (about 30 minutes)

This way, you stay motionless for 40 minutes but your mind remains awake. Then I use a Void State meditation I recorded with my own voice. I’m sharing the text below for you:

Void State Meditation Script: “Find a place where you can feel comfortable. Make sure your body is as comfortable and relaxed as possible. It’s very important to take your time preparing your body for this practice. If needed, pause, take a deep breath, and come back when you feel ready. When you feel ready, lovingly close your beautiful eyes and allow your awareness to gently turn inward. Gently focus your attention on your breath; notice your belly expanding as you inhale and relaxing as you exhale, maybe feeling a sense of relief.

Let gravity do its work. Feel all the muscles in your body relax and release: your head, face, neck, shoulders, arms, hands... your chest, back, belly, hips, legs, and feet becoming heavier. Because right now, they don’t need to do anything. Whisper gently to your body: “Body, it’s time to relax now. I give you permission to relax.”

With each breath in, fill yourself with deep relaxation, and with each breath out, let all tension flow out of your body. Breathe naturally, at a rhythm that feels good to you, without overthinking it. Trust that even if you don’t consciously understand, your body benefits from this process and is doing what’s right for you. Knowing that your body understands, allow yourself to let go even more.

Now, imagine a vast and dark emptiness in your mind. An infinite, silent, shapeless space... This emptiness gently surrounds you, all your thoughts, feelings, and worries dissolve into this darkness. You no longer need to do anything; you simply exist. All remaining thoughts drift away like clouds floating in the sky. Your body’s boundaries become indistinct; you are now pure awareness in this infinite space. This emptiness fills you with peace; here there is no time, no place, no right or wrong.

Allow the darkness to envelop you. In this void, feel a nameless peace slowly wrapping around you. As this peace deepens, notice a light being born inside. This light is soft, warm, and reassuring. It slowly expands, enveloping your entire being, filling you with love and tranquility. Now, realize that this light actually comes from within you. Fully surrender to this moment.

Rest peacefully in this space for a while. Whether you stay in the endless darkness or watch a colorful display within it doesn’t matter. Trust that this moment and space are with you. With every inhale, notice how good this emptiness and light feel, and with every exhale, sink deeper into relaxation.

When you’re ready, on your next inhale, feel deep gratitude for this darkness and emptiness. Hold your breath and feel your body filling with a sense of lightness. When ready, notice this lightness spreading through your entire body and touching every cell. A sense of enlightenment arises within you; you realize you have the power to choose what your mind perceives, choosing non-judgment and acceptance. You can rest in this feeling as long as you want. Carry the peace, trust, and acceptance this experience gives you inside.

Now, I will count down from 10 to 1. With each number, you will feel closer to the void state: 10: Keep focusing on your breath. 9: Feel yourself getting closer. 8: Take one more step closer to the void in your mind, body, and emotional state. 7: Notice how wonderful it feels to breathe. 6: You are entering the void state. No struggle, no problem, no doubt. 5: You’re very close, feel how near you are. 4: You become one with the void. 3: Closer than ever before. 2: Almost fully in the void state. 1: You are now completely in the void state.”

You can either record this with your own voice or use a text-to-speech app to turn it into audio.

After the meditation, the next step is tricking the brain. Without moving, and with eyes closed, move your eyes left, right, down, and up. 1-2 minutes is enough.

Then comes a robotic affirmation: “I am the Void. I am aware that I am in the void state right now.”

Your body will already be relaxed and numb from immobility, your brain between dream and reality. When the moment comes when all sounds fade away, your entire destiny will change. This was my journey. To make your life even better than your dreams, all you need is 1 to 1.5 hours of not moving, relaxing, and affirming. It’s that simple.

What I have achieved:

୨୧ An extraordinary, never-before-seen facial beauty — green feline eyes, Russian lips, and a Cindy Crawford nose.

୨୧ Slim, narrow shoulders and rib cage, a slender waist and abdomen, proportionate wide hips, and long model-like legs.

୨୧ Hairless, crystal-clear skin free from all skin issues (Goodbye to eczema I had for years).

୨୧ Perfect, flawless, full, soft, shiny, non-frizzy, never breaking, never smelling bad, never greasy, healthy, and always beautifully scented thick wavy light brown hair.

୨୧ Always super clean, attractive, sexy, and sweet-smelling everywhere. Never sweat or smell bad. No sweat stains ever. My clothes and underwear always smell very clean, nice, and sexy. Both my bathroom visits always smell good. No sounds from the bathroom, no discharge, no gas or burps. This doesn’t harm my health.

୨୧ Graduated from Yale Law School and currently accepted to Harvard Law School for my master’s degree.

୨୧ A passive income job earning $15,000 per month and a $5,000 scholarship for my master’s degree.

୨୧ Currently living in a Bosphorus-view loft apartment in Istanbul, with a Mercedes iX.

୨୧ All the skincare products, Dyson, Apple devices, luxury cosmetics, books, cameras, and more from my Pinterest wishlist.

୨୧ My sister overcoming PCOS, and a summer house in Muğla for my mother.

୨୧ Meeting the man of my dreams in the summer of 2026.

And countless other details I can’t list here…

Learning Void State — even if years pass — never lose hope, and remember that something that has never happened before might just happen in one day. Let this be the moment your luck turns around. Thanks to all the Tumblr blogs, I am grateful beyond words. Now, to live the best summer of my life, I’m going to the Bahamas with my sister and my closest three friends. (And yes, I manifested my friends too ;) )

— OPIA (maybe I’ll use this nickname to share motivational talks and thoughts again. I love you all <3)

SO HAPPY FOR YOUUU!!

[alaskan-wallflower]

YES to your last few posts, especially about Ponyboy also getting hurt which might get even more ignored than Johnny and Dally’s injuries (which still get ignored all the time). Dally hits Pony so hard to put the fire out that he literally knocks Pony out. When they meet again in the hospital Dally even says that he was worried he’d killed Pony from hitting him too hard. That’s super dangerous and could likely result in brain trauma (I know it was done to stop him getting burned but like it was a lesser of two evils situation: serious burns or serious concussion?)

no seriously like? and i know that coupled with the world of delusion pony was living in after johnny and dally died wasn’t doing him much good either. nobody talks about any of the injuries they’d sustain. or any of the gang had sustained. dally literally did concuss ponyboy. he knocked him out. he, dallas winston was worried he had killed ponyboy with how hard he had hit him. and adding on, before that when pony was jumped by socs at the movies what, days prior? they concussed him. there’s no way with that, added onto whatever brain injury he attained when dally knocked him out, that he doesn’t suffer some sort of consequence.

back to the latter, i NEVER see johnny’s canonical, “hard to look at” eye scar that goes down to his cheek in fanart. i never see any scars on johnny from the socs hearing his face. with metal rings nonetheless. i never ever ever see anyone talking about the burns, the scars, the bruises these children (because that’s what most of them are. children.) have. i never see any fanart of these characters with any real “flaws” to them. whether it’s a simple slip of the mind or its in favor of “perfect sexy men clones” (because that’s what happens when the majority of the characters in a story are teenage boys, they’re romanticized beyond the point of recognition) or they just don’t wanna discuss/add it, i don’t know, but there is absolutely no way any of the gang walks around with perfect skin, perfect hair, perfect clothes…look at them. they’re greasers. they’re hoods in the 1960s living in poverty in one of the most controversial towns with one of the messiest histories in the united states. nobody gives them scars or remembers their canonical ones for that matter. johnny has abusive parents canonically. steve’s implied to as well. (the latter is more so up for speculation i suppose though). curly and pony played chicken together with lit cigarettes. johnny’s eye scar. dally’s nature to get into fights. work injuries that darry’s most definitely sustained. soda being impulsive and getting his nose into things he shouldn’t be. soda and steve working on defective cars, they’ve probably sustained work injuries from used oil and such too (don’t quote me on this idk much about cars). two bit being himself and doing stupid things under the influence. in my opinion they’d all have scars or (for lack of better terms) “defects”.

(just wanna add on before people get defensive and mad, im not saying everyone has to draw or add the gang’s scars. im not asking you to analyze that deep. im just saying it’d be nice to see some like…diversity. something different. especially in the “everyone lives” aus. adding burns and scars would certainly be more interesting. and more true to what would have happened to them anyway. there’s no way they’d walk out without some sort of disfigurement or anything. some diversity and differences in design would be nice imo)

[m-o-o-n-f-i-r-e]

i just left this as a comment on an instagram post but uh…

you ever think about the fact that kris does seem to genuinely care about and get along with susie, but that susie doesn’t actually know Kris she just knows us controlling kris.

do you think kris worries about whether susie would still like them as them and not while being possessed? or if susie finding out about the player would scare them or mess up their friendship? do you think it’s more lonely and hurtful for them to hanging out with susie and ralsei, doing things that they might genuinely find fun otherwise , but being disconnected from the moment because they aren’t actually doing these things. they are something of an observer watching someone else pretending to be them making friends with someone kris might actually like but it’s not kris who’s making friends with them

or what about when the player makes a choice that kris never would but susie or ralsei seem to like it?

i hope susie gets to properly meet the real kris soon. themes moments we see of them where we dont really choose what kris doing are so sweet. like when their pouring juice into eachothers mouths in the church or when kris gives susie the knife to make the dark world and blushes when susie asks if they always carry a knife with them. or the other little gremlin things that kris has done in the past or does without our control that susie appreciates.

i just think they would be very good friends and i hope they can be one day

[thedreadvampy]

and actually I also know I'm good at accessible factual writing because:

my informational/opinion-led posts keep getting Many Notes

in those notes people largely correctly understand what I'm conveying

and don't debunk my claims even when they would to

and also

in a different context but engaging factual writing about social issues is Literally My Day Job and I am consistently extremely successful at it

[brokenrefraction]

im so scared of the future man

[cappurrccino]

I think what I'm going to do is get a big decorative jar and then any good things that happen, big or small, I'm going to write on a little piece of paper and put it in the jar and eventually it will either be full of paper stars or paper cranes or both all representing something good or silly or hopeful

[mirmidones]

3.40 i woke up bc i was cold and needed to pee and now i can't fall back asleep i keep thinking of the people i accidentally ghosted. is it ghosted if there was no intent to ghost? i feel so bad and it's not even like i don't think about them i often do think "i should really reply to them... once this is over ill properly sit down and write them... " and then i don't bc something else happens and im dealing with that and the longer i leave it unanswered the more difficult it becomes because i feel so guilty and therefore want to do things properly not half assed but bc i feel so guilty a part of me also tends to avoid it even more. if i do this to you just know i'm really sorry and ill get back to you i swear

[theendofmybody]

praying that one day tumblr users learn that it's neither correct nor progressive to only discuss drug policy in terms of addiction & addicts

[gingersnapwolves]

So today I want to talk about puberty blockers for transgender kids, because despite being cisgender, this is a subject I’m actually well-versed in. Specifically, I want to talk about how far backwards things have gone.

This story starts almost 20 years ago, and it’s kind of long, but I think it’s important to give you the full history. At the time, I was working as an administrative assistant for a pediatric endocrinologist in a red state. Not a deep deep red state like Alabama, we had a little bit of a purple trend, but still very much red. (I don’t want to say the state at the risk of doxxing myself.) And I took a phone call from a woman who said, “My son is transgender. Does your doctor do hormone therapy?”

I said, “Good question! Let me find out.”

I went into the back and found the doctor playing Solitaire on his computer and said, “Do you do hormone therapy for transgender kids?” It had literally never come up before. He had opened his practice there in the early 2000s. This was roughly 2006, and the first time someone asked. Without looking up from his game of Solitaire, the doctor said, “I’ve never done it before, but I know how it works, so sure.”

I got back on the phone and told the mom, who was overjoyed, and scheduled an appointment for her son. He was the first transgender child we treated with puberty blockers. But not, by far, the first child we treated with puberty blockers, period. Because puberty blockers are used very commonly for children with precocious puberty (early-onset puberty). I would say about twenty percent of the kids our doctor treated were for precocious puberty and were on puberty blockers. They have been well studied and are widely used, safe, and effective.

Well. It turned out, the doctor I worked for was the only doctor in the state who was willing to do this. And word spread pretty fast in the tight-knit community of ‘parents of transgender children in a red state’. We started seeing more kids. A better drug came out. We saw some kids who were at the age where they were past puberty, and prescribed them estrogen or testosterone. Our doctor became, I’m fairly sure, a small folk hero to this community. 

