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blooming-violets · 2 months

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Saints and Sinners || Under the Banner of Heaven

[Jeb Pyre x fem!Reader]

Summary: Jeb falls prey to his darkest temptations while working a case.

Warnings: adult graphic smut, a cheating fic, heavy LDS religious themes and traumas, brief mentions of the murder of sex workers, light fem!dom/male!sub roles but nothing too crazy, brining it back to the religious trauma stuff - a lot of strong feelings of being trapped in a family/religion you don't feel like you belong in, if you are someone who feels offended with merging religion and sexual themes then this is not the fic for you

Note: "Reader" is nicknamed Daisy as her stage name as a stripper/sex worker. She has no physical descriptions apart from having female anatomy/a human body and wearing a sun dress. She can look however you'd want her to which is what makes her a reader character. Apart from that, she is her own character.

Jeb Pyre considered himself to be a decently good man.

He was well groomed. He was respectful. He loved his family. He gave his job 100% and loved his neighbors.

He was a devout son of the Heavenly Father.

Or, at least, he used to be.

He had been hiding his true self for his family's sake. He was trying, but failing, to keep up his appearance of perfection. Every day was a new struggle to keep up his flawless Latter-day smile. Docile and submissive. Never making waves. Never voicing questions. Day after day, trapped in his own mind, slowly being eaten alive by his ever growing doubt. It was only a matter of time before he cracked.

She was his forbidden fruit. The temptress sent straight from the devil to corrupt his soul. The snake in his garden.

His latest case had led him straight to her doorstep. There were sex workers in the city being murdered. A killer who vowed to cleanse his city from their filth. Jeb hadn’t even known there were sex workers living in his area. He’d never even seen a strip club before he was forced to step inside one to investigate. It was a terrifying world he wasn’t sure how to navigate.

She had taken his hand and led him through the darkness.

Daisy. That’s what she called herself. Her stage name. She had told him it was after Daisy Buchanan. The paragon of perfection for men to lust after but hiding a sardonic, amoral soul. It seemed to fit. She was the kind of woman he’d leave a green light on for but never be able to obtain. He knew her real name for his investigation but she refused to have him call her by such. She claimed only the people who truly loved her were allowed to utter her true name. To everyone else, she was just Daisy.

He used to believe that all sex workers were women who needed saving. They had lost their way from God. They were impure. Drug addicts. Abused. Lost souls desperate to be saved.

But she fit none of those roles.

She was strong and sure. A business woman. A homeowner. She didn’t need a man to provide for her. Everything she owned was achieved through her own tenacity. When he looked at her, he saw someone who truly enjoyed their job. He struggled to wrap his head around that fact. A woman shouldn’t enjoy having sex for a living. She shouldn’t enjoy selling her body to perverted men. She should remain pure and devout until marriage. He often wondered what her future husband would think of her lewd, depraved acts.

And then he remembered that she never wanted to marry.

What an absurd thought. A woman with no desire for a husband? Utterly bizarre.

She was unlike any woman he had ever met and he was tempted by the wickedness of her world. He knew he shouldn’t be. He knew better than to dance with the devil. Yet, here he was. Allowing her to occupy every existing thought in his brain. She was the one he thought about late at night. She was the name he moaned into his pillow in the early hours of the morning while his wife slept beside him. She was the one he dreamed of being able to touch.

The one thing he couldn’t have, was the one thing he truly coveted. For Jeb Pyre was a sinner. He wasn't a devout man. He didn’t believe in the Heavenly Father.

And he hated the life he was forced to be living.

Everything was an act and he was tired of playing his part.

So, when a killer murdered two of her work acquaintances, and put her in his targets, Jeb decided to personally oversee her protection. After all, she had been such a help to the investigation thus far. He needed to keep his best informant alive.

Even if that meant risking everything he had to spend the night in her arms.

Jeb parked his car on the street directly outside of her house. From out here, one would never know what kind of person she was. It looked no different than any other house on the block. He wondered if her neighbors had any idea. He couldn’t imagine if they knew, they would let her stay in the neighborhood without a fight. They’d blame it on the guise of protecting their innocent children from the evil whore but the truth was that they hated anyone who dared to step outside their carefully crafted circle. They hated those different from them.

But who were her clients then, if not the men who claimed to hate everything about her?

Everything was a facade. He was so used to hearing people say one thing but act the opposite. The men who would run her from their neighborhood if they knew the truth, were the same men who would cash out their family’s credit card to spend a night with her. Publically, they would denounce her. Privately, they would take whatever they desired from her.

He was no different from them. The perverse thoughts inside his head were just as bad, if not worse. He had seen too much in this job. It had twisted his core. His mind was polluted. He was lusting down paths he could never travel.

Jeb rapped three, strong knocks on her door. It was later in the evening. He knew she wasn't at the strip club because he had a copy of her schedule in his car glove box. There were other women he had to keep an eye on, too, but she was the one he chose to personally protect. She was the one he feared to lose the most. It was irrational, he knew that. She had no notion of his fantasies keeping him up at night. To her, he was just the lead detective on a case.

He caught her peeking out the top window of her front door, standing on her tiptoes to reach, and he gave a friendly wave. At least she was smart. She wasn’t opening her door to just anyone.

He listened to the clicks of two different locks and smiled as she opened to him, “Good evening, ma’am. Detective Jeb Pyre, remember me?”

She forced a tight smile in return, “Of course I remember you. Do you think I have the memory of a goldfish?”

He let out a half hearted laugh. She was beautiful but she was scared. Women she had worked with were dying. It was supposed to be his job to keep them safe.

He tried to take a subtle glance down her body. She was wearing a sundress and nothing else. Warm yellow with tiny white flowers dotting the sleek fabric. One of the thin straps was sliding down her shoulder. The dress clung tightly around her torso to highlight her stunning cleavage and flared out over her hips whenever she moved. Women around here never wore clothes like that unless they also donned a buttoned up cardigan and tights. To see her display her body so openly caught his breath in his throat. He had to shift on his feet to readjust himself. He refused to allow her to see how excited his body was reacting to hers.

It was unprofessional. Wrong.

“Not at all. Do you have a moment to chat?” He asked, doing his best to keep his voice level.

She gave a sharp inhale, “Is everything okay? Did someone else get hurt?”

Jeb shook his head, “No, no. Nothing like that. I just wanted…”

What did he want? He wanted to commit a sin. He wanted to see her naked. He wanted to kiss her entire body. He wanted to slide his cock between her beautifully plump lips. He-

He was going to hell.

“I just wanted to stop in and let you know that I’ll be stationed outside your house for the rest of the night. With everything going on, I thought it would be best to station some people at various hot spots around town to keep an eye on things.”

Her eyes narrowed, “My house is a hot spot?” She shook her head in disbelief. “I’m sorry, Detective Pyre, but I don’t do business out of my own home. No one knows where I live. I use a stage name at work. No one there knows my real name. I’m not a street walker, I’m a stripper who occasionally takes up extra clients in the vip rooms when the money is good enough. My house isn’t a revolving door for men to come and go whenever they please like some brothel. I’ve taken some time off work for the next week to lay low, anyway. A lot of the other girls are doing the same. I think I’ll be alright.”

Jeb chewed awkwardly on his bottom lip, feeling like he had offended her, “I didn’t mean to imply…anything…”

This was not going how he intended. He wasn’t used to women talking back to him. He wasn’t sure how to respond.

“You being stationed out in your car all night, in front of my house, is only going to cause more eyes to look at me. My neighbors already think I’m some crazy heretic for not attending their church. I don’t need them looking further into my life. Thank you for stopping by and offering your support but I don’t need it.”

As she started to close the door, Jeb stuck his foot between the crack, wincing as it slammed into his shoe. He felt immediate guilt for doing such a strong handed act with her. He just couldn’t bear the thought of being turned away. He couldn’t spend another night laying in a bed next to a wife he no longer loved.

“I’m sorry,” he quickly added when he saw her look of outrage. “I don’t think you understand how dangerous the man we are hunting is. He could have already followed you home. He probably already knows where you live. I wouldn’t put it past him to break in. I’ve seen it before.” He gave a quiet sigh, nearly begging for her approval. “Please. Let me watch over you tonight. I won’t be able to live with myself if something happened while I was supposed to be here.”

Her shoulders dropped in defeat. He watched her peer side to side down the street, taking in her surroundings for anything unusual.

“Fine,” she huffed. “But do you have to be parked in the street? Can’t you pull your car into my garage so no nosy neighbors will see and spend the night inside? I have a perfectly adequate couch for you to hang out on.”

Jeb smiled, relieved, “I can do that. Thank you.”

He shouldn’t be this excited about being inside her home.

As he slowly walked through her place, he took note of the items she owned. Her house looked like any others he might enter. There were pictures of her with friends hanging on her refrigerator, a television in the corner of the living room, a brick fireplace with a little ceramic frog on top of the mantle. A cozy, hand knit blanket was draped over the back of the couch. Everything looked normal. He felt stupid for imagining her living inside of sex dungeon. Whatever that might look like. He still had a lot of biases he had to work on.

She walked into the living room after him with a glass of ice water, offering it to him, “The bathroom is the first door on the left down the hall. My bedroom is the last door. There’s a spare room to the right where I do my step aerobics. I have a basement with some empty rooms down there but I don’t really use them. Then there’s the kitchen and, obviously, living room. The front door and the basement door are the only doors into the house besides the garage. It’s a pretty small house with thin walls so you should be able to hear anything if there’s a break in.”

Jeb smiled politely in thanks. He knew what he was doing would be considered nefarious in his community. A married man spending the night in a single woman’s home, a stripper, no less, would be the gossip of the town. It wouldn’t matter if he was a detective keeping watch on someone who could be in danger. He was still a man alone with a woman. The first night he was ever alone with his wife was their wedding night. It was no wonder Daisy wanted him to park in the garage so people wouldn’t talk. She probably had a hard enough time as it was.

“I won’t take up much room,” he said. “I don’t want to be a burden. Only trying to help to keep everyone safe.”

“Isn’t this usually the type of job you give to the rookies?” She asked, taking a seat in an armchair across from the couch. She crossed her legs at the ankles like a respectable lady should and, somehow, she still looked like a seductress doing so. “Does the lead detective usually make overnight house calls?”

The skirt of her dress was short. It bunched up around her thighs as she sat. He willed himself to only look at her face and keep his eyes from wandering.

Jeb blushed and perched on the edge of the couch cushion, “We don’t have too many men at the station. I volunteered to lend an extra hand.”

She leaned back, eyeing him up with a type of bold, observant intelligence he wasn’t used to seeing, “What does your wife think of you spending the night with a whore?”

He anxiously twirled his wedding band around his finger. She spoke with such brashness it caught him off guard.

“I told her I was spending the night at the office,” he wasn’t sure why he willingly answered so honestly and without hesitation.

She had that kind of spell over him. He wanted to protect her. Wanted to give her things. Wanted to tell her all his secrets. She was a siren luring him to his destruction and he was willing to sail his ship straight into the rocks if it made her happy.

