#yes folks i finally did it | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

obsessivevoidkitten · 5 months

Text

Releasing The Noctwind Brothers

Yandere Twin Vampire Brothers x Gender Neutral Human Turned Vampire Reader CW: Incest between the vampire brothers, mildly dubious consent, intoxication, reader initiated sex, threesome, spit as lube, cum as lube, biting, blood sucking, forced to drink blood, forced to turn into a vampire, bullying, bully gets killed, beating, reader has temporarily broken bones, temporary injury, overprotective yanderes, general yandere behavior, twin yanderes, surprisingly whole ending, surprisingly happy ending Word Count: 3.3k (I know this kind of fic isn't for everyone between the violence the bully receives and the incest, but I hope a lot of people like it anyway. I worked very hard. Also yes, this is a repost because the original had an accidentally gendered pronoun. I apologize if anyone read that and experienced dysphoria.)

You had made a mistake. One that would, soon enough, prove to be a fatal one. Not just for you.

In your haste to start a task you had as one of the town’s carpenters you had turned a corner and ran right into the town brute himself, Jorry. Running into him, at any time, could result in a punch from his large meaty fists, but he had been carrying eggs freshly laid from his hens. This resulted in egg yolk covering an outraged Jorry.

Jorry had bullied you for as long as you could remember, he and his friends pummeling you whenever you happened upon them while he was in a bad mood. Or in any mood really. He just really liked using you as a punching bag. Most people left such behavior in childhood, but not Jorry.

You wasted no time at all in fleeing upon seeing who you had ran into. You weren’t quite in the mood to be nursing a broken nose that day. Luckily he had to wipe egg goop out of his eyes and that gave you some crucial extra seconds to make yourself scarce.

Despite making it a good way out of your village, the angered Jorry pursued you. He was nothing if not persistent. You hesitated a bit, but decided your only hope was to flee into the cave that everyone in all the nearby villages were terrified of. No one could remember the truth of the matter, but it had long been forbidden to enter. Many superstitious folks wouldn’t even travel within viewing distance of it.

You did not put much faith in superstition though, and no matter what was in there it couldn’t be worse than how badly Jorry would beat you if he caught up to you. If you had just taken your punishment in town someone would have happened by or heard your screams and he wouldn’t have been able to do nearly as much as he would all the way out here.

Again, a truly fatal miscalculation. You damn fool.

Hoping that you were safe in the cave you crouched in the shadows. But, while absurdly violent, your pursuer was not particularly dimwitted. He pretty quickly surmised that the cave was the logical place for you to have gone. You heard him scream and call for you in the distance.

The only chance to avoid the beating of your lifetime was to retreat farther into the cave. You crept back as silently as humanly possibly. When you went as far back as you could you came across an old metal door, carved into the rock surrounding it were twisting serpents. An ancient rune of unknown meaning was etched into the door itself.

Staring at it filled you with dread and you were possessed with the all consuming urge to flee the way you had come, but it was forgotten as if it was never there when you heard Jorry again, this time near the entrance of the cave. If he entered it now he would be able to see you. Light still made it this far.

With the subtle magic of the rune no longer working on you, you slowly opened the metal door and entered into what looked like an underground mausoleum. An underground tomb long forgotten by the histories of man.

You found yourself between two large rectangles of stone. A chill ran up your spine when you realized they were sarcophagi. Evidently the final resting place for two souls left to the dark and dust of this cave. They were plain and unadorned, other than some words on the top. You leaned over and tried to make out the inscription on one when you suddenly heard the unmistakable sound of stone grating against stone.

The sarcophagus opposite of you moved before the one in front of you did. You tripped backwards in fright as the lids were pushed aside and two pale emaciated corpses pulled themselves up and faced your direction. You couldn’t quite tell in the dark but it seemed like their eyes were completely black, creating a chilling contrast with their pale skin.

The thin pale figures slowly began to pull themselves out of their not so final resting places as you got over your initial shock, got up, and got the fuck out of there. You sprinted past the metal door and back into the front of the cave.

You were so engrossed with the current task of running away from the corpses of the damned risen to do any manner of unholy things to those still living that you did not see Jorry as he entered the cave. For the second time that day you careened right into him, knocking you both out of the cavern and on to the dirt outside.

Jorry growled and grabbed your leg, pulling you over to him.

“You ran like a bitch, finally decide it’s better to face your punishment?”

“No, no, no, you don’t understan-”

He pinned you and began wailing away at your smaller body with his mighty fists. Blow after blow. Your nose was surely broken. Then he got up and started stomping on you with his powerful foot. Now some ribs were certainly broken too.

Suddenly you heard Jorry yelp and the beating stopped. Your face was swollen and bloodied, your mind consumed by the pain of broken bones. You couldn’t tell what was going on. Jorry was screaming, blubbering like a girl. The dearly departed had been slowed due to their time without feeding, but with Jorry distracted by his treatment of you he was easy enough prey.

The thin pale figures had him down on the ground, pinning him with less effort than he had pinned you. They bit into his body, ravenously drinking his blood. Not enough to kill him, but enough to reinvigorate themselves and make him weak and helpless. Barely able to move.

You had managed to wipe the blood from your face and saw what was transpiring. You tried your best to drag yourself through the dirt and put distance between yourself and them, but you only managed to get about a foot away before they finally noticed you.

“Alaric look! The one who saved us… they need tending to.”

The vampire evidently named Alaric joined his companion in looking over you. As injured as you were, you struggled to plea for mercy.

“Shhh, shhh. We aren’t going to hurt you. We’d never hurt our savior.”

“I’m Anthelm Noctwind and this is my twin brother Alaric Noctwind. We're going to help.”

Anhelm positioned himself so that your head was propped up in his lap. He bit at his wrist until blood was flowing.

“Here. Drink.”

You weren't sure what lore was true and what was merely myth, but you were fairly positive that it was universally agreed upon that turning into a vampire required the consumption of one’s blood. You struggled to turn away but you were powerless to do so. Alaric held your mouth open as Anthelm held his bleeding wrist above it.

Blood dripped in and you gagged as you were forced to swallow. It tasted the same as any blood, though perhaps a little sweeter. Shortly after you consumed it you lost consciousness. Both due to the blood itself and your rather severe injuries.

They took you and Jorry back into the cave. It would take the rest of the day and a lot of the night for you to turn and heal. Alaric carried you with the utmost care and consideration for your wounds while just picking up Jorry and tossing him in unceremoniously, causing him to cry out in pain as he hit the hard rocky floor.

“I’d kill you now and decorate this place with your entrails, but we need you for something, so just keep quiet.”

Between Jorry’s incessant pleas to be freed and his attempt to run out of the cavern while they were both busy watching you resulted in his clothes being torn from him and ripped into strips that were used to bind and gag him.

Alaric, the cruelest of the brothers, watched in amusement as their hog tied victim cried and shook in fear. The hulking peasant experiencing the fear of death for the first time. The amused vampire went over to him and pet him like he was a pet, in mock sympathy.

“Don’t worry~,” Alaric cooed, “You’ll be out of your misery soon enough.”

That prompted renewed struggles from the naked man. Alaric only laughed in a maniacal fashion as he returned to your side. They had removed their coats, still pristine as the day they had been sealed away, and used them as bedding for you.

They patiently waited for hours, Alaric occasionally taunting poor Jorry, until you finally stirred. The swelling had gone, your bones had mended, and they had licked up the blood that had covered your face. The only evidence that you had ever suffered at all were the bloodstains on your clothing.

It was well past midnight, the twins had lit a fire to keep you and themselves warm. You could see them clearly now that your face was healed. They both looked exactly alike, down to the same outfits. High class, but outdated, attire. They had pale grey eyes that observed your every movement, completely different from the black voids you thought you had seen earlier. Flawless pale skin with delicate, feminine, features. Their long straight hair accentuated their looks perfectly. They could certainly pass as women if they wore the right attire. Maybe they lured in victims that way.

You were confused and more than a bit groggy, but you managed to piece together all the events that had transpired before your rest. You jumped up and made for the door but they were quicker than anything, human or animal, that you had ever encountered. One got behind you with his hand on your shoulders and the other stood in front with his hand on your cheek.

“Don’t be afraid, dove. We aren’t going to hurt you.”

You whimpered as they each took one of your hands and guided you over to Jorry.

“You consumed vampiric blood, right now it has transformed you. Temporarily.”

“Yes, to make it stick you’ll now need to kill.”

“Technically it doesn’t need to be human, any mammal will do, but since we have this lovely volunteer we figured we shouldn’t waste it. ”

“Don’t really want him talking about us. Don’t really want him to live after hurting our dove. And, well, it spares some rodent that is more deserving of life.”

You shuffled nervously.

“I… don’t want to be a… vampire…”

You looked down at your feet, trying to avoid eye contact with them or Jorry who looked up at you with tears streaking his face.

“Sorry, but we aren’t really giving you a choice.”

“We didn’t mean to make it seem that way, please forgive us.”

“You saved us, you had enough magical power to open the door and ignore the rune. You will be a strong vampire, and we can tell a lot more about you by your scent.”

“Smell things like personality, even some thoughts. We know you will be perfect for us.”

“Uh… can’t I just stay with you and remain human?”

“No.” They both said in unison.

“Humans age and die.”

“Humans have betrayed us too. That’s how we ended up here. You broke the seal so we have to show our gratitude.”

You kept staring at your feet until you worked up the courage to ask the question you were afraid to hear the answer to.

“What if I refuse?”

Anthelm smiled and Alaric laughed as if it was a funny joke. Not that you could tell them apart yet.

“Not a choice sweetie, remember?”

“If you don’t do it willingly then I block the tomb entrance so you can’t go deeper.”

“And I guard the cave exit so you can’t leave. Then we leave you alone with your friend. Your hunger will grow. You’ll crave blood. Your senses will be unbearable.”

“You’ll hear his heartbeat, he will smell delicious, then you’ll drain him dry.”

“In more normal circumstances he could survive that, and the blood consumption without a death only prolongs the transitional period, it wouldn’t make you a true vampire. Go long enough without blood, have someone tie you up for a few days, and you’d turn fully human.”

“But he is weak and beaten. He won’t survive.”

You looked at them and stated boldly that you’d resist.

“You are more than welcome to try.”

They each took their agreed upon spots to guard against you fleeing. True to their word you did steadily become more and more hungry. Thirsty for blood. Your senses became acutely aware of the food that had been tied up for you. You tried to resist. Your body shook with the effort. You had a splitting headache and panted heavily. Jorry smelled so good, and the beat of his heart beckoned you towards him. Though you resisted longer than most, the outcome was inevitable.

You descended upon him, he squealed as much as he could with his gag as you bit into his neck and sucked him dry. His futile struggles getting more feeble by the second until they stopped entirely.

Alaric and Anthelm were behind you watching with wicked smiles.

When you finished your meal of Jorry you looked on in horror. But only briefly. You had over consumed and the effects were as powerful as they were swift. You were a bit dizzy and felt as though you were light as air.

“With his death you’ll be with us forever!”

You tried to get up but stumbled and nearly fell. One of the twins caught you. You smiled and nuzzled into his neck. There was a cute man holding you, why had you been so horrified earlier? You shrugged it off, if you couldn’t remember then it probably wasn’t too terribly important.

“Careful, dove. The first times on human blood and drinking to the point of death can be intense.”

“And we definitely let you drink too much.”

You giggled and stroked Anthelm’s soft black hair, not at all paying attention to his words.

“You’re prettier than any girl I’ve ever seen.”

He blushed and Alaric cackled at the spectacle. Until you kissed Anthelm deeply. Then Alaric looked a bit jealous.

You grinded your crotch against Anthelm and giggled at the face he made.

“Everything feels so… intense.”

“Ddon’t you want to go somewhere a bit more... comfy?

“Or romantic? We could find a town. An inn.” Added Alaric.

You ignored him, proceeded to unbutton his shirt and then rubbed your hands over his lean abs. He started returning the treatment, Alaric came over and helped him undress you. It didn’t take long for all three of you to be nude. They used the clothes to make an impromptu bed. Anthelm laid down, his erect cock on full display.

He pulled you on top of him, kissing and nipping at your neck while Alaric was behind the two of you. He pressed two spit-lubed fingers into both you and his brother. Both of you writhed in pleasure, but it simply wasn’t enough.