Insurance coverage was a struggle. I remember copying articles and pages out of the Endocrine Society Manual to submit with prior authorization requests for the medications. Insurance coverage was a struggle for a lot of what we did, though. Growth hormone for kids with severe idiopathic short stature. Insulin pumps, which weren’t as common at the time, and then continuous glucose monitoring, when that came out. Insurance struggles were just part and parcel of the job.

I remember vividly when CVS Caremark, a pharmaceutical management company, changed their criteria and included gender dysphoria as a covered diagnosis for puberty blockers. I thought they had put the option on the questionnaire to trigger an automatic denial. But no - it triggered an approval. Medicaid started to cover it. I got so good at getting approvals with my by then tidy packet of articles and documentation that I actually had people in other states calling me to see what I was submitting (the pharmaceutical rep gave them my number because they wanted more people on their drug, which, shady, but sure. He did ask me if it was okay first).

And here’s the key point of this story:

At no point, during any of this, did it ever even occur to any of us that we might have to worry about whether or not what we were doing was legal.

It just never even came up. It was the medically recommended treatment so we did it. And seeing what’s happening in the UK and certain states in America is both terrifying and genuinely shocking to me, as someone who did this for almost fifteen years, without ever even wondering about the legality of it.

The doctor retired some years ago, at which point there were two other doctors in the state who were willing to prescribe the medications for transgender kids. I truly think that he would still be working if nobody else had been willing to take those kids on as patients. He was, by the way, a white cisgender heterosexual Boomer. I remember when he was introduced to the concept of ‘genderfluid’ because one of our patients on HRT wanted to go off. He said ‘that’s so interesting!’ and immediately went to Google to learn more about it. 

I watched these kids transform. I saw them come into the office the first time, sometimes anxious and uncertain, sometimes sullen and angry. I saw them come in the subsequent times, once they were on hormone therapy, how they gradually became happy and confident in themselves. I saw the smiles on their faces when I gave them a gender marker letter for the DMV. I heard them cheer when I called to tell them I’d gotten HRT approved by insurance and we were calling in a prescription. It was honestly amazing and I will always consider the work I did in that red state with those kids to be something I am incredibly proud of. I was honored to be a part of it.

When I see all this transgender backlash, it’s horrifying, because it was well on the way to become standard and accepted treatment. Insurances started to cover it. Other doctors were learning to prescribe it. And now … it’s fucking illegal? Like what the actual fuck. We have gone so far backwards that it makes me want to cry. I don’t know how to stop this slide. But I wrote this so people would understand exactly how steep the slide is.

[gratuiciel]

move aside takemichi/everyone it's time for kisaki/everyone

[joycrispy]

Awhile ago @ouidamforeman made this post:

This shot through my brain like a chain of firecrackers, so, without derailing the original post, I have some THOUGHTS to add about why this concept is not only hilarious (because it is), but also...

It. It kind of fucks. Severely.

And in a delightfully Pratchett-y way, I'd dare to suggest.

I'll explain:

As inferred above, both Crowley AND Aziraphale have canonical Biblical counterparts. Not by name, no, but by function.

Crowley, of course, is the serpent of Eden.

(note on the serpent of Eden: In Genesis 3:1-15, at least, the serpent is not identified as anything other than a serpent, albeit one that can talk. Later, it will be variously interpreted as a traitorous agent of Hell, as a demon, as a guise of Satan himself, etc. In Good Omens --as a slinky ginger who walks funny)

Lesser known, at least so far as I can tell, is the flaming sword. It, too, appears in Genesis 3, in the very last line:

"So he drove out the man; and placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." --Genesis 3:24, KJV

Thanks to translation ambiguity, there is some debate concerning the nature of the flaming sword --is it a divine weapon given unto one of the Cherubim (if so, why only one)? Or is it an independent entity, which takes the form of a sword (as other angelic beings take the form of wheels and such)? For our purposes, I don't think the distinction matters. The guard at the gate of Eden, whether an angel wielding the sword or an angel who IS the sword, is Aziraphale.

(note on the flaming sword: in some traditions --Eastern Orthodox, for example-- it is held that upon Christ's death and resurrection, the flaming sword gave up it's post and vanished from Eden for good. By these sensibilities, the removal of the sword signifies the redemption and salvation of man.

...Put a pin in that. We're coming back to it.)

So, we have our pair. The Serpent and the Sword, introduced at the beginning and the end (ha) of the very same chapter of Genesis.

But here's the important bit, the bit that's not immediately obvious, the bit that nonetheless encapsulates one of the central themes, if not THE central theme, of Good Omens:

The Sword was never intended to guard Eden while Adam and Eve were still in it.

Do you understand?

The Sword's function was never to protect them. It doesn't even appear until after they've already fallen. No... it was to usher Adam and Eve from the garden, and then keep them out. It was a threat. It was a punishment.

The flaming sword was given to be used against them.

So. Again. We have our pair. The Serpent and the Sword: the inception and the consequence of original sin, personified. They are the one-two punch that launches mankind from paradise, after Hell lures it to destruction and Heaven condemns it for being destroyed. Which is to say that despite being, supposedly, hereditary enemies on two different sides of a celestial cold war, they are actually unified by one purpose, one pivotal role to play in the Divine Plan: completely fucking humanity over.

That's how it's supposed to go. It is written.

...But, in Good Omens, they're not just the Serpent and the Sword.

They're Crowley and Aziraphale.

(author begins to go insane from emotion under the cut)

In Good Omens, humanity is handed it's salvation (pin!) scarcely half an hour after losing it. Instead of looming over God's empty garden, the sword protects a very sad, very scared and very pregnant girl. And no, not because a blameless martyr suffered and died for the privilege, either.

It was just that she'd had such a bad day. And there were vicious animals out there. And Aziraphale worried she would be cold.

...I need to impress upon you how much this is NOT just a matter of being careless with company property. With this one act of kindness, Aziraphale is undermining the whole entire POINT of the expulsion from Eden. God Herself confronts him about it, and he lies. To God.

And the Serpent--

(Crowley, that is, who wonders what's so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil anyway; who thinks that maybe he did a GOOD thing when he tempted Eve with the apple; who objects that God is over-reacting to a first offense; who knows what it is to fall but not what it is to be comforted after the fact...)

--just goes ahead and falls in love with him about it.

As for Crowley --I barely need to explain him, right? People have been making the 'didn't the serpent actually do us a solid?' argument for centuries. But if I'm going to quote one of them, it may as well be the one Neil Gaiman wrote ficlet about:

"If the account given in Genesis is really true, ought we not, after all, to thank this serpent? He was the first schoolmaster, the first advocate of learning, the first enemy of ignorance, the first to whisper in human ears the sacred word liberty, the creator of ambition, the author of modesty, of inquiry, of doubt, of investigation, of progress and of civilization." --Robert G. Ingersoll

The first to ask questions.

Even beyond flattering literary interpretation, we know that Crowley is, so often, discreetly running damage control on the machinations of Heaven and Hell. When he can get away with it. Occasionally, when he can't (1827).

And Aziraphale loves him for it, too. Loves him back.

And so this romance plays out over millennia, where they fall in love with each other but also the world, because of each other and because of the world. But it begins in Eden. Where, instead of acting as the first Earthly example of Divine/Diabolical collusion and callousness--

(other examples --the flood; the bet with Satan; the back channels; the exchange of Holy Water and Hellfire; and on and on...)

--they refuse. Without even necessarily knowing they're doing it, they just refuse. Refuse to trivialize human life, and refuse to hate each other.

To write a story about the Serpent and the Sword falling in love is to write a story about transgression.

Not just in the sense that they are a demon and an angel, and it's ~forbidden. That's part of it, yeah, but the greater part of it is that they are THIS demon and angel, in particular. From The Real Bible's Book of Genesis, in the chapter where man falls.

It's the sort of thing you write and laugh. And then you look at it. And you think. And then you frown, and you sit up a little straighter. And you think.

And then you keep writing.

And what emerges hits you like a goddamn truck.

(...A lot of Pratchett reads that way. I believe Gaiman when he says Pratchett would have been happy with the romance, by the way. I really really do).

It's a story about transgression, about love as transgression. They break the rules by loving each other, by loving creation, and by rejecting the hatred and hypocrisy that would have triangulated them as a unified blow against humanity, before humanity had even really got started. And yeah, hell, it's a queer romance too, just to really drive the point home (oh, that!!! THAT!!!)

...I could spend a long time wildly gesturing at this and never be satisfied. Instead of watching me do that (I'll spare you), please look at this gif:

I love this shot so much.

Look at Eve and Crowley moving, at the same time in the same direction, towards their respective wielders of the flaming sword. Adam reaches out and takes her hand; Aziraphale reaches out and covers him with a wing.

You know what a shot like that establishes? Likeness. Commonality. Kinship.

"Our side" was never just Crowley and Aziraphale. Crowley says as much at the end of season 1 ("--all of us against all of them."). From the beginning, "our side" was Crowley, Aziraphale, and every single human being. Lately that's around 8 billion, but once upon a time it was just two other people. Another couple. The primeval mother and father.

But Adam and Eve die, eventually. Humanity grows without them. It's Crowley and Aziraphale who remain, and who protect it. Who...oversee it's upbringing.

Godfathers. Sort of.

[iydiamartinx]

GUILTY PLEASURES

Pairing: Jason Todd x Reader

divider by: cafekitsune & omi-resources word count: 1.8k synopsis: You cheat on your boyfriend Jason with the Red Hood a/n: To my anon who requested this hope you liked it! I had to rush through editing so apologies for any grammar errors y'all might find. warnings: 18+ mdni, use of the words whore & slut, a little rough.

Jason Todd had been tailing a weapons deal all night, dressed in full Red Hood gear, helmet and all. The scum he’d come to intercept were already zip-tied and unconscious in the back of a stolen van. Meanwhile, you had told him you were going out with your girlfriends and had stopped texting him about an half hour ago much to his worry, so instead of going home like he planned he decided for Red hood to make a pass by the club you had went to.

Which was why he was leaning against his bike, by the alley across the street watching the people entering and exiting. He straightened up as you stumbled out giggling with your friends and he huffed both annoyed and amused at the sight. You were in the middle of saying something, hands waving animatedly when you suddenly paused at the sight of him.

You said something to your friends before you began staggering towards him.

“Reeeeed!” you sang—sang—as you stumbled closer, high heels clacking on the wet pavement, your dress slightly askew and hair tousled from what looked like a hell of a night out.

Jason froze. “Y/N?”

You beamed, oblivious to his tension. “Youuuu know my name,” you hiccuped, staggering toward him with a grin that could short-circuit every neuron in his brain. “God, its not fair that your voice this hot.”

He coughed, straightening. “You shouldn’t be here. It’s late. And dangerous.”

You only grinned, as you staggered closer hand clutching his arm as you pressed yourself up against him. “Mhmm good thing I have a big bad crime lord to keep an eye on me.”

Jason cleared his throat unsure whether he should be amused or offended that you were flirting with him—well Red Hood.

You, meanwhile, were utterly unbothered.

In fact, you leaned closer, pressing up on your toes like you were about to tell him a state secret. “You know,” you whispered conspiratorially, breath warm against the edge of his helmet, “I think about you. Like… a lot.”

Jason swallowed. “Is that so?”

You giggle. “Mhm hm,” Your wandering fingers begin to trail up under his shirt, smile growing as you felt his muscles tense. “All those hard muscles, that sexy voice, you’re like every bad decision I’ve ever wanted to make all rolled into one.”

Jason sucked in a slow breath, jaw tightening behind the helmet. The feel of your fingers skating up his abdomen sent a jolt through him, and he hated—loved—how easily you could fluster him like this. Especially dressed like that. Especially talking like this.

You took advantage of his frozen state, your grin downright wicked as you nudged him backward, step by step, deeper into the alley’s shadows. His back hit the brick wall with a dull thud, but he didn’t resist. He just watched you, tense beneath the armour, like a predator unsure if he was about to pounce—or be devoured.

Your fingers slipped out from beneath his shirt, nails grazing down his chest plate before trailing lower—lower still—until they flirted with the waistband of his tactical pants.

“Y/N—” His voice was a warning. A plea. A prayer. He wasn’t sure which.