A smirk tugged up the corner of her lips, “Ah, I see. So you’re a liar. What else are you lying to her about?”

Jeb choked on the water he was sipping. His eyes widened.

“I’m not-what-I’m not-” he sputtered out.

She laughed quietly to herself, “Calm down, detective. I was only joking. An LDS man telling his wife a lie? That’s never been heard of before.” Sarcasm dripped from her words.

He ran the back of his hand over his lips to hide his smile. He liked her. He liked her sass. She didn't care what he thought of her. She wasn’t playing a game like everyone else he knew. It made him want to tell her the truth. Every truth. Everything he had been holding in for the past year.

He hated his wife. He didn’t just not love her anymore, he despised her.

Her words had been echoing in his ears for over a year now, “I love you but I can’t struggle through this with you.”

She had left him when he needed her the most. She chose her faith over him. He should have known. He had married her because of how devout she was. Her love for Heavenly Father was what drew him towards her in the first place. Now, it’s what cast him away.

If he didn’t pretend, Rebecca would take everything from him. She would leave him for nothing if he didn’t keep on impersonating a saintly man. As if they hadn’t spent an entire lifetime together. As if he hadn’t devoted everything to his family. She would rather jump ship than dare to stand by his side when he needed her most. He would have never left her if she had been in his place. He would have held her hand and walked her through her doubts but she couldn’t do the same. Her love was conditional.

He hated her for that.

He hated himself for hating her.

Rebecca’s faith was what kept her moving forward. It was all she ever knew. She lives in the LDS belief that Jeb, with his priesthood, is the one who must usher her through the veil when she passes so she can enter the highest form of heaven. Without him, without his beliefs, she was fucked.

Jeb smiled to himself. He liked that word.

Fucked.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

That was his life.

A big fucking lie. A pile of steaming bullshit.

He had just met Daisy five days ago and she had already pegged him for exactly the kind of man he was. A liar. A stripper knew more about him than his own wife. She could see straight through the fabricated, bullshit act he put on and he had only been inside her home for five minutes. Five fucking minutes and she could already see the depravity leaking out of him.

God, he was pathetic.

“I don’t believe in a God,” he blurted out, shocking even himself with the outburst.

She gave him a few, stunned blinks in response, “...Okay.”

Jeb cleared his throat, his face heating with embarrassment, “I don’t know where that came from. I deeply apologize.”

If he was with anyone else, his confession would have been met with gasps of horror. With her, it was nothing more than a passing sentence.

She was perfect. He wanted her. Badly. That sundress was only working to fuel his indiscretion.

She leaned her head into the palm of her hand as she rested it on the arm of the chair, “Is this…something you’d like to discuss further, detective? Men seem to enjoy emptying their traumas onto me. I’ve consoled many men over the years. I’ve been told I’m a very good listener.”

“I-” he stammered, his ear heating up in shame for his actions. “No. I’m sorry. Again.”

She wasn’t his therapist. He didn’t have a therapist. Only crazy people had therapists. And he wasn’t crazy.

Or maybe he was.

Life might be easier if he was crazy.

“I love my wife,” he stated. He only said that to try and convince his brain to stop lusting after the woman he was meant to be protecting. He was here to make sure no one broke in. He was working a case. He was not here to turn to sin.

She nodded her head, pretending to follow along with whatever obvious breakdown was going on inside his mind, “That’s good. A lot of men love their wives. A lot of men don’t. That’s a part of life.”

“I love…no…” Jeb sighed. Fuck it. The rant was coming out. He couldn’t stop it. He was already too far gone to keep it repressed any longer. “I don’t love my wife. I hate her. Every time I look at her, all I feel is animosity. I think she’s the dumbest woman I’ve ever met and I know that’s wrong to think. I know that makes me a terrible man. I’m an awful husband. It’s just that she blindly follows whatever the profit says. Whatever a bishop tells her to do, she’d do it without a second thought. They could tell her to get on her knees and suck them off because Heavenly Father commanded it so and she would do it. She doesn’t see anything further than her own nose. She follows and never questions. And, I understand, because I used to be the same. I used to believe because that’s what I was taught to do. Blindly believe. That’s all there ever was.

“She’s never seen true evil. Not like I have. Because she refuses to look even though it’s all around her. I see it everywhere. She puts on her little Mormon blinders and never dares to take them off. So, she follows. And she makes my girls follow. And she makes me follow or else she will take the girls away from me. I am raising my daughters in a world that hates women. My wife is letting them be preyed upon. She’s happy to let them be squashed into submission. Keep sweet. Pray and obey. Learn to worship your future husband. Never think for yourself.” He closed his eyes and took a deep, shaking breath, feeling himself losing it. His voice cracked. “If I give up, is there no hope for my daughters? Who will protect them if not me? My wife would marry again, quickly, so she can still get into the celestial kingdom when she dies. She’ll marry someone who won’t waver in their beliefs. Another man would raise my girls. He won’t care about them. Not like I do. They’ll be sold off to the first Mormon boy they fancy. They’ll be married at 18. Never attend college. Never think for themselves. Never get a job. Because I won’t be there to inspire them to reach for more. I’ve seen what kind of men are out there. My daughters won’t be safe unless I play the part my wife created for me.”

He opened his eyes to look over at the woman across from him. Her face was neutral but her eyes were burning with an eagerness to know more. His sudden outburst of lament had stricken something deep inside of her. He had captured her interest like he was a strange bug forced under a microscope that she wanted to dissect. His spiel may have exploded out of nowhere but she was already on board to follow along. She seemed like someone who enjoyed a feisty debate. He needed someone who wouldn’t hold back.

“You claim your wife is the dumb one, yet, here you are, spewing a load of shit all over my living room,” she mused, giving him a snarky grin.

Jeb’s jaw dropped. He forced himself to quickly regain his composure and took another swig of cold water. The fire behind her eyes was enticing. He desperately wished his wife could show that kind of passion once in her fucking life. He hated the docile, sweet act. He craved raging forest fires not babbling brooks. He licked his lips, ready to swallow anything she threw back at him. This is what he wanted. Someone to argue with. Someone he could express himself with without fear of rejection. He wanted this fierce lioness to eat him alive.

He just wanted something that felt real for once.

She stood up to pace around the room in front of him while she spoke, “Do you realize your wife is like that because she knows nothing else? That is her way of survival. She chooses to believe instead of question because questioning is terrifying. Questioning means losing everything and everyone you’ve ever loved. Your entire world crumbles under your feet if you dare to question. Want to ask me how I know?” She stopped her aggravated pacing to shoot him a look of annoyance. “You’re a man. You have so many options still available should you fumble. If she were to question her faith, she would lose her family. Her mother, father, sisters, brothers, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends. She loses them all. And then she is left with what, exactly? I doubt your wife works? Does she have her own career? Skill sets? Does she have her own income? Does she have her own car? Bank account? She dares to question, she is left with nothing. But you know that already. Obviously. Because you are just as scared to speak your truths out loud. You’re no better than her.”

She stopped momentarily to catch her breath, flipping a strand of hair from off her forehead. He couldn’t keep his eyes off the way her hips swayed when she walked. He adored her temper. It felt so natural. Real. She wasn’t holding herself back to placate him. She acted on her own accord without worrying about how others perceived her.

He wanted to toss her onto this couch and take her right here. He could only half listen to her rant through his ever growing desires.

“How do you know your wife doesn’t think the same thoughts as you? How do you know she doesn’t hide her truths locked up deep inside her mind and never dares to speak them? It’s fine to voice your opinions when you’re in the safety of my house. To you, I am nothing, I’m just a stripper. A prostitute. Hooker. Harlot. Whore. Whatever you want to call me. I pose no threat to you because, to you, I am so far below you that my voice does not matter. You feel safe to speak freely inside these walls because you face no real consequences here. You’ve seen evil? Well I’ve lived evil. You’re here because of the evil that wants to be inflicted upon me. Because I think differently from you. Because I use my body as a tool. Because I don’t subscribe to your values. Someone out there thinks I deserve death simply because I exist in a way he doesn’t approve of. You want to blame your wife for your problems. Blame yourself because you’re no better than her. You’re all a part of the same system.”

Jeb sat there in silence. The condensation from the glass of ice water clutched in his hand dripped down his wrist. His heart thumped wildly in his chest as he took it all in. He was torn between fully digesting her words and imagining her naked, writhing body under him as he dragged the ice cube from his glass down her stomach.

“I don’t,” he whispered. “I don’t think you’re a whore.”

He didn’t even like saying that word out loud. He felt a dark cloud of shame rain down around him. But was she wrong?

He had never imagined his wife in the scenario currently playing in his head. He saw Daisy as a sex object willing to be exploited to his darkest temptations.

She stopped in front of him. She placed her finger under his chin and lifted his head up to look at her. His wide, pleading, brown eyes took her in, silently begging for some kind of clarity to fix his entire life.

“Tell me what you think of me, detective. Tell me the truth. When you look at me, what is it you truly see?” She murmured down at him. “Why are you really here? It’s not to discuss your lapse of faith, or your wife, and it’s not to keep me safe. I can see it in your eyes. Tell me what it is you truly want? Don’t you lie to me.”

The way his world saw it, Rebecca was pure, because she had remained a virgin until marriage. She lived and breathed by the Book of Mormon. Daisy was a condemned sinner, because she sold her body for sex. She was beyond saving. Even the outfit she wore was considered taboo. Modest clothing was the foundation stone to sustaining abstinence. She was the sinner.

But so was he.

Jeb was no saint despite the role he was trying to play.

He took a deep breath and recited the scripture, “He that looketh on a woman to lust after her, or if any shall commit adultery in their hearts, they shall not have the Spirit, but shall deny the faith and shall fear.”

Her eyes flicked with curiosity and a smile tugged at her lips. She caressed her thumb over his cheek, “You lust, Jeb Pyre? For me?”

He licked his drying lips, gently pushing her hand away from his face, “Yes.”

She nodded, knowingly, “You don’t know what you want. Your mind is in one place but your actions keep you in another. I am not the answer to your problems. Many men have tried but all have failed. The answer is never found between the legs of a whore. Unless, that is, what you say is true and you don’t think of me that way. Something tells me, though, that you’re lying to us both.” She gave him a wink, turning on her heels with her dress spinning out around her, and swayed down the hallway towards her bedroom. “Have a good night on the couch, detective. I’ll be retiring to my bedroom should you decide you need me.”

She let those last few words linger in the air, the weight of them settling down around him, as the door closed behind her.

The cuckoo clock hanging on her wall let him know that midnight was here. The sudden sound breaking the peaceful silence had caused him to jump up from his spot on the couch and reach for the gun at his hip. Jeb rolled his eyes in the clock's direction and lowered his hands back to his side. He might still have some residual PTSD from his former cases…

Her house was dark and quiet.