Alaric didn’t need to stretch either of you out, vampires wouldn’t be pained by something like a cock shoving its way in, but it would feel better with more moisture. He withdrew his fingers, making you pout, and lubed up his cock with saliva before sucking on his brothers for a moment to get it wet.

Then he guided his brother's dick into you before sliding his own cock into his brother. You pressed back against it, trying to get the girthy member as deep into you as possible. Anthelm humped into you slowly, timing his thrusts with your bounces.

Alaric gasped as his cock was gripped by his brother’s tight inviting insides, he gripped Anthelm’s legs for leverage as he drove himself deeper. Anthelm, in the middle of all the action, could barely think. Simultaneously making love to you while being bred by his twin had him drooling.

“Always so tight…”

“Alaric, h-harder.”

His sibling obliged him.

You were in a worse state than Anthelm. You were new to being a vampire and the blood drunkenness combined with your recent kill made every sensation indescribable. More so when the sensations were that of a vampire at your neck and a cock humping into you while you weakly continued to bounce on it.

Anthelm’s entire body shook as he came in you, shoving his cock far into depths before unloading his seed. He took a few moments to catch his breath, an orgasm evidently enough to tire a vampire. If only for a moment. He stayed hard and began fucking into you again.

“I think you were made for us, angel.”

The stimulation was just too much for you and you screamed as you had the most intense orgasm of your entire life. Your body relaxed as you lay on Anthelm, no longer bouncing on his cock but content to let him keep using you as long as he saw fit as you nuzzled into his chest.

Alaric gripped his brother’s legs tightly as he finally slammed in hard and filled him like he had filled you. Without missing a beat he slid out of his brother, covered his cock in the cum that pooled out of him, and slid it right into you. Both of there cocks now covered in a slimy mix of both of their loads, using it as lube as they thrust into you in tandem. You whimpered at the sheer immensity of the pleasure that was filling you.

The three of you spent the rest of the entire night, and a good chunk of the morning, engaged in a rapturous sea of sex. Eventually you all fell asleep on top of them. Given their recent centuries long slumber they stayed awake and idly toyed with your hair or caressing you as you slept soundly.

They whispered to themselves about what the plan from there was.

“There’s a stream outside we can clean ourselves off in.”

“Yeah, I can smell it. After that head to a town?”

“A large one where we can blend in. Feed on livestock outside the walls. Maybe rats too if necessary. Always rats in large towns.”

“What about humans? Always rapists and thugs in cities that need to be taken care of.”

Alaric looked at Anthelm hopefully.

“True. True,” Anthelm relented, “I suppose it won’t hurt to remove a few bad ones. On occasion.”

Alaric broke into a large grin.

“Yes! I love how our new partner gets when they are drunk on human life.”

You stirred a bit in your sleep though you didn’t wake, drool under your cheek and on Alaric’s bare chest.

“Quiet, they need their rest…”

“Sorry,” Alaric murmured sheepishly.

They continued chatting about the future until you woke up. With a clearer head you were once more traumatized by what you had done, but they calmed you down and explained how he deserved it and that you were not a monster. They would guide you in your new life.

They were eager to leave behind the cave that had held them prisoner for so long. Bidding the cave farewell with a piss on Jorry’s soon to be rotting corpse, the closest thing he would get to a burial, the brothers departed with you.

You made a life for yourselves in one of the larger cities. Anytime someone tried to hurt you they went missing quite fast. It would be many years still before you had the degree of strength and power that the twins possessed. And even once you did they’d always remain overprotective.

You quickly came to accept and love your new existence with them. Anthelm took up your trade with you while Alaric became a prominent cook and eventually owner of his own restaurant. Apparently the hypersensitivity of vampiric taste buds helped him make delicacies. There was always a need for carpentry and fancy food, so you never had any money troubles, (un)life was good. And you had an eternity to spend it with them.

2K notes · View notes

ghostbsuter · 1 year

Text

"And? What did you decide on?" Duke asks, fork slipping from his mouth and chewing, focused on Danny.

The boy in question hums. "Oh yeah, I'm totally joining in on the nightlife."

The statement has all of them stopping in their tracks, blatantly staring at the still eating boy.

"This will be my emo arc, daylight vigilante turned dark."

Tim snorts, Jason gives a smirk, nudging the eldest sibling next to him from his frozen state.

"Ooooh," Steph leans forward. "Have you decided? Bat or Bird?"

"New name?" Cass jumps in on the questioning with a small smile, eyes crinkling.

"Will you be joining us tonight then, danyal?" His twin speaks up for the first time during dinner, eyes narrowed and calculating.

"Yes." Is the short reply, with the way damian's lips turn down and displeasure makes itself clear, the intention of giving such a short answer has been met.

"Danny," Bruce gains the attention, leaning forward with his fingers interlocked and brows furrowed with what must be worry.

"Are you sure? I don't want you to feel pressured into this just because everyone else is—"

"I'm more than sure, B!"

The man sighs. "And I won't be able to stop you?"

"Mhm." He gives a nod.

"Okay," his shoulders sag in defeat. "Do you have everything then—?"

"Yep!"

"Even—"

"B, I'm pretty sure I got everything, you can, if in your opinion I am missing something, give it to me later!"

Danny grins, pushing himself up from the table and rounding around towards the door.

"Besides! My whole get up will be a suprise!! So stay awake folks because I'm gonna blow ya all away."

As he leaves, Steph and Duke make sounds of anticipation, curiosity eating at all of them.

(They dont know whats gonna hit 'em.)

"I'm betting 50 bucks that he's gonna be a bat."

Alfred shakes his head at the newfound excitement.

—

What an exciting night.

There is still no sight of their newest, despite oracle's teasing, having apparently already been included in the suprise.

"Well well well," a sly, yet teasing voice makes itself into the open. Catwoman, in all her glory, walks up to the group of bats and birds.

"If it isn't the bat, what's with the gloomy face?"

Batman gives her a nod. "Cat."

Her eyes roam the group and she tilts her head. "Everyone seems to be here tonight." She comments.

"We're waiting," the man shares. "Our newest decided to be more secretive about his debut."

Catwoman gives him a smug smirk. "So I have heard," a chuckle. "I've come here to introduce you to someone, truthfully."

"Oh? Who is it?" Nightwing perks up, having finally decided to join in.

"Me."

Some yelp, whip their head around and away from the lady in black, gasps and cooing (particularly from steph) fill the roof and Danny joins them.

He wears black combat boots, they're heavy just from the look, but make no sound as he jumps around. The front of the boots look like cat paws, they're reaching up to his knees.

Then comes the baggy black pants, knees protected by poleyn and his belt acting as a cats tail. The hoodie he is wearing is also black, with fingerless gloves (only the middle finger is covered) and reaching up to his neck.

Instead of a domino mask, he wears a hood with cat ears and a dark face mask. Cass claps, knowing fully well he took inspiration from her own get up.

The whole outfit is detailed with orange spots, some parts brown and others grayish.

"Meet my new mentee, Calico."

Danny, Calico, waves.

3K notes · View notes

mypoisonedvine · 6 months

Text

𝐬𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐛𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐤 | angus tully x reader (series finale)

read 𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲 and 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐞𝐫 first!

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲 | angus has been waiting to see you again, but the more feelings get involved, the more complicated your affair becomes.

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭 | 7k

𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 | SMUT (18+ only!!), mega angst but also fluff too, infidelity, boring old people parties, reader is still emotionally constipated and angus still has a breeding kink, but that's honestly it it's just a bunch of emotions so strap in folks!

Angus was pretty sure he broke some kind of record, with how quickly he ran back to his room after talking to you on the payphone.

He was sure that was exactly what you were picturing him doing— he’d made it pretty clear what he’d do once you hung up, and you’d made it pretty difficult to do anything else with the way you were talking. You’d been winding him up on purpose, of course; so yes, you could easily imagine him making a mad dash to his room and slamming the door— if you really ever thought about him outside of those phone calls.

That was the thing Angus couldn’t figure out about you. Well, there were probably a lot of other things than that, but it was the quandary he spent the most time pondering: does she think about me?

Whenever he mustered the courage to ask you something to that effect, you would either change the subject or give a half-answer. Something about how you had a dream about him the other night or how your parents asked about him— never what he was really asking.

But, frankly, at that moment as he shut his dorm room door and jumped into bed, whether or not you thought about him much was not as pertinent an issue. Right then, all he could think about was getting his hand around his raging boner; his mind was just playing everything you’d said to him over the phone on repeat.

I’m touching myself right now, you’d whispered in a sultry voice, I’m so wet, Angus— fuck, I’m so wet…

He’d never had to work so hard to keep a straight face on the phone before… he figured if anyone was really looking, they’d notice how red he was turning or how he kept shifting uncomfortably. And he told you just as much, which of course only encouraged you. Don’t want them to know, huh? you’d taunted. Don’t want the other boys to find out you’re listening to me get off?

And no, he didn’t— you were such a precious thing, the boys here didn’t even deserve to imagine you— but when you offered to stop if it was too distracting, he only found himself shakily begging for more.

As he quickly opened his khaki pants and gripping his cock, he hissed through his teeth; his ego could barely take all you’d said about that cock, about how thick and ‘perfect’ (you used that exact word, perfect, and he thought he might float) it was, about how you wished you could come around it right then instead of your fingers.

“It’s all yours,” he mumbled to himself, under his breath, not even really noticing he was saying it aloud. “You want it, baby? It’s all fucking yours.”

He groaned as he stroked himself, the precum that had been leaking from his tip for a while making everything even easier. Shutting his eyes tight, he pictured you, like he always did: all of you, everything, anything he could remember.

You ever think about me? you’d asked him over the phone— and he’d blurted out his always before he even realized you meant while he was getting off. It was still true, but more specific than necessary. He craved to hear you say it: I think about you too. But he didn’t ask, and you just went back to moaning while you rubbed your clit— which, apparently, was already swollen and throbbing— and, well, he wasn’t strong enough to interrupt that.

“Fuck,” he grunted, deep in the back of his throat, finally letting his pace pick up until his hand was a blur: after all that anticipation and all that waiting, there was no use trying to hold back now. It wasn’t like you were here to worry about him coming too fast, even though you’d still maintained you found it endearing when it happened.

He repeated your voice in his head, the moment that had made him worry he would blow his load in his trousers before he could even get off the phone and back to his room: I’m gonna come for you, you’d warned him in the most beautiful moaning voice, Angus— I want you so bad, oh god— I’m gonna come for you, fuck…

His lip caught between his teeth, his hips rocked up into his own palm. “Yes, fuck, baby,” he panted, “I— fuck!”

He tried to conjure in his mind how it had felt to come inside you, but he knew even his vivid imagination could never really capture the feeling; nothing could even come close. Still, remembering it and letting himself indulge in his strangest fantasies for just a moment sent him over the edge. His face flushed suddenly as he came in long, heavy pulses, the back of his free hand falling over his open mouth yet doing little to suppress his moans.

It was intense— it was certainly better than his orgasms usually were when brought on by himself— but it only satisfied him for a moment. The moment he was finished, with a deep breath in and his hips relaxing back down onto the mattress, he wanted more— he wanted you.

His heavy eyes glanced to the side, trying to remember what it felt like to lie next to you. He’d never felt lonely after jerking off before he met you; now getting off seemed to bring a new wave of heartbreak each time.

When he shook off the thought and looked down at himself, he frowned as he realized he’d ruined his own shirt doing that— not that he could fully bring himself to regret it.

No, his regrets only really began a few weeks later, when the nagging loneliness in the back of his mind finally got the better of him.

It was the middle of the night when he wrote it, after he woke up from a dream of you that he just couldn’t shake from his mind. After checking that his roommate was fast asleep, Angus carefully slipped out of bed and tip-toed to the desk, and pulling out a box of cards and envelopes from one of the drawers. (He thought he’d never use them when his mom sent them with him at the beginning of the year, but a lot had changed since then.)

Something about the ungodly hour made him more honest— or maybe just more shameless. He wrote a frantic ramble, everything he’d wanted to say to you that he’d never had the courage to blurt out over the phone; all the feelings he’d felt since that incredible night in the backseat of your car, which he’d assumed would fade… which he’d tried to convince himself would fade.

Unfortunately, even the adrenaline of writing down the thoughts of you he’d been poring over for over a month wasn’t enough to overpower exhaustion: he awoke the next morning slumped over the desk, the pen still uncapped and fallen a few inches from his hand, the letter left folded open.