“Just relax, Hood… no one’s gotta know,” you purr, voice velvet-draped sin, your smile all teeth and temptation.

Jason’s jaw clenched, his breath catching as your fingers danced at the edge of his restraint—and his patience. He had fought crime lords, torn through ambushes, taken bullets without blinking…but you? You were something else.

The second your fingers brushed against him, Jason snapped.

In one fluid, furious motion, he spun you, pressing you up against the cold brick wall. His chest pressed hard into your back, the weight of him pinning you effortlessly in place. One gloved hand flattened against your stomach to hold you still, and the alley suddenly felt claustrophobic with heat and tension.

“Is this what you want?” he growled against your ear, voice rough and ragged. “To be bent over in a filthy alley and be taken by a criminal like some cheap whore?”

You let out a soft, breathless noise in answer—needy, aching—and pushed back into him deliberately, rubbing back against him. The sound he made in response was low and guttural, somewhere between a curse and a prayer.

The hand not holding you still began to unbuckle his belt as he unzipped himself just enough to set his throbbing length free. Then he gripped the hem of your dress and shoved it up with no patience at all, his fingers trailing fire against your bare skin. You felt the sharp tug as something tore, heard the hiss of his breath as his hand disappeared into his pocket of his jacket—where he stashed your now-ruined panties like a trophy.

The cold air brushing your exposed pussy had you whining, your voice breaking into a desperate whimper. “Please,” you breathed, unable to hold back. “Please.”

One gloved hand reached for your throat while the other wrapped around his hard length, lining himself up before thrusting into you in one smooth motion. You were dripping wet and offered no resistance as he slid inside you with ease, your eyes rolling back as a low groan rumbled from his chest. He was was so long and thick that he filled up every inch of you.

A loud whine tore past your lips and his hand moved to muffle your mouth as he pulled out. “You gotta be quiet doll, you don’t want everyone hearing me ruin you now do you?”

You tried to say something through his hand, but he chose that exact moment to thrust sharply back into you. Whatever words you had died in a needy moan as your cunt clenched down around his cock. The last of his restraint snapped at the sensation, and he began pounding into you in earnest.

Part of him knew how wrong and fucked up this was—you were technically cheating on him with the Red Hood. But at the same time, he was the Red Hood. So were you really cheating? The complication of it all only made him thrust into you harder,  taking you rougher than he usually did.

He might’ve felt guilty—might’ve—if not for how much you seemed to love it. His hand shifted from your mouth, gloved fingers curling at your lips. You didn’t hesitate, taking them in eagerly, sucking around them, gagging and drooling as he pushed them deeper.

“That’s it, doll. Take everything I give you,” he groaned, voice low and cooing—a gentle contrast to the brutal pace of his thrusts. “Such a good girl, lettin’ me use your holes.”

The sounds echoing through the alley were utterly obscene—from the wet squelch of your pussy to the sharp slap of skin on skin, and the broken moans spilling past your lips as you begged for more.

“Mmmf—feels… s’good—fuck…” you mumbled around his fingers, the words wet and barely coherent, spit trailing down your chin where his hand kept your mouth stretched open.

“Look at you… so fucked out on my cock” He groaned, “You’re such a little slut taking it so well.”

The bruising grip around your waist shifted to your clit, his fingers rubbing fast, harsh circles that made your hips jerk as you cried out. But with his cock still buried deep inside you and his strength anchoring you in place, there was nowhere to go—no escape—as he worked you toward your orgasm.

It hit you hard and fast—your head falling back, your entire body tensing before collapsing into trembling aftershocks as stars danced across your vision. He kept pounding you through it, relentless, until he finally followed, burying himself deep as he came with a broken curse, emptying himself inside you.

For a long moment, the only sound that filled the silent alley was the sound of both your heavy, ragged breathing as you both fought to catch your breaths and calm your racing hearts. Your palms pressed flat against the brick wall, still trembling, while his body remained close behind—forehead resting against your shoulder, chest rising and falling against your back in rhythm with your own.

Neither of you spoke. Not at first.

Then, finally, the quiet was broken by the low rasp of Red Hood’s voice, “You know,” he drawled, still breathless, “I don’t think your boyfriend would approve of what we just did.”

You let out a breathless, incredulous laugh, your head tilting back just enough for your eyes to find him over your shoulder. “Oh no,” you murmured with mock concern, “you think he’ll be mad?”

Red Hood huffed as he carefully began to pull out of you, his cum immediately dribbling from your well-used hole. “Well, he certainly won’t approve.”

You turned to look at him, your eyes wide with faux innocence, lashes fluttering like you hadn’t just been thoroughly fucked against a brick wall. “Really?” you said, voice light, teasing—dangerously sweet. “Even after the mind-blowing orgasm we both just had?”

Jason froze. “What.”

You tilted your head, your grin only growing. “I know it’s you, Jason.”

Silence.

He blinked, eyes searching yours, as if he’d misheard. “What… how—”

“Baby,” you cut him off with a laugh, soft and incredulous. “You seriously thought I wouldn’t figure it out?”

Jason just stared at you, lips parting slightly. You could see the moment it fully registered, the sharp shift behind his eyes as his mind caught up.

“You knew this whole time?” he asked, almost in disbelief.

You huffed and rolled your eyes as you tug down your dress. “I wouldn’t cheat on you, Jason. Come on. I’ve known for months. You’re not exactly subtle.”

His mouth opened, but you kept going, voice now edged with affection and amused exasperation. “You leave your gear everywhere. Under the bed? Really? That’s your big secret hiding spot?”

Jason let out a groan and dragged the helmet off his head, revealing sweat-mussed hair and a flushed, stunned expression caught somewhere between impressed, exasperated, and undeniably aroused.

“You are such a menace,” he muttered as he pulled you in, his voice low and full of something torn between amusement and affection.

Your hands came up to cup his face, fingers brushing along his jaw, thumbs stroking gently across flushed skin. His eyes flicked shut at the touch, just for a second—like he couldn’t help but melt into you, even after everything.

“Yeah,” you murmured, a soft smile tugging at your lips, “but I’m your menace.”

Your lips met softly, a gentle contrast to everything that had come before. When you finally pulled away, your expression shifted into something sheepish.

“You’re gonna have to carry me,” you mumbled, still breathless. “I don’t think my legs are working after how hard you fucked me.”

He snorted, the sound low and amused, as he smoothly lifted you into his arms without so much as a grunt of effort. “We still have all night,” he said, glancing at you with a wicked glint in his eye. “And trust me… you won’t be walking properly for a week.”

And with that, he carried you off to his bike, so he could take you back to the apartment to get started on round two.

[lockefanfic]

Translate

Part One of Three. 12k words.

---

The day before the trip, you’re turning a corner at the office and she’s spilling an iced caramel macchiato - extra whipped cream, extra caramel drizzle - onto your clothes.

“Oh my god-” she spits, mouth frozen open as the reality of what she’d just done dawns on you both. She sees the suit, sees the ID card dangling on a lanyard from your neck, sees the Director title on it - and freezes.

After you both overcome your momentary shock, she steps close, producing napkins from her blazer’s inside pocket and using it to wipe uselessly at the whipped cream and caffeinated sugar-water soaking into your jacket.

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” you say, genuinely. You were late to a meeting, and it was probably your fault for turning the corner too quickly without looking. You notice the equally wet patch on her own blazer, and notice her napkins quickly shredding into wet pieces as they try and fail to absorb the rogue caffeine stain. You reach into your pocket for your handkerchief and offer it to her.

“I- shit, I’ll, uh,” she stammers, even as she takes your handkerchief.

“Don’t worry about it,” you say, slipping the jacket off, offering a crooked smile. For the first time you look up at her. She’s an unfamiliar face, and her ID card isn’t immediately visible. She’s slim, with dark hair, and beneath the awkward, worried look on her features is the kind of face that belongs on a magazine. You smile sheepishly.

“I’m so fucking sorry, I’ll get it cleaned, oh my god-”

“Seriously, don’t worry about it,” you say, already heading down the hall. “Late to a meeting. See you around!”

She watches you leave, still a little frozen in shock. She clutches what’s left of her macchiato in one hand, your handkerchief in the other.

She sighs.

---

“Seoul. Tokyo. Two weeks each. You leave tomorrow.” Taeyeon slides a tablet across her desk, just past the Vice President, Strategy name plate. On it are graphs and spreadsheets, numbers generally in green and arrows pointing generally upward. She spares a glance at the clearly dripping blazer folded over the back of your chair, and the corresponding damp spot on your chest, before leaning forward and threading her fingers atop her desk.

“Seoul is doing fine. Tokyo needs to pick it up a little,” she continues, tone sharp and direct, business persona fully on and engaged. “Either way, the CEO wants a status report on both offices by end-of-month so he can decide whether to expand ops in either country. We already have the hard data we need for a business case - we just need someone on the ground to confirm the numbers. Meet with the directors of each office, let them wine and dine you, take a tour of the facilities and offices, slap together a report for me to hand to the boss when you get back. Piece of cake.”

“Sounds like a month-long vacation,” you reply, relaxing a little further into the leather chair opposite her desk.

“Consider it a thank you for the good work you did on the Hirai deal,” Taeyeon says with a shrug, taking a sip from her mug - double-shot Americano, black, extra hot. You smirk as you recall the details of the deal, which took every ounce of your attention and time for a couple of months. There were too many long nights spent in this very office, the two of you working away at this document or that. “And you’re too busy?” Taeyeon glares, but there’s no heat in the frown on her lips. “I’m going to London to check up on the office there. I’d spend too much time in Seoul fielding ‘why aren’t you married to a chaebol heir and popping out kids yet’ questions from the family.”

“Coward. Come to Seoul with me. I’ll play the handsome foreign fiance in front of your parents. Maybe we tell them there’s a bun in the oven. Maybe in the hotel room-”

Taeyeon throws a paper clip at you. Her faux-serious frown becomes a reluctant smile to mirror the one on your own. Thankfully, her promotion to a VP position a year ago didn’t change the close relationship you’d forged over almost a decade of working together, especially now that you technically reported to her. HR would’ve had a field day with the things said and done in this twentieth-floor corner office, had even a fraction of it somehow leaked beyond its walls. 

“You had your shot with me,” she says, mostly-jokingly, under her breath. You don’t miss the wistfulness in the corners of her eyes as she crosses her arms and makes a playful show of looking out of her office’s floor-to-ceiling windows at Vancouver’s dark, cloudy afternoon. “I’ve moved on.”

Silence reigns for a moment that felt longer than it actually was. The I haven’t on your lips dies there, unspoken.

“Anyway, you’ll need a translator,” Taeyeon continues, eager to change the subject before it drowned you both in memories of years past. She shuffles a few papers around randomly on her desk in an attempt to alleviate the sudden tension in the air. When she looks up at you, the wistfulness isn’t entirely gone - just pushed down by the professionalism she wore like armor. “Her file’s on the tablet. Some new kid from Marketing.”

Your eyes linger on Taeyeon’s for a moment longer before you pick up the tablet. There is something behind her eyes in that split-second - thoughts she perhaps wants to turn into words. But the moment passes as quickly as it comes. She turns her eyes to her laptop, and you return yours to the tablet.

A swipe left reveals a resume and an unfamiliar name.

“Ryujin Shin.”

“Brand new to the company - only been with us less than a year, but apparently she’s already a bit of a rock star. Got promoted to Marketing Lead in six months. Her manager says she volunteered for this assignment. She was pretty insistent that she get it, apparently. Maybe she thinks overseas experience will be good for her career.”

“Hmm,” you muse, as you review Ryujin’s resume. Degree with honors, top of her training cohort, gleaming reference letters. 

“She’s fluent in both Korean and Japanese,” Tayeon continues, “so make sure you get your translations directly from her. CEO wants real shit in the report, not a sugarcoated version from the local translators.”

You place the tablet back on her desk as you rise. “I’ll get it done, ma’am,” you state, before straightening up and giving her an exaggerated military salute. 

Taeyeon returns the salute with one of her own, a soft smile perking up the corners of her lips. For a moment she’s twenty-six again, bright-eyed, greeting you with a smile at the company orientation that she was in charge of organizing. You feel something stir in your chest, somewhere deep down where the past still lingered.

“Dismissed, Director,” she answers.