He liked it that way. Sometimes he missed the quiet. She hadn’t left her bedroom since she entered. Without her in his sights, he could better attempt to control his impulses. He was too weak to be trusted around her. If she hadn’t left when she did, he would have given in. It had taken everything in him to not follow her blindly into that bedroom like a dog on a leash.

Jeb ran a ragged hand over his face. He wasn’t tired. Late nights were where he thrived best. He hadn’t felt this alive in a long time. She’d awoken his mind in a way he thirsted for. Even just being in her house, prowling silently down her hallway, gave him a thrill. He felt like a naughty school boy getting into mischief after class. He longed to feel something more. His life was full of boredom and she offered him the keys to adventure. He longed to find solace in the arms of a stripper.

A soft light illuminated from under her door to let him know that she was still awake down there. He wondered what she was doing hidden away out of his sight. She had invited him to join her. She had invited him to relish in his sins. It would be a line that, once he crossed, he would never be able to erase. The second he gave in to her, he wouldn't be able to stop. He was already past the point of saving. One little push was all it would take for him to delve into the madness. That glowing light under her door beckoned him to her like the light of God calling him home.

He slipped into her bathroom instead.

He ran cold water out of her orchid pink sink to splash over his heated face. His eyes sought his reflection in the mirror to stare deeply into his own battered soul. This was his crossroads. Whichever path he took would alter the rest of his life. He had already committed adultery in his mind. It was now the act to see if his body would follow or not.

The sight of a black and golden lipstick sitting on the edge of her sink caught his eye. Jeb reached for it, popping off the cap, and twisting it up. A deep, berry red. A color housewives wouldn’t be caught dead wearing. He brushed his thumb over the top to coat his skin with the color of her lips. The bottom of the stick was engraved with the name of the shade. Walk of Shame. He smiled a wicked smile to himself.

He knew what road he was going to take. He would take that walk of shame.

Jeb placed the stick back where he found it. He twisted his wedding ring around his finger, mulling over his decision, then carefully plucked it off his body. He placed the ring around the lipstick, listening to it rattle against the ceramic sink, and gave a long, soft sigh. A weight had been lifted from him. He quickly exited the bathroom and allowed his feet to lead him straight to her door. He stood outside, silent, listening.

Soft moans floated under the door. Little whines. Whimpers.

His eyes slipped closed and his lips parted. He knew those sounds. She was putting on a show for him. All he had to do was raise the curtain and let her perform. His hand hovered over her door knob.

It was okay. She had invited him in.

“-should you need me.”

He needed her. He hadn’t engaged in sex with his wife in over eight months. He needed her now more than ever.

He slowly and silently turned the knob. Inch by inch. Until he was able to push open the door. Just a crack. Just enough to peek through. He had to make sure she was safe behind those walls. After all, that was his job.

She laid across the bottom of her mattress. Her sundress was gathered around her hips. Her legs were parted wide, aimed straight at the door, as if she knew he would show up. He was that predictable. Through her half closed, dreamy lids, her long, elegant fingers drew delicate circles through her glistening flower. His breath caught in his throat when he watched her dip a finger deep inside of her. His cock sprang to life, begging to be touched, pushing at the loose fabric of his dark gray suit pants.

He should close the door. He should leave.

This was wrong. He needed to repent.

“I see you watching me, detective,” she whispered to him as he hid away in the dark hallway, lurking in the shadows like a predator. She let out a soft whine, dragging her soaked finger in circles around her clit. “I know you’re there.”

Jeb swallowed. She was the devil. A demon. He had no power over her. Heat flushed through his veins. His breath was already coming out in heavy pants. He was chained to the doorway, captivated by her seduction. He couldn’t move away even if he wanted to.

“Have you ever seen a woman masturbate, Brother Pyre?” She moaned. “Have you ever seen a woman touch herself like this?”

His fingers wrapped around the edge of the door, gripping tightly onto the wood for support. No. He hadn’t. It would shock him if he found out his wife secretly masturbated in private. She was so well behaved. Masturbation was a sin. She would never dare allow anyone else besides him to touch her, not even herself.

“Do you like to watch me?” She whimpered, sinking her finger back inside of her. “I was hoping you would come. I know you, detective. I see through you. Your mind is just as perverted as the rest of us. You want to give in. You want to taste what is forbidden to you. It’s okay. I won’t tell.”

She looked hotly up into his eyes, staring straight into his corrupted soul. He was too weak. He had no resolve. The devil looked too appetizing. The sins of the flesh were tempting him forward as he let the door push open to reveal himself in all his shame.

She gave him a warm smile, taking in the sight of the bulge below his belt. Her fingers swept through her folds, slippery with her arousal. With the expertise of someone with diligent practice, she used two fingers to part the outer petals of her womanhood to reveal to him the hot, sinking abyss he craved to explore.

Enraptured, he could not tear his eyes from the slender digit plunging into her soaking depths. His mouth opened and closed, silently, begging to seek a taste of such a treasure. He watched in a starving trance as she anointed her needy pearl, bathing it in her honey, tending to it like a precious garden. Her eyes locked with his, burning, tempting him to join her in her display of debauchery.

Oh, lord, he was tempted.

Through heavy, ragged breaths she spoke, “Watch me, detective. Gaze upon the kind of life you were kept from. Look at what you could have been given. See what you missed out on.”

He was watching. His eyes were padlocked to her dancing fingers. She was beautiful. His heart sought to hold her in his arms while he touched her with a wild abandon.

“Do you like what you see, Jeb?” She moaned out his name extra low and tantalizing.

He almost came in his pants at the sound of his name in her mouth. A shudder ran through his tightly wound body.

“Answer me!” She demanded from him.

He gasped, “Yes.”

A smile spread across her lips, “Good boy. Men like you work so hard, don’t they? You give and give and give but who ever takes care of you? Let yourself relax, detective. Let yourself give in. Let me care for you. Let someone else take control for once.”

Her eyes closed, lost in the rhythmic tones of her own words, casting her enchantment over them both. She had known he would come seek her out. She had known he would watch. She wanted him here. All he craved was to feel wanted again.

He took a tentative step into her bedroom, closing the door behind him, and sealing his fate with the click of the lock.

“That’s it, baby,” she cooed. “Come a little closer. Take a look at your new toy. All for you.”

Jeb held his breath, shuffling slowly forward a few more paces. His heart was racing. His skin was on fire. His mind was made up.

“Why don’t you let Daisy see what her Gatsby is working with, hmm? Take your belt off. Unzip your pants. Show me.” It wasn’t a request but a demand.

He swallowed, his nerves sending him into a frenzy, as he undid his belt, lost in her trance. His eyes stayed glued to her hypnotic fingers casting circles of magic around her clit. Subconsciously, his tongue dated out to lick his lips, desperate for a taste.

His hot, heavy cock fell out into the palm of his hand. He listened to her sharp inhale at the sight. It was followed by a purr of approval.

“I want you to touch yourself but keep your eyes on my pussy, detective. Watch what I’m doing. Watch how wet you’re making me. Listen.” Two fingers sunk into her, squelching and sloppy, as she pumped them in and out.

His eyes rolled into the back of his head at the sound and a growl rumbled in the back of his throat. With the tip of his thumb, still stained with her lipstick, he smeared around his own wetness leaking from his tip. He worked it down his shaft, slowly pumping himself through his fist.

“I’ve been dreaming of this moment since the day I met you,” she breathed, keeping him in her watchful sights, each of them working to build their own pleasure. “I saw you then like I see you now. A lost man in need of guidance. I dreamed of you touching me. That first day, when you called me into your office. I imagined spreading my legs for you as I sat on top of your desk, throwing papers to the floor, while you ate me out in front of the large window. I dreamed of you finding me at my work, paying extra to take me to the back rooms, making me suck your cock while you grabbed my hair and prayed to your pathetic God.” He wanted to eat that arrogant smirk straight off her face. “You like watching me, don’t you, pretty boy? You like hiding here, away from the world, where only you and I can bear witness to the blasphemy of your true self. Show me who you really are.”

He whimpered, tugging on his cock a little harder. He was a sinner. An adulterer. A pervert. A heretic. A liar.

“Tell me what you want to do to me, detective? Tell me all the ways you’ve dreamed of fucking me while you slept next to your frigid wife.”

Jeb stuttered over his words, trying to force them out his tightening throat, “I’ve-I’ve…dreamt of dragging you to temple, b-bending you over the sacrament table, and fucking you in front of the congregation so they could all see what kind of dirty whore you are.”

Tears pricked in his eyes as the shame battled it out with the unbridled lust. He had never spoken like that in his life. A sense of vitality flowed through him. It made his cock twitch in his hand and he stroked it more fervently.

She licked her lips, letting out a light, amused laugh, “Such a naughty boy, detective. I know there’s more darkness in you. I want to hear it all. What else do you dream of?”

“Taking you into my home. F-fucking you-” he stumbled over the word “fucking” as it still felt so forgein on his lips to openly talk this dirty. “In my bed. On my wife’s side. Forcing her to watch while I make you unravel on my tongue. Showing her exactly what she is missing out on. Showing her what kind of man I could be if she’d only open herself up to experiment more.”

He couldn’t believe the filth he was allowing himself to admit. These were his private thoughts. They were never meant to be exposed to anyone. She had that effect on him. His skull was cracked open and his most shameless self was laid bare.

“You’re poor, poor wife,” she mewled. “She deserves to have someone tend to her needs, too. I know she wants it. All women do. You’ve just never pushed her far enough because you’re weak, Jeb Pyre.” She removed her fingers from her pussy and sat up, letting her dress fall back over her hips. She stared him down with her possessive gaze. “Get on your knees,” she ordered.

He didn’t even hesitate. He released his hand from his cock and knelt down before her. She slowly got to her feet to take a stand directly in front of him. She was so close he could smell her sex clinging to her skin.

“Men like you are always searching for something to worship.You told me you don’t believe in God. You told me you’ve lost your way. You have nothing to hold onto.” She trailed her finger, still glistening with her slick, over his bottom lip. “If you’ve lost your God then worship me instead. I’m your new God now, detective. Open your mouth and worship me. Cleanse my fingers with your tongue.”

His lips parted and she slipped two fingers over his tongue. He closed around her, bathing her clean, tasting the remnants of her devine pussy. She slid her fingers down his throat causing him to gag.

“Good boy,” she murmured her praises to him. “Sing me your devotions. Relax your throat. Soften your tongue. Take it like a man.”

Jeb reached up to gently take hold of her wrist. He showered her hand in soft kisses, trailing up her arm and back down again, lapping at the tips of her fingers with his tongue, sucking them into his mouth, moaning as she glided down his throat.

“Look at how hard you are. Desperate to be touched. Desperate to follow directions. Desperate to pray to anything that will have you.”

She jerked her hand away from him, leaving him feeling empty and cold. She grabbed his chin in her grasp. Her nails dug into his cheeks.

“Who’s your God, Jeb Pyre?” She asked.

“You,” he replied.

“Prove it. Pray at your altar.”