He awoke to the sound of someone’s door shutting down the hall, specifically; jumping and blinking quickly, he looked at the window— it was morning, though still quite early— and then at his roommate who was, thank god, still asleep.

Angus looked back at the letter in front of him, only making out a few words in his brief glance, before his cheeks began to heat up and he quickly folded it shut. As more footsteps moved through the hall, the boy in the bed nearby stirred and grumbled to himself, and Angus quickly snatched up the letter and shoved it in his book bag before he was caught red-handed.

Ironically, that little commotion was what actually got the other boy’s attention. “What are you doing at the desk?” he asked groggily, rubbing one of his eyes with the back of his palm.

“Oh, I, uh— I had to do some late night cramming,” Angus explained nervously, “that big Geography test coming up and all…”

The half-awake boy seemed to notice for a moment that the story didn’t really make sense, on account of the empty desk, but he simply shrugged and tossed his blanket aside to get up as well.

For the rest of the day, Angus couldn’t think straight— and not just because of his mediocre rest and achy back from the absolutely terrible sleep posture he’d had. He couldn’t stop thinking about the letter, even if he honestly couldn’t remember for certain everything he’d said… he couldn’t stop wondering if he should send it to you. He almost didn’t want to read it again first— he wanted you to read it in its most authentic state, he wanted to mail it before he chickened out just like he had when you said you two could just stay casual. Even if it made his heart race and his palms especially clammy, Angus decided in the middle of that goddamned Geography test that he was going to mail that letter tonight after dinner: he was finally just going to man up and tell you.

Of course, something went horribly wrong along the way: he made a fatal mistake. Looking back on it, he couldn’t tell for certain if his mistake was falling for you in the first place, or writing the infamous letter, or shoulder-checking Kountze without holding on tight enough to his bag.

The argument that happened beforehand was petty and forgettable, even if it gathered a small crowd of Kountze’s friends, but it ended with Angus trying to walk away a tad… aggressively, and with Kountze grabbing him by the strap of his bag which not only knocked Angus off-balance but spilled the contents onto the floor of the dorm’s shared room.

Everyone saw the books and papers hit the ground; everyone saw the off-white cardstock land right on top. Angus reached for the letter quickly, but Kountze beat him there, and held it back with a snicker.

“Well, well,” Kountze tutted proudly, “what’s this?”

“H-hey, don’t read that,” Angus warned, hoping the seriousness of his tone would somehow affect the other boy— but, obviously, it did not. Kountze started to open it and Angus instantly made a dive for it, only to be stopped by three other students who apparently were curious as well about the letter. “Don’t fucking read that!” Angus demanded.

“Oh god, it’s to a girl!” he realized. “Do you have a girlfriend, Tully?”

“I swear to god, Kountze, if you fucking read that—”

“I miss you,” Kountze began to read aloud as Angus thrashed around to try to stop him, “I miss you so much I don’t even know what to say.”

The boys holding Angus back were enraptured as Kountze read the letter; “Do you guys pay this much attention in class?” he mocked them, though they were ignoring him completely as they waited for the other boy to keep reading.

“I feel like I can’t breathe without you— aw, Tully, you’re a poet,” Kountze mocked with a smile. Angus’ heart raced as he remembered what part of the letter came next. “Not a day goes by where I don’t think about you and your smile— Jesus, this is some really sappy shit— or what it’s like talking with you for hours, or how it feels—”

He stopped, and Angus froze, and after a moment the group of boys started demanding the conclusion. “What— what does it say?!” “Read it, Kountze!”

“How it feels to be inside you,” Kountze continued with wide eyes, staring at Angus’ bright red face as the other boys began to react loudly.

Angus renewed his struggle against the kids holding him back, but even though he was taller than them, he was severely outnumbered. “Stop— that’s personal!” Angus demanded to no avail.

“I don’t know how I’m supposed to go back to my hand after having you,” Kountze continued with a laugh. “From what I hear from your roommate, Tully, your hand is treating you just fine.”

“Shut up,” Angus hissed, but his words had lost their bite as his humiliation grew.

“I should’ve told you before I left—” he started, but finally Angus found some new strength within himself to shake off the boys holding him back: he dove at Kountze and took him down, scrambling to snatch the card away. He was going to be satisfied with just that, but of course Kountze still had to open his mouth, even when Angus had him pinned. “Jesus, Tully,” he scoffed, “how ugly is this chick that you got her to sleep with you?”

Angus brought a fist swiftly down to Kountze’s nose, who groaned in pain and held his face as Angus got up and ran away. The other boys let him pass, thankfully, and Angus wasted no time getting to his room and slamming the door behind him.

Defiantly wiping a tear from his cheek, Angus took a quick look at the letter— wrinkled, stained and scuffed from the fight with Kountze— and crumpled it up, tossing it into his wastebasket before throwing himself onto his bed and hiding his head under the pillow.

He was stupid to even write it, let alone consider sending it; it was no use, you obviously didn’t feel the same way about him that he did about you. You were the one who said it should just be what it was— a fling. But Angus felt like he’d been flung directly into hell, the way it tore into his chest to imagine you didn’t really want him.

Even if he never read the letter again that day, he remembered how it ended— and it was the part he couldn’t get out of his mind even when he wanted more than anything to forget it all.

Is this what love feels like?

It reminded you a lot of that dinner over Christmas break, except somehow, it seemed like he was staring at you even more. Shouldn’t he have gotten that out of his system a bit by now?

But then again, maybe you should’ve been more used to it, since it had been over an hour of picking away at this quail dinner, and he’d barely taken his eyes off of you. Something about him looked different; it was basically impossible that he could’ve visibly aged in just a couple months, and yet he seemed like he was carrying just a bit more age on those thin shoulders. Maybe it was just the slight five-o-clock shadow over his jaw— but, no, there was a different look in his eyes, too—

Realizing you were, in fact, staring back at him, you quickly snapped your gaze back down to your plate.

You’d been wanting a chance to talk to him before this dinner, to hopefully prevent exactly this issue, but once the dinner ended you found yourself avoiding him. Of course you weren’t ready to talk to him— of course you had a million thoughts in your head and half of them didn’t even make sense.

For once, you actually tried to talk to all of your parents’ snooty friends, repeating the same answers over and over about how you were going to graduate school in the fall and how you were looking forward to your family’s Paris trip in the summer and all that jazz. It was worth it to keep Angus off your back for a moment, even if you could still feel his eyes boring into said back from time to time.

Midway through a mind-numbingly boring conversation (if something so one-sided could be called a conversation) with the Gordons about renovations they’d done on their summer house, you glanced around the room over your shoulder and noticed that Angus was apparently absent. His parents were still there, sitting on a couch— that is, his mom and stepdad— so he couldn’t be far, but out of view he was far enough. Figuring he’d gone to the kitchen or the restroom, you figured it was the perfect time to disappear into the downstairs bedroom and, hopefully, hide out for the rest of the party. Excusing yourself quickly, you made a polite dash for the other end of the room.

And yet, somehow, he appeared out of thin air; as you turned down the hallway, only a dim lamp on an antique credenza lighting your way, you heard Angus’ hushed voice behind you. He laid his hand on your shoulder, and the moment you turned to face him, he was on you— his weight pressed you into the wall and you felt trapped in a way that was annoyingly pleasant.

“God, I missed you,” he breathed, kissing you hard and sudden; you whimpered a little, nearly melting into it, before you pushed him back at his shoulders.

“A-Angus, wait,” you sighed. “You, um… you didn’t call for a while.”

“Oh,” he mumbled, “um, I’m sorry— I just got busy with midterms and stuff— but I really wanted to!”

He moved like he was about to kiss you again, but you kept your hand on his chest to keep him away. “I wanted to tell you…” you trailed off.

“Tell me what?”

“You remember Brian Stevenson?”

“Oh— um, yeah, I guess so,” Angus frowned a little, clearly confused by what seemed like a non sequitur. “I used to go over to his house when I was little, although it was just to play with his little brother, but… yeah, I remember him.”

“I’ve been sorta, y’know… going with him,” you explained, hesitantly meeting Angus’ gaze just in time to see the most terrible sadness cover his face.

“O-oh,” he choked out, quickly stepping back from you and shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Yeah…” you mumbled, twisting your loafer-clad foot on the carpet nervously. “It’s just, you know, he asked me out a couple weeks ago, and ever since then—”

“So is he, like, your boyfriend?” Angus pressed. You nodded. He looked away. “Right— that’s… cool. That’s cool.”

You bit your lip slightly, hating that he wouldn’t look at you all of a sudden. “Angus, it’s just that, you know, we said—”

“Right,” he interrupted sharply. “Right, I remember what we said— what you said, that we weren’t— you know. That it wasn’t anything.”

“I didn’t say that—” you tried to correct him.

“You said you were mine,” he added suddenly, making your eyes widen. “Did you even mean that?”

“I— Angus, come on,” you laughed nervously. “That’s… that’s just something people say…”

He scoffed, and looked to the side as he pushed his tongue against the inside of his cheek; contempt looked sort of good on him, you thought, except that it was directed at you. He was trying to hide it, but his eyes were watering.

“I’m sorry,” you began but he cut you off right away.

“No, don’t do that,” he shook his head quickly, crossing his arms and staring down at the floor. “Don’t lie to me anymore.”

“No— I really am,” you tried to assure.

“Hey, it’s fine,” he insisted sharply. “It’s— you know, it is what it is. It was just one of those things.”

“If it’s fine, then look at me,” you pleaded. He didn’t. And for a long moment, the two of you stood there, still and silent.

“It’s fine,” he repeated softly, turning on his heel.

“Angus, wait,” you hissed, not wanting to raise your voice with all the guests not too far away— of course, it was fruitless, and he briskly blended back in with the crowd.

Sighing, you dropped your head into your hands. That wasn’t how you ever wanted this to go, you never wanted to hurt him; honestly, you’d assumed he’d be irritated, but not… sad. Not devastated. Of course he would prefer to be getting laid, but you figured he wouldn’t have too much trouble finding some other girl to screw around with— sometimes, you’d wondered if he already had.

It was supposed to be easy, it was supposed to be casual, it was supposed to be fun. You couldn’t think of anything you’d ever done, or anything you’d ever felt, that was less fun than this.

It made a strange sort of sense that the next time you saw him was at another party. Of course, this party was entirely different from the last one: for one, it was hosted by your boyfriend, and there sure as hell wasn’t any quail. There was a lot more alcohol, though.

You were hanging off to the side, not feeling quite up for mixing in with the crowd as they danced to the record Brian had put on. Even if they spared you from the same boring questions that your parents’ friends bombarded you with, they were uninteresting in their own way as every conversation seemed to come back to politics or pot.

Brian startled you a bit by coming up beside you, resting his hand on the small of your back. “Hey,” he greeted, and you smiled up at him. Your eyes lingered on his face— he looked… grown up. It was probably just because he had a beard; he certainly didn’t always act grown up, but overall, Brian was perfectly acceptable. He’d asked you out, he’d actually had the bravery for that, so that was a great head start.

You tried to shake the thought out of your mind, looking away from him; it wasn’t a head start because this wasn’t a race. Who, after all, would he be racing against?

For some reason, your eyes turned to the front door— and you bit your lip as you saw Angus coming inside, slipping off his coat and looking around the room (for you, presumably). He looked even more haggard than before: a little pale, eyes sunken and dark, and he definitely hadn’t shaved since you saw him.

Brian looked to find where you were staring, and frowned slightly. “Who’s that?” he asked.

“Oh, um— Angus Tully, his parents are friends with mine, I used to babysit him when he was a kid.”

You knew that wasn’t really what he was asking, so you weren’t surprised when he got to the point more directly: “What’s he doing here?”

“I don’t know,” you shrugged, hoping Brian wouldn’t somehow figure out that your heart was racing.

Brian’s hand moved up to your shoulder and gave it a squeeze, just as Angus noticed you and hurriedly shoved his way through the crowd to come face-to-face with you.

“Hey, can I talk to you for a second?” he asked, his voice raspy and hurried as he took a quick glance at Brian in his peripheral.

“Um— sure,” you agreed awkwardly, not sure which answer would be less suspicious. Of course, when you glanced at Brian, he just looked mildly annoyed— bored, even. You realized in that moment that you didn’t need to worry about him suspecting you and Angus of anything, because he barely registered Angus’ existence: he certainly wouldn’t acknowledge him as some kind of sexual threat.

