#yeah just a quick doodle to distract my self | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

chaos-burst · 3 years

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direction to perfection

Dorian fought his parents to be here.

He fought tooth and nail to be allowed to live in a dorm, so there is no way he can back down from this decision. It’s his first shot at freedom and being normal and doing something for himself instead of his family.

Dorian will not back down.

He will persevere.

“Harder, come on!”

Loud moaning and the creaking of an old mattress accompany the dull thudding that comes from inside of his room. The room he’s currently standing in front of.

“I’m so close, so close, so close—“

Dorian stares at the door. His face is hot and he stands frozen in place as he tries to decide what to do. He needs his lute for the next bard class. He also needs to be far away from this room.

Gods, most of all he needs a new roommate.

“Oh, fuck, just like that—ah—“

Dorian closes his eyes and hides his face in his hands.

He was so proud after he finally convinced his parents to let him stay here. When he first entered his room he wasn’t even concerned about how small it was, or how his roommate’s bed was so close to his that stretching both their arms out would result in them touching hands.

And then he met Dariax, the guy he’s supposed to be living with for a long time.

“Dorian, are you literally standing here listening to Dariax bang someone inside of your room?”, Opal’s voice reaches his ears and he turns his head to look at her. She must see the desperation on his face because the next moment she gives him a pointed look before hammering her fist on the door.

“What the fuck, guys! Rent a room! And hurry up, Dorian needs his stuff!”

Dorian feels mortification creep from his face down into his stomach as he hears a loud thump, a shriek and a curse. The fact that Dariax knows that Dorian has been standing here makes him go through the five stages of grief so quickly that he can feel his insides churn.

Opal turns to face him and gives him a stern stop-putting-up-with-this look before she stalks away, twirling her dagger in her hand.

Dorian wishes it were that easy to voice what he wants.

To be sure of himself.

To live unashamed and free.

Sadly, his current repertoire covers none of these things.

The door gets yanked open and Dorian finds himself face to face with a white, half-elven woman wrapped in a bed sheet, her hair a complete and utter, blonde mess, her purple lipstick smeared across her left cheek.

“I was so close!”, she hisses as she holds up her index finger and thumb to indicate the fact that Dorian just ruined her earth-shattering orgasm.

“I—uh. I’m so—“

“Dorian! Gosh, I’m so sorry, I forgot that you had class, buddy!”

The half-elven woman throws Dorian the nastiest stink-eye and rushes down the corridor in nothing but the bedsheet wrapped around her. Dorian has no idea why she would do that, but Dariax distracts him.

Dariax, who is completely naked, his lips covered in purple lipstick, his cheeks flushed and his hair standing up from his head.

For decency, he’s holding a bottle of wine to cover his crotch.

Dorian wishes the floor would open up and swallow him whole.

“I—uh. Sorry to disturb the—ah. Fun? I just. I just need to grab my lute real quick”, he says weakly, rushes over to his bed and grabs the lute leaning against the wall beside it.

“Oh, don’t worry about it, buddy, I’ll just go jack off in the shower, it’s no biggie.”

Dorian stares at Dariax who grins at him, as if that was a perfectly normal thing to say to someone in this situation.

“Sure. Have fun”, he croaks, his cheeks still flaming, and flees out of the room and down the hallway.

Dorian fought so hard to be here but gods, he wishes he were somewhere else right now.

The class he’s attending is one of his favorites—one that covers Bardic Inspiration as a form of self-expression, but it takes him a while to cool down from the mortifying ordeal of having Dariax as his roommate.

They’ve been living together for almost three months now and it’s not like it’s all bad.

Hell, Dorian likes Dariax.

He’s funny, doesn’t take himself too seriously, he tells ridiculous, entertaining stories and is loyal to a fault. But he’s also extroverted in a way that makes Dorian go insane. There is no moment of silence when Dariax is in the room—because Dariax hates silence. He also brings back so many different people to their room without asking Dorian first. Not all of them are Dariax’ lovers—at least not as far as he knows.

But they’re always loud, always messy and always completely oblivious to Dorian’s social cues.

Opal keeps ranting about how Dorian needs to reinforce his boundaries, but Dorian has no idea how to do that. Never in a million years would he bang on the door of his room if he knows that Dariax is having sex in there. Opal is always so loud and unapologetic about everything—Dorian envies her for it.

Dorian has never kissed anyone. Or had sex. Or anything in between these things. How the fuck both Dariax and Opal know exactly what they like and who they like is beyond him.

“Excuse me, is this seat taken?”, a soft voice says right next to him and Dorian is ripped out of thoughts and into reality. The class has been going for an hour and there’s someone standing next to him he’s never seen before.

She’s definitely some sort of fey—the whole lower half of her body is goat-like and her long ears are drooping. The amount of ribbons her dress is supporting is truly astounding and there is a whole crown of poisonous flowers on top of her head that she wears like a crown. Dorian blinks before catching himself.

“Ah—no. Please”, he says and gestures at the empty chair next to him.

The faun sits down carefully and watches as she carefully places a panflute on her thighs.

“Which bard college do you specialize in?”, Dorian asks.

“Hm? Oh, I’m not a bard. I’m majoring in druid. I just like to make music”, she answers with a smile.

Dorian never considered just taking classes that have nothing to do with his major. Maybe it would be something his parents would disapprove of even more than they did of his bard major and his choice to sleep in a dorm.

“I’m Fearne, by the way”, she adds and nods her heads slightly. A single leaf falls from her head and onto her panflute.

“Dorian”, he answers. Fearne smiles at him.

“You have very pretty hair”, she says.

“Oh. Ah—thank you? You—you too. Your hair, I mean. It’s—uh. Very green.”

Fearne’s smile widens.

“Thank you!”, she says in a tone that suggests that this might be the compliment she’s ever received. Dorian on the other hand wishes he could bite off his tongue. Your hair is very green. What kind of compliment is that? It’s no wonder that he didn’t have any chance to kiss anyone yet if this is all that he can come up with.

Dorian turns around and tries to concentrate on the professor’s lecture but his mind keeps wandering. He takes only a few notes and as he looks over at Fearne he sees that she’s doodling all sorts of mushrooms into her notebook. Then there is a small screech coming directly from her bag.

The class falls silent and everyone turns to look in their direction.

“What was that?”, professor Brooke asks with a confused look on his face. “I don’t remember any familiar registrations for this class.”

Dorian looks at Fearne who turns her head to look around at all the people staring in their direction.

“That was just me”, Fearne says and points to herself. “I ate too much pudding for breakfast.”

Professor Brooke looks embarrassed and very apologetic.

“I’m sorry, dear. Let’s continue then.”

As the lecture continues, Dorian leans over to Fearne.

“Didn’t that come out of your bag?”, he wants to know. Fearne shoots him a sly smile and gently lifts the flap of her green bag. Dorian stares at a small monkey peeking up at him with weirdly glowing eyes. Then the monkey raises his index finger to his mouth as if trying to tell Dorian to shut up.

Fearne closes the bag.

“That’s just Little Mister. He’s my… friend.”

“I see”, Dorian says.

He supposes that this is what he left home for—to meet all sorts of people, learn about all kinds of different things that he would never get in touch with while under his parents’ wings.

So Dorian decides to simply accept that some people are friends with monkeys and carry them around in bags.

If he can manage to live with someone like Dariax, he sure as hell won’t judge someone for bringing an animal companion to class.

After another fifteen minutes, Fearne leans over to Dorian again.

“I don’t understand this concept that the professor is talking about.”

“Oh, they explained it in the first half hour, before you got here.”

“Oh, I see. I was late”, Fearne says and looks disappointed, as if she was only now realizing this.

“Uh—yeah. Like, half an hour.”

“Time is kind of hard, you know. It’s like—it’s like this weird soup. And I don’t think I really have it memorized how to read clocks.”

Dorian stares at her.

“So. Are you not from here?”, he asks and groans internally at his phrasing. Fearne doesn’t seem to mind, though. She nods gratefully as Dorian pushes over his notes so she can look at them.

“No, not really. I come from the Feywild. We don’t really have clocks.”

“Because… time is a weird soup.”

“Yeah, exactly. Is that a saying here, too?”, she asks, her ears turning towards him full of excitement.

“Ah—no. I don’t think it is. Not here, at least.”

“Well, now you know it.”

Dorian nods and watches as Fearne studies his notes to copy some of them down into her notebook. He tries to imagine a world without clocks and immediately gets anxious at the prospect of always being late.

In the last twenty minutes of the lecture, they actually get to play their instruments.

“You play beautifully”, Fearne says after listening to Dorian play for a few minutes.

“Thank you! Your music is really different from what I know. It’s interesting.”

Fearne beams at him.

“Maybe we could make some music together some time?”, she asks.

“I would like that, yeah.”

Dorian isn’t bad at making friends, he’s just not as good or fast at it as Dariax. Maybe that’s because he’s a little more selective about the people he hangs out with, but Dariax just seems to consider everyone he talked to more than once his friend.

Dorian never really had friends growing up, so he doesn’t consider himself an expert. But at least for him Dariax’ way doesn’t seem to be all that great.

So when Dariax asks: “Hey, do you wanna come hang out with me and my friends tonight?” Dorian feels less than inclined to say yes.

“Uh—I already have plans”, he lies, trying to figure out if he should try to convince Opal to spend the evening with him or if he should just take this opportunity to have some peace and quiet in his room.

“Aw, man. Too bad. We wanted to go skinny dipping in the gym’s pool”, Dariax says.

“Isn’t that off limits at night?”, Dorian asks, his brow furrowed as he looks at Dariax’ face that breaks into a wide grin.

“Yeah, that’s why it’s fun to go there”, he answers and winks at Dorian. Dorian feels his cheeks grow hot and swallows as his intestines suddenly feel the need to writhe around like living snakes.

“Oh, well—I’m not really a—uh. A rebel boy, as they say”, he says and laughs nervously. “You go and have fun, though.”

He tries not to picture Dariax completely naked in the dim, shimmering light of the campus’ pool but he fails miserably. His palms start sweating.

“Oh, don’t worry, I will, I will. But hey, maybe next time!”

“Uh—yeah. Maybe”, Dorian says weakly as Dariax saunters out of their room and closes the door behind him. Dorian stares at the locked door for way too long and he’s endlessly glad that no one can see him.

This doesn’t seem like a normal thing to invite someone to. When he went to college to learn how to be a bard, he envisioned parties, maybe some illegal weed smoking on a restricted rooftop, at the most.

He did not envision to be asked to get butt naked, break into a gym with a pool at night and go swimming with a bunch of—probably drunk—strangers he doesn’t even know the names of.

That was, of course, before he got Dariax as a roommate.

Now Dorian feels like he should be prepared for anything.

As Dorian grabs his lute and sinks down onto his bed he wonders if Fearne lives on campus or if she lives in the Feywild and somehow manages to travel here for every class that she has. That would explain the time thing, he supposes, because he learned that time works differently on other planes.

This is the first evening in what feels like weeks that he has the room just to himself. In between the pieces he plays on his lute he simply sits on the bed, enjoying the silence. When he opens the window the cool breeze from outside reminds him of home and he closes his eyes for a little while.

It smells like rain and autumn outside. Dorian turns to look at the small room that’s his now. It’s nothing compared to the big, bright room he had at home, but it feels special simply because this is the first time he gets to do what he wants with a space without anyone breathing down his neck.

There’s not much in the room aside from their desks, beds and the closet they share, but Dorian pinned a few posters and postcards over his bed for the very first time. His bed is unmade—something that his parents would have never allowed—and there are fairy lights dangling from the ceiling that he actually picked out himself.

The desk is covered in sheet music and books and for a few seconds Dorian looks at the small picture of his brother and himself that is sticking to his pencil holder, before turning his gaze at some of the articles he printed out yesterday.

He might actually get some homework done in this blessed quiet.

At least that’s what he thinks until his phone rings.

At some point Dariax must’ve stolen Dorian’s phone and taken a selfie to make it pop up every time he calls Dorian, because as his phone lights up Dorian can see Dariax’ dopey smile appear. Dorian ignores the rush of heat he feels as he looks down at the glowing display, reaches for his phone and picks up the call.

“Dariax?”

“Dorian, hey buddy!”

He definitely sounds drunk, which doesn’t surprise Dorian. But there’s an edge to his voice that makes Dorian nervous.

“What’s up, Dariax?”

“I—uh. Remember how I told you that we were going to go skinny dipping in the gym and everything?”

“Yeah, I haven’t forgotten. It was like, three hours ago.”

“Cool, yeah. So the guys—“, and Dorian wonders who exactly ‘the guys’ are supposed to be, “were in a real funny mood. So. They stole my clothes and locked me in here—“

“They what?”

“I know, right? So… I tried to break open the lock, but I might be a little too drunk to get it right. And I was wondering—could you maybe bring me some clothes and get that door open for me?”

Dorian stares out into the night.

“How do you have your phone if they took all your stuff?”, he asks weakly.

“Had it with me in the pool to take some underwater selfies. It’s waterproof”, Dariax supplies cheerfully.

Dorian can see lights in the buildings all over campus and a crescent moon in the sky. He tries not to imagine what kind of pictures Dariax was trying to take of himself. Naked. In a pool.

“You want me to break open a door”, he repeats, just in case he misheard.

“I mean, kinda? Maybe? I really don’t wanna sleep in here. I slept in worse places, but it seems kinda shitty to wake up and immediately get into trouble for trespassing and all of that…”

Dorian isn’t sure if he wants to know in what kind of places Dariax has slept that count as worse as a college gym’s pool.

“But I guess I could just sleep in the showers or something.”

“I don’t really know how to get locks open”, Dorian sighs, but he’s already walking over to their shared closet. In theory, Dariax’ half is on the left, but he insists on just throwing all of his clothes in there without actually caring about which side they land on, so Dorian grabs some jeans, a hoodie and some underwear and stuffs it into his bag. He tries very hard not to look at the underwear too closely.

Dariax might not know what privacy is but that doesn’t mean that Dorian has to stoop down to the same level as his roommate.

“Fine. I’ll see what I can do”, he huffs.

“Aw, fuck yeah, you’re the best. I lo—“

“Bye”, Dorian calls and hangs up hastily before Dariax can finish.

His dreams of a quiet night dissipate into smoke as he throws the bag over his shoulder, grabs his keys, his jacket and his phone and leaves the room to head towards the gym.

Dorian, never in his life, has tried to open a lock with anything other than the key that was supposed to go into it. He doubts that he would manage to learn it in the heat of a moment so as he walks through the night, passing under a lantern every few steps he takes, he considers what he can do to get a locked door to open.

He is not strong enough to pry it open.

He has never learned how to do that trick with a credit card and isn’t sure if it would even work on this door even if he knew how.

There is no spell he knows that would be useful to open a door.

The only thing Dorian is good at is music and talking to people.

He makes his decision as he heads for the closest security guard patrolling campus at night.

“Excuse me, hi”, he says with the most honest and simultaneously nervous smile he can muster. The young man looks him up and down and seems to come to the conclusion that Dorian is worthy of his attention because his body turns towards him and offers a small smile back. He’s white withshort, brown hair, a long nose and arms full of tattoos.

“Can I help you?”, he asks.

“Well—this is so embarrassing. I—uh. I was in the gym earlier and I forgot my phone in there and my girlfriend wanted to call me tonight and I—uh. I already missed the last call so…”

He trails off as he tries to looks as bashful and stressed as he can—something that isn’t hard because Dorian still has to think about how Dariax is naked and probably dripping wet and how they’re most likely going to get into so much damn trouble.

“Oh wow, that sucks”, the security guard says and Dorian nods.

“Yeah, I’m—this is so dumb, I know you have better things to do, but… If you could just let me sneak in there for a minute and grab my phone? That would be a total life-saver, man”, he says and brings his hands up in front of his chest in a pleading gesture.

“Well, I guess we can make an exception. Don’t want to be the cause for trouble in paradise, right?”, he answers with a smile and Dorian forces himself to laugh.

“Thanks so much, I’ll drop off some cookies next time I see you around”, Dorian says and the security guard chuckles and makes a joke about bribery that Dorian doesn’t actually find funny but laughs about anyway. Since he officially ‘lost’ his phone he has no idea how to let Dariax know what his plan is.

All Dorian can do is hope that Dariax isn’t standing right behind the door butt-naked. Dorian supposes that he could always claim not to know him then—something that would only hold up for so long.

They walk towards the gym and Dorian can feel his heartbeat picking up.

What if he gets suspended? Kicked out? Sent home?

When they arrive in front of the gym everything is silent. Dariax is not banging on the door from the inside, calling Dorian’s name. Dorian decides to take that as a win as he nervously watches the guard fiddle for the master-key before opening the door.

“So, where did you leave your phone?”, the guard asks him and Dorian looks around hastily to see if he can spot Dariax anywhere.

“Uh—over on the benches, I’ll be right back!”, he says with an apologetic smile before rushing through the gym and towards the benches on the other side of the building.

“Dariax!”, he hisses into the darkness towards the corridor that leads to the locker-room and the pool.

“Hey bu—“

“Pscht. There’s a guard there. I had him open the door, you have to sneak out!”

Dorian starts crouching down on the floor and drops his bag so Dariax can reach it. He’s peaking his head out of the dark corridor and Dorian hopes that the security guard doesn’t spot him as he reaches his arm out towards the bag with Dariax’ clothes inside it.

“Did you find it?”, the guard calls over and Dorian can hear his footsteps coming closer. He hastily fishes for his phone and slides it under one of the benches.

“Not yet, it’s pretty dark in here”, he says. The rustling in the corridor next to him tells him that Dariax is hastily getting dressed.

“I have a flashlight, one sec”, the guard says and crouches down next to Dorian who feels bad for lying to the poor guy. He’s so friendly and forthcoming—Dorian decides that he actually has to get this man some cookies.

“Oh, there it is!”, he says and points to the left as the light of the torch reaches his phone.

“I’m afraid my arms too short to reach that”, the guard says and scoots back so Dorian can extent his arm and grab his phone. He tries hard not to look behind him to check if Dariax already made it out or not. He gets up, stuffs the phone into his pocket and dusts off his pants before turning towards the guard with an embarrassed smile.

“Man, thank you so much, this is really clutch.”

“No problem. I hope it works out with your girlfriend”, he answers and leads Dorian back towards the door.

“Thanks. If I see you again I’ll keep you posted!”

They step outside into the cool night air and Dorian can’t see Dariax anywhere. His heart is still beating rapidly in his chest and his palms are terribly sweaty. He wipes them off on his pants and decides that he needs a hot shower and his warm bed after this terrible disaster. His body feels as if he just ran a marathon.

So much for a quiet, peaceful night.

As soon as the guard leaves Dorian looks around frantically. If Dariax didn’t make it outside, there’s no way Dorian can convince this guy to open the gym up again without telling him the truth—something Dorian desperately does not want to do.

“Hey, over here!”

Dorian turns around and sees Dariax waving out of one of the bushes. His hair is wet and sticking to his forehead, his face is flushed and his eyes glassy, but he has a wide, reckless smile on his face that makes Dorian’s heart leap into his throat and press on his windpipe.

“What the fuck, man?”, Dorian hisses as he walks over to Dariax who gets up now, slightly swaying on his feet. There are some yellow leaves stuck in his auburn hair.

“Damn, buddy, that was awesome! You seriously have a velvet tongue, how did you even do that?”

“I asked nicely. What the actual fuck, Dariax? Why did your friends think that was a good idea?”

Dariax looks at him sheepishly and shrugs.

“Ah—to tell you the truth, I don’t know.”

“Sounds like they were fucking you over”, Dorian says and starts walking back towards the dorm. Some fine mist hangs between the trees, which look mostly black except for those who reach into the light of the street lamps. The orange and brown colored leaves remind Dorian of Dariax’ hair.

“Yeah. Sounds like it, huh.”

Dariax is quiet after that, something which Dorian, for some reason, finds even more disturbing than hearing Dariax’ sex-noises through a locked door.

“You okay?”, he asks after two minutes of walking in silence.

Dariax turns to look at him and the smile that appears on his face doesn’t reach his eyes.

“Yeah, sure. You know how it is, people just fuck you over. That’s how it works, I guess.”

“It doesn’t have to work like this”, Dorian says, his brow furrowed and his hands itchy to reach out and tussle Dariax’ wet hair for comfort. He doesn’t even know if Dariax wants to be comforted. Or wants to be comforted by Dorian specifically.

Dorian doesn’t even know why he feels the need to comfort Dariax, seeing as to how it’s his own fault for getting into such a situation in the first place.

“Hm, maybe. But I guess you showed up to save the day”, Dariax says, looking at Dorian thoughtfully.

“Yeah, I didn’t fuck you over”, Dorian agrees and holds open the door for them as they reach the dorm.

“Yeah. You didn’t. Thanks, buddy. I owe you one.”

The security guard’s name is Orym, he knows Fearne from taking some druid classes on the side on top of his fighter classes and he enjoys blueberry muffins.

“So, how did it go with your girlfriend?”, he asks while chewing on the muffin that Dorian handed him a few moments ago.

“We broke up”, Dorian replies with a gravelly voice and Orym pulls a face.

“I’m sorry, man.”

“Don’t worry about it. Thanks again for helping me with my phone.”

“It’s no problem at all. Thank you for this muffin.”

“You’re welcome. I’ll see you around.”

Dorian is pleased to find that the steady trickle of loud people that Dariax used to invite to their room before is thinning. He still goes out drinking and partying a lot, and he still has guests over to play Mario Kart or some horrible drinking game, but overall Dorian’s having more peace and quiet than ever before since he moved into this room with Dariax.

On a Wednesday night Dariax is sprawled out on his bed flipping through his phone. Dorian wonders if he’s going through his contacts, considering whom to call on for some. Well. Drinking or sex, probably.

Dorian hopes it’s not sex. And if it is sex, then for sex that is supposed to happen far away from here.

“How come you never go out?”, Dariax wants to know.

Dorian looks up from the sheet music he’s working on. He’s humming along quietly as he writes down, erases, writes down again and corrects the song he’s trying to write. He finds that he actually likes working in companionable silence, even though he didn’t think this would be possible with Dariax as his roommate a few weeks ago.

Dariax doesn’t seem to mind not talking as long as there is some sort of sound in the room—and Dorian’s humming apparently counts.

“How do you mean? I go out all the time”, Dorian says and looks up from his paper, cocking his head to regard Dariax who’s head is now hanging off of the side of the bed so he looks back at Dorian upside down.

“Yeah but like, partying. Drinking. College stuff, you know. You just hang out with the scary lady and she seems to like partying.”

“First of all, her name’s Opal. And I guess she can be kind of scary, but only if you’re a dick. And second of all, I hang out with other people! I met this very nice faun in my bard class and we’re making music from time to time. And—I don’t know. Partying is just not. Uh... It’s just not...”

Dorian sighs and leans against the wall behind him. The room is so scrappy that some of the wallpaper is coming down in little flakes in some places. He absentmindedly starts picking at his pillow.

“I never really went to parties before coming here. It’s just. I don’t know. New. I’m not like you. You know, with all the drinking and partying and—and uh. Sex. I guess.”

He can feel his ears burning and his cheeks heating up as he mumbles the end of his sentence. Dariax blinks at him and drops his phone on his face.

“Ow, fuck—okay. Wait. Are you saying that you’re a party-virgin and an actual virgin?”

“Oh come on, man, why do you have to say it like that? I’ve been to parties! But not—you know? College parties! And I never really drank alcohol before. It seems... I don’t know. Shifty.”

“Shifty”, Dariax repeats and a shit-eating grin spreads over his face, lighting up his eyes with a shimmer of mischief that Dorian finds very disconcerting.

“So you are a virgin.”

Dorian throws his pencil at Dariax and misses.

“So what? There’s nothing wrong with being a virgin! We can’t all walk around like you sleeping with people left and right!”

Dariax chuckles, obviously pleased with himself.

“Very true, I’m one of a kind. So, okay. But you kissed people, right?”, he wants to know.

“Why is that even relevant?”, Dorian hisses. He decides to throw his pillow next and Dariax almost falls off the bed trying to dodge it as he laughs.

“It’s not, I’m just curious! You’re always super uptight and mysterious, I know shit all about you and you’ve basically seen me banging someone at least twice!”

Dorian tries and fails to keep his poise as he flails his arms around.

“I could’ve lived happily without having seen any of that!”

“So that means you never kissed anyone?”, Dariax asks again, his grin wide and his eyebrows offensively wiggling. Dorian wishes he had some sort of cake that he could press Dariax’ face into.

“No, never. Are you happy now?”

“Would you like to kiss someone?”, Dariax wants to know and leans forward on the bed. He seems to have decided that sitting upright is the better choice in case Dorian decides to throw something else at him.

“I—I mean. I don’t know? I haven’t found the right person to kiss yet!”

“Ah, you’re one of those guys”, Dariax says with a wise nod that drives Dorian up the walls.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know? Like a romantic. True love and shit.”

“I wouldn’t—I. I haven’t really thought about it much. It’s not that important to me.”

Dariax pulls a face and nods, as if he understands perfectly what it means to not much care about kissing, sex or relationships. Dorian doubts that he actually understands with the frequency in which he drags people into his bed.

“I guess it’s not bad to wait for someone special”, Dariax concedes with a lopsided smile. “My first kiss was a total disaster, I didn’t know what I was doing at all and the dude told me it was like kissing a bowl of rice pudding.”

Dorian stares at him.

“That’s such a horrible thing to say”, he answers and Dariax shrugs.

“Yeah, I guess. He could’ve been nicer about it.”

Dorian’s brain is reeling.

Dariax had his first kiss with a guy. Dariax doesn’t only like women.

“Oh gods, I wish you hadn’t told me”, Dorian groans and presses the palms of his hands on his eyes until he sees little, colorful specs dancing on the inside of his eyelids. “What if I kiss someone I actually like and it turns out to be a completely terrible?”

He lowers his hands and stares at Dariax who stares back at Dorian with an intensity that surprises him.

“I mean. I guess you could just practice”, Dariax says.

“Oh yeah, sure. I’ll ask the first random person I meet in the hallway—“

“I would do it. Practice with you, I mean.”