She lifted the skirt of her dress to expose herself to him. Her foot rested on the edge of the mattress so he could get an eye to eye look with his new lifeline. Jeb let out a shaky breath. His hands extended to wrap around her waist, drawing himself closer to her. He tilted his head to bring his quivering breaths to her heated core. She draped the hem of her dress over his head to curtain him the darkness where he belonged. In the dark, he could worship in secrecy.

His head pushed between her thighs to force her legs to widen for him. Her salty musk filled his senses, hooking him in like a drug. His eyes slipped closed at the first taste of the almighty. She was the bread of life. Honey flowed from the darkness and he relished in every drop. His tongue probed at her entrance, burying between her warmth, reaching deeper depths with lapping rolls. Teasing. Tantalizing. Tasting. He suckled at her clitoris, nibbling softly at the sensitive flesh, swirling her with his tongue. The sounds of her coos were all the praises he craved. He didn’t need practice to know how to please her. Surrendering to her was as natural to him as breathing.

“A virtuous woman is the crown to her husband,” she moaned, quoting the scripture. “And, yet, your sinning whore is the one who sits upon your head like a crown.”

He shivered at the debauchery of her words. He smiled against her pussy and took his time to savor his meal. She was a blessing bestowed upon him. A crown upon his head. His tongue thrust up inside of her, fucking her slowly and tenderly. He tightened his grip around her waist to hold her closer, a desperate man clinging to his lifesaver, moaning against her heated skin. The way she ground herself against him, thrusting herself deeper against his tongue, was enough to trigger his own needs. He humped his hips into the air, thrusting into nothing.

“Oh, sweet thing,” she hummed. “Is my favorite detective in need of some more attention? When was the last time you’ve had that gorgeously thick cock buried inside someone’s cunt?”

He whimpered, not letting up on his assault of her pussy, and clung tightly onto her waist. Eight months. Eight torturous months.

“Shh, baby, it’s okay,” she murmured, her voice thick with lust from trying to control her building orgasm. “I’ll take good care of you. I don’t want you getting too drunk off my pussy. Can’t have you completely let go before I’ve had my fun. Come here.”

She slid out from his grasp by pulling herself up onto the mattress. Her eyes were glazed over with a needy passion. Glassy and wet.

“Take your pants off,” she ordered. “I want to see you fully.”

They were already half way down his thighs. With a little push, they pooled around his ankles, pulled down quickly by the weight of his gun belt. He kicked off his nice dress shoes and stepped out of his pants to leave only his temple garments.

She smirked at the sight and hopped off the bed to take a step closer. Her hand wrapped around his tie to pull him down to her level. Her lips trailed over his as his eyes fluttered close. She glided her tongue across his lips, cleaning herself from them, with a gentle hum of approval.

“Who tastes better? Me or your wife?” She asked.

Jeb flustered in her question, “I-I wouldn’t know. She won’t let me. She believes it’s a form of sexual transgression.”

“Did you think about her?” She questioned. “When your tongue was buried inside of me, did she ever cross your mind?”

Guilt filled him, “Not once.”

She smiled, releasing his tie from her grasp, and began to work on extracting him from his perfectly crisp, white button up until he was left in nothing but his sacred garments.

She slowly eyed him up and down, “Keep the top on. I want you to remember exactly what your betraying as you fuck me.”

She sank to her knees, pulling down his underwear with her. His cock sat against his left thigh, hard and in need of attention. Her nails dragged along his sensitive, delicate skin. When she reached the tip of his cock, she carefully pushed a nail into the soft flesh while he hissed in pain. She left a crescent moon imprint behind which she quickly leaned down to kiss better. It was her harsh reminder that even if she was on her knees for him, she was still the one calling the shots.

He quite liked how the pain made him feel but he was too nervous to ask for more.

Her throat relaxed as she slipped him between her lips. He skimmed over her warm tongue with little jerking movements from his hips to push himself deeper into her. He wanted to reach out and grab her hair but was afraid to touch her. Instead, he balled his hands up at his side, digging his nails into his palm to try and elicit a bit more pain. It wasn’t the same as when she inflicted it.

Her head bobbed with an expertise that could only be brought from years of practice. It made his own oral skills seem novice and weak in comparison. His head leaned back as he stared at the ceiling, looking straight through it, and up into the heavens. There was no celestial kingdom up there. There was no God looking down on him. His heaven was right here in this room. His God was on her knees with her lips wrapped around his cock. This was the true meaning of life.

Jeb moaned out her name. Not Daisy. Not her stage name. Her real name. The one he kept locked up in a file in his desk. The name he would slowly stroke his finger over as he spent his late nights searching through his notes. The name only people who loved her were allowed to use.

She froze.

His cock fell from her lips and she stared up at him with a playful vengeance.

“What was that, detective?” She asked, her voice low and dangerous, but hiding an impish undertone. “I know I didn’t hear what I think I just did.”

He ran a hand over his face, too overwhelmed to be thinking straight, “Daisy. I meant Daisy.”

“You think you know me?” She got to her feet, wiping her bottom lip with her thumb. “You think you know the real me? Because I know the real you, Jeb, but do you know me?”

A heated red tint blushed across his cheeks, “I…don’t know…”

“Of course you don’t. Are you ever sure about anything in your life?” She raised a curious eyebrow at him. “I’m sure of most things that I do and say and believe. Can you say the same?”

He shook his head, “No. I can’t.”

She flashed him a poignant smile, “Name one thing you are 100% sure of right this very second.”

Jeb licked his lips. He knew.

“I am certain that I want to kiss you. Certain that I want to tear that dress from your body. And I’m certain that I want to throw you over this bed and fuck you like you deserve.”

“Then let go, detective. Give in. Become the animal you’ve always repressed. What are you waiting for?”

It was all the release he needed.

His fingers wrapped around her wrist to drag her against his body. His lips crashed down onto hers as he held her in his arms with a steellike grip. She didn’t kiss him back, so much as, surrendered her mouth to him. Her body went nearly limp and he kept her on her feet with his own strength. Her surrender brought forth a rush of devoted emotions and blind, sexual desire turning him into the beast he longed to become. He seized at her hair, tugging, pulling, wildly gripping, and attacked her mouth like it was the holy spirit he sought to believe in. She shuddered before his onslaught and melted into him. The more he reached for, the more he stole, the more she wanted it. She was driving him insane with an unrestrained passion of pure lust. He pitied any man who didn’t fall to his knees to worship her like the goddess she was. Her mouth was a sin that he wanted to violate.

Jeb violently grabbed at the straps of her sundress, nearly ripping them off, as he tore them down her body. The dress thumped to the floor to leave her completely naked and exposed. She didn’t flinch away. She didn’t try to hide and play with her coy modesty. She stood proudly before him exactly how a goddess should hold herself before a mortal man.

He slid his hands up her sides, grazing over the swell of her breasts, feasting on them with his eyes. He ran his thumbs over her nipples, pinching and flicking, while he attacked her mouth once more. She parted her lips to submit his tongue into her depths, sucking on it and twirling it around her mouth. Whenever he pinched her gorgeous nipples between his fingers, she would let out the most delicious moan and thrust her chest against his palms. His heart was racing with a pace that might kill him if he didn’t force himself to breath. His head was spinning in a dizzying whirlwind of thrill.

Jeb sank down and lowered his head to capture her nipple between his teeth, lashing at it with his tongue, listening to the gospel choir of whimpering moans coming out of her. She had shoved her nail into the head of his cock so he took a mouthful of her flesh, just under her beautifully darkened areola, and bit down hard. He had never bitten his wife in his life. He liked the way it felt as he tumbled deeper into his own carnal depravity. He wanted to defile her body and join her in their mutual corruption.

She arched her back, letting out a gasping shriek and letting it tumble down into a slurry of cooing whimpers, “Oh, Jeb. Yes. Yes.”

A circle of intended teeth marks, glistening with his saliva, shone proudly back at him. He liked marking her skin, claiming her as his own. It felt animalistic. Primal. A growl ripped from his throat, he was sick with lust, feverish and sweaty, panting with need. He grabbed at her hips and spun her around, pushing his hand between her shoulder blades to shove her face first into the mattress. Her ankles spread wide to allow him to have easy access.

He took a stumbling step back to admire the sight. Her pussy was glistening and spread open in wait for him. Beads of sweat dotted along her back down her spine. Her ass was sticking upwards, parted, so he could see her tight, little hole. She looked more ready to be fucked than anyone he’d ever seen. His wife had never presented herself to him like this. He imagined her splayed out in this same position and gave a breathless laugh. He could hardly even create a mental picture in his mind, it was so improbable.

“Something funny back there, asshole?”

Jeb gave a dark laugh in response, “Just the neverending joke that is my life.”

He lined the head of his cock up to her pussy, coating the tip in her slick, and bumping it back and forth over her clit.

Murder. Denying the Holy Spirit. Adultery.

Three of the worst things a good Mormon man could ever commit.

He’d already knocked denying the holy spirit off his list…might as well add another.

He sunk his cock into her. Steady and true. She let out an exhale and he watched her head tilt back to enjoy the sensation. So hot. So tight. Perfection. She was here to be fucked. Here to take his cock.

“That’s it,” he breathed.

He felt no shame. It was unusual for a Mormon not to feel shame but, tonight, buried balls deep in this woman, he felt nothing but relief. This was everything his body needed. He wanted fast and rough. He wanted to take her from behind with a feral abandon. He wanted to do all the things he wasn’t allowed to do until he was gripped with satisfaction.

Jeb grabbed her hips for leverage and began his awakening. Tonight, he was becoming a new man. He fucked her with quick, short thrusts that slammed into her. Her ass slapped against his stomach with each pound. She filled the room with the sounds of her gasps and erotic moans. Depending on how hard he rammed into her, she’d even let out little shrieks. He liked those sounds best. They made him fuck her harder, dragging out his full length, then smacking back into her. Possessing her body. Over and over and over.

He didn’t even care that he wasn’t wearing a condom. Those were problems for later Jeb. Present Jeb had everything he could ever need.

Sweat dripped down his forehead. Ragged, heavy, heaving breaths tumbled from his lips. He grabbed a fistful of her hair, jerking her upwards, so he could feel her body against his. She arched her back with her head rolling against his. He inhaled the scent of her hair fusing with the musk of their sex. He fumbled his hands around to capture her breasts, feeling the weight of them in his hands, her rock hard nipples dragging across his palm. She reached an arm around the side of his head to hold her steady from the onslaught of vigor his hips were causing her.

“Oh, fuck, Jeb!” She cried. “You needed this, baby. You needed this to happen. Let go. Let it all out. Give me everything you’ve got. Don’t hold back.”

Jeb whimpered out a sob in response, sounding pathetic even to his own ears. All he wanted was someone to listen, someone to take care of him, someone to understand.