Her smile follows you out the door. It lingers even after you leave, but tinged with a sadness that she’d fought to keep hidden while you were in the room.

---

Ryujin Shin was late.

You weren’t exactly sure what to expect - her profile didn’t include a photo or even so much as a birthdate, so you treated every female that approached within twenty feet as potentially being your translator and guide for the next month. This resulted in some awkward eye contact and equally awkward smiles with random female travellers making their way through Vancouver International Airport’s departures terminal.

You’re directing one such awkward smile toward a middle-aged woman when the actual Ryujin Shin approaches. “Director?”

You turn your head to the sound and there she is - the girl from the morning prior. The one that had left half her drink on your suit jacket.

“...Ryujin Shin?”

“That’s me,” she says, shyly. She fidgets with the slim silver chain around her wrist. She’s dressed casually, in an oversized navy cardigan and wide cut jeans, but looks just as fitting for a magazine cover as she did when she was spilling iced caffeine on you the day before.  “Shall we get going?”

---

The thirteen hours over the Pacific are relatively uneventful - hours of movies on your iPad, a microwaved but surprisingly edible bibimbap, and dying more than you’d like in the latest Souls-like to test your blood pressure. Ryujin spent most of it asleep, snoring softly in the seat next to you.

It’s near midnight when the two of you arrive in South Korea’s capital city. The bright neon lights of downtown Seoul paint Ryujin’s soft features in bright blues and pastel pinks as she stares out the taxi windows with wonder, awe, and nostalgia clashing on her soft features. The taxi pulls up in front of a high-end boutique hotel that your assistant had insisted was popular with travel influencers.

Ryujin slipped into her translator duties early, helping the two of you check in to your rooms. You don’t miss the blush on her cheeks and the embarrassed wave of her hands when the desk clerk sheepishly asks her a question in Korean before shooting you a glance heavy with implication. Eventually, Ryujin receives two key cards from the clerk and hands one of them to you as you both make your way to the elevator.

“She thought we were married,” she admits, shyly, as she pushes the up arrow button on the wall. “Thought we were here for our wedding or something.”

“Cute,” you say, shooting her a smile. The blush lingers.

The elevator dings on the 10th floor, and the doors open. Ryujin heads out first, but when you make to follow her, she stops you with a raised hand.

“Company got you a suite. You’re on the 14th floor. Room 1421.”

“Oh,” you admit. “Got it.”

“Don’t forget - first meeting tomorrow is at 9am. See you in the lobby at 8?”

“I’ll be there.”

“Good night, Director,” she says with a slim smile, before disappearing behind the closing elevator doors, leaving you still a little unsure as to what to make of her.

--

Your first day in the Seoul office is filled with introductions and greetings - it wasn’t your first time in the city and you were used to the overly formal introductions, but it didn’t make things any less awkward. The day starts with a meeting with the office’s leadership, each of whom rise from their seats in turn and provide you with their name, title, and what you assume to be the usual corporate platitudes and greetings.

At your shoulder, Ryujin translates.

“...Shin Yuna, Marketing Lead. She’s looking forward to working with you. Lee Chaeryeong, Operations Lead. She’s looking forward to working with you. Hwang Yeji, Legal Counsel. She’s looking forward to working with you. Choi Jisu, HR Head. She’s looking forward to-”

You turn your head to Ryujin and give her a smile. She looks sharp in a white blouse, navy blazer, and charcoal pencil skirt, hair pulled up into a professional bun atop her head. 

“I get it,” you whisper, softly, with a small smile. “They’re looking forward to working with me.”

Ryujin nods. Her cheeks blush slightly and there’s the ghost of a smile on her lips, but she otherwise returns to translating as the office director begins his opening speech.

---

“...profitability is up eighteen point nine five percent - primarily driven by… logistics improvements- no, a better word would be enhancements… that allow for faster- actually, no, I mean smoother transport of goods up from the port of Busan to manufacturing and distribution facilities in Seoul,” Ryujin says, softly but clearly. At the head of the room, the Operations Lead continues her presentation in rapid-fire Korean, gesturing to a bar graph that emphasizes the eighteen point nine five percent increase in large green numbers.

“Ask her to elaborate on what she means by ‘logistics enhancements,’” you ask Ryujin, turning your head to speak softly to her. You watch as Ryujin nods and frantically jots down notes in a messy looking notebook.

Ryujin raises her hand, interrupting the presentation, and asks your question in Korean. She corrects herself with a couple of her word choices, as though a better word had come to her just as the previous one had left her mouth. The Operations Lead takes a moment to consider her response before answering. “She says they found a way to… get better pricing agreements- no, contracts- from their suppliers - no, I mean, she used the term suppliers, but I think she means shipping specialists. The big difference that resulted in the increase was how they went from relying on trucks -I mean, truckload shipping, to high-speed rail to send goods from the Port of Busan to Seoul. The costs for shipping via trains are lesser than shipping via trucks due to-”

“They went from trucks to trains, got it,” you say, with a grin.

Ryujin nods. “Yeah,” she agrees, with a flustered smile.

“Thank her, and ask her to continue.”

The smile lingers on Ryujin’s lips as she asks the Operations Lead to continue. Out of the corner of your eye, you watch as she scribbles “trucks to trains” in her notebook.

---

The setting sun is painting Seoul in gold and amber by the time the day’s meetings have wrapped up. You were used to the long working hours involved with working in Asian offices, but the jetlag made the first afternoon especially draining.

Next to you, Ryujin stifles a yawn as you both step out into the early summer evening. 

“Jetlag?” you ask as you both head towards the street and the taxis waiting there.

“Jetlag,” she repeats. She fidgets with the silver chain bracelet again, fingers tracing the delicate links - a habit of hers, you’d noticed. She flags down a waiting taxi, and you follow her into the cab as she gives the driver the address of the hotel and the car pulls away from the curb.

“Dinner plans tonight?” you ask as you watch Seoul’s downtown whiz by in a blur of concrete and glass.

There is a moment of silence. When Ryujin doesn’t answer, you give her a glance to find her eyes already on yours. She looks away shyly, fingers playing with the glimmering silver wrapped around her wrist.

“Uh, probably just going to grab something from the convenience store,” she says. “Kinda tired.”

“Gotcha. I suppose I’ll do the same and call it a night early,” you admit. “Jetlag’s a bitch.”

There is an awkward, uncomfortable silence for a few more blocks. At a red light, you watch as the neon sign above a fried chicken and beer restaurant beckons weary office workers into its doors. On the outdoor tables, tired-looking office employees tuck into delicious looking chicken wings and frosted mugs of beer.

“I wouldn’t mind some of that right now,” you say, hoping to break the tension.

Silence for a few more seconds. You watch as Ryujin peers out your window and notices the sign. Her lips curl up into a small, cautious smile.

She asks the driver to pull over.

---

The fried chicken and beer restaurant is busy but comfortable, the kind of neighborhood place that catered mostly to local employees from the surrounding corporate towers grabbing a bite and a drink on their way home. Ryujin orders in Korean, and soon enough you find yourselves presented with that heavenly combination of fried chicken and light beer. A side of fries and mozzarella sticks accompany the main course at Ryujin’s insistence.

The conversation is light and casual, mostly about the day’s meetings. It’s towards the end of the meal that you muster the courage to broach the topic that had been weighing on your mind for the whole trip.

“Hey, Ryujin,” you begin. “Are we… cool? I dunno, just wanted to make sure you didn’t secretly hate me or something.”

Ryujin takes a sip of beer, likely to buy time for her to form a response. She places her mug back on the table and examines the half-eaten piece of chicken thigh on her plate for a few seconds, as though she could find the right answer to your question somewhere amidst the delicious breaded and fried poultry on her plate.

“You don’t remember me, do you?” she asks, cautiously.

You smile to yourself as you take a sip of your own beer.

“Hmm,” you begin, feigning ignorance. “I don’t think we’ve met prior to this trip. Your file says you’ve been with the company a year or so?”

“Yeah.”

“Hmmmmm,” you continue, tapping a finger on your lips for emphasis. “No, I think I’d remember if I bumped into someone like you. So no, I don’t remember. But my suit jacket might.”

A moment passes before Ryujin’s lips break into a tentative smile.

“I’m so, so sorry,” she says, covering her face shyly with her hands. “I felt so bad.”

“Don’t worry about it,” you reply, happy to have lightened the mood somewhat. “I didn’t really like that jacket anyway.”

“I could pay to have it cleaned?”

“Naw,” you assure. “It wasn’t as bad as it looked. It was due for a visit to the dry cleaners, anyway. Dropped it off on my way to the airport.”

Ryujin nods, returning to pushing the chicken thigh around on her plate. “Alright,” she says, “but drinks after this are on me. Least I could do for leaving half a macchiato on your jacket.”

“Sure,” you agree, excited at the prospect of getting to know her better over drinks. You take your corporate credit card out of your wallet and place it on the table before excusing yourself from the table to hit the washroom.

The waiter comes by and Ryujin uses your card to pay for the meal. She gathers her things and waits for you outside the restaurant.

Outside, she lets a long, sad sigh escape her throat, wishing you had a better memory.

---

“I was born here,” Ryujin begins as she pours you a shot of soju from the second bottle the two of you were working on. “Family moved to Vancouver when I was six, so I essentially grew up there - but somehow, coming back always feels like coming home.”

“Ahh,” you say, taking the small shot glass and tapping it to hers before downing the shot. The soju here is harder and less sweet - unlike the overly sugary versions back home. You pick at the seafood pancake on the table with your chopsticks, chasing the burn of the alcohol with the grease of fried batter. “So - what brought you to the company?”

Ryujin takes her own bite of the pancake before refilling your glasses with another shot. She takes a moment to swirl the alcohol around in the glass, not quite bringing it to her lips just yet.

“It’s the biggest game in town,” she begins. “Wanted to work with the best.”

“Fair enough. How has the first year been?”

Ryujin’s eyes leave yours for a moment, drifting to the space between you.

“Good,” she begins, the word leaving her mouth in a measured, careful way. “The orientation week in particular was… fun.”

You perk up at the mention of orientation week. The company had a mentorship program wherein every new employee was matched with a senior leader for a week during their company orientation  - one of Taeyeon’s ideas. It was during the inaugural orientation week, almost a decade ago, that you and Taeyeon had begun your friendship. You’d since taken over leadership of the program following her promotion to VP a year ago.

“That’s good to hear,” you begin. “I really enjoyed my own orientation week, and I really wanted to make sure new employees get the same experience. I’m glad yours went well.”

Ryujin nods, a soft smile perking up the corners of her mouth. The sight of it stirs you, because you’re convinced it’s the first genuine smile you’ve seen on her lips.

“It was great,” she says, eyes suddenly bright, smile a little more authentic, a little more real - as though she were waiting the whole trip to bring up this topic. “I really liked getting to know-”

Your phone, on the table between you, vibrates. The message preview on your lock screen shows a message from Taeyeon, asking if the weather in Seoul is as good as it is in London. Attached to it is a selfie - her in front of Big Ben, half a world away.

“Sorry,” you say, grabbing the phone and putting it on Do Not Disturb before replacing it face down on the table.

“It’s fine,” Ryujin says, not having missed the brief message preview or the attached photo. She downs her shot of soju - without tapping her glass to yours. “It’s getting late, and we’ve got meetings tomorrow. Shall we?”

---

“That was fun,” you say as the two of you wait for the elevators back at the hotel. “Thanks for translating those menus for me. Would’ve been microwaved rice and a can of tuna for me otherwise.” Ryujin smiles, but even the blush of alcohol on her cheeks fails to hide the awkwardness that is still lingering somewhere behind the curve of her lips.

“No worries,” she says, as the two of you step into the elevator and she hits the button for her floor. “Thanks for the food.”

“Thank the company card, not me,” you say with a grin.

She smiles back, politely, but doesn’t say anything more. The elevator doors open to her floor, and she steps out.

“First meeting’s at 9-”

“-see you at 8,” you finish.

She smiles a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. You wave good night. As the elevator door closes again, the forced smile leaves her face, replaced quickly with a frown - just a moment too soon, just long enough for you to see. 

The elevator rises to your floor, leaving you no closer to figuring out Ryujin Shin than you were the day before.

---

“Director!” Shin Yuna exclaims, the title overly sweet and saccharine, almost sing-song in its delivery. “Do you… want to drink? With us?”