Dorian blinks. He can feel the heat rising in his face and knows that his cheeks are turning purple.

“I—uh. That’s. Well. That’s very kind of you. But I’ll—I guess I’ll just figure it out on my own.”

Dorian chuckles nervously and glances back at Dariax who looks at him for a second longer before flopping back down onto his bed.

“Sure thing, buddy”, he says quietly and it’s probably just Dorian’s imagination that he sounds a bit disappointed.

“Dorian. Hey, Dorian!”

Dariax’ voice cuts through a dream about flying through space naked and Dorian opens his eyes. He is met with darkness and turns his head over to look towards Dariax’ side of the room. It takes a few seconds for his eyes to adjust and the confusion and sleep to drain out of him.

“Huh?”

“Hey, sorry. I—uh. I kinda had—I kinda had a nightmare?”

“Sorry to hear that”, Dorian rasps and rubs at his eyes, “was it the one about the giant dwarven woman again?”

“Ah, no. Not this time. I—uh. Do you mind maybe just… I don’t know. Talking to me a little? Or, ah—humming? I would scoot over but your bed is probably a bit too small”, Dariax rambles and laughs nervously.

Dorian is too tired to get flustered about the prospect of cuddling with his roommate.

“You can scoot over. But don’t hog the blanket”, he mumbles and makes room in his tiny bed, pressing his back against the wall and lifting his blanket up, his eyes already falling shut again.

“Oh fuck yeah”, he hears Dariax whisper. There’s a rustling, the sound of naked feet on a wooden floor and then the mattress dips and Dariax climbs into bed with him, his body way warmer than Dorian expected it to be.

He’s wearing nothing but boxers.

“You sure this is okay?”, Dariax whispers into the dark and Dorian makes a noncommittal noise at the back of his throat before letting the blanket fall down over Dariax. His arms simply drops which is probably way too close to a hug in this position as they lie face to face on the mattress that was not made for two people to sleep on it.

“Thanks a lot, buddy. You’re the best”, Dariax whispers. Dorian knows that Dariax is pretty dense simply because he’s a dwarf, but while he drifts back off to sleep he feels the tension in Dariax’ body. This nightmare must have been deeply upsetting for someone as carefree and jovial as Dariax to ask for goddamn snuggles in the middle of the night.

Dorian starts humming. It’s faint and definitely not his best and probably not even a real song, but slowly, ever so slowly, he can feel Dariax relax beside him as they both fall asleep again.

What his sleepy brain did not account for when Dorian allowed Dariax entry into his bed was how they might wake up in completely different positions to the ones they fell asleep in and how his body was a mean betrayer set out to humiliate Dorian.

As he slowly comes back to consciousness Dorian realizes how incredibly warm it is. The next thing he notices is that there is a quietly snoring dwarf pressed against his side, one leg pushed over Dorian’s legs. Dariax, sometime during the night, has curled into Dorian so his nose is now pressed somewhere close to Dorian’s ribs. He can feel Dariax’ hot breath tickle his exposed skin.

This is the most skin-on-skin contact Dorian has ever had with someone who is not related to him.

Dariax’ arm is curled around his waist and Dorian has no idea how he’ll be able to get to the bathroom without waking Dariax up or alerting him to the fact that Dorian is suffering a terrible case of a morning boner.

Yeah, he definitely didn’t think this through when he allowed Dariax in here. If Dariax pulls his leg up a little more his thigh will absolutely come in contact with Dorian’s dick and he is not ready for that to happen.

Not even a little bit.

Dorian can’t help but notice that Dariax smells kind of nice. And the feeling of naked skin on naked skin feels so much better than he imagined it would. He should probably not think about skin on skin contact too much in his current predicament but Dariax decides that this is the right moment to move his leg.

Dorian makes an undignified noise in the back of his throat as Dariax’ thigh rubs against his erection and before he can really consider what his best course of action might be, he’s already shoving Dariax off of him.

Since these beds are tiny, that also means shoving Dariax off the bed.

There is loud thunk as Dariax hits the floor and bolts upright with a yelp, his hair tousled and untidy, his eyes barely open.

“I didn’t do it!”, he slurs loudly, holding both hands up in a gesture of surrender and Dorian can’t help but wonder what in the nine hells Dariax has been dreaming about.

“Sorry, man. You were—uh. Getting a little close”, Dorian says and sits up, carefully pulling the blanket over his crotch.

Dariax blinks up at him.

“Sorry, buddy. Didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable”, he mumbles and sways to his feet to stumble back over to his own bed.

Dorian immediately misses the warmth and the feeling of naked skin against his but he pushes the thought away and clears his throat.

“Did you sleep okay after your nightmare?”, he asks.

“Hmhm. Like a baby”, Dariax mumbles into his pillow. His face is pressed into it and he didn’t even take the take to cover himself with his blanket. “You have the most beautiful voice.”

Dorian’s cheeks begin to burn and he grips the blanket tighter.

“Thank you.”

“’S no problem.”

Dorian glances over at his roommate. Dariax looks surprisingly peaceful like this and it doesn’t take long for him to fall asleep again. The quiet snore returns and his mouth falls open slightly. When Dorian finally gets up to take a shower, he shivers slightly in the cold before carefully stepping over to the other bed and pulling the blanket over Dariax.

“You know what, I feel honored that you’re going to trust me with your first time”, Dariax says, looking endlessly pleased with himself.

Dorian sputters.

“Excuse m—“

“Your first time drinking, buddy”, Dariax explains and laughs as he sees the flush on Dorian’s cheeks.

They’re both sitting on Dariax’ bed—because Dariax doesn’t care about getting spots on his sheets at all—with a bottle of liquor that is bright red and looks a little radioactive.

“Well, I think I would just—uh. Prefer it… to try this out with someone I trust before I make a fool of myself in front of a whole party, you know”, Dorian says. When no answer comes, he turns his head to look at Dariax.

Dariax’ eyes are shimmering with something that Dorian can’t quite read but it makes his heart race in his chest. Dariax never looked at him like this before. His expression is almost soft with the barest hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“Glad to hear you trust me, Dorian. I trust you, too.”

Dorian clears his throat and looks away, the tension in the air between them suddenly too much for him.

“I am very trustworthy”, he jokes and grabs the bottle to unscrew it and smell the liquid inside.

“Ugh—it’s revolting”, he remarks and coughs a little.

Dariax chuckles.

“That’s how you know it’s good”, he says with a nod and gestures for Dorian to take the first sip.

Dorian has tried some champagne before, some beer. Some wine. But never more than half a glass. He never tried drinking any hard liquor and this stuff is burning his throat and sending heatwaves through his whole body immediately.

“Wow”, he coughs and hands the bottle to Dariax.

“Good stuff, right?”, Dariax says and

“It’s terrible!”

“Yeah”, Dariax says with a wide grin and a twinkle in his eyes.

“I don’t think a thing can be both good and terrible at the same time”, Dorian remarks, his face still in a grimace as he tries to get used to the burning sensation of hard alcohol in his throat.

“Nonsense, those are like, all of my favorite movies!”, Dariax says and takes a huge swig out of the bottle before handing it back to Dorian.

Dorian feels weirdly honored that Dariax decided to stay in on a Saturday night just to hang out with him and test the waters with his roommate while no doubt all his friends are out there partying.

“Like what movies”, Dorian wants to know and takes another careful sip out of the bottle. His mind provides him with the terrible thought that this might as well count as an indirect kiss, something that is entirely idiotic and not useful at all.

“Okay, so, you know when someone asks you a question about yourself and suddenly you have forgotten all of your interests and hobbies and favorites and pretty much everything about yourself?”, Dariax says, his brow furrowed as he tries to think of a movie that is both terrible and good at the same time.

“Tell you what. I can say that two of my favorite movies of all time are Pacific Rim and Mad Max, and those are not terrible, mind you, they’re just good. But if I manage to think of one that is both terrible and good, I’ll tell you immediately.”

Dorian has neither seen Mad Max nor Pacific Rim. When he tells Dariax as much his roommate looks aghast.

“Oh my gosh, Dorian. Buddy. My boy. That is—no. No, I can’t let this stand. Grab your laptop, we’re watching Pacific Rim right now”, Dariax orders and looks at Dorian expectantly.

This is how Dorian ends up crying about giant robots. And maybe also brothers.

Dariax hands him a tissue and sniffs.

“Good stuff, right?”, Dariax asks and empties the bottle as the end credits start rolling. Dorian nods and watches as Dariax throws the empty bottle to the side before pulling out a second one from under his bed.

Dorian is definitely tipsy. He drank way less than Dariax, of course, but he can feel a faint buzzing in his head and his vision seems to be slowed. There is a feeling of heaviness in his legs as he accepts the new bottle—this time the liquor is bright blue and tastes even worse—and drinks.

The new sensations in his body aren’t unpleasantly.

In a way, his soul feels lighter like this, less anxious, less unsure about things, which is pretty nice.

“So, what’s your favorite movie?”, Dariax wants to know.

“I—hm. I don’t know. I’m not much of a movie guy. I suppose I liked Lord of the Rings when I watched it a few years ago”, he says, thinking about the movies he has seen and which ones he enjoyed the most. Weirdly enough it’s exactly as Dariax said—now that someone asked about what he likes, Dorian can’t seem to remember much about himself.

“Good choice”, Dariax says with an approving nod that makes Dorian feel weirdly pleased.

“I guess we could totally do a Lord of the Rings marathon, you know? Get some snacks, order pizza, get fucked up. Hey, we could make it a drinking game!”

Dorian isn’t sure why there’s a tingling sensation under his skin, or why his heart starts beating faster in light of Dariax’ suggestion. Maybe it’s because he feels happy that Dariax wants to spend more time with Dorian. Maybe it’s just because the alcohol is getting to Dorian.

“What about your other friends?”, Dorian asks.

“What about them?”

“Well—wouldn’t you rather spend more time with them? You know—partying. Going skinny dipping. That sort of thing.”

Dorian knows that he’s fishing for compliments. He knows and he feels embarrassed about it but he can’t stop. Validation is something that he craves way too much for his own comfort, but the alcohol has lowered his defenses—or raised his stupidity. Either one of those.

“Well—you know when we went skinny dipping and they fucked me over, that was like. Not cool? And you got me outta there, even though you don’t really do that sorta thing, you know? So—that was not the first time I got fucked over by people I called my friends, but it was totally the first time someone bailed me out of stuff. So yeah. I’d rather stick with you, if that’s alright with you”, Dariax says, taking a few long gulps from the bottle of blue liquid.

Dorian feels a rush of heat under his skin. It’s not unusual for him to feel strongly about being praised or validated, but it usually doesn’t hit this hard.

He swallows and laughs nervously, grabbing the bottle from Dariax and taking a big sip that burns his throat.

“Yeah—yeah, alright”, he croaks and Dariax beams at him.

“I’m sorry, by the way. That—uh. That those people left you behind”, he adds quietly and hands the bottle back to Dariax.

“Oh, you know. I suppose it’s on me. I’m not very smart and I’m not good on my own, so I tend to follow people’s leads and they—uh. I guess they get bored with me, or something? Anyway. It’s not really important. Hey, how do you feel about watching Mad Max, too?”

“Hey, my friend is throwing a party on Saturday. Do you want to come?”

“Are you kidding? Do I wanna take your partying virginity? Hell, yes!”

“Dariax...”

“Sorry buddy, I got carried away.”

Dorian is still thinking about rice pudding on Friday.

The fact that somewhere out there is a person who would tell someone else something mean like this makes him nervous to try and kiss anyone. What if he actually likes the person he’s kissing and gets told that his kisses feel like a bowl of rice pudding?

Or worse, something even slimier?

He’s trying to get another song for one of his bard classes done, but he’s unable to concentrate.

“Hey, Dariax”, he says and looks over at Dariax who’s watching cat videos on YouTube, “can I ask you something? About—uh. About... kissing?”

Dariax looks up at him with bright eyes.

“Sure”, he says and grins.

Dorian swallows.

“Uh—I was thinking. How—uh. How did you get better at kissing? Did you practice with anyone?”

“Nah, not really. I mean, not like that. I just went for it again and again until I got better at it. Guess it would’ve been nice to have someone around for practice, but I made it work anyway. No one’s been complaining for a while now.”

Dorian chews on his bottom lip and pokes the paper he’s working on with a pencil.

“So—uh. You said—“

“Yes”, Dariax shoots back immediately, as if he knows what Dorian is going to say next. Dorian feels the familiar heat rise up in his chest as he looks at his roommate who seems very intense all of a sudden, leaning forward and shutting his laptop, his eyes fixed on Dorian.

“I—uh. I don’t. I don’t really... I don’t like... guys?”, Dorian says and his voice sounds way too hoarse in his own ears. Dariax’ shoulders sag a little but he shrugs.

“Doesn’t really matter for this, right? It’s just kissing.”

“Right. Okay. Uh—so. If I—if I wanted to try this... how do you—how do we make this work?”, he asks.

His heart is beating so fast, Dorian is afraid it’s going to break his rib cage and fly out of the window. Dariax puts his laptop to the side and pats the mattress beside himself, his eyes still fixed on Dorian’s face with an intensity that makes heat pool in Dorian’s lower abdomen.

He pushes the feeling aside and gets up from his own bed to sit down next to Dariax.

“I know what this is about”, Dariax says with a sly grin.

“Uh—you do?”

Dorian doesn’t know what this is about aside from his own nagging sense of anxiety and the fact that he can’t stop thinking about kissing Dariax—which is entirely Dariax’ fault because he offered this whole practicing thing in the first place.

“Yeah. You’re going to check out some ladies on that party tomorrow”, Dariax says, his grin widening as he scoots closer to Dorian. Dorian can feel Dariax’ body heat and he presses his back against the wall, his fingers digging into the blanket crumpled below his legs.

“Ah—yeah. You got me”, he lies and laughs nervously. Dariax winks and gives him fingerguns.

“Don’t worry, buddy. I gotcha! I’ll be the best wingman ever. Here, just lemme—“

And Dariax climbs into Dorian’s lap, straddling him, his face so close to Dorian’s that Dorian can feel his breath on his cheek.

He holds his breath as he notices all the freckles on Dariax’ face, his scruffy beard, his hazel-brown eyes...

His heart is stumbling in his chest.

“Thanks”, he rasps.

“No need to be nervous, I’m sure you’ll be way better at this than I was the first time around. Just lemme take the lead, okay?”

Dorian nods.

If he gets hard now, Dariax will definitely feel it.

Fuck.

Dariax raises his hands and tilts Dorian’s chin up while his other hand gently cups Dorian’s cheek. It’s already almost too much for Dorian. His lips open slightly and his eyes widen as Dariax gets closer still, his nose gently touching Dorian’s.

“If you want me to stop, just smack me real hard”, Dariax whispers and his breath tickles Dorian’s lips before the distance between their mouths is closed and Dariax is kissing him, his hazel-brown eyes closed.

Dariax’ lips are warm and a little chapped and Dorian gasps against his mouth helplessly—something that Dariax seems to take as encouragement. He tilts his head to the side to get a better angle and then his lips press against Dorian’s in earnest.

Dorian’s heart stops for a few seconds before restarting with doubled speed.

His whole body seems to be on fire all of a sudden and he can’t help but raise his hands to touch Dariax—just touch him anywhere. He needs to ground himself, hold onto something, or he might just get lost in the feeling of Dariax’ warm lips carefully moving against his.

It’s a slow kiss, almost sweet, but Dorian’s skin is set aflame.

I don’t like guys, he thinks as his whole body decides that he must get closer to Dariax, wrap his arms around him, pull him in, cup the back of his head so he doesn’t move away—

“This okay?”, Dariax mumbles against his lips and he sounds so out of breath as if he just sprinted a whole mile.

“Yeah—I. Yeah.”

“You wanna try with tongue?”

Dorian swallows. There is still heat pooling in his abdomen. He should say no. He should stop doing this. This feels dangerous and stupid.

But it also feels so good.

“Yeah, okay”, he whispers.

Dariax doesn’t wait for another invite, he immediately leans forward again to close the distance between them and as Dorian’s hands dig themselves into the back of Dariax’s shirt and his heart starts racing even faster Dariax slides his tongue into Dorian’s mouth and Dorian’s mind goes blank.

There is a sound that is dangerously close to a moan and it takes him a few seconds to realize that it’s coming from him.

He holds onto Dariax like a drowning man before he manages to kiss back.

The second their tongues slide against one another there is a sound from Dariax too, one that shoots directly into Dorian’s lap. His hips buckle up involuntarily, his arms wrap around Dariax tighter and Dariax presses closer, his hips grinding down against him.

Dorian is lost.

And he’s so, so fucked.

It feels so incredibly good to kiss Dariax. He forgot why he even started kissing him, all he knows that he doesn’t want to stop, that he wants to get closer, wants to touch more skin—

He’s hard by now, and so is Dariax. Dorian can feel his erection through the jeans that Dariax is wearing.

Dorian buries his hands in Dariax’ hair and pulls. Dariax makes a helpless sound and bites down on Dorian’s bottom lip before sucking on it lightly and Dorian is afraid that he might come in his pants just from kissing and the delicious friction of Dariax’ crotch rubbing against his.

Shit, shit, shit, shit—

Before Dorian can make a fool of himself Dariax pulls back.

He’s panting, his eyes are glassy, his lips red and wet from kissing and he looks so pretty, Dorian is momentarily stunned by the revelation that he might not be into girls or guys or pretty much anyone.

But he’s definitely, terribly, irrevocably into Dariax.

Fuck.

“S—sorry”, Dariax gasps and clambers off of Dorian’s lap. “That was—I’m. I—uh. I got carried away a little. Didn’t mean to overstep any boundaries.”

Dorian swallows and stares at him, his eyes wide and his heart pressing against his rib cage.

“It’s okay”, he rasps. “I—uh. I got a little carried away, too.”

Dariax throws him a lopsided smile.

“Well. I’d say you’re good to go.”

And he gets off the bed and stumbles over to the bathroom, leaving Dorian behind with a rapidly beating heart, tingling lips and the revelation that he has the world’s worst crush on Dariax.

#doriax #critfic #exu fic #critical role #dariax zaveon #dorian storm #exandria unlimited #exu #fanfiction #screeching into the void #text #this has an M rating on ao3 jsyk #we have ~9k of practice kissing/college au magical realism here my guys #dorian #dariax

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hazyilluminations · 2 years

Text

My spot. Your spot. Our spot…

It is nice to have someone to support you, isn't it?

Sometimes the closest ones don't provide even the smallest amount of that. They don't accept you as a standalone human being, don't even try to do it, and keep pushing you with their own aspirations and goals.

It gets you in a cage of suppressed emotions.

At some point, you just lose the will to defend your own way in life.

Does it have to be that way? Why can't people just accept you for who you are and let you have your wings.

Even if you fail, it will be your path.

"You need to stop fooling around with your art stuff. After graduation, you'll join me and make yourself a career", your father just wouldn't stop picturing your future for you.

"Do I have a vote in this?", you smiled a little.

It is not like your father was a tyrant, you meant a world to him. You had everything, but not your future. He just didn't consider your aspirations.

"This is your future we are talking about, Y/N. You should thank me for being so interested in it. I love you and wish only the best for you".

"Yes, sure, Dad. Thank you. I need to go. I don't want to be late on the first day in a new school… in the middle of the year", you kissed your Dad on the temple, grabbed your school backpack and went out of the cage.

It was a bit chilly outside, but it is exactly what you needed – fresh, cool air. You took a deep breath and put on headphones.

Play…

Intoxicating vibes filled your mind and put your soul at ease. Maybe just for a bit, but it worked for you.

You walked past small colorful shrines with little fox statues and tried to imprint little details, so that you could draw it later as a sketch or even with watercolors. Perhaps you'll even make a foxy themed bullet journal.

Oh, it would look so cute…

You didn't notice that you've already reached your destination - Inarizaki High School.

As you were about to go straight to the lockers, you felt a strong push from behind.

"Samu, you jerk! What the hell?", bleached boy didn't even try to look sorry.

"Hey, are you alright? Sorry, I didn't notice you. It is just my stupid brother and his morning antics. Are you new? I didn't see you before", grey haired boy, approached you with curiosity.

"Yeah, I am fine. Moved a week ago. I am sorry, I need to go, need to find my classroom", you bowed and turned around.

"Hey, wait. What class are you in? I can show you the way".

"What? You? The way? Samu, don't be stupid. If you need a guide, I am your guy. Atsumu Miya at your service", he winked and held out his hand.

"Cut it, Sumu. He is an idiot. Don't mind him".

And just like that, they started bickering. It would probably entertain you a bit, but you decided not to waste any time.

"I am fine. Thanks", you walked away from the loud twins.

You found your classroom without any further problems and stopped for a moment in front of the door.

You've got this. It is just a new school, new people …

You were lucky, the bell rang, and the teacher welcomed you. You made a quick routine self introduction and took a place at the back of the class, near the window. Perfect.

Time passed by and it was already lunch pause. Mmm, the most delicious time of the day with its long peaceful break for all the students.

It had always been the most special time for you, as you found the best hidden spot on the rooftop at your previous school, to escape from everyone and everything, and spend the time in your own universe … doodling, sketching.

That was your quest for the break in this new school – to find the perfect deserted place on the roof and claim it as yours. Little did you know, the perfect places don't stay deserted for long.

You sneaked out of the classroom before anyone jumped on you with questions for newcomers. There will be time for that, you thought.

Five minutes later, you found it – your desolate paradise – the sun peeking from the corner, to keep you warm on a chilly day, zero noisy pipes to distract you and take you out of the mood. Ideal.

You didn't want to waste any time. You leaned against the wall and took your sketchbook out. And just when you wanted to turn on the music, you heard a quiet, yet annoyed voice.

"This is my spot".

You blinked twice, then looked at the source of the voice. Dark brown weirdly combed down hair, with few strands at the top and middle-parted bangs. Foxy grayish-yellow eyes piercing through with a blank expression.

"Excuse me?".

"This.is.my.spot", he repeated, bending slightly down.

"Ok, Doctor Cooper. What do you want me to do about it?".

"Suna. And this sitcom is so outdated".

"True. It has its charm, though", you pretended not to understand his hints.

"So?", he quirked his brows.

"What? If you expect me to leave, then you are sooo wrong".

"You are, supposedly, a newcomer so, technically, you have no right to claim this spot, for, at least, a couple of weeks".

"And you are a local roof Sheriff now? I am teeeeeeerribly sorry, Mr. Myspot, for not being sorry".

"You are a stubborn one, aren't you? Don't want to leave, then move".

You frowned, but moved a bit, just not to spend the whole break debating. You held your hands in order to accommodate yourself, when he plopped down on your legs.

"What the?".

"It is your entrance fee to the club".

"Who said that I want to join?".

"You".

"When, smartass?".

"Oh. You hurt me right here in my meow meow", he grinned with closed eyes.

It was a stupid meme, but you cracked. It didn't go unnoticed.

"Hm. You can smile. Ouch. What was that for?".

You slightly pinched him by the cheek.

"Didn't know artists could be that tough", he teased.

"What made you think I am an artist?".

"Come on. I saw your sketches… they are pretty cool".

"Yeah, I know", you sounded smug.

"Oh. Wow. Self-esteem".

"What's the point to do art, if you don't cherish it. This is the way".

"You are such a nerd. I wanna see more".

"What? My works or Mandalorian?", this time you teased him.

"Don't be ridiculous. Of course, Mandalorian".

"Oh, look who is a nerd now", you giggled.

Somehow, this strange encounter made you feel warm and serene.

"Here", you held out your sketchbook to him.

"Hm? Really? I can?", he was a bit confused.

You nodded and kept your eyes at the clear blue sky.

He turned gently the pages over, examining each one in details. You found yourself being captivated by the sight of his fingers, turning the pages. Then you looked up at his face. You found him appealing.

You felt the urge to dry his portrait. Not being able to do it at that moment, you bit your lower lip.

"Cute", he side-eyed you with a small smile.

"What? The little corgi? Yeah, he surely is".

"Oh, you wanna play dummy? I can do that", he laughed.

"Can I draw you?", you blurted out, looking him straight in the eyes.

"Yeah, sure, I guess. I have one condition, though".

"I am listening".

"Don't get involved with the twins".

"Twins? Ah, Miya. What? Why so sudden? I hardly know anyone here. By the way, Osamu looked normal, I guess. They seemed a bit loud, though".

"You know me now. I saw you bumping with Atsumu in the morning. And their antics will get you into trouble", he mumbled, frowning a bit.

"If I went completely insane, I would think that you like me", you felt so confident, but regretted it instantly.

"Would it be so bad if I do?".

"No. Wouldn't it be too fast?", now you were blushing. You didn't expect him to be so bold and confident. You did share the feeling.

"Maybe it is that thing with the first sight", he put your sketchbook to the side and laid his head onto your knees. "Do you want some Chuupet?".

"I'd prefer something more nutritious".

"There is a café near, they make nice sandwiches and muffins".

"I have no choice but to come by then".

"Fine. Tomorrow. At 5. After school. You can draw. It is pretty quiet there".

"How can I say no now", you smiled at the thought of going on a date with him. "Look at me, first day at school and made a friend, that takes me out to eat something delicious", still, you didn't want to overthink the situation.

"What?!", he sounded annoyed, – "I don't want to be friends with you".

"You barely know me, you don't even know my name".

"Y/N. Class 4. Dorky. With old-fashioned movie taste. Amazing artist. You should probably make a living out of this", he paused, – "Rintarou".

Your face flushed, whether from the fact, that he knew your name, or from the fact, that he pointed out something you strived for. How in the world did he manage to know your name? It has passed only a half of the day.

"Are you a stalker or something?".

"Dummy", he gave a slight flick on your nose. — "Your sketchbook. It has your info paper".

Right… It surely had it …

"So… Rin. How are we going to share your spot. I am willing to claim it to myself", you were proud to mock him a little.

"Hmm. My spot. Your spot… Our spot. This is the way", he retorted, and your smile became laughter.

"You.are.a.dork, Suna Rintarou".

"I should go check it up then. What if it is contagious?".

Just like that, you found someone who saw you for who you were.

Someone to share your thoughts with. To crack silly jokes with.

And don't pretend.