He tumbled them both against the side of the mattress, falling on top of her. Her head turned, leaning against the covers, so he could shower the side of her face with wet, tear stained kisses. He nibbled on her earlobe, lapped his tongue at the corner of her lips, and dragged his teeth along the edge of her jaw. She was made to be devoured. His hips hammered with an agonizing precision into her heat. They were trapped in a hurricane, holding onto each other for dear life, as the maelstrom of building emotions swept them away.

He could feel her clenching down around him. He knew she was close. He was, too, but he wanted her to cum first. His goddess deserved to reach euphoria before he did. His hand slipped down her side and wedged itself between her hips and the mattress to find a home between the slick fire of her lips. She whined, bucking her hips, the moment he found her clit, tormenting it with his fingers.

“Cum for me,” his raspy, lust drunk voice growled in her ear. “Let me feel you unravel on my cock.”

Her body shook. Waves rippled over her skin with each hard pound of his cock into her. He could feel her tightening. Clenching. Gripping. A mangled yelp tore from her throat. When she orgasmed, she gave him everything. Her entire body surrendered to him. It burst from her with everything she could give. Her eyes widened, her mouth parted in a silent shriek, her spine arched. Like a demon possessing her body, she writhed under him with jerking, frantic thrusts. He wrapped his arms around her, collecting her tightly against him, to try and hold her together so she didn’t combust into the flames of Hell.

He let out a whimper as he desperately tried to hold off his own orgasm. He wanted to let her ride out her ecstasy on his cock without him cumming inside of her.

Her legs gave out and she sunk onto her knees, letting him slip out of her, “I got you, baby. I’wan’taste you. Use me.”

Without missing a beat, she ushered him straight out of her pussy and into her wet, waiting mouth. His eyes closed as his head fell back. He let out a long, drawn out moan. His hand found her hair, no longer feeling nervous to touch her or manipulate her how he pleased. He helped push her forward to take more and more of him. He wasn’t going to last much longer.

She let him slide down her throat, relishing his cock with her tongue, tasting herself on his tender flesh. He balled a fistful of her hair into his grasp.

“I’m-I’m-I” he stuttered out, not able to finish the sentence, but she got to the hint.

Her pace quickened. Her suction around him tightened. He felt himself tense up before an explosion of dopamine flooded his brain with a loud cry of pleasure.

She straightened her back, moaning softly, as she swallowed down the hot spurts of his semen. Her fisted hand continued to massage his shaft while her mouth tended diligently to his crown.

Jeb’s mouth hung open, tears flowed freely down his face, and he eventually managed to stumble backwards away from her. He crashed into the back wall and slid down to his ass, shaking.

She crawled across the floor to drape herself into his lap. His arms snaked around her, thankful for having something to hold onto. His mind felt like he was floating away. His body felt amazing but his emotions were in turmoil. She stroked her fingers through his hair and left soft kisses along his neck.

He had done it. There was no going back now.

“It’s okay, baby,” she murmured against his sweat stained skin, as if reading his mind. “You did what you had to do. Sometimes your body knows better than your brain. It was telling you what it needed. It’s just like taking a spoonful of medicine to fight off a cold. There are times when you need to give in and give your body what it craves.”

He craved her. Daisy. And everything that she represented. Even at this moment, after he had already had her, after he had given in, he should be feeling horror, disgust, shame, but he only wanted more of her. That’s why the tears were freely flowing. Not because he was humiliated by his sins but because he wanted more.

This was the life he wanted to live. He had gotten a taste, a spoonful, of the other side. A side he could never have. A side he would always be reaching for but never able to obtain due to the religion he was trapped in. His priorities had to remain elsewhere. He had family to care for. Children to raise. He was their only hope for a different future. He would never allow Rebecca to take his kids from him. He would do whatever he needed to keep her docile and oblivious. He could save his children from the inside, even if that meant selling his soul to a God he didn’t believe in.

Everything was so clear to him now. There was no more confusion. No more doubt.

Daisy and his green light.

The inability to ever reach what he truly desired.

A/N: If you dare to ask me to write a part two and you don't reblog detailing in great detail everything you liked and enjoyed about this story, then I will curse your entire family and block you. No one gets to ask for a part two without doing their damn part and reblogging first xoxo

Tagging some people who seemed like they might be interested in this smutty lil fic: @moonyslove78 @raindropsandteaandtears @withahappyrefrain @lxinesux @liz-allyn (i dont care if youre hardly on tumblr anymore liz i will tag you in everything i do until the end of time deal with it)

#andrew garfield #andrew garfield fic #jeb pyre #jeb pyre fic #jeb pyre x reader #jeb pyre smut #under the banner of heaven #utboh #utboh jeb pyre #jeb pyre imagine #blooming violets fic #blooming violets

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thatfreshi · 2 months

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"Light-Headed"

A short sequel to "Undeserving," commissioned by @mosshugs

(Please note that the original piece dealt heavily with disordered eating behaviors and that this one is similar, but a happy ending <3)

It’s been a while since the fall of Cazador, and all your other adventures have come to an end. You’ve settled down since then, Astarion by your side. You stopped counting the days a long time ago, how long it had been since his old master had died. Maybe he stopped counting as well, but you know against your better judgement that he probably hasn’t. Since those times, your group has found new ways of life. Gale has started teaching young wizards, Wyll moved on with Lae’zel to help the army of Baldur’s Gate, and so on. You and Astarion though? You’ve spent a lot of time in your new home, organizing, collecting new trinkets, decorating, building, and overall enjoying having a home. This hasn’t stopped your personal ongoing struggles though.

The two of you have your own issues, things that didn’t end after Cazador died, and things that would probably never end. Especially in Astarion’s case, immortality leaves him with a lot of problems to solve, and a lot of those problems may never have solutions. One morning though, when the two of you are lying in bed, he manages to solve just one debacle.

“Darling? Are you awake?”

It’s slightly lit, the bedroom, with Astarion on the darker side of the bed. You are awake, having just woken up from a long slumber. Turns out being new homeowners is quite tiresome, leaving the two of you with much rest to catch up on.

“Yes, I am awake. Sadly.”

It seems a though shuteye is never enough these days, especially afte trying to catch up on all the missed sleep on your journey.

“I thought… and only if you’d want to of course, that we could try feeding again? I don’t know what it is but today, I feel better than normal. As if this pang of hunger is somehow, more delicate than it usually feels.”

You barely spoke about his feeding habits, but it has been quite difficult for him to find energy with his lack of drinking from you. You try every now again to let him drink your blood, but it never seems quite right. Even with Cazaor gone, the wounds are still there. It seems like maybe, some of them will always be there, no matter how hard either of you try.

“Of course my love, always.”

A common response on your end, one that he quite likes. It’s nice for him to know that there is always a source of food for him, that scarcity is no longer in existence. Security, what a luxury that should only be a necessity.

Somewhere in the middle of your thoughts, you feel a sharp pain in your neck. This process must have happened over a hundred times by now, so you’re used to the cold, the sting, and all of those fun metaphors people use in reference to vampire bites. While you’re thinking though, trying not to put any pressure on him, you ponder what is on the agenda today. There’s still much to be done, many more pieces of furniture to procure, a garden to start outside…

And after a while of listing things off in your head, you realize that for the first time in a long time, you’re starting to get light-headed. Soon after, he releases from your throat, and there’s a sense of joy in your dizzy state. You try not to make a big deal out of it, considering you don’t want to scare him with some big gesture or make it seem like a successful feeding is abnormal, but he’s the one to outwardly express it first. When you lock eyes with him, he’s actually tearing up a little.

“That was… good. It was good for once.”

“It was?”

“Yes.”

And that response brings down the dam, and he fully begins to cry. This isn’t something you see from him often, but this issue with him being unable to feed has been plaguing the two of you for months. You find yourself soon crying along with him.

“How do you feel?”

“I don’t know. Strong? Peaceful? Not like I should be punished?”

That word pangs in your chest, ‘punished,’ as if he should ever be punished for sustenance. Sadly, you know that reality was all too real in the past.

“Good. You should feel strong, because you are.”

He takes one of your hands in both of his.

“Thank you my dear. Maybe I’m stronger than I thought I was.”

Is every other feeding from then on perfect? No, of course not. Healing is never quite as linear as we would like it to be, and it certainly isn’t as pretty either. There are horrible moments in the future, but also grand ones, ones like these that pull at your heartstrings and remind you why you ever fell in love. And slowly, day by day, the grand moments outweigh the horrible ones, and your dear Aster becomes better and better because of it, and the two of you become better because of each other.

#baldur's gate 3 #astarion #astarion x reader #astarion x tav #angst #comfort

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proxima-writes · 1 year

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Title: cruel summer | chapter 5

Pairing: No Outbreak!Joel Miller/Female Reader

Rating: Explicit (18+ MDNI)

Read on AO3 | Masterlist | Join the tag list

Summary: Joel takes a contracting job renovating a master bedroom and bathroom while the homeowners are away for the summer on a cruise.

He wasn’t expecting their twenty-three year old daughter and the thoughts he’d have about her.

Author’s Note: Thank you for all the love on this fic and any others you may have read! Please consider leaving a comment if you enjoyed 💕 There will be one more chapter to this story.

Reminder that I’m open to requests, esp Joel because he’s the source of my brain rot right now. 🫠

Additional Warnings/Tags: explicit sexual content (18+ MDNI), age gap (38M and 23F), oral (f receiving), pet names, dirty talk, ANGST not resolved in chapter (i hurt my own feelings with this one). Let me know if any are missing!

At the start of November, you ask Joel about coming with you to your parent’s house for Thanksgiving.

The question stops him in his tracks. It makes sense, the next logical progression of your relationship would be meeting friends and family, and you’ve already met his brother and daughter. In any other relationship, it would only be fair that he meets your parents soon.

The problem is he’s met your parents, just under different circumstances. And he doesn’t have much faith in them being particularly receptive to the news that their hired contractor got in bed with their daughter.

“You look worried,” you comment. You’re reclined on his couch with a book, one of his sweatshirts engulfing your frame. You set the book aside as he enters the room and sits beside you, moving your feet to his lap and squeezing your shin.

“I am worried. I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he says gently. Your face drops and he feels his heart fracture at the sight.

“I don’t want to have to keep you a secret just to keep you,” you say, voice small. He gives you a tight smile.

“Just…give me a little more time, okay?” He leans over until his hands are planted in the cushions on either side of your head. He drops a kiss to your lips. Then another. And another.

The question is forgotten between the movement of your bodies.

________

The next time you ask is around Christmas. You’re lying in bed beside him, head resting on his chest, fingers drawing patterns over his bare skin.

“What do you think about coming to my parent’s Christmas Eve?” You ask quietly. If the hitch in his breath is any indication, you already prepare yourself for disappointment.

“I can’t, baby,” he says. “Goin’ to Tommy’s place that night.”

“Right,” you reply.

He doesn’t say anything more. Doesn’t offer an alternative. You recognize that it’s not fair of you to expect that as a response, but the hurt in your heart isn’t helping your sense of logic.

