#Four-spotted Cup Moth | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

meliorist-midoriya · 3 years

Text

chasing the sun

synopsis: there’s something screaming in familiarity—in mourning—deep in his soul at the sight of you, a complete stranger. this is the price you pay for resurrection, the sun whispers as it rises.

pairing: takami keigo x fem!reader

genre: angst with a happy ending, reincarnation au

warnings: mentions and depictions of death, major character deaths, mentions of war (+ description of a battlefield scene), injuries, blood.

word count: 11.7k

a/n: happy (extremely belated) birthday, bird boy. and aaaa my baby’s here, she’s finally here! i’ve been working on this fic for a little over two months now, and i’m so happy to see it fully fleshed out! thank you to @dimplesum for beta reading, and the tumblr chaos server for listening to me yell all the time abt this fic :’) disclaimer, i did as much research as i could, but any historical depictions are not 100% historically accurate and i have taken some creative liberty, so please take the historical scenes with a grain of salt!

important: there will be songs linked throughout the fic to be played in accordance with the scene, i do hope you listen to them for the full experience! it is okay if the ost ends before the scene as that is also on purpose. the beginning of the song will start with 【 ☀︎ 】 with a link to the song. with that said, i hope you enjoy, and happy reading!

crossposted on Ao3

【 ☀︎ 】

Dawn finds Keigo, the youngest government official in the empire, stumbling upon a lone concubine in the eastern lotus garden.

He’d been searching for solitude, away from the viper’s nest of samurai-turned-aristocrats, strutting around the castle with their now-useless weapons strapped to their hips, discussing poetry and politics instead of battle and war tactics.

It’d been disgustingly easy for them to make the switch from warrior to bureaucrat, taking the status boost in stride. Those who couldn’t, they stayed with their lords if they were lucky. The warriors who weren’t… Keigo would need an abacus to count the ones who weren’t so lucky, the countless rumors and reports of wandering rōnin with familiar names never failing to reach over the palace walls to get to him.

(Oh, what he would give to join them.)

Of course, he’d been intending to brood ponder over this in the seclusion of the garden he’d discovered a few days ago, staring at the green buds of the young lotuses in the water until his head spun. The sight of the concubine sitting in his spot (that he was certain was too secluded to be found) told him fate had other plans, however.

He cleared his throat and forced down the grimace once he saw the concubine jump, startled, before trying her best to smoothly turn and bow without looking too flustered.

“Good morning, madam.”

“Good morning—”

He smiled through the static in his brain at the mention of his surname, messily tacked to the honorific that he would never get used to.

That name… it’s not mine. Don’t call me that.

A discordant mess of jumbled kanji that sounded nothing like the powerfully elegant names in the court. The ill-fitting characters standing out like an eyesore on his documents, the syllables falling awkwardly off the tongue in conversation.

Wholly fitting for an outsider like him, really.

The mention of that name grated something terrible in him, and he settled for keeping his teeth grit into a smile. A sheltered concubine wouldn’t know, of course she wouldn’t know. Practically no one did, so he had no one to fault but his own cursed sensitivity to a name he wanted to burn.

“Do you mind if I join you?” The slight twitch in her demure smile was answer enough, but he’d set aside time for this escape, and damn if he was going to let it go to waste.

“Of course not. Please, don’t mind me, my lord.”

He dipped his head in thanks and you bowed in return, the silence hanging in the air settling into something stiff and awkward.

A minute passed…

Then another…

Then five…

Keigo was going to go mad at this rate. Neither of you had any intention of leaving the rare pocket of seclusion, and the competitive whisper in the corner of his mind told him that leaving first meant conceding, meant losing.

(In his world, losing meant death.)

Keigo’s had enough of losing in life despite his dumb luck, thank you very much.

So, he did what he knew he did best. He talked. Shattering the awkward silence in an effort to coax the tranquil silence he was searching for back into the little gazebo by the pond. Maybe if he ran his mouth long enough, you’d get tired and leave.

“You’re a new face in the palace.”

With an expectant gaze, he watched the telltale shift from awkward to apprehensive, the rigidness of your stature sharply contrasting the flowing brocade of your kimono as you looked back at him with a too-sharp gaze before casting your eyes away to the green buds in the water. Had he been any slower, Keigo would’ve thought that the conflicted expression you quickly smoothed over was solemn (it was anything but).

“I would say the same to you, my lord, but every face in this castle is a new face to me.” You tilted your head with a thin-lipped smile that didn’t quite reach your eyes. “Although… I’m sure an official who just arrived at the castle for his yearly residence would be an especially new face. Please excuse my rudeness.”

Keigo blinked. Once, twice, his jaw relaxing into a disbelieving smile at the sight of your steely gaze bright with a challenge and a smile sharper than the blades at his waist, the unsaid words ringing clearly.

Two could play at this game.

Well, now, this was new.

Perhaps it was your defiance that remained steadfast in this castle, or the blissful ignorance that made you one of the few to look at him straight on instead of down your nose. A little voice whispered that this would change in due time, the politics and power struggles confined within the castle never failing to break down even the most resilient. Those that didn’t know how to play the game correctly simply… vanished.

“Someone’s well-informed, I see.” He folded his hands behind his back, his wish for tranquility long forgotten. “I heard a new concubine has just entered the castle as well. A consolation prize, of sorts, from the farthest reaches of the country. Of course, as I’ve been gone for a year and have only been here for four, I’m not too sure.” He flicks his gaze to you, accepting your challenge with a knife-sharp smile of his own.

“I am curious as to what this concubine’s name is, however.”

You arched a brow, the thin-lipped smile widening into something sweet (that looked better on a fox rather than a beautiful concubine), and you bowed. Any trace of that stiff apprehensiveness dissolved into a graceful fluidity that seemed to disappear within the rippling silk of your kimono.

“Lady Y/N. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

To this day, he’ll never admit how surprised he was at your reverence, nor how his heart did a funny little flip in his chest when you giggled at his flustered response. What kind of fool gave respect to a commoner picked up from the slums?

You. Except you were no fool, and maybe that’s why he kept coming back like a moth to flame.

Time passed, and he found himself in that little garden day after day, morning after morning. Listening to the concubine who told vivid stories of lands he could only dream of, foods he found himself craving, and tales of warriors past.

The conversations at dawn soon turned into stories of the past, the laments of the present, and dreams of a bleak future. With delicate hands and gently prying words, you two unlocked every bar and lock you’d put over your souls and allowed yourselves to lay them bare for each other, the intimacy of a bond forged in secrets and solidarity far stronger than any alliance or contract.

You two confided in each other in that garden, staring at the dew on the lilypads as you two whispered how you didn’t belong in the palace. How the confines of grand walls with ears and eyes were no place for the adopted commoner and a concubine far from home. Two people in this big world who were just lucky enough, fortunate enough to end up within this lavish palace, your lives guaranteed splendor and comfort.

Then again—you two would share a conspiratorial laugh—maybe you two were unfortunate instead. What was splendor and comfort when you had to constantly watch for a knife in your back or poison in your cup? When a single misstep could cost you your life?

Conversations shared with you, the concubine with a sharp tongue and even sharper wit, were the most fulfilling he’s had in ages. Maybe it was the sense of formality that the intimacy of the waterside gazebo stripped away, or the unraveling realization that he hasn’t breathed this freely in ages, that he was looking forward to these moments in the morning. The intimacy shared in the garden he selfishly liked to call his own little world.

Keigo catches the smile you hide behind your sleeve when he steps into the gazebo, and he realizes you’re being selfish, too.

He didn’t know how the conversation got here, he didn’t know why he had a hairpin meant for you tucked into his sleeve. All he knew was that when it came to you, he was helpless to the whims of rambling and buying a pretty hairpin made of red jade because it reminded him of a sharp wit with a pretty smile.

“I live for this country and I die for this country. Well, not that there’s anything much to die for anyway.” Keigo’s laugh is empty, and your melancholic gaze even emptier. A fog had blown in that morning, covering the pond in a soft cover of white, and your soft voice and softer touch on his arm (careful, almost) silenced his dry laughter and left his throat even drier.

“What you would die for is also an excellent reason to live, is it not?”

Your words, whispered into the stillness of the moment, resonated so loudly within his soul and forced a shaky breath out of his lungs as he gazed in awe at you. At the soft, ethereal glow in the fog cast by the rising sun breaking through the clouds, the scent of bloomed lotuses wafting in on the breeze that rustles the dangling pieces of your hair ornaments. He is weak to whims when it comes to you, so he pulls out the hairpin burning a hole in his sleeve to slip into your hair with shaking hands unbefitting a swordsman. Keigo watches your eyes sparkle like the gem in your hair, and his heart lifts with hope as he whispers his devotion into the warm morning, carried by the wind into a sea of blooms.

“I’ll live for you, then.”

And with a smile, you fall in love.

(Keigo falls even harder.)

【 ☀︎ 】

He should have known.

“I don’t know what I was expecting from the son of a criminal.”

He really should have known.

“What was that fool thinking, taking a street rat like you in all those years ago?”

Honestly, he’d like an answer to that, too. Too bad the old man was dead and left him to inherit a position he didn’t even want. To think he’d agree with the emperor for once in his short life.

“Tsk, a son will follow in his father’s footsteps, after all. A grave in Kozukappara should suit him well.”

Keigo should be concerned that he couldn’t feel how the coarse dirt dug into his knees anymore, his cheek still aching from where the guard had punched him.

(Okay, yes, he deserved it, but he could’ve done without tasting iron.)

The sadistic glee in the guard’s face after he landed that “disciplinary strike” told him otherwise. With a bitter grimace, he spat red into the dirt.

How long has he been kneeling here? Minutes? Hours? The words echoing over and over in his head pulled him away from his present reality, bringing him back to the blur that was the past two days.

(Three? He couldn’t be sure, time passes oddly in a prison cell.)

The servants whispering about a concubine being expelled from the harem, the handmaid being promoted to concubine suspiciously quickly, and sudden memories of too-loud rustling coming from the treeline that he’d foolishly brushed off. All of it culminated in the form of palace guards dragging him from his study all the way to the harem to throw him at the emperor’s feet.

“Could the street rat not keep his hands off the women of the court? Plenty to pick back where you came from.”

Keigo wanted to vomit at the cloying stench of sake, unpleasant memories rushing to the forefront of his mind and forcing his limbs to lock from age-old fear. Not like he could use them anyway, with heavy hands on each shoulder pinning his knees to the tatami and his blades having long been tossed away in the struggle to drag him here.

“Oh, my lord, haven’t you heard?” A sickeningly saccharine voice pulled the man’s attention away to coo at the woman curled into his side, cradling a bottle of warmed sake. “Apparently the small-time nobleman who adopted him, did it knowing he was the son of that criminal you were having trouble with all that time ago.”

The grip forcing his head down loosened from the resounding laughter that rippled around the room, just enough to allow Keigo to glare at the loose-lipped concubine. Your opportunistic maidservant who’d been all too willing to take your place in the harem, having taken her chance and fleeing with it. Her tittering giggles and power-drunk grin grated his ears, and he kept glaring. Daring her to look back, to look him in the eye without feeling an ounce of guilt for what she had done.

Almost as if she heard his furious challenge, she took a glance at the man pinned to the floor (trying to look down her nose like she had been looked down on. Pathetic fool.) only to jump at the righteous fury burning in his gaze, fear clouding her conscience for a precious moment.

More, Keigo urged, rage bitter on his tongue, Guilt, shame, despair, all of it.

I hope you regret this for the rest of your life. Lament, as punishment for ruining hers—

“Don’t assume what I have and haven’t heard, woman,” The drunkard grunted, holding his cup out for her to pour with shaking hands and a meek surrender, “But, the man was losing his mind from age. What was that fool thinking, taking a dirty brat like this in all those years ago? Too useless to bear a son nor keep a wife, so he had to stoop low enough to take in a criminal’s son from the slums.”

Righteous fury welled up in his chest, and his body moved before his brain could catch up, spit landing at the emperor’s feet. Almost immediately thereafter, his head whipped to the side, cheek smarting from the sharp strike the guard’s knuckles had indented into his swelling cheek. He grit his teeth as that same cheek came down on the tatami, someone pressing his head into the ground.

“Years upon years of trying to force yourself into nobility, and you’d think you’d learn some respect along the way.”

Had he not been the one with his face pressed into the ground, Keigo would’ve laughed at the shade of fury-red the man’s face was turning. Sake did not treat him well. The concubines at his side, fearing for their lives, immediately rushed to whisper soothing words and calming pleas. Somehow, it worked, and he reclined back into his seat with a heavy sigh, draining the sake in one gulp.

“The son of a criminal shall inevitably become a criminal. Now that I think about it, this is a wonderful opportunity to get rid of an eyesore. A grave in Kozukappara should suit him well.” A sadistic grin split his lips around the cup, chortling with laughter at his own (terrible) wit. “Being buried next to his criminal father! What a filial son!”

The table shook from the force of a fine porcelain cup slamming down on it, as if the emperor were stamping his death certificate right then and there.

(He was.)

“Get him out of my sight. The next time I want to see his head is on the gates of Kozukappara.”

Keigo the official had died in that room, and the man that was dragged out by his shoulders left the castle as a criminal.

“Done saying your prayers?”

Slowly, he looked up from the white paper fan set in front of him in place of the tantō that should’ve been there for his use (obligatory seppuku, his muddled brain supplied with annoyingly familiar haughtiness, so the ex-warrior could die a warrior. What a joke—) to the man he’d chosen to be his executioner. Normally, he would’ve snapped back with something witty, something sharp, but going days without water wasn’t treating him well. A heavy sigh, and the man ran a frustrated thumb down the bright blue wrap of his katana hilt.

“The concubine, of all women? An imperial concubine, at that. I’d expect you to know better than that, my friend.”

Ah, the static in his head was a little stronger today. Wonderful.

“I thought I knew better, too. At least I get to die to someone with a steady hand.”

He scoffed, thumb running over the blue hilt again. Keigo idly remembered seeing the man rub his burn-leathered skin the same way countless times, the anxious habit having stubbornly ingrained itself into his being since childhood.

“Must you be so dark?”

“When am I not?” He managed to muster up a slow grin. “I’m hurt, I thought my closest companion would’ve known this after years of keeping swords out of each other’s backs.”

The heavy gong announcing his execution sounded, and he watched his best friend’s melancholic gaze glaze over into soulless steel that mirrored the blade drawn from its hilt. Keigo dipped his head with a solemn smile and shut his eyes in resignation.

I really… should’ve known…

“Keigo!”

Everything paused for a breath, in shock at your shout breaking the stillness of the moment. He didn’t have to lift his head to know who was crying out, trying to delay the inevitable certainty. A sharp smile and an even sharper tongue reduced to nothing but cries and desperation.

“...I’ll continue.” The executioner ignored your desperate “No!” as he shifted his stance, scarred hands steady as he placed the blade against the back of his neck despite the pain Keigo knew he was in.

It would’ve been nice to hold you in his arms, at least once—

No, for eternity.

The blade came down and, like a lotus facing the sun in supplication, you screamed your despair into the heavens.

That day, the blood red sunset matched the crimson pooling on the execution ground’s floor.

【 ☀︎ 】

Dawn finds Private First Class Takami Keigo marching into a small city on the way to the front lines, rifle slung over his shoulder and feet aching.

They’ve been marching through the night, and for the first time in his life, he found himself grateful for Japan’s humid summer nights. He’d take sweat over losing toes from frostbite any day.

But, he decides, sighing in relief along with the rest of the company at the sight of a town once they crested the hill, there was nothing like the relief of a warm bed and any food other than the tasteless military rations.

“Tired already?” The low voice beside him would’ve made him jump had it not been so familiar.

“Aw, what’s this? Is Touya-kun worried for little old me?” Keigo shot a grin at the man marching next to him and dodged the elbow that he aimed at his side with a short laugh.

“A tired soldier is a dead soldier.” A pause, and the next response came backed with a dry laugh. “Not like it’d affect you and your monstrous instincts, anyway.”

“Yes, as we’ve been told a thousand times, General.” The teasing tilt to his voice came easy, and he let his best friend elbow him this time, too busy laughing at his annoyance.

Should he have been a little more worried of the captain catching him messing around? Yes, but he couldn’t be bothered to care. Judging by the restless shifting rippling through the soldiers, no one was too worried about getting a scolding when they were so close to a warm meal and rest.

“Think the inn will be big enough to house all of us? Another night sleeping on the floor doesn’t sound all that nice to me.”

Touya scoffed as if his question was the stupidest thing he’d heard all day, keeping his gaze straight as he adjusted the rifle on his shoulder, the company shifting around them into formation as they approached the gates.

“You’re complaining like it’s anything new to us.”

“Harsh.”

The conversation faded after that, the rough dirt under his boots soon transitioning into the packed earth of the town’s main street as residents gathered to whisper and gawk at the soldiers passing through, the sight of their uniforms a jarring eyesore in this sleepy town.

A sleepy, familiar town.

Keigo’s mind was spinning. His restless gaze kept flicking around the too-familiar buildings and shops and people that remained after all these years. The restaurant with the broken kitchen window that was too easy to sneak into, the grocer who still kept his trash bin too close to the alley, the old woman sitting in front of her izakaya who always had ginger candy and a meal to give.

They slowed to a stop in front of the large inn, and he stared up at the building that looked much smaller than he remembered, the interior much less grand than he’d imagined it to be as they filed their way in, and he found himself in the room he once dreamed of sleeping in. There, Keigo sat in near disbelief, on the futon that wasn’t as soft as he thought it would’ve been.

“How time flies, huh?” He looked up to see Touya dropping his pack next to his futon and sitting down across from him with a melancholy grin.

There was too much Keigo wanted to say, nostalgia bitter in the back of his throat, so he settled for a matching smile.

“Old Man Yasutaro never got around to fixing that boarded up window.”

Touya barked out a surprised laugh, Keigo’s smile widening into a self-satisfied grin.

“You ever think he did that on purpose? He always did stock too much food.”

“Are you kidding?” Keigo shuddered at the phantom pain of the beatings he earned. “He was scary whenever he caught us, there’s no way mean ol’ Yasutaro would do all that just for a pair of orphans on the street.”

“Mm, I don’t know, he was always pretty sweet to Granny Tamayo, so anything that made him look good in her book.” Touya leaned back on his arms, the melancholy melting into the ease of bittersweet nostalgia. It was easier to smile through the painful memories rather than dwell on the past, so Keigo let himself toss his head back with a laugh.

“God, her ginger candy was the best.”

“You sure it was the candy? Or the granddaughter who always snuck an extra piece to you?” That earned Touya a frustrated noise of protest and a half-hearted kick he dodged.