It's something, that everyone need in their life, even if it won't last.

#sunarintarou #anime #haikyu #hq drabbles #hq x reader #sunarin #inarizaki #inarizakixyou #sunaxreader #rinxyou #haikyuu #animefanfiction #hqfanfics #furudate haruichi #haikyuu!!#haikyuu x you

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puckngrind · 3 years

Text

Leave Her Wild: Chapter 16 - N. MacKinnon

Summary: MacKenzie has to make a choice while Nate is on a long road trip.

Warnings: smut, swearing, human emotion

Word count: 3,314

Series masterlist / Puck ‘n Grind’s masterlist

Foundation.

The rhythm of Kenzie's feet on the pavement syncing with her breath and heart pushed everything else out of her head space. The unseasonably warm weather for February made it easy for her to convince Drew to come out running with her. She liked running with Drew since he did not force her to talk while they ran. Just a constant presence when she needed someone to run with.

Nathan had left the evening they returned from Banff for a ten day road trip. She didn't tell him who was on the phone and when he tried to pry it out of her on their flight back, she snapped at him. The guilt constantly loomed over her head.

"Mac!" Drew grabbed her arm as it pumped backwards. She swung around defensively. "Bahahaha! MacKenzie Blackwood, do you really think you are going to take me with your tiny ass self? Oh. Okay." Drew laughed still holding onto her arm.

"Sorry. I was thinking or well... not thinking." Kenzie shook herself loose.

"I know. I asked if you at least told Nate where you were headed tomorrow?" He looked down at her then brushed her rouge curl back. "Mac, why so secretive? Who is he gonna tell?"

"Drew, I can't." Kenzie gritted her teach and broke eye contact with Drew.

"Are ya gonna tell me at least?" He started running backwards.

"Come work for me and I'll spill all my secrets." Kenzie flies past him jumping up to attempt to shoulder bump him.

"ALL your secrets. I might work for free for that info." Drew turns to find his pace.

"Not what I meant, Drew." Kenzie huffs out. "I am actually serious, ya know? If you cannot find a job, I think you would fit in nicely working for me. You have a speciality that would help us grow." Kenzie picks up the pace to finish off their run leaving Drew in the dust.

The plane ride the following day had Kenzie doodling to keep her mind distracted. She blamed herself for Nate’s loss and four minute penalty from the the night before. His shortness when they spoke solidified her feelings. He, of course still told her he loved her and asked for Kenzie to call or text when she landed. She just felt the uneasiness over them and not just the cute awkwardness that sometimes happened. This was different and it scared her.

“I like that symbol.” The stranger next to her said as he passed Kenzie the drink from the flight attendant. Kenzie smiled and begins to speak when he continued, “Is your last name, huh, is that... MacKinnon?” He tapped the doodle under the symbol where she wrote out his last name in a stylized font. She feels the blush rush to her cheeks.

“Oh, no… uh… thanks. Just clearing my brain... for work.” What the stranger didn’t see was the very noticeable M. in front of Nathan’s last name. She gulped in her recognition of her subconscious doodling. Thankful for the drink to sip while she willed the plane to make it’s approach. The blur of landing, Uber ride to the hotel and checking in was Kenzie on autopilot. She had done it so many times.

Kenzie FaceTimed Nate when she made it to her hotel and took a quick run to refocus.

“Oh, you won’t tell me where you went but I get to see your face, yet sadly cannot tell what time of day, what city… nothing. Are you near me at least? Can you sneak into my hotel room?” Nate laid in his hotel room with a smirk on his face.

“Nate, don’t push it, please. Just talk to me.” Kenzie begged.

“Kenz, Baby, I was joking. So talk... like how I’m not sure how I’m going to go ten days without touching you?” Nate groaned in agony.

“Nate, it’s not even two weeks and we are both gonna be busy.” Kenzie tries to comfort him.

“But this is the loooonnnngggest we’ve been apart since we started dating.” Nate sticks out his bottom lip in a full pout.

“Yeah, I know.” Kenzie looks down. “This is your job and there might be times when mine separates us for ten days or longer…” Her voice gets quiet.

“Hey, whatever this meeting is about and that phone call the other day, know I will support you and always will. Like your race cheerleader but whatever life throws at us. I'm here, well not there here but... fuck. You get it.” He chuckles.

“Thanks. I need to prep and call my team. Love you.” She blew him a kiss and hung up to work.

The Avalanche won the next two games. Kenzie had her friends over to watch Colorado take on Columbus. She curled up on her couch listening to her friends talk around her.

"Kenzie Lou, you with us?" Remy pressed his toes into her side to get Kenzie's attention.

"Yup. Scoreless first period, eh?" She reached down and grabbed her phone.

"We were talking about sex and you were just staring at the fireplace." Mosi chimes in.

"You were talking about sex?" Kenzie gulps as her friends nod enthusiastically.

"Who is blowing up your phone now?" Mosi leans over, "Better Halves chat." She reads slowly.

"Yeah, there is a breakfast thing where they, I mean, we... shit. I just don't know." Kenzie shifts bringing her attention back to screen as the second period was underway.

"You don't know what?" Drew places his dessert pizza trough down.

"My role, I guess. Maybe if I even belong in that group. I want to... I... uh... but, Nate." She mumbles to silence.

"You belong because he loves you and you love him. Ame Soeur, ya know?" Remy wrinkles up his nose at her.

"Don't give that bull shit about not fitting in either. Those girls are fantastic from what I've seen. You know one is studying to be a lawyer, right? Legit could rival you for top brain." Mosi had her stern but loving teacher voice on. "They like you too. Period. End of discussion."

"Oh fuck!" Drew shouts looking at the screen. The friends look up to see Columbus's Seth Jones score. "He's hurt too. For sure, playing on adrenaline only."

"Have I created a hockey fan?" Kenzie laughs watching Drew's face. He looks over at her only to stick out his tongue. Thankfully Nate scored in the third giving the Avs another win. Kenzie knew she wouldn't hear from him until later as they were flying straight to Minnesota from the rink. She realized in that moment that their routines were starting to become almost normal even when they weren't to most people.

It was the start of a typical Monday morning run for Kenzie. Nate was going to be home that afternoon. She had planned on an easy day in the office then leaving early to make sure she was over at Nate's place quickly. She feels her phone vibrate and checks her watch. Stopping to catch her breath before answering.

"Hello. MacKenzie Blackwood speaking." She spoke with her professional voice even through the heavy breathing of the faster paced run. She listened and listened. Walking around in a small area of the park across from her place. She didn't say much before ending the call, sending a text to work, and heading back to her place. She turned her music up. Blaring what she considered the soundtrack of her childhood. She threw her phone on the counter before grabbing the coffee as it was finishing brewing pouring it in her Calgary travel mug. Kenzie meandered her way back to her bedroom, gently placing the mug on her nightstand, running her pointer finger over the new picture she ordered of Nate skating on Lake Louise with his hockey stick in hand and a smile that said a million things. Falling hard on her bed, Kenzie laid there for awhile before deciding to slip into the bath.

MacKenzie wasn't exactly a bath person but when she needs to soak her sore body or mind, she would drop some bath salts in the tub and just float. Tears started running down her cheeks in no time. Bottled up emotion falling into the warm bath water.

"Kenz!" Nate's voice broke through the noise of her own thoughts and she jumped. Blankly staring at him before taking in his team issued sweats from the flight and a look of panic on his face.

"Nate?" Kenzie cocked her head to the side. "How?" she reached up to try to hide the tear stream with bath water.

"You haven't answered my calls. You weren't at your office. They said you were working from home. I called Mosi and went by to get her key. Kenz, I got worried. What's wrong, Baby?" Nate bends down to kiss her forehead. His hand swipes down her temple to her chin.

"Nothin'." She lies.

"Bull shit. You have been off since that call in Banff. Talk to me." Nate forces her to maintain eye contact.

"Nate, don't." She squirms.

"Please." He begs.

"I've never wanted to choose." She whispers.

"Choose? Choose what, Kenz?" Nate's voice soft but concerned.

"Between you and my job." She whimpers out as the tears roll down again. Without words Nate steps into the tub, pulls Kenzie's limp body into his and holds her. He just cradles her in the water.

"Kenz, I'm sorry." Nate finally whispers in her ear.

"Nate, do you have all your clothes on?" Kenzie tries to sit up realizing he plunged into the tub fully clothed.

"Don't worry about it. You are worth it." Nate pulls her back into his chest. "Now can you talk about how you somehow need to make a choice between me and your company?" Nate kisses her temple.

"Let's get out of the tub first, I'm getting cold." Kenzie moves and Nate lets her. He stands, steps out of the tub and holds out a towel for her. "Sorry about your floor." He looks down at the puddle.

"It'll dry, please tell me you didn't dive in the tub with your wallet and phone on ya?" She watches as he removes his water logged clothes.

"Nope, left them on the hall table like always. I planning on seducing you out of work." Nate towels off. "I'm gonna grab clothes, m'kay?" He goes to leave but she pulls him back into her. Kenzie pops up on her toes to kiss him deep.

"I love you Nathan." She whispers. "Let's just slip into bed." She finishes drying off and leads him to her bed. He looks at the picture then the mug.

"Uh, when did you do that?" He pulls open the covers for her to slide in. He follows her. Kenzie lays her head on his chest.

"When I was in Seattle I ordered some prints. There is a canvas coming too." Her eyes go wide as she shifts to look at him.

"Seattle, Seattle?" Nate's face was easy to read as she admitted where she was while he was gone. Kenzie nods. "And they want you to either have their account or date me I'm guessing? Why?"

"They saw me with you at the All-Star game. Think there is a conflict of interest." Kenzie is barely speaking above a whisper, somehow a tear is still left and rolls down her face to his chest. Nate just rubs her back.

"Conflict of interest, from dating me?" The hint of anger being held back in Nate's voice. She sits up and starts to fix her hair. "It's very hard to concentrate now." Nate reaches out with grabby hands.

"Nathan." She sternly looks at him. He mouths sorry as he leans to his side propping his head up on his hand. "Yes, Nate. The new hockey team. When you are dating one of the star players for another team there seems to be a conflict of interest. I'm sure it would be a hard no if they saw me talking to Keith." Nathan's mouth drops open processing. "As in the expansion? Kenz!" Nate processes. She nods. "That's a big ass deal."

"Yeah but I think we are a big ass deal." Kenzie flops down into the pillows. Nate flips her body easily so she can face him.

"We are a big ass deal but you've worked so hard to get where you are. Built your own firm. If we need to..." Nate kisses her forehead as the tears start welling up again in Kenzie's eyes.

"Please don't say break up." She starts to feel the pain in her chest.

"Kenz, no. That's not what I was going to say." Nate starts his voice shaking. "I was going to say is not do public events together. That sucks so fucking much but if it means that you stay the front runner for this giant opportunity then I can handle going solo to my team events. Won't be the first time."

"Sounds like we are taking a ton of steps back and I felt like we were in a good place." Kenzie sniffles.

"Kenz, we are. We are, I promise. I've never loved someone as much as I love you. The thing is I know the public stuff is that one thing that strains us. For some reason you think you are out of place when you fit right in." He kisses her lightly.

"I don't think I'm attractive like the other girls that look like they walked off the runway and into the family section of any team." Kenzie tenses up under Nate's touch.

"Baby, why don't you realize what a smoke show you are?" Nate's hands travel down her body.

"You've been with the boys too much. Smoke show? Really?" Kenzie giggles a little.

"Got you to laugh even with tears in your eyes. But for real, you are so beautiful." Nate shifts Kenzie to her back but doesn't place his weight on her. "Can I show you? Show you how so damn in love with you I am?"

"Nate." Kenzie breathes out as Nate's lips travel down her body. He ghosts her skin leaving goosebumps in his path.

"I'll take that as a yes?" Nate moves Kenzie legs exposing her core. He kisses down her legs, switching from one side to the other. He lays down as he gets to the hitch in her legs, running his fingers through her folds. Kenzie moans with each touch. "Our relationship is not just sex but fuck I have missed this." He places his lips over her lower lips kissing until his tongue slips through swiping up to her clit. Kenzie squirms causing Nate to press her leg down with his arm to put weight between her hips with his hand.

"Oh, Nate." Kenzie moaned over and over again as her orgasms crash over her. She presses down into his motion wanting more. Nate shifts to his knees, Kenzie goes to sit up. "Let me..." She motions to his needy cock.

"Kenz, I'm gonna blow and I'd rather release in you not on you." Nate lines up to press fully into Kenzie. His lips find hers kissing like it's the first time. Nate's thumb swipes under her eye as he lifts up slightly. "You okay? This okay?"

"Yes Nate. We are beyond the consent asking part in our relationship." Kenzie jokes as she slides her legs up the back of his.

"I meant emotionally, Baby." Nate starts to pull out but Kenzie presses her heals into his ass.

"I need this." She kisses his lips again causing Nate to jump into gear. It doesn't take much to send their highs crashing over their needy but emotional bodies. Nate panting leaving sweet kisses all over Kenzie's neck while trying to catch his breath. He rolls over pulling her into his chest.

"I need all of this." He kisses her forehead. “I never wanted my profession to screw with yours. You have to know that.” Nate whispers.

“I know. I never meant to get so emotional.” Kenzie admitted.

“You are allowed to have emotions. You love your job.” He reassures her.

“Yeah, but I never realized how much more I love you until that meeting. Until I was essentially told to choose. This is new for me Nate.” Kenzie’s admission was heavy and felt.

“How about we rest here, get some food in a bit and curl up watching a movie? I’m not going anywhere.” Kenzie nods as her eyes get heavy. Nate’s lips lightly on her forehead as she starts to fall asleep. “I’ll love you forever MacKenzie Elizabeth. When you are ready, I’m gonna tell the world.” He whispers before falling asleep himself.

The next two weeks leading up to the Charity Brunch, Nathan didn't leave MacKenzie's side unless they were working. The two agreed that Nate would do the brunch appearance alone even though all of their friends thought the idea was insanely stupid sounding. Kenzie was relieved when Gabe cornered her about going after a game knowing that there was no way he would if Nate spilled the beans about why.

Nate left for the brunch as Kenzie stared at the computer screen working on a project that would take her on a small trip out east in a few weeks. Her facetime went off and she answered without looking.

"You are officially the dumbest person I know." Mosi didn't even say hello.

"Why hello to you too, friend." Kenzie looks at her screen. "Wait, where are you?"

"At the brunch and you are NOT here!" Mosi looks around and eyes Kenzie.

"Do we not wanna talk about why YOU are there?" Kenzie typed away with a smirk on her face.

"They needed an extra set of hands so Tyson asked if I was free. Maybe since the alternate captain's girlfriend is hiding in her condo pretending to work." She clicked her tongue as her best friend

"I'm not coming. Nate and I agreed." Kenzie flatly replied.

"You may have agreed but your man looks miserable and he normally lights up with these things." Mosi turned her camera to show Nate in the distance. His hands in his pockets listening to the directions but his face said it all. He looked miserable. Mosi was right. Kenzie had seen pictures from previous seasons. Nate with the kids at the brunch was something else. JT kept elbowing him to bring his attention back to the director. "Yeah, you both look miserable. Just saying. I now need to go." Mosi hangs up leaving Kenzie to ponder her actions then gets up to head to her bedroom.

"You know, if the base was larger the tower would be taller." Kenzie smirks almost out of breath. Nate looks up slowly from his lego tower he was building with the child.

"Uh..." Nate mumbles out. "I..."

"She's right." The little voice he was helping pipes up when Nate couldn't formulate words.

"She is. Could you excuse us." Nate doesn't take his eyes off Kenzie. "Start on that base, okay?" He hands the child the lego and stands. "You came? You actually came? But..."

"Nate, I heard you the other night." Kenzie places her hand in his, rubbing the back of his hand. "I heard you. It scares the... crap out of me but I heard you. My job is important, yes. Will losing that account suck? Yes. At the end of the day, I'm in this. Charity Brunches and all." Kenzie lifts up to kiss him on the cheek. "Now, to build a lego tower!" She smirks then turns her attention to the child.

"I'm speechless." Nate's mouth drops open but the twinkle in his eye returned.

"You don't need words to build." Kenzie chirps. "Now, get down here." Kenzie pulled him back down to the stool and they both started building a wider foundation.

#Leave Her Wild #N MacKinnon fic #nathan mackinnon #nate mackinnon #nate the great 29 #sorry this is so late but here we are

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inadaydream99 · 4 years

Text

Coffee Shop Crush

cafe oneshot with the Boyz Changmin

Requested: Yes

A/N - Hi, thanks for requesting! I always love writing coffee shop oneshots, so I really hope you enjoy what I’ve come up with. Stay safe 💕

12:34pm... your shoulders slump defeatedly. He’s not shown up yet and now you’re beginning to wonder if he ever will. Your mind runs over your previous encounters, eyes glazed over from not blinking in so long. You can’t help but think about his cheeky smile, the one where the corner of his lips quirk up to form the lopsided grin that sends your heart racing. And those plush pink lips that you find yourself fantasising about as you walk home from work at the end of everyday. Oh what you’d do to know what they feel like...

“Umm (Y/N)?” You zone back into reality upon the call of your name and the hand that waves in your face, swallowing your embarrassment when your eyes lock onto the deep brown orbs in front of you.

You can’t help but fall shy when reality sets in, the incredibly cute customer you’d been crushing on for months finally standing at the counter in front of you. He was later than usual, but still seemed in good spirits, the very grin that you’d been thinking about just seconds before now directed towards you.

“How’d you know my name...” You timidly question, autonomously tapping his order into the register. You’d memorised his order off by heart by this point, he never seemed to deviate from the same drink everyday; an iced mocha. In response to your question he simply points to the name tag pinned onto your apron, snickering as your eyes widen in realisation, a light “oh” emitting from you in realisation.

The rest of your interaction goes by in a blur of crimson cheeks and shy glances, which you continue to steal as he waits at the end of the counter for his drink.

“Just ask him out already. Or at least find out his name.” Your coworker nudges you discreetly with her elbow, keeping a hushed tone so no one overhears.

“I can’t... I’ve already embarrassed myself enough. Can you imagine how awkward I’d be actually trying to talk to him?” You whine, bottom lip jutted out in a sulk.

“Just do it as you hand over his drink... go!” She encourages through a light laugh, shoving his order into your grasp before moving on to making the next.

“Iced mocha for?” You call out, pausing when you reach the part where you’d say the customers name. The coffee shop you work at doesn’t take names for orders, you just aren’t great at thinking on your toes and in a panic this is the best you could come up with.

The cute customer raises his head to look at you from his phone screen, taking a few steps to reach the counter.

“Changmin.” He smiles at you warmly as his hand simultaneously reaches out to take the cup. You notice how his fingers delicately brush against yours, sending a tingling sensation up your arm as they overlap slightly from the exchange. “But if you wanted to know my name you should have just asked (Y/N).” He quirks his brow, teasing you a little. You simply nod, taken back by his forwardness.

“See you tomorrow.” His final words echo in your mind as he exits the cafe. Your combined look of disbelief and awe following him until he’s turned the corner.

So now you know the name of the customer that had completely stolen your heart... and your ability to think straight in his presence.

You’d spent hours the previous evening thinking about your next encounter with Changmin. What you’d say, how you’d respond to him, how you’d flirt... he really had taken over your mind.

Although, one thing you hadn’t prepared for was for him to turn up with some friends the next day. Yes, at his usual time, 12:15pm on the dot, he’d entered the coffee shop with three incredibly handsome friends trailing behind him. Of course, you assumed he’d have friends equally as handsome as he is, you just never thought they’d join him.

They’d been sat in the back corner of the shop for the past fifteen minutes, talking amongst themselves, presumably all sharing their lunch break together. Honestly, nothing out of the ordinary had really occurred until you accidentally caught eyes with one of them. Repeatedly.

The friend in question was the tallest in the group, with a kind, almost timid nature. He seemed like a genuine guy, well, from the very brief encounter you had with him while he ordered a coffee. And he had a charming, friendly smile. But being caught observing them still made you nervous.

The first time he caught you looking over at their table he’d simply smiled at you. By the third time, however, he’d leaned in, saying something discreetly into Changmin’s side.

You haven’t dared to look back at the table since then, feeling far to self conscious about the fact that he’d mentioned it to Changmin. Instead you’d decided to keep yourself distracted... by doodling Changmin’s name across a napkin as soon as the lunchtime rush ended.

“What are you drawing?” Your head snaps up to meet Changmin who was now stood directly in front of you. Your mouth falls agape at the situation, hands scrambling to hide your doddles as quick as you can. You don’t think he noticed his name, seeing as his question was so casual. So you decide to try and act just as casual and cool as he is.

“I um, I was just passing some time.” You stand up straighter, smoothing your apron out with your clammy palms. Nice... not awkward at all. You mentally cringe at yourself.

“Drawing anything in particular?” And there’s his signature smirk. You breath hitches in your throat, startled by his coy tone. He erupts into laughter upon seeing your reaction, his adorable giggle leaving you breathless.

“Well, what can I help you with?” You regain your composure after your laughing dies down.

“Well, you see my friend Juyeon over there?” Changmin begins, turning and pointing to his friend sat at their table, caught in a discussion with the others. The very same guy who’d caught you staring.

“Yeah...” you trail off a little nervously.

“He thinks you’re really cute.” Your eyes widen in surprise. That definitely wasn’t what you were expecting, though you’re flattered by the compliment. “Except, here’s my dilemma.” Your attention is drawn back onto Changmin’s once again. You notice how the smile that was previously on his face has vanished and how his eyes seem to have turned darker, becoming more serious in an instant.

“I saw you first.”

He’s staring at you directly, no sense of fear or regret in his expression, and, in all honesty, it’s a little unnerving.

“Huh?” Your brows raise in bewilderment, mouth agape as you try to comprehend all that has just happened. “So... are you asking me out?” You question, cheeks flushing pink upon realising you’d uttered the thought out loud.

“Yeah. Are you free after your shift ends?” Changmin chuckles, his confident expression melting into a soft, giggly childlike manner. His duality is quite something.

“I close up at 6.” You beam, heart racing a million miles a minute.

“Great, I’ll pick you up then.” He returns the smile, his eyes gleaming in joy.

You watch as Changmin strolls back over to his friends, easily sliding back into their conversation with a triumphant grin. You catch him sneaking glances over to you right up until his lunch break ends, each time making your heart summersault. And, for the rest of your shift you find yourself unable to contain the bright smile on your face, eagerly looking forward to your first date with Changmin, your coffee shop crush.

#the boyz fluff #the boyz oneshots #the boyz drabbles #the boyz scenarios #the boyz imagines #the boyz x reader #the boyz requests #the boyz q #the boyz changmin #tbz fluff #tbz x reader #tbz oneshots #kpop fluff #kpop requests #kpop x reader #kpop scenarios #kpop oneshots #kpop drabbles

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firebrands · 4 years

Text

the square root of infinity | stevetony

2.7k, established relationship, first fight angst | on ao3 | for @maguna-stxrk

***

Tony finds out with his hands deep in JARVIS’ code. Former-JARVIS, actual-JARVIS, he hasn’t really decided on what to refer to the mess of numbers of letters that formed his former AI, and now, well—Vision, too. It’s all a mess, really, and Tony wanted something simple to do with his hands, minimal focus, low-risk.

He should have known better, really. Nothing about him, his work, his life, has ever been low-risk.

It’s a command from Steve with a privacy protocol. Search, identify, and surveil Sergeant James “Bucky” Barnes, also known as The Winter Soldier. Missing, found, and missing again as of six months ago. Tony frowns at the monitor. He knows he hasn’t read it wrong, but can’t believe it; he reads it again.

Somehow, in the span of time of Steve coming back from Washington, of them settling in together, he’d done this. He’d asked JARVIS to do this for him, and keep it from Tony.

Tony leans back against his chair. “FRI,” he says.

His new AI chirps to life. “Boss?”

“Gimme everything JARVIS found on this.”

“It’s on your phone now, boss.” In front of him, a hologram materializes as well, displaying hundreds of photos, grainy and filtered, and copies of reports on sightings. Tony stands up, takes a step back and frowns some more. He opens his mouth a few times, borne of his need to verbalize even without anyone listening; he’s angry. He’s more shocked than angry, but the anger is there, low and simmering.

Beneath it, though, is a grain of doubt: Why? Why did he keep it hidden? Especially now—after all the truth came spilling out of them, crystallizing into something Tony held dear. And after all Steve had said, about keeping secrets, about trust. He briefly considers asking FRIDAY to print it all out, just so he can throw the sheaf of paper in front of Steve and demand: what the fuck, but he’s better now, more mature. Or so he likes to tell himself.

So instead, he walks to the penthouse and finds Steve reading.

Tony clears his throat.

Steve looks up. “Hey,” he says, setting his book down. “You done working?”

Tony smiles, pained and tight. “So,” he says, sitting at the foot of the bed. “Bucky.”

Steve’s eyebrows meet, looking concerned. “What about him?”

Tony shuts his eyes and counts backward from five. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

Steve inches closer to him and rests his hand on Tony’s knee. Tony doesn’t open his eyes.

“I didn’t want to worry you,” Steve says very quietly.

Tony’s eyes fly open, the anger now boiling over. “Oh is that it?” He asks sarcastically. “So you decided to use JARVIS—without my permission, to look for him?”

Steve’s mouth works, and he looks genuinely shocked. “You said I could talk to JARVIS.”

“That’s not the point!” He pushes Steve’s hand off him and stands. “Why would you keep that a secret?”

“I—I didn’t,” Steve says haltingly. “I wasn’t thinking. I just wanted to know if JARVIS could find him, but I knew it was almost impossible anyway, so there was no real point—”

“If there was no point,” Tony says, voice lowering, “then why’d you do it?”

“Tony,” Steve stands now, too, tries to reach out and touch Tony’s elbow, to disentangle Tony’s arms that have crossed over his chest on their own volition. “He’s my best friend. I’m worried about him. I just thought it was something I should do myself.”

Tony nods, not really listening. His head is swimming with what he thinks could be actual reasons why Steve had kept this from him. A tangled mess of fear and insecurity, then shock at his ability to be aware of it. Is this maturity? He doesn’t like it much. Better if it stayed Steve’s fault—and it is Steve’s fault, it is. But maybe Tony doesn’t need to work himself up like this. But then again, Tony’s already worked up. “Stop,” Tony grinds out.