The Marketing Lead is standing a few steps apart from a dozen or so members of the Seoul office that are seemingly debating which dinner and drinks spot to hit first. Yuna - bright, cheery, and a little too handsy - skips over to you, wrapping her forearm around yours.

“Team bonding,” she says, her accent giving the English words a pleasant lilt. Her smile is wide and cheerful, and for a moment you lose yourself in the fact that an attractive young woman is asking you to join her for drinks.

“Uh-” you stammer, even as Yuna forcefully drags you towards the rest of the team, who have begun to wander towards the first destination of the night. 

“What’s wrong?” Yuna asks, lower lip extended in an exaggerated pout.

“Nothing, Yuna - it’s just-”

“Ah, I see,” she says, turning back towards where Ryujin is just appearing from the revolving door entrance to the office, eyes glued to her phone. “You need her. To… translate.”

Ryujin looks up from her phone to see you, Yuna’s arm hooked in yours.

“Ryujin-ssi!” Yuna exclaims, waving at Ryujin with her free hand more frantically than was actually necessary. “Come join us!”

Ryujin’s eyes flit to you, then at Yuna’s arm around yours, then back to your eyes.

“Sure,” she says, before moving toward you.

---

It’s somewhere between the second and third stops of the night that you finally find yourself alone with Ryujin. She is trailing just behind the crowd as it sings off-tune k-pop ballads into the warm Seoul evening. Yuna is at their head, leading them to the bright red pocha tents like a conductor leading an inebriated orchestra.

“Having fun?” you ask.

“Yeah,” she answers, turning to you with a smile that betrays the lie.

Silence for another few steps.

“Hey,” you start, stopping in place. “Ryujin,” you add, when she continues without you.

“Yeah?”

The questions come to your lips - What’s wrong? What’s your problem? Did I do something? Is this going to be the month-long business trip from hell with a translator that hates me?

“Can we talk?” you manage.

Ryujin glances over at the crowd of your colleagues as they disappear into one of the pocha tents.

“Sure,” she says, stepping towards a different one.

---

The soju arrives quickly. She hadn’t bothered to ask you what you wanted before ordering it. The bottle hasn’t been on the table for a second before Ryujin picks it up, twists the cap, and pours you both a shot. Neither of you move to take it.

“Ryujin,” you begin, cautious, wary of your word choice. “I… I’m a little confused,” you admit, honestly. “I thought things were cool between us after dinner last night. I liked… getting to know you.”

Ryujin can’t hide the small quirk in her lip, as though what you’d just said had physically hurt her.

“I-” you begin, “I feel like maybe there’s something you’re not telling me? Or something I’m missing? Because after we had drinks you seemed kind of… upset. We’re going to be working together for a month, and-”

“-and you don’t want things to be awkward,” she finishes. Her eyes finally find yours, an unreadable, blank expression on her face.

“Yeah,” you admit. “Did I fuck something up? Say something that upset you? Is this about the drink you spilled on my suit? Because I’m trying to remember if I-”

“No,” she interrupts. She takes a sip from her soju glass, but her eyes don’t raise from the table between you.

“Then what is it?” Your glass of soju sits on the table, untouched.

Silence for a few more seconds, each one far longer than it had any right to be.

“Jesus Christ,” she says, eyes rolling, before finally settling on you. “You really don’t remember me.”

“What? I just said I did. You spilled your drink on my jacket and-”

“I’ll see you at the office tomorrow,” she states, before she stands, her plastic chair scraping loudly against the concrete. She steps out of the pocha and raises her hand to flag a nearby taxi.

The silver chain on her wrist catches the fading Seoul sunset.

And you remember.

---

“My mother gave it to me,” she says, eyes dropping to the delicate silver on her wrist. “When I graduated. First one in the family to get a degree! She wanted to commemorate it somehow. It means a lot.”

“That’s awesome,” you reply, watching her fingers play with the glimmering links. “I bet she’s real proud of you.”

“She is,” she replies, eyes forlorn for a moment. You sense that she wants to tell you more, that there are thoughts right there on her lips that she debates turning into words.

She wants to tell you how much she’s looked forward to your one-on-one meetings, how she’s laid in bed at night going over everything you said and did that day with a smile on her lips. She wants to tell you about how she’s memorized the flex in your forearms as you point something out on your laptop, the way you tie your tie, the scent of your cologne. She wants to tell you that the way she bumped her knees against yours under the table “accidentally” that morning wasn’t really accidental at all. 

But she settles for something less. Something more professional, more fitting for an orientation week spent with a senior leader she only just met a few days ago.

“Anyway - you were telling me about our distribution channels in Korea?”

“Right,” you say, glancing back at the PowerPoint in full screen on your laptop. “Our manufacturing happens all over the world, but our main distribution centre is in Seoul. Goods come up from Busan…”

---

“Ryujin!” you say, throwing some cash on the table before leaving the pocha tent and catching up with her on the curb. “Ryujin. I remember.”

She turns to face you, arms crossed, upset.

“Do you?” she asks, unconvinced.

“Orientation week,” you blurt, ashamed. “We were matched up.”

Relief and disappointment war on Ryujin’s features. When she speaks, the words leave her mouth with intent, as though she’d been waiting to say them for a while. “I couldn’t give less of a shit about that corporate bullshit,” she spits. “And I get that people like you are too busy to give a fuck about lowly Marketing drones. What I care about is-”

A vehicle pulls up to the curb. The door opens. A taxi.

“-when people break their promises,” she finishes, her tone suddenly sadder. “Or forget they made them in the first place.”

She gets into the taxi alone, and it pulls away from the curb. For a second, you catch the way Seoul’s streetlights make her eyes glisten.

---

“I had a great week, Director,” she says, hands clasping her tablet to her chest like it were some sort of life preserver. “Thanks for… taking me seriously.”

“Pleasure was all mine. You’re gonna kill it in Marketing. Your comments on the Hirai marketing campaign materials were visionary - I’ve forwarded them to your boss and he’s pretty impressed. I think they’ll make a difference when it comes to the bargaining phase. And please, drop the title. I have a first name like anyone else.”

She smiles, a hint of a blush on her cheeks. She says your name out loud, as though she were testing the way it sounded. You feel something stir inside you at the sound of your name, and the smile it leaves behind on her lips.

You want to tell her that the week flew by, and that you’d wished you’d had more scheduled one-on-ones with her to look forward to next week, where you’d start discussing market demographics and somehow end up discussing which of the Sailor Scouts was your favorite. You want to tell her you are a little in love with the way she tucks her hair behind her ear, or the cute burrow in her brow when she’s concentrating on logistics figures and graphs. You want to tell her that you’ll miss her perfume - something between caramel and vanilla? - and the way she laughs at your terrible puns. You want to ask her if she’ll have lunch with you next Tuesday - and maybe dinner the Friday after that.

But you settle for something less - something more fitting of a leader during a brief, HR-mandated mentorship with a new recruit.

“Anyway,” you continue, eager to make sure she doesn’t catch on to your sudden nervousness. “Tip #2,391 before you go: the ramen place a block away from here has a pretty great tonkotsu.”

“Ooooh,” she coos. “My favorite.” She plays with the bracelet on her wrist, fingers pinching the silver links as though she could squeeze the courage she needed from them. “...I don’t suppose you’d want to join me tonight after work-”

A woman approaches - Ryujin recognizes her from the executive introductions earlier in the week; the new VP of Strategy, Taeyeon Kim. She’s all poise and professionalism, corporate success in a tailored black pantsuit. She gives Ryujin a brief nod and a token smile before turning to you.

“Budget meeting for the Hirai deal in five,” she says to you, before heading off towards the meeting rooms.

“Duty calls,” you state to Ryujin. “Ramen sounds good, though. See you at six?”

“It’s a date,” she says, smile bright.

The Hirai deal budget meeting takes all night. Ryujin eats alone.

---

It takes three knocks for her to open the door.

“Yes, Director?” she asks, arms crossed, frosty emphasis on your title. Gone are the crisp pale blue blouse and heather grey pencil skirt, replaced with a navy blue oversized hoodie and strawberry-print pajama shorts. Her hair, released from the corporate bun she wore during the day, falls in dark waves around her face.

“The ramen date. I remember. I’m sorry. I was in a meeting that day that-”

“It’s not that that fucking matters,” she interrupts, the curse word somehow sounding sharper than you’d expected coming from her. “It’s the ghosting afterward. I wasn’t expecting a Director to give two shits about a lowly newbie in Marketing, but an apology would’ve been nice.”

“That deal took every ounce of my attention for a few months,” you protest. “I’m sorry, Ryujin. I really am.”

She seems only slightly placated by your apology. Her crossed arms tighten around her small torso, as though tightening her plates of armor. “And you just totally forgot about me afterward, huh? Even after I spilled a drink on your chest accidentally-on-purpose? Even after I volunteered for this assignment, hoping you’d remember me when saw my name on the brief?”

You frown, unsure of what else to do or say.

“Do you know how it makes me feel to have someone I was into ask me who the fuck I am? Twice?” she continues. “Make me feel like I’m top of the world one moment, then forget I exist the next? No one I’ve ever known has made me feel… seen like you did - and then you went and forgot all about me the second your precious VP smiled at you.”

There is silence for a moment. She was into you? A hand uncrosses itself from her chest and moves to her mouth, as though she regretted saying the words. 

“Ryujin, I… I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say,” you manage. You look up at her and she’s covering her face with her hand now, brow furrowed, as though she were suddenly fighting a headache.

“You don’t have to say anything, Director,” she says, arms crossing again. “I’m used to not expecting anything from you.”

More silence. Her words hit you with the force of a punch to the gut. She lingers there for a moment, as though gauging your response and finding none. She moves to close the door.

“I… I’ll see you at the office tomorrow,” she says, defeat and disappointment in every syllable.

Your hand, operating out of instinct, holds the door open with your palm. She looks up at you, surprised. Your feet carry you forward until you’re standing in front of the door frame.

“I’m here now, Ryujin,” you say. “I see you.”

“Do you?” she hisses. “Did you ever? Or was I just-”

You step forward, and you kiss her.

Your hands drift to her sides, holding her close. After a moment, her hands find their way to your chest, and you fear that she’s about to push you away - but instead they wind around your neck, fingers sliding into your hairline. She kisses you back, and your tongues find each other.

You pull away first. “Fuck, Ryujin, I’m sorry. That was-”

“Stop fucking apologizing,” she spits, and then she’s kissing you again, leaving one hand around your neck to pull you into her hotel room and using the other to shut the door behind her. You both stumble backward, lips locked, until her butt brushes up against her room’s desk.

You break the kiss. You look into her eyes and find them half-lidded, full of need. You smile, and she returns it, before she leans to kiss you again.

Your hands find their way under her hoodie. You grasp its hem, testing the waters and her reaction.

“Quickly,” she says, taking the hoodie by the hem and peeling it off her body herself, “before I realize how monumentally stupid this is.”

You smirk as your mouth finds her neck and she leans her head backward to allow you better access. A soft gasp leaves her lips as you find a warm point on her neck, kissing and suckling, leaving a mark on her.

She’s topless - not having worn a bra beneath her hoodie - and you want more of her, want to taste her on your tongue. Your hands find their way beneath her butt and you lift her onto the desk, depositing her on it with a soft thud. She yelps - and you silence her with a kiss before bending to kiss a trail down her neck and to her heaving chest. Your hands snake up her sides, cupping her small, round breasts, teasing but not touching her nipples.

“Fuck, just-” she begins, the words turning into a wordless gasp as you capture one of her nipples in your mouth, tongue slick and wet and licking a flat stripe across it. You close your lips around the bud, swirling the tip of your tongue around it, feeling it tighten quickly with arousal. Her hands snake into your hair, her back arching as she offers more of her body to you.

You switch, suckling her other nipple, closing your lips around it and sucking hard. Your free hand reaches up to tease and pinch her saliva-coated breast, not leaving it unattended.

“Oh god,” she gasps, “like that, like that.” She says your name and it’s breathless and airy, the best possible iteration of it you’d ever heard.

She’s writhing now, a mess of sighs and gasps atop the hotel desk. You could’ve stayed there all night, suckling from her small, cute little breasts and the tight nipples atop them - but she has other ideas, other needs. Her hands find themselves flat against your chest and with a regretful sigh she finally pushes you away from her chest. She hops off the desk, pushing you back against the bed.