“That was ages ago!”

“And you still react like a little boy!”

Keigo groaned, burying his face into his hands as if that would tune out Touya’s cackling laughter. It was short moments like this that took the weight off his shoulders, the murmurs of public dissent, the leaked plans of a planned riot, the magnitude of his actions tomorrow morning.

(Civilians. Of all things, why did it have to be civilians?)

He suddenly pushed himself to his feet, the heavy weight having pushed itself back onto his shoulders and slotting the familiar hum of alertness back into place. Touya gave him a knowing look that he, decidedly, ignored in favor of getting out before his mind swallowed him whole.

“Dinner is supposed to be in a bit, we should get going.”

“Wonderful job of changing the subject, really.”

“Wonderful job of being annoying.”

Touya dodged another swipe of the leg, laughing at his displeasure as he stood to follow.

“Why thank you, I try.” His grin widened with a certain glint in his eye that Keigo found himself dreading. “Now let’s get going, I heard some of the guys are at Granny Tamayo’s izakaya.”

“What?”

“My, isn’t that little Keigo? And little Touya?”

Keigo faltered halfway through the entrance, smoothing his grimace into a smile as he watched the old lady totter over from her seat with all the coddling of a grandmother. The soldiers within earshot (who were already drinking and eating away. It was barely sunset—) paused to gawk and grin at the endearing interaction.

“Not so little anymore, Granny.”

“I’ll say. Are you eating alright? Is the military treating you well?”

“Granny!”

“What’s this? Speedy and Torchface have some history here?” Keigo kept his smile smooth, only shifting it just the slightest bit into what he knew would look like a sheepish grin instead of the pained grimace underneath the surface. Boisterous laughter that only alcohol could bring rippled around the spacious izakaya, the men cracking jokes over drinks and food.

“Careful calling him Torchface, he has the temper to match.”

Ah, there it is. Touya shouldered past him to stalk towards the offending table with a scarily wide grin, pulling the loose-lipped rookie into a chokehold, his wide grin unmoving.

“‘Has a temper’ my ass, you’re just jealous that a guy with a bunch of burn scars has an easier time with women than you idiots.”

The laughter only grew louder, Granny Tamayo’s expression softening at the interaction before turning back to Keigo with a nostalgic smile.

“Not so little… I see.” She motioned to the table Touya had made a space for himself at, shoving the rookie (who was still in a chokehold, poor kid) aside to make room for him. “Take a seat, dear, and the drinks will be right out.”

The too-loud laughter and incessantly clinking glasses filled the space up with ear-grating noise, and Keigo wanted to leave. Search for peace and solitude in the quiet streets in a way that was strangely familiar.

(For a fleeting moment, he thought a quiet garden would be nice.)

However, he’d rather eat with the company of drunks rather than the void of his own mind and the horrors silence tended to bring, so the migraine starting to brew in the back of his head was a small price to pay. As was the heavy arm slung over his shoulder from some random soldier, alcohol-loosened and heavy, and the awkward conversation he found himself following along with perfectly tailored humor.

“Alright, I have two beers as well as a few rounds of edamame and—”

The familiar voice stopped short, and Keigo felt his heart stop in tandem. Slowly, he looked up and saw the girl who used to sneak out an extra candy when her grandmother wasn’t looking, now a woman in the izakaya uniform balancing trays in one hand and two mugs in the other.

“...Keigo?”

Almost as if the locked gates had been thrown open, a new rush of memories past had overcome him. Jaunts through the town disguised as adventures, clumsily dancing around an old gramophone and calling it a waltz, and the start of blossoming love. Keigo simply smiled, easygoing and familiar, like it hadn’t been years since you saw him run to the military with Touya the first chance they had, drawn by the promise of food and shelter. Like he hadn’t left a malnourished boy and come back a man with more scars than skin.

“It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

“‘Been a while.’” You rolled your eyes, setting down the mug in front of him with a huff. “The two most important people in my life run off to join the army without so much as a word, and that’s what you say?”

His words stopped halfway up his throat the moment he saw Granny Tamayo come up behind you to pinch you on the arm, the half-formed response morphing into a laugh as he watched you flinch back with a surprised (and betrayed) yelp.

“Y/N, darling, don’t be rude to the customers.” You pouted, rubbing at the sore spot on your upper arm.

“Yes, Grandmother.”

“It’s fine, Granny. Nothing new, right?” At the sight of his cheeky smile, the old woman scoffs, something endearing, before nudging him out of his seat despite your noise of protest.

“Well, since you two seem to be talking of nothing but the past, why don’t you go take a walk down memory lane?”

“Wha— Grandmother! There’s still customers—”

“Kaede can handle it just fine! Shoo, shoo, get out of my hair.”

Without missing a beat, Granny Tamayo smoothly plucked the trays from your hands and nudged you two towards the door as the soldiers watching roared with laughter and cooed jokes at the two “childhood lovers”. Keigo turned towards Touya, almost desperately, in a futile search for— what? Escape? Wasn’t he looking for escape in the first place?

“Wait, Granny, come on. Touya’s part of this too, isn’t he?”

“Don’t drag me into this, a trip down memory lane isn’t for me!” With an arm still slung over the now-wheezing rookie’s shoulder, Touya raised the cup of sake he’d ordered as if in toast. Whether it was to Keigo’s mortification, or to the potential opportunities this meant, Keigo didn’t want to know.

Probably both.

(...Probably the former, if he were to be honest with himself.)

A flurry of drunken laughter and lighthearted jokes, half-hearted protests that fell on deaf ears, and insistent pushing at his back later, he found himself standing outside the izakaya, blinking up at the full moon before looking over at you.

“...Did we just get kicked out?”

“I think we did.” You snorted, scuffing a mark into the dirt path with your heel, and Keigo wanted the earth to crack open and swallow him whole. What was he supposed to do? Stuck with the remnants of a rekindling love, the awkwardness that tended to come with years of estrangement and words that failed him when it came to you.

Well, there’s really only one thing he could do.

Talk.

“So, what’s new with you?” He immediately cringed at his choice of words, forcing himself to school his expression over into an easygoing smile instead of recoiling like he so desperately wanted to do.

Nice going there, Keigo, really.

“...Same old.” Your quiet answer snapped him out of his thoughts, and he tilted his head, almost like he was beckoning you to continue. “Same old town, same old job, same old life. I pretty much walked the path everyone knew I was going to go on as the granddaughter of the izakaya’s owner.”

You looked up with a sheepish grin, the bright moonlight casting the world (and you) in a silver glow, and Keigo felt his heart leap into his throat.

“Not the most exciting to a man from the military, huh?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say I’ve seen a lot—” Keigo rubbed at the identification tag hidden under his clothes by force of habit, the leather cord heavy around his neck. He has seen a lot. Too much, to be exact, but how would he even begin to explain the horrors of man to someone… “normal”? How could he?

For someone whose wit and silver tongue helped him survive all these years, he was awfully tongue-tied tonight. Or maybe it was just you, and the surreal lightness settling into his soul that had him stumbling over his words.

“But you’ve seen enough?” You finished his sentence with a wry grin, and the surprised laugh found itself past his lips before he could catch it. How could he forget? You were always, always a step ahead of him. Back then and even now.

“Enough of my barracks and Touya’s face? Yeah, definitely.” You swatted his arm with a huff, and the familiar action made the next laugh come a little easier, his chest a little lighter as the awkwardness slowly dissipated into something… comfortable. Normal.

“You know that’s not what I meant!”

“Well, that’s your answer, Y/N. Don’t know what else to tell you,” He shrugged in mock ignorance, and you groaned, going back to worrying at the deepening scuff in the dirt.

“What, so, we both had boring lives?”

Far from boring.

“...Yeah, I guess so.”

You pursed your lips and stared out at the quiet street, the beat of silence almost bordering on awkward by the time you broke it with a resolute sigh, starting to walk forward into the moonlight.

“Well, I guess we’ll have to make up for it somehow.”

“And how would you do that?”

“By going back to when life wasn’t so boring,” You hummed, spinning to face him and grandly spreading your arms, as if you were presenting the lantern-lit street to him, “C’mon! Tonight, this main street is memory lane!”

“Aren’t you taking me out of town at one point, though?”

“Oh, hush. Are you coming or not?”

“I’m coming, coming.”

Oh, your smile was radiant, and Keigo had to force himself to keep moving instead of gaping like a fool.

(Was it possible for him to make you smile like that all the time?)

For the next hour, time seemed to stop. The moon stood frozen in the sparkling sky, watching two star-crossed lovers go around town, laughing and reminiscing on what could’ve been. What could be, if Keigo were to be bold. You took him down Main Street as promised, and he found it hard to relate to the memories you spoke of, associating each store with scornful stares and pitiful ignorance. Eventually, you two looped around to the outskirts of town. To the river that looked more like a creek now, and the quaint houses and maze of alleyways. To familiarity.

He smiles as he watches you skip rocks in the creek, laughs when you wrinkle your nose at the dog that always seems to only bark when you two pass by Old Man Yasutaro’s gate, and revels in the memories.

“You still suck!”

“Hey! It’s not like we skip rocks all the time in the military.”

You merely rolled your eyes and continued to skip ahead, the slow and awkward trudge from before revived into the enthusiastic step he remembered, fueled by the joys of nostalgia and escape.

This, Keigo realizes, is nostalgia.

Not the pain of remembering a past he wanted to forget, not looking at alleyways to remember what used to be his childhood, not thinking of the shops as someplace otherworldly. Rather, it was this. The joy of reminiscing on good times. The joy of breathing new life into old memories.

The joy he now knew was to be found in you.

“Hey.” Your voice pulled him from his thoughts, and he looked up to see you grinning, the moonlight illuminating something akin to mischief in your eyes. “Remember that old gramophone we could never figure out when we were little?”

“You mean you could never figure out. I didn’t want to touch it because Granny Tamayo is a scary, scary woman.”

And a dirty street orphan’s hands had no place on such an expensive thing.

You rolled your eyes and he chuckled, following along anyway as you set off down the path with a new purpose. The route was familiar, and Keigo already had an idea of where this was going, but who was he to speak when you were nearly buzzing with excitement?

“What I mean to say is: I figured it out, so—” You spun in place again, taking his hand, and his heart damn near stopped, “—would you like this dance? To some actual music, this time.”

“Shouldn’t I be saying that to you? A proper lady needs the proper etiquette, after all.” His cheeky grin betrayed the politeness of his words, and you scoffed, tugging him along.

“Like you would ask me first.” Keigo’s tongue stalled around a response, scrambling for a proper comeback because you were right. Deep down, he knew that he still never would’ve asked you first for anything. It wasn’t his place. First, as a kid on the street compared to the granddaughter of the izakaya owner. Now, as a man with blood on his hands compared to an innocent civilian, untainted by the shadows of war.

Who was he to ask anything from a normal person?

“Lead the way, then.”

There was that radiant grin again, brimming with excitement and sending him reeling. Keigo couldn’t help but let your enthusiasm rub off on him as he followed you to the little communal courtyard behind Granny Tamayo’s home, where he knew that she liked to keep that Western gramophone to play for guests. You broke away to go and try and work the old machine, mumbling to yourself as you fiddled with the knobs and rifled through the records filed away in the ornate cabinet it was sitting on.

He took the chance to look around the empty courtyard, struck with the realization that it hadn’t changed at all in the years he was gone. He left all those years ago, only to return to a town that seemed almost frozen in time. It was too far from the cities for all the modern inventions to catch up with it, so the only things that changed were, well, the people. Keigo most of all. What if he hadn’t—

The sudden burst of music and your shout of victory cut off his wandering train of thought, and you walked back into his line of vision with a triumphant grin.

“I still don’t know how to fix the tempo, so the song’s a little slow. You’ll have to forgive me for that.” You offered up your hand and tilted your head, still smiling. “May I have this dance?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?”

“Like you’d ask me first.”

【 ☀︎ 】

Keigo grinned in well-earned defeat, and his hand slipped into yours with the other on your waist. The music swelled, and he took the first step.

One, two, three, one, two, three…

With too-slow, clumsy steps, the two of you slowly began waltzing your way around the small courtyard. You still kind of didn’t know how to work the gramophone—the song almost eerily slow, despite the years of fiddling—but that didn’t matter in the face of the giddy smiles shared, your soft laughs when he spun you in a flash of spontaneity, and the nostalgia of old times.

Before, he was a scrawny kid on the street who clumsily tried to follow the steps of the pretty girl playing a song on her father’s gramophone. Tomorrow, he would be Private First Class Takami Keigo, fighting for his life on the battlefield. Tonight, he would be normal again, slow dancing to Clair de Lune playing off an old, off-beat gramophone with you in his arms, mourning a start he didn’t get to have.

(As normal as a kid scrounging for scraps on the street could’ve been.)

Your voice, soft and wavering, broke the stillness of the moment, as if it were something taboo that shouldn’t have been uttered into existence at all.

“Keigo?”

“Yes, beautiful?”

You flushed at the endearment, the next words shattering his illusion of happiness within nostalgia with the renewed vigor of confidence in the face of the impossible.

“Will you come home?”

Home.

A simple word, really. And yet it dropped like a stone in his chest. Home meant a roof over his head. Home meant warm food on the table. Home meant a simple life in a sleepy rural town. Home meant the promise of a new beginning.

To you, “home” probably meant nothing more than the place you had known all your life.

To him, “home” meant you.

So, like a dreamer in love, he answered with all the confidence of a fool.

“Yeah... I will. I don’t care how long it’ll take me, but I’ll come home.”

He thought the shaky lilt to his voice would’ve given him away, or the way his step faltered in the already clumsy waltz as if trying to step around what he knew should’ve been the answer.

Instead, you laughed. Something soft, and let him spin you once more.

“Well, I’ve already waited a couple years, what’s a little more waiting?”

Keigo had to keep himself from double checking if this was real. Dancing with you in the moonlight as he tried to step around the reality of that answer with all the awkward grace of a scared child.

One, two, three, one, two, three…

Truth be told, the both of you knew the answer long before you had pushed the question into desperate existence, searching for a shred of hope. That his simple answer should have been an realistic “I don’t know” or a pessimistic “no promises”, instead of a foolish “yes.”

Instead, he slowed the waltz to a sway, pulling you close to both ingrain the feeling of you into his soul and to hopefully hide the resigned melancholy of a soldier being carted off to uncertainty.

And, for a traitorous moment, Keigo wondered.

Dreamed, even.

What would it have been like to have a “normal” life? Instead of grasping the hand of desperation, would he have grown out of the side alleys and homes made of boxes into a “respectable” man? Maybe he could’ve gotten a job at the grocer’s, at Old Yasutaro’s restaurant, or maybe even Granny Tamayo’s izakaya. Could he have—he pulled you closer, pressing a ghost of a kiss to your temple—could he have courted you the “right” way? Brought you flowers and honey-sweet words of praise and promises of a happy future, instead of a single night dancing in the moonlight with a brittle promise hanging in the tense air that the both of you clung onto like a lifeline. A promise that Keigo wasn’t even sure he could fulfill.

He would later come to regret this single moment. Of this, he was sure.

(But, as you lifted your head from his chest with glassy eyes and a shaky smile, he knew he wasn’t alone in this regret.)

Keigo knew the words that you wished to let fall into the night air, in hopes of making that brittle promise tangible. Of giving life to a bright future with three little words. The reality crawled up his throat like poison, bitter and cloying, something that he knew shouldn’t be said. Keigo settled for gently wrapping his hand around your head to pull you closer, filtering the harsh truth into something a little softer, the bittersweet tone marking the unspoken truth as a reality instead of the dreams of a future.

One… two… three…

“Don’t,” He muttered, heart tightening as he felt you go rigid in his arms, “I know. Please, God, I know—”

You slowly relaxed in his arms with all the bitter acceptance of a night before battle, and he murmured the next words into another ghost of a kiss. A whisper against your lips, seen only by the fading notes of a song in the moonlight.

“—but don’t.”

【 ☀︎ 】

Keigo’s breath was rattling, ears ringing with war cries, death wails, and everything in between. The once-blue noon sky was now a startling haze of ash gray, thick with the choking scent of the world burning.

He couldn’t even tell where the carnage started or ended anymore.

(Would it ever end?)

How long has it been since the first shot?

(Too long.)

Would he live to see the sunset?

(Of all times to worry about this, why now?)

The incessant drill of artillery fire was nothing new to him, as was the stench of the battlefield that could only be described as death. What was new, was something that pushed his aching body to keep moving, the autopilot state he usually entered backed with something raw. Something like fear.

Something like the will to survive.

The pain that set his nerves on fire has long since faded, all the pain of countless wounds blending together into something numbed by the adrenaline of survival. Were the wet patches on his uniform sweat? Blood? Both? He couldn’t tell anymore, all he knew was survival and the persistent voice whispering deadly distraction in the back of his mind.

Civilians. You’re fighting civilians, you mur—

The skin of his back prickled, the telltale whistling of something flying screeched in his ears, and his reflexes yanked him to dive out of the way before his mind could catch up. Not even a second later, another explosive detonated behind him and heat blazed across his back. His nerves screamed fresh pain into his senses and he grit his teeth, ignoring the concerning sound of sizzling over the ringing in his ears in favor of ducking into cover, collapsing against the wall of a destroyed building.

Since when did regular people know how to make bombs?!

In the next breath, someone else had ducked into the small shelter he’d found in this hellscape of a city.

Well, the remains of one. All hell broke loose once the other side brought homemade explosives into the fray and now, as he stared at the burning and destruction, Keigo wondered if those Westerners who muttered meaningless blessings whenever they passed were right.

If this “Hell” they spoke of really was on Earth.

He turned his head, suddenly sluggish, to the man that had joined him in the makeshift cover, and grinned at the familiar face.

“Hey, man.”

(Maybe giving his body a chance to slow down was a mistake.)

Touya ignored his exhausted greeting, instead opting to yank a rag from his pouch as he pulled Keigo to sit up so he could press the rag into the deep gashes the shrapnel had gouged into his back. Keigo immediately groaned in protest at the stinging pain, despite how necessary he knew it was.

“Fucking— how did you even survive that?”

“Dunno,” He let out a weak laugh, “Don’t think I will—”

“Finish that sentence and I’ll kill you myself.” Despite his harsh threat, Touya pressed the slowly darkening rag deeper into his wound. A desperate (futile) attempt to stop the life pooling onto the floor underneath them, steadily flowing from the deep gashes in his back and all the other wounds peppering his body.

“Isn’t that the exact opposite—” He hissed in pain at the pressure on his wounds, “—of what you want?”

“Shut up.”