So Steve stops, a foot away from Tony, looking more scared than Tony’s ever seen him.

“I’m going to go.”

“Don’t.”

Tony looks up at Steve. He hadn’t even realized he’d looked away. Steve takes a deep breath, closes the space between them, and takes Tony’s hands in his.

Tony sighs.

Steve threads their fingers together, squeezes Tony’s palms. “Hey.”

“Hi.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“Want to say more than one syllable, maybe?”

A joke? Now? Tony feels his frown deepen.

“No.”

“Is this a fight?”

Tony looks up at him. “A fight means you don’t think you should be sorry.”

“Now, hold on a second,” Steve says, a small frown beginning to form on his face. Barely perceptible, if you didn’t know the signs. “I already explained why—”

“And that’s supposed to make it okay?”

“Where is this coming from?” Steve asks, letting go of Tony’s hands, which means he’s mad too, which drives Tony insane.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“There’s no need to raise your tone—”

“Don’t fucking use your de-escalation tactics on me.” Tony hisses, turns on his heel, and walks out the door. He gives himself the satisfaction of slamming it shut.

***

The next few days are filled with small acts of penitence: a cup of coffee on the bedside table when Tony wakes, a sandwich in the workshop, a completed report for a day-old mishap. It’s on Thursday that Tony’s heart finally softens. Over nothing, really, just a small doodle on his desk. He realizes, in that moment, that of all his achievements, perhaps learning to understand Steve Rogers should rank highest. Right up there with being understood by him, too.

Tony’s lying in bed, reading a report on his tablet, when Steve peeks in.

“Hey.” He sounds tentative.

Tony sighs, sets his tablet aside, and takes off his glasses. “Well, come in.”

Steve’s barely able to hide his grin, and nearly bowls Tony over when he hugs him. “Hi,” Steve says, burying his nose against Tony’s neck.

“Hello to you too, you overgrown labrador,” Tony laughs, pushing Steve away a little lest he be crushed under all combined weight of supersoldier and three bowls of pasta that Clint prepared for dinner.

“I missed you,” Steve says, hugging Tony closer to him. He looks up at Tony, resting his chin right on Tony’s sternum. “Was that our first fight?”

Tony snorts. “Unlikely to be our last,” he says.

“Hey,” Steve chides, leaning up and brushing Tony’s nose with his. “Don’t say that.”

“It’s true. Anyway,” Tony leans closer, brushes their lips together. “Make it up to me.”

Steve arches an eyebrow.

“Don’t start,” Tony warns.

Steve huffs out a laugh, tips them over until they’re lying down, and makes it up to him.

***

As a man of science, it behooves Tony to conduct experiments and to test hypotheses.

First, identify the problem.

Second, conduct research.

Third, develop a hypothesis: follow if / then structure.

Fourth, test through experiments: ensure factors are varied one at a time.

Fifth and final, draw a conclusion.

Tony’s tapping the tip of a screwdriver against his bottom lip as he thinks, and then two strong arms wrap around his waist and just like that, the problem has identified itself.

(One frustrating blind spot in Tony’s life: relationships. Which isn’t to say he hasn’t tried to make sense of them, sped read through self-help books and trawled through Reddit. Unlike everything else, research pales in comparison to experience, and there’s only so much he can do to make sure this one precious thing in his life is perfect.)

“Busy?” Steve presses a small kiss on the back of Tony’s neck. Tony can barely suppress a shiver.

He wants to say, I was, until you showed up. It doesn’t just apply to this moment. That fact shouldn’t hurt.

Instead, Tony says: “Yeah, kinda.”

“Okay,” Steve says easily, pulling away. He comes back to press a quick kiss to Tony’s cheek. “See you later?”

“Yup,” Tony says, and okay. Maybe he needs to spend a day or two really figuring out who the problem is, here. (It’s him. He knows this. He’s always the problem.)

Two days later, Tony settles on having to review related literature. In this case, this means sitting alone in the workshop as he relives every moment when Steve was distracted. Was that a sign? In a brief moment of clarity, Tony asks: “Fri, am I crazy?”

“Signs point to no, boss. But I can pull up recent results on the search engines?”

“I’d rather not hear what the general public thinks, thanks,” Tony says, sighing. He rests his face in his hands. It’s not like he meant to think of this—what is wrong with his brain, that the intrusive thoughts come in the form of the few moments he’d asked Steve what was on his mind, only to be brushed off?

What did that mean?

Did it matter?

Step three: if that was a sign, then there was a problem.

If that wasn’t a sign, then there wasn’t a problem.

If Tony didn’t figure this out, then there would definitely be a problem.

This isn’t how a hypothesis is meant to sound. Tony’s a terrible scientist.

“Fri, call Bruce.”

“Tony?” Bruce’s voice is rough. He sounds annoyed.

“Hey, seven PhDs, how do I form a proper hypothesis?”

“Fuck you, Stark.” The line clicks off.

Tony turns his wrist, checks his watch. Three AM? Figures.

He stretches out his back. “Friday,” he says, standing up. “The search functions for Barnes.”

“On it, boss.”

“Atta girl.”

***

Try as Tony might—and he’s trying, which in itself feels like a failure, because Tony stark does or does not and there is no need to attempt—he feels like something has shifted between them, and he doesn’t know how to fix it.

Maybe he’s just making it all up in his head. That’s the easy solution, isn’t it? And that’s usually the answer: start with the easiest answer and work your way up. He can already see Natasha rolling her eyes at him. Maybe the solution is to stop treating your relationship like it’s quantum theory.

Steve’s hand is on his lower back, steering him inside a restaurant. He thinks only of what Steve said, all those weeks ago: I had to do it myself.

Tony wants to argue, right this moment. But how can he? It’s awful that they can be so alike. The only reason he keeps his mouth shut is because he knows that Tony’s used that argument before. Maybe this is growth, to know when to back down from a fight. Or to avoid one totally.

Steve reaches over the table, brushes his fingers over Tony’s wrist. “You okay?”

There are a lot of answers to that. Tony settles on the truth. “Not really.”

Steve’s brow creases with worry. “What’s wrong?”

Again: an infinite multiverse of answers to answer a question that simple. With this, Tony does struggle for a moment, and the next words are much harder to say—they almost feel caught in his throat, like a lump of meat. “I don’t know.”

“You can tell me anything, you know,” Steve says gently. So gentle, it almost breaks him; Tony doesn’t deserve this. Steve doesn’t deserve this.

“I know,” Tony says, and this is him lying through his teeth, and this is what he’s good at, and maybe this is why he’ll never know how relationships are. It’s a trust issue, probably. He doesn’t know if the issue is with Steve, or with himself. “Don’t worry about it.”

Tony tries harder, now: smiles more, eats with gusto. He knocks Steve’s thigh with his knee, looks up at him from under his lashes. This is what life is like for Tony Stark: it’s acting. He knows the approximations to get his point across. As their evening goes on, the small wrinkle on Steve’s forehead smooths out, and maybe Tony wishes he wasn’t so good at pretending.

Maybe he wishes that Steve read him better.

***

The moment of epiphany is often described as transcendental.

This one hits like a ton of bricks—literally, because Tony does know what that feels like, and the suit is shock proof, sure, but that shit still fucking hurts, and even in moments of epiphany, somehow he still manages to go off on a tangent. The point remains: Steve’s hand is on his hip, and they’re in bed, and epiphanies usually equate clarity, peace.

Tony freezes up.

“Tony?” Steve murmurs, sliding his hand up Tony’s side.

“I’m sorry,” Tony says, sitting up. “I know I’m being difficult.”

“I didn’t say you were.” Steve sits up beside him, rests his hand on Tony’s shoulder, and turns Tony to look at him. “Who said you were being difficult?”

“Me, I’m saying it,” Tony says. Panic is beginning to bubble in his belly, slowly rising up his throat. Typical of him to mistake a eureka moment with a panic attack. Par for the fucking course for Tony Stark. “I’m being difficult right now.”

“No you’re not,” Steve says, rubbing up and down his arms. “Tony. Look at me.”

Tony breathes out through his mouth, then in through his nose. Steve tips his chin up and meets his gaze.

“Here are the variables,” Tony breathes out, is afraid of what he’ll say next, his brain is fogged over and full of static. “I love you, and I don’t know what to do with that.”

Steve takes a deep breath, takes Tony’s face in his hands. “Here’s a constant,” he whispers, breath warm on Tony’s cheek. “I love you. I love you. You, Tony Stark. I love you.” He kisses Tony, hard and close lipped, more aggressive reminder than affection.

“Okay,” Tony says, because there’s a wild part of him that still thinks—there was a problem, there was a problem and if this is love, then what comes next? If this is constant, then what variable will arrive to change all of that?

Steve kisses Tony again, almost desperate, this time. “Is this about Bucky?” Tony sucks in a breath at the question, horrified at being discovered. Steve hums, then he runs one hand down Tony’s back, up his arm, down his side. A reminder of his presence. Tony is suddenly grateful for it.

“And if it is?” he murmurs.

“Tony,” and somehow, Steve sounds fond, which throws a wrench in this whole debacle, and deep in the recesses of Tony’s brain, rationality begins to take root. “He’s my best friend. You’re the love of my life.”

Tony breathes.

“Did you hear me? You. You’re the love of my life. Please don’t make me compare,” Steve huffs out a small laugh, and it warms Tony all over, like sunshine peeking through the clouds after a strong rain. “And maybe you don’t believe me just yet,” Steve touches their foreheads together, then rubs his nose against Tony’s, the affection plain and chaste. It makes Tony feel more loved than he’s ever felt in his life—not that there were many moments to compare against, but still.

“I feel a little crazy,” Tony says, finding it in himself to smile up at Steve.

“A little crazy in love?” Steve asks, grinning.

“I can’t believe you just made a Beyonce reference. In the middle of my panic attack.”

Steve bites his bottom lip, a poor attempt at stopping himself from laughing. Tony flicks his forehead. “Say it again,” Tony says, and his smile still feels a little wobbly, but it’s a step.

“Crazy in Love?” Steve asks, pulling Tony close and wrapping his arms around Tony’s waist.

It’s an odd angle, and eventually Steve shifts to lift Tony up onto his lap. “Ass,” Tony says. “You know what I meant.”

Steve smiles again, right before pressing a kiss to Tony’s shoulder. “Step one,” he says. “The problem is you’re afraid I don’t love you. Step two: find out how to show you that I do.” He pauses, and Tony feels breathless as he presses another kiss to Tony’s bare skin. “Step three. Hypothesis? If I show Tony I love him all the time, then eventually he’ll believe me.”

“Sounds like a shaky hypothesis,” Tony says, but his voice quivers a little as he says it. He can’t explain how he feels, other than warm in Steve’s embrace.

Steve tuts. “Step four, experimentation. Small gestures, date nights.” Steve rubs Tony’s back as he speaks, and stops to tilt Tony’s head up to face him. “Am I getting this right?”

Tony smiles. “I don’t know, what’s the conclusion?”

Steve wraps his arms around Tony’s waist once more. “You’re here. I’m here. I love you.” He leans up, brushes their lips together. “Is that enough?”

#stony #steve rogers #tony stark #stevetony #(well hello) (sometimes you just want to write something warm and familiar. i thought i'd forgotten how.)#things i write

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dilexit · 3 years

Text

To be Young and Dumb ~ Karl Jacobs Edition

Summary: In which (Y/N) and Karl forget their 22 for a minute

Pairing and Pronouns: CC!Karl x GN!Reader (preestablished relationship). Reader is mentioned to have a brother but that could be changed to sister or friend easily

Each edition to this series has a different plot just under the same name and same idea of safe spontaneous things

Hey so I’ve been a little bit MIA but so I’ve been having a wave of depression especially due to the school year ending and my fear of change and stuff like that so I’ll be writing a few imagines titled To be Young and Dumb just about doing so safe spontaneous things that I do during these episodes so I hope y’all enjoy and know that if you are struggling rn you are not alone in this and we believe in you

Warnings: Cars, Depression (not mentioned but implied), Self Doubt, Talk of growing up, Angst to Fluff, probably swearing, Not proof read

Requested: Yes No

(Y/N) had a love hate relationship with adulthood. They loved the freedom it gave them, but also missed the ability to just be childish. (Y/N) had just got back from visiting the house they grew up in, and couldn't help the feeling of sadness grow in their stomach. Walking around and looking at all old memories and photos made them think back to all the things they could have been. These episodes of self doubt have happened before, and they always hurt. The easiest way to get rid of it was to distract themselves, but their favorite distraction was in the other room streaming. (Y/N) turned on the TV and wrapped up into their favorite blanket watching nostalgic movies to feel like a child again, waiting for their boyfriend to end stream and spend time with them. For (Y/N) nostalgia would present itself in less of a joyful way and more of a longing for it to be the present again way. Giving in to it always feels great in the short-lived moments, but (Y/N) just longed for Karl to help them take the pain away. As if the universe could hear their thoughts, the sound of Karl's door opening followed by footstep could be heard from above. When Karl made it down stairs, he immediately noticed the way (Y/N) was laying on the couch surrounded by their blankets and stuffed animals, and the land before time on the TV.

"Hey baby," he said sitting down on the end on couch near (Y/N)'s feet. "Are you ok?". Karl knew they weren't, and that and just sitting here would be much help. As Karl suspected (Y/N) shook their head no and leaned in to bury their face into Karl's shoulder. Karl look over their head to see the sun was still up and shining, thinking (Y/N) could benefit from the fresh air.

"Why don't we go for a walk, it's warm out," Karl offered, to which (Y/N) let out a groan, but got up anyway.

"Fine, but let me change first," they said stretching a little bit. They went upstairs finding their clothes and deciding on some black shorts and their favorite shirt to wear in the 77 degree heat. Walk back down the stairs, they saw no sign of Karl, but the front door open a little bit. Heading out the door into his driveway, they turned to see Karl standing in the open garage. (Y/N) started walking towards him, but as they got closer, they noticed something behind him. Walking past Karl much to his dismay (Y/N) landed at the green box on the shelf.

"Do we have to walk?" (Y/N) asked, pointing at the container of chalk.

"Oh, I guess we don't," Karl responded, and (Y/N) felt a wave of happiness rush over them.

"Can we use?" (Y/N) asked, still pointing towards the large container of sidewalk chalk.

"Yeah Jimmy used it for a video and left it with me I never thought I ever get rid of it." He said walking with his SO and taking a seat on the driveway. (Y/N) reached for the red chalk and started drawing. Karl watched over their shoulder ad they started drawing a rose. Karl went a grabbed a purple piece of chalk and started absent-mindedly drawing. When (Y/N) had quickly grown bored with their rose and turned to Karl. He didn't really know what he was doing, and it showed. (Y/N) let out a giggle and scooted closer to him.

"Whatcu drawing?" (Y/N) asked catching Karl off guard.

"Oh! I don't really know, to be honest." He said and (Y/N) leaned over and drew a big red heart in the middle of Karl's doodles. Karl looked up at them and giggled, leaning in to give them a quick peck. A small breeze rustled the leafs of nearby trees a blew around loose chalk particles. The couple went back to drawing together mainly hearts and smiley faces as they made some conversation.

"You know my brother and I would make obstacle courses around our drive way on days like these," (Y/N) laughed.

"Corry, Sean and I were much more boring we would just go on like bike rides together if we even wanted to spend time with each other." Karl retorted.

"Yeah (Y/B/N) and I really didn't hang out much, but sometimes we would have fun. It was mainly competitions and stuff like that. But every now and then we would just sit aa draw a bunch of random stuff," (Y/N) felt much better while they passed stories back and forth.

"My mom wouldn't let us have chalk because we were too messy with it." Karl joked back looking down at his chalk covered hands. (Y/N) also took not of the chalk covering their hands and quickly rubbed their hand in to a red heart.

"You know what our favorite thing to do with chalk was?" (Y/N) questioned

"No what was it," Karl asked leaning forward a bit.

"This," (Y/N) giggled lightly hitting Karl's chest leaving a red handprint on his shirt. Karl opened his mouth in slight defense while giggling at the gesture reaching out and leaving a green mark on (Y/N)'s shorts. Karl then reached for a few more hearts covering his hands, while (Y/N) grabbed a stray piece of chalk and running away. Karl quickly noticed their absents and chased after them. He caught up to them quickly and grabbed their waist pulling them close. His hands left blue marks on their waist, and their hands were covered in the green chalk they had picked up before. (Y/N) wriggled into Karl's arms, facing him again, taking their chalk covered fingers and running them on his face. After (Y/N), brought theirs onto Karl's arms, that were still on their waist. Karl looked at their face and brought his hands up to their cheek pulling them in. The minute their lips touch and chill went down (Y/N)'s spine, the bits of wonder they had shared in the hour of messing around was all (Y/N) needed to remember why they loved who they are now. As the kiss kept on going (Y/N), was sure both parties were covered in chalk. They didn't know how long it would take for them to pull apart. Instead of stopping by choice, they were pulled apart by a car horn and Chris yelling from the car window.

"We've been waiting for you two for 30 minutes. Now I see you were busy, but go change and hurry up."

"Crap! Let's go," Karl said pulling (Y/N)'s arm, leading them back instead to get ready for the video they forgot about.

#karl x reader #karl jacobs x reader #karl jacobs x you #karl jacobs x y/n #mcyt fanfiction #mcyt x reader #karl jacobs fanfic #dream smp x reader

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limit-list · 4 years

Text

CONCEPT!!! zukos a librarian at a community library, does story time for the kiddos, sokka’s friend toph works at the same library, and he likes to listen in on the children’s story time and draw the cute guy who makes funny voices and acts out the best parts of the stories. zuko catches him staring and gets flustered, demands to see what he’s been drawing, sokka is embarrassed and self-conscious of his artwork and doesn’t let him.

zuko misinterprets his ramblings and thinks he’s making fun of his scar and verbally eviscerates sokka. sokka is absolutely embarrassed and crushed and just doesn’t know what to do to make it right!! so he finds him after his shift and apologizes profusely and is like wtf can i do to make up for this and zukos all like “actions speak louder than words”.

so now zuko’s got sokka following him around like a duckling when their class and work schedules align, sketching him when zuko decides to let him, stocking the shelves, sorting books, helping pick out books for story time, getting to know him a lot better.

*cue the montage of adorable scenes of these absolute goofballs, at first super awkward-turtleduck, sokka slowly getting zuko to relax and have fun around him, sokka getting jealous about zuko’s coworker jin, zuko unknowingly getting jealous cause he thinks sokka likes yue due to toph’s teasing, sokka bringing zuko coffee and then tea when he hears stories about uncle iroh, the boss (who is definitely the cabbage merchant) getting mad at sokka for hanging around for no reason, zuko and sokka hiding in the shelves and shushing each other pointlessly cause neither can stop giggling and it’s obvious where they are (toph is just distracting the boss, and man sokka, you owe her for protecting your flirting time) and zuko realizes crap i really like him and goes back to being awkward, except this time sokka just doesn’t let him, he keeps them together as friends even tho sokka is so freakin interested!!! he’s used to zukos weirdness and doesn’t expect anything more than friendship, really toph, there’s no way zuko likes him and he’s fine with that. totally fine. and every so often sokka’s other friends drop by and chat for a bit and zuko just keeps falling harder for him but doesn’t wanna risk everything cause now he’s not just friends with sokka, he likes all of his friends too, so he just pines from afar*

they get to be friends, duh, and then finally zuko gets to work one morning that sokka said he would be at and can’t find sokka anywhere, and he’s like ??? but decides to let it be (cause no one he ever wants to stay does besides his books and his uncle)

(he’s very clearly freaking out and trying not to, but toph just smirks when he asks where sokka is and says “around” so he’s assuming things are fine. things are f i n e, stupid brain)

however, when he goes to sort the books from the drop off bin there’s a quick lil sketch done of sokka holding up books with ridiculous titles and zuko laughing his ass off from last week. zukos in like shock at first cause he really thought sokka was never gonna let him see his art!! so he’s in shock, and he texts sokka a picture with ?????? but gets no reply.

zuko leaves it cause he’s still got a job to do, sorts all the books, goes to put them on the cart and taped to the side of the cart is a detail sketch of a hand on books, a hand with long fingers and perfect nails and a scar across two knuckles and wtf that’s zukos hand?? and so zuko tries to call sokka and there’s no response, so he’s like well okay. (he’s not overthinking this, he’s not getting his hopes up, he’s n o t)

zuko goes about doing his thing, reshelves, and then in the war book section he finds a little cartoon-style sketch of he and sokka when they re-enacted a battle on the tables and chairs of the big reading area and at this point zuko just takes a picture and sends it off with “okay but i clearly won the battle”, keeps moving.

today’s not his day to read to the kids, so he moves on to check out duty, where he finds a little doodle of sokka holding the scanner up to zuko’s face, captioned “yes, i’m checking you out.” zuko does his picture thing and says “hilarious.” (but internally he’s freaking out and doesn’t know if sokkas being serious or making fun of him and he doesn’t know what to do with this and no he is NOT freaking out he’s just mildly concerned)

zuko says hi to all the kids as they’re coming in for story time as they’re passing by. and then toph is like “oh shit, i think yue forgot to grab the books for today, can you bring them to her?” and zuko is like yeah sure, grabs the stack of books off the spot for children’s time and heads over to the kids area.

where he’s stopped short when he sees sokka telling a story to the kids. and he’s like wtf is this what’s going on?? but sokka sees him and just grins and is like ah yes children!!! here is the prince, come to save the peasant boy!!! and all the children cheer!!! sokka winks at zuko takes the books, goes back to the front of the room, and is like “okay kids ready for the actual stories?” but then a kid pipes up and is like “hey!! i thought you said the prince was in love with the peasant boy!!” and sokka just blushes really hard is like “no! i didn’t say that!” but another kid is like “fairy tales end with a kiss!!! mr. zuko has to kiss you!!!”

and sokkas just like total blush face, gaped mouth, then snaps his mouth shut and hisses “kids this isn’t the plan!!”, his eyes are going from the kids to zuko to the kids like he’s not sure who to be worried about more, but zuko’s been hit by his clue-by-four and is like ahhh i see, and kisses sokka on the cheek for the kids sake, then whispers something like “after my shift, can a prince get the real reward for saving you?” and sokkas just gaping before nodding frantically.

and so zukos laughing, says bye to all the kids, and goes back to check out duty. (and he’s still not freaking out, cause this time he’s got hope and confusion and he really can’t wait to see sokka again and figure this out).

story time ends, the kids all head out, last kid is overheard telling his mom about how he wants to be a prince so he can kiss the peasant boy while the mom is just like sure honey, sokka wanders up to zukos check out station like... hi? and zuko just completely straight face, looks him up and down, and then clicks his scanner in his face. and sokka just sputters “hey that’s MY joke!!!” and zuko rolls his eyes and pulls him down and kisses him over the counter, and in the distance toph yells “SUCCESS” while she and yue are holding the boss back from interfering.

(and later, zuko stops abruptly and is like “what did you mean when you told this kids this wasn’t the plan?” and sokka blushes again and mumbles “i might’ve had a plan to convince you i like you through book selection” and zuko is quiet and then he’s just laughing so hard, and he’s like “thank GOD the kids came up with a better plan, i’m entirely too oblivious for that buddy”)

(toph and yue bribed the kids with lollipops to force zuko and sokka together. the pining was exhausting to watch/listen to.)

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kyoupann · 4 years

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Please do more of the writing head canons. It’s really interesting to see other people’s ideas on the topic, so if you can be bothered, I would highly appreciate more, thanks bye <3

Y’all don’t know how happy I am to talk about these headcanons, they are my babies and I love them so much :’) thanks for asking g <3

Handwriting Headcanons

Same dynamic as before, try to guess whose handwriting it is before reading and tell me how many you got right! <3

You can find the first post here (no need to check it tho)

Quick disclaimer: halfway through making my initial notes, I remembered I had one (1) single lesson of graphology in my applied linguistics class, but that was a year ago and some information might be off. I just thought it was neat to include.

Another quick disclaimer: I don’t know much about Hylian, but I like to think it has a similar stroke system to Japanese, so the pressure and accuracy of your strokes play a major role in your handwriting (among other things, ofc.) so there are some parts where I focus more on that

(First Row, from left to right)

Sky

Our first boy is mother hen! Believe it or not, he has the prettiest handwriting out of all of them! Sky: probably has nice, even elegant handwriting because Sun forced him to practice when they were little. In the end, that paid off because his handwriting is the prettiest one. There’s no pressure, but he is confident in what he writes that his lines aren’t thin. Mistakes? what is that? this boy has impeccable grammar and spelling. No mechanic errors to be found in his letters! I’d like to think that many of Hyrule’s classic/staple poems were originally written by the firt king aka sky child. Like, imagine, after a retiring from being a Person of Power (as the first ruler), Sky finds comfort in the arts: revisits his old woodcarvings and starts writing poetry about the world he still doesn’t fully understand. wowie. tldr: sky writes poetry and you can pry it from my cold dead hands.

This is what one of his letters would look like:

Next one is the one and only, our Hero of Time

2. Time

I’ll die on the “Time didn’t know how to read and write” hill. His handwriting is simple, not pretty but not messy. It has some grammar and spelling mistakes here and there. Can become unreadable if writing in a hurry, he sorts of forgets spaces between words are a thing/letters have different sizes and lowercase letters end up the same size as capital letters. I’m not saying he sometimes forgets to write articles: he just doesn’t want to. Honestly, he just has this dad-neat handwriting. He is a gentle dad and writes like a dad, if he puts too much pressure onto the paper, his handwriting become too sharp/angle-ish and ends up looking ugly. And as much as he would like to not care about it, in the end he does (:

Malon taught him how to write and it was quite the experience. At first he didn’t want to because he was ‘too old’ to learn and it was torture at first, but now look at him devouring his cowboy novels.

A chunk of his handwriting:

*sniff* such a dad quote.