“Privately,” Angus added— and that actually got Brian’s attention, though he seemed more aware of your discomfort than anything.

“Anything you wanna say to her, you can say in front of me,” Brian assured firmly, and Angus swallowed anxiously— it was obvious from the bob of his Adam’s apple.

“Actually, uh, somebody was looking for you out front,” Angus told him. “Something about a keg getting delivered to the wrong house?”

“Shit,” Brian hissed, dropping his hand from your shoulder and looking towards the door again. “Fucking idiots…”

Having made quick work of Brian, Angus put his attention back on you. “Let’s go outside,” he suggested.

“W-we can just talk here,” you tried to say, but he was already grabbing your wrist and guiding you out; why did your heart still skip when he touched you?

Once he’d taken you through the kitchen and out to the back porch— where you could still hear the music and chatter, but it was much quieter— you spoke.

“Angus, I really am sorry about— you know— but you can’t just—” you started.

“It’s not over yet,” he insisted, surprising you with his intensity; you leaned back against the wooden railing, and he stood just a little too close with those dark brown eyes piercing through you.

“If you tell me you’re happy with Brian, I’ll leave you alone,” Angus decided, puffing up his chest a bit.

“I’m happy with Brian,” you said sternly.

A brief moment passed. “Okay, I lied,” Angus admitted.

“Jesus,” you hissed.

“But only because I don’t believe you!” he explained. “We were so good together.”

“Yeah, we were,” you admitted, “but… it’s over now.”

“No— it’s not. It can’t be!” he insisted with a whine, and you scoffed as you shook your head.

“Angus, you’re being childish,” you scolded.

“Oh, don’t say that,” he grimaced. “Don’t hold that against me— I’m not stupid, you know.”

“Of course you’re not— but you’re not thinking clearly.”

“Damn right I’m not!” he spat. “You’re all I could think about, for months! Months, I couldn’t fucking get you out of my head! And not just the, you know, the dirty stuff— everything. Every moment I spent with you, every dumb thing we talked about for hours, every time you laughed at one of my shitty jokes—”

“Angus, please,” you breathed, glancing down; you could only take so much of this, and you worried he was figuring that out.

“Does he make you laugh?” Angus pressed, stepping a bit closer to you. “Does he make you feel special? Does he make you come?”

“Yes,” you said sharply, “he’s great, okay? I’m happy— so please just stop fucking this up for me.”

“Okay, fine,” he conceded, “you’re happy, I believe you. But… but what about me, y’know? He doesn’t need you like I do.”

Your face warmed up and you crossed your arms tighter, staring down at the ground.

“Of course he likes you— who wouldn’t? But he couldn’t even imagine how I feel about you— how long I’ve been thinking about you. I mean, I’ve wanted you since I was a kid! You’re my dream girl!”

“That’s— that has nothing to do with me,” you tried to explain. “That’s a fantasy!”

“But it’s real, baby,” he sighed, bringing his hands up to gently hold your arms at either side. “It’s so real, you know it is.”

You didn’t even have the heart to deny it— or to tell him not to call you that. You knew if you looked up at him, you wouldn’t be able to fight him anymore; he must’ve known that, too, because he delicately lifted your chin until you met his gaze.

And then he kissed you: tender, sweet, and shameless. He didn’t care if anyone saw, if anyone knew— even Brian. You, on the other hand, still cared enough to try to stop him; but even you couldn’t resist a kiss like this, and you found your hands pulling him closer as quickly as they’d tried to push him away.

He took you home, without another word about what this meant or where you stood with each other. You snuck him into your room and he climbed into bed with you and he touched you like he’d been waiting a lot longer than just a few months for this moment. Frankly, you were beginning to realize that you’d been waiting a lot longer for this, too.

Before, Angus had always been talkative during sex— sometimes annoyingly so. But this time, he didn’t say a damn thing; neither of you did. And yet, somehow, just by the way he looked at you, just by the way he held you, just by the way he moved inside you... you felt like you heard more than you ever had.

You sat next to each other on the bench, staring forward into the dark treeline ahead— there was still a layer of frost around their roots, and a new snow had begun to fall even if it wasn’t cold enough for it to stick on the pavement. You tried not to look at him too long, in case it made this any harder, but you did appreciate that he seemed a bit more put together than he had the last time you went a few days without seeing him. He was clean-shaven, too… is it wrong that you kinda missed the stubble?

“Thanks for, you know… giving me a couple days to think about it,” you mumbled, and he nodded.

“I thought you might have somewhere better to be on a Friday night,” he said— trying to lighten the mood a bit, you could tell; trying to make you comfortable.

“Well, even if I did, I think this needs to be done,” you explained, and he pressed his lips together a bit.

He waited patiently, though, for you to break the silence and explain yourself, even if he didn’t seem too surprised when you did it.

“It was a mistake,” you decided. “It was great, but it was a mistake— and I’d really appreciate if we could just… let it go. And if you didn’t tell Brian.”

“Okay,” he nodded slowly. “I wasn’t gonna tell him. But I still think you should dump him.”

“Well, that’s my decision,” you reminded him, crossing your arms.

“I know,” he breathed.

You could already tell, just by the way the next silence began, that he was going to interrupt it with something stupid… you just never expected how stupid.

“The thing is— I love you,” he blurted out suddenly, turning to look at you again as your eyes widened. “I fucking love you.”

“Angus, I— you can’t—!” you choked out, but he continued before you could try to think of a response.

“I know I do— don’t say I don’t know what that is, or that I’m too young or something stupid like that,” he pleaded. “I know how I feel, okay? When you miss somebody this much, when you think about somebody this much— what else could love be, but that?”

You sighed, looking away, and he moved closer to you on the bench. Even if you knew it was preposterous that someone else would be in the park at the end of the street at this time of night, you still fought the urge to look over your shoulder.

“Don’t tell me I’m crazy,” he breathed. “You love me too, don’t you? I mean— I thought you basically forgot I existed, but last night… that sort of thing doesn’t just happen, does it? It’s not… it’s not usually like that.”

“No, it’s not,” you admitted, “that was different.”

He perked up, smiling wide when you looked at him again. “Just say it,” he begged, “say you love me too— ‘cause I know you do.”

“I— Angus, it’s more complicated than that,” you explained. “We’re still— there’s Brian, for one thing… we can’t really go on like this, you know that.”

“I know— I don’t want to keep doing this. I want to really be together,” he replied. You tried to turn your body away from his slightly, but he grabbed your hands and held them tight until you looked at him again. “I’m almost done with high school— I’ll go to college where you’re going for grad school!”

You shook your head. “No, you can’t do that.”

“Just think about it: us, together— we could actually go on real dates, and go to college parties together, and, like, study out at the library— or, you know, whatever you college kids do,” he fantasized. You smiled, but shook your head again.

“We… we can’t do that,” you denied.

He frowned, and turned away from you, staring darkly at the ground. “I knew it,” he mumbled, shaking his head. “You’re embarrassed— you’re ashamed of me.”

“What?!” you blurted out. “Angus, no—”

“It’s okay,” he said in a terribly unconvincing way, crossing his arms. “I don’t blame you: I’m just some dumb kid from your hometown. You want a guy your age— not some random freshman… you want something better.”

“That’s bullshit,” you replied instantly, “you can do so much better.”

“C’mon, I’ll never do better than you,” he insisted.

Even though he’d misunderstood you, your heart still swelled a bit at the compliment. “I meant for college, Angus,” you explained, and he deflated a little. “You can do a lot better than a state school.”

“Well, I, um… I don’t know if I can,” he admitted nervously. “My grades are kinda… inconsistent. And I went to so many different high schools—”

“Who gives a shit?” you scoffed. “You’re fucking smart— way smarter than anybody else here. You act like an idiot sometimes, but you’re eighteen, it kinda comes with the territory.”

He frowned, but couldn’t exactly deny it.

“You deserve to go somewhere amazing,” you told him. “You need to go somewhere amazing— and do something amazing.”

For a long moment, he just stared out into the dark; until, suddenly, he whipped his head back around at you with a quizzical look on his face. “Wait— is that what this is all about?”

“What?”

“Do you not want to be with me because you think you’d, like, hold me back or something?” he accused.

You blinked quickly; something about the way he said be with me caught you off-guard— like it was a term much more mature than you had expected from him. Instead of answering directly, you just stammered. “Well, y-you’re young, and—”

He cut you off quickly with a laugh. “Oh my god! You think I give a shit about that?”

“No,” you shot back, “but you should. You realize how fucking dumb it would be to change your whole life for the first person you ever slept with?”

“When you put it like that, it sounds dumb,” he admitted, looking down at his feet swinging over the edge. “But what if it’s somebody that, you know, you think you really have a shot with? What if it’s somebody that you feel like you can’t live without? Somebody that makes you finally get all those songs you hear on the radio—”

“It only feels like this to you because you’ve never felt anything else,” you explained gently. “It’s your first love. It fades.”

“But I don’t want it to,” he said instantly, looking at you with the most heartbreaking eyes you’d ever seen. “God, I don’t want it to.”

You looked up at him as his hand brushed over your face, and felt tears welling before you could fight them off; he kissed you, in a way that you thought he might have never really kissed you before. In a way nobody had kissed you before, in fact. It wasn’t very long, but it felt like it might as well have gone on forever.

When he broke away, he kept his eyes shut, and he pressed his forehead to yours as his thumb stroked your cheek. “Tell me it doesn’t have to end,” he breathed, “please. Tell me it’s not going to end.”

“It has to,” you whispered back, watching his shoulders sink and bringing your hand up to clutch at his chest. “It has to end, someday.”

You took a shaky breath, watching a tear fall from his jaw onto your arm, feeling everything you’d held back finally breaking through as your grip on shirt tightened and your lip began to quiver.

“But it doesn’t have to be tonight,” you sighed.

Gasping with relief and joy simultaneously, he kissed you again, and pulled you closer at your waist, and wrapped you up in his arms tightly.

There was, of course, this nagging voice at the back of your mind— that maybe it didn’t have to end. And god, you wanted to silence that thought permanently if you could, because it had never done you any good. That hope had only ever led to pain before. But, without it, nothing would ever really have a chance: if you weren’t willing to risk the heartache, you’d never let yourself love Angus the way that he deserved and the way that you knew, deep down, you already did.

So, as he kissed you that way you thought people only kissed in movies, and whispered to you those words you thought people only said because they were poets and dreamers, you realized that maybe it didn’t have to end someday. Maybe he would spend the next several years of your lives convincing you that you didn’t need to protect yourself from your own feelings. Maybe he would actually have the patience to break down walls he never built, to fix wounds he didn’t leave. Maybe he was ready to give you something to believe in, something worth taking risks for while you were still young and reckless. Maybe he, like the oncoming equinox, would melt your ice so new life could grow.

Or, maybe, this feeling he had really would fade once he gained a little more life experience; maybe you would make too many mistakes for him to forgive. Maybe you would always be friends, or maybe you would have too much history to be able to see each other again. Maybe you would grow apart— maybe you would have to brace yourself for that, to sit next to him on a cold dorm room mattress as you both realized it just wasn’t working anymore.

The most important thing that you realized in that moment— that eternal moment in his arms, in the dark, in the last snow of Spring— was that it didn’t matter. It didn’t have to be forever to be perfect; it didn’t have to be the ending to be beautiful. He loved you. Even if you were still trying to figure out why, he loved you; and that was true, and real, and special. His love couldn’t fix you, but it made you feel fixable, and you hadn’t seen yourself that way in a long time— you could only dream that you might see yourself the way he saw you.

When you pulled back from the kiss for a moment, you smiled wide— you laughed, actually— and sniffled as he wiped your tears away. “I love you,” you told him, and even though he kissed you again, you didn’t stop saying it. You wanted to keep it on your lips until it didn’t scare you anymore; you wanted to keep your heart open, even if it made you vulnerable, maybe because it made you vulnerable. After all, you couldn’t ever be sure it wouldn’t come back to bite you… if you could, it wouldn’t mean anything.

Even though all you said to him was I love you, each one meant something a bit different. I trust you. I’m not sure I’m ready, but I’m going to try. I’m sorry. I’m so glad I met you. I’ll never forget you. Please don’t let me go.