“You know you don’t want me doing that.”

(He was right. Keigo running his mouth meant that he was breathing. Meant that he was alive.)

Touya pressed his lips into a thin line, Keigo blearily tracking the way his burn scars pulled with the movement.

Grounding himself, that’s what he’s supposed to do during times like this, right? Hell, he didn’t know. Not every day he came so close to death. Touya really needed to look into something for those sc—

“For the love of the gods, I am begging you to shut up.”

Ah, he said all that out loud? He managed to muster up a sheepish grin, despite Touya’s grim expression.

“Ooh, Touya? Begging? That’s a first, I should stay awake to hear it.” Keigo didn’t have to look to know that the rag was soaked through and Touya was fighting against the inevitable at this point. Keigo? He… he was too tired to fight to keep his eyes open. Too cold.

“Maybe you should stay awake to go home, loverboy.”

“I should.” He fumbled to find purchase, pressing his palm into the ground and scooting his feet closer for leverage. “Can’t leave Y/N waiting after all.”

Maybe it was the delirium from the blood-loss, or the desperation of this cursed situation, but Keigo tried to pull himself up. To move, to get somewhere safer, somewhere where he could survive. His palm slipped on the blood-slick floor underneath him and he came crashing down once more, his strength disappearing along with it as he slumped against Touya.

“Ah—”

“Shit, I’ll get you to the medic.”

Keigo groaned at the pain of his wounds being jostled as Touya tried to haul the deadweight of his sluggish body up. The reality of the situation weighed heavy on his shoulders (or was it his strength leaving him?) and he licked his chapped lips, whispering the grim truth into the ash-hazy air.

“I’m not gonna make it to the medic.”

“How many times do I have to keep telling you to shut up?” Another attempt to pull him to his feet, and Keigo managed to push out a weak laugh.

“Just a couple more times.”

“Hey… hey, c’mon now, I still have to make fun of you and Y/N for being the most disgusting couple I’ve ever met.” He carefully shook Keigo, trying desperately to get him to keep his drooping eyes open.

“Aw, don’t tease Y/N too badly.”

Something changed in Touya’s voice, a block in his throat that he had to force his words through, and he clutched the dripping rag closer to his wounds as he muttered out his response.

“I won’t.”

“Good, good,” Keigo’s hands clumsily fumbled for the cord wrapped over his chest, tugging at it until it came loose. “Hey, can you tell Y/N that I’ll do my best to come home? In any way I can.”

“...Just do it yourself.”

“Mm, that would… that would be nice. Coming home, I mean. I promised… Y/N… I would…”

His words faded, and Touya froze, arms suspended in midair around the slumped form of his best friend, his stunned gaze locked on the identification tag hanging from a limp, bloody hand.

“Kei...go?”

【 ☀︎ 】

Waiting was agony.

You used to think you were a patient person, years of dealing with drunks, horrible customers, and everything in between training the patience of a saint into you.

Today, however, revealed that you were anything but. The moment the company had crested the hill and out of sight, your anxieties slowly overcame you the farther they went. Working in the izakaya helped, the constant flow of customers and orders kept you on your feet and your thoughts off the battle that was no doubt waging mere miles away. Every so often, a wandering patron would come in murmuring that they heard bits and pieces of the battle, and you forced yourself to forget again.

All that effort was lost once the company’s runner came barreling through the town, shouting that the soldiers were on their way back. That they needed spaces cleared for the wounded and their lodgings secured. They called for the doctor, they called for food, they called for supplies.

If you didn’t know any better, it would’ve sounded like a cry for help.

Word spread like wildfire, and the rush of serving customers turned into the rush of trying to help prepare for the soldiers’ return. None of it helped get your mind off the one thing you didn’t want to worry about. If anything, it just shoved all your worries to the forefront of your mind, accompanied by the dull headaches of something you hoped were just random fantasies.

(Fantasies of a lotus garden, a guarded grin, a red hairpin, a betrayal—)

Would he have to be wrapped in the bandages you were carrying? Would he have to rest in the bedding in your hands? Would he be able to eat the food your grandmother was preparing?

Then, they came.

A slow straggle of wounded and weary men, leaning and limping on each other as they slowly trickled in through the main street.

There were many things that wouldn’t happen, you would later realize, watching the company trudge back into the town. Their formation was shaky from the hobbling wounded, and you felt your heart drop as you desperately searched the noticeably thinner crowd, trying to peek through the uniforms and bandages and dented helmets for any sign that he had come home. That he had survived.

How many men did they lose?

(Too many.)

You watched the flow of soldiers slowly follow their commander to their lodgings and the doctor, the once boisterous crowd now silent and battle-worn. The rookie that had just been under a chokehold the other night was now cradling bandaged wounds and a gaunt expression that only told of his first brushes with death.

One soldier broke from the crowd to make his way towards you, and—for a fleeting moment—you hoped.

And just as quickly as it came, that hope you had soon sunk into despair once you saw who it was, and what he held in his scarred hands.

Across the street, a man broke rank, with a heavier burden than most would’ve thought and few would ever experience. He hoped that no one would have to experience this, a death and the task of delivering such news weighing heavy on his shoulders.

Life, Touya thinks, is cruel.

It left such a brilliant mind like Keigo to starve with him on the streets.

It forced him to run to the military in desperation, searching for steady food and shelter.

It snatched away the one man who had salvation waiting for him.

Death, Touya grieves, is even crueler.

Keigo would never get to go home.

He wouldn’t get to see the joy on your face once you welcomed him home with open arms.

(How could he? When your expression twists into something akin to dawning horror instead of joy, watching Touya make his way up to you with downcast eyes and a heavy bundle of fabric carefully cradled in his palm.)

He wouldn’t get to start the new life he deserved, in a sleepy rural town with the one he adored.

He wouldn’t get to fulfill his promise to you.

A promise that everyone knew was too risky a promise to make. Yet, he believed enough to make it to you.

A promise that Touya holds back on his tongue because he knew this—a little metal disc on a bloodstained cord—wouldn’t fulfill it, not when he hands you the neat square of scrap fabric and watches your tears flow before you even open it. Not when you slip out a worn identification tag, holding it up to the sunset to try and make out the letters you already knew were there.

A lantern illuminates what the fading sunlight could not, casting the stamped characters of Keigo’s bloodied name in an amber glow, and you crumble.

【 ☀︎ 】

Dawn finds Professor Takami, Head of the Sociology Department, first through the doors of the campus café with essays to be finished grading in one hand and his laptop bag in the other.

The cashier greets him with a familiar warmth as he steps up to the counter, his staple order already halfway punched into the register with a knowing smile that he forces himself to return. There’s a nervous energy simmering under his skin that he can’t seem to shake, and it shows. The barista (Touya. His name is Touya. He literally has one of the guy’s essays in his hand, fucking hell. Get it together, Keigo) shoots the normally easygoing professor a worried look as he slides the warmed pastry across the counter to him, the full sleeves of swirling blue and black ink a stark contrast against the smooth wood of the counter.

“Everything good with you, Professor?”

“Perfect, now that I got my pastry. Think I’ll be even better once I drink some coffee.”

Nothing was perfect, and he couldn’t even put a finger on what it was.

He plastered a convincing smile on his face as he picked up the too-heavy plate, careful to hold it steady before making a beeline for his usual table. The faster he got to sit down at his usual corner booth and sort himself out, the better.

He knew that he would just drown himself in grading papers instead of figuring out what was making him feel off, but it was the thought that counted.

The hum of energy under his skin was nothing new to him. Something deep inside that made him almost jumpy, wary of the peaceful days that had consumed his entire life, lying in wait for… something. For what? Keigo wished he knew.

(For battles yet started, for warcries yet sung, for survival yet fought for.)

All he knew was that the strange hum that threatened to vibrate him out of his own skin was different this time. Wrong. It didn’t help that his sleep had been suffering for the past week, plagued by dreams and nightmares both of eras past, the blurry picture of the same person a constant sight in the swirling mix of history. Images flickering between a secluded lotus garden and an elaborate kimono to an old izakaya and Clair de Lune at moonrise. Images of yearning and blood and tragedy and endings before the beginnings.

At least his conversations with the once-intimidating Japanese Literature professor got a smidge more interesting.

With the resolute click of a red pen, he swept away the thoughts clouding his mind as he resigned himself to his fate of just dealing with the strange mood for now, fully intent on getting to work. Years of repetition and muscle memory had him opening up his email with practiced ease, quietly sighing to himself as he waited for the doubtlessly endless emails from students and colleagues alike to load.

Would procrastinating just the tiniest bit by fiddling with the rolled cuffs of his sleeves or pushing up his glasses for the nth time help at all?

No, but it let Keigo expel the weirdly restless energy in what ways he could, the creeping sense of foreboding setting his nerves into overdrive. The page loaded and he frowned at the onslaught of emails he knew were going to flood his inbox.

Hell, he expected them to.

What he didn’t expect were the contents, the subject lines all variations of “Did you know?” and “There’s no way” and “I can’t believe it” from colleagues he didn’t even talk to regularly. Sure, the email from the cultural anthropology professor made sense, but the graphic design professor? The head of the business department?

Before he could open the first email of many, his laptop chirped out the familiar ‘ding!’ of a new email, the sound rippling through the café as everyone’s phones and laptops lit up with the same message.

A schoolwide email? Okay, th—

The world slowed to a crawl, everyone in the packed coffee shop silencing almost at once and the shocked whispers rippling throughout the space only serving to make the silence all the more deafening (“Hey, check your email.” and “Look at this.” and “No way.” and it was too loud someone please make it stop—), his ears near ringing as he struggled to tear his gaze away from the picture embedded at the top of the page.

“Looking a little rough there.” The cotton suddenly stuffing his ears muffled the barista’s voice and would’ve made him jump out of his skin had he been focused on anything but burning the email into his eyes. God, he’d barely even registered the guy coming up to serve his coffee, what was wrong with him? “Professor? Was it that email?”

“Y-Yeah, I just read it.” He cleared his throat and slid the mug closer to himself, taking a sip of the scalding hot coffee to ground himself as he stared at the picture of you.

The barista merely arched a pierced brow and muttered a soft “ah.” before going back to his spot behind the espresso machine, vibrant blue eyes tracking the rattled professor suspiciously. Keigo was too preoccupied to thank him as he usually would’ve. Too preoccupied with what was staring back at him from his laptop screen.

A picture placed right under the subject line plastering “Unfortunate news about Prof. L/N Y/N” across his screen, the few words in the body text (that he could pick out through the sudden tidal wave of memories past clicking into place) painted an image that he couldn’t help but mourn.

After being reported missing… remains found… will be missed.

Will be missed…

Well, now that he thought about it, Keigo had been missing you all his life, hadn’t he?

Both figuratively and literally, always arriving after you left and vice versa, never really seeming to connect in person. Any emails were shrouded with a veil of professionalism that he couldn’t pierce through. Yet, there were things so irrevocably you that he knew to pick out now. The jovial note at the end of your emails, the unapologetically confident sharpness to your words, the extra mug you left for the next person that passed through the faculty lounge (that somehow always ended up being him on the days he was rushing to his next lecture).

All these things, all these moments, and the fool had passed all of them by.

The restless energy humming under his skin through his entire being disappeared much quicker than it had come, its job done, leaving a gaping void in its wake that was shockingly familiar. Almost as if this wasn’t the first time this had happened, where the curtains never raised on the beginning you two could’ve had. He took a shuddering, stabilizing breath (that didn’t work), too numb to feel the freshly brewed coffee scalding his tongue that he had hoped would pull him back to reality, hoped the sweet taste would wash away the bitterness at the back of his throat and the splitting headache of years upon years of memories crashing into him like a tidal wave.

Professor Takami had work to get done.

Keigo could mourn later.

Even as he convinced himself of that, he couldn’t even bring himself to brush the dead lotus petals off his work, the sight of the wilted centerpiece only bringing more pain. The cruel coincidence of the once bloomed flowers now dead in his hands didn’t go unnoticed, and Keigo desperately tried to bore the printed words laid in front of him into his mind.

As if doing that would sear away the sudden onslaught of memories, dead lotus petals igniting a yearning for a long-demolished lotus garden and a pretty concubine who didn’t belong in the palace (or was it a small town and the life he could’ve had?) and the love that slipped through his fingers once more.

Did you go through this too? When he—

The half-graded essays lay untouched for the rest of the day, red ink disappearing in the crimson light cast by the setting sun.

【 ☀︎ 】

When did I…?

He blinked down at the concrete under his feet, stunned, before looking up to see an endless sea of trains passing in front of him. The incessant rushing of the trains around him had replaced the silence of the hotel room he was supposed to be sound asleep in, the too-rhythmic noise of the train tracks surrounding him in an almost ethereal white noise.

I had just gone to bed… How did I end up at a train station?

He winced at the glare of the midday sun reflecting off of the last car of the train passing in front of him, before stopping short at the sight of someone standing on the other side of the tracks—alone—revealed by the passing train. His heart leapt into his throat and pushed a name he didn’t know and wouldn’t remember out of his lips. There was no way he knew her, the multi-layered kimono and elegant hairpins looked like something out of a millenia-old ukiyo-e print and wholly out of place in a modern train station. But... something deep in his soul knew that it was right, and it sang as he watched the woman turn around.

“You’re dreaming right now, Keigo. Go back to sleep,”

“What…?”

“It’s true,” The woman tilted her head with the soft smile that he’d missed so much (missed? Wasn’t this his first time seeing it?) and the ancient hairpieces jingled and swayed with the movement, his gaze locking on a familiar crimson gemstone catching the sunlight, “Don’t believe me? Try to count some numbers, then. One… two…”

Another train hurtled past, blocking his view once more as her painted lips moved soundlessly around the final number.

“Three.”

Keigo sat up with a gasp, staring at the soft shafts of light the sunrise painted on the walls.

It was the start of a new day, and he found himself mourning something lost that he couldn’t even remember.

Dawn finds Hawks, the number two hero, leaping out of his Tokyo hotel window, wind catching on vermilion wings to buffer his descent to the sidewalk.

He was far from home, his current mission dragging him all the way to Tokyo from his agency in Fukuoka. Sneakers touched concrete, and he started down the path where he was supposed to meet with the last person he wanted to see right now. Especially after that mess with the High-End Nomu. He shuddered, spreading his wings as if to remind himself that they were all there, recovered after that hellish fight.

Come to the location on foot, he’d been told, and don’t be conspicuous.

Weird request, and it was kind of hard to remain inconspicuous when he was the number two hero and had a pair of bright red wings announcing his identity to the world. Alas, he needed to cooperate or else he’d end up jeopardizing the entire mission, so Keigo settled for ditching his hero costume in favor of casual clothes and a cap to hide his identity. He pulled a mask over his nose and tucked his wings closer to further help conceal himself as he walked down the street, dipping into the first alley he saw.

His path through the grid of alleyways and side streets had already been mapped out the days before, so it was just a matter of making the short trek there. Unfortunately, the area wasn’t the best, and Keigo found himself slowed by sidestepping trash and the occasional bottle of liquor. The scent of stale alcohol only brought unpleasant fragments of memories, and he pushed them aside in favor of quickening his pace.

“My, not every day I see such a bigshot hero pass by.”

He almost tripped over another bottle, wings ruffling in surprise as he cursed himself for being caught off guard.

There was an old woman sitting there, a steaming cup of tea in her hands as she sat outside her quaint little storefront.

A flower shop, in this secluded side street?

“Ah, sorry, ma’am, you have the wrong person. I mean, me? The number 2 pro hero?” He was quick to deny her, sheepishly scratching the back of his neck. She merely hummed and took another sip of her tea.

“Do I? Well, this old woman’s eyes aren’t what they used to be after all.” She set down the cup and stepped out of her chair, shuffling over to the water feature on the other side of the doorway that served as an attraction. He could see why, the soft rush of the small waterfall and fragrant lotuses drawing his attention the more he stared.

Suddenly, the woman plucked one of the younger lotuses, patting the stem dry before handing it to him with a smile.

“Uh—”

“You saved my son that day, from the Nomu attack in Fukuoka. This is the least I could do.”

Against his better judgement—he really needed to get going to catch the train in time—he took the half-bloomed lotus in his hands and pulled down his mask to smile at her.

“Your eyes are… actually pretty sharp, ma’am. Thank you.”

She laughed, sitting back in her seat and sent him on his way. The rest of the walk went smoothly after that, and he soon found himself jogging up the stairs to the station, muttering under his breath as he checked his watch.

Right on time.

【 ☀︎ 】

A strange sense of deja vu creeped into his chest as he stepped onto the platform in Minami-senju station. He’d been feeling off all day, and the weird sense of familiarity that had been tugging at the back of his mind didn’t help. Luckily, he’d managed to arrive in time to catch the noon train so the rest of his schedule should hopefully go smoothly from here. A departing train screeched into motion, and he winced at the rippling glare of sunlight that reflected into his eyes, the strange deja vu rearing its head again.

Keigo stared at the train passing in front of him as he idly twirled the lotus stem in between his fingers. The words left his lips before he could catch himself.

“One… two…” He cut himself off with a sigh, dropping his head and dragging a hand over his face.

It was ridiculous. He was being ridiculous.

Keigo.

His head shot up at the sound of his name, the world darkening under the shade of a passing cloud. Did he just imagine that? He had to. The train station was practically stranded, and there was no one even close enough to call his name without shouting across the station (if they even knew his name in the first place). Despite his better judgement, he wet his lips and shut his eyes, the strangely familiar words passing his lips once more as he desperately tried to recall the familiarity he longed for.

“One…”

I want to see you.

“Two…”

I don’t even know who you are, but I miss you anyway.

“Three—”

Suddenly, the steady rhythm of the train tracks silenced and left him with the raging drum of his heartbeat, the blood rushing in his ears as he stared at the person standing on the other side of the tracks. The emerging sun smiled upon him, casting the world in light once more as his voice locked around a familiar name he’d never spoken.

It started as a hushed whisper, and he swallowed the lump in his throat to call the name thrice ingrained into his soul.

“Y/N!”

The familiar smile that bloomed across your lips was answer enough as he pushed through the newly arrived train to the other side, to you. He reached out, clawing through the rush hour crowd (why were there so many people? Why were you so far? Closer, closer, closer—) and he nearly sobbed in relief as you fell into his arms, clinging to each other as your souls finally, finally, melded together as one. Now and forevermore.

The questions could come later, but now... he had a promise to fulfill.

He was home.

notes: minami-senju train station is located in very close proximity (a two-minute walk) from what is left of the kozukappara execution grounds, where a temple now stands in its place. he’s made quite the journey to come full circle, hasn’t he?