3. my mansss, your 4x1 deal at Target: Four

Look, my boy is patient! He could do some nice and fancy lettering if he wanted to. He was taught that handwriting and spelling said a whole lot about him as a person, you know, like a first impression kinda thing; so he always proof reads more than twice before sending a letter. Super rare grammar mistakes.

The faster he writes, the more slant his writing becomes. Under stress/ when not sure how to write things down, run-on sentences are everywhere and his handwriting is inconsistent in general (I don’t headcanon each part of him having completely different handwriting because handwriting becomes muscle memory over time. It’s just slightly different variations of the same, like idk Vio’s handwriting is neater than Green’s and Red writes hearts instead of any dot/circle and no, I do not take constructive criticism on that, jk i do.) Adding on to each of the colours’ handwriting, I’d think Red and Green write with words slanted to the right( inclined), Vio is a mix of the opposite, so reclined and straight, and my mans blue a true neutral writes straight (kinda like Time’s).

The logic behind this is that inclined writing supposedly means honesty and need for giving (and getting) affection; reclined means, as you can probably imagine, defensiveness and repression of true feelings, but also shows great concentration; straight handwriting means self-control, observation and reflection as well as distrust and indifference. But as complete being (tm), Four just writes as in the image example which is not too straight and not too inclined, and I believe that’s a good middle for him

HOWEVER, if I’m feeling in the mood for crack, I totally accept this boy to have the ugliest, chicken scratches-looking handwriting! :’D It’s just funny to think that someone like him, who has to be precise and careful in his work, can't write neatly to save his life.

One of his letters would look like this:

Also I just LOVE how his hero titles look in this font ksksks

and that’s

(Middle row, from left to right)

4.- Mister Bunny Boy - Legend

His uncle taught him how to write. I’d call his handwriting pretty and neat at a first glance, but he presses too hard on the paper, most of the time staining the back or the following page. Sometimes will retrace some words if he doesn’t like how it looks (which only makes it messier). According to my notes, a thick or strong handwriting represents determination/commitment.

As I also headcanon him to know many languages, mechanical errors are more present than grammar ones; that is, weird capitalisation of words. Punctuation is somewhere in between; uses too many commas when he should just cut the sentence. he mixes punctuation from two languages or more in writing when too distracted (or too focused, because, well, pressure.); when he writes for himself, he has almost no problem following said language’s punctuation rules. Also, this is just polyglot culture, and I’m projecting a bit, but when he forgets a word in the language he’s writing, he just replaces it with its equivalent in another language because we don’t care about fluency, but rather functionality. in this household (more on that in my language hc, ksksks).

An example of his writing:

so powerful

4.- Mr. Wolfman, howl me a song - Twilight

I don’t have much for him because 1) I don’t think he writes a lot and 2) he is a hands-on/visual learner, I’ll die by that. He only learnt how to write because Ulli insisted it was important and he was not about to disrespect his momma; he IS That Guy, but doesn’t really write enough to have neat handwriting.

Many people seem to overlook the fact that his house is filled with books and write him as completely illiterate (which if not explored properly, ends up feeling a bit disrespectful and full of prejudice, but go off I guess; and that’s on my core Headcanons for Twi); however, he sticks to simple sentences. Knowing how to read and understanding a text is different from knowing how to write them. Like, when we would see a semicolon and understand its position in the text, but didn’t understand the nature of it. Is this clear? idk i’m sorry. So yeah, boy reads a lot, writes very little.

As for his Actual Handwriting, as opposed to Legend, his handwriting is thiccc but not because he presses into the paper; he is just that messy, he has no sense of ink-flow-control, he does what he can with what he has. To the untrained eye, his handwriting illegible letters like v, n, u are very similar; when he makes notes for himself he does it in the form of doodles or small ‘icons’. But! He reads a lot, so he rarely makes spelling mistakes (: he is your go-to guy when you don’t know how to write a word.

An example of his writing:

He keeps a journal, sue me.

3. My first born- Warrior

Okay, first off... I accept this is completely biased. I saw the idea and said “That’s True”. If you haven’t, please read Effective Communication; or The Lack of Thereof by htruona, a fic where the boys reflect on the language barriers between them. It’s incredibly funny and probably what made me start making these silly notes. So, if you’ve read that fic, you know where I’m going.

My man, Warrior, can’t fucking write. I mean, he physically can, but it’s very bad. Here’s the reason for it, tho, and it’s not his fault: Technically, he knew how to write alright but he joined the military and whatever note he had to write had to be concise or in the worst case coded. He mixes capital and lowercase letters. If we consider that he joined the military at around 15, his handwriting and grammar had yet to continue developing. Just think about how after summer break, your handwriting was always slightly worse than before because you didn’t write for an entire month. Now think what 2 years can do to that. Hmm, not cool, dude. He makes quick notes, when writing he’s all gotta go fast. he is the lighting mcqueen of writing; good for emergency messages, not ideal for love letters. His punctuation also suffered a lot, he only know full stops and commas and hardly uses them. A sentence for him is either one word or fifty without a single comma, no inbetween.

His hero title and an example of his writing.

(Bottom row, or what I like to call “fuck cursive” row)

7.- Magic man - Hyrule

I’m basic and I do agree with the popular headcanon of he not knowing how to write because well, y’all know his Hyrule. He only knows how to write his name because that’s important, same with numbers. I don’t see why would he write/read except checking the roadsigns. (he can even use this as an excuse for getting lost frequently; he thought it said something different.) But I do think that because his habitual reading consists of roadsigns, his ‘punctuation’ is weird af and places full stops/points/periods at the same level of his words and his commas/question/exclamation marks below them. Yk, creative license. Sadly, I don’t have much about my magic hands man so here’s what his writing would look like if he actually wrote a paragraph:

Man, I love Hyrule.

8.- Man, I don’t understand this boy - Wild

Cursive? ain’t nobody have the time for that. He woke up and had to save the world in his underwear while not knowing how to read nor write. He learnt during his journey and was taught by multiple people from different regions, that explains his inconsistent spelling of things and names for them. So Wild knows language variations for many items and uses them interchangeably (even if they aren’t exactly the same). Another headcanon related to writing/language skills that I’ve been thinking about is that if the shrine was able to cause amnesia, I’m sure there were other areas in the brain affected which leads us to language disorders such as agraphia and aphasia. But that’s a story for another day ksksksk

An example of his writing (after relearning)

9.- The best of sons - Wind

I don’t have much for him and that makes me sad. Look, he’s a kid, doing kid things like stabbing dudes on the head. This boy was taught cursive by his grandma, but could never do it and no one needs it anyway. His handwriting is good enough for his pirate life, Tetra is the one to handle Official stuff, he just gotta sign. Spelling and grammar mistakes abound. He is still relatively young and can correct his handwriting if he desires. But same as Wild, with how many times he’s been thrown out and hit his head, I’m starting to consider some language disorder for him as well.

An example of his writing:

aaand that’s it.

Thanks, y’all for showing interest in this silly thing uwu it was fun to finally talk about this. If you ever want to discuss ideas/headcanons(especially if they are related to language and culture), I’m your person (: I’m always happy to hear new headcanons. Feel free to add anything to this post either in a reply or in a reblog, I’d love to hear from y’all <3<3

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obeyme-kaidii-writes · 4 years

Text

Your Otaku

Leviathan x poly gn!MC x Mammon

Words - 2818

Content Warnings - panic attacks, lots of angst, but lots of cuddles too (mostly focused on the relationship between Levi & MC)

Prompt/Inspiration - loosely inspired by the “Ruri-chan is my Bae!” event (and I mean loose)

Summary - You, Levi, and Mammon take a trip to the human realm together, and things take a sudden turn for the worse.

AO3

Arm in arm with Mammon, you walked through the convention center with Levi chattering excitedly at your side. You had managed to surprise him with a trip to the human realm to visit a popular anime convention, and he was just beside himself with excitement. The pure joy was practically radiating off him.

“That Q&A was amazing! Omg I never thought I’d get to see them so close. And they actually looked at me! Can you believe it? I know they were looking at me. There was a connection. I just felt it!”

His eyes were glued to the map in front of him, and only occasionally did you have to tug on his sleeve a bit to keep him from bumping into people. He started making plans about where you three should head to next, and come up with a strategy for maximizing the amount of limited edition merchandise he could acquire. He’d need your help obviously. And Mammon’s too. He only had so many arms after all, and as much as he wished he could stand in line for each item himself, he knew he had to be smart about this.

“So, we are gonna meet back up here in an hour, ok?” he said, “Set an alarm so you don’t get distracted and forget the time.”

“Yeah yeah yeah. Got it. One hour,” Mammon replied. He wouldn’t admit it, but the idea of scoring limited edition merchandise actually had him rather excited. Perhaps he could grab a couple extra copies so he could resell them later? These nerds sure seemed desperate for these things, so he figured they’d sell like hot cakes and he’d be swimming in money in no time.

The three of you separated and went your different ways to go wait in line. You glanced at the shopping list Levi had given you. It was decorated with little doodles of Azuki-tan, color coded, and organized by priority. You couldn’t help but giggle at the thought of Levi working diligently to prepare this for you. You knew Mammon had one as well, but it definitely had way fewer hearts and stickers attached to it.

After an hour of line hopping, waiting, and more waiting, your DDD vibrated signaling it was time to meet up with your boys again and see how successful everyone had been. You glanced around and noticed Mammon right away. His face lit up when he saw you, and you returned his smile with one of your own. His arms were full of way more bags than you knew he needed.

“Did you get enough?” you teased, a small laugh escaping your lips.

“Oi! This is all Levi’s stuff remember? I might’ve grabbed a couple extras to make some quick Grimm, but most of this is his!” As much as he tried to deny it, you knew that less than half of those bags were for Levi, and you also knew that only a third were things he had intended to resell. You noticed some TSL merchandise peeking out from one bag that you were positive Mammon bought just for himself.

“Ok, let’s go with that,” you replied, still laughing. Mammon blushed, realizing he had been caught. He should have known better. You always seemed to see right through him. He was thankful you had decided to keep it to yourself though and let him at least pretend you didn’t notice.

CRASH

You snapped your head up and looked in the direction of the loud noise - the same direction you were supposed to be heading. It was only a moment later that you could hear the sound of laughter break out, and you had a sinking feeling that Levi was involved somehow. You didn’t even bother explaining to Mammon what you were thinking, you didn’t need to, you just walked as quickly as you could through the crowded pathways just short of breaking into a full out sprint.

What you saw when you arrived at the meetup spot made your heart ache. Levi was sitting on the ground, on his knees, and scattered around him were what you could only assume were the bags of merchandise he had been carrying. His eyes were laser focused on the objects in front of him as he attempted to gather everything up and put it back into his bags.

Behind him, only a few yards away, stood a group of teenage boys that were cackling as they looked on. It didn’t take you long to piece together what must have happened - Levi had been in a hurry, and the boys knocked him down, causing him to crash into a display, and sending his things flying.

You could catch bits and pieces of their conversation over the laughter and buzz of the convention center. “Loser.” “Weeb.” “Freak.” It made your blood boil. You wanted nothing more than to march over there and deliver a swift kick in the groin to all of them, but you had something much more important to do.

Not wasting anytime, you made your way to Levi, gathering things up as you went. You crouched down beside him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Hey babe,” you said, leaning forward to kiss his cheek lightly. You knew he didn’t like public displays of affection, but it was the only thing you could think to do to get him to shift his attention to you rather than his surroundings.

It seemed to work, for a moment at least. Levi turned to look at you, shocked to find you suddenly so close, but relieved all the same. You gave him a small smile, and rubbed his back. You could see he was struggling to keep his composure and not shift into his demon form in the middle of all these people. It was also obvious that he was only moments away from crying.

“C’mon, let’s go find somewhere to take a break,” you said, picking up the last of his bags yourself and rising to your feet. Levi gave a small nod and stood up as well, careful to keep his eyes trained on the ground in front of him. He dare not look around. He could feel the eyes of everyone boring into his back, and their whispers echoed in his ears. Freak. Loser. Weirdo. Creep.

He tried to take a deep breath to calm himself. He just wanted to take off running, but he knew it would only make things worse. He’d probably fall again like the loser that he was. He really should have stayed home. Why in hell did he let you convince him to go out today? If he was in his room right now like he should be, none of this would have happened. He was an otaku after all, and this was clearly divine punishment of some kind for him venturing out of his cave.

Mammon soon appeared beside you, “Hey! Ya can’t go takin’ off like that! What if somethin’ woulda happened to…” His voice trailed off as he became aware of his surroundings and noticed the group of teenagers standing a ways away. Their attention had now moved to you, and they were whispering rather loudly amongst themselves, and Mammon did not like the look in their eyes as they stared at you.

He looked back to you and Levi and realized just how shaken up his brother seemed. He could feel the waves of demonic energy rolling off him as he struggled to keep it together.

“Hey, I got this,” he said, moving to take the bags from your hands, “Y’all go on ahead. I’ll catch up in a bit.”

You gave Mammon a small nod, before linking arms with Levi and leading him away. He walked forward, robotically, no longer the bouncing, happy go lucky boyfriend you had seen just a mere hour ago. How quickly things had changed.

You felt so guilty for leaving him alone. You should have stayed with him. You knew he didn’t like crowds. Or people. If you had stopped to think for a moment you would have realized that it would have been better for you all to stick together. But you had let yourself get caught up in Levi’s excitement, and convinced yourself you had nothing to worry about.

Soon you approached a hall lined with closed doors. These seemed to be conference rooms, and a quick look inside told you they were unused.

“Here looks good. We will just rest for a bit inside, ok? Enjoy the peace and quiet,” you said as you opened the door and motioned for Levi to get inside. He listened obediently, not bothering to really pay attention to where he was going or where you had led him. His brain was on autopilot now, and he was just so incredibly tired.

Immediately upon entering the room, Levi’s self control finally started to crumble as his tail made an appearance, dragging along the floor behind him. He leaned his back against the nearest wall, and slid down to the floor, utterly exhausted. Before he could curl into a ball, you had locked the door and climbed into his lap, straddling his legs as you faced him. Once you wrapped your arms around his neck, it was like something just snapped inside him. He buried his face into the crook of your neck, clinging to your waist, sobbing uncontrollably.

As Levi cried, you gently stroked his hair and whispered in his ear, “Its ok now. I got you. You’re safe. It’s just us here.” You repeated this over and over again, like a mantra that you hoped would settle into his heart and disrupt what you were sure were very dark, chaotic thoughts.

“This is so not fair!” he wailed, “Why are there normies here?! They shouldn’t be here! This is supposed to MY place. MINE.”

He noticed the shirt he was wearing, and felt incredibly foolish for thinking it would be a good idea to wear it out of the house, “I’m so stupid. I shouldn’t have worn this. What kind of loser likes a children’s show anyways?”

He grabbed at his Ruri-chan shirt, and you were sure he would have ripped it off himself if you didn’t stop him soon.

“Hey, let’s not remove our clothes while we are out in public, ok?” you said as you gently grabbed his hand to stop the assault on his shirt.

He froze for a moment as he processed your words. You were right after all. Once again he was about to do something reckless and impulsive. How could you even stand to be around someone like him? He was just a gross, yucky shut in. When were you going to realize that and leave him? Surely it was only a matter of time. You would grow tired of his breakdowns. Get bored of his rants. Annoyed with his negativity.

You brought his hand to your lips and gave it a quick kiss before releasing it and pulling his head to your chest. He seemed to be calming down a little now, if only slightly, but you could still feel the rapid beat of his heart and saw his tail twitch beside him. You resumed stroking his hair as you had been earlier, whispering your affirmations and reassurances in his ear.

He wrapped his arms around your waist once more, before closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, inhaling your scent. Your words were starting to reach him, and he concentrated on each and every syllable as he tried to ground himself. You were here with him, so he knew it would be ok. Everything always was when you were around.

He hadn’t the faintest idea why exactly you loved him or put up with his eccentricities, but you had never given him reason to doubt you. Not even for a moment. And even though he shared your affection with Mammon, you always made time for him and took an interest in the things that were important to him. You never forgot about him.

And you were always there to encourage him when he was feeling down about himself. That’s right. He was safe with you. The only person that truly understood him and accepted him for who he was, flaws and all. And you were here right now, holding him close, pressing soft kisses to his head. He could feel your warmth in his arms, and his muscles finally started to relax, aching because of how long they had been tensed.

His grip around your waist began to loosen slightly, though he was still holding your firmly, and his body had stopped shaking.

“Feeling a little better?” you smiled, as you tried to sneak a look at his face, but he kept his eyes hidden beneath his bangs.

“Yeah,” he said. Now that he was calmer he was beginning to become aware of the situation he found himself in and it was making him somewhat self conscious, though he wasn’t ready to let you go just yet.

“Alright,” you laughed, breathing a sigh of relief. You had your favorite otaku back. At some point his tail had disappeared too. As you continued to alternate between hugging him close, kissing the top of his head, and running your fingers through his hair, you felt the last of the tension leave his body.

“Ready to head home now? Or are you feeling up to checking out more of the convention?”, you asked, taking his face in your hands now and gently turning him to look at you.

He was not prepared for the love he saw in your eyes when he finally made eye contact with you. He was expecting something closer to pity, which was ridiculous really since you had never looked at him that way before, but this was a million times better. Without even thinking he kissed you gently on the lips. You could taste the salt from his tears in his kiss, but you didn’t care. It wasn’t often Levi initiated affection like this and you were determined to treasure every second of it.

He pulled away slightly, and rested his forehead against yours, keeping his eyes closed. You stroked his cheeks with your thumbs and smiled as you felt him lean into your touch.

“Thank you,” was all he could manage to say, and you knew exactly what he meant. It wasn’t the first time you had witnessed him having a meltdown after all, and you had begun to figure out what worked best to soothe him.

You kissed his forehead, “Of course. You’d do the same for me wouldn’t you?”

He looked up at you again as you started to wipe what remained of his tears from his face. He was sure he looked like a complete mess, but somehow you were still smiling at him so sweetly. He felt the heat rise to his cheeks, and you gave him a soft laugh. That was your Leviathan alright.

“Obviously,” he said, looking away.

“I think there was one more Q&A session scheduled,” you offered, trying to see if he was interested. Finally, he smiled back at you and you could see that familiar sparkle in his eyes. He definitely did not want to miss out on this, not when he had the chance to shake hands with his favorite manga artist. He bet they even had signed copies of the latest release available. And this artist usually had stickers and keychains to pass out. He just had to get a matching set for you and him. And maybe Mammon too. Maybe.

You stood up, your legs stiff from the awkward position you had been sitting in. You hadn’t realized just how uncomfortably you had been positioned until now, and your knees felt like jelly. You started to wobble slightly, but Levi had already gotten up himself and grabbed your arm to steady you.

“C’mon. Let’s go find Mammon and get to the conference hall. If we hurry, I bet we can get some good seats too. Oh is this the one that always hands out keychains and stuff?”, you asked as you stretched your legs and started to test out your ability to walk again.

He smiled even more brightly, knowing that you had remembered, “Yeah! I really wanted a chance at grabbing a matching set. If that’s ok with you, I mean.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” you said, giving him a quick peck on the cheek. He couldn’t help but blush again. How did you always manage to say just what he wanted to hear? How did you always know what would make him happy? He thought about all the fun you had had together earlier that morning, and all he had to look forward to this evening.

Yeah, he was glad he left his room today.

#gn!mc #poly mc #tw: panic attack #obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me levi #levi x mc #levi x poly mc #mammon x mc x levi #obey me fanfic #obey me angst #obey me comfort #levi comfort #levi fanfic #levi angst

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bellafarallones2 · 3 years

Text

a/n: t-rated indruck fluff from #21 on Veronica Bunch's college au prompt list: I get stuck with a late class that doesn’t end until 9pm and I’m always anxious about walking across the campus to the dorms, so you offer to walk with me and one night, I find out that it’s in the exact opposite direction that you need to go in

Duck had signed up for Performance Studies because he needed arts credits and because the meeting time, seven to nine in the evening Tuesdays and Thursdays, worked well with the rest of his schedule. He was less happy when the professor emailed out the homework for the first day: a reading that examined the question “what is performance?” for thirteen dense pages without managing to come to a conclusion.

By the time he showed up to the first class, he barely remembered any of the points the reading had made. Most of the other students already seemed to know each other, and were talking in groups when he arrived. Only one man, a tall guy with silver hair whose black roots suggested he’d spent an evening bent over a sink for it, was sitting alone and silent.

“Anyone sitting here?” said Duck.

“You?” said the guy hopefully. He was wearing jeans and a soft beige cardigan over his white shirt, and there was a small rainbow-flag patch on his black backpack.

“I’m Duck,” Duck said. “And my pronouns are he/him.” He still occasionally got read as a butch lesbian, and it was better to establish the pronoun thing right out of the gate.

“Indrid. I also use he/him.”

That was all they said before the professor showed up and class began. The professor genuinely cared about the material, which made the whole thing more interesting, though Duck was still distracted. Indrid had very nice hands, nails painted chipped black, and he doodled the entire class, filling a whole page with spiky fractals.

Finally nine o’clock arrived. The sky outside was pitch-black. “I’m not really looking forward to walking home this late,” Duck said as he stood waiting for Indrid to finish packing up. “Wish I had your punk privilege.”

“Excuse me?” Indrid looked amused.

“You know. You’re tall and you have piercings.” As Duck said that, Indrid stood up, revealing that he was even taller than Duck had previously thought. Jesus, this guy had Slenderman legs. “You look like you could throw a punch.”

“I could use my punk privilege to walk you home, if you’d like.”

“I’d appreciate it, if it’s not too out of your way - I live on High Street next to the REI.”

“Yeah, I’m going that way.”

Duck held the door as they left the building and walked together down the half-lit street. The planes of Indrid’s face looked almost unearthly in the streetlights.

“You an art major?” Duck asked.

“Visual arts and math. I needed to take something in theater or music as a distribution requirement and this was the least theater or music class I could find that was also after noon.”

Duck laughed. “Yeah, I’m in the forestry program and I had to take something artsy.”

Indrid nodded. They walked in silence for a while, but Indrid didn’t seem to mind, his hands shoved into his pockets and his face turned up.

“This is me,” Duck said when they reached the REI. The door to the apartments above was almost unnoticeable next to the brightly-lit storefront.

“Alright,” Indrid said as Duck fiddled with his key. “See you on Thursday!”

“Goodnight!” said Duck when the door swung open, looking around. As soon as Indrid saw that Duck was inside, he turned and walked back the way they’d come. Duck wondered vaguely where he lived; this block didn’t have many students. Ah, well. A question for another day.

On Thursday before class Duck stopped at the snack bar for dinner and spotted a familiar head of silver hair. Indrid was drawing, his head tilted at an odd angle so he could both look at the page and drink from the straw on a sixteen-ounce cherry slushy.

“Mind if I join you?” said Duck.

Indrid looked up and his face lit up. “Of course! I don’t mind, I mean. Please sit.”

Duck realized then that what he’d assumed was art was in fact math, that Indrid was taking notes out of a slim, intimidating textbook. Duck recognized a couple of integral signs and that was about it. “Math, huh?”

Indrid nodded.

“I had to take Calc 2 for my major, I wish I’d known you then so you could have helped me with it.”

Indrid laughed, tapping his pencil. “I’d have been happy to. Certainly numbers make more sense than people do, sometimes.”

“Probably more sense than that performance reading.” Duck leaned forward. “I don’t suppose you’d be down to walk me home again?”

Indrid shrugged. “You’re good company.”

Duck met Indrid again at the local park that weekend. Their homework for the week was to record themselves performing in a way they did in their daily lives, and Duck didn’t feel like getting into gender, so he’d decided to show how he performed when giving a nature talk, and he’d asked Indrid to help film. (He’d offered to help film Indrid’s performance in return, but Indrid had politely declined, joking about performance anxiety.)

It was less awkward than Duck had been expecting. He walked around the park, pointing out the fungus on a tree trunk and a frog sitting with just its eyes over the surface of the water. Indrid, filming on Duck’s phone, smiled encouragingly whenever he met Duck’s eyes, and it was all Duck could do not to break his train of thought to grin back.

“Thank you for helping me,” he said when he was done.

“Thank you for the free nature walk!” said Indrid as he handed Duck’s phone back to him. Their hands brushed against Duck’s smooth phone case. “I come here to draw sometimes, but I’ve never noticed all that before.”

They watched everyone’s videos in class that week. Most of them were pretty boring. Duck cringed through the playing of his own video, though Indrid had done a good job with the camerawork, and a few of the music majors in the class had recorded themselves playing their instruments, which was at least nice to listen to. And then it was Indrid’s turn.

The video opened on a close-up shot of Indrid’s face. I am an artist, the voiceover said, Indrid’s own voice booming across the classroom. Sometimes I even look like it.

The Indrid on the screen bent his head - he was looking not at the camera but at a mirror behind it, putting on heavy eyeliner and spotty mascara. He switched out the subtle studs along the shell of his ear for something heavier, flashier, chain running between the holes. Then he stepped back from the camera and shrugged on a black leather jacket with spikes on the shoulders. A punk jacket. He posed, self-conscious, and as he started laughing the camera cut sharply to his face, again large.

I had an internship last summer with an insurance company calculating risk. He rubbed the makeup off his face with a makeup wipe, his eyes reddening slightly at the contact. He removed the jacket and folded it carefully before placing it out of frame. And then he picked up a pale blue button-down and buttoned it carefully down over his undershirt, and tied a tie in a perfect Windsor around his neck. He removed the bar from his eyebrow and the chains from his ears, which looked rather naked without them.

I perform to look like the things I know I can do. He dabbed concealer over the rosy maple moth tattooed at his neck, one wingtip peeking over the collar of the shirt. Then he held his hand out for a handshake, a business handshake, and sure, he looked like the kind of person Duck would trust to sell insurance. But there was something about his smile, something Duck wondered if anyone else could see. Something that lingered no matter what he wore.

Duck probably should spend less time thinking about his mouth.

“So my lease ends in January,” said Duck casually as they turned the corner onto his street. “And I’ve been having trouble finding other places that rent to students in this neighborhood, so I was wondering how you found your place.”

“Oh,” said Indrid, sounding guilty. “Well, I don’t know how much help I can be. I live up by the corner of 16th street and Broad.”