Ryujin straddles you as you sit atop it, and you’re kissing again - passionate, intense, wild. She breaks the kiss first - and when you angle your neck to resume it, she smiles and steps off the bed, standing between your spread legs.

“Off,” she hisses, bending to help you get your pants and boxers off your legs after you undo the belt buckle and zipper. You take the opportunity to rid yourself of your button-up while she lets her shorts slide down her legs to pool at her feet - and you’re both naked. She’s so slim and small and tight, her tiny waist and the fullness in her hips and thighs forming a perfect hourglass in the dim light of her hotel room.

She’s straddling you again - naked, this time, and you both let a deep sigh escape your lips as the heat between her legs makes contact with your stiffened shaft. Almost immediately she begins to gyrate and writhe in your lap, hips sliding her slick heat against your hips and cock.

“Fuck,” she hisses from behind gritted teeth, between frenzied, urgent kisses. “Fuck, I’ve wanted you for so long.”

“Me too, Ryujin. Fucking need to be inside you-”

“Now,” she snaps. “Fuck me now.”

“Condom,” you say, almost regretfully. “My jacket pocket.”

Ryujin lets out a sigh, hopping off your lap for a moment to retrieve your jacket for you. You fish it out of the wrapper, placing it on your tip - and you sigh, softly, as Ryujin straddles you again and rolls it down your shaft. You gasp as her slim fingers wrap themselves around you, giving you a small squeeze.

“Fuck me,” Ryujin hisses into your ear.

Your arms wrap around her and you turn her over on the bed so you’re on top. Your hand reaches between you, placing your tip at her opening. Even through the latex you can feel the heat of her, almost feel the slickness of her body as your tip divides her lips.

Your eyes find hers. She tells you without words what she wants.

You slide inside her, and she’s tight and hot, the thin barrier of latex doing little to dampen the sensations of her body wrapping itself around your shaft. You give her a moment to adjust to the stretch, the fullness - before you’re pulling out slowly, leaving just the tip inside her, and sliding back in, filling her again.

“Fuck, fuck yes,” she’s hissing into your ear, arms wrapping around your neck, thighs parting and lower legs pulling against your butt. There’s a hint of relief in the words and sighs spilling softly from her mouth, as though she were finally receiving something she’d wanted and waited for for so long. “Yes, yes, you’e stretching me out, fuck--”

Ryujin’s voice is like silk, smooth and light, and you find it difficult to reconcile the filth leaving her lips with the perfect, business-like translations she whispered in your ear from earlier in the day. To hear that voice now, urging you, begging you to fuck her harder, faster - it drove you insane.

“Harder, please, harder.”

You comply, and soon you're thrusting in and out of her cunt at a firm but consistent pace, her tight walls squeezing around you on each entry and only reluctantly letting you go on the backstroke. You kiss her again and it’s frantic, fevered. When your lips part your eyes remain locked on each other, inches apart.

“So… fucking tight, Ryujin.”

“Mmmmph,” is the only reply, at least initially - a soft, wordless moan after a particularly deep thrust that leaves her eyes rolling back into her skull for a moment. Her eyes close shut, her head tilted back to reveal the pale column of her throat. She lets a long, languid moan leave her lips when you place yours on her neck.

Your pace continues - in, out, in, out - each thrust sending another spike of pleasure up your spines. She brings her mouth close to your ear.

“I’m gonna cum soon,” she hisses. “Gonna cum on your cock, Daddy-”

The word unmakes you - ignites something dark and primal inside you that sends a jolt of sheer pleasure up your spine and into your brain. You increase your pace, her voice and the words they form giving you a high you want to chase. She moans louder, sighs louder, curses sweet words into your ear. Her walls tighten around you, pulsating; her legs lock themselves around your hips; her nails dig sharp furrows into your scalp.

“Fuck, Daddy, fuck--”

“Cum for me, baby,” reply, bringing your own lips to her ear - your turn to torture her with words. “Cum on my cock, Ryujin. Cum on my cock like a good little girl.”

Calling her that must have similarly ignited something dark and primal inside her, because almost as soon as the words leave your mouth, she cums. Her entire body spasms, her back arching off the now-sweaty mattress, her cunt pulsating and tightening exponentially around your shaft as you fuck her through the orgasm coursing through her veins.

The moan of pleasure that leaves her mouth is unholy - a wordless sound of uncontrolled pleasure tumbling wildly from her lips and into your ear. 

Your pace slows, eventually, probably for the better as a few more moments of thrusting inside Ryujin’s pulsating, vice-tight cunt probably would have undone you. She comes down from her high, aftershocks still sending involuntary spasms through her limbs. Her eyes, shut throughout her orgasm, eventually open to find yours. 

She pulls your head to her lips and you kiss, her tongue finding yours quickly and resuming the duel it had been waging for the past half hour. 

“Fuck, Daddy,” she begins, the use of that word sending a little tremor of pleasure straight to your groin. “Fuck, that felt so good.”

“You feel even better, baby girl,” you reply, burying yourself into her neck again and planting small kisses onto the side of her neck.

“Did you--?” she asks.

“No, not yet,” you reply, emphasizing your response with a twist of your hips that sends another soft moan tumbling from her lips.

“Mmmmm,” she sighs. “We better fix that.”

Her palms find your chest and she gently pushes you away. You get the hint and slowly ease yourself out of her, sitting back on your haunches. You watch, in awe, as Ryujin turns onto her hands and knees.

“Fuck me like this, Daddy.”

You want to savor the sight of her - on all fours, that round, full ass of hers presented to you, the slick, dripping cunt between her thighs begging to be filled again. You last only a second before your urges overcome your self-control. Before you know it you’re positioning yourself behind her, hands giving her firm cheeks and a soft spank that wrests a yelp of surprise from her. She looks over her shoulder back at you and the image of her - naked, back glistening with sweat, eyes half-lidded with want - is one you want to remember forever.

You bring your tip to her opening - only to find her easing away from you. Puzzled, you find her eyes still locked on you.

“Not like that, Daddy.”

“What do you mean, baby?”

Her lower lip curls under a tooth for a moment before she licks her lips - another small, lustful gesture that drives you insane. 

“I… I want-” she begins. “I want it. You. I want to feel you.”

You catch on to what she means, and know what she wants you to do, but you want to hear it from her. Want to hear that voice - the same one whispering business and corporate in your ear during the day - to say it.

“Tell me what you want, Ryujin. Use your words, baby girl.”

Ryujin’s lips curl into a wry smile, her tooth biting into her lip again. Her back arches, like a cat stretching. She pushes her dripping, slick cunt back toward your latex-covered cock, capturing your shaft between the cheeks of her ass and gyrating against it. You moan - long, low - as she grinds against you. She’s hot and slick against the underside of your shaft and you find yourself groaning at the feel of her grinding away against you.

She straightens up, presses her sweat-slick back against your chest. You reach around and wrap your arms around her torso on instinct, your hands finding and cradling her soft, small breasts, capturing and teasing her nipples between your thumbs and index fingers.

“Ryujin-” you begin, a token protest, as you place kisses on her neck and shoulder. Even though you can’t see it, you know she’s smiling. She lets a hand drift back between your bodies, cradling your trembling, covered cock.

“Daddy, please,” she says, half-gasp, half-demand. Her fingers curl around your cock. “I want to feel you inside me. Raw. Fuck me raw, Daddy.”

You tremble. Your cock twitches in her grasp.

“Fuck, Ryujin-”

“Take it off, Daddy. Let me feel you. Let me feel you cum inside me. Don’t you want to…”

“I do, Ryujin, fuck-”

“Do it, Daddy. Cum inside me. Breed me.”

That’s what undoes you. Your fingers work quickly, peeling the condom off your needy, trembling cock. 

You push her back down onto the mattress, and she lets a soft, playful little yelp out at the sudden forcefulness. Her back arches. Her eyes find yours over her shoulder.

“Daddy, please-”

You slide your bare cock inside her. She’s sublime - tight, hot, so very wet. Your hands find her hips, and you’re fucking her again. 

“Fuck!” she spits, as you fill her to the hilt for the first time - raw, uncovered - the new angle allowing you deeper inside her than you were when you were on top of her. “Yes, fuck me!”

You comply, your hands anchoring yourself on her hips as you begin to thrust in and out of her tight, slick cunt. You want to pace yourself, want to relish every entry and exit, but the tightness, the wetness, everything about Ryujin Shin is too much, too much to handle. Before long she’s throwing her hips back against you, firmly but steadily, matching you thrust for thrust.

You watch her, burn every inch of her body into your memory - the arch of her back, the sweat dripping down the column of her spine, the way the neon of Seoul’s skyline is striping her skin in alternating lines of shadow and pastel blue. You relish the feel of her body, the tightness of her velvet cunt wrapped around you, the softness of her hips, the moans and sighs that continue to spill wildly from her lips.

For a few minutes you fuck her. Minutes that feel like hours, your pleasure-addled brain suddenly unable to parse the passing of time. The sounds of your bodies meeting, her moans and your grunts, the ridiculous, sublime sight of her bent over, taking your cock - it’s all overwhelming, a heady mix of heat and wetness and pleasure that drives you insane, pulls you into a glorious high that you never want to come down from. 

For a few brilliant minutes all that exists is Ryujin Shin’s body. Not the consequences of raw sex, not the complications of your work relationship, not the obstacles in your personal relationship that you’d both have to hurdle once the high of sex has worn off - none of that exists, right here, in this moment. She’s it, she’s all.

Your hands wander her body - gripping her hips and pulling them back toward you, or placing a palm flat on her lower back, or reaching forward with one hand and grasping one of her trembling shoulders - but they settle on her wide, firm hips. Your fingers dig deeper into her skin, surely leaving bruises she’ll feel in the morning. She takes it as the sign of your impending orgasm that it almost certainly is.

“Are you- are you close, Daddy? Fuck, you’re gonna… gonna make me cum again. Don’t stop, please.”

You grit your teeth. There was no denying the pleasure quickly building to a boiling point between your legs.

“Fuck, yeah, baby girl. Getting close. Where-”

“You know where, Daddy,” she hisses, hair whipping around her as she turns her head to look over her shoulder at you. Her eyes bore into yours with an intensity that makes you tremble, her gaze holding firm on you even as her body is rocked back and forth with each thrust you make into her cunt. 

“Ryujin-”

“Cum inside me, Daddy. Breed me.”

“Fuck-”

“Daddy, please - breed me, breed this cunt, cum inside me please, fuck I’m gonna cum too cum with me please, breed me-”

Ryujin cums - and you do too. Her body spasms, quivers, turns into a tight, wet, slick vice around your cock and all you can do is bury yourself as deeply as you can inside her before you let go. 

Your cock pulsates as it sends thick, warm ropes of semen into Ryujin’s cunt - each one drawing a soft gasp from her, each one sending a jolt of pleasure up her spine that heightens her own orgasm. Your mind blanks, and nothing else exists aside from the pleasure coursing through your body.

When your eyes finally open some indeterminate amount of time later you look down to find another one of the many sights you wanted to burn into your memory - Ryujin bent over on the bed, chest and head pressed to the mattress. Between the reddened cheeks of her ass, your cock slowly withdraws, slick and wet and glistening. The well-used lips of her cunt grip your cock tightly, as though not wanting to let you go just yet.

When your tip finally slips from between her lips it’s quickly followed by a rush of warm, thick cum, dripping freely from her cunt and onto the pristine sheets below her.

Ryujin finally falls onto her side. You fall onto yours beside her. Your eyes find each other. Her hand comes up to your cheek, cradles the side of your face with a tenderness that surprises the both of you.

There is a warm smile on her lips. Her eyes glisten for a moment in the low light of the bedroom before she brings her body close to yours, tucking her head beneath your chin as your arms wrap around each other.

There are words to be said, conversations to be had. But all that matters now is the warmth of her body against yours, and the feel of her breath against your chest. Everything else can wait, and so it will.

“Stay,” she says into your chest, and so you do.

---

“I’m on the pill,” she says, on the taxi ride to the Seoul office. The morning after was awkward in some parts, sweet in others; after an uneasy parting so you could go back to your room to shower and change, you’d both met again in the lobby - both a little unsure how to navigate the uncharted waters, but knowing only that things had changed for the better between you.