#takami keigo x reader #keigo takami x reader #keigo x reader #hawks x reader #bnha oneshot #hawks x reader angst #mha oneshot #bnha reader insert #mha reader insert #reincarnation au #from the typewriter #pocuties #cw death #tw death #cw blood #tw blood #cw war #tw war #if you'd like me to add a warning please let me know!

471 notes · View notes

trashcanfanfics · 3 years

Note

since we know that in the 'Val's favourite actor' series, Vox has pretty harsh feelings towards the reader. (and at least in my mind they still work at the studio) what if, one day val was busy and so he let Vox control what happens at the studio. Reader originally was supposed to have the day off or something but Vox made them work in a pretty intense scene. Val comes back only to find reader brusied from the scene and obviously asks what happened and they explain, val gets angry at Vox, you decide what happens next (sorry this was so goddamm long)

I love it when people give me details!! We can make this a precursor for the confession because shortly after that, Val made Babycakes (the nickname I'm using specifically for the fav actor series) the Studios' co-owner.

Valentino had to meet up with a potential employee so he had left Vox in charge of the studio. Normally, he'd let them govern themselves for the day, but last time he left them to do that, his favorite was almost beaten. So, now Vox is the next choice. He had told the television to watch out for any suspicious activity and gave Y/n the day off, just in case.

The meeting went as planned and a contract signed. Val was in high spirits and eager to visit his favorite at their house before going to the studio to check on things. He wondered what they did on their day off. How they spend their free time, and what hobbies they have. If he knew their hobbies, he could get them better gifts. Sure the clothes and such are fine, but maybe something a little more personal to let them know he listens? He'd have to ask them.

Knocking on the little cottage like home's door, he couldn't help the butterflies that erupted in his stomach. They only worsened as he heard their footsteps. However, they were crushed by the drop of his heart when Y/n opened the door. They were covered in bruises and red marks. What?

"Babycakes! What happened? Who did this?" His upper hands went to gently cup their face while the lower ones gently took their shoulders. They flinched at the contact. His anger bubbled higher at the sight. Who dared to hurt them? He'll kill them!

"I was just in an intense scene today, that's all." They stepped back, making Val's hands fall. He followed them inside and shut the door behind him. Val noticed the slight limp to their walk and grew even more furious.

"You were supposed to have the day off." The venom in his voice didn't go unnoticed as they flinched again. He took a deep breath to try and calm himself. "Why were you working today?" They went to sit on the couch and hissed as they leaned back, lifting their right foot to rest on the coffee table to place an ice pack on their knee. It was swollen.

"Vox called me and said I needed to come in and shoot a scene because someone chickened out or whatever. So I went." They closed their eyes and rested their head against the back of the couch as Val went to sit in the armchair. He was fuming.

"So this is Vox's fault." He grit his teeth. That piece of shit. "Interesting." Their eyes opened and looked down to his hands, making his realize he was gripping the armrests with both sets of hands. He quickly released them and put all four fists into his lap.

"I mean, I guess, but isn't this the hazard of the job?" They gestured to themselves. "Besides, you two were just getting back into the swing of things, boss. You don't want to ruin what you've got, do you?"

"Y/n, believe me when I say that this is not okay. You weren't supposed to work and he made you do an intense scene, which, by the way, doesn't look like he let you prepare for at all. That's not the type of partner I want at all." He stood up and headed for the door. "You have the next two days to heal up and rest. When you get back, you're stuck doing vanilla shit until you're fully healed. Hazard pay will be added on top of your over time for this." Val left the house and went straight to the studio.

~*~

VOX! YOU STUPID FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT! WHERE ARE YOU!" Val was pissed as he stomped down the hallway. He slammed open his office door to see the asshole in question sitting at his desk. The television looked back at him, question on his digital face.

"Easy, lovebug, what's got you hot under the collar?" He stood from the chair and went around the desk to meet face the moth fully. Val growled, stalked forward to grab Vox by the lapels and slammed the obsolete tech against the wall. "Ow! What the fuck?!"

"You asshole! You utter jackass!" Val snarled into the digital face of his off and on again lover. "You made them work! They are injured and covered in marks!" Those comments made a sinister smile creep onto Vox's screen.

"Oh, I understand now." He chuckled. This fucking shithead had the audacity to laugh at Y/n's expense! That set Val off more. "You're in love with that little whore, huh?" The comment made Val pause. What? In love with Y/n?

"What are you talking about, motherfucker?"

"You're in love with Y/n, you obviously have a soft spot for them and show favoritism in the studio. It's hilarious, really. I had to make sure, though, so I had them work with the harshest scene to see what you'd do." Vox rolled his eyes. "Like they could love you back, anyways."

"Excuse me?" Val's anger was a fire, but there was an extinguisher in the shape of hurt that was trying to douse the flames. Vox took hold of this weakness.

"I mean, you're their boss, they don't have a choice but to be nice to you and accept your gifts. You think their smiles are real? That they aren't just being nice to you out of greed? You really are stupid, Val." The moth's hands loosened and dropped Vox, who stood and brushed himself off. He made his way around the pimp and towards the door. "Oh, and by the way, we're through. For good this time." The tech left, leaving Valentino to endure the storm of his emotions in the empty room. He needed a drink.

#hazbin hotel x reader #valentino x reader #babycakes #trashcan answers you

111 notes · View notes

onlydreamofmysoul · 3 years

Text

Cardigan (Wolfstar)

I sat down to write a teeny drabble with two lines from the song Cardigan by Taylor Swift. It quickly spiralled into this. (I really love it though).

Set in the cannon universe, cw for mentions of death, injuries and scars. (Nothing graphic though).

I knew you, dancing in your Levi’s drunk under a streetlight.

“Shh! Pads. you’re gonna get us caught!” Remus half-whispered, his own voice a tad too loud for his own liking but his slightly tipsy state didn’t allow for a lower volume. Sirius spun into him smushing his fingers right up against Remus’ lips, both of them chest to chest under James’ cloak. It was hard to believe the four of them mused to fit under this - now it only just about covered Remus and Sirius even with Remus ducking down to Sirius’ height.

“Come on Moony, you’re ‘Perfect Mister Prefect’,” He said, punctuating each word of the grand title with his index finger poking into Remus; chest. “Even if we do get caught, you can charm our way out of it.”

Remus rolled his eyes, but followed. The passage was dim and the ground was uneven and to be perfectly honest, they hadn’t yet discovered if this particular passage way had been caved in since they last explored it the previous year, but Sirius seemed sure of himself and that was enough for Remus. If Sirius was the one leading, he’d always follow.

“Alright, but I’m late on a transfiguration essay, so if Minnie catches us, you’re on your own. I need to save my charm for that.” He said, his tone stern, but all his reserve melted when Sirius smiled up at him and pressed a victorious kiss to his cheek.

“I take back your title.” Sirius said dramatically, looking at Remus with a smug righteousness. “Apparently ‘Perfect Mister Prefect’ isn’t so perfect after all.”

He pressed his mouth right up next to Remus’ ear just as they stepped out the little secret entrance, ducking under the ivy trellis that hid their little passageway. “It’s a good thing I like bad boys.” Sirius breathed, and Remus couldn’t wait any more, not caring whether the cloak revealed their ankles or not when he pulled Sirius in for a blazing kiss.

“I love you, you know that, right?”

Sirius smirked and kissed him again. “That seems to be the general consensus.”

Remus laughed and took off walking again, tugging the cloak off as soon as they were far enough away from the school, catching hands and spinning under the soft glow of the lamplights illuminating the path to Hogsmeade. Sirius tilted his head back, still spinning, their hands acting as the axis that centred the entire universe.

“I love you too.”

I knew you, hands under my sweatshirt, baby kiss it better.

“Sirius, if you don’t start being more careful, I’m gonna-”

“What?” Sirius teased, wriggling his eyebrows suggestively, looking far too haughty for a man sitting on a countertop, his legs dangling in the air. “What’re you gonna do Re? You gonna punish me?”

Remus pursed his lips to try hide his smile, but gave in, kissing Sirius once briefly.

“No,” He said, pulling up Sirius’ jumper to get a proper look at the gash he had acquired after climbing a tree. Then subsequently falling out of said tree. “But I will send you to Madam Pomfrey and have you try to explain to her that you thought you’d be able to pull off a levitation charm if there was a ‘more extreme sense of urgency’.” He finished, mocking Sirius’ words from earlier.

Sirius just scrunched up his face playfully in retaliation, before breathing in shakily as Remus coated the cut with a liberal amount of salve, watching in fascination as the skin knitted back together.

“There.” He said, straightening up to stand between Sirius’ legs, pulling down his jumper again. “Good as new.”

“Nah ah.” Sirius countered, shaking his head as his legs locked behind Remus’ back, binding them together. “Gotta kiss it better.”

Remus wet his lips, shaking his head in fond disbelief, but leaned in willingly, feeling the hot slide of Sirius’ mouth against his own cooler one.

“All better?” Remus asked, panting slightly as they rested their foreheads together.

Sirius shrugged, hooking his arm more firmly around Remus’ neck. “Close, but not quite better yet.”

Remus huffed a laugh through his nose, but gladly locked their lips together again, the pair fully intertwined as if they had been made for each other.

(And maybe they had. For what else was the moon to do but love the stars?)

And when I felt like I was an old cardigan, under someone’s bed, you put me on and said I was your favourite.

“Sirius?” Re said softly, pushing the door to their dorm open slowly. “Are you here?”

“Yeah,” Came a muffled reply. “I’m here.”

Remus stepped into the room, looking first to Sirius’ bed to find it empty. Remus frowned, looking around to find Sirius curled up on Remus’ own bed, his favourite cardigan folded gently around him.

“Hi sweetheart,” Remus said, voice hushed as he climbed onto the bed next to the other boy, noting the red stained eyes and puffed lips. “What do you need?”

At the words, anything that seemed to be holding Sirius together until that point shattered, the raven haired boy collapsing into Sirius’ arms.

“Re,” He gasped, between his sobs as Remus just pulled him closer. “Why is it possible to love someone who hates you? Isn’t love supposed to be good? If it’s so great, then why the fuck does it hurt so much?”

Remus’ heart clenched. Regulus.

“I don’t know sweetheart,” He murmured, holding Sirius close. “But it makes us who we are.” He cupped Sirius’ face so he could meet the raging stormy eyes. “It’s better to have loved and have lost than to never have loved at all.”

Sirius just blinked at him.

“But for the record,” Remus said, touching their heads together. “I don’t think you’ve lost him. He’s just lost right now. But he’ll find his way back to you.”

Sirius nodded, and slumped against Remus’ chest, no longer crying, just breathing deeply.

“You know Remus Lupin,” He whispered after a while. “I don’t care how long it takes, but I’m gonna marry you someday.”

To kiss in cars, and downtown bars, was all we needed.

“Oh Merlin, they’re snogging again.” Peter commented as he turned his head to spot James and Lily, leaning in for a kiss. Remus, currently with his tongue in Sirius’ mouth heard this, but let Peter discover the other couple in his own time.

“Christ, the pair of you are too. You’re all fuckin at it.” He grumbled. If Remus’ mouth wasn’t already a little preoccupied, he would have laughed. There it was.

“Right, I’m off to find humans capable of holding decent conversation.” Peter muttered and he might have left. He could have stayed and done a jig on the table for all Remus cared, but in this moment, he noticed none of it. What was the poem he had read somewhere? Stars and moths and rinds slanting around fruit. This moment.

You drew stars around my scars and now I’m bleeding.

“Hey, look at this.” Sirius said somewhat excitedly, rolling away from Remus momentarily and returning with a quill and a jar of ink.

Remus eyed him skeptically, his arm tucked under his head as they lounged on his bed, the curtains drawn to create the illusion of their own little oasis.

“I bet I could draw stars on your chest and then your scars could connect them, like in astronomy.”

Remus bit his lip, looking at Sirius’ appraised expression. “I feel like I should say no,” He said slowly, even as he unscrewed the ink. “But go for it.”

Sirius grinned triumphantly and studied Remus for a minute, brushing the quill over his lips as he concentrated. Remus couldn’t help but muse that if Sirius put half as much effort into his schoolwork as he was doing here, he would be top of the class. Finally, Sirius ditched the quill, dipping a finger into the ink directly.

“I don’t want the point of the quill to scratch you.” He explained, after noticing Remus’ raised eyebrow. Something warmed inside Remus’ chest while something cold trickled over the outside. Remus closed his eyes and let himself focus on the slightly ticklish, but mostly soothing sensation of Sirius tracing patterns over his skin.

“Done.” Sirius muttered after a while and Remus opened his eyes, raising his head a little to peer down at himself. He looked like some abstract piece of art, covered in black and blue and red and green, scars shining silver between it all.

“Woah,” He breathed, “That’s pretty cool.”

Sirius grinned, then pointed to a star just over Remus; appendix. “That’s Sirius right there.”

Remus hummed, pursing his lips together, then grabbed a jar of ink, tracing a star a little messily, right over his heart.

“Nah,” He countered, “Sirius is there.”

Sirius rolled his eyes, but came up to press their lips together. In the morning, they both looked like works of art.

But I knew you, stepping on the last train, marked me like a blood stain.

“I can’t believe this is the last time we’ll be taking this train.” James said, the four of them standing in a row on the platform, not yet ready to get on.

“We’ll be back.” Remus said. “Someday, we’ll be back.”

Sirius linked their fingers together. As one, the marauders stepped onto the train.

Mischief Managed.

I knew you, tried to change the ending, Peter losing Wendy.

Remus just stared at the auror.

“Mr Lupin,” The man said gently, playing his hand tenderly on Remus’ arm. Remus didn’t know what his name was. It was probable the man had said it but Remus wasn’t listening. Everything had gone dark. “I realise this must come as a shock.”

Remus wrenched his arm back, shaking his head. “A shock?” He laughed a little manically. “No, you’re wrong.”

“Mr Lupin, we have evidence that Sirius Black was the one to-”

“Well you’re wrong!” Remus yelled. Or maybe he had whispered. It was possible he hadn’t even spoken at all, but the words swirled around and around in his head. “I don’t know how, but you’re wrong. You’re wrong, this isn’t right, you have it all wrong, he would never-”

Remus gasped, pressing a hand to his cracking heart as if it would hold him together. “He would never.” He repeated, his voice breaking, tears streaming down his cheeks. When they had gotten there, he didn’t know, but their presence was suddenly noticeable with the cold rush against Remus’ skin.

“I’m so sorry.” The auror said and then he was gone. And Remus was alone.

Had it always been this way? Remus alone. Remus with friends. Remus with Sirius. Remus alone.

Maybe he had made the entire thing up.

But dreams didn’t leave you feeling like the last kiss you’d ever had was from a dementor, not your true love.

It is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. He had said that to Sirius once.

What a fool he had been.

I knew you, leaving like a father, running like water, when you are young they assume you know nothing.

“It is believed this was a plan Mr Black had been staging for quite some time now.” A newspaper read. Remus snorted and threw it in the fire. Sirius couldn’t even plan a week in advance. What they fuck did these people know.

But then, what did Remus know? His love was long lost, Rapunzel in a tower. Remus was no knight.

But he knew in his heart, none of this was true. He knew. He didn't care what anyone else said, they may have known his thoughts, but Remus knew his heart.

But I knew you’d linger like a tattoo kiss.

Sirius’ leather jacket still hung in the cupboard under the stairs. His hair potion, still in the shower. Remus couldn’t bear to see them. He could never throw them away.

I knew you’d haunt all of my what if’s.

Remus should have fought harder for Harry.

He should have, he should have, he should have, he should have.

He should have known better.

What if.

A smirking smile and stormy eyes. Hair held up with a wand. Those same dark strands coiled around Remus’ fingers.

The smell of smoke would hang around this long. Cause I knew everything when I was young.

Remus woke up to James’ scream. Except it couldn’t be James. Unless… Had this all been a dream?

James opened his eyes and suddenly there was Lily. Lily and James and they didn’t know who Remus was.

(Remus had been the first one to hold baby Harry. Before even Sirius. And now he didn’t even know him)

I knew I’d curse you for the longest time.

Remus hated Sirius. Not for being the notorious mass murderer Sirius Black. But for leaving him alone.

Why is it possible to love someone who hates you? Remus wanted to laugh. His question to Sirius now would be this; Why couldn’t he stop loving someone he should hate.

Chasing shadows in the grocery line.

The students all murmured about the Grimm. The paintings gossiped about little else. Even the staff room had a few words on the subject matter. Remus tried not to let his heart flutter.

(But his boy was free. And there was a grim on the loose).

I knew you’d miss me once the thrill expired.

Walking down to Hagrid's hut, Remus thought he saw something rustle in the bushes. He stepped off the path and looked closer, barely even breathing as his heart thundered, but the shadows that had lurked were gone.

And you’d be standing in my front porch light.

“Lie low at Lupins.”

For the first time in twelve years, amber met grey.

“Re,” Sirius croaked, and Remus shattered. He pulled Sirius inside the door quickly, shutting it and reinforcing all of the charms around his little cottage, drawing all the blinds shut and placing a charm around the area so he would know if anyone approached the house before he finally turned, and there he was.

And I knew you’d come back to me.

Not Mass Murderer Sirius Black.

Not even Padfoot.

But Sirius. Remus’ Sirius.

“Re,” Sirius said again, “It’s not true, it’s not true.” He said, repeating the words as he shook his head, eyes filling. “It’s not true, I would never.”

He would never.

Remus shook his head too, pulling Sirius into the tightest hug they ever might have shared.

“I know.” He whispered. “I know.”

You’d come back to me.

Sirius after a few weeks of good food and warmth looked a lot more like the boy Remus had once known, but there was no denying the person with his was now a man. Remus supposed they both were.

You’d come back.

“I love you.” Sirius whispered one night as they were curled under a blanket, Remus reading as Sirius lay on his chest, the position comforting and oh so familiar.

“Do you think you could ever love me again?”

Remus’ heart cracked as he set down his book and curled his fingers gently around Sirius’ jaw, tilting his head so Remus could look into that swirling sea.

“Love you again?” He said, his voice nearly cracking in disbelief. “Pads, how could I love you again when I never stopped?”

And when I felt like I was an old cardigan, under someone’s bed, you put me on and said I was your favourite.

“I can’t believe you still have this.” Sirius whispered, pulling the same cardigan he always stole out of the back of Remus’ drawer.

“It used to smell like you.” Remus admitted. “But I wore it too much, I missed you too much.”

Sirius smiled, shrugging it on, it curling around his shoulders the way he curled into Remus, tilting his head up and pressing his lips against Remus’.