Somehow, you felt like he heard each one. Each time he told you that he loved you, though, you heard the same thing: I won’t let you go, ever.

Easter Mass was relatively pleasant, if a little too long. You did notice Angus sitting with his family, across the aisle and a few rows back, but you only gave him a quick wave before the service started and managed to resist glancing back at him after that.

The best part of Easter was always afterwards, though: you stood at the furthest end of the lawn, in front of the ivy-covered exterior wall of the chapel, as children ran around snatching up colorful eggs to collect for their baskets. Even if it was totally stupid, and irrelevant to the actual message of the holiday that the priest had just spent the whole service hammering in, you got a kick out of the fancy clothes and tiny dress shoes, the squeals of delight, the candy and toys in bright pastels. You were just thankful the weather had warmed up in the nick of time for all the festivities— indoor egg hunts never have quite the same effect.

Angus sauntered up beside you, sipping on a styrofoam cup of complimentary coffee, and you didn’t even look at each other, but you both smiled.

“They’re cute,” he stated after a little while.

“Yeah,” you agreed.

“Do you wanna have a kid?” he asked, and you gave him a hesitant glance only to find him looking right back at you— his expression was friendly, but neutral enough that you couldn’t read if he meant having a kid with him or just, you know, in general.

Deciding it must be the second one, you let out a soft, nervous laugh. “Uh, I dunno… maybe someday,” you offered, as non-committal as possible.

“How about right now?” he challenged, lowering his voice slightly, but not enough to stop you from glancing around to make sure nobody heard.

“Angus, fucking Christ,” you coughed. “Don’t joke about that.”

“I’m not,” he shrugged. “I mean, maybe I’m not being literal, but that doesn’t mean I’m not being serious.”

“Well… we can’t,” you mumbled, looking out at the lawn again, hoping not to stand out too much. “Not here.”

“I know, I know,” he agreed, and the two of you fell back into a silence— an oddly comfortable one, even. You crossed your arms as you watched the kids run around and he kept sipping on his coffee. After a few moments, though, you spoke again.

“Meet you in the Sunday school room in the West wing in five minutes?”

“Yup,” he said, already turning to leave. You smiled slightly to yourself, glancing down at your white shoes planted in the grass. Even on such a delicately-manicured lawn, wildflowers were already springing up— little periwinkle diamonds scattered here and there.

When what felt like a reasonable amount of time passed, you made your careful and casual exit from the egg hunt to slip back inside. Once you were away from the crowds and on your way to meet Angus, you couldn’t stop yourself from running… and you couldn’t stop yourself from smiling, either.

#angus tully x reader #angus tully smut

1K notes · View notes

chubsonthemoon · 3 months

Text

It is done! This is The Death of Translation, originally written in English by @landwriter, translated into Mandarin by @thirrith. Binding is dos-à-dos, with English version on one side and Mandarin on the other. Bookcloth was handwoven by me, on my rigid heddle loom :3

More under the cut!

Typeset: Fanbinders are Liars

Full stop, this typeset would not have been possible without Eth and all their patience, enthusiasm, and willingness to do even more translating! I reached out to them *checks watch* nearly a year ago in July 2023 (lololol), asking if I could use their translation of TDOT in a surprise bind I wanted to send along with Gloam's author copy of Flower King. They were kind enough to say yes, and even kinder to answer my questions when I reached out six months later in January, when I was finally able to start work on the typeset.

We talked about the many delicious things that are bound to come up when discussing translating not just from English to Mandarin, but also from digital space to meatspace. Some topics I had anticipated, like font questions, translating the colophon, etc. But even with the topics I thought I'd prepared for, there were still things that came up that both surprised and delighted: for example, while AO3's website allows for italics in Mandarin--

--my publishing program doesn't (or at least, it doesn't without needing to manually tilt every character by about 10 degrees). So as a workaround, Eth suggested changing these cases of italics to the font 华文楷体:

Through no one's fault but my own, this ended up being only slightly less work than manually tilting every instance of italics--I wanted to be sure that I got all of them, so I ended up doing a lot of double-checking manually anyway, instead of relying solely on the Search function. There was a lot of cross-referencing with the Word document that Eth was kind enough to provide, as well as squinting and general swearing. I also did the same for the uses of Latin script, manually styling each instance as Garamond to keep it consistent with the English edition:

The only other time I've had to do font surgery this intensive is probably for my typeset for Tell Me About the Big Bang, which I had to port over from a PDF. Folks, hell on earth. Do not recommend XD I remember squinting at my monitor as I had to visually confirm every instance of italics, thinking I will never do this again. Welp, four years later, here were are: fanbinders are liars, LMAO. At the very least, using Eth's Word document at least allowed me to search by styles, so it was a little easier on my eyes. 🙏

Is there a script that I might've been able to use if I was more code-savvy? Probably. But I figured going at it sledgehammer style would be the least hair-pulling way to get the job done, weirdly enough. Still, despite my best efforts, there are a few instances of PMingLiU to Garamond and PMingLiU to 华文楷体 that I know I missed, and I know I missed them because I caught them after I'd printed/cut/folded/sewn/glued (cue more swearing), so Gloam and Eth, my apologies >.< please consider them artifacts of a uniquely handmade object ajslkdjfs

In addition to the fonts, there were also some other fun things Eth and I discussed, like how to translate the notes I usually provide on the colophons! In addition to information on fonts, I also usually include some variation of:

This private, limited edition published by chubsthehamster (Moonham Press, imprint of Renegade Publishing) in 2024. This is chubsthehamster's personal copy. Out of three existing copies, this is the first.

The thing that came up with this, which still tickles my brain to this day, was how Eth chose how to translate "Moonham Press, imprint of Renegade Publishing." To get a better sense of what word to use for "imprint," they asked what the relationship was between Moonham Press and Renegade Publishing, which got me thinking about the relationship between my lil imprint and the wonderful @renegadeguild:

What's all very funny about all of this is that we are now, in fact, going by the name "Renegade Bookbinding Guild," per our most recently updated Code of Conduct. While this renders the wording I asked for out of date (and thus, the wording that made it into the book out of date :'D), I think it's also a testament to how cool the work @renegadeguild is doing--like any artform, fanbinding is alive, with its own evolving language, communities, and ideas about the craft. And I love it, I love it so much. (Was this also a plug for our new-ish website? Perhaps).

There's more I could say here, but this post is already going to be long enough, so I'll move on for now! If you get anything from this section, it's that @thirrith is amazing and very patient and kind, and I'm so grateful that we got to talk shop together. Thank you so much for all your invaluable help with this, Eth! I hope the typeset, though undoubtedly flawed, does your hard work justice!

Binding: Or, SO Much Math. Like, So Much, Guys. (It was worth it, though!)

Whoo, boy! So math was never my strong suit in school, but when I set out to do this bind last year, that wasn't an issue. At first. The dos-à-dos binding, if anything, just requires a little bit of finagling on the usual case-bound format--a bit more math if you want to do an all-cloth cover, like I planned on doing, but nothing I couldn't work out with some trial and error. (My prototype below!)

Then came February, when I took a weaving class with my friend, and then everything kinda exploded.

My original idea was to use some green Duo bookcloth I had on hand (this color, actually)--for those of you not initiated into the Duo cult, Duo is a Rayon bookcloth with a very devoted fan following in Renegade. It's very pretty; the Rayon weave is one color, and the paper backing is usually complementary color, so it has this cool two-toned effect. Duo is in high demand in Renegade circles because sadly, the company that manufactures it went out of business last year. (Although I've heard rumors recently that there's another company making something similar, but the cloth has a really high purchase requirement and is, like, for businesses only I think).

Anyway, I also wanted to have a gold line around the whole book as a kind of bellyband/obi to further connect the two versions of the story (another reason why I chose the dos-à-dos format to begin with heh), as you can see from my scribbled notes here--

But alas! I knew going in that adhering things to Duo is often Problematic, thanks to one very painful experience trying to get some iron-on foil on another bind (the textured surface of Duo just makes it kinda hard to stick or paint stuff on it). So if I wanted a clean, continuous line, the remaining options were to either paint it on a strip of paper that I'd somehow...adhere to the cloth? Or maybe cut different slices of bookcloth and glue them on. I wasn't satisfied with either of those options, though.

Then--the weaving class. I made a scarf, and I love it and I loved making it. But the whole time, I'll not lie, my thoughts were elsewhere.

In short, my decision to weave my own bookcloth kinda came from a few different factors:

The desire to attempt to recreate Duo, that elusive beauty, the one that got away, etc. (I have several yards in my stash, but still). Others have also attempted to recreate it, and I thought I'd throw my hat in the ring.

My current spiral into the deep hole that is fiber arts (it started with crochet, then knitting, then sewing, then weaving, then spinning, and now I'm eyeing quilting! Please help me).

The gold line. It kept bugging me. And when I found weaving, I just thought there was something very neat about the process of actually making the cloth for a dos-à-dos binding from scratch, and especially for this binding. I wanted to bind a story about translation (or rather, the death of it, and yet still the necessity of it--how we must try to communicate, despite of, or perhaps precisely because of, everything that gets lost in the spaces between people, and the tragedy of that loss, and the beauty of what makes it through, and the love always present in the effort regardless), and also, the translation of that story. Weaving is a very meditative process, and with every pass of the shuttle, back and forth, building slowly but surely the fabric that would hold the story that Gloam had written and that Eth had translated, I thought a lot about translation, and the gaps between people, and how we choose our words not just when translating, but when we speak at all. From a design perspective, I used the same colors I would've used had I chosen the Duo bookcloth--green and gold--so the design wasn't too altered in terms of color scheme. But I think the choice to weave the bookcloth--the thing that bound it all together--made the project take on a completely new meaning for me, both in process and in scope, one that hadn't been there when I started. I saw the warp, perhaps, as the original story, laying the groundwork for the weft, the translation; or maybe it was the other way around, with the translation providing the scaffolding for its own, new meaning, choices that Eth had to make with this word or phrase or another building something new, something translated, and the original a live, moving thing that wove over and under each word turned phrase turned story; or maybe it was both. Maybe it didn't matter which was which, in the end. And as I wove, the thing that connected them, that gold line that had started all of this, slowly formed.

All that to say: Good God, was there a lot of math. So much math. That prototype pictured above was actually made specifically so I could calculate exactly how much I needed to weave, lol, because while I certainly had enough thread, I didn't want to have to warp more than once. I'd learned the basics in my class, but the training wheels came off here. I wanted to make my own custom fabric, which meant calculating things like ends per inch, picks per inch, loom waste, shrinkage after washing, the width of that damn gold line, how much I'd need for the hinge, the turn-ins, the boards--the whole nine yards (I didn't actually weave nine yards tho heh). It was all absolutely worth it in the end--so challenging and so, so rewarding!

(And my final reason for weaving the bookcloth? Not gonna lie, It was because I just wanted to see if I could do it LOL. I love trying at least one new thing with each of my binds, and this was it for this project. While I've been bookbinding for a few years now, I'm still very much a beginner weaver, and I'm so excited to continue to learn and experiment! Also, here's a video of me unwinding the cloth from the loom, heh. I used 10/2 Perle cotton in gold and green colors :3)

Also, turns out, you can back handmade cloth the same way you can any other cloth! I backed it using my usual heat-n-bond method, and with some Unryu Tissue in the color Forest. Since the cloth itself is a bit transparent, there are a bunch of really fun fibers you can see when it's held up to the light, but which aren't visible when the cloth is glued down to the boards. Still, knowing they're there still makes me happy :D

Finally, capping all this off, is one final, small detail I really liked: ginkgo leaf endpapers :3 this one's for me and Eth and Gloam specifically <3

Aaaand that's all from me for today, folks! Thus ends (several months late XD) my last Binderary project for the year. This was probably my most ambitious bind to date, and gosh it was so, so much fun.

And, of course, thank you so much to Gloam for sharing your story, and Eth for translating it. I can't wait for y'all to receive your copies soon!