Duck did some quick mental geography as he climbed the step up to the front door. “That’s completely the other direction!”

“I know.” He was dressed like neither an insurance salesman nor a metal punk, today, with gold studs glittering in his ears like grains of sand and a soft, oversized sweater falling off one shoulder. The black roots of his hair had grown since the beginning of the term.

“You told me the first day of class that walking home wouldn’t be going out of your way! You know I don’t need walking home, right?”

“Of course. I just. Uh. I wanted to spend more time with you. I’m sorry for misleading you, we can stop if it makes you feel weird.”

Duck looked down at him. Indrid stood silently, awaiting judgment. “How about you come in?”

Indrid looked up. “I don’t mean to impose, it’s no trouble to walk home -”

Duck held out his hand. Indrid took it and followed him up the stairs without letting go. “You aren’t allergic to cats, are you?” Duck said when he finally had to take his hand back to unlock the door.

“Even if I was, I’d happily resign myself to sneezing.”

Duck opened the door and, as soon as Indrid was inside, crowded him up against it. Indrid slowly lifted his hands, trembling, and rested them on Duck’s shoulders. His gaze beneath his glasses flicked from Duck’s eyes to his lips and back again.

“Can I kiss you?” Duck said.

“Yes please.”

Indrid’s mouth was warm and soft and yielded so easily to Duck’s tongue, fuck, they should have done this sooner. Class would have been so much more bearable if he could have been looking over at Indrid’s lips the whole time knowing that as soon as class was over he could drag him out into the hallway, into one of the gender-neutral bathrooms in the arts building and kiss him silly.

“You don’t have any morning classes tomorrow, do you?” Duck asked when he finally pulled away enough to speak.

Indrid shook his head.

“Want to watch a movie and make out?”

“That sounds perfect.”

#indruck

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icequeenoriginal · 4 years

Text

The Meaning of FamILY

Note: I am so sorry for this taking centuries to come out, I blame laziness and writer’s block. So here it finally is, @khadij-al-kubra, the fic you requested. Again, I am so so sorry this took so long to get out. Also, this takes place a year after Intimacy and All Its Forms. Also Happy Late One Year Anniversary of this AU’s blog.

Thank you @theromnempire for editing. You’re the best!

Names of side characters belong to @hi-i-love-u-bitch. This AU belongs to @ask-spiderverse-virgil and @sugarglider9603

Trigger Warnings: Deaths mentioned, two past minor character death, crying (Let me know if I missed anything)

Pairings: Prinxiety and Logicality

Roman was ushered into the living room by his older sister. He couldn’t understand why. Normally when his father came home, he would see Roman sitting at the kitchen table, doing his homework and his father would walk over and ask about before changing out of his work clothes.

Maybe it was a celebration! Or maybe a surprise! But…why was Amá crying?

Roman’s mother looked up and locked eyes with her confused, innocent son. It made her burst into more tears and Roman ran to comfort her.

“¿Amá?¿Por qué lloras mami?” Roman asked while tilting his head to the side.

Lupita couldn’t help but smile at Roman, almost forgetting what had just happened. She frowned, and more tears fell as she realized what she had to do now.

“Roman ...mi Valiente chico…tengo algo que decirte...se trata de tu padre…”

Roman woke up with a start like he did every year on this day. It’s always the same memory that would wake him up like clockwork, ending right before his mom said the words that shattered his world forever. Roman’s brain liked to torture him but pretend to forget the worst part.

He decided not to think about it and just dressed.

Roman never noticed how quiet the house actually was on this day. Any other day of the year, even if he was the first to wake up, there was some kind of noise. It could be anything from the humming of the ceiling fan or people rushing to get breakfast ready. But today, nothing. All the sounds of the apartment were swept out as if the family occupying the house needed a reminder of what was happening

Maybe Roman just lost his touch with reality on this day. He was never sure, not that it really mattered. He knew the world did not stop just because he is in a shitty mood. Did that ever make him feel any better? No, but it gave him a false motivation to get up and get ready for school.

He walked to the twins' room, like every day, to get them ready for school. Any other of the 365 days of the year, the twins would already be awake, fully ready to run around and make Roman’s morning even more hectic. Today, both had a blanket over their heads and he could hear his little sister sniffling.

He wished it was because of a cold. It never was.

“Vamos, es hora de levantarse,” Roman said, just loud enough for the twins to hear, worried if his voice went any height they could hear how broke it was.

“NO!” both Jenni and Marco shouted, pulling the blanket simultaneously over their heads. Roman wanted to laugh at the sight, badly.

Instead, he sighed “No no, you guys gotta get up and go to school.”

“NO!” Marco shouted

“It’s a bad day today!” Jenni cries

“I know guys but we can’t miss school,” Roman said softly.

“We’ll go to school tomorrow!”

“Yeah, when it’s not Papi’s death day!”

Roman inhaled sharply, it was the first time of the day someone acknowledged what the 17th of February meant. The house somehow got even muter, if that was possible. His sister and brother burst into tears and Roman felt his face heat up. But he couldn’t cry, he was-

A soft, reassuring hand landed on his shoulder as he took a step forward.

“Amá…” Roman said, his voice strained

Lupita’s eyes were full of storms of sadness, threatening a downpour. “Roman ... ve y desayuna.”

Roman shook his head. He could do it, he had to. His mother had enough on her plate. “Pero Amá--” Lupita cut him off.

“Está bien. No te preocupes por eso”

Roman sighed “Okay.” He was too tired to argue. This day seemed to already take so much out of him and it had hardly had started.

Roman sulked to the kitchen and made himself some toast. Something quick, easy and he was least likely to get sick from. He stared absently, unfortunately making eye contact with his father in an old happy family photo. He sucks in his breath as silent memories began to haunt him like they always do. He hated those more than any amount of his siblings sobbing or screaming in agony. He could tune those out with music, his one constant. These just got louder and louder no matter what he tried.

What snapped him out of the pitiful void was a vibration from his phone. He pulled it out to reveal a text notification from Patton.

Bestie <3: I’ll be on the fire escape in a minute! Alex stole my sweater again :(((

Roman frowned, had he really taken that long to get ready? He hadn’t even made anyone’s lunch or even breakfast. He wasn’t even sure he was ready to talk to anyone today. Much less to get their glances of pity. Constantly hearing “sorry for your loss” got old quick. Besides, he didn’t want to bring anyone down, especially his best friends, just because of what today is. He sighed and texted Patton back:

Romaine Lettuce :): It’s okay. I’m gonna swing over to school today, go on without me.

Roman saw that Patton had read his text but he didn’t reply. Roman didn’t think much of it, he figured he was still chasing Alex around, and just grabbed his toast as soon as it was done in the toaster.

“Amá! I’m heading out to school! I love you! Bye!” Roman didn’t wait for a reply and ran up the stairs that lead to the roof as he put on his costume. Web swinging always seemed to calm his nerves, or more accurately, distracted him. Something about one mistake and you can fall to your death really makes your other problems seem small. As he was about to fire his first web, a voice shouted for him to halt.

Patton ran up to him, also in full costume “Wait for me!”

“Pat?” Roman asked, not trying to hide his confusion. “What are you doing here?”

Although Patton had the mask on, It wasn’t hard to tell he was smiling. “I’m going to swing with you.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I know but I want to head to school with you like I always do.”

Roman felt a mixture of happiness and guilt swirl around in his stomach, creating an unpleasant cocktail make just for him. Not that he knew what a cocktail tasted like.

Roman gave a small smile behind his mask “Okay then Pat, I’ll race you” and took off without another word.

They swung without another word, which relieved Roman. He didn’t want to be asked about how he was doing, the answer was obvious and Roman was tired of being asked it.

Unfortunately, this feeling did not last and Roman quickly returns to his self-pity and dark thoughts. Roman was so lost in his brooding thoughts of the bombardment of sympathy that he would receive through the day that he did not see the tall building in front of him. Thankfully, Patton did and webbed Roman quick enough so that he landed on the roof.

Well...landed is a generous term here. With how fast Roman was going, Patton had to quickly web him and throw him on the roof of the building.

Patton landed gracefully next to him. He placed his hands on his hips and said: “Okay, that’s enough swinging for you, mister!”

“I’m fine Patton, I just wasn’t paying attention this time.”

Patton shook his head, “You’re distracted, understandably so and I know you don’t want to talk about it, even though you should, but I won’t make you. It’s not safe Roman! I can’t let my best friend get hurt again! Not on my watch…”

Roman could see the agony swept into Patton’s eyes. He knew that memories of the year before, bad ones brought nothing but pain, were swarming Patton’s mind. Memories of Roman avoiding him, the fighting, the robot battle, all were tearing Patton down. It was a look far too familiar to him.

Roman ran to Patton as he began to shake. Roman muttered an apology that seemed small to himself but was perfect to Patton. Once Patton was able to calm himself down, he hugged Roman tightly, to show he was never going to let him go.

“Let’s walk to school okay? I know a game we can play. It’s called “Beautiful Things’. As we walk, we point out the beautiful things we see and why we find them beautiful. Alex and Georgie made it up after Frankie…passed…and we played it all the time”

Roman raised his mask just above his lip to show that he was smiling “That sounds great, Patton, I’d love to.”

So they snuck off the roof, changed, and walked. They pointed out birds, children, babies, and music playing from cars. Roman had no idea that such a simple game could bring him so much calm, but it did. He never realized there is so much good in the world, that was what they, as heroes, fought for.

When they got to school, Roman headed to his locker. To an outside viewer, it was nothing out of the ordinary. But for the four, it was breaking the sacred tradition. First, they would meet at Logan’s locker as it was the closest to the entrance. Then they would make their way to their own lockers while catching up with one another. Finally, they would arrive at homeroom to get ready for the school day.

However, as Roman watched Patton saunter over and embrace Logan, his feet didn’t want to go anywhere except towards an island of isolation. He didn’t want to ruin the happy mood, especially after making Patton think of Frankie so early in the morning. What best friend forces you to remember your dead brother?

He opened his locker and slowly pulled out the books he would need until lunch. When that took less than a minute. He stared at the objects he taped onto the door of his locker over the course of the year. At the top was a small mirror that he suddenly did not want to look into. At the bottom is a whiteboard with reminders of tests written by Logan, supportive messages from Patton, and quick doodles by Virgil. He felt the tug of a small smile on his lips, though it went away quickly.

He had only begun scanning the dozens of photographs he had before two arms snaked their way around his waist. He felt warmth in his chest as his boyfriend’s lips were pressed on the space between his shoulder blades.

“Morning” Virgil said, tiredness leaking into his speech.

Roman smiled softly and leaned slightly into the touch. “What leads you to my neck of the woods?” Roman asked as if he did not already know the answer.

“I needed to escape before I drowned in the puppy love.”

It wasn’t the answer he was expecting so he pressed on, “What do you mean?” Roman turned his head slightly to look at Virgil. Virgil, without lifting his cheek off Roman’s back, unfortunately, removed one of his arms from around Roman and gestures to his right.

In distance, Patton has Logan’s shirt held carefully in his fingers, playing with the buttons as he talked to Logan. Logan watched with nothing but love and appreciation in his eyes. Roman couldn’t help but sigh at the couple, he was part of the team that got them together after all. One of his best accomplishments, if he’d say so himself..

“It’s so sweet...disgusting.” Virgil continued. Switching from resting his cheek on Roman’s back to his chin, he looked up and said, “Now give me my good morning kiss.”

Roman chuckled and happily obliged. When they pulled apart, Virgil asks “I’m going to ask you a stupid question.”

“No question is stupid, love, ask away.”

“Are you okay?” “I stand corrected.” Virgil elbowed Roman in the side, both happy for their spider-strength for the opposite reasons.

“I mean it, Ro. I know you hate being asked that question, especially today, but I rather you get annoyed with me than let something happen like last time. So I’ll ask again, are you okay?”

“I am.”

Virgil raises an eyebrow “Am what?”

“Fine.” “I asked you if you were okay”

“Same difference.”

“Big difference, people only say they’re fine when they don’t want to admit they aren’t okay.”

Roman just looked away, having nothing to really say, plus he didn’t want to argue. Virgil sighed and hugged him again. Roman doesn’t push away, the pressure behind his eyes getting more and more unbearable. His emotions were already becoming too much for him to handle. He hugged back, relishing in the warmth of another person. It was stupid, in his mind, since Virgil was just hugging him moments ago.

With a sigh, Roman pulled back. He brushed his knuckles gently against Virgil’s cheek and whispered “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay because I’m sorry too,” Virgil said softly.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.”

Virgil couldn’t help but smile at that. “You know what? You’re right. I don’t. And with that, I’m going to spend this whole day cheering you up.”

“Virge…You don’t have to. Really! There’s no reason to-“

Virgil suddenly poked Roman chest, silencing the boy. “Do you remember the day that marked the anniversary of my grandpa’s death?”

“Of course I do, you were so upset. You didn’t even want to leave your room”

“Yeah, and you know what you did? You broke into my room, like some lunatic by the way, wrapped me up like a burrito-“

“It’s called a blanket burrito for a reason.”

“Don’t interrupt me. You wrapped me up, put on all my favorite movies that I wasn’t even aware you remembered and fed me snacks as we cuddled. Not even Logan had thought of doing that, he would just let me lie under my blankets while he just sat in the room.” Virgil paused to smirk before continuing “And I was never more grateful for you than at that moment.”

Roman’s face began to heat up. He couldn’t help it. No matter how big or small the compliment that Virgil would give him, he would turn into a blushing schoolgirl, ready to throw himself at Virgil and pepper him with kisses.

He opted to just hug Virgil again, a silent thank you. They were in public after all. They had some class.

Virgil embraced him for a few moments before the warning bell went off. “Listen, I’m going to make sure today is not going to be total shit for you.”

Roman chuckled in response, “Thanks, stormcloud.” Roman took a step to walk to his class but stopped when Virgil firmly grabbed his hand, “Huh?”

“What? I can’t hold my boyfriend’s hand as we walk to class?”

Roman chuckled, if there was one thing he knew about Virgil is that despite his boyfriend’s wariness of physical affection, Virgil always saw things through. Roman gently squeezed Virgil’s hand, absorbing the love that came from that simple gesture. Logan told him a few months ago about Love Languages and how physical touch was definitely his. It was a nice bonding moment for him and Logan, and it made Virgil really happy. Roman was rewarded handsomely for it.

Compared to every other year since his dad died, this was actually a pretty good day. Virgil would bring him to every class, even the ones were Virgil’s classes were nowhere near. Virgil had to keep reassuring Roman that it was fine, “I will just use my invisibility and sneak in. It will be funny to see how confused my teachers will be.” It made Roman genuinely laugh, something seemingly unachievable on this day.

The classes he did share with Virgil were the best. Virgil left his non-writing hand resting on Roman’s shoulder, giving him a gentle squeeze whenever he felt Roman quiver, shake or tense up. Which was often since their teacher would not stop shooting Roman sympathetic looks, even after Virgil glared at her. Other classes that Virgil wasn’t in, Virgil would wrap his hoodie around Roman before he headed off to his next class. People would focus on this action and how cute it was that Roman would forget, even for a few minutes.

Around lunch, Roman’s mood changed from melancholy to calm, relatively speaking. He wasn’t walking with his head down, and even partaking. The numb and somewhat painful feeling in his chest was still present, but it was no longer the black pit sucking his emotions into it like usual.

Already seated at the lunch table were Logan and Patton, whispering and smiling at one another. Before Roman could announce his presence to the couple, Virgil tugged him back. He nearly made Roman fall backward in the process, but they both knew it wasn’t intentional. They always forgot how strong their spidey strength actually was.

“Sorry!” Virgil said instinctively though he did start laughing as Roman caught himself.

“What was that for?” Roman asked once he regained his balance.

“I needed to tell you before I forget, I asked Thomas if we could borrow his living room for a movie night and he said yes. Ask your mom if you can stay over.”

Roman smiled, “That sounds great”

Virgil smiled back as the two sat in their normal seats. As soon as the two entered Patton’s vision, his eyes light and he pushed a plate covered in tin foil towards the couple. It wasn’t anything uncommon, Patton using any excuse to make people food, from “Virgil had a headache” cookies to “You saved a bus filled with little kiddos and the city still won’t give you a key!” double chocolate cake. Roman removed the tin foil to reveal donuts. It shocked Roman, he had a bit of an expectation that Patton would make one of Roman’s favorite desserts; like he always did in years past.

Roman looked up at Patton puzzled and Patton reached over the table to squeeze Roman’s arm as it rested on the cafeteria table. “I know you don’t want to make this day all about you, so I made something we all consider a normal snack. Is it okay?”

Patton’s eyes read desperate and Roman, half because he wanted to be a good best friend and half because he did not want Patton to use his Empath powers, smiled, and nodded.

“This is perfect, Pat.”

Patton pulled back so he could properly muffle his squeal of delight since they were still in school and he did not want to get into trouble for “starting a disturbance.”

Logan whispered to Patton “You told me it was because you did not have enough time to make Roman his favorite cake.”

“...I can have multiple reasons” Patton whispered back, glad that Roman and Virgil were too busy bickering about the best Avenger to listen in.

Everyone ate their lunches and donuts, just enjoying the time they had together. Logan commented on how he heard that Roman and Virgil would not join them on patrol and he hoped that they “don’t burn down Thomas’ apartment”. That earned him a look from Roman, a “Logie!’ from Patton and a kick in the shin from Virgil all at the same time.

“It was a simple precaution!” Logan shouted, only to be told to quiet down by the cafeteria monitor.

It would later become a memory they would always look back on, Virgil even including it into his best man speech at Logan and Patton’s wedding, much to Logan’s dismay.

Once lunch was over, Roman snuck into the bathroom and sent off a text to his mom asking if it was possible if he could stay over at Virgil’s, adding that if she needed him to come home then it would be fine. He didn’t want to be selfish.

Roman figured he would get his reply by the end of the day since he knew his mom would be really busy at work and he wasn’t exactly sure when his mom had her lunch break. He put his phone in his pocket only to scare himself when his notification sound went off in the silent password. He pulled it out and his phone and had a new text from his mom.

Amá: Of course you can, Your sister is watching the twins today, go have fun. It’s what Papí would want.

Roman smiled, a single tear fell down his face. His mom was the best.

Roman’s afternoon classes came and went, nothing exciting or saddening happened of note. Though it wouldn’t have mattered, the prospect of cuddles and Disney movies filled him with so much excitement and joy.

As faith would have it, he had no play practice since their show season had just ended and Mr. Bell always gave them a week off so he could tie up any last loose ends and decide the dates for the next auditions. This gave him an extra two hours to spend with his boyfriend, perfect!

Roman ran up to Virgil’s locker and bounced on his toes as his boyfriend got his stuff together so they could head off. Virgil smirked and tilted his head to Roman, “You seem excited.”

Roman smiled and nods “I’m really excited for tonight”

“Oh?” Virgil teased “What’s happening tonight? I can’t remember anything important”

Roman lightly punched him in the arm “You’re so mean, remind me why I love you again?” “It was your choice to get into this relationship, Princey, don’t forget that” Virgil waved his hand as he spoke and Roman, to Virgil’s surprise, quickly snatched Virgil’s hand.

Roman smirked back “I am very aware, and I am so happy to have you.” He then kissed Virgil’s knuckles.

Virgil cursed his cheeks for the blush that always came when Roman did something romantic. He pulled his hand back and nervously giggled “Oh shush, let’s get going already.”

Man, did he love that boy.

After swinging over to Thomas’ apartment with Patton and Logan, Roman and Virgil quickly went to work on their pillow fort as the two other spider children spoke to their spider dad about the details of the patrol.

Once everything was set up, Thomas said “Great. Patton, you and Logan get my snack bag and go to the bodega on the corner, there is money in the bag so don’t worry about using your own money. Meet me on the roof in half an hour.”

Patton and Logan nodded and left to get their favorite snacks.

Thomas turned to Roman “Hey, Ro? Before you guys start, could you come with me to the roof?”

Roman was confused but agreed. He was a bit nervous, he felt like a child about to get yelled at and tried to think of what he could have done wrong recently.

Once they got to the roof, Roman asked, “If this about keeping your apartment clean, I promise Virgil and I will not burn it down. Logan already gave us the rundown.”

Thomas put his hand on Roman’s shoulder and softly smiled “I can feel you stressing out, even without Patton’s power. Don’t worry, I trust you. I just wanted to tell you something. Sit with me” Thomas patted Roman’s head when Roman released a sigh of relief.

The two sat on the edge of the roof, Thomas in his Rainbow Weaver costume with the mask on and Roman in his civilian clothes.

Thomas gazed over the city before saying “I know you are probably expecting me to give you a speech about grief and how to handle it, but I hated those speeches at your age when I got them because of my Aunt Patty. In fact, you remind me a lot of myself when I was younger, and I’m not just talking about being a fellow theatre geek. I never wanted to think about when she died and I would throw myself into helping people, with or without the suit. One thing led to another and I ended up beaten and bloodied in an alley on the anniversary of her death. When Talyn and Joan found me, I swear my Aunt Patty possessed them to yell at me for it. I thought Talyn might kill me themself.”

Roman laughed “I can see them doing that.”

Thomas chuckled and nodded “Oh yes. But what they and Joan did instead was patching me up and we had a FRIENDS marathon, ‘the police will handle crime for now’ Joan said. I broke down after three episodes because I love my friends so much. So before I start crying again at the memories, I just wanted to tell you that your friends--including Joan, Talyn, and I--are always here for you. Don’t make the same mistake I did and forget” Roman threw himself at Thomas for a hug “Never again, I promise.”

Thomas hugged back “Thanks, kid. Now go have fun.”

Virgil looked up from his phone when he heard footsteps coming towards him “What did Thomas want? Hey, are you okay?” Virgil pops out from under the fort and cups Roman’s face to wipe the tears away.

Roman smiles “I’m fine, really. I’m just...thank you, for putting up with me”

Virgil kisses him “It’s not putting up with you, it’s loving you. Ready to start Tangled” “Of course my love”

Tag list (Ask if you want to be added or removed):

@corkeecoderyt @per-seph-o-nee @3milystuff @asymmetricalgarbage8888 @fairytailtwists @sanders-sides-rebloger @mycatshuman @sanderssidesfluffyangst @unikornavenger @0callmevirge0 @gloomingwitch @roxiefox24 @ijustreallylovesanderssides @unisaurioamorfo @nadja-chamack16 @angelic-cali

#sanders sides #thomas sanders #spiderverse au #prinxiety #logicality #roman sanders #logan sanders #virgil sanders #patton sanders #joan #talyn

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mikauzoran · 4 years

Text

Lady Noir/Adrienette: Save Yourself (I’ll Help You): Chapter Two

Read it on AO3: Save Yourself (I’ll Help You): Chapter Two: Self-Help

At some point three years prior, before Adrien became cognizant of his crush on Marinette, he had surreptitiously begun to pay close attention to her. These years of reconnaissance allowed him to quickly pick up on the fact that something was up with his charming friend that Monday at school.

She was fidgety and distracted, obviously preoccupied by something.

Alya and some of the other girls noted her particularly odd behavior, but, when asked what was wrong, Marinette politely waved away their concerns and made excuses.

Adrien let it go that first day. He knew she had a lot on her plate with all of her extracurricular responsibilities. Marinette was rivaled only by Ladybug in her jam-packed schedule and need of multitasking.

When she was noticeably agitated the second day in a row, Adrien caught her as they were packing up to move classrooms, resting a hand on her forearm and giving her a confidence-inspiring smile.

“Hey. You’ve seemed really stressed out the past two days. If there’s anything I can do to help, let me know. Even if you just need to vent, I’m here for you, okay?”

She blinked, blushed, and looked away, smiling weakly. “Thanks, Adrien. I really appreciate the offer. I’m okay, though.”

His own smile faltered slightly because she obviously was not okay, but…if she didn’t want to confide in him, it wasn’t like he could force her.

He nodded, turned up the wattage on his grin, and removed his hand from her forearm. “Well…let me know if you ever change your mind.”

She nodded, returned the smile with one even more fake than his own, and quickly finished packing her books, hurrying out the door as fast as she could without appearing to be fleeing.

On the third day of watching the woman he loved in obvious distress, Adrien could no longer stand by and do nothing.

He packed up quickly and waited for her outside the locker room after school, and when she came out with Alya, he flagged her down, asking if she were headed home.

“May I walk you there?” he inquired, shooting Alya a quick, meaningful look.

Alya promptly remembered that she’d forgotten a notebook she needed back in her locker, literally pushing Marinette towards Adrien as she beat a hasty retreat.

Quick of reflexes, Adrien deftly stopped Marinette’s fall and helped her get steady on her feet.

“I’m going to kill Alya,” she seethed, straightening her jarred purse and backpack as they nearly slipped off her shoulders.

“Forgive her,” Adrien chuckled. “She and Nino have this scheme about setting us up with each other so that the four of us can double date. Goodness knows I need all the help I can get to make you fall for me. Alya is doing God’s work.”

Marinette rolled her eyes, glaring petulantly at her friend’s retreating back as Alya disappeared into the locker room. “Goodness also knows that I don’t need help falling flat on my face, so I think I can do without Alya shoving me.”

“Fair,” Adrien allowed, holding out a hand. “May I carry something?”

Marinette shook her head, hugging her sketchpad closer to her chest reflexively. “No, thanks. I’ve got it,” she assured, starting to head for home.

In the back of her mind, she worried about coming off as rude, but the last thing she needed was for Adrien to carry her books and somehow see the endless doodles she’d been doing of Chat Noir all week as she fretted ceaselessly about him.

Slightly dejected, Adrien slipped his hands into his pockets and followed after her, regretting her brisk pace, fearing it wouldn’t give them much time to talk.

“So…” He cleared his throat as they made their way down the school steps.

She looked back at him and nearly tripped to her death.

Luckily, he caught her by the arms, keeping her from nosediving into the concrete.

Unfortunately, her books and notebooks went flying as she flailed in the seconds before he steadied her.

Once he was sure she wasn’t going to fall, Adrien bent down to gather up her things, only to be stopped as she gasped, “Don’t look!” and rushed to retrieve them herself.