“I can fix that.” He whispered and Remus held him close, taking his time.

(For what else was the moon to do but love the stars?)

#wolfstar #Remus Lupin #Sirius Black #wolfstar oneshot #Marauders #marauders era fanfiction #cannon compliant #wolfstar fic #James Potter #peter pettigrew #Lily Evans #harry potter #cardigan taylor swift #ao3 OpeningMyEyes #wolfstar angst

272 notes · View notes

golchaworld · 4 years

Text

Brown Sugar, Cinnamon Spice | H. HJ

pairing: baker!hyunjin x wedding planner!reader, (implied fem!reader), various celebrity cameos

genre: tooth-rotting fluff, a pinch of angst

word count: 5.4k

warnings: none!

summary: amidst stress and loneliness, you find your own decadence.

A/N: this is probably the longest fic I’ve written in the shortest amount of time! This only took me a few days start to finish. I guess I was super in love with the concept, and I hope y’all are too. As always, comments, critiques, and feedback are welcome and encouraged. My ask box is always open. Enjoy :D

You swear you’re going to die from a sugar overdose. Not from the piece of red velvet cheesecake sitting in front of you, but instead from the gazes that the couple in front of you shares. They fuss and coo, feeding each other different types of cake with disgustingly sweet smiles on their faces. It would be cute...if you didn’t have to deal with this everyday.

Planning weddings was always your dream. There was something so whimsical about the aura of weddings, the aura of love, that was always destroyed by the stress of planning. Ever since you were little, you vowed to take as much stress off of engaged couples as possible, in order to let them bask in the excitement of getting married.

Four years after college, and here you are, the best wedding planner in the city. The best wedding planner in the city, and absolutely, devastatingly single.

It’s not that you expected to be happily married by 25, but it would be nice to at least have a boyfriend, a significant other, someone. But no, instead you’re forced to help happy couples as they live out your dream. All too often you find yourself wishing you were in the place of the bride-to-be, having a fiancé to fawn over.

It’s sad, really, the way you watch the couple across from you as they bask in their pre-marital bliss. Every glance feels intimate. Every spoonful that they feed to each other feels private. You smile sadly before clearing your throat.

“I’ll leave you two to go through more of the cakes. Let me know when you guys make a decision. I’ll be waiting up front.”

The couple dismisses you with a wave, barely taking their eyes off of each other. You just set your shoulders and smooth out the blouse that’s tucked artfully into your skirt. Your heels make a satisfying click as you make your way to the front counter, adorned with cases of pastries and other sinful sweets. It’s the one behind the counter, however, that makes your head fill with sugar.

Hwang Hyunjin was more than just a familiar face. He was a college acquaintance, mutual friends always having the two of you running into each other. After graduation, the two of you were the only ones who decided to stay in the city, some twisted stab of fate bringing you closer.

You can say he’s your glorified best friend. The two of you aren’t exactly the closest, but you see each other often enough that conversation has moved from awkward to easy, distant to friendly. It also helps that the both of you have entered a sort of...business agreement.

You send any couples needing to taste cakes to his bakery first. When anyone comes to him with an order for a large event that needs planning, he sends them your way.

Now, the man just looks relaxed, smiling at you with a streak of white flour on his cheek. He leans one arm against the counter and you struggle not to look down at the way it flexes. Hyunjin always said that baking proves to be a full body workout. You can’t help but agree.

“Which one are they leaning towards?” Hyunjin asks in lieu of greeting.

“No idea.” You scrunch your nose in disgust. “They were too busy feeding each other and flirting to make any actual judgements about the cake.”

Hyunjin giggles in that unique way of his, high pitched and muted. His cheeks scrunch up, causing crow’s feet to form around his eyes. The flour flakes off in some spots.

“You can’t blame them,” Hyunjin teases. “They’re in love. Unlike a certain grumpy pants over here.”

You scoff at his insinuations.

“Don’t be jealous, Y/N.”

“I am not jealous! It would just make my life a lot easier if they just chose the damn cake.”

Hyunjin cocks an eyebrow. “Which one of us is actually baking it again?”

You roll your eyes. “Shut it, Hyunjin.”

The bell above the door chimes, announcing the arrival of a new wave of customers. Hyunjin shoots a wink your way before heading over to the cash register. He has on his salesman smile, and that alone has the group of girls in front of him swooning.

In college, Hwang Hyunjin was the mega-hot culinary business student who never slept around and went to church every Sunday. Now Hyunjin is the mega-hot baker-slash-bakery owner who may or may not sleep around but still goes to church every Sunday. It’s fair to say that the entire city is in love with him.

They have a right to be, of course. Hyunjin is a hot, young, single guy who bakes for crying out loud. He specializes in wedding cakes. What 26 year old man specializes in wedding cakes?

Hyunjin, the anomaly that he is, is the apple of everyone’s eye, a diamond in the rough, a sweet lawn in the concrete jungle. He’s a breath of fresh air, coated in sugary sweetness.

And you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want him.

Even now, you watch how he makes small talk with his customers, how he shoots them small smiles and flirty winks. He lays the charm on thick; anything to get them to buy an extra cannoli, he says. And like a moth to a flame, you’re drawn in. You’re drawn into his sweet smile, his long blonde hair, the beauty mark under his left eye. It leaves you with a sugar rush.

Eventually, you’re called back to reality by your clients approaching. They decide on a simple yellow cake with the strawberry and vanilla pudding filling. Internally, you smile, knowing that it’s Hyunjin’s best seller...obviously for a reason.

You leave the couple with a reassurance that you’ll set up an appointment with Hyunjin to go over the design of the cake. They mentioned that they already have pre-determined cake toppers, and you fight not to roll your eyes. It’s always the cheesiest when the couples pick their own toppers.

You plaster on a smile and wave them goodbye, watching as the door closes behind them with a soft thud, the bell above still chiming. You glance down at your wristwatch and sigh. You have 15 minutes to get to Yeji’s dress fitting, all the way across the city. You straighten your shoulders, fix your blouse, and give Hyunjin one last glance on the way out.

He winks in return.

. . .

The catch of Hyunjin being your pseudo-best friend is that he has to take care of you. Not that you need a lot of taking care of. But at the end of a long work day, Hyunjin is always there to pick up the pieces. He always gives you a choice of desserts to make the day better, and today you choose to do so with tiramisu.

You practically groan when the first bit of coffee cream hits your tastebuds, followed by the bittersweet hint of cocoa powder. The cake is rich and moist, melting on your tongue in a way that’s not overly decadent. It’s not until you hear a chuckle from across from you do you realize that your eyes are closed.

When you open them, Hyunjin beams at you from across the counter, laughing at the way you’re indulging in your dessert.

“Stop laughing at me,” you command around a mouthful of cream.

“I’m not! It’s just,” Hyunjin tucks a blonde strand behind his ear. “You eat this tiramisu like twice a week, and every time you act like it’s the first...or like it’s going to be your last.”

“You should take it as a compliment.”

Hyunjin chuckles again. “Maybe I do.”

The bakery has a different aura at night. Instead of the lively buzz of coffee cups and sugar rushes, it’s bathed in a velvety decadence, illuminated by the subtle light of the pastry display. All of the chairs have been put up for the night, all of the leftover pastries have been discarded, all of the employees gone for the night. It just leaves you, Hyunjin, and the bold cream of tiramisu.

The first time Hyunjin had invited you to the bakery after hours, you thought he was joking. The two of you hadn’t been that close yet, and spending secluded, unstructured time together seemed like a recipe for disaster. To your surprise, however, the night was comfortable and casual, spent test-tasting various desserts and laughing over various college memories.

It surprised you how much Hyunjin embraced you when everyone else from school moved onto different things. In a city this big, it wouldn’t have been hard for him to disregard you completely. You stay up at night wondering why he didn’t.

“So, how was the fitting?”

Hyunjin looks genuinely interested as you recount the details of your day. At a certain point he even reaches for a fork, indulging in the tiramisu with you. With his cheeks full to the brim, he nods, smiles and inserts commentary wherever necessary. Hyunjin has always been the best listener.

“Why do you plan weddings if it stresses you out so much?”

You pout at Hyunjin’s questions. “Why do you run a bakery if it stresses you out so much?”

“Because I get to eat delicious treats at the end of the day.”

You smirk. “So do I.”

“Touché,” Hyunjin smiles.

The two of you are quiet for a moment, indulging in the last few bites of tiramisu. It makes you smile, the way Hyunjin is still in love with all of his desserts after having to make them all day, every day. After every bite he groans dramatically, pointing an accusatory finger at the cake to say “damn you for being so good.”

When the tiramisu is finished, and all that’s left is the sound of forks scraping empty plates, Hyunjin sighs.

“Are you going to plan your own?”

“My own wedding?” When Hyunjin nods in response, you chuckle sadly. “At this point, it looks like I’ll never even have a wedding, let alone have the chance to plan it.”

Hyunjin rolls his eyes. “Don’t lie. I’m sure you have suitors lining up to take your hand in marriage.”

You scoff, picking up the plate that once held your tiramisu. You deposit it in the sink full of soapy water behind the counter, along with the fork. Hyunjin grabs your arm as you get closer, forcing you to face his looming form.

“I’m being serious, you know.”

You shrug in response. “Maybe that’s the problem. My love life is such a joke that you being serious about it seems like an insult.”

“It wasn’t anything.”

“I know.”

“Then why—“

You’re quick to cut the man off. “It’s getting late, Hyunjin. I’ll see you, okay?”

You don’t wait for Hyunjin to respond, leaving the man nodding dumbly behind the counter. At the first whip of the harsh wind against your face, you groan. Hyunjin was supposed to be your ride home.

. . .

The thing about the city is that celebrity weddings are frequent. Celebrity weddings, known for their flashy, expensive decorations, and over-the-top attire single handedly wipe out your energy for the entire season. But they pay well.

The money may or may not be the reason you sit in front of the Minatozaki Sana in your office, her hand being held by her fiancé. He’s a gorgeous man, with a strong jaw and high cheekbones. That much is expected as the fiancé of the top model in the country.

“So do you guys have a date in mind?” You ask the couple, a warm smile glossing over your face.

“Well,” Sana glances at her fiancé before returning your gaze. “We were hoping for November 18th.”

“Got it! So a year and a month isn’t too bad. It’s a little tight for planning, but—“

The fiancé chuckles. “Oh no, I think you’ve misunderstood. We meant November 18th, 2020. We want to get married next month.”

You can’t help the way your jaw drops. A month for a normal wedding would be hell on earth. A month for a celebrity wedding is like jumping head first into Dante’s Inferno. Your distress must be palpable, seeing as Sana’s brows furrow almost instantly.

“That’s...doable right?” She asks with wide eyes.

“Umm,” you rack your brain for words. “It’s going to be tight. Like really tight. But yes, it’s doable.”

Sana instantly lights up, clasping her fiancé’s hands in hers. “Oh wonderful! I’m so excited.”

You nod in agreement, plastering on the biggest smile you can manage.

“Oh! And one more thing!” Sana’s eyes sparkle with excitement. “I want a Hwang Cake!”

. . .

Three hours later, you’re seated across from the engaged couple as the two indulge in a plethora of different cakes and icings. Hyunjin had managed to whip them all up in such a short amount of time, not once complaining about the pinch you put him in. At some point, though, you’ll have to tell him about the month until the wedding. You’re sure you’re going to hear some complaints then.

Instead of Hyunjin being the face of the bakery today, it’s one of his employees, a short but bright boy by the name of Felix. He always wears glittery eyeshadow and a smile too big for his face, and it only adds to how endearing he is. You’d never met the human embodiment of cotton candy until Felix waltzed into the bakery on his first day of work.

With Felix manning the register, Hyunjin is nowhere to be found. The only appearance he made was to hand-deliver the test cakes to Sana and her fiancé. He greeted them with a bright smile and many thanks for choosing his bakery. He only gave you a curt nod before disappearing behind the threshold of the kitchen.

“The red velvet is to die for! Don’t you think, hun?”

Sana’s fiancé looks back at the woman as if she hung the stars, confessing his love for her and more with just one glance. Once again, you are reminded of what true love looks like. Once again, you feel jealousy brewing in the pit of your stomach.

“It is. I love it with the cream cheese icing.”

Sana smiles. “I know you do. Cream cheese has always been your favorite. If only you could see that buttercream is superior.”

For a second, the couple just gaze at each other, basking in the vitality of a fresh engagement. You can tell that even though their romance was very spur of the moment, they will clearly last for a long time.

Your chest hurts.

“I think we’ll go with the red velvet and cream cheese icing.”

You’re quick to put on a smile. “Perfect! I’ll go let Hyunjin know, and then later we can make an appointment to figure out the design and aesthetics of the cake.”

“Sounds good.”

As you stand and approach the register, you can hear the couple begin to giggle to themselves, as if choosing a wedding cake flavor is the epitome of cloud nine. You suppose it might be. You wouldn’t know

Felix greets you with a smile when you arrive at the register, the corners of his eyes scrunching cutely. “How did it go?”

You can’t help but return the smile. “Good! They decided pretty quickly. Where’s Hyunjin, so I can let him know?”

“In the kitchen,” Felix points behind his shoulder with a thumb. “You can just head back there.”

“Thanks, Felix.”

You expect the hardcore rap music that’s playing through the speakers in the kitchen. It’s muted enough so that the rest of the bakery can’t hear it, but loud enough that Hyunjin can get lost in it. It’s endearing, the way he mumbles the words under his breath while he pipes bright orange frosting onto a black fondant cake. It’s always around this time that he has to perfect his Halloween treats.

You wait until he’s done piping his row before calling his attention softly. “Hyunjin? They decided.”

Hyunjin doesn’t look up. He just moves on to piping the next row while he says, “and what did they decide?”

“Red velvet with the cream cheese icing.”

“Okay. We’ll make the appointment for later in the week.”

Hyunjin’s tone carries an air of finality to it. It’s formal, cold, and all too detached. Although the two of you have never been that close, this distance is still new from you. Hyunjin has never stood in front of you and felt miles away.

“Okay.” And when he doesn’t respond, “I’ll be back later, okay? After closing.”

Hyunjin stills for a moment before continuing his piping job, the movement almost imperceptible. “Tiramisu or cannoli?”

A sticky sweet smile blooms on your face. “Cannoli.”

. . .

The shell of the cannoli crunches deliciously, breaking the silence between you and Hyunjin. It’s once again after closing, but gone is the aura of awkwardness the two of you had left behind the previous night. Hyunjin glances at you, a small smirk gracing his face.

“Is it good?”

You roll your eyes. “You know it’s good.”

“Maybe I do.” Hyunjin shrugs cutely, his white apron shifting in the process.

He looks more up-kept than usual. His long hair is tied half up by a navy blue ribbon that matches the oversized sweater he wears. He’s wearing his jewelry, all of his piercings filled with earrings, various chunky rings adorning his fingers. But when you look down, you notice he’s still wearing his trademark neon green crocs.

“Nice shoes.”

Hyunjin looks down before realizing what you’re referring to. “Oh shut up. You know they’re the comfiest for baking.”

“Maybe I do.”

You savor the taste of the whipped cream and ricotta as it hits your tongue. Hyunjin looks content to watch you enjoy the dessert, folding his arms over his chest as he eyes you. He’s not the slightest bit insecure about his work, knowing that no matter what he makes, you’ll love.

It reminds you all too much of the first time you met Hyunjin, packed together inside a way-too-crowded frat party. Changbin, a mutual friend had grabbed you by the hand and pulled you through the crowd, insisting that there was someone you had to meet. You spotted Hyunjin long before you could make your way over.

Hyunjin had been leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his chest. His gaze had been disinterested, but confident, knowing that his presence alone was a gift in and of itself. At the time, he didn’t know how right he was.

“You know, I didn’t mean to insult you yesterday.”

The man’s comment has you finally looking up from your cannoli, the last bite standing frozen between your fingers. After swallowing down a mouthful of filling, you clear your throat, slowly lowering the pastry down to the plate.

“It’s okay. I think I just overreacted a bit.”

Hyunjin nods, arms still crossed tightly over his chest. Light glints off of one of his silver rings. “Why is it such a sore topic? I mean, if you don’t mind me asking.”

“Honestly?” You chuckle bitterly to yourself. “Honestly, I don’t know. I guess I just expected something by now. But here I am, 25 years old, having a stable career, and having not had a relationship over half a decade. I just feel like I’m behind, you know?”

Surprisingly, Hyunjin nods. “I do. I mean, I’ve never had a relationship.”

This is news. Hwang Hyunjin, the star culinary student slash campus heartthrob has never had a relationship. Never? Even the thought seems ridiculous.

The confusion must be evident on your face, because Hyunjin chuckles. “I know, I know. It’s silly, isn’t it?”

“Not silly! Just...surprising…”

“Well, I guess so.”

You’re still attempting to process your thoughts, unable to stop a slew of questions from leaving your mouth. “Why not, though? Have you never considered it? Have you never had your eye on someone?”

At this, Hyunjin’s eyes grow sad. The confident light in them disappears like a wisp of cotton candy in the wind. His eyes swim with a salty-sweetness.

“I’ve actually always had my eye on someone. Since college, actually.”

Instantly, it clicks. “Oh! They must have moved away, right? Everyone moved away after college except us, and I know how sucky that must be for you. Gosh, I didn’t even consider that.”

Hyunjin traps a bubblegum bottom lip between his teeth, seemingly mulling something over in his head. His arm tenses, only once, before releasing. Hyunjin uncrosses his arms, choosing to lean forward onto the countertop.

“I don’t think they left.”

Your eyes light up at the same time your heart falls. It’s so easy to fake not being hurt by the information, just like it’s easy to fake not wanting Hyunjin. Just like it’s easy to say that sticking around after hours is for work and not personal agendas. Just like it’s easy to be his pseudo-best friend.

“Then why don’t you go for it?”

Hyunjin chuckles sadly. “I’m not even on their radar. Not like that.”

For the first time tonight, you laugh. You laugh genuinely and boldly. You laugh loudly, until tears are pooling in the corners of your eyes. Hyunjin just looks at you as if you are crazy, overcome with a laughing fit in the middle of his closed bakery. But you can’t help it; it’s funny.

“You’re literally Hwang Hyunjin. There’s no one who’s radar you aren’t on! And I mean no one.”

Hyunjin rolls his eyes. “Then why don’t they ever go for it or flirt with me back? I keep waiting on them to indulge me, but they never do.”

“I think…” You take a deep breath in order to swallow back tears. “I think that maybe they dont know that you’re interested. You have to be bold and make the first move! I promise you no one would ever turn you down.”

Hyunjin sighs. “And you know this for sure?”