All my love! <3

#the sandman #The Death of Translation #bookbinding #fanbinding #binderary 2024 #<<<lol #landwriter #Ethiseth #also IF YOU SAW THIS POST BEFORE I FINISHED WRITING IT. NO U DIDN'T AJLKSDJFS #weaving #rigid heddle weaving

928 notes · View notes

inkchwe · 25 days

Text

dancing with our hands tied ↦ sjy

⋆ pairing: sim (jake) jaeyun x fem!reader ⋆ word count: 7.7k ⋆ genre: semi-angst, fluff, smut (18+/mdni!) ⋆ tags: brothersbsf!jake, minor age difference, college au, friends with benefits, secret relationship, light choking, semi-public sex, oral (f + m receiving), fingering penetration, unprotected sex (please practice safe sex folks). ⋆ synopsis: What began as a simple friends-with-benefits situation with your brother's best friend has turned into something deeper, and you now find that your emotions are more complicated than you initially thought. ➸ bless @temptaetions for giving me so much amazing dialogue to work with and @sweetvenomnet for getting me through finishing this monster!

You did not envision Sunday morning sitting across from your brother, concealing the bottom half of your body with your comforter and Jake next to you in bed. Jay’s face is a jumble of shock and anger, fists balled at his sides. You’re unsure if he’s ready to kick his best friend’s ass or throw him out by his neck, or both.

“How the fuck did this fucking happen,” Jay yells.

Well, you think, the beginning is a lot easier to explain than where we’re at now…

The first night you slept with Jake six months ago was like any other. Jay, your older brother by two years, was home with his best friend for the weekend. They had bonded over their freshman year as dorm buddies and Jay immediately inserted Jake into the family. “He’s like the brother I never had,” Jay would say when people would comment on them being attached at the hip.

It was not unusual for the two of them to stay over at your parents’ house when they were back in town. The university was more than three hours away. If they tried to drive home the same day, it would only end in a headache thanks to the rush-hour traffic.

It was nice to see Jay succeeding though, his footsteps being ones you’d hope to follow in one day. He had it all figured out, while you were anything but decided. Still unsure about what to do now that you had graduated, you chose to stay home and attend community college in the meantime.

But Jay occasionally being back in your presence meant he had to fulfill his annoying brotherly roles, like boring you with tales of campus and admonishing you for risqué outfit choices.

Like that night.

He stopped you short at the door with judgmental eyes scanning up and down your dress. “Absolutely not.”

You scoffed and pushed him out of your way. The dress hugged your curves just right and the color fit your aestethic. You knew when you bought it that the length wasn’t ideal for everyday wear, but it was perfect for a night out. Jay wouldn’t tell you otherwise. “You don’t have to act like Dad, dude.”

“Listen,” he said, rolling his eyes. “We all know you’re a woman. You don’t need to prove it with a little black dress.”

“Unless you’re blind, this dress is blue,” you mocked him.

“You know what I mean, smart-ass! You’re not leaving wearing that!”

“What’s going on,” Jake called from the kitchen.

“My sister’s about to walk out of the house in a napkin,” Jay responded, sarcasm dripping from his mouth.

“You’re such a prick,” you said, crossing your arms.

Jake sauntered into the sitting room, a bag of chips in his hand. He was taken back by the outfit, his eyes slowly trailing down your body. His Adam’s apple bobbed as Jay continued on his tirade about modesty to nobody but the air.

“You look pretty,” Jake said finally. He popped a chip in his mouth.

Your cheeks turned red instantly. Jay’s best friend wasn’t unattractive to look at, not in the slightest, so hearing him say such a thing even in quick passing made your body tense.

Before you could thank him for the compliment, Jay coughed like he swallowed his own spit.

“Did you just say she looks pretty?” Jay asked in his best friend’s direction.

Jake chomped down on another chip. “What,” he said, his mouth full.

“If I heard that right, you just said my sister looks pretty in her dress.”

“Yes?” Jake’s expression morphed into confusion as your brother’s face went pale.

“Do you have a death wish?” Jay asked.

“Bro, c’mon—”

“No, seriously. Do you?”

You backed up towards the door, making sure not to clack your heels too hard on the tile to be noticed.

Jay, however, sensed your escape. “I meant it! You’re not leaving without putting something else on.”

“Seongie, stop being an asshole. I’m gonna be late,” you whined.

“Dude, all I said was that she looked pretty,” Jake butted in.

Jay turned his focus back to him. “You said the girl you fucked at that club on Fifth was pretty.”

“Bro, I’m not gonna fuck—” Jake ran his free hand through his hair, smiling in incredulity at the ridiculous conversation. “Just trust me.”

“Finish that sentence.”

Jake scoffed, mouth agape. “What the hell, man?”

“Finish. The. Sentence. Jaeyun.”

“Okay, if you’re done being weirdly overprotective and Jaeyun’s done taking back his compliment, I have a happy hour to go to.”

Jay was so preoccupied with Jake at that point that he barely registered your words and your exit from the house. Before he could protest again, Jake interrupted him.

“I’m not going to fuck your sister, Jong,” he says.

“Thanks, that’s reassuring,” Jay responded.

As you closed the door, you heard Jake say, “But if she fucks me, that’s a different story.”

Despite walking down the cobblestone pathway, you heard Jake’s cries from your older brother whacking him. Jay screamed, “You sick fuck!”

Your cheeks felt hot when you finally got inside of your friend’s car. You greeted them with a smile when you sat in the back seat, but your mind kept playing back Jake’s words. He must have had enough pickings on campus and in his hometown to keep him satisfied. He didn’t need to put his effort or interest in you. There’s no way that he would, right?

Five hours later, the clock just shy of 1 AM, you stepped quietly inside to not wake your parents. Tiptoeing up the stairs to your room, you didn’t see Jay’s bedroom light on, certain he was fast asleep. That gave you some relief knowing he didn’t stick around to admonish you for not listening to his forceful advice.

What you weren’t expecting was Jake to be sprawled out on your bed, his body akin to a limp starfish. He had been scrolling endlessly through his Instagram feed until you creaked open the door to your room.

A silent scream jolted your pulse. “Jaeyun, what the fuck are you doing here?” you asked.

“Jongseong told me to wait for you. He wanted to make sure you got home safe,” Jake said absentmindedly, like being in your bed is a natural occurrence by now.

You suppressed the urge to roll your eyes. “Helicopter Himbo couldn’t do that himself?”

“He linked up with some girl he knows…Dahyun I think was her name?”

You sighed. Of course Jay had to hook up with his high school ex when he had no other options to exhaust. You thought Jay had higher standards than that at this point in his life, but he was still Jay.

You nodded. The soles of your feet throbbed from wearing your heels longer than you intended to. You tried to hide the pain on your face, but Jake was quick to walk over to you and feign concern.

“You okay?” He asked.

“Yeah. I’m just slightly buzzed and I’d like to see the inside of my eyelids and forget how bad my feet hurt right now.” You released a breathless laugh. “You can text my doofus of a brother and tell him I’m in one piece.”

You practically motioned your head towards the door, but Jake only smirked in response.

“Well, first things first, let’s take these off.” Before you knew it, Jake leaned down and began unbuckling the clasps of your stilettos for you. The sight made the alcoholic buzz running through your veins mutate into something sensual. You felt the ache between your legs as Jake’s fingers caressed the skin of your ankle as he was taking off your shoes for you, and immediately you remembered who he was.

This was wrong, and in no way going to happen. Not with someone who your brother confided in and loved so dearly. No matter how it felt every time you looked at him, or if he did intimate things like this that made you question everything.

“I meant what I said earlier you know,” Jake whispered. “And I wasn’t trying to take it back when Jongseong was grilling me about it.”

“I get it. He can be intense sometimes,” you mumbled.

“But you did look pretty. Fuck, you still do.” Jake chuckled to himself and positioned your feet out of the shoes and onto the carpet floor. The fabric felt cool against your toes, and instinctively you released a pleasurable sigh.

“So much better,” you moaned, smiling. “Thank you.”

Jake stood up, his grin infectious. “My pleasure.”

Neither of you moved, and admittedly you were glad Jake hadn’t made his exit yet. In the blur between your gratitude and onslaught of confusing feelings, the tether between your head and your body loosened.

Then you were kissing him. You were kissing your brother’s best friend and enjoying it very much, an amalgamation of all the passing glances you threw at him when Jay wasn’t looking and the semi-flirty conversations coming to a head in your lips and tongue.

Jake was kissing you back with the same fervor, his hands roaming to the curve of your ass and groaning in your mouth at the sensation of your bodies touching.

“Fuck,” Jake swore and pulled you in tighter, clutching at the hem of your dress.

In a tangle of fingers and lips, you almost didn’t register the feeling of your mattress against your back and the cool air on your skin when Jake pulled the dress down your body. But you did relish in the feeling of his tongue between your legs and how deliciously he slipped inside of you afterwards. And by that point, there was no time to regret and worry about what would happen next. All that mattered was the present and savoring it.

Three weeks after that first encounter, it was easy to forget it ever happened. The next morning, Jay and Jake had gone back to campus without a word. That was normal for them, seeing as they woke early and didn’t want to disturb anyone in the house.

For you, it was a bit disheartening, but it proved exactly what you knew. It was a mistake and a potential repeat was nonexistent. “Jeong’ll never find out and this can stay buried,” you told yourself.

Jay was too busy with his studies to respond with anything but one-word answers to your texts after that, so you gave up initiating anything. Jake, however, began texting you often to either greet you in the morning or say he hoped you were having a good day. It was sweet, but you didn’t read too deep into it. You replied in kind and left it at that.

Then, the boys came back one Friday afternoon in Jake’s Tahoe, and your nerves were live wires at their impromptu arrival. You had not seen Jake since that night in your bedroom. You felt the heaviness of guilt when you welcomed Jay home with a hug. A secret shouldn’t have had the power to eat you alive, but it did all the same.

And it didn’t help seeing Jake either. His smile took you back to the hours you had spent together in your bed. It was a kaleidoscope of memories. His hands on your hips, his whispers in your ear, his mouth in between your legs—

“Yo!” Jay waved his hand in front of your face. “I asked if you could help us with the last duffel bag.”

“Yeah, of course,” you said, walking over to the trunk. Jake’s shoulder brushed yours as you moved past him, and you couldn’t help the way your breath hitched. If you weren’t deluding yourself, you could’ve sworn you heard his throat catch in the same way.

You decided to leave the house that night, meeting up with a classmate to take your mind off of what was waiting at home. The Uber driver was polite, not bothering you as you were lost in your thoughts. Thankfully, the tequila sunrise you gulped down numbed your thought processes long enough that you could unwind and converse without rambling on about the situation you were in.

Then, you heard the ping of your phone and saw Jake’s message light up the screen.

Received at 11:23 PM: I’m picking you up. JS doesn’t want you taking an Uber when you’re not sober.

You sighed and typed back a reply with the hand not holding your drink. The words might have been mistyped, but you knew the message would get across to him.

Sent at 11:27 PM: im find u dont ned to come th last guy w nice.

Received at 11:29 PM: Sure. I’ll be there in 15.

You groaned. Jake could be as stubborn as your brother; it was no surprise the two of them became such good friends.

When Jake’s arrival came closer, you said goodbye and walked out of the bar, kicking your feet on the sidewalk gravel while you waited.

His truck’s lights came into full view a minute later. You got inside without a word, leaning your forehead against the passenger window. Just because he was being stubborn didn’t mean you had to be okay with it.

“Have fun?” Jake kept his focus on the road, but he sounded sincere when he asked about your night. While your heart swelled at the tone of his voice, it made the thoughts you tried so hard to suppress creep back in with full force. You were at a loss as to what to say. Honesty was off the table, but you weren’t capable of pulling your heart from your sleeve.

“I was. Not anymore.” You pouted.

You didn’t let him respond to your comment, instead looking around at his car’s interior and changing the subject. “I didn’t expect you to own a Tahoe.”

“What do you mean?” He asked with a chuckle.

“It’s so much space for one person.”

“Well, it was my dad’s truck. He gave it to me before I left for school. Now, I use it to go hiking and stuff with my dog, Layla.”

You smiled and leaned into the seat, looking at him. “That’s hard to believe.”

“That I have a dog or that I actually do physical activity? You’ve seen my body.”

You giggled and turned away. “I guess both. I’ve always wanted a dog, but Jungseong’s allergic. My parents thought plushies were a good compromise. And it all makes sense now. You can’t be that handsome naturally.”

Jake laughed harder. Without warning, he put his hand on your thigh, the feeling foreign yet incredibly welcome. You hummed in pleasure at the sensation. While you would’ve loved to enjoy the moment, your logic kicked in at the scene playing out in front of you.