You just want to be completely open about your relationship, and your parents knowing about it is the last hurdle. Your best friend, Hannah, met him a couple months ago when he’d woken up at your apartment the morning after you’d screamed your confession of love at him in your hallway.

Things have been great since then. You spend the night at his place a couple times a week, trying to balance the visits with your study schedule. Together you take Sarah to the park or the zoo or back to the aquarium, spending the days wrapped around the little girl’s finger and the nights wrapped around each other.

But you want him in every facet of your life. You want him and his daughter and hell, even his brother, over for holidays with your family and you want them with you during big milestones like your graduation in the spring.

His breathing goes deep and slow beneath your head and you sigh, sinking into the disappointment.

________

To make up for not seeing you on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, Joel makes plans with you on December 26. You arrive at his house late in the morning to find him making breakfast while Sarah stands on a kitchen chair beside him, mixing a bowl of pancake batter with intense focus. She nearly drops it in excitement when she hears you come in, shouting your name and scrambling from her perch.

Her arms wrap around your legs and her eyes zero in on the brightly wrapped box balanced in your arms as you try to set your overnight bag down.

“Who’s that for?” She asks. “Is it for me?”

“Sarah,” Joel admonishes, taking over her abandoned mixing. The little girl is unfazed.

“It just so happens to be for you,” you tell her, handing over the present. She squeals, ripping into the wrapping paper and pulling out a new Barbie doll, one who’s curly hair looks just like hers. She gasps.

“Daddy, it’s a Barbie! And look at her hair!” She exclaims, shaking the box in Joel’s face. His eyes meet yours over her head, full of gratitude.

“What do you say?” Joel prompts gently. Sarah wraps her arms around your legs again.

“Thank you,” she says sweetly. “Can you help me open it?”

“Of course. Could you get me your scissors?”

She bolts from the room and Joel crosses the kitchen to grasp your face in his palms, pressing a sweet kiss to your lips that makes your knees go weak.

“Now where’s my present?” He asks with a sly grin, earning him a smack on the chest.

“You can unwrap it later,” you tell him, wiggling your eyebrows. Sarah returns to the room, carefully holding her craft scissors with the blades down like she learned in school.

You help free the Barbie from her cardboard confinement and Sarah plays with her through breakfast, alternating bites of pancake and pretend conversation with her new favorite toy. Towards the end of breakfast, the front door opens and Tommy yells out his hello.

“Hey there, gorgeous,” he says to you with a wink. Joel glares at him. It’s been a running joke between you and Tommy the last couple of months.

“You’re gonna give yourself wrinkles glaring at your brother like that,” you tease.

Tommy’s come over to pick up Sarah because Joel has a whole day planned, starting with a trip to your favorite coffee shop.

“Get somethin’ hot, it’s cold where I’m takin’ you next,” Joel says while you’re in line, his hand around your hip to keep you pressed to his side.

________

The next stop Joel has planned for you is the ice skating rink. You mentioned briefly at the beginning of the month that you usually go every winter, digging the old pair of skates from your teenage years out from your closet for the occasion. Joel was lucky enough to find them the last time he’d stayed at your apartment, stashing them in the back of the truck for this moment. He holds the bag out to you and your face lights up.

“Joel! Seriously?” You ask, bouncing slightly in your seat.

“Yep. You ready to watch me fall on my ass?” He asks.

And fall on his ass he does. He grips the wall of the rink, inching along on shaky legs as you skate laps past him, the sound of your laughter making the suffering worth it.

You try to help him learn. He holds both your hands as you slowly skate backwards, his knees bent as he’s simply dragged along the ice. As soon as you let go of his hands, his feet slide out from under him and he goes tumbling down.

You stand over him, trying to hide a giggle behind your hand as he groans in pain, the cold seeping into his jeans.

“You think that’s funny, do you?” He asks with a grunt. “Help an old man up.”

“I will always lend a hand to a senior citizen in need,” you tease, holding a hand to him.

Once standing, Joel tugs you closer, wrapping his arms around your shoulders and looking down into your face. Christ, you’re so pretty, face all flushed and smile so wide it’s damn near blinding in its brightness.

“You ready for dinner yet?” He asks. You nod.

You try to pull away, but he keeps a tight hold around you. “Joel?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you just holding on to me so that you don’t fall?”

“Is it that obvious?” You laugh, ducking until you’ve escaped his arms. He stands still, arms out at his sides as he tries to maintain his balance. “You gonna help me here?”

Your grin is mischievous as you skate away from him, the sound of his cursing drowned out by your delighted laughter.

________

Joel makes a quick stop at his house so that you can change into the outfit you’d been instructed to bring for dinner, a light blue dress with a low neckline that hugged your curves down to your knees. You did your hair and makeup in his bathroom before slipping the dress on, stepping out to request his help with the zipper.

“Shit, baby, I might have to cancel the reservations if you’re goin’ to walk around lookin’ good enough to eat,” he says with a whistle. You raise an eyebrow at him.

“Then why don’t you?” You ask.

He blinks, staring at you with his mouth dropped open like he can’t believe you said that. But then his brain comes back online and he marches toward you, backing you up with the press of his body until your knees meet the edge of the mattress and he pushes you down gently.

He drops to his knees, hiking the dress up over your thighs until he’s exposed the lacy black panties you put on. He groans, looking up at you briefly before he turns his head and sinks his teeth into your inner thigh.

Your head drops back with a moan and you can feel his lips spread into a smile against your skin. His hands work to slide your panties down your thighs and off your legs, bunching them into a ball and stuffing them into his pocket.

“Dirty man,” you tease. He laughs, a dark low rumble that makes you impossibly wetter.

“Can’t help it when you look this good, sweetheart.”

There’s no more talking after that. He licks through your wet center, circling your clit with the flat of his tongue before sucking it into his mouth. Your back arches from the bed as you shout, fingers digging into his hair to pull him closer.

His tongue dips lower to explore inside your tight heat, his nose bumping your clit and his fingers pressed so tightly into your thighs you’re certain there will be bruises for you to admire in the morning.

“Joel,” you whimper, hips writhing beneath him. He releases his grip on one thigh to slide two fingers into you, curling them as he withdraws his hand and making you see stars.

He lifts his head, circling your clit with his thumb as he growls, “Come on, darlin’, wanna feel this pussy get drenched for me.”

With a shout of his name, your release washes over you, your legs tightening against his shoulders as you clench around his fingers. He works you through the waves of pleasure before slowly withdrawing his fingers.

Joel brings his fingers to his lips, sucking them into his mouth with a groan, eyes fluttering shut at the taste.

“Such a good girl, baby,” he says. You can’t help the little giggle that bubbles up.

“You gonna give me back my panties?” You ask.

“No chance in hell,” he replies with a wink.

________

Joel manages to get the two of you to the restaurant just in time for the reservation, despite the distraction of your sweet moans and delicious pussy.

He picked this restaurant because of two things. One, it had great reviews for their steak and he’s a sucker for a good hunk of meat. He’s a Texan man, after all.

Two, it was a bit more upscale and he wanted to treat you to something nice. He knows you’ve been disappointed that two holidays have come and gone now and he still hasn’t agreed to meet your parents and bring your relationship to the light. But he just can’t shake the feeling that telling them will pop this beautiful bubble that the two of you have created. This whole day has been as much of an apology as it has been a gift.

The restaurant is busy. Most of the tables are filled and there’s a private room that’s bustling with people as well. The hostess walks the two of you to a small table near the bar and he holds your chair out for you to take a seat. The table is set with a number of cutlery he’s not sure how to use on top of a pristine white tablecloth. There’s a candle and a small floral arrangement in the center, the flame throwing a pretty glow over your face.

“This is beautiful,” you comment once the hostess has stepped away with promises that your waiter will be there shortly. “Oh, they have duck!”

The waiter comes by with a wine list. Joel knows fuck all about wine, so he hands it to you, only for you to stare wide eyed at it.

“Joel, these prices are insane!” You hiss when the waiter steps away to let you make a choice. He grabs your hand.

“I mean this in the nicest way possible, baby, but I don’t give a fuck. Pick whatever you want,” he says. You still look uncertain.

When the waiter returns, he takes matters into his own hands, slipping the list from your hands. “My girl wants the duck. What’s the best white wine to pair with it.” He listens to the options and raises an eyebrow at you to pick one. He keeps the list captive so that you don’t base the choice off the dollar amount.

When the food arrives, you chat about anything and everything while you eat. When you’ve set your silverware down, insisting you can’t eat another bite, Joel reaches across the table for your hand, thumb circling the smooth skin of your palm. You give him the softest smile that makes his heart beat triple time.

“You have fun today?” He asks.

“The most fun,” you confirm. You’re about to say something else, but you’re cut off by a loud voice from the other side of the restaurant.

“Joel Miller!” The voice calls. He looks up.

Right into your father’s smiling face.

________

Joel goes tense all over, the grip on your hand tightening as his eyes flick between you and your father approaching from behind you. You stare at Joel with wide eyes, unsure of what to do. If the earth opening up and swallowing you whole were an option, you’d gladly take it.

He stands as your dad reaches the edge of the table, shaking his hand with a strained smile.

“How have you been, Miller? The wife loves that bathroom, sometimes she’ll just stand in the doorway and stare at it lovingly,” he jokes.

“That’s great. That she loves it. Uh, I’ve been great,” he replies. He runs a hand nervously through his hair.

“I don’t want to interrupt your date—,” your dad starts, turning towards you. His smile immediately drops. Your name leaves his lips in surprise. “What are you doing here?” He asks. You bite your lip, unsure of how to respond, but as your dad’s eyes go between your surprised expression and Joel’s guilty one, his brain seems to make the connection. He turns to Joel.

“Joel. Why is my daughter here?” He asks, voice quietly controlled in the same way it is when he’s asking you something he already knows the answer to.

Joel straightens, throwing his shoulders back and keeping his head high as he looks your dad in the eye. “Because she’s my date.”

Your dad pinches the bridge of his nose. “What the fuck do you mean, she’s your date? She’s twenty-three!” He snaps.

“Dad—“

“No, I don’t want to hear anything from you right now.” You feel his words like a slap. “What is this, Miller? Spent all that time in my house and thought you could take advantage of my daughter?”

“Dad! ” You snap. “He didn’t take advantage of me, I’m an adult .”

“You’re still a kid,” your dad snaps back. “And he’s a goddamn adult who should have fuckin’ known better.”

“Dad, please. Stop. We can talk about this later, ” you plead desperately. Your dad gives you both one last derisive look before turning on his heel and storming off, heading into the private event room. “Shit. Fuck. His fucking company Christmas dinner. And it had to be here?!”

Joel stares blankly after your dad’s retreating figure. You place a tentative hand on his shoulder. “Joel?” You ask quietly.

“How about you go out to the truck and I’ll take care of the bill,” he says, eyes looking everywhere but at you. You swallow nervously.

“Why don’t we at least finish dinner?”

He snaps your name, making you flinch. “Please. Just…listen to me, alright? I’ll be out in a minute.”