The smile that you plaster on is watery and obviously fake. However, it’s the best you can do in the dark chocolate ambience of the bakery. It echoes everything inside you at the moment—bittersweet.

“Maybe I do.”

. . .

You don’t see Hyunjin again until a few days later. Your schedule is packed with last minute rearrangements and irregular breaks as you make room for Sana’s wedding plans. It’s hectic, stressful, and overall just a handful.

Your hands hurt from typing out various versions of wedding invitations. Every venue in the city hates you for repeatedly calling and begging for availability on November 18th. A few of your clients are pissed for having their appointments rescheduled, and an even smaller few are understanding.

The worst part of it all is that when Sana and her fiancé waltz into your office on a random Monday, they have the audacity to look cheerful. Neither of them look the least bit stressed, and all the more in love, which angers you slightly. You have to remind yourself that this is why you do this. You have voluntarily become a stress ball for engaged couples. You’re starting to regret that decision.

Sana blinks her pretty eyes at you sweetly, greeting you with a honey-dipped smile. “How have things been going?”

You plaster on an equally sweet smile, composed of high fructose corn syrup instead of genuine sugar. “It’s been going well. Your cake appointment is scheduled for Thursday. All that’s left is for you to pick an invitation format, your dress, and the venue.”

“That sounds great! That’s nothing.” The fiancé exclaims.

You grit your teeth. “Yep, it should be smooth sailing from here.”

The couple leaves with various printed versions of wedding invitations that you paid extra to express print. The minute the door closes behind the two, you sag into your chair. Running your hands over your face, you let out a loud groan. The best part about having an individual office is that no one is around to hear your mental breakdowns.

You spend a moment indulging in the secret stash of chocolates you keep in the top drawer of your desk, letting the rich bitterness melt on your tongue. The taste is dangerous, and you remind yourself to hit the gym extra hard this week.

After a moment, your phone chimes with a message. It’s a simple text from Hyunjin, asking you if you’re planning to visit the bakery later. When you reply in the affirmative, he responds with a simple question.

Cheesecake or Torrone?

You smile and reply with the former.

. . .

The bakery is eerily silent when you arrive. Although it’s normally quiet at this hour, you can usually hear the soft hum of Hyunjin’s music, or the sounds of dishes and pans being cleaned. But this time, there’s nothing.

“Hyunjin?” You call out, slightly confused at the ambience.

It’s silent for a moment, and then a voice sounds out. “In the kitchen!”

You follow the familiar path back to the kitchen, surprised at the dimness of the lights and the lack of sound. When you enter the kitchen, though, it makes both more and less sense at the same time. Hyunjin has various candles littered around the countertops, illuminating the kitchen in a soft orange glow.

Hyunjin himself stands in the corner of the kitchen, changed out of his work attire. He’s wearing a neat button up shirt, untucked over black jeans. The look is completed with his black dress shoes and various jewelry. At his lack of bright green crocs, you’re taken aback.

At the center of the kitchen, poised atop what is usually used as a workbench for kneading bread, is a perfect cheesecake resting on a cake stand. The cake’s tan surface is tainted with tracks of a red reduction that has been placed gently on the center of the cheesecake. At second glance, you determine it to be raspberry. Your favorite.

“What is all this?”

A small smile graces Hyunjin’s face. “Well you told me to ‘be bold and make the first move.’ I don’t know what could be a bolder move than candles and raspberry cheesecake.”

A thousand thoughts run through your mind at the revelation. First move? Being bold? It’s you? Through your jumble of thoughts and emotions, you manage out a small, “so it is raspberry?”

“I’m standing here confessing, and you’re asking about the cheesecake?” Hyunjin laughs. “Yes, it’s raspberry. I knew that was your favorite so…”

“So it's me? I don’t understand.”

Hyunjin finally moves from his position in the corner, crossing the large kitchen easily. “Well, I hoped we could talk about it over cake.” The man motions towards the stools around the workbench.

You just nod, taking a seat on one of the stools. You struggle to keep up with the situation, still wrapping your head around it. Hyunjin makes his way over, a smile still poised on his face. You bite your lip as he rolls up the sleeves of his dress shirt. You find yourself biting harder as you watch the flex of his forearms when he cuts the cake. The piece he deposits in front of you is picturesque, something straight out of a food and wine magazine.

When Hyunjin sits across from you, you take in the way the candlelight hits him, perfectly illuminating his features. His lips are plush and pink, blonde hair falling down onto his shoulders. There’s something glimmering in his eyes, a conflicted wetness that borders between hopeful and disappointed.

“So?” You start.

Hyunjin just shakes his head. “Take a bite first.”

“Hyunjin, I know what your cheesecake tastes like.”

“I don’t care. I’m not talking until you take a bite.”

Stubbornly, you pick up your fork and shovel a bite into your mouth. You’re about to immediately retaliate and open your mouth again, but the pleasant assault of flavor on your taste buds leaves you immobilized. Your eyes widen in shock, causing Hyunjin to chuckle cutely.

“It’s good, right? I added an extra hint of cinnamon spice in order to give the crust that extra umph.”

You practically moan around your bite of food. “Hwang Hyunjin I could marry you right--”

Hyunjin laughs again, this time appreciating the way you cut yourself off before he had to. He shifts in his seat, taking a bite of his own cheesecake before pushing a strand of hair out of his face. He savors his bite, chewing slowly and swallowing completely before opening his mouth again.

“I know this may be sudden,” he begins. “And I know we’ve never been that close. But I like you, Y/N. I have since college. And I don’t want to be too presumptuous, but I have a feeling that you may like me too.”

You nod slowly, trying to ignore the heat that rises to the apples of your cheeks. “Maybe I do.”

Once again, Hyunjin laughs. “Well I guess a ‘maybe’ is as good as I’m going to get from you.”

“No, I mean,” you clear your throat. “I like you, too. Not maybe. I do.”

Hyunjin’s smile is bright, soft around the edges as the shadows of the candle flames dance around his face. He’s gorgeous, all rounded cheeks and bleach blonde hair, squinty eyes and the faintest of dimples.

“I’m glad.”

You sigh. “This whole time I wondered why we were always on the border of friendship. We were close, but not that close. It felt weird to be your friend but also felt weird to not be. I guess that should have been a sign, huh?”

“I’ve always been bad at reading signals.”

“Me too.”

The smile you two share is warm and sweet, filled with the kind of rich sweetness that only comes with something fresh and purified. It’s not the synthetic sugar that makes candy, nor the citrusy sweetness of fruit. The sugar you share is rich, deep, with a slight tang. It’s reminiscent of the crust of the cheesecake, a mellow combination of brown sugar and cinnamon spice.

. . .

Sana’s wedding is just as grand as she wanted it to be. The venue is decked out in flashes of burgundy silk and red roses, complimenting the warm brown of Sana’s hair. Her dress is adorned with Swarovski crystals and delicate stitching, allowing her to sparkle all throughout the ceremony. Eventually vows are read, and the couple is officiated, and you hold Hyunjin’s hand when he sheds a few tears.

The reception is equally as flashy, various celebrity couples trying to outdo each other with their outfits and lavish gifts for the newlywed couple. They take up all of the space in the room and on the dance floor, their fame-inflated egos making the venue feel much smaller than it actually is.

The couple cuts into the cake with cheers in the background. Hyunjin cringes as they smash pieces of cake in each others’ faces, complaining about the waste of frosting and “immaculately made cake.” It takes two kisses and holding his hand for 5 minutes straight to placate him.

After cheers and various upbeat songs, the DJ finally slows down the pace. Various couples get up and slow dance together, swaying to the melody of the soft ballads. Even though its far from the vibes of Hyunjin’s favorite rap songs, he offers a hand out, and leads you happily to the dance floor.

The two of you find a small, unoccupied space on the dance floor, instantly falling into each other. You wrap your arms tightly around Hyunjin’s shoulders, revelling in the feeling of his warm hands around your waist. The two of you sway together, holding each other too close. You can feel the steady thump of Hyunjin’s heart under your head, each beat lining up with the slow pumps of yours.

The spectacularly sweet scent that always clings to Hyunjin as a result of his time in the bakery is ever-present, and you find yourself inhaling it reverently. You allow your eyes to close, getting lost in the song. And if you think hard enough, you can picture it being your own wedding.

You can picture you and Hyunjin at the altar, a few years in the future. You would hold each other’s hands tightly, fighting hard to hold back tears. Hyunjin would of course let a few fall, and you would laugh. And when the minister asks if you take Hwang Hyunjin to be your lawfully wedded husband, you would smile and respond:

“Maybe I do.”

#hwang hyunjin #hwang hyunjin imagines #skz imagines #stray kids imagines #stray kids #skz #escritos

90 notes · View notes

rattyexplores · 6 months

Text

Four-spotted Cup Moth

!!! - This species stings, do not handle with bare hands. Doratifera quadriguttata

24/03/23 - NSW, Dapto

24 notes · View notes

sohotthateveryonedied · 4 years

Text

Just the Same

Summary:

“You’re sick.”

“You’re ugly.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone you weren’t feeling well?”

“I’m fine.” Jason closes his eyes. “Just a little tired.”

“Uh-huh. And that’s why you have a fever?”

Read it here on AO3!

Bruce has a very simple plan for tonight, alright? He’s going to grab a quick post-patrol snack from the kitchen, then he’s going to take a shower, and then he will go promptly to bed. He’s tired. It’s been a long day. He just wants to sleep. (You absolute fool, the goblin in his brain screeches at him, because the goddamn Batman cannot get a goddamn break or else the world will literally split in two.) Fatefully, Bruce passes the den’s open doorway while half of his mind is preoccupied with sending Dick a goodnight text, and he happens to glance into the room. That’s when he stops in his tracks. Even more fatefully, Alfred is coming down the hall in Bruce’s direction, carrying a tray with a single cup of tea on it. “Alfred?” “Yes, Master Bruce?” “Were you aware that Jason was home?” Alfred looks over at where Jason is asleep on the den sofa, still in his leather jacket and boots. He doesn’t look remotely surprised by the sight. Then again, is Alfred ever surprised? “Master Jason got in while you were on patrol. I offered to make him dinner, but he said he wasn’t hungry.” Then there’s that classic Alfred Pennyworth eyebrow crease. “When he wakes up, do inform him that one does not forgo the need for nutrition when one has been dipped in a Lazarus Pit.” “I’ll be sure to do that.” “Now, if you will excuse me.” Alfred walks off with his perfectly level tray, on a perilous journey to Damian’s room. Bruce envies him. At least Alfred gets to go to sleep after Damian gets his nighttime tea. Bruce enters the den carefully, without a sound. God knows Jason hardly sleeps through the night without interruption as it is. Now, at least, he looks peaceful enough. So much time has passed since his last haircut that his hair curls against his temple, plastered with sweat. He must have come here straight from Red Hood business. At least he didn’t get blood on the couch this time. Quietly, Bruce pulls the knitted throw blanket from where it’s draped over the back of the sofa and lays it over Jason, tucking it in close when he catches a shiver rattling Jason’s teeth. Now that he’s paying attention, he can see that Jason’s cheeks are flushed as well. His mouth is locked in a grimace, even in sleep. Bruce presses the back of his hand against Jason’s forehead and clicks his tongue. Definitely a fever. Jason’s eyebrows wrinkle at the touch. His eyes crack open and take a moment to land on Bruce, sitting on the edge of the couch by Jason’s torso. It says a lot that he doesn’t go into battle mode as soon as he registers an unfamiliar presence in the room. “Mmph. Go away.” “You’re sick.” “You’re ugly.” “Why didn’t you tell anyone you weren’t feeling well?” “I’m fine.” Jason closes his eyes. “Just a little tired.” “Uh-huh. And that’s why you have a fever?” “Why don’t you mind your fucking—” Jason tumbles into a coughing fit, wet and hacking. “I’ll be right back,” Bruce tells him with a parting pat on the knee. His knees creak as he stands, heading for the bathroom down the hall. He digs through the medicine cabinet until he finds the thermometer, one of many that Alfred keeps in every bathroom in the house. He grabs a bottle of Tylenol as well. Bruce goes back to the couch and reclaims his spot next to Jason, who has stopped coughing by now, but his breathing is heavy. Bruce touches the thermometer to Jason’s temple, ignoring his weak swats. It reads out a hundred and one degrees. “When did you start feeling sick?” Jason grunts and rolls onto his side, curling in on himself. “Dunno. Yesterday, I guess.” Bruce frowns. Of course Jason would ignore any achy feelings for as long as possible. None of Bruce’s kids have a single self-preserving bone in their bodies. “Tell me your symptoms.” “Being a fucking snack.” “Jason.” Jason coughs. “Leave me alone, old man.” “Does your throat hurt?” “Yeah, so quit trying to make me talk.” “Any nausea?” Jason buries his face into a throw pillow. “You’re fuckin’ exhausting, you know that?” He sighs. “Not since last night. I’m freezing, lethargic, and my head is killing me. Happy?” Bruce hums. “It’s probably the flu.” “Yeah, no shit.” Jason closes his eyes. “Now will you leave me alone? You’re making my headache worse.” Bruce twists open the Tylenol cap and shakes out a couple of tablets into his palm. “Here.” He holds them out to Jason. Jason opens one eye, looks at the pills, and closes it again. “No.” “Jason—” “No. Don’t like pills.” Bruce can’t say he didn’t expect as much. Still, it does Jason no favors to continuously refuse any sort of medication, choosing to tough out the pain for as long as he can. It all ties back to his mother’s drug addiction, a disease which Jason watched slowly kill her over years and years. It makes sense that he’d grow up with an unwavering aversion to drugs. When Jason was a small tot, Bruce and Alfred spent what probably accumulated to hours of cajoling, trying to talk Jason into taking even the lightest painkillers. Lidocaine and numbing solutions were fine, but anything resembling a narcotic was out—and still is, apparently. It makes Bruce wonder how Jason reacted to the Lazarus Pit and its euphoria-inducing waters—part of the whole “magical healing” process. Maybe he was too out of his mind at the time to form a solid thought, much less remember his childhood trauma. This is one fight Bruce chooses not to get into, so he recaps the Tylenol and sets it aside. Miraculously, Jason is already asleep again. That’s fine with Bruce; it’s better his son sleeps this flu off than wastes his energy arguing. Trying not to jostle him too much, Bruce takes off Jason’s boots and leaves them on the carpet. He grabs the TV remote and settles in on the couch with Jason’s feet in his lap, pulling up a nature documentary on hyenas that he and Damian haven’t had the chance to finish yet. Looks like he’ll be catching up on his sleep tomorrow night. Right now, Jason needs him (despite how fervently he’ll protest as much). Honestly, this whole situation brings Bruce back to the old days. After moving into the manor, it took over six months for Jason to completely recover from the years of malnutrition he suffered on the streets. His weight was far too low for a boy his age, even more scrawny than Tim. Alfred provided Jason with plenty of vitamin supplements and extra servings at dinner to bulk him up, but his immune system was shoddy at best no matter how much weight he gained. During his Robin era it was illness after illness, from the common cold to a whammying case of pneumonia. This is the first time Jason has been sick in Bruce’s presence since his death, though. Bruce is learning about the eating habits of hyenas when Tim comes in from the kitchen with a cup of peppermint tea, despite having supposedly gone to bed three hours ago. He stands there in the doorway for a moment, looks owlishly at Jason, then at Bruce, then back to Jason. He grins. “No,” Bruce says. “You don’t even know what I was going to do!” “I know you, and the answer is no.” “Jeez, Bruce. I’m not gonna kill him.” Tim attempts to cross his arms, forgetting that he’s holding hot tea, and hisses when it scalds his arm. “The hand-in-warm-water trick’s never hurt anyone,” he mutters. “Go back upstairs. You’ll get sick.” Tim wrinkles his nose. “This is prejudice against people without spleens, you know. I could sue your ass.” “Sue me from upstairs where I can comfortably know that you won’t die from the flu.” Tim rolls his eyes, but he goes. Bruce hears him stomp up the stairs, getting quieter and quieter until the footsteps are gone entirely. Bruce shakes his head. How did he ever think that having four boys would be a good idea? He questions his younger self’s judgement every day. For the next three hours, Jason sleeps in fits and starts. He never stays awake longer than five minutes at a time, drinking water when Bruce prods him to and grudgingly letting Bruce check his temperature for any spikes. Bruce learns quite a bit about hyenas in the meantime, until the documentary ends and a new one about sea otters begins. In between the hazy bouts of wakefulness, Jason tosses restlessly in the throes of nightmare after nightmare. Beads of sweat roll down his forehead. In the back of his mind Bruce wonders, is this just the fever talking or are nightmares a nightly villain for Jason? The latter would come as no shock, but that doesn’t mean he likes the idea. Bruce runs his fingers through Jason’s sweaty curls, a reflection of years ago when he would do the same thing any time Jason had a nightmare during his youth. Jason has been cheated out of peaceful nights from the beginning. Of course, back then there wasn’t a white streak splitting the darkness of his onyx hair—a reminder of the pit water swimming in Jason’s blood. Bruce moves a lock of hair off Jason’s forehead, gentle as a moth. Jason’s eyes fly open and he jerks away from the touch, a gasp ripping up his throat. Bruce doesn’t move. He gives Jason a moment to regain his bearings, stilling the hand in Jason’s hair. Green irises lock on Bruce, frenzied. “Where?” he croaks. “The manor.” Jason takes a deep breath in, clenching his jaw. “Okay.” He lets it out. “Okay.” Bruce grabs the water bottle he’s kept on the coffee table. “Here,” he says, moving his hand down to Jason’s back and prodding a shoulder blade. “Sit up.” “Fuck you.” It comes out half groan, the illness-wrought exhaustion catching back up with Jason. “You need to hydrate.” “Double fuck you.” Bruce shrugs. “Drink half of this or I’ll call Alfred and have him convince you. Your choice.” Jason rolls his eyes and snatches the bottle. Bruce will take that as a victory. Jason sits up with enormous effort, groaning at the aches in his body until he’s upright next to Bruce. He drinks the water, wincing when it hits his sore throat. “What were you dreaming about?” Bruce ventures to ask. Jason lowers the bottle to narrow his eyes at Bruce like he’s the biggest idiot in this room. “Shut up.” The annoying part is that Bruce genuinely has no idea what Jason’s nightmare could have been about. His childhood? His death? His resurrection? Any of the traumatic things that could have happened afterward, ones that Bruce wasn’t there for? There is such a disconnect between the two of them now. He should count it a blessing that they have moments like this, though Bruce would greatly prefer spending time with Jason while he isn’t sick and miserable. But Bruce will take it, nonetheless. Jason drains a sufficient amount of water, only to lurch forward in another coughing fit as soon as he gets in a breath. “Christ,” he rasps, eyes watering. “Just fucking shoot me already, will ya?” Bruce rubs his back. “I could tranq you, if you really think it would help. But I can’t guarantee that one of your brothers won’t take advantage of that and draw mustaches on your face while I’m not looking.” “Har, har. You’re a fucking comedian now.” Jason’s voice is coarse as gravel, scraping up his vocal cords. “Want some tea? It’ll help soothe your throat.” “Later. Just wanna...sleep for now.” In spite of everything he stands for, Jason tips his head to rest it on Bruce’s shoulder. Whether it was intentional or he’s just so disoriented from the fever that he has no idea he’s even doing it, Bruce won’t take the gesture for granted. Jason is shivering, so Bruce pulls the blanket tighter around his shoulders where it slackened during his sleep. Then, in a riskier maneuver, he puts his arm around Jason and pulls him in close like he did so many times when Jason was a lot shorter and a lot less jagged around the edges. Bcuce still loves him just the same. Jason leans into Bruce’s warmth instinctively, but he warns, “Tell anyone about this and I’ll shatter your clavicle.” “Mm-hm.” “I mean it. You’ll need a goddamn orthopedic surgeon to fix you up if you breathe a word of this to anyone.” “I believe you.” It must be a good enough answer because Jason closes his eyes, relaxing in Bruce’s hold. “The only reason I’m gonna say this is ‘cause my brain is melting,” Jason says, “but...thanks. For being here.” He yawns. “Being sick alone fuckin’ sucks.” “I hear you.” “And keep Tim away from me, ‘kay? I don’t trust the little snot not to pull something.” Bruce snorts and unpauses the otter movie. “Go to sleep, Jay.”