“Jaeyun, you can’t just do that.”

“Why not? I wanted to,” he confessed, squeezing the curve of your knee. He moved his hand slowly across your skin.

You bit your lip and shook your head. “Just because you want to doesn’t mean you should.”

“Are we still talking about my hand or something else?” You gave him a stern but cutting look, the Are you kidding me evident in your eyes. It made Jake curse into the open air. “Fuck this.”

Jake pulled off into a vacant parking lot of a convenience store, one lamppost barely lighting the surrounding area. He put the car in park with an aggressive fist on the stick shift.

“Okay,” he started. “You want to talk about that night? Let’s talk about it.”

He inhaled a breath. You were terrified of what was unsaid and what he planned on saying, but you knew it was better to put it to rest sooner rather than later.

“I’m not sorry for what happened that night. I liked it and I liked you.” He looked directly into your eyes, his pupils dilating with extreme vulnerability. “I like you. And I’d like to repeat that night as many times as you want, but you’re my best friend’s sister and I don’t know how to accept those two things being true at once.”

You were taken back, his words the ones you wish you could have said to him before he left that morning. You tried to stamp down the truth many times since then, but Jake feeling the exact same way made you realize it wasn’t wrong to want what you wanted.

And Jay didn’t have to know everything.

“I do too,” you responded. “I like you too, and that night is all I’ve been thinking about.” You felt the knot in your stomach loosen, smiling in surprise from his confession. “And I would like to have more of those nights, for sure. In more than just my bed.”

Jake smirked and leaned in closer to you, lips ghosting over yours. “So if I said I wanted to fuck you in my car, you’d let me?”

You didn’t respond to that question with words, both of you knowing the question itself was rhetorical. You pressed your mouth to his hard.

The kiss was a clash of teeth and tongue, the act a desperate plea to pull each other closer after weeks of not being together. Now that you had Jake where you wanted him, you weren’t letting him go.

Jake palmed one of your breasts over your shirt, and you partially broke away from his mouth to moan. He swallowed it, tugging on your bottom lip with his teeth.

“You like that?” Jake asked, his voice husky.

“Fuck yes,” you said, knowing it was the truth. Nothing felt better than his touch on your skin.

He grabbed the side of your throat with his free palm. The other was hovering over the waistband of your shorts, his thumbs deftly unbuttoning them and dragging the zipper down.

“Tell me now if you don’t want this,” he panted. “And I swear I’ll stop.”

You shook your head vigorously. “If you stop right now, Jaeyun, I might just have to kill you.”

Jake gave you a crooked smile and kissed you again, harder than the first time but just as pleasurable.

His fingers dipped into your underwear, and you both groaned when he found your clit. He was surprised that the little amount of foreplay already made you this wet. You were just glad to have his fingers where you needed them the most.

You moved your hips in rhythm with his digits, the figure-eight patterns he was drawing into your skin creating stars behind your eyes. You released numerous whimpers and gasps into Jake’s mouth as he kept rubbing up and down your pussy, your clit receiving the most attention.

But it wasn’t enough.

“Jaeyun, I need you inside of me, please,” you begged. You gripped onto his shirt tightly to emphasize how bad the desire was to feel him stretch you open.

He nipped your lips again. “Climb in the back seat, baby.”

Jake followed in suit as soon as you moved from the passenger seat to the back. Once he sat down, you had his pants around his ankles and the head of his dick lined up with your entrance, your panties moved to the side to make room for him.

The fullness of his cock filling you to the hilt made your eyelids flutter. Jake knocked the back of his head into one of the headrests, the groan that left his mouth so beautiful you wished you could’ve replayed the sound on loop.

“God, you’re so tight.” He pushed his hips up further into you, the tip kissing your cervix. “It’s fucking incredible.”

You moaned in agreement. Beginning to grind his hips into yours, you licked and sucked the spot behind Jaeyun’s ear. You remembered how much he loved it the first night you had sex, and he loved it even more now that you were partially in control riding him.

He bucked up into you here and there, but for the most part, you were setting the pace. The sounds of your skin slapping against each other as well as both of your moan-laced expletives filled the back seat.

“That’s it, sweetheart. Bounce on this cock. Show me how much you want me.” He trapped your hips with his hands, holding on tight as you continued to grind against him.

“I want to come so bad, Jae,” you gasped. “Please make me come.”

Jake took his index and middle finger and found your clit again. He circled the nub with tenderness as you continued to ride him without mercy. He knew he could come at anytime with how well you were touching him and taking all of him inside of you, but he had no problem waiting until you found your pleasure first.

You felt the orgasm creeping up on you, starting in the pit of your stomach and ready to come to the surface. You begin to grow sloppy with your rhythm, and Jake took extra effort with his fingers to push you over the edge.

“Let go for me, love. Come all over me.”

You cried out, clutching onto Jake’s hair hard as you rode out your orgasm to its full capacity. Jake let go in that same moment, painting your insides white and cursing the entire time at how good it felt.

When you sat down next to him in the back seat, both of you sated and breathless, you knew the path forward was uncertain. And sure, a million questions still lingered in your mind, but you stored them away without a second thought, refusing to let them ruin your current happiness.

This led to where you were with Jake for the past six months, having sex every time he was in town and even sneaking off to visit him when you had the chance. He would pick you up in his truck and hold your hand across the console the entire drive to and from his student apartment. The two of you were skilled at keeping your trysts out of sight from Jay both in your hometown and on campus, the local spots he wanted to take you to and your favorite hometown stores not ones Jay frequented often.

At the same time, Jay had gotten back into a relationship with Dahyun, but you were optimistic for the both of them this time around. He seemed to be really happy, as were you, although he didn’t know the reason why. Dahyun would hang out with the guys and you when she got off work, and the four of you would drink and watch movies together like any other couples would.

The only part that didn’t fit such a picture perfect image was the fact you and Jake were not a couple at all. You slept together and did most things boyfriends and girlfriends did, but there were no labels. It was as if saying it out loud would make it real, and then you’d have to confront the biggest hurdle of all: telling your brother. And you were determined to put that off for as long as possible.

One morning, as you made breakfast in the kitchen for all three of you, Jake slid in behind you without you noticing. You gasped, feeling his chest against your back. “Jae, you can’t do that!”

“Couldn’t help it. Smelled pretty good in here,” Jake responded, kissing the spot that joined your neck and shoulder together, his hair tickling your ear in the process.

“I know, I can’t wait to eat it.”

“I was gonna say the same thing.” Jake smirked.

“Jae,” you reprimanded him, grinning. “Jongseong could come down at any second.”

“But he’s not. Last time I checked, he was still asleep.” The curve of his lips touched your collarbone, making you shiver.

“And when was that?”

In that moment, you both heard Jay yelling “I did it!” in tandem with his quick steps down the staircase. You both split apart in record time. Jake pretended he was searching for a drink in the fridge while you flipped the fried egg in the pan.

“I finally did it,” Jay exclaimed, a wide smile on his face directed at Jake.

“Did what?” Jake asked.

“I got you a date with Dahyun’s cousin Jihyo tonight. Dahyun’s been dying to go out to this new restaurant downtown, and I know you’ve been lacking in the pussy department lately.” You felt the saliva in the back of your mouth hit the wrong pipe, and you coughed.

“You okay, sis?” Jay asked, grabbing you by the shoulder.

“Yeah. Just choked for a second, sorry.” There was nothing wrong with Jake going out; he had no obligations to you. Yet, at the same time, the thought of him finding someone new felt like acid on your tongue.

Jay turned back to Jake, excitement filling his features again. “Come on man, you haven’t picked anyone up in what? Five months? Either your game got terrible or you’ve been holding out on me about some new chick.”

You plopped the fried egg on the plate next to you and motioned for Jake to pick it up. “Over medium, how you like it.”

“How do you know his egg order, freak?” Jay questioned you with a chuckle.

“I asked him this morning, dingbat. While you were snoring in your room and told me to leave so you could get your beauty rest.” Jay gave you the middle finger but you didn’t pay attention to him. You looked back at Jake with shy eyes. “You want toast?”

“No thank you,” Jake said with a smile that didn’t meet his eyes. You could tell when Jake was uncomfortable. His entire body grew stiff at the thought of being roped into a double date with a stranger.

But, avoiding suspicion, Jake said, “Sure man. Can’t promise I’ll be into her, though.”

Jay smiled and patted his friend on the shoulder. “I’ll take it.”

When Jay ran back upstairs to call Dahyun with the news, Jake dropped his plate back on the counter. He suddenly pinned you against it with his hands on your waist, forcing you to look at him. “I don’t have to go on this date if you don’t want me to.”

You shook your head, the faintest frown on your face, hoping it looked more like an expression of indifference. “If you don’t, Seongie’s going to ask more questions. Besides, we’re not together. You don’t have to ask for my permission.”

“That’s not what I’m doing.” He furrowed his eyebrows. If there was one emotion you didn’t show him often, it was ice. But if the alternative was being emotionally exposed in that moment, you would choose the former.

“You know what I mean.” You broke free from his grasp, swallowing the bitter taste in your mouth. You turned off the stove and threw the sizzling pan into the sink. “Hope you have fun.”

Jake waited for you to elaborate, but after a minute of silence, he admitted his defeat and walked out of the kitchen. It cracked a piece of your heart to be so cold, but what other choices were on the table?

Once he was gone, you grabbed your phone from your pocket. Typing out the number in your mind and pressing the call button, you hoped the man you were looking for answered.

“Sunghoon?” You spoke, relieved he picked up. “I need a huge favor.”

“Do I have to?” Sunghoon groaned, straightening the collar of his polo shirt. “This is so ridiculous.”

“Hold my fucking hand, Hoon, or I swear to god I will tell Professor Choi you used my essay on Machiavelli for your paper.”

He released a low, agitated sound and put his hand in yours, squeezing your palm in retaliation. You smiled and walked into the restaurant.

You didn’t go all out with your outfit. A simple dress and denim jacket fit with the atmosphere of the Brazilian barbecue joint Dahyun wanted to check out. Sunghoon also followed your instructions to the letter, looking presentable without trying too hard.

The hostess made you both wait fifteen minutes or so for a table. Even at 9 PM on a Saturday, past normal dinner time for most folks, the business was still bustling due to the word of mouth from their grand opening a week ago. It didn’t take long though for you to find Jay and Jake sitting at a table in a corner booth. It was like Jake’s presence in any tiny or expansive space was a magnet, pulling you in without giving you space to put up a fight.

“So that’s the guy,” Sunghoon stated, staring at Jake next to your brother. “He’s cute. I see why you’re in love with him.”

“Shut up!” You laughed and smacked him in the chest. He pretended to act hurt, smiling the entire time.

Your Humanities classmate might have been too sarcastic and vain for his own good, but you knew he was a good friend and would always come if you called. And while it was purely platonic, he didn’t mind playing the part of the arm candy for another free essay.

In the midst of your shared laughter, neither of you saw both Jay and Jake walking over to you. Jay’s cough pulled you out of your trance, and you stood stock still at the sight of Jake’s clenched jaw and crossed arms, immediately dropping Sunghoon’s hand in the process.

Jay said your name in annoyance. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Hoon and I have class together, but we decided to have dinner after studying,” you say with a smile. “Funny we’d be at the same place as you guys!”

“You have my location, dipshit,” Jay said with a stone face.

“Just because I have it doesn’t mean I look at it,” you said in your defense.

Hoon held his hand out to both men, but you knew it was bait specifically meant for Jake. “Nice to meet you.”

Jake clenched his jaw even tighter. You thought he would break the bottom half of his face if he kept it up. To your surprise, he grabbed Sunghoon’s hand like a pure gentleman. Jay did the same.

You immediately felt so small. It didn’t have to be this way, trying to pull a front for this guy that wasn’t even yours. If it took this much effort to be exclusive, a title you didn’t fight for to begin with, maybe it wasn’t meant to be.

When Sunghoon let go of Jay’s hand, you grabbed him by the bicep. “We can just go somewhere else. We’ll probably wait another hour before getting a table if we stay, anyway.”

Jay agreed. “I had to book this in advance, so she’s probably right.”

Jake looked directly in your eyes when he said, “Hope you have fun.” Mirroring your words from earlier, Jake’s were laced with spiteful sarcasm.