You gather your purse and make your way out to the parking lot, fighting back tears with each step.

________

After paying the bill, Joel slips inside the private room, eyes scanning for your father. He finds him at a back corner table, head down as he types on his phone.

Joel approaches and takes the seat beside him. When your father looks up, his face drops from welcoming to downright frosty.

“Sir,” Joel starts. He swallows around the lump in his throat. “I just want you to know that I love your daughter. More than anythin’. This isn’t some sick game of me tryin’ to get my rocks off with some girl younger than me. It’s…she’s the best thing that’s happened to me since my own daughter was born. And I’d do anythin’ for her.”

The man doesn’t respond, but Joel sees the tick of his jaw.

“I just thought you should know,” Joel finishes. He waits a beat for the other man to respond. When he doesn’t, Joel stands with a sigh, heading to the truck with a nervous heart.

________

Joel’s quiet on the ride home. He keeps both hands on the wheel and the spot on your thigh where he usually rests his palm is especially cold.

You don’t know what to say. That whole scene in the restaurant was an absolute disaster, one that you were hoping could be avoided by telling your dad about your relationship, but Joel hadn’t been ready. There’s a bitter taste in your mouth, an “I told you so” threatening to escape your lips as you stare out the window.

When Joel pulls to a stop, it takes you a moment to realize that he’s outside of your apartment and not his house. Turning to face him, he’s staring out the windshield with his jaw clenched tight. He doesn’t look at you.

“Joel?” You ask. You hate how tiny your voice sounds. “Can…can we please talk? About this?”

His eyes slip shut and he rests his head back against the headrest with a sigh. “I’m not sure what there is to talk about, sweetheart.”

The tears burn as they slide down your cheeks. “Please?”

He turns his head to look at you. “Please what?”

“Please don’t shut me out again,” you beg, leaning forward to wrap your arms around his, resting your head against his shoulder as you shut your eyes tightly against the tears. You can feel him turn and press his lips to the crown of your head.

“Baby…I just need some time, okay? I love you, I swear it, but I just gotta take a breather and think about everythin’, okay?”

You can feel your heart fracture in your chest, your stomach aching as you try to come up with a reply.

“Don’t cry,” Joel whispers. He unbuckles his seatbelt. “Come on, baby, let’s get you inside.” You shake your head against his shoulder. “You’re breakin’ my heart.”

“You’re breaking mine, Joel!” You snap.

He doesn’t reply, and silence has never been quite as loud as this before.

You sit up straight, swiping at the tear stains on your cheeks before shoving the passenger door open. Before slamming it shut, you take one last look at him.

“I love you, Joel Miller. I hope you find it in you to not be a fucking coward and love me back,” you tell him before slamming the door shut.

A fresh wave of tears cascades down your cheeks as you let yourself into your apartment, collapsing against the door as soon as you have it shut.

________

In the truck, Joel sends a text to Tommy letting him know he’ll be home soon and that he can bring Sarah back over if she’s still awake.

He opens the chat thread with you, fingers hovering over the keyboard. He has so much to say, he doesn’t know where to start. He settles on one sentence.

I love you. I’ll fix this.

He opens a new chat thread and finds a contact he hasn’t used since the summer.

Can we talk?

Tag list: @huffle-punk @telepathay @johnwatsn @hopelessromantic727 @caatheeriinee07 @leeeesahhh @whereasport @pedr0swh0r3 @yellingloudly @dragon-of-winterfell @mydailyhyperfixations @liati2000 @endlessthxxghts @fake-bleach @thedeadsingwithdirtintheirmouths @letsgroovetonighttt @ghostofjoharvelle @cutesyscreenname

#no use of y/n #joel miller x reader #joel miller #joel miller fic #joel miller smut #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x you #joel miller fanfiction #joel tlou #joel x reader #cruel summer

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bsof-maarav · 19 days

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Things I saw on my way to shul this Shabbat:

A house with tons of pro-Hamas signs in the window right next to a house with one huge sign that said "You Need Jesus"

A series of telephone poles covered in pro-Hamas posters, but one was torn one down and in the white residue it left behind, someone wrote Bring Them Home Now

Pieces left behind of stickers about antisemitism that had been torn down, with just a few words left readable, pleas for recognition that Israelis and Jews are human

The poster that's been up since October on a public electrical box that says "The world stands with Palestine" (which always makes me roll my eyes and think, yes, Jews know the world stands with whoever would like to eliminate us, this isn't news) was updated to also say Fuck Israel

The "Viva Palestina" sign depicting a terrorist with a gun that's been in the window of one house since October was updated to add more names of murderous terrorists that the homeowner wished to honor with a special shout-out

The huge banner outside of a church saying "Love demands a permanent ceasefire now!" with an image of a dove carrying an olive branch apparently offended the local bird population who didn't want their image associated with this message so they pooped all over it

Many, many signs campaigning for a candidate for city council who says she is a "recovering Zionist" who did "ancestral healing" so that she no longer feels a stake in the ancestral homeland full of refugees and can now be a Good Jew (her campaign slogan is about her compassion and integrity which is rich when you consider she's part of the mob screaming at Shoah survivors in city council meetings that they're lying and works with a white supremacist guy who literally calls Jews "zios" and pigs)

The most gorgeously lush and varied flower gardens that you could ever imagine gracing every sidewalk

Flowering trees everywhere

Birds, bees, butterflies, well fed squirrels, and prosperous housecats of all kinds

Gorgeous period architecture, much of it beautifully preserved

A homeless person under a freeway overpass, trying to snuggle into a comfortable position on the cement, in the exact place that another homeless person was recently found dead

Multimillion dollar houses in one of the wealthiest areas of a country that never gets bombed, covered in signs advocating their support for Israel to keep being bombed and terrorized

On a street full of houses with pro-Hamas placards, one solitary house with a mezuzah and a sign on its door saying שלום

#im going to start counting upsetting signs and donating a dollar per each to Magen David Adom #jumblr #october 7 #israel #antisemitism #frumblr #terrorism #usa diaspora #attacks on israelis in the us #attacks on jews in the diaspora #attacks on diaspora jews #israel under attack #am yisrael chai #the edge of the west #bsof maarav #i spend a lot of the walk saying Tehillim #this world is a lot in so many ways #im grieving the loss of this place #aliyah

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rjzimmerman · 6 days

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Excerpt from this story from the Associated Press (AP):

Vermont has become the first state to enact a law requiring fossil fuel companies to pay a share of the damage caused by climate change after the state suffered catastrophic summer flooding and damage from other extreme weather.

Republican Gov. Phil Scott allowed the bill to become law without his signature late Thursday, saying he is very concerned about the costs and outcome of the small state taking on “Big Oil” alone in what will likely be a grueling legal fight. But he acknowledged that he understands something has to be done to address the toll of climate change.

“I understand the desire to seek funding to mitigate the effects of climate change that has hurt our state in so many ways,” Scott, a moderate Republican in the largely blue state of Vermont, wrote in a letter to lawmakers.

The popular governor who recently announced that he’s running for reelection to a fifth two-year term, has been at odds with the Democrat-controlled Legislature, which he has called out of balance. He was expected by environmental advocates to veto the bill but then allowed it to be enacted. Scott wrote to lawmakers that he was comforted that the Agency of Natural Resources is required to report back to the Legislature on the feasibility of the effort.

Last July’s flooding from torrential rains inundated Vermont’s capital city of Montpelier, the nearby city Barre, some southern Vermont communities and ripped through homes and washed away roads around the rural state. Some saw it as the state’s worst natural disaster since a 1927 flood that killed dozens of people and caused widespread destruction. It took months for businesses — from restaurants to shops — to rebuild, losing out on their summer and even fall seasons. Several have just recently reopened while scores of homeowners were left with flood-ravaged homes heading into the cold season.

Under the legislation, the Vermont state treasurer, in consultation with the Agency of Natural Resources, would provide a report by Jan. 15, 2026, on the total cost to Vermonters and the state from the emission of greenhouse gases from Jan. 1, 1995, to Dec. 31, 2024. The assessment would look at the effects on public health, natural resources, agriculture, economic development, housing and other areas. The state would use federal data to determine the amount of covered greenhouse gas emissions attributed to a fossil fuel company.

It’s a polluter-pays model affecting companies engaged in the trade or business of extracting fossil fuel or refining crude oil attributable to more than 1 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions during the time period. The funds could be used by the state for such things as upgrading stormwater drainage systems; upgrading roads, bridges and railroads; relocating, elevating or retrofitting sewage treatment plants; and making energy efficient weatherization upgrades to public and private buildings. It’s modeled after the federal Superfund pollution cleanup program.

Maryland, Massachusetts and New York are considering similar measures.

#Vermont #climate change liability #fossil fuel industry

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rosepetalgold · 8 months

Text

the art of saying goodbye

Summary: Remus expects a lot of things from the Queen Anne Victorian house he’s just purchased—a restoration project to occupy his time, some peace and quiet from nosy neighbors, a chance to brag about being a homeowner before his goody two-shoes brother.

What he doesn’t expect is for the property to come with a very real, very curious ghost. But what is he supposed to do, just ignore the spirit? That'd be nothing short of rude, especially considering that the specter's fascination with modern science and penchant for hijacking Remus' technology proves unfairly endearing.

But even as their unlikely friendship grows, so too do the questions swirling in Remus’ mind: Why is Logan still haunting the place he used to live? Who is the mysterious Janus he refuses to talk about? And what will it take for the ghost to finally find peace with the life and the love that were stolen from him so long ago?

Relationships: Platonic Intrulogical, past romantic Loceit, background romantic Prinxiety

Warnings for this chapter: None!

Word Count: 7000

Notes: My fic for this year's @sandersidesbigbang, aka another angsty tale that inexplicably grew out of a single fluffy scene, aka a prime excuse to procrastinate by poring through countless photos of beautiful Queen Anne houses my beloved. I hope you enjoy this ghostie story as much I enjoyed writing it! A big shoutout to my wonderful beta reader @dragonsaphirareads for all their feedback on this fic, and don't miss the amazing art by the incredible @casart and @onthevirgeofdestruction—you can check out their pieces here and here! (Seriously, even if you don't read the fic, go feast your eyes on their work because it is straight-up stunning. Go look, you'll see.)

Read on Ao3 Masterpost

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“This place is definitely haunted.”

Remus snorts, giving his brother a friendly sock in the arm.

“Oh come on, Ro, you scared of a few ghosties now? Afraid a floating white sheet is gonna jump out and yell boo?”

Roman doesn’t answer, just eyes the Queen Anne Victorian home in front of them with the amount of trepidation he usually reserved for any time Remus started a sentence with ‘I have an idea.’ The house does give off distinctly spooky vibes, Remus has to admit, what with its boards in desperate need of a new coat of paint and its broken window in the attic, not to mention the porch that looks liable to send someone plummeting to the ground if they take a single wrong step, but what was wrong with any of that? It all just added to the building’s character, and the risk of falling through the veranda was a delightful way to keep visitors on their toes, in his superior opinion.