“Would’ve been nice to know that before I went in raw,” you say, in English - sparing the driver an awkward few blocks of Seoul rush hour traffic.

Ryujin smiles, slyly. “Sure, but it was hot not knowing, wasn’t it? Knowing you could have bred me last night?”

She leans in closer to whisper into your ear - the way she whispered business translations, the way she whispered how close she was to orgasm.

“...knowing you could have put a baby in me?”

She leans back in her seat, giving you one last look before turning her attention to the buildings of downtown Seoul.

Your pinky fingers brush against each other on the seat. You hook yours in hers, and she doesn’t pull away.

---

To her credit, Ryujin was professional and effective with her translation duties throughout the day - mostly. It’s during a presentation by the Seoul office’s Legal lead that her facade cracks.

“...There have been some issues related to IP that they’ve had to deal with,” she says softly in your ear. “But they’ve been dealt with- …fuck.”

You turn to face her. There’s a small grimace on her face. She adjusts the way she’s sitting on her chair, her legs crossing and uncrossing beneath her pencil skirt.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she says, bringing her lips close to your ear as if to continue translating whatever the Legal lead was droning on about. “But every time I move, a bit of you leaks out of me. Gonna need to clean up in the washroom after this meeting.”

You’re speechless. The smirk on her lips is a victorious one.

“Anyway,” she continues, “the other thing they’ve had to deal with is patent trolls…”

The rest of the meeting goes in your ear and out the other, every small movement Ryujin makes in her seat stealing all of your attention. When the presentation ends Ryujin stands, gingerly, and excuses herself to the washroom. You watch her leave the room with a slightly awkward gait.

Across the room, Yuna catches your eye. She flashes you a knowing smile.

---

The work day ends, eventually - not that you got any work done at all. 

After work, Ryujin is waiting for you in the lobby, scrolling her phone. As you approach she holds it out to you - on it is a Google search listing of several nearby restaurants. 

“Feeling like burgers? Or more Korean food? It’s Friday night, so it’s gonna be busy, but there’s a place nearby-”

“No,” you answer, firmly, already walking past her and out the door.

“But dinner--?”

“Room service,” you answer. “Hotel, now.”

A devilish smile pulls at the corners of Ryujin’s lips as she hails a taxi.

In the hotel elevator, you don’t bother pushing the button for her floor.

---

You’re on each other from the moment you cross the threshold of your suite - lips crashing against each other, hands wandering, undressing. You only get as far as her blazer before she’s pushing you down onto the chair facing the floor-to-ceiling window that makes up one side of your suite. 

She stands in front of you, silhouetted by Seoul’s glass and concrete skyline, and undresses.

The tight white button-up first, each button revealing a little more perfect vanilla skin, marred only by the marks your lips and teeth left the night before. Soon it’s a pool of white cotton on the floor, joined quickly by her white lace bra. Her small, perky round breasts tremble slightly under your gaze, her nipples already taut and tight.

She turns to face away from you, topless, exposing herself to the city - as she undoes the zipper holding her pencil skirt tight around her wide hips. She takes her time, making you watch, making you want, as the skirt finds its way onto the floor. 

When Ryujin faces you again she’s naked save for lace panties that have been tormenting her all day with their damp stickiness. Eyes locked on you the whole while, she hooks her thumbs into the thin lace and slides them down her full, round thighs, then past her knees, until they pool on the floor and she is naked, with only Seoul’s fluorescent and neon lights to clothe her.

She steps toward you, straddles you in the chair. Your hands find her hips, soothing the bruises your grip had left there hours before.

Her hand drifts between her spread thighs. You watch, enraptured, as her middle and ring fingers slide inside her cunt for a moment. Her eyes shut, her head tilts back as she touches herself. 

When her fingers emerge, they glisten.

“Look what you did to me,” she says, softly. “I’ve been dripping you all day, Daddy. But now… now I’m empty. Need you to fill me up again.”

“Ryujin. Fuck,” you stammer, because it’s all you can say, all your brain can muster for a response.

She smiles, your weakness giving her confidence. Her hands work quickly at your belt and slacks, and soon she reveals your cock, already stiff and weeping pre-cum. You groan at the feel of her soft fingers around your shaft as she strokes you softly, timing each movement of her wrist to the sultry words leaving her lips.

“Want you to fuck me again, Daddy, and raw and deep and hard. But first…”

She bends to kiss you - only to ignore your lips entirely, as she slinks down off the chair and onto her knees.

“-first, I want to taste you.”

She licks a long, slow stripe from your base to your tip, her tongue flat and tight against your cock. 

“Wanted that for so long, Daddy. During orientation. Watching you in the office. Been dreaming about what you’d taste like-”

“Do I taste like you dreamed, Ryujin?”

“Fuck, yes, Daddy,” she says, after another long, slow lick. “Even better.”

“Suck my cock then, baby girl. Show me how much you wanted this.”

The words spur her, challenge her - and soon she’s taking your cock into her mouth. It’s all you can do to lean back in the chair and sigh as she works between your spread legs, taking you in and out of her wet, slick mouth with an enthusiasm that had been boiling over months of want and need.

When you open your eyes again it’s to look out at Seoul’s skyline. You watch as cars move on distant roads, as signs for restaurants and stores light up, as people on faraway sidewalks make their way home. You do anything but look down at Ryujin, knowing that the sight of her combined with the pleasure she is conjuring between your legs would be too much to handle, all at once.

You sigh. This was messy. Complicated. Might end up ruining one or both of your lives. But fuck if it mattered at all, right here, right now - with your cock in her mouth and a soft sigh escaping her lips as you finally look down and watch as she begins to finger herself.

She lets your cock slip from her lips after one last, slow suckle. Her tongue flicks around your tip one last time. Then she stands, eyes half-lidded, filled with want and need. She straddles you again and lowers herself onto your cock.

You think of bending to suckle from one of her soft, perky little breasts as they bounce up and down, inches from your face. You want to reach a hand up to that pale, thin throat of hers and squeeze with just enough pressure to make her gasp for her next breath. You want to reach down with both palms and squeeze her ass, thrusting up with your hips each time she impales herself on you - but you do none of those things. 

You watch. Watch as she rides you, takes you in and out of her dripping, pulsing cunt. Watch as Seoul paints her slim, tight body in gold and shadow. Watch as she ruins herself, ruins you with something that is reckless, stupid, and utterly irresistible, all at the same time.

Her hands aren’t idle, like yours are. They fondle her own breasts, pinch her own nipples. They reach forward and anchor herself on your shoulders, or dig furrows into your hair when she brings you close and increases her pace. They lie flat, palm against your chest, feeling your heart hammer a wild beat as she slows down again, bringing her face in front of yours so your noses touch, fucking herself slowly, passionately on your cock, making you feel everything. 

You wanted to talk to her, wanted to discuss this idiotic thing that you were both giving in to. You want to have a conversation about what it would mean for your professional and personal relationship. You want to ask her if this was a stupid fling borne out of a stupid week of meetings that happened a year ago. You want to ask her if this was just sex or-

“Fuck, Daddy, I’m gonna-”

Her voice - her perfect fucking voice - shatters any thought you might have had that wasn’t focused on the pleasure she was creating for the both of you with every movement of her body.

“Me too, Ryujin, fuck, you’re too-”

“Daddy, breed me, give me a baby-”

A lie, a pretend act - but no less arousing. No less utterly devastating to what remained of your self-control.

“Gonna cum, Ryujin. Ryujin--”

“Daddy--!”

She cums. You spasm beneath her as your cock fills her up. Afterward, when you’ve both stopped trembling, you feel your cum drip from her stuffed cunt, down your balls, and onto the leather of the couch.

She slides off you - and you both watch as her cunt drips more of your cum onto the couch and the slacks that you never bothered to remove. She takes you by the hand and leads you into the bedroom, into another terrible mistake, another act you will probably both regret later, when sanity somehow finds its way back into your lust-addled minds.

You follow her willingly into ruin.

---

It’s not until the next morning, as you wander a morning market together after breakfast, when you finally have your talk.

“Ryujin,” you begin, as the two of you walk down the street, past stalls selling vegetables, treats, and souvenirs. “We should talk. About this. About us.”

She sighs, takes a sip from her caramel macchiato - extra whipped cream, extra caramel drizzle - as though the caffeine and sugar would fortify her for what was about to be said.

“I want you,” she says, confidently, as though it were a phrase she’d rehearsed with her eyes closed as she lay in bed alone, dreaming of a moment like this. “I’ve wanted you since the second you walked into that meeting room in that stupid-hot suit on my first day and said your name. I’ve wanted you every second since. I want to be with you.”

You take a moment. Your heart leaps, but your brain fears.

“I want you too,” you admit, the words leaving your mouth quickly, even before you knew you were speaking them - your heart outpacing your brain, as it had gained the habit of doing around her. “But-”

“-we work together,” she interrupts. Another sip of her caffeine. Her eyes remain locked on the stalls hawking hotteok and japchae. “You’re a Director in Strategy, I’m just some newbie in Marketing. You’re older than me. Your boss is holding a torch for you, and she’s fucking perfect - ‘girlboss’ in all caps. HR will have a fit. Our colleagues will whisper; say you’re taking advantage of a younger girl, or that I’m sleeping my way into a promotion. And maybe one day we’ll end up hurting each other, and ruin one or both of our careers and/or lives in the process.”

You don’t reply. The list is long. Daunting.

Finally, she turns to you. There is a faint smile on her lips. “Did I miss anything?”

You return her smile with a slim one of your own. “No,” you admit.

“Are you for real, or do you just need a fucktoy to keep your cock warm while you’re working overseas for a month?”

Her question stuns you, catches you unprepared. But it takes you only a moment of consideration before you answer.

“I’m not sure yet,” you answer, honestly. “But I want to find out.”

Something between a smile and a frown forms her lips as she casts her eyes downward for a moment.

“That’s good enough for me,” she says. “Because that’s what I want too.”

“It won’t be easy.”

“But I want you, and you want me.”

“Yes.”

“Then that’s it,” she states, eyes forward, as though the future of your relationship existed somewhere amidst the winding lanes of the bustling market. “That’s all that matters.”

After a few more steps, your hand finds hers. Your fingers intertwine.

“That’s all that matters,” you repeat. “We’ll figure this out.”

She turns to look at you as you walk through the market. She smiles and says nothing further, because nothing further needed to be said.

---

A week and a half pass quickly. Meetings, meals, sex - it all passes in a long, hazy blur. There are candlelit dinners at Michelin-starred restaurants by the Han River, and there are nights having instant noodles outside convenience stores at 2am because you were both too lazy to have or make anything else. There is slow love making, hard, fast fucking, and everything inbetween.

The two of you navigate that first week together with the kind of eagerness and enthusiasm that is in great supply at the start of a relationship. In some ways it is like every other first week of every other relationship you’d ever been in - sweet, hot, exciting in a way that nothing else can be. In some ways it is completely different, completely unique. 

Ryujin was not like any other girl. She was professional and proper during the day and wild and needy at night - and you saw it all, every moment, a gradual transformation over the course of the day from dedicated and thorough businesswoman to the barely controlled wantonness of the night. Throughout it all she is confident, self-assured, assertive. 

But she was also sweet, caring, and thoughtful in her own unique way. She knew you, already. She asked questions during presentations even before you voiced them to her, because she knew they were questions you would ask. Without telling you, she bought you a spare charger for your phone when yours broke five days into the trip - and made sure a charged power bank was packed in your suitcase when you left the hotel room in the morning. She showed genuine interest in you - your childhood, your family, your quirky hobbies, as though she were writing a book on you and wanted to know every single detail, every single story you had to tell.

“I want you,” she said once, sometime during the second week of this ridiculous, dangerous, stupid thing you were both undertaking. Her head was on your chest as you lie together in bed atop a mattress soaked with evidence of recent lovemaking, her finger tracing random patterns on your skin above your heart. “And that includes figuring out what you keep in here.”

Neither of you knew what this was, where it would go, even how long it would last - whether the other was a terrible mistake, the love of your life, or something inbetween. You only knew you wanted to find out together, one day at a time.

It’s not until your last day in Seoul, when the two of you attend an industry gala, that Ryujin Shin inched a little more towards the ‘love of your life’ end of the scale.