Sunghoon put a hand on the small of your back and guided the two of you out of the restaurant. It took everything in you to not turn back and reveal it all in that stupid restaurant, but you circled back to your initial thoughts. What would it do attempting to claim him now? It was already pointless.

You didn’t make it home until midnight, spending the night scarfing down Chinese with Sunghoon in his apartment and watching old seasons of New Girl together. It was a bitch thinking about what it would be like when you got home. Jay would quiz you on Sunghoon and his motives or Jake would get defensive on what you were doing with the guy to begin with. Or both.

The last piece of advice Sunghoon left you with as he drove off was to “be honest” with Jake, if that was any bit as simple as it sounded coming out of his mouth.

You stepped inside your house without a care for your noise level, knowing your parents were off on an overseas conference for four days. And what were the chances the guys had gotten home by now?

But, like the first night you had spent together, Jake was waiting up for you in your room, sitting stock straight with his hands in his lap.

You didn’t freak out or feel shocked by his presence. You were glad to see him actually, but greeting him with anything but a hello would have been inappropriate given the last few hours.

“Hi,” you began.

“Why have you been gone so long?” His voice was clipped, matter-of-fact but laced with authority. The mixture of sadness and anger in his face surprised you. Jake was always fun, silly, casual…never like this.

“I lost track of time.” It was the easiest answer to give him, even if it wasn’t enough to assuage his concerns. “We just ate takeout and watched sitcoms.”

He nodded and stood up. Walking closer to you, the emotions on his face registered to you so clearly now. The anger was simply misplaced pain, unsure where to go but in front of you for an answer. “What do you want from me?”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m asking you what this is, what are we doing here?” He ran a hand through his hair. “Seeing you tonight with that dickhead was all I thought about while eating that churrasco and listening to Jay’s dumb jokes. And if that’s against some unspoken rule, I need to know.”

You gulped down a heavy bubble of air. It was now or never. Choose to either lose the guy you had spent so much time with by keeping your feelings to yourself or risk him breaking your heart by being vulnerable.

“I don’t want you going on dates with anyone else.” You beginning with that wasn’t perfect, but you were out of ideas.

He nodded. “Okay.”

“Sunghoon’s a friend, but you’re my best friend. And you make me feel like nobody else ever has.” Your lip quivered. “I feel like an idiot for not saying it before, but I’ve liked you since the second Jay introduced all of us to you. And maybe all you want out of this is exclusive sex and I’m even more of an idiot for saying all of this but—”

Jake caught your mouth in a perfect kiss, effectively shutting you up. A tear passed between your lips, but he was all you tasted. He pressed his forehead to yours, eyes bright and expression full of mirth. “You’re a beautiful idiot, but still an idiot for not realizing I feel the same..”

You gasped. Grabbing his shirt, you pulled him back in hungrily.

The subsequent kisses and touches were ripe with the things you didn’t know how to say in words but could easily express with your body. Every kiss on his jaw told him how enraptured he made you feel. Each pass of your hands exploring his naked skin expressed why you saw nobody but him in the most crowded room. And when you took him into your mouth, you hoped Jake knew why it was so easy to fall for him and want nobody else.

“Just like that,” he said, tenderly grabbing your hair as you stroked what you couldn’t fit past your lips.

It didn’t last long. Jake pulled you in his arms and said, “I want to be inside you.”

Jake held you as you sunk down onto him. Your legs were wrapped around his waist as he sat on the edge of the bed, rocking his hips up into you. No matter how many times you had sex, it still felt incredible feeling all of him fitting around the spaces inside of you. You wished he could occupy them forever.

“Fuck,” you exclaimed, clutching the hair at the nape of his neck. Your bodies were slick, foreheads touching but slippery from perspiration.

But it didn’t matter how loud you were being or how sweaty your skin became. All you could focus on was the words that came out of Jake’s mouth. “God, I love you so much.”

It didn’t make you slow down, instead riding him faster and kissing him fervently in response. You mewled into his mouth, feeling yourself coming undone quickly.

“I’m gonna come,” you announced.

“Right there with you, sweetheart. Come with me,” he said, and so you did. You felt the warmth of him inside of you in tandem with the downfall of your orgasm, siphoning every drop until you were spent.

When you were lying next to each other, however, you remembered those three little words that slipped from his mouth.

“You said you loved me,” you stated in post-coitus bliss, covering half of your face with your comforter.

“So what if I did?” He was glowing, and it only made you smile harder. “So what if I do?”

You smirked and pecked his lips sweetly, nipping his bottom lip. “I love you too, you goof.”

You woke up next to each other that morning, both in a euphoric daze despite your fatigue. You also took into account how you now held the title of Jake’s girlfriend, a majority of the reason why you were a thousand leagues above cloud nine. Jake showed his joy in the form of his tongue pressed to your clit.

But it didn’t last for long.

You weren’t fast enough to cover yourself when Jay barged in asking whether or not you had seen Jake at all. Little did he know he would find his best friend in the last place he ever expected.

Which led to now, your brother interrogating the two of you like you committed the worst crime humanly possible. In a way, you could see why he would think such a thing.

“So you kiss my sister—” Jay starts.

You cut him off, grabbing Jake’s hand. “I kissed him first.”

“Then you decide to hook up in my car.”

“It was actually my car.” Jake counters, squeezing your fingers with his own.

“And now I find you guys here in your room”—Jay looks directly at you—“just doing whatever the fuck you were doing before I came in.” His face is red from the shock. “How long has this been going on?”

“Six months,” Jake says.

Jay takes a deep breath of air into his lungs, his body rising and falling at a rapid rate. He’s probably grateful your parents can’t hear him yelling. Otherwise they’d come in and ask more invasive questions while you’re not in the position to answer them, half naked and all.

“And where was I while you guys were fucking behind my back?” Jay asks, darting his eyes between the both of you.

“Hanging out between Dahyun’s legs?” You hypothesize, throwing your other hand in the air. “How the hell are we supposed to remember?”

“And you expect me to believe you kissed his scrawny ass first?” Jay asks you.

“Dude, you’ve seen me shirtless,” Jake remarks, rolling his eyes.

“True, but it’s not much of a show, bro.”

“Seriously, this is not the point!” You yell, placing your face in your hands.

“Yes it is! You’re my sister!”

“And she’s my girlfriend,” Jake interrupts, “so you need to get your head out of your ass and stop acting like she’s not capable of taking care of herself.”

Jake stands up to Jay, the two of them face to face with each other in a way you expected when your relationship came out of the shadows. You don’t want Jay to feel betrayed, but at the same time, it will kill you if Jake gets hurt trying to stick up for you.

“My priority will always be looking out for my family.” Jay turns to you, disappointment clear as day in his eyes. “No matter how I’ve shown it, I didn’t expect to be branded the bad guy for wanting to protect you.”

Jay slams the door on his way out. Tears prick your eyes, silence permeating the bedroom.

Jake sits back down next to you and places a few kisses on the curve of your shoulder. “Believe it or not, but I think he took it better than I thought he would.”

“He hates me,” you sob.

“He doesn’t hate you. Maybe me, but never you.” Jake takes your hand and kisses the inside of your palm, tucking it gingerly between his fingers. “Nobody could ever hate you.”

“I need to fix this, though.” You swiftly kiss Jake’s lips before standing up to get dressed, throwing on a pair of gym shorts and one of his shirts you stole. When you go to Jay’s room, it’s empty. But you hear the faint notes of a guitar from somewhere on the first floor of the house.

You walk down the stairs to find Jay strumming his favorite Yamaha in the living room, the one your father brought home from a trip to Japan for Jay as his graduation present. You step towards his spot on the couch quietly, but he’s already too adept at sensing your presence. He stops playing but says nothing.

“Hey,” you say.

“Don’t.” Jay’s voice is gruff. “Don’t ‘hey’ me right now.”

“Well, if you’re looking for an apology, I’m not going to give you one.”

The two of you are silent, unsure where to take the conversation next. What was there to say? Yes, you felt guilty for keeping Jay in the dark, but either way, the situation would hurt him. His best friend and his younger sister falling in love is not ideal, but feelings couldn’t be fought. All the same, the deceit sat in your stomach like a stone, begging to be thrown away.

You sigh and sit down on the love-seat, adjacent to Jay’s spot on the couch. “I really like him, Seongie,” you confess. “No. I, actually—I love him.”

Jay looks directly at you for the first time, his eyes a bit puffy. “Are you happy?”

“What?”

“Are you happy? Does he treat you well?”

You laugh. “I mean we’ve only been a couple for about 12 hours, so—”

“You know what I mean, asshat.” The two of you share a laugh together, the mood much lighter than before. “Do you see a future with him?”

You nod. “Yeah, I do.”

“Then I can’t get in between that. I just wish one of you would’ve fucking said something.”

“And I would’ve, but you know Jaeyun.”

Jay nods. “He’s a wimp.”

“No,” you shake your head, smiling. “He just didn’t want to hurt you either. He loves you, and I love you, too.” You run a hand through your hair, contemplating your next words. “I’m just not a baby anymore, Jongseong. I know how to handle things.”

Jay nods, sniffling. “I know. It’s just…hard.”

“What is?”

He puts his guitar by his side. Clapping his hands together, he tries to brush off whatever emotion is surfacing. “It’s nothing, I don’t know. Stupid, probably.”

You move positions to sit closer to your brother, placing a hand on his knee. “Nothing you say to me could ever be stupid.”

He knocks you in the shoulder with his fist lightly. “It’s just—when did you get so grown up? You gotta stop doing that.”

“If I did, I’d be dead.”

“True.” Jay chuckles. “I’m sorry for freaking out.”

“I’m sorry for keeping it from you. And I hope you and Jaeyun can talk, too.”

“We will. For now, I’m just glad we did.”

Nodding, you open your arms for a hug, a hug that Jay gladly accepts. It’s a tight one that encompasses both a white flag of retreat and a sincere love for you that you forget to remember sometimes in the midst of his teasing and admonishment. You now know, more than ever, it’s his way of protecting you and proving he cares.

And you’re grateful to have both him and now Jake by your side through all your successes and slip-ups.

“You don’t seriously think I’m okay with you wearing that dress again now that you have a boyfriend, right,” Jay asks. “I’m even more against it because Jake will have a heart attack.”

You chuckle and twirl in the mirror, checking the back of your dress to make sure it’s sitting right on you. “He thought I looked pretty in it the first time.”

“Well now, he’s not worried about you looking pretty. He’s worried about other douchebags checking you out.” Jay flips the page of his book, trying to feign a nonchalant expression. “I’m just saying, he’s still my best friend. I know things.”

You poke your tongue out at your brother. The doorbell rings and you rush to answer, your heart beating at a vigorous pace in your chest.

Once you open the door, Jake’s standing there with a bouquet of flowers and a lopsided grin on his face. When he sees your dress, however, his smile falters a fraction.

“Oh my god, Jay was right!”

“I usually am,” Jay yells from his space in the sitting room armchair.

Jake looks confused, but the realization dawns on him in a flash. “No, you look beautiful. It’s just…a bit short, don’t you think?”

You pout, crossing your arms. “I spent so much time getting ready, Jae.”

“I know, sweetheart.” He takes his free hand and rests it on your hip. “And everyone will be able to see that. I just don’t want to have to fight anyone off at the restaurant.”

You giggle. Going in for an impromptu kiss, you smell the traces of his cologne. The scent could make your knees buckle, but you try to stay confident and lull your boyfriend into submission. “I’ll only be looking at you. And I can defend myself just fine, baby.”

Jake’s bottom lip juts out. “So, I can’t convince you to change?”

You shake your head, grinning.

Jay sneaks up behind you, making you gasp. “If she isn’t gonna listen to her brother, she’s definitely not gonna listen to you, man.”

Jay and Jake exchange a handshake. You’re relieved their relationship has recovered from the reveal of your relationship, but you know that means they have the potential to gang up on you more out of their misguided sense of protection.

“I have the advantage though. She’s in love with me,” Jake sing-songs, kissing you on the cheek after doing so.

“Regardless,” you say, “I’m wearing the dress.”

Jay rolls his eyes. “Just change, for fuck’s sake.”

Jake nods. “Pretty please?”

“Not a chance in hell, boys.”

#jake sim x reader #sim jaeyun x reader #enhypen x reader #jake sim fic #sim jaeyun fic #enhypen fic #sim jaeyun smut #enhypen smut #jake sim smut

589 notes · View notes