#batfamily #batfam #fanfic commission #sickfic #jason todd #red hood #batman #bruce wayne #robin #batman and robin #fanfiction #fanfic

77 notes · View notes

serendipityunho · 4 years

Text

always yours (pg) — jung wooyoung

The bickering, the arguing. There was only so much you could handle before you lost your mind.

You were sick of the aggravated voices booming through the house, it gave you headaches to the point of crying. You hated it. The feeling of weakness flowing through your body and the feeling of uselessness as you weren’t able to do anything about it.

It only stopped for a little bit. You had to cherish those few seconds of silence before the pounding headaches hit you like a brick once again. You knew that if you tried to scream, nothing would come out no matter how hard you try, not even a whimper.

Never have you had the thought of running away cross your mind but tonight might be the first. Nothing was stopping you. Your parents probably wouldn’t even notice, too busy throwing curses and yells into each other’s faces.

It was better out than trapped inside this box of hell. But where was there to go? Anywhere but here.

You did it.

Contemplating every decision you were about to make with each step down the stairs to the front door. And you were right, they didn’t notice. You could even hear their tiresome voices from outside.

That’s when you ran, you ran like you never wanted to go back. Never looking back, afraid of the possibility of a sudden change in mind.

The streets were the embodiment of how you were feeling. Empty, dark, cold, only a little bit of light left.

You didn’t even realise you were panting like crazy until your legs had slowed down after growing tired of the sprint you had just done. The headache seemed to have been consumed with spins now, just great. It felt like it was about to explode any second now with the cold air sinking in every pore of your body.

Slight relief flushed over you as your eyes land on the flickering neon lights of a convenience store situated in the corner of the street. It drew you in like a moth as your legs start moving again.

A slight buzz filled your ear as you approached, eyes aching slightly at the sign. It was empty, of course it was, it was a dead street.

A foot into the store and you felt calmer than ever, the quiet atmosphere was more than enough to have you breathing normally again. The cashier looked as if they were seconds away from falling asleep, it was a twenty-four-hour store after all.

There was a little seating area further inside the store in front of the ceiling-high window, a man occupied the spot towards the end of the table with nothing but a cup of some sort of steaming hot beverage in his hands. If only you took the time to snatch some change off of your table, you wouldn’t be licking your lips for something warm to fill your cold body.

As you grew closer to the line of seats, the face of whom sitting alone grew recognisable. It wasn’t just a random stranger chilling in a convenience store in the middle of the night. It was, in fact, someone you had once known very well.

You wouldn’t be able to mistake that jawline for anyone else other than Jung Wooyoung. Your heart clenched at the sight of him finally in front of you.

People say losing friendships with someone you were once close to was worse than heartbreak, you finally understood that after conflicting discourses between the two of you that lead to him parting his way and you parting the other. Not a day goes by without you wishing things could back to the way it was, the way it could be.

It would be cliche to say Wooyoung was your everything, but he was. He was the only one that understood, the one that could.

The chair pulled out with ease as you take a seat on it, you didn’t bother taking another glance at Wooyoung, you couldn’t despite how badly you just wanted to mutter a greeting to him. Nothing was the same after your partings, no regular hallway scares, no contagious laughter, no nothing. You missed it dearly.

What were you supposed to do sitting here? That was the real question. Stay until the sun comes up? Wait until your parents go berserk and search for you? Let’s just see where the night takes you.

It was a silence you’ve been dreading for so long. Free and away from the chaos at home. Back when you and Wooyoung were attached to the hip, he was your place of sanctuary, always buying rice cakes for the two of you to snack on and hopefully take your mind off things. But now it seems like he was the only one on your mind considering he was literally sitting three seats away from you.

“You still wear that ring to sleep?” You jumped at the sudden voice, eyes widening as you stop fiddling with your fingers.

“You know I don’t take it off” It took some courage to raise your head, facing the voice beside you.

It was almost like you were in a fever dream just seeing Wooyoung’s eyes again, his face, him. You didn’t realise how much it hurt to be away from him for so long until now when a stinging feeling erupts in the pit of your stomach.

The ring on your index finger was a simple silver band, given to you by Wooyoung when he had experienced his first heartbreak and you were there to console him. A little ‘thank you’ since he had been too embarrassed to say it out loud to your face.

“Finally did it huh? Ran away from your parents?” It was Wooyoung who had given you the idea of running away even though you never thought you’d consider it. You wouldn’t say his situation was the same but he always managed to find a way to escape it.

His irrational decisions always taught you lessons, to never do what he did. But look where you are now.

“Is it that obvious?” You chuckled, shifting uncomfortably in your seat.

“Why else would you be sitting here at three in the morning?” Wooyoung’s face remained blank, a tint of concern pooling in his eyes as he pivoted his body to face you.

“Speaking of which, why are you?”

“Same thing”

“Oh,” Do you comfort him? Leave him alone? He probably spoke up for a reason, didn’t he? “, what happened this time?- I mean, you don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to-”.

“- Actually, they kicked me out”

“O-Oh, I’m sorry” You weren’t surprised at all to be honest. You saw this coming, just never expected it to be now. Wooyoung never really did have a good bond with his parents, it was fragmented to the point where you could never remend it.

“It’s fine, better now than never. I can’t stand it there anymore” You could almost feel his pain through his words. It pained you to know Wooyoung was thinking so lowly, yearning for escape from his own parents.

“Where are you going to go?”

“I don’t know, my friend Jongho got himself a place. I might crash there for a while” It was only the two of you back then, seems like he’s moved on pretty quickly after that too. But you? It was progress.

“Good luck”

“Where are you going to go? Are you just staying here for the rest of the night?” Wooyoung furrowed his brows, resting his chin on the palm of his hand as the two of you spoke more words than you could’ve possibly expected.

“If I have to, yes”

“Good luck to you too then”

“Thanks”

Silence once again. The shot of serotonin from just talking to Wooyoung was the only thing keeping you awake, keeping your mind busy and away from home. You wanted to thank him, thank him for talking to you even though it was barely anything, you were happy to hear his voice. Probably one last time.

You trace the silver ring with your finger, facing back to the window as you sit in silence. You could feel Wooyoung’s gaze still on you from the side of your head, a part of you wanted to face back to him and talk, the other just wants to be left alone in complete silence hoping for the night to pass quicker.

“I’ll be back” Your head snapped up to Wooyoung pushing himself off his seat and disappearing into the aisles of goods.

You could see Wooyoung eyeing some food near the cold area from the circled mirror in the corner of the store. He had grabbed a few things before approaching the cashier, muttering a faint ‘thank you’ before moving back to the other side of the store.

What was this boy doing?

It was the echo of beeps that had sprung your interest now. Wooyoung was standing in front of the microwave, tapping his foot as he looked around. His eyes met yours in the mirror, throwing you a small smile before looking back at his little project.

The whirring sound of the microwave halted as Wooyoung pulled out whatever was inside, holding it but its edges and speedwalking back to your little seating area. This time, sitting next to you.

“I bought us rice cakes” You didn’t know what to say, just staring at Wooyoung with awe as he shot a meaningful smile, handing over a second fork to you.

“Wha-”

“I know you don’t eat when shit like that happens so you must be hungry as fuck right now, just eat with me. Please?”

Your heart softened at his words, lips twitching into a small smile as you accept the fork he held out. Your life turned to darkness after Wooyoung had parted from you, but now, it was like you had found light again.

“Thank you, Wooyoung”

He chuckled, stabbing a rice cake with his fork before raising it up to your mouth with his hand under to catch any fallout. This wasn’t the first time you’ve seen this trick. Your mouth opens with an ‘ah’ as Wooyoung chuckles softly while feeding you.

“I missed you, I missed you so much” He says softly.

“Don’t leave me ever again, please” You choked, the stinging feeling had come back as you feel tears lining your vision. From those three platonic words, it was enough to open a door full of closeted emotions.

“I won’t ever think about it” Wooyoung instantly embraced you in a hug, rubbing your back with his hand as you let a tear fall.

“Promise?”

“I promise”

#ateez fluff #ateez angst #kpop fluff #kpop angst #wooyoung fluff #ateez #ateez imagines #kpop #kpop imagines #jung wooyoung #fluff:wooyoung #ateez wooyoung #wooyoung imagines

265 notes · View notes

halothenthehorns · 3 years

Text

All in the Family

Chapter 59: The Riddle House

It was a run-down cottage, fit to fall in a burst of strong wind. Eight teenagers falling into its midst nearly did the job. Dust coated everything in such thick layers, the simultaneous sneezes nearly sent a chair falling over. A burnished teapot with long cold water sat ready on the stove, a chipped cup and bag never used set at the ready with no one to save it as it toppled on its side. The only distinguishing sight from the moth-eaten, broken recliner in the living room and the tightly fitted bed was the mansion just visible in the distant gloom.

Frank tried not to look at it longer than he had to, it gave him the creeps for no good reason. Upon closer inspection of the minuscule space, he found a book lodged into the broken back of the chair, but it had changed again to a dark blue. It was much, much thicker than the previous three versions, but as it had a light blue four emblazoned on the spine he was sure it was the right one he was supposed to find. Even without previous experience, it still gave off a magical energy as blatant as the tension filling the tiny area, and he'd rather not be too close as this place gave no choice when it blew, so he tried to crack it open and begin.

He didn't even get the chapter title out.

"So that's it then?"

Alice couldn't help but be rather impressed with the way Regulus bowed up to the three boys much older and larger than him, he certainly wasn't giving it much thought as he laid into them.

"Don't know what you're on about," Sirius Black scoffed while inspecting his nails, the air around him still exuding he always found himself winding up in dusty cottages a thousand miles from school do to magic outside their control. Then she reminded herself he regularly spent his free time in that Shrieking Shack and exploring the grounds with a werewolf, so maybe that's why the four had taken it in stride so quickly. This really wasn't such a big deal in comparison.

Regulus didn't seem to agree, as he shoved at his brother to keep his attention. Alice watched as all three, she turned purposefully just to see it as true, frowned reproachfully at him for it. "You know perfectly well! Why's Peter suddenly not looking anyone in the eye, eh? What did you lot say to him? He ruddy stood by you and defended you because of some crimes, now you can't be bothered to do the same?"

It seemed to take a lot of effort for Sirius Black to force his scowl to look light and amused as he continued antagonizing his brother. "Oh, as if I have to explain to you," he pandered. "Come on Reggie, you're smart enough to know the difference between the rat who set me up for a crime isn't the same as not doing it."

"He hasn't done it you arrogant shit!" Regulus shouted loud enough dust trickled down from the rafters.

"I don't see how it's your business," Potter finally cut in as Sirius wasn't holding back his anger much longer. "Why don't you run along back to your Dark Art's club now and let the big kids handle it."

If his goal had been to infuriate the younger Black beyond words, it worked. He turned on his heel and went to stand by the front door where Pettigrew was and hissed something quietly to him.

Pettigrew just shook his head fiercely, and then 'vanished.' This time though, they all had the sense of mind to look to the ground and just spot a bald tale slipping underneath the recliner.

The three Marauders still visible looked like they were going to be sick at the cowardly display, but Lily felt like bursting into applause someone other than her had finally called them out on their insolence. She wanted to have a go at them herself, but Frank had finally taken the lingering silence to begin.

Peter listened, just like he always had for his friends. He'd always been smaller, everyone always overlooked him, he'd been the perfect one to blend in and hear every conversation in a room even before he'd shrunk down to this size. He took in quickly everything there was to say about The Riddle House and stored that information away, connecting it easily to You-Know-Who, ergo it would definitely be important later. There would be a later, there had to be.

He would not confront his friends as Regulus had suggested, nor do anything to further incite them like suddenly trying to pathetically make friends with Longbottom and Smith. He doubted he could anyways, he still wasn't sure how he'd made the friends he had. They'd take him back though, just like they had Sirius, once he found a way of reminding them of his usefulness.

Doubts began plaguing him at once though, if they even should. He'd probably just turn around and somehow get James killed all over again. You-Know-Who was no unintelligent animal to be outsmarted as he'd done in the past, and it was clear to him now they didn't even need him to do that. Their tricks and planning couldn't last forever, when school ended they'd have to find something else to do, would probably have started to forget about him anyway, he'd already seen the beginnings of that. Who would need him around then to get information? What would be his purpose?

Frank read with intrigue about the history being fed to him, but felt he was the only one really taking it in. The three Marauders had banded together in a tight circle and seemed to be having some whispered argument Black was on the outs of. He kept shaking his head and gesturing over his shoulder a lot. Lily and Alice weren't being much better, looking out the window to the decrepit old Manor being described but exchanging softly whispered words as well while throwing pitiful looks to the younger Black, who was gazing foully at the recliner.

His namesake alone seemed to have his interest as he spotted burglars in the old house, and Frank couldn't help but glance up now to make sure a light wasn't visible there yet. He was the only one paying strict attention to the details provided as the war hero made his way along the property past his beloved plants, and then began overhearing You-Know-Who's conversation to Pettigrew.

He almost wished he could climb under some furniture and hear the rest of it out too rather than read through the dead air proceeding this portion. Pathetic was the kind way to put the following description of the interactions for plots of murder, a far cry from the boy he'd been seeing recently tagging around with the most extravagant students in the castle.

The poor old groundskeeper had been marked dead as soon as he'd entered that house, to this everyone knew. Still, there were flinches all around for the curse being cast, but it was Harry's experience seeing it all that had them gasping for breath as they were pulled away.

#Harry Potter #fanfiction #The Marauders #GoF #Wolfstar #Jilly #Regulus Black #Remus Lupin #Peter Pettigrew #Sirius Black #James Potter #Lily Evans #Alice Smith #Frank Longbottom #reading the books

4 notes · View notes

absentsdream · 3 years

Text

* you know rina benton-moa, right? they’re twenty-four, and they’ve lived in irving for, like, their whole life on and off? well, their spotify wrapped says they listened to reinvent by phoebe green like, a million times this year, which makes sense ‘cause they’ve got that whole fury encased by the reflection of daylight in the eyes; lines etched into skin from lifetimes over of squinting into midsummer skies, odd trinkets lined carelessly along a mantlepiece shrouded by aged dust, a split in the lip lancing keenly as the tongue darts out to wet it thing going on. i just checked and their birthday is july 15th, so they’re a cancer, which is unsurprising, all things considered.

hi i’m cee .. u all know me...... regrettably gone for a cutla weeks but now i’m back ready n waiting to finally write rina (rip to their intro i never wrote last time around) kisses u all so tenderly let us plot shall we.......

AESTHETICS.

a weather-worn baseball cap ( jacksonville jazz festival 1983 ) adorned with dried sweat akin to the rings of saturn that collects dust on the back seat of a car, neglected piles of unopened government letters spilling from a haphazard tower onto the floor, a moth-eaten cotton shirt, johnny cash at four a.m. on the jukebox hits radio station, hand me down trainers marred by crowsfoot grass stains, dollar store candy older than your own existence, blinking grocery store fluorescent lights, the acrid scent of tyres set aflame.

CHARA INSPO.

frankie ( animal kingdom ), theo ( catherine house ), libby bray ( dark places ), frances ( conversations with friends ), ruth ( ozark ), tommy ( never let me go )

BACKGROUND.

lilac ridge’s newest, unwelcome baby for 1997. rina’s mother is gone before they have the chance to memorise a voice, the touch of a hand on their fever-ridden forehead. she forever remains in old polaroids - their parents look happy here, sun-blushed and clutching amber bottles of schlitz. their dad tries and tries, often in a futile effort, to be the parent an unruly rina needs. that old woman in the trailer next to them hates the saturday morning cartoons that they play too loud: she says the catdog theme loops in her sleep, now.

TW NEGLECT despite the one or two friends rina manages to keep, school isn’t lonely. it’s lilac ridge that’s hollow, an ugly reflection of the way their father returns wordlessly to the chair found on hard rubbish collection day once, gesturing for a drink and waving them out of the trailer as he lights a cigarette. he doesn’t say he’s lonely. they’re too young to understand, or too foolhardy, and spends the afternoon fashioning bracelets from creek reeds until the cicadas quiet and the evening sky turns imperial violet, led back by constellations. some nights, rina isn’t there but in the alien comfort of a tentative friend’s trundle bed, eyes fixed on the owl nightlight and stereo that emits a soft tick as it reaches the end of a 4kids cd. TW END

the trailer is often empty without warning. rina’s in fernandina beach, florida one month. the next two, it is macon, georgia. the louisiana dirge for a friend of a friend of a friend’s funeral holds their attention better than any maths teacher can. to make friends is hard, but money is money and it puts food on the table. rina becomes used to tucking away their life in a tattered rucksack. prized possessions are rare. when they find one, it makes a home at the very bottom of their bag, cushioned by old newspaper and a spare pair of socks.

one tepid night, rina wakes to a clear desert sky wheeling above them. in the front seat, knees cramped under a too-thin blanket, their father is nowhere to be found in the street emptied by midnight. without keys the radio doesn’t start. for hours, they wait in silence for him to return. he does, eventually, fifty dollars short and reeking of beer.