“Sorry,” she added when she came to her senses. “Just…private stuff. I don’t…” She paused to take a deep breath and blow it out slowly. “Sorry I’m being such a spazz today. I have a lot on my mind.”

“Is it anything I could help with?” he offered, holding out a hand to assist her back to her feet.

She shook her head, getting up on her own. “I’ll be fine. Thank you, though.”

He bit the inside of his cheek, debating whether or not to let it go.

“…I’m really worried about you,” he confessed after a moment, unable to hold it in.

She stopped mid-step, turning to face him with a puzzled expression. “…You are?”

“Yeah,” he replied in a hushed tone. “Seriously worried. You’ve been really off all week. I’m not trying to force you to talk to me if you don’t feel comfortable doing so, but…I just want you to be okay, and I don’t think you are, and I’m feeling kind of helpless, so…”

He almost felt bad for forcing her hand, but it was getting to the point where he was worried about Marinette getting akumatized, and that was no good for anyone because how was he supposed to fight against the girl he adored if worst came to worst?

He couldn’t…so he crossed his fingers and hoped he’d be forgiven for being slightly manipulative.

“I’m concerned about getting akumatized over worrying about you,” he told her with a grimace.

Her eyes flew wide in alarm before fluttering rapidly in a series of astonished blinks.

“And, if that happens, I’m scared my akumatized self will come after you because you’re technically the source of my negative emotions, and then you’ll be caught up in things,” he elaborated, “and I really don’t want that. The last thing I want to do is add to your stress, so…”

He worried his bottom lip between his teeth and gave her a pleading look. “Sorry, but…isn’t there anything I can do to help? I’m not asking you to talk to me about your problems, but if there were some way I could feel like I wasn’t so powerless to help you…”

He watched as her surprise crumpled up like a note passed during class into a troubled, thoughtful expression.

“…Sorry for being such a pain. I don’t want to cause problems,” he added earnestly, dropping the act and retreating one step at a time. “Sorry. Forget I said anything, but if you do want to talk, know that I’m always here for you.”

He turned to go, but she caught him, fingers wrapping around his forearm, gripping, holding him in place.

“…Wait,” she called softly, a weary resignation in her voice.

He arched an eyebrow questioningly and waited for her to continue.

She sighed and tipped her head, motioning for him to come with her. “Walk with me a bit?”

“Sure,” he easily agreed and followed as she led him across the street and then past her house to the park next door.

They completed one lap around the square, Marinette deep in thought the whole time. Then, she went and took a seat on one of the park benches, and he sat beside her, waiting patiently for her to give some kind of cue.

She inhaled deeply and, gazing down intently at her shoes all the while, finally spoke. “So…there’s this guy.”

Adrien stiffened, his heart screeching to a halt as his mind called up helpful memories of all the times Ladybug had told him about her mystery boy.

Why was there always some other guy? Adrien wondered bitterly but then mentally slapped himself because of course there were guys in the lives of smart, talented, beautiful women like Marinette and Ladybug.

“A friend,” Marinette clarified. “A really close friend, and I’m worried sick about him,” she sighed heavily, shaking her head, at a loss as to what to do.

Adrien relaxed slightly at the friendship label but didn’t let his guard down as she continued.

“He’s having some trouble with mental health and his family relationships, and I think he’s really depressed.” She looked up from her feet to meet Adrien’s gaze, and it hurt his heart to see the glistening tears blurring her vision. “I’m scared, Adrien, and I feel really useless because there’s nothing I can do to help him.

“It’s complicated,” she explained softly, looking away as if it would hide her guilt as shame turned her cheeks pink. “I can’t be there for him the way a friend should, so…I guess I’m feeling for him what you’re feeling for me. I’ve been agonizing over this since Saturday night, and I don’t know what to do. I know that there’s nothing to do. I just wish I could make it all okay for him.”

She lifted her head once more as she vehemently informed, “Adrien, he’s one of the sweetest, best people I know, and he deserves better than what he’s stuck with. I wish there was something I could do so that he wouldn’t have to struggle so much. He shouldn’t have to.”

Adrien nodded, tentatively reaching out to place a comforting hand on her shoulder. “You’re such a good friend, Marinette. I wish someone would worry about me like that,” he chuckled, but the manufactured mirth didn’t quite make it into his voice. “He’s really lucky. It sounds like you care about your friend a lot.”

She smiled wretchedly, giving a sad little nod as she admitted, “I love him.”

It felt like getting hit with an icy blast of winter air or walking outside without a coat, shocking his system.

His hand froze on her arm.

It took a minute for him to form words, and, when he did, they came out stilted and awkward, betraying his distraction. “Oh. Wow. Uh… That’s… He’s really lucky.”

Marinette tipped her head to the side, frowning in concern. “Is everything all right, Adrien?”

“Sorry.” He forced a smile, cheeks stinging as he blushed. “Ignore me. I was just a little surprised because I think this is the first I’ve heard about you having your eye on someone. I mean, it’s only natural that you would, but…”

His hand went up reflexively to rub at the back of his neck, and he shook his head, trying to clear away his muddled thoughts. He was supposed to be helping her feel better, not having a pity party for himself.

“Sorry,” he repeated softly, sheepishly. “I’m just kind of flustered…and more than a little bit jealous,” he added honestly.

Marinette’s mouth dropped open, and she leaned in to stare at him in shock. “W-Wait. What? Like…what?”

“I thought I was pretty obvious,” Adrien laughed openly at himself, hoping to keep the atmosphere light so that she wouldn’t see his heart breaking. “You really didn’t know I have feelings for you?”

Slowly, she began to shake her head from side to side, speechless in her astonishment as she tried to determine whether or not she was dreaming this entire scenario up.

“Marinette,” he chuckled more genuinely, his voice warm and affectionate. “You’re amazing. Any guy who didn’t fall in love with you would have to be a total idiot.”

She gripped the bench seat to keep herself from tipping over and falling flat in the dirt.

Her head was spinning. How could this be happening? Adrien loved her?

Impossible.

And yet…he was looking at her with such a fond, soft expression in his eyes. It was just like the looks Chat Noir often gave Ladybug, so… Maybe it was real.

Her lips parted to respond, to confess her own feelings, but Adrien cut her off.

His eyes widened in alarm, and he gave a start, jolting back and putting up his hands in defence. “…Oh, but, I mean, I totally support you! With this guy. If he’s the one you love…. I support you,” he rushed to assure.

Marinette blinked, mentally reeling from the whiplash.

Did he love her or not? She wasn’t entirely sure now, if he weren’t willing to fight for her. His affections couldn’t be that strong if he was okay with giving up so easily.

“More than anything, I’m your friend, so I don’t want my feelings for you to get in the way of that or make things weird between us,” he explained, desperate for her to understand. “So, if you have to pretend that I never said anything, that’s totally fine. I support you. Whatever makes you happy is the most important thing.”

She had to pause to consider before responding. Her thoughts were so twisted up like a ball of writhing serpents battling to consume one another.

“Thank you, Adrien. That’s so sweet, and it’s seriously not a problem,” she promised, reaching out and placing a hand on his forearm. “We’re fine. Everything’s fine…. Honestly, there’s nothing for you to support. Things aren’t going to work between me and my friend, so…thank you, but nothing’s going to happen between us.”

Adrien’s eyebrows gradually pulled together into a V of concern. “Is it…because of his mental health situation?”

Marinette recoiled, staring at him in stupefaction. “What? No! No, of course not! Nothing like that. He’s amazing, and I’d be more than willing to stay by his side and support him through his struggles. He’s worth putting in the hard work for.”

Adrien’s stomach stopped clenching, and a faint hope welled up in his chest. If things weren’t going to work out between Marinette and this other guy, maybe Adrien still had a chance. Maybe she could see past Adrien’s struggles and still care for him too.

“So…what exactly is the problem, if you don’t mind me asking?” he pressed gently, chewing nervously at the inside of his lip.

She looked away, frowning down at her knees. “It’s…complicated.”

Adrien arched an eyebrow. “Is he gay?”

It was the only reason Adrien could come up with why a guy wouldn’t want to overcome all obstacles to be with Marinette.

Marinette chuckled softly, shaking her head. “No. He’s bi, so…”

She looked back up at him, scrutinizing his face, evaluating his trustworthiness. “…I’m going to tell you a secret.”

He scooted in closer, nodding that he was ready. “I won’t tell a soul.”

She glanced around, scanning the area to make sure they wouldn’t be overheard before she lowered her voice, whispering, “It’s Chat Noir.”

Adrien blinked slowly, uncomprehendingly. The words meant nothing to him.

Seeing his confusion, Marinette elaborated, her cheeks turning cherry blossom pink as she confessed, “My friend, the guy I’m in love with…it’s Chat Noir.”

Adrien’s brain crashed, and it took him a good ten seconds to reboot.

His initial inclination was to laugh hysterically because finally his love was requited, and he couldn’t have asked for a better romantic partner than Marinette Dupain-Cheng.

His mind next trotted off to construct a detailed plan of all the ways he was going to make her happy and spoil her rotten.

It then occurred to him that he needed to tell her his identity, but then he decided to table that idea because Ladybug would be furious, and he wasn’t sure how Marinette would react.

He also wasn’t so sure that this was the best time to reveal his identity because Marinette was convinced that things wouldn’t work between them. She was also currently upset…because of him.

“You’ve been worried all week because of Chat Noir?” Adrien breathed as his brain came back online.

She nodded meekly. “I…Yes. He’s having a rough time, and I’m worried that there’s nothing I can do to help him. I’m not doing a very good job as his friend.”

Adrien rolled his eyes, wrapping his arms around Marinette and pulling her into a fierce hug.

“You’re doing amazing,” he whispered into her hair, wishing he could express how much it meant to him, knowing that her skylight door was always open when he needed a safe space to escape from his life.

He may not have confided in her before about how bad things were because he was afraid of burdening her and scaring her away, but all the times when she’d allowed him to hang out on her balcony or in her room, all the times she and her parents had strong-armed him into making dinner and eating with them once they’d found out he ate alone most meals, all the times she’d saved pastries for him and Plagg…

Chat Noir might not have let Marinette see how dark it was inside of his mind, but she’d always been there to help right when he needed her. She’d gotten him through many tough times, even if she’d never known it.

He pulled back to look her intently in the eyes. “Marinette, I’ve seen you two together before, and Chat Noir is crazy about you. Trust me. I can tell. If you love him and he loves you, why can’t you two be together?”

“Adrien, he’s a superhero,” Marinette snorted, rolling her eyes as if the problem were obvious.

“So?” he scoffed right back. “You don’t think you’re good enough for a superhero or something? Marinette, Chat Noir is the one not good enough for you. Stop being humble and date him already.”

“I’m not being humble,” she returned saucily. “I’m being practical. I can’t date a guy whose identity I don’t know.”

“Then let him reveal his identity to you,” Adrien suggested matter-of-factly. “You’re making this more complicated than it needs to be.”

“I am not,” she protested, crossing her arms indignantly. “It’s too dangerous for me to know his identity.”

“How so?” he argued. “All you have to do is just not tell anyone that you know. Don’t get caught kissing Chat Noir, and no one will be the wiser. No one’s going to think twice if you start dating his civilian self.”

She pursed her lips, trying not to see his point. “What if I get caught up in an akuma attack and get brainwashed into revealing his secrets?”

“Chat Noir has been mind-controlled countless times, and he hasn’t given away his secret identity yet,” Adrien continued to stack solid argument on top of solid argument. “If you don’t tell anyone you know who Chat Noir is, Papillon won’t know to come after you. You’re perfectly safe so long as you keep your mouth shut. I think you can manage that, Marinette.”

“What if there’s a truth-telling akuma?” she tried in one last-ditch attempt.

He frowned at her in mildly annoyed disappointment. “Has there ever been a truth-telling akuma? In the past three and a half years?”

She averted her gaze, her lip pushing forward into a pout.

“No. No, there has not,” he answered his own question triumphantly. “See? I’m not going to say it’s perfectly safe for him to reveal himself to you, but the risk is small enough that I feel comfortable with you taking it. Don’t you think he would be worth it?”

“Of course he would be worth it,” she replied in a small, tired whisper. “It’s just…it’s complicated, Adrien.”

“It’s really not as complicated as you’re making it,” he sighed, gently cupping her cheek and tipping her head up to make her look at him. “Marinette, you’re a wonderful person, and you deserve happiness and love. Why won’t you let yourself have this?”

Her lips slowly moved into a self-deprecating smile, and she shook her head sadly. “I’m afraid that I really am a masochist who doesn’t allow herself to have nice things.”

It was like a foggy pane of glass shattered between them at her words, and Adrien flashed back to Ladybug sitting on the roof of Sainte Chapelle saying the same thing Saturday night.

He couldn’t breathe.

“What…did you say?” he choked as the pieces slid together: Ladybug’s insistence that Chat go to Marinette when Ladybug couldn’t be there for him herself. Marinette’s claims that things were complicated between herself and Chat Noir.

She shook her head again. “Nothing. It’s nothing.”

His Lady, his Princess…the same person? Could he be so lucky?

Her brow pinched into a frown as she registered his expression. “Why are you grinning like that?”

“Because I love you,” he chuckled giddily, rendering her utterly speechless.

She found that she literally couldn’t remember how to make her mouth, brain, and vocal cords work in concert to form any kind of reply, so she just sat there, parting and closing her lips like a drowning fish.

“Hey,” he called softly, slipping his hand into hers. “I really need to talk to you. It’s important,” he emphasized. “Could we please head to your house so we can talk undisturbed?”

She tried to speak, but it came out sounding like a collection of gibberish syllables, so, instead, she nodded and got to her feet, leading him back to her house and up the stairs to her room.

He had to let go of her hand in order to file up the narrow staircase, and, by the time they reached the attic, Marinette’s brain was once again semi-functional.

She took a seat on her chaise longue and motioned for him to sit anywhere he liked, urging, “Make yourself comfortable.”

“I’m good standing, thanks,” he assured. “I’m actually feeling kind of jittery, so…do you mind if I pace?”

“Uh…go right ahead,” she encouraged, watching as he did indeed start to walk back and forth across her carpet. “…You said that you needed to talk to me?”

He took a deep breath and let it out as a sigh, “Yeah. Yeah. I did. I do. I…”

He bit his lip, rubbing at the back of his neck as he tried to get his harried thoughts in order. “I’m not sure you want to know, but I feel like I have to tell you. You’re not going to be happy, but this isn’t something I can keep from you.”

He stopped and turned to face her. “Honestly, I’ve kind of been in a dark place lately, Marinette.”

Her eyes rounded, pupils dilating in fear for yet another one of the most precious boys in her life going through a hard time.

“I’ve been feeling pretty down,” he confessed. “I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to bother anyone or make them worry.”

“Adrien, we’re your friends,” she scolded, fighting back a whirlwind of emotions.

Hurt that he hadn’t trusted her, frustration that he thought so little of himself and how much he meant to them.

“Worrying about one another and supporting each other is what friends do,” she stressed, hands going to her hips. “When you need help or just someone to listen to you vent, you come to us. We will always be there for you.”

His lips quirked into a sheepish smile. “I’m sorry. I know. I just…have self-esteem issues. But I’m coming to you now, so…better late than never?”

Her expression softened, and she pushed herself up, going to him and wrapping him in a loose hug. “Oh, Adrien…you idiot.”

He rested his head against hers, muttering, “I was also afraid to talk to you about it because I was worried about ruining my chances with you. I know I wouldn’t want to deal with me and all of my insecurities and hang-ups. I couldn’t imagine someone as epic as you picking someone like me when you could do so much better.”

“Adrien,” she cooed, pulling back to meet his gaze with an abundance of sympathy and affection. “Don’t…say things like that. There are so many amazing things about you.”

“That’s what Plagg said too,” he chuckled softly.

She blinked, her brain not registering. “Plagg?”

He nodded. “Saturday…I told Ladybug about how lost and alone I’d been feeling, and she told me to come talk to you…so here I am.”

Marinette’s jaw dropped as she struggled to make sense of what she was hearing.

Saturday night, Ladybug had talked to Chat Noir, not Adrien, so…

Her lungs seized, cutting off her breath.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered like a chastened child waiting to be struck. “I know you didn’t want to reveal identities and that’s why you sent me to Marinette instead of trying to help as Ladybug, but…I think the cat’s out of the bag, My Lady.”

To her credit, Marinette did not faint. She would have liked to because, if she were unconscious, she wouldn’t have to deal with reality right away, but she remained in full control of her faculties and, thus, had to attend to the matter at hand in real time.

“I need to sit down,” she announced, heading back over to the chaise to compose herself.

Adrien followed nervously, taking a seat beside her without infringing upon her personal space. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

She waved away his words, shaking her head. “No. No. It’s fine. I…This is my fault. I knew you could potentially figure out my identity every time I had Chat Noir over to watch movies or play video games. I knew I was taking a risk.”

She turned to look him in the eye. “If I had the chance to do it all over, I wouldn’t change anything.”

“Oh,” he whispered, dazed as she leaned in and pressed her lips to his cheek, smiling softly.

“I don’t regret anything except not being able to be there for you more,” she added, making his heart swell. “But now we have to sit down and figure out what to do about this catastrophe now that we’re here.”

He arched an eyebrow, echoing, “Catastrophe?”

She nodded. “I mean…you know my identity. We’re in grave danger, Chaton.”

Deep furrows gradually dug their way across his brow. “Are we actually, though?”

She blinked, taken aback.

“Is this really the end-of-the-world scenario you think it is?” he pressed. “Like what I was saying earlier, if we don’t advertise that we know, why should Papillon target Marinette and Adrien more than any other Parisian?”

Marinette opened her mouth to argue her point but then closed it again when she realized that she didn’t have any good rebuttals to make.

“That’s why I’m always so careful when I come over here as Chat Noir. I don’t let myself get spotted coming and going so that I don’t tip anyone off to the fact that you’re important to me and could be used against me,” he explained, scooting in a little closer on the chaise. “If no one knows we know, how are we in danger?”

She pursed her lips and thought hard, trying to come up with a way to refute his logic. “…But what if there’s a truth-telling akuma?” she inquired weakly, knowing the feeble argument wouldn’t hold water.

He cupped her cheek in his hand and swore, “I would literally die before I betrayed you.”

Her heart cracked open at the very thought, and tears started to stream down her face.

“You die too much already,” she whispered, looping her arms around his neck. “I don’t want you to die…. I love you.”

He didn’t protest as she leaned in and pressed a butterfly’s wing beat of a kiss to his lips.

“Okay,” he chuckled, resting his forehead against hers. “No dying. We’ll figure something else out, but it’s going to be okay, Marinette. No matter what, we’ll get through this together.”

“Promise?” she hummed, a gentle smile lifting the corners of her lips.

“Promise,” he affirmed, inching forward to steal a more substantial kiss.

When they broke apart, there was a question in his eyes. “…Me being Adrien doesn’t change the way you feel about me, does it? You said you loved Chat Noir, but…”

A scarlet flare lit up her cheeks and spread across the bridge of her nose as she finally confessed, “You know the mystery boy I’ve been pining after since we were thirteen?”

He quirked an eyebrow. “Yeeeees?”

“His name is Adrien Agreste,” she giggled.

He burst out laughing. “You have horrible taste in men.”

She slapped him playfully on the arm. “You have horrible self-esteem. That’s the real problem here. I only fall for the sweetest, kindest, most thoughtful guys. I have impeccable taste.”

“…You really think so?” he sought to verify, amazed that such a thing could be true, that such a woman could want him.

She nodded, gaze earnest. “You don’t give yourself enough credit, Adrien. We’re going to have to work on changing that.”

“Is this a team effort thing now?” he hummed, delighted by the prospect.

“Absolutely,” she confirmed…but then the air of teasing left her. “…I’ve been really worried about you since Saturday. If there’s anything—anything—I can do for you, please let me know. …What do you think I could do to help?”

He chewed thoughtfully on the inside of his cheek for a moment before answering. “…I don’t know, really. You’ve done so much already for me as Chat Noir just by giving me a warm, safe, place to go when I need to escape. I feel bad asking for more.”

“Don’t,” she urged. “It really is fine, Adrien. Earlier, you said that you wanted me to be okay, didn’t you? That’s how I feel about you too, so don’t ever feel bad for asking.”

Slowly, he began to nod as comprehension dawned upon him. “…Oh….”

She gave him an encouraging smile and squeezed his hand. “Yeah.”

Blushing, he looked down at their joined hands. “Okay. Well…I’ll have to let you know as I think of things, but…I don’t know if there’s a whole lot you can do. I think a lot of being mentally healthy starts and ends with me, so…I think I have to do most of the work myself.”

“But you can still let me know if there’s anything I can do to support you,” she reminded.

He nodded. “Yeah. You’re right. …I will. I think mostly I just need someone to talk to about things.”

“You can talk to me whenever you need to,” she assured. “I mean, I hardly sleep, so you can call or text whenever.”

He frowned at this. “I think maybe we need to reevaluate your self-care behaviors while we’re at it. I’ve always known that Marinette had a crazy hectic schedule full of stress and deadlines, but now that I know you’re juggling a side gig as a superhero on top of everything you do as Marinette, I’m kind of worried.”

She averted her gaze, sticking her lip out in a pout. “I liked it better when we were focusing on you.”

“I’ll bet you did,” he snickered. “Just know that this is a two-way street. I’m here for you too, Marinette.”

She dropped the pout and looked up at him with a soft smile. “Thanks…. I think you should talk to Nino about how you’ve been feeling lately. Maybe Alya too, if you feel comfortable talking to her, but definitely Nino. He’s going to freak.”

Adrien winced. “Yeah…. Yeah, I know. I just don’t want—”

“—Don’t you dare mention being a burden or bothering him,” she warned. “Nino would be insulted. He loves you literally as much as he loves his brother, if not, more.”

“Yeah,” Adrien sighed, sufficiently cowed. “I’ve just been too scared to say anything.”

She hesitated before continuing, “And…you know…maybe we could go see a therapist?”

He raised an eyebrow in surprise at the suggestion. “A therapist?”

She nodded tentatively. “I know I’m awesome, but I’m only seventeen, Adrien. There are a lot of things that I’m completely clueless about. I’ve looked into psychology a little bit to help me deal with akuma victims, but I’m not an expert. I was just thinking that maybe talking to a counselor would be helpful. Maybe they’ll think of things that could help that we would never come up with on our own.”

“That’s true,” he allowed, considering the idea.

“I don’t know,” she sighed. “I just know that there are a lot of times where I think, ‘Man, I wish I had an adult to help me out with this’. Most of the time I’m completely on my own—besides you and the others and Tikki, I mean…. I was just thinking that this is maybe one time where we don’t have to go it alone. Maybe an adult can help.”

“I’ll think about it,” he granted. “It would be hard to see a doctor without my father finding out, and he isn’t going to like this, but…it’s a good idea,” he agreed.

“Good,” she sighed in relief, leaning into a languid, exploratory kiss that Adrien was more than happy to return.

They broke apart a few minutes later with a contented hum and stared dreamily into each other’s eyes.

Suddenly, an idea occurred to Adrien, and he gave a start.

“Stupid question,” he announced hesitantly.

“No such thing,” she assured, wrapping her arms around him more snugly.

“Are we dating now?” he warily inquired. “Sorry. Do I need to ask you out still? I mean, I assume we’re on the same page because we both said that we loved one another, and we’ve been kissing, so one would think that we’re dating, but I just wanted to make sure because I’ve never done this before, and I’m—”

“—Adrien?” she cut him off gently.

He tipped his head to the side. “Yes?”

“Will you go out with me?” she asked so that there would be no doubt in his mind as to what she wanted.

“Yes,” he responded breathlessly, and the joy in his eyes made her heart melt.

“Good,” she chuckled. “For our first date, would you want to have movie night tonight? We could snuggle on the couch and make cookies together.”

He surprised her by saying no.

“That can’t be our first date,” he whined. “It’s not romantic enough. I’ve had our first date planned for years, Princess. There have to be rose petals and candles and mood music. We’re supposed to eat at this amazing restaurant and take ballroom dancing lessons and then have a rooftop picnic as we watch the stars and snuggle. We can’t have a night in as our first date,” he argued.

She stared at him with a deadpan expression, debating whether it would be damaging to their nascent relationship for her to face-palm.

“My boyfriend is a high-maintenance dork,” she sighed.

“Hey,” he pouted, and she could almost see his ears and tail drooping despite the fact that he wasn’t transformed.

“All right,” she relented. “If we don’t call it a date, would you like to hang out and snuggle and watch movies and bake cookies?”

“Definitely,” he easily approved but then thought to add softly, in a slightly hurt tone, “I’m not silly, you know, for wanting my first date with the woman I love to be everything I’ve ever dreamed it would be.”

“No,” she agreed, reaching up to stroke his hair lovingly. “I’m sorry. You’re not. You deserve to have the first date of your dreams. I shouldn’t have scoffed, even if it is a bit more…” She searched for the word, came up with “over the top”, and decided against voicing it. “…more than I had in mind,” she ended conciliatorily.

“I love you, and I want you to have nice things,” she assured, earning herself an affectionate nuzzle from him.

“Thanks,” he whispered. “That means a lot to me.”

She then did something she knew she would later regret as a show of her love for him: “You can plan our first date,” she offered. “Whatever you want it to be. Go wild.”

The way his eyes lit up at her giving him free rein confirmed her fears…yet, the pure joy in his expression made her think that, if a crazy rom-com-cliché-filled date was the price of his happiness, it was well worth it.

The End

#Lady Noir #Adrinette #Adrienette #Miraculous Ladybug #Miraculous Ladybug Fanfiction #Adrien Agreste #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #Chat Noir #Ladybug #Identity Reveal #Fluff #Hurt/Comfort #Friends to Lovers #Love Confession #Talking #Honesty #Mikau's Writings #Save Yourself (I'll Help You)

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ronninoir · 4 years

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Can I Steal You For A Second? Chapter 26

Summary: Adrien is forced to participate in a new dating show, but becomes more excited when Ladybug says she’ll participate as her civilian self.

AKA: AU where Adrien doesn’t know Marinette, the superheroes are 22 and Gabriel is mean and ruthless but not Hawkmoth.