---

The elevator door opens - she insisted you meet in the lobby, as she needed a few more minutes to get ready - and there she is, in a little black dress that steals the breath from your lungs. Simple, demure, utterly captivating. You realize that the ‘few more minutes to work on her hair’ was an excuse, and she just wanted to make an entrance.

The smile on her lips is confident, assured, as is every click-clack of her heels on the marble of the hotel foyer as she walks up to you, takes your hand, and leads you out to the waiting taxi - all without saying a word. 

The gala, held in an outdoor venue with plenty of string lights and stand-up tables, is busier than you’d expected. Colleagues from the Seoul office are in attendance, including Yuna in a bold red dress that’s one inch off the hemline away from sparking multiple emails to HR - if it hadn’t already. She comes close to the two of you and says she’s happy for you, shooting you both a wink as she saunters off to chat up a group of investors that spend the rest of the evening vying for her attention.

For most of the evening your mind is elsewhere - on Ryujin’s dress, and what it will look like hiked up around her hips or on the floor of your suite. Your thoughts drift to the trip to Japan, and the two weeks to follow. A new country to explore with her by your side.

You’re mid-conversation with a couple of staff from the Seoul office, and about ready to lean over to Ryujin and ask if she’s ready to head back to the hotel, when a commotion at the entrance to the venue steals your attention for a moment.

Yuna and a couple of the other leads are huddled in a crowd around a figure that has emerged from a sleek black sedan. They chat excitedly, as though they were meeting a celebrity for the first time.

“Go see who it is,” Ryujin urges. “I’ll get us a drink for the road, then we can hit it.”

You excuse yourself from the conversation to join Yuna and the others. The crowd parts, and she emerges.

“Sorry I’m late,” Taeyeon says, smile beaming. “Thought I’d surprise you.”

At the bar, Ryujin turns, drinks in hand, just in time to watch Taeyeon embrace you.

---

Author’s Note: Whelp that pretty much wrote itself. Ryujin best girl. 

Get ready for more “Business Trip but with Ryujin lmao” no but fr this will only be 3 parts max I promise <3

[gf2bellamy]

okay bc tell me why i’m also in that hotch obsession phase.. if u don’t mind writing recs for him — hear me out: both lawyer!reader and his’ stubborn asses having an argument and you start setting up to sleep in the guest room or on the couch and hotch is just like what are u doing??

stubborn — aaron hotchner

pairing: aaron hotchner x reader ( no use of y/n ) content warnings: lawyer!reader , argument, reader is mad at hotch , a/n: hii !! i havent written for hotch in ages sooo forgive me if this isn't good

“Okay, I’m done talking about this.” You stood abruptly from the kitchen table, both hands raised in surrender, not the calm kind. The kind that came after a long, thankless day and a disappointment too many.Aaron stayed seated for a second, then pushed back his chair and followed you out of the kitchen. But you didn’t look back as you walked away, your socked feet padding softly against the hardwood.

"No," he said, following you into the hallway. "We need to talk about this."

“Aaron, I get it,” you snapped, not looking back. “You’re too busy to come.” You didn’t sound like you “got it” at all.

This was supposed to be something, a major trial, and you’d asked, just once, if he could be there. You’d seen him hesitate earlier, mumbling about the BAU’s schedule and not being sure it would work out.Between your clients snapping at you, case files mysteriously vanishing from your desk, and the scalding coffee that had spilled down your blouse in the courthouse lobby, you were at your limit. And Hotch’s hesitation, his quiet, infuriating "I’m not sure if it’ll work with work", had been the tipping point.

“I’ll try to make it,” he offered quietly behind you. His hand settled on your shoulder.

You didn’t even hesitate. Your shoulder shifted just enough to let his hand fall away as you walked into the bathroom. The overhead light flicked on. You avoided looking at him directly, reaching up instead to remove the clips from your hair with trembling fingers.

Click. One pin. Click. Another. Each clink against the porcelain sink echoed louder than it should have.When your eyes finally found his in the mirror, your voice was soft, but the chill in it was unmistakable.

“Don’t worry about it, Aaron. I'll manage just fine on my own.”

Behind you, Hotch watched you in the mirror. His jaw was tight, his dark eyes searching yours. But you didn’t turn around.The way you said his name made his expression flicker. He knew what it meant. Knew that when you repeated it like that, when your tone went flat and cool, forgiveness wasn’t on the table. Not yet. His hand, still hovering where you’d shaken him off, finally dropped to his side.

You took your time unraveling the mess of your hair, fingers dragging through the strands with deliberate slowness. ( Something he usually did for you. )

The bathroom light buzzed softly, filling the silence. In the doorway, Aaron lingered. You could see him in the mirror, arms crossed, brows slightly drawn, trying to find the right words. But you didn’t give him the chance.

“I’m going to take a shower now,” you said, calm but cold, your tone clear enough that it wasn’t just about hygiene.

It was a dismissal. He hesitated for a beat, as if trying to decide whether to push further or retreat. Then, without a word, he turned and walked away. You shut the door with a soft click and leaned back against it, releasing a slow breath. You knew you were being petty. You could admit that much to yourself.

Aaron had come to every single one of your trials, without fail. Sat in the back row, out of the way, sometimes still in his dress shirt and tie from work. He always gave you that same look when it was over: proud, warm, a touch of awe in his eyes. And then the hug, God, the way his arms wrapped around you afterward made the chaos of the courtroom melt away.

This was the first time he couldn’t make it. And, of course, it had to be this trial, your biggest one yet. Maybe it wasn’t fair, but the thought of looking up and not seeing him there, not catching that faint smile of his across the room, hurt. A lot.

The shower helped a little. The hot water washed away the day’s tension, but not the sting under your skin. When you stepped out and reached for your clothes, you realized with a sigh that the only things left in the bathroom were your favorite black shorts… and Aaron’s shirt, slung over the towel rack.

The one he’d worn last weekend, the one that still carried the faintest trace of his cologne. You hesitated, jaw tightening. Then, with a frustrated sigh, you yanked it over your head.

You hated that it made you feel better.

When you stepped out of the bathroom, the apartment was quiet. The lights were off in most of the rooms, bathed instead in the faint moonlight filtering through the windows.

You paused near the kitchen.

Even in the dim light, you could see the dishes had been washed and the counters wiped clean. The plate of food you hadn’t finished, because you were too upset to eat, was neatly packed away in the fridge. Aaron had done it, without saying a word. You felt a small pang of guilt tug at your chest.

But then your mind circled back to the trial. To that awful, hollow feeling of imagining the courtroom without him in it. Just like that, the guilt was overtaken by that sharp ache again. You didn’t want to feel it. You didn’t want to talk. You didn’t want to hear reasonable explanations or I’ll try my best or you know how the job is.

So, you did the one thing your stubborn, exhausted mind told you to do.

You walked into the bedroom, still wearing his shirt, where Aaron sat on the edge of the bed, a file open in his hands. He looked up the second you entered. His eyes flicked over you, shirt, damp hair, tired expression, and then back to your arms, where you were gathering a spare pillow and blanket.

He set the file aside instantly. “What are you doing?” he asked, brows drawing together as he stood slowly.

“Getting ready for bed,” you mumbled without meeting his eyes, fussing with the blanket as you tucked it under your arm and turned away.You didn’t have to say anything else. You didn’t need to. He followed you out into the hallway.

“You’re sleeping on the couch?” he asked, voice low but tinged with concern.

“Yes.” You dropped the pillow onto the couch, smoothing the blanket over the cushions with more force than necessary. Your back was turned to him.

“You don’t have to do this,” he said gently from behind you, stepping closer until he was just a few feet away. You didn’t reply. Instead, you lowered yourself onto the couch, still avoiding his eyes, your fingers tugging absently at the edge of the blanket.

“I’m going to try and make it,” he said. “I only brought it up because I didn’t want to promise something and let you down. But sweetheart… I swear I’ll try.”

The sound of him crouching in front of you made you finally glance up. He was kneeling now, trying to meet your gaze, his voice laced with sincerity. You pouted just slightly, more from emotional exhaustion than actual defiance, and he took that as permission to rest his hands gently on your knees.

“I don’t want you sleeping out here,” he murmured, thumbs beginning to draw slow circles over the fabric of your shorts.

You didn’t say anything at first. “I just like having you there in court,” you mumbled eventually, voice barely above a whisper. You were looking at his hands, not his eyes, but the words were honest.His expression softened instantly. The crease between his brows eased, his shoulders dropping just slightly.

"I like being there too," he admitted, the ghost of a smile playing at his lips. His thumb resumed its gentle circles on your knee. "And I know this is a big trial for you."

A involuntary shiver ran through you at the reminder, your fingers tightening slightly in the fabric of your shorts.

"I was reading about it and-"

"You read about it?" The words tumbled out before you could stop them, your eyes widening slightly in surprise. That tiny flicker of eye contact made his smile grow. 

“What do you think I was doing in the bedroom just now?” he asked, tilting his head. There was a trace of smugness in his tone.

"Oh." The single syllable escaped in a breathy exhale as you felt some of the weight lift from your chest. Without realizing it, your shoulders relaxed slightly, the rigid line of your spine softening. His hands felt warmer now where they rested against your skin, the earlier anger ebbing away.

“But like I said,” Aaron murmured, continuing those slow, soothing circles against your knees. The muscles in his legs protested from crouching so long, but he gave no indication of discomfort beyond the faint tightening of his jaw. “I will try to make it.”

You shifted slightly at his words, your pout threatening to return, but before it could fully form, he gently pressed a finger to your bottom lip.

“Hey,” he said softly, eyes intent on yours. “I know you’re going to do amazing. Just like you always do.”

His hand moved tenderly, brushing a stray strand of hair from your face. You leaned into the touch almost instinctively, your cheek resting in his warm, calloused palm. Your eyes fluttered shut at the familiar comfort of it, at how easily he could melt you without even trying. Taking your silence as a cue, he leaned in just a little and whispered, “Please come to bed.”

You didn’t answer right away. The emotional fog hadn’t entirely lifted, but it had lightened. You exhaled, a soft, resigned sigh escaping your lips.

“Fine.” You grumbled, but there was no bite left in your voice.

Aaron smiled, just a small one, and let out a breath of relief, standing up slowly and offering you his hand. You took it, and in one gentle pull, he brought you to your feet and into his arms. The relief was immediate, both in the way his shoulders relaxed and the quiet exhale he released as he finally straightened his protesting legs. Your hands fisted in the back of his shirt instinctively.

“I’m sorry for upsetting you,” he murmured into your hair, pressing a soft kiss to your hairline.

"You should be," you muttered into the soft cotton of his shirt, your words muffled but your meaning clear. The vibration of his quiet laughter rumbled through his chest, and you felt the curve of his smile against your hair.

"You're stubborn, you know that?" His lips brushed your crown once more before he reluctantly loosened his hold, fingers sliding down to intertwine with yours as he guided you toward the bedroom, taking your blanket and pillow with him. You offered a half-hearted shrug but let him lead, your resistance fading with each step. The moment your legs brushed against the mattress, he drew you back into him, your body molding perfectly against his as if you were made to fit there.

"And you also can't hold grudges," he teased, his fingers idly tracing the seam of his shirt where it stretched across your shoulder.

"Hey!" You lifted your head sharply, only to have it gently pressed back into place by his hand. "That wasn't intentional - it was the only thing in the bathroom," you protested, though the effect was somewhat ruined by the way you instinctively nuzzled closer.

"Yeah, yeah, sure," he hummed, the words laced with amused disbelief as his palm smoothed down your back in slow, comforting circles.

The sheets rustled as he shifted, one hand sliding beneath the hem of the shirt, his shirt, to press against the small of your back.

"You’re still mad," he observed, though his voice held amusement.

"Mm. Maybe." You curled closer, your lips grazing his collarbone.

A pause.

"You know," he murmured, his voice a low rumble you felt more than heard, "I was thinking of sitting in the front row this time." His thumb brushed a particularly sensitive spot between your shoulder blades, drawing an involuntary shiver. "That way you can't miss me when you're tearing the prosecution's case apart."

You tilted your head just enough to peer up at him through your lashes. "Front row? You never sit in the front row."

The corners of his eyes crinkled as his hand came up to tuck a stray strand of hair behind your ear. "For this case? I'd sit on the witness stand if it meant seeing that fire in your eyes when you cross-examine."