TW DEATH live and let die — an eighty-cent find from a gas station in texas that exists permanently under a layer of dust some time in the nineties, the garish yellow sticker stubbornly remains on the back window of her father’s car. it’s not a day after his funeral that she peels it off. cirrhosis and failing lungs, they say. the more stubborn parts of the sticker come away easily by the blade of a pocket knife and sat on the bottom cinder block step to the now-empty trailer back at lilac ridge, rina sets it alight. the sticker melts and warps above the flame. heat stings the pad of their thumb that grips to the top of it for as long as they can bear it and the melted bits stick to the hem of the navy dress the old lady next door lent them for the day. she asks if they need anything else. they say no. TW END

at sixteen, nobody has impeccable financing. rina doesn’t leave irving until after graduating high school, sustenance made off cup noodles that they microwave despite the label saying not to, a quick buck made to sit the SAT for that quarterback who thinks he’s hot shit, yale material, for the mousy girl who likes literature written by dead people exclusively and scrunches her nose up at rina’s rates, upfront, but pushes across the seventy bucks anyway. the school’s careers counsellor catches them eventually - you could make it into an ivy league if you applied yourself a bit more. rina’s brow quirks. their grades are fine, more than fine. what else do they need to do?

on blind faith alone — a rarity, perhaps something rina let free after the hideous, lonely last two years — hands that never quiver submit college applications. pre-med at dartmouth awaits, but two years in the structure and demand wigs them out. lilac ridge is the glue trap dangling from the ceiling and rina is the fly, buzzing relentlessly. they are nothing, just as they suspected.

TRAITS & QUIRKS.

dumbass sun, fuckwit moon, muppet rising

unofficial mensa member with zero motivation. self-help books won’t work, neither will a stern word from an exasperated mentor

at their core, all seems numb. rina is nowhere close to understanding themselves. really, there’s a stubbornness that makes them reliable, even at the worst of times. a warmth, too, not a raging flame but embers that never go cold. hands which caress despite the bruised knuckles and nail bitten fingertips. outwardly, rina’s personality depends on whichever standout film or book antihero has their attention at the time.

petty criminal and relegated to dead-end jobs because of it. it’s rare for a boss to re-hire them, simply because their habit of up and leaving town without warning is too expensive and too frustrating

refused bail once for being a flight risk on account of their propensity to disappear into a louisiana bayou

although rina has never breathed a word of it to anyone, they’re desperate to scrape together enough money to leave for new zealand and track down their mother’s family, if only for the prospect of a better life than thier father’s derelict trailer, the only inheritance received from him

absolute parasite :/

julian assange apologist. took up skateboarding after the infamous ecuadorian embassy footage came on the news one evening

on that note, rina hacks for a spot of extra money. cites their resume for it, so they’re reliable. it consists of them hacking into the irving mayor’s website once and photoshopping che guevara onto the face of every councillor

WANTED PLOTS.

ummmmm

a childhood friend, particularly one whose house rina ended up staying at far longer than planned on account of concerned parents

rina’s natural enemy whose own rigid academics competed against their disorganisation and confounding, cherry red a+’s. bonus: debate club rivals

literally anything. i’ll take it. gimme

#irvingintro #:P #tw alcoholism -#tw death -#tw neglect -

2 notes · View notes

jinmukangwrites · 4 years

Text

Whumptober Day 28

Mugged

Ao3

Summary: It's a simple get together, and for once everything was fine.

Warnings: GRAPHIC MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH AND GRAPHIC INJURY. DO NOT READ IF THIS KIND OF VIOLENCE BOTHERS YOU, WHETHER ITS DIRECTED TO A CHILD OR AN ADULT. SPOILERS FOR DEATH IS IN TAGS.

-o-o-o-o-

"You have something on your face," Dick teases, smiling and leaning his elbows forward onto the 24 hour diner table. In the booth across from him, Damian scowls and wipes a smidge of strawberry ice cream from his cheek then elbows to his side to hit the laughing Tim straight into his gut.

Jason snorts and takes a spoonful of his own ice cream, which is raspberry flavored with little chocolate chips.

The time outside is very late. So late that when the four of them walked inside the diner after a long, team up for patrol, one of the workers actually glared at them. Which is valid. If Jason worked at one of these places when it was reaching the buttcrack of dawn, then watched as four annoyingly loud and too awake people barged in, he'd probably glare too.

Maybe they should have came inside in their costumes instead of getting dressed first into their normal clothes. One of the waitresses literally has a Nightwing pin on her vest. They could have probably gotten the ice cream and fries for free.

Oh well. The ice cream here is worth a little glaring and a few bucks.

"So I was thinking-" Dick says through a mouthful of ice cream. He's already dipping another fry into his chocolate mint shake, so Jason gets the feeling that whatever Dick says for the next twenty minutes will be through food- "that after this, we can go to a Redbox and pick up a movie."

"What movie?" Tim asks.

Dick hums. "One that Cass hasn't seen yet."

Jason scoffs. "She hasn't seen a lot of movies. You're going to have to be more specific."

"Then what about a movie Duke hasn't seen," Tim asks, scraping the bottom of his shake with his spoon. "That way we can kill two birds with one stone."

"I hate that metaphor," Jason stands up from the booth with his empty shake cup and equally empty bag of fries.

Dick glares at him with a face that says yes Jason, we all know you died.

Jason smirks and throws his trash away.

As they all walk out of the diner, Jason hears one of the workers mumble finally, and he's not even that mad about it. He hopes their shifts end soon and they can go home and watch anime or something. Working night shifts like that in Gotham isn't something to scoff at.

Dick pulls out his phone while Tim runs ahead to take the lead. Jason walks behind the group as Damian falls into step besides Dick and looks over at his phone screen to see what he's typing. "Where's the closest Redbox?" Dick mumbles to himself and Jason rolls his eyes.

He's serious about the Redbox thing? "You do know we can just buy whatever movie we want with B's card. We don't need a Redbox."

"It's for the experience, Jay," Dick argues back, scrolling on his phone through Google. "Everyone goes to Redbox to get random movies they don't actually want to own."

"Alright, alright," Jason huffs, smirking a little.

And okay, he'll admit it. Tonight has actually been… a little fun. Even if Dick had to threaten to go skiing without him next winter if he didn't join them for patrol. And while yes, Jason could just go skiing alone or force Roy to come along… and while yes, Dick would have gone skiing with him regardless of the threat and if Jason went through with it… he still found it enjoyable to just pretend to be a family with these idiots for the night. He almost wishes the others could have joined, but with Duke and Cass being busy on their own sibling bonding mission for the night where no one else were allowed they were forced to be just the four of them tonight.

Dick will have to work with Cass to better schedule sibling get togethers'. Just imagining the shenanigans and trash taking about Bruce they could be doing if it were all six of them has him staunching down a grin.

Even better if Steph joined as well.

Jason follows along as Dick picks up speed to pass Tim—whos balancing on the curb of the street like an actual five year old—and lead them towards the nearest Redbox.

"We should get Princess Bride," Tim suggests as they walk past an alleyway. "I don't think Duke's seen that."

"He has no excuse to have not seen Princess Bride," Damian huffs. "It was one of the first movies Richard showed me."

"And one of the first I showed Cass, too," Dick adds, turning to flash a lopsided grin. "So we need to think of another one."

"What about that new movie?" Tim suggests.

Jason lifts an eyebrow. "What new movie?"

"You know," Tim replies, "the- the new movie. With that guy from Voltron. Where they go on the bridges and fight the monkeys?"

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"It's-" Tim growls, sounding frustrated with himself. Jason finds him amusing. "You know. That one movie."

"Timothy has no idea what he's talking about."

"I'm sorry I don't spend all day watching movies all the time. Oh! Dwayne the Rock Johnson was there!"

"… Are you talking about Jumanji 2?" Dick asks and Tim snaps his fingers.

"Jumanji 2!"

They turn a corner, then immediately all stop when they spot the entire road blocked off by orange coned and giant signs telling you to detour. In the middle of the blocked off road is a giant, dangerous looking hole in the ground leading towards the sewers.

Huh. Jason's almost forgotten one of Two-Face's thugs had thrown a very powerful grenade of some sort last night.

"Damn. Google hasn't updated this?" Dick sighs and begins tapping on his phone.

"Crap like this happens all the time in Gotham," Tim sighs while stuffing his hands in his pockets, "you really think they're gonna catch everything?"

Dick's mouth turns into a frown, then he looks up at the building rooftops around them as if wondering how difficult it would be to climb up and parkour towards the nearest Redbox in civilian attire. He sighs, probably settling on it not being difficult, but potentially compromising of their identities ifanyone saw.

He looks back at the phone. Then turns towards the alleyway they have just passed.

"… We can cut through the alley," he suggests.

Jason immediately scoffs while Tim walks towards them, shaking his head.

"Um no? We shouldn't? Have you forgot what city we're in?"

Dick gives an unimpressed look at Tim before sighing. "We'll have to go all the way around the block to get to the Redbox. That's like, another twenty minutes. Besides, we just finished patrol. Gotham's at its safest around now."

"We're going to get in there and then get shanked by some rando," Tim argues.

Damian watches the two of them argue with narrowed eyes. When Damian opens his mouth, Jason decides it's his turn to step in. He grabs Dick by the back of his jacket and then behind to walk towards the mouth of the alleyway. He has his guns on him still, concealed under the belt of his jeans. If anyone is stupid enough to try and try to assult them in the alleyway, all Jason needs to do is pull out his guns and they'll go running for the hills.

Gotham isn't filled with fighters. Gotham is filled with rats that only prey on those with smaller claws than them.

"I'm not spendin' another hour out here to get a monkey bridge movie," Jason huffs, stopping in front of the mouth of the alleyway. "Now let's go."

"Fine," Tim mumbles, following behind as Dick takes the lead inside the alley. "But if we all get killed don't blame me."

"Dying isn't that bad, actually," Jason says, and Dick turns around and shoots that glare again.

Damian huffs and trails behind Dick, but he watches the shadows like how a kid shouldn't. Thirteen years old and he's already seen the worst the world has to offer. Jason, once again, takes the back, fully aware of the weight hanging off his hip. The alleyway is long, and dark, and definitely not as surveillanced as it should be, but they continue anyways. So far, all there is to see is closed doors here and there that would lead into various shops and such if they weren't boarded up. Trash cans, litter, bags, and boxes of various contents dot the entirety of the alleyway.

Otherwise, it looks pretty empty.

Jason sighs. It should be fine. Gotham is always quiet around these early morning hours after Batman and his army of sidekicks have just combed through its streets. Criminals are back in there nests, shivering and praying they're not found tonight. Hours like these are usually the safest to go out for a after midnight stroll, or a very early morning jog. It's like a limbo. Where Gotham can actually feel like a normal city for once.

Of course, it's right when Jason let's his guard down that something goes wrong.

Because something always goes wrong.

Because some criminals are rats. But there's others who are like moths, too dumb to go back inside and persistent enough to jump at anything shiny enough to catch their attention.

A man, practically rags, skin, and bones jumps our from behind a dumpster, his hands already lifted in front of him with a gun in his grasp. Immediately, everyone pauses in their tracks. Jason goes to grab his own gun like he planned, but the man points his weapon at Jason with shaking, obviously trigger happy hands.

"No one move!" The man shouts, trembling like a nervous mut. Jason holds off grabbing his guns for the moment, knowing that if he makes any sudden or threatening moves the man will fire.

Dick, like the idiot he is, immediately steps in front of Damian. Damian growls, but doesn't make a move to fight that show of protection yet. Dick slowly raises his hands in surrender. "Take whatever you want," he says slowly. Evenly.

Tim shifts behind Dick and glances at Jason, questioning in his eyes.

"Give me your money- all of it," the man demands, and Jason can practically hear the body of his weapon tremble in his shaking hands. "No one will get hurt if ya give me all your money."

"Okay, okay," Dick says gently. Like he's soothing the mugger. Dick carefully lowers his arms to his pockets and uses smooth motions to bring out his wallet, which is probably only filled a debit card he can easily cancel, his driver's license which is definitely expired, and not even four dollars of cash. Jason only knows what's in Dick's wallet because Dick's his main victim for him to practice pickpocketing on. He holds out his Superman patterned wallet but the man keep his gun up and trained.

"All of you," he wheezes. "All of you, give me your fuckin' money."

Tim snaps into movement with shaking hands, pulling out his wallet while Damian makes to do the same. Why the kid has a wallet with actual cash, Jason will never know. Something about Bruce wanting Damian to feel independent… like how he bought a lock for Jason's bedroom door that only Jason had the key for, just to make him feel like he had control while small and scared and barely eleven years old.

The gun moves back to Jason, and Jason realizes he's been focusing too much on the wrong things. He lifts his hands and clears his throat.

"I don't have anything," he says, because it's true. He doesn't carry his wallet while on patrol, nor does he stash personal belongings with his changes of clothes after patrol. Then, there's also the added fact that this guy is definitely one more nerve shot from firing his weapon. Him seeing a glock on Jason's belt might be the thing that pushes him over the edge.

"I don't believe you," the man growls, taking a step forward and aiming directly at Jason now.

And of course this is happening. Of course Jason's being mugged when he doesn't have any change on him.

"Jason…" Tim hissed and Jason throws him a sideways glare.

"I'm telling you, man, I don't have anything."

"Show me," the man snarls, jerking his pistol dangerously. "Show me your pockets."

And shit. This is what Jason was worried about.

"Okay," he says, softening his voice, "alright. Just... I'm carrying okay? But I'm not gonna-"

"YOU HAVE A GUN?!" The man screeches, and Jason winces. Great. He was trying to warn the guy. There's no way Jason can show all of his pockets and his gun go unnoticed. It's grip is hanging out of his jeans waistband, black as night and clear as day.

Jason lifts his hands immediately in surrender, watching the man wearily as his already panicked breaths become more labored. The tendons in his paper thin wrists are twitching.

Jason's record for drawing and shooting a gun with accuracy is a little less than two seconds. Even with his hands up like this.

But this man already has the gun aimed and finger on the trigger.

"Let's calm down," Dick tries, "we have money, just take it and we can all-"

"You have a gun-" the man practically froths.

And that is when Jason knew the sound of gunfire will be heard in this alleyway tonight. Jason can see the resolution in the man's eyes to shoot a moment before it happens. Jason doesn't have time to dodge or pull his own weapons. He will try to anyway.

He goes to dodge, drops his hands to his waistline, and the enemies gun explodes.

There's normally a moment of nothing between the time you've been shot and the time you realize you've been shot. But it doesn't happen this time.

What happens is that Jason suddenly blinks on the grimy floor, his gun having skid across the cement from the force of his fall.

He… he was pushed.

"RICHARD!"

Jason looks up just in time to watch Damian run for the collapsing Dick Grayson… just to be violently knocked to the side by the sound of another bullet launching from the chamber.

Jason doesn't watch or look anymore. He just scrambles to his gun, turns, aims, and fires.

The man chokes on blood as the bullet rips through his chest.

And Jason thinks that this should be the end of it. This should be when he can get to his feet and look his brother's all in the eye one at a time. And- and he doesn't know. Go home? Call Gordon? Plead self defense?

However, when he stands up, he finds only Tim standing, his hands leaving his face from protecting himself moments before.

Dick's on the ground writhing from pooling red in the center of his gut.

Damian… Damian…

Jason thinks he's going to get sick.

The damage a 9mil can do to a head at this close of range…

He doesn't look. He can't look. Not yet. He rushes towards Dick and ignored Damian's b- he-

He ignores Damian. He ignores Damian and slams his hands down onto Dick's stomach.

Guilt twists in his gut like something he's never felt before. Rage. Helplessness. Disbelief. It's all he can do to force his limbs to press down as Dick jolts from agony beneath him. "Stay- stay still-" Jason snarls. His chest hurts so badly. His ears are ringing.

His fault his fault his fault his fault-

"D-" Dick babbles, blood coating his teeth and dripping from the corners of his mouth. "No- n-"

Dick's not paying attention to anything. It's then, Jason realizes he's not struggling because of his own pain.

He's struggling because his kid is laying across from him in a puddle of blood, a hole in his skull.

"No-" Dick twitches. Practically sobs. "M'suh- sorry- D'mi…"

"It's okay, just-" it's not okay, but Jason continues- "just focus on me, kay? Just- Tim, hospital?"

"Working on it."

Jason presses harder onto Dick's stomach. Dick sobs and his eyelashes flutter.

He almost wants to tell Tim to stop.

The ambulance isn't going to make it in time.

He knows this because he can hear Dick's protests begin to die down. He knows because he can see Dick's hand twitching towards Damian's limp one. He knows because he can feel the final shudder through his frame before his normally clear blue eyes cloud over.

Jason… doesn't know what to do now. It's like his entire world just… stops.

And he wants to scream. He wants to throw something. He wants to go back in time and shake Dick by the shoulders until he fixes this.

He can't... he can't go back to a world where Dick and Damian aren't apart of it.

Especially not if it's all. His. Fucking. Fault.

"-we need help- my brother's been shot-"

And Jason clutches his fists in Dick's sopping wet, blood-soaked shirt and turns to find Tim kneeling against Damian, blood painting his fingertips.

He wants to scream that there's no use of an ambulance. There's no point.

But then Tim meets his eyes, tears trailing down in tracks, then looks down at Damian.

It takes a second for Jason to see it. But Damian's chest moves.

Damian's still alive.

He's still alive.

Jason forces himself to leave Dick so he can scramble over to Damian and get a closer, desperate look. Tim rattles off the details of their location the the details of the mugging while Jason just... Hovers. Holding his red stained hands above his- his baby brother.

He doesn't want to touch Damian. He doesn't want to break him more.

So he sits there and counts every breath the kid stubbornly makes even with a bullet in his skull.

He sits there until Tim hangs up the call and sits besides him. He sits there until a loud ambulance accompanied by at least three cop cars pull up and then a shock blanket is wrapped around his shoulders. He stays there until Damian is loaded into a gurney. Until he's left there, kneeling, not even realizing he's holding Tim's hand, until a female cop with sad brown eyes kneels down in front of him and tells him Bruce is on his way with Cass and Duke.

He nods, and stands up, keeping Tim besides him even though he's caused this.

He looks to his side to see Dick already covered by by a tarp. He can see red bleeding out from under it.

Slender arms wrap around his waste, and it takes him a moment to realize Tim is clutching to him.

Jason's... The big brother again. The big brother.

He- he should…

He wraps his arms around Tim and let's his own tears finally fall.