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Start from the beginning Chp 1 on AO3

Chapter 26

When Marinette met up with the other girls for the date card the next morning, it seemed that Juliette had found a way to pull herself together as well. She was chipper than normal and was chatting with the other girls when Marinette walked in, almost late as usual.

Marinette took the seat next to Juliette who smiled at her before turning and finishing her conversation with Kagami, of all people. Marinette only heard the tail end of their conversation, but it was enough to peak her interest.

“...let you know when it’s been decided, and you’ll be there?” Juliette asked as Marinette sat down. Kagami gave a curt nod in response before standing up and moving to the other side of the room.

Marinette gave Juliette a look, but she just winked and turned her attention towards Lucie, who had gone to grab the date card.

Looking around the date card room, Marinette was once again struck by how many girls there were remaining. Including Lucie, 6, which meant that 2 would go home this week, and next week would be hometowns, where Adrien would finally get to meet Marinette’s parents.

Lucie came back with only one date card. Marinette could see that she was confused, but she hid it really well for the cameras. “Here we are ladies!” She smiled and cracked the seal on the card reading out, “Juliette,” which elicited a gasp from the girl sitting directly next to Marinette. “Let’s ride together,” Lucie read before setting the card down on the table.

Juliette looked genuinely surprised, and had turned to Marinette to say something when Lila stood up, looking ready to pop.

“WHY is there only ONE date card?!” Lila asked the general population. It was a question that everyone else was thinking, but only Lila would feel the need to stand up in the middle of the room and scream it at everyone. Marinette realized with a jolt that this was the first time she’d heard Lila be mean to anyone since that conversation with Adrien at the last group date. Well that deal lasted about 4 days. Marinette thought with a smirk. “What about the group date? When will we find out about that?”

All of the girls looked at the group of producers as one, but a more familiar face stepped out to address the room.

“Well good morning ladies,” the beautiful face of Adrien said as he smiled at them all. Lila had the good sense to sit down and keep her mouth shut as Adrien went on. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t able to be here to explain it all earlier, I had a work thing that had to be cleared up.” Adrien’s eyes locked on Marinette’s, where her unasked question was. He couldn’t say anything, but she could read the expression in his eyes, Father, and she knew they could chat about it later. “Anyway, this week is a special week. I want to spend a lot more time with all of you individually, so I’m going to be doing some one-on-one dates only this week. Sadly, not everyone will get a date, but I’ll still be able to spend plenty of time with all of you.” Adrien paused, and as much as she hated it, she had a feeling she wouldn’t be getting a date this week.

“As most of you know,” Adrien continued without looking at Marinette, which only confirmed her suspicion. “Next week is Hometowns, which means I’ll finally get to spend some time meeting your family and learning more about where you come from. However, that makes my decision this week even harder. That just means I have a lot of work ahead of me,” Adrien got that twinkle in his eye that meant he was doing something mischievous. He walked towards where Marinette and Juliette were sitting and held out his hand to the latter. “Juliette, how about we start out our date right now?”

Juliette blushed and gave a small nod, taking his hand and standing so they were eye to eye. “Perfect,” Adrien responded, flashing that gorgeous smile, “I’ll wait here for you and I’ll see you in about an hour?” Adrien smoothly switched spots with Juliette to where now he was sitting right next to Marinette, and close enough for their thighs to be touching.

Juliette stood there shocked for a moment until Marinette gave her hand a squeeze and she shot off towards her bedroom to get ready. Marinette could feel Adrien laughing at her as she ran up the stairs, as well as the stares of all of the other girls.

It wasn’t like they had never had conversations with Adrien as a group, they just were usually more prepared for them then they were today. Even Marinette felt slightly awkward and speechless, and she could see it in the faces of the other girls as well. Well, all except Lila, who quickly made a place on the other side of Adrien and was suddenly acting sweet again.

Marinette tried hard to focus on the conversation at hand, but with Adrien sitting so close to her... she was losing her mind. She wanted to touch him, grab his hand or lean her head on his shoulder. She wanted to talk with him and ask him if she had a date or even to warn him that Lila might be going back to her old ways. Instead, still highly aware of the other girls and their watchful eyes, she shifted slightly to where they were just sitting next to each other, no physical touch at all. Thankfully, Adrien seemed to be the only one who noticed.

Juliette was ready in a record 15 minutes, and she looked beautiful. Her hair was down and wavy, her make-up natural, and her jeans, booties, and cute white top would look great wherever Adrien took her. When she walked in the room, slightly panting from her run downstairs, Adrien stood and gave her a hug.

“You look wonderful. You ready to go?” She gave him a nod and he turned to wave at the girls. “I’ll see you all later,” he said as he hooked his arm around Juliette’s waist and walked her towards the front door. Juliette quickly looked back and gave Marinette the biggest smile, which she responded with a quick thumbs up before Juliette disappeared out the door.

Once she was gone, Lila was the first out of the room. Whatever she did to entertain herself every day at the mansion was clearly something that needed her attention immediately. Marinette rolled her eyes as she stood up and made her way to Lucie and Sasha.

“Well that was an eventful morning.” Marinette said as she approached the pair. They both turned to her suddenly, as if Marinette had walked in on a conversation that she wasn’t supposed to hear. Lucie recovered first and responded with a, “Yeah, I was super confused that there was only one date card outside, and what are the chances that Adrien shows up and takes Juliette on the date right now?”

Marinette nodded her agreement, but she was thinking of other things. Why did it seem like everyone was acting weird around her? First Juliette chatting with Kagami, and now these two? She excused herself from the conversation quickly and made her way to her room. At least Tikki would be grateful for her company.

----------------------------------------------------

Marinette stayed in her room, sketching and doodling, and doing anything to distract herself from thinking of worst-case scenarios to do with all of the whispering. Eventually, she got so bored that she cleaned Juliette’s room for her, knowing that she probably left it messy while in a hurry to get ready for her date. By mid-afternoon she couldn’t stand it anymore, she gently made her way downstairs, hoping she would find some girls whispering that she could spy on or whatnot.

Instead, she found Lucie sitting alone at the kitchen island. Marinette sat next to her and waited.

Most of her interrogations were done with spots and a mask, but she’d learned that silence and facial expressions worked really well, even if no one ever gave up good information about Hawkmoth’s identity or location, but it did come in handy whenever the local police needed her. As she got closer to Lucie, she decided that now might be a good time to try it without the disguise. There was a steady silence between the two of them for almost 2 minutes before Lucie broke the silence.

“We aren’t supposed to tell you yet.” Lucie sighed, finally turning to look at Marinette as well. Marinette stayed quiet still, though raised an eyebrow in an unasked question. Lucie sighed once more before continuing, “Juliette wanted to be the one to tell you. I was sworn to secrecy.” Marinette let the moment last a little longer, staring into Lucie’s eyes and not daring to breathe in case Lucie really did break. Finally, Lucie broke eye contact and groaned, her head gently going to rest on her crossed arms on the counter.

“Okay! Fine, I’ll tell you.” When she looked back up at Marinette, she was frowning, and she looked so frustrated and child-like that Marinette couldn’t help but smile. “You’re good at this. Just know, Juliette’s going to be mad at me once she finds out I told you.”

“Oh, she’ll get over it. Now spill.”

“We’re having a meeting. It was going to be today, since we never have dates on Mondays, but now we just need to come up with a time this week where all of us except Lila can meet up.”

“All, except Lila?” Marinette asked.

Lucie looked around the room, as if making sure they were truly alone, before leaning closer and whispering, “Apparently, one of the girls has a scoop on Lila. They know why she is so desperate to stay on the show, and it’s not for Adrien.” Marinette opened her mouth to ask a question, but Lucie cut her off, “That’s all I know. Juliette was just forming the meeting and the girl wanted to remain anonymous in case Lila found out before the meeting happened.”

Marinette leaned back and thought for a moment. Juliette probably wanted to be the one to tell her because she knew how much Marinette hated Lila. If the girl wanted to remain anonymous, and they were planning a secret meeting without getting the cameras involved, then it must be something serious.

“So, everyone’s been whispering around me today because...?” Marinette asked, and to her surprise, Lucie busted out laughing.

“Because Juliette threatened to ‘track us down and hang us by our toes in the cellar while making us listen to old-school Justin Bieber.’” Lucie managed to get out before laughing again. “No one took her seriously, but they were worried what she would actually do if we told you.”

“Well if she hangs you by your toes in this imaginary cellar, I’ll come rescue you myself.” Marinette giggled.

The rest of the day went much better, especially when Juliette came home that night, a rose in hand. All of the girls were screaming and excited, especially as Juliette told of their horseback riding adventures from the day and how Adrien had almost fallen off of his horse. As excited as everyone was for Juliette, there was a bit of a gloomy air hanging around the mansion as everyone went to sleep. Marinette felt it too. She was pretty good at math, especially when it came to measurements, but it didn’t take an expert to realize that with only four roses available this week, and Juliette getting one of them, that left only three for the remaining five girls to fight over.

----------------------------------------------------

The next morning, they were informed that another date card would be arriving, which meant that everyone got ready as if they were going on a date. Everyone, except Juliette and Marinette. Marinette was that confident that she wouldn’t be getting a date this week, so she decided not to waste her energy.

Sadly, all of the girls’ hard work was in vain, Adrien didn’t show up, only a date card that Sasha read with Lucie’s name on it. The card said, “Let’s catch some waves,” and Lucie was instructed to wear a swimsuit under her clothes, and that Adrien would pick her up in half an hour. Lucie ran off to change, and before the other girls could leave, Lila turned on Juliette.

“What did you and Barbie doll Lucie do to get two one-on-ones. I should have received the first repeat one-on-one, not you!” Juliette had stood to retort, but Marinette grabbed her arm and pulled her from the room to avoid a confrontation.

Marinette didn’t let go of Juliette’s arm until they were safely locked in the furthest bathroom from the Date Card room.

“For someone so small, you are incredibly strong,” Juliette said, thankfully with no malice in her voice. “I’m totally going to have a bruise tomorrow.”

“Sorry, I just couldn’t let you have it out with Lila.”

“Well, I appreciate that.” Juliette said in a small voice.

Marinette let the silence sit for a minute. She hadn’t even realized that Juliette was the first girl to get two one-on-ones, but now that Lila said it, she couldn’t shake the feeling that it should have been her. It was a crazy thought, especially considering she’s had so much more one-on-one time with Adrien than any of the girls, but for some reason, Marinette was jealous of Juliette. She shook her head to clear those thoughts and to bring her back to the situation at hand.

“So, I heard there was something you needed to tell me?” Marinette asked, the ghost of laugh in her voice.

Juliette paused for a moment, clearly still thinking about what had just happened with Lila before her eyes got wide and she frowned. “Who told you?”

“No one that I’ll let you force to listen to Justin Bieber. My lips are sealed, so spill.” Marinette responded with a sweet smile.

Juliette sighed, but Marinette knew she wasn’t actually mad. The light in her eyes when she turned towards her let Marinette know that this gossip was too good for her to stay mad about anything for too long. “It’s Lila. Sasha saw something, and she finally figured it all out. Since they’ve been on the same floor this whole time, she saw a handful of things that didn’t make sense until this past weekend when she finally put it together. She won’t tell me more than that, except she said that it’s the reason that Lila is still on the show.”

Marinette was speechless. This could finally be the thing that got Lila off of the show. “When’s this meeting?”

Juliette sighed, “It was supposed to be Monday, but we can’t have it without everyone present. I’ve talked with every girl, and they’re on board to listen, and we even had a place to have the discussion and a time, we just don’t have a day where everyone is in the house anymore.” Juliette let out another sigh and moved to sit on the counter next to the sink. “Once all these dates are done I guess before the rose ceremony, we’ll get together and Sasha will spill what she knows.”

There was a pounding on the door, which made both girls jump. Marinette opened it to find Lucie standing there, looking beautiful in her date outfit.

“Sorry to interrupt, but I was hoping to find you two. Adrien’s going to be here any minute,” She looked slightly panicked, her eyes wide. She glanced down nervously at herself before meeting their eyes again, “Does this make me look fat?”

Marinette and Juliette exchanged looks before quickly reassuring her and rushing off to help Lucie put on some finishing touches.

----------------------------------------------------

Adrien was having the worst week. First, Marinette was upset with him for keeping Lila and sending home Hanna, which is valid, but he just couldn’t shake the feeling that he had finally gotten to see the real Lila Saturday night. Then, his Father had a conversation with him, about Marinette, causing him to be late to picking up Juliette and addressing the girls.

His Father was upset that Marinette was even still here.

“She was not one of the agreed upon girls. I let you keep her for a couple of weeks, expecting you to eventually pick her off. Then she made it to the top 10, now you’re acting as though she’s going to be in the top 4 and you’re going to go meet her parents. It’s high time she leaves and is sent back to the blasted bakery where she came from.”

Adrien of course, wasn’t having it.

He yelled and fought and tried very hard to reason with his dad that Marinette is okay if he would just give her a chance, but his Father wouldn’t budge. Instead of bringing the date card to the girls and asking Juliette to come on the date with him, he showed up 5 minutes late, and ended up just explaining how this week was going to work instead.

That date went well, except for him totally falling off the horse and making a fool of himself, and the date he was on now, with Lucie was going well too. He had trouble reminding himself not to hate Lucie, since she was his Father’s first choice, but thankfully she was a really sweet girl who was fun to hang out with, so that made it a little easier not to hate her. Plus, she seemed to have absolutely no idea that Gabriel had picked her, or made a deal with her Aunt’s company in America.

Everything was going fine, they were at the pool on top of the Grand Paris, which they had all to themselves. They had just stepped out of the pool, and Adrien was helping Lucie wrap a towel around her shoulders, when they heard the noise. Being so high up and with minimal noise surrounding them, they could hear clearly what was being shouted from the top of Montparnasse Tower.

“I’ll show you to never make a bad movie again!” There was a flash of red light, and then something large and white started falling from the top of the tower, almost as if it was being thrown up and over.

Adrien knew that it was an akuma, he just didn’t know what to do about Lucie. Thankfully, she had heard the noise too, and could see the falling... things as well, but she just looked stunned and alarmed and had no intention to move anywhere.

“Is that...” she asked nervously, and Adrien did his best to look reassuring.

“Yeah, I think it’s an akuma, it happens a lot here.” He rushed over to the chair where they had put their things and grabbed everything he could, pushing all of the items into her arms, and pulling her towards the elevator. “Don’t worry, Ladybug and Chat Noir will take care of it, for now we just need to move to a safe place.”

Lucie didn’t look reassured, and Adrien really didn’t have the chance to worry about her as he frantically pushed the main floor button, willing the elevator to move faster. He had to find a way to ditch her so he could transform and hope that Marinette had seen the damage as well and would meet up with him soon.

That was another crappy thing that had happened to him this week. They wouldn’t let him have a one-on-one with Marinette. Instead, he’s going to have to see her on the closest thing to a group date there is this week. Adrien involuntarily let out a small sigh as the doors to the elevator finally opened and he was able to rush Lucie out of it.

He stopped short when he saw what was happening outside of the window. Something white and fluffy, about the size of someone’s head, was stacking up outside of the glass doors to the hotel. The doorman was trying his hardest to keep the doors shut, but he was fighting a losing battle. As Adrien and Lucie watched, the doors burst open, letting the sounds of panic and mayhem in from the street as well as the smell of butter and... popcorn? A piece of it rolled towards Adrien and he bent down and snagged a taste. Yep, that was definitely popcorn. Whoever this akuma was, apparently, he was trying to drown the city of Paris in popcorn.

Man, this week just couldn’t get any worse.

Adrien shouted at the room, which had a large number of people gathered, “Everyone needs to move up, go gather on the roof, grab as many people as you can!” Thankfully, very few argued, and Lucie grabbed his hand and pulled him back towards the elevator and where they had come from.

He almost let her, before he realized that this was the perfect opportunity to ditch her and find a place to transform. He stopped short and pulled her close so she could hear him over the chaos. “I’m going to go out there and grab as many people as I can. Go with them so I’ll know you’re safe.

She didn’t like the idea, but nodded gravely. Before he could turn around she leaned in and gave him a long kiss, which would have been sweet if it wasn’t just delaying him from transforming and saving the city from giant pieces of popcorn.

He turned and bolted out of the hotel, into the growing sea of concessions.

---------------------------------------------------

Marinette had seen some weird things in her time as Ladybug, but a city overrun with popcorn was definitely on her Top 10 List of Weird. Right up there with the giant baby.

Ladybug gracefully landed on the roof of a building directly across the street from Montparnasse Tower. After a beat, a black feline landed right next to her.

“Glad you could make it,” she said, without glancing at her partner.

“Lucie and I were close by, so my biggest worry was ditching her to transform.”

“You put her somewhere safe?” Ladybug asked, finally turning her head to look at him. She wasn’t trying to be icy with him, but she still couldn’t shake the jealousy she was feeling of Juliette, and now Lucie. Chat cocked his head slightly before coming in close.

“You know, I think the best part of my day is going to be this akuma and the fact that it let me spend some quality time with my favorite lady.” He whispered, leaning in close enough to where all she had to do was move an inch, and their lips would be touching.

As much as she wanted to kiss him, and she really wanted to kiss him, they had a city to save. She backed up slightly and gave his bell a flick. “Maybe after we’ve defeated this akuma, Kitty.”

He gave a small sigh before turning towards the tower, a serious look crossing his face. “I heard him yell, right before he started popping the popcorn I guess.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, Lucie and I were at the Grand Paris. He said something about a bad movie and then the popcorn started falling, but I didn’t know it was popcorn at the time.”

“You never answered my question,” Ladybug asked, looking Chat straight in the eye. “Is Lucie safe?” As much as she hated not getting to spend time with Adrien this week, she still didn’t want anything to happen to her friend.

Chat gave her a look, “Please Bugaboo, I’m more responsible than that! She and the rest of the people at the Grand Paris are on the roof, safe from the ever-growing pile of popcorn.”

Ladybug let out a little sigh of relief, and then turned back to the problem at hand. There was a definite red glow coming from the roof of Montparnasse, that Ladybug knew she needed to check out. “Let’s hop over a building and see what’s making that glow okay?”

Chat furrowed his eyes, “You can see the glow too?”

Ladybug cocked her head and looked at her stupid partner. “Of course, I can see the glow dummy. It may be faint but it’s obviously right there,” she pointed towards the top of the tower.

“I thought only I could see the glow. My eyesight is normally better than yours, you know with the cat thing. I can also hear the popping of the popcorn, and the humming of a machine.”

Ladybug just stared at him. They could both see the glow, and he could hear a machine and the popping of the popcorn from across the street? Then a memory popped into her head.

“Our enhanced powers. Tikki said that we’d have more advanced powers after the Task. I get better eyesight for me, and hearing for you are some of our powers.” Ladybug started to get excited, thinking about all of the other things she could possibly now do.

Chat was studying his hands, an awed look on his face. “I wonder what else we can do.” They were brought out of their thoughts and discovery by a loud crash from across the street. Ladybug shook her head, once again clearing her thoughts.

“No time for that now, Kitty, we’ve got an akuma to fight!” She then unlatched her yo-yo and swung it to the top of the tower. She felt, rather than saw, Chat unlatch his baton and prepare himself for the jump. “For now, we just need to observe, see what we’re up against. So be stealthy, please.”

Chat rolled his eyes, “Please, stealthy is my middle name,” and at that, Ladybug shot off across the sky.

She landed much faster than she was prepared for, and almost fell over, breaking her own stealthy rules. When she righted herself and made sure she was fully hidden, she peered around the air conditioning unit she was behind.

What she saw didn’t make sense. The first thing she noticed was the large machine pumping popcorn over the side of the roof. It was shaped like a popcorn box, one you would get at a movie theater. Surrounding the popcorn box was a shield of some sort. It was circular and covered the whole machine, and there didn’t appear to be any holes in it at first glance. As she scanned the roof, she found the akuma victim sitting on the edge of the roof, happily watching the city being covered in popcorn.

“He doesn’t look very scary,” A voice said in her ear. She jumped, but only found Chat Noir lurking behind her.

“Gosh, don’t do that!” Ladybug whispered, clutching her chest where her heartbeat was still running wild.

“What? I told you stealthy was my middle name.” He whispered back, still watching the akuma. “At least I didn’t almost fall over in my landing and ruin the whole gig from the start,” he teased with a wink.

Ladybug blushed slightly before composing herself and looking at the scene before her. “We need to turn off that machine, but to do so, we need to—”

“Destroy that force field, right.” Chat finished for her. She always loved that they worked on the same wavelength when battling it out with an akuma.

“Do you want to distract or do you want to take a whack at the shield?”

Chat shot her a devious smile, “Oh you know I’m a great distraction,” before jumping straight over the unit they were hiding behind and landing on his feet on the other side. Ladybug had never seen him jump that high, but she didn’t have time to think as she heard Chat yell, “Hey! Did the theater not have enough popcorn for you?”

The akuma turned, and Ladybug noticed that he couldn’t have been more than 12 as she rushed to the shield protecting the popcorn machine. She could hear Chat and the akuma talking and even heard a crazy sounding laugh before all outside noise was drowned out by the sounds the machine was making. The popcorn bag was at least 4 feet high and twice as long, still strongly shooting popcorn off the side of the building. She got close enough to touch the shield surrounding it, when something hit her hard in the stomach and she flew across the roof and felt a crack as she landed against one of the supporting walls that prevented people from falling off.

She heard Chat yell and knew that she must have been injured, especially with that crack, but for some reason, she felt totally fine. She slowly stood up and noticed that Chat had moved into actual combat with the akuma. When she looked down, nothing was broken and everything seemed to work as it should. Normally, a throw like that would have hurt something, even inside of the magical suit, but she pushed the questions she had away and rushed off to help Chat.

She noticed that every time the akuma got hit by Chat’s baton, the shield around the machine would flicker. The two must be connected. She thought and she had a very sudden and crazy idea.

Chat noticed her standing there, gave the akuma one last push that knocked him to the ground and ran towards her. “Oh shit, LB you scared me. That sounded like it hurt, are you sure you’re okay?” She gave him a nod and opened her mouth to relay what she had just learned but he beat her to it. “The shield is connected to Revengapop, so if I keep hitting him harder, it should go away. I also think that the akuma is in the machine, which means I’ll need to cataclysm it in order to release the butterfly.” He looked at her expectantly, as if waiting for further instructions.

All of this happened in less than a minute, and the akuma (Revengapop?) was getting up and starting to come towards them. “Revengapop?”

Chat at last cracked a smile, “Yeah I laughed when he told me his name too. I’ll distract him some more, you get your Lucky Charm and let’s defeat this thing.” With that, Chat met Revengapop in the middle of the roof and continued their hand-to-hand combat. Ladybug was so in shock, she almost forgot to move.

Chat was smart, Ladybug knew that to be true in and out of the mask, but she’d never seen him understand her plan as soon as she had come up with it. It was almost like he could see what she was thinking, and was able to come to the same conclusion. The thought made her slightly giddy, as she whispered, “Lucky Charm!” from behind the popcorn machine.

What fell into her hands was a bottle of melted butter, and suddenly it all made sense.

She rushed to intercept the fighting with Revengapop, knocking the kid to the ground before saying, “I’ll take care of the shield, you get ready to cataclysm the machine when you can.”

Chat ran off without saying a word. Ladybug turned to the akuma, who was getting up slower this time. Ladybug could feel new strength surge through her as she looked at Revegapop and readied her yo-yo in her right hand and the butter in her left.

“What kind of a name is Revengapop anyway?” Ladybug asked as the akuma got to his feet.

For the first time, Ladybug got a good look at him. He was dressed in a red leather outfit, that covered him head to toe. His hair was dark and messy looking, very similar to Chat’s messy hairstyle. His outfit had three different shades of red on him, and he almost looked like an evil red ninja, except without the nunchucks.

“I have to revenge all of the bad movies by drowning Paris in popcorn!” Revengapop screamed. If his voice hadn’t given it away, his “evil” motivation may have: this was definitely a teenage boy.

“Yeah, that totally makes sense,” Ladybug responded sarcastically, which caused Revengapop to launch himself at her in anger. She took that opportunity to spray the liquid butter right into his eyes and knocked him in the head with her yo-yo hard.

He landed on the ground in front of her with a crunch and out of the corner of her eye, she saw the shield flicker and go down long enough for Chat to yell “Cataclysm!” and touch the popcorn machine.

There was a loud boom and as Ladybug watched the machine crumble and the akuma fly out, she also felt her whole world tilt sideways. Montparnasse Tower was splitting in two and within a couple of seconds the building was going down.

Ladybug grabbed the akuma with her yo-yo and quickly threw the container of melted butter into the air. “Miraculous Ladybug!”

She felt more than saw the magical ladybugs seal up the cracks in the building and fix all the rest of the damage from around the city. She released the now-cleansed akuma from her yo-yo with a “Bye bye little butterfly,” before locking eyes with Chat on the other side of the building. He looked scared, his face drained of color and his hands were slightly shaking. She quickly checked on the akuma victim, who really was a 12-year-old boy, before rushing off to her partner.

“Chat! Are you okay? What happened?” Ladybug nearly sobbed as she watched him slide to the floor of the roof. She sat next to him and hugged him as tight as she could.

“I don’t know. I hit the machine with my cataclysm and somehow, I hit the building and the whole thing started to crumble.”

“Hey, it’s okay. You didn’t do it on purpose. It must be our enhanced power. Your cataclysm must be stronger, and possibly last a little longer to where you can hit more than one thing.” His bright green eyes were trained on hers and she could see the worry and the fear of himself in them. She squeezed him a little tighter before continuing. “I fixed it, okay? Everything’s better and there’s a little boy over there who just went through something traumatizing too.” She watched his eyes shift to the boy and saw some of those emotions in his eyes soften. She pulled away from their hug and gripped his arm to where he would look at her again. “Listen to me. We will figure this out. We’ll talk to Tikki and Plagg and get them to tell us more. But, no matter what happens in the future, I will always be with you to fix it.”

She looked once again into those eyes and saw tears begin to form. He pulled her into a quick kiss, before standing up and walking over to the boy.

When he asked him, “What movie did you see that made you want to drown Paris in popcorn?” he sounded almost exactly like his old self. Almost.

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