And besides, he couldn’t turn his nose up at the property’s many flaws when they made it dirt-cheap. He wasn’t exactly a millionaire.

He grabs Roman’s arm, tugging him forward.

“C’mon, there’s some wicked spindlework on the back you gotta check out.”

His brother makes a sound of protest, dragging his feet as Remus hauls him onward.

“Aren’t we going to go inside?”

“Nah, I don’t have the keys yet. Everything’s still pending or whatever.”

Roman shifts his incredulous gaze from the house to Remus.

“You made me come all this way just to look at the outside of a house you haven’t even officially bought yet?”

Why yes, he had. He was such a good brother.

“Don’t act like it’s such a burden to drive twenty minutes out of the way to get here, especially when it means you’re twenty minutes closer to a booty call with Virgil.”

Roman splutters, face flushing a splendidly scandalized shade of crimson, and Remus cackles. That was more like it.

“Now c’mon c’mon c’mon, the sooner you ooh and aah over all my cool house shit, the sooner you can get some of that good di—”

“Don’t even finish that sentence,” Roman interrupts, slapping his hands over his ears, but he doesn’t protest as Remus pulls him around to the back of the house and points out the expansive if overgrown backyard, the plethora of decorative elements adorning the home, the leaded glass windows that have survived well over a century.

“I don’t get it, though,” Roman says as he eyes the tower gracing the corner of the house, something Remus would swear is a hint of jealousy in his gaze. Made sense. He knows for a fact his brother would sell his soul to be Rapunzel. “If this is such a nice place, why has it sat empty for so long?”

“Dunno. The realtor just said it stayed in the family of the guy who built it for a while before changing hands a bunch. Apparently every time it’s been on the market it’s taken ages to find a buyer, but she didn’t really say why no one wanted to live here for too long.” Probably just her trying not to scare him away from what was clearly a substantial restoration project so she wouldn’t lose her commission. Either that or there was some kind of toxic fungus in the walls that had taken over all the previous residents’ brains and turned them into zombies and Remus was about to become its next victim.

What a delightful gamble to find out which one it was.

“Can we please go now before some serial killer comes charging out of this place and we both end up on the news?” Roman asks, already edging back towards the front of the house.

“Sure, if you really want to give up your one shot of having your fifteen minutes of fame in the media,” Remus replies, dancing away with a grin as Roman aims a kick at his shins. “Fine, fine, we’ll go. I wouldn’t want to keep you from a hot date and some—”

Something catches his attention, a flash of movement out of the very corner of his eye, and he pauses mid-stride, doing a double-take at the second-story balcony overlooking the backyard.

Nothing. Not even a curtain blowing in the non-existent breeze.

“What?” Roman questions from where he’s also stopped a few yards ahead of him.

Remus looks a moment longer, searching for anything out of place, but all is still.

“Nothing. Probably just a bat or something. Wouldn’t that be cool as shit, to have bats as roommates? Hey, maybe they have rabies if they’re out in the daytime. Did you know…”

He launches into a spiel of the most gruesome and fascinating facts he knows about the disease, joyfully watching his brother’s face grow increasingly horrified with each one as they make their way back across the yard, and by the time they reach the driveway, the flicker of movement is barely a blip on his mental radar.

Just a trick of his eyes, surely.

It wasn’t like houses could actually be haunted, after all.

---

Home sweet home.

Or home rundown-and-slightly-musty-smelling home, as the case may be, but who was Remus to nitpick?

He fits his shiny new key into the lock and steps inside, letting the door click shut solidly behind him as he pauses just over the threshold, taking a moment to survey the foyer. His foyer now, in his very own home. The sale had been endless offers and counteroffers and a mountain of paperwork so large he’s positive he could have buried himself beneath it and never been seen again, but the place is finally his.

Him, a homeowner. Who’d have thunk it. He’ll be rubbing this in Roman’s apartment-renting face every chance he can get, thank you very much. It’s the least he can do, really.

He unceremoniously deposits the cardboard box in his arms on the floor and wanders further inside, trailing his hand along the smooth wood of the stair banister as he passes. He’s supposed to be meeting some of his friends back at his old place shortly—or now, actually, but that was wholly irrelevant—to start moving all of his worldly possessions into his fancy new abode, but he hadn’t been able to resist the temptation of taking the first load of boxes alone just to have the place to himself for a bit; he could use a few minutes to enjoy the space in peace before it’s filled with Roman and Virgil squabbling about the worst Disney movie heroes or whatever argument they were bound to get into.

Despite its well-worn exterior, the house is in surprisingly good condition inside, he muses as he roams through the empty rooms. There’s clearly extensive work that needs to be done if he wants to restore the place to its Victorian glory, an ambitious undertaking he knows will be neither cheap nor easy, but the bones of the structure are all solid, especially considering how many years it’s stood empty.

He finishes his meandering loop around the first floor and heads up the stairs, the tread of his steps entirely too loud for the pervasive quiet as he continues his exploratory wandering through the second story rooms. He pauses as he reaches what is clearly the master bedroom, surveying the original fireplace, the century-old hardwood, the attached balcony that was just begging to be used to pour water onto his unsuspecting brother’s head. Shit, his new house was cool as fuck.

It’d make the most sense to start hauling his load of boxes here, considering that’s where most of his crap is going to end up eventually, but the longer he hovers in the doorway, the more something feels … off. Just the slightest tingle prickling down his spine, and not the good kind. He steps inside and the temperature drops noticeably, a chill raising the hair on his arms.

“The fuck?” he mutters, raking his gaze over the windows in search of damaged panes letting in a breeze, but everything is intact.

He advances another step on impulse and the pinpricks dancing along his vertebrae only grow stronger, now accompanied by the distinct feeling he’s being watched. He scans the room again, slower this time, but there’s no furniture, no closet, not so much as a nook or cranny for anyone or anything to hide. Even the ceiling is empty when he turns his gaze upwards on the off chance he really does have some bats hanging around that he’s somehow missed on his numerous pre-sale walk-throughs.

Nary a beady eye to be found and still the sensation of being in someone’s sights doesn’t lessen. Not that it’s a threatening feeling, exactly, just distinctly unsettling, like there’s someone behind him no matter how many times he glances over his shoulder and finds nothing but empty air.

But that was crazy. He’d read the final sale documents until his eyes had been about to start bleeding and he’s absolutely positive that the house hadn’t come with any roommates. He’s probably just imagining the feeling, the result of watching one too many horror movies in the last week or his brain making things up in an attempt to liven up the empty space.

His phone buzzes in his pocket, yanking him out of his thoughts, and he rolls his eyes without even looking at the screen, already able to see the text from Roman in his mind’s eye: where you at?? i’m not packing up all your crap for you followed by an absurdly long string of emojis that basically constituted their own Roman-specific hieroglyphic language.

Time to face the moving-day music before Roman got annoyed enough with waiting that he rescinded his promise of free manual labor, then. Any investigations of potential invisible voyeurs would have to wait, no matter how titillating such a prospect sounded when he put it like that.

“You win for now, house,” he says into the quiet as he turns to leave, an edge of coldness still dancing along the goosebumps on his skin. “Keep your secrets. I’ll figure ‘em out eventually.”

---

The afternoon passes in a blur of hauling entirely too many heavy boxes and unwieldy pieces of furniture to the new house, and by the time night settles onto the horizon, Remus is utterly exhausted. He flops back on the couch, too tired to even think about putting his bedframe together, and he’s out in minutes.

He wakes disoriented, mind scrabbling blankly for a moment before the darkness coalesces into the still-unfamiliar contours of his sitting room. He just lies there for a moment, trying to figure out what’s roused him, but all is still. Just his brain deciding to deprive him of some tantalizingly horrifying nightmares, unfortunately—

Tap tap tap.

Remus bolts upright at the unmistakable sound of footsteps on the hardwood upstairs, adrenaline surging in a dizzying rush. There hadn’t been any signs of a squatter all day, and surely he’d remembered to lock the doors so no one could steal all the crap he’d just spent a whole day of his life lugging around. He waits for a moment, holding his breath as silence falls, and just when he’s about to pass the whole thing off as his imagination playing tricks on him, the steps start up again, slow and rhythmic like someone is pacing on the upper level.

Fuck his luck. If someone is secretly living in the attic of his fancy new home, he’s not going to be pleased.

He rolls off the couch and snatches his phone off of one of the plethora of boxes waiting to be unpacked, debating whether to risk turning on the flashlight before deciding for it; he might give away any element of surprise with the beam, but he’s certain to give it away if he starts banging face-first into walls or cracking his skull open falling down the stairs. His eye catches on a glass paperweight on the coffee table, a characteristically pretentious housewarming present from Roman, who apparently thought Remus had so many papers flying about that he needed to corral them with a glorified rock, and he seizes it on a whim.

Makeshift weapon was a much more useful purpose for the thing than its intended function anyways.

He edges around the scattered boxes towards the stairs, careful to keep his steps light and his hand shielding the light from his phone as the footfalls continue overhead, and makes it all the way up the steps without so much as a creak to give him away.

Flawless. He knew all those times sneaking up behind Roman to scare the shit out of him as kids would pay off someday.

He pauses on the landing to triangulate the noise, then creeps down the hall towards the footsteps as the sound grows even more distinct. The master bedroom again? What the actual fuck was going on with that room? Had he really managed to miss someone in there when he’d investigated earlier in the day? No, he couldn’t have, but then how had someone managed to get past where he’d been sleeping on the couch? Unless he really did have somebody living in the walls—

A floorboard squeaks underneath his foot, deafeningly loud in the quiet of the night, and the footsteps abruptly stop. Remus swears under his breath. Traitorous piece of wood. Now or never, then.

He lunges forward into the doorway of the master bedroom, raising the paperweight and howling a war cry as he swings his light across the room to reveal—

Nothing. The space is as entirely and utterly empty as it had been that morning.

Well, shit. There went any element of surprise he had left.

He darts back into the hall, racing to search through the rest of the rooms on the upper level one by one, but they’re all just as vacant as the first. He even hauls himself into the attic, bracing himself to be clubbed over the head by whoever is lurking, but with the exception of innumerable shadows billowing away from his flashlight, the space proves equally empty as the rest.

Unease stirs in his gut, creeping in alongside the lingering adrenaline as he makes his way back down the precariously rickety ladder into the main house. Surely there’s no way someone could have gotten past him, not when he would have heard them in the hall or going down the stairs.

And yet, as far as he can tell, besides a few mice tucked away in the attic, there isn’t another living soul in the house.

He stops in the doorway of the master bedroom again, staring inside. He’s positive this is where the footsteps had been emanating from, lack of proof be damned. Something weird was going on with this house.

Good thing Remus had just made the biggest financial commitment of his life to buy it.

Nothing for it now but to hope some elusive, wall-dwelling ax murderer doesn’t give him the chop in his sleep, he supposes, although he has to admit that’d be a badass way to go.

He reluctantly makes his way back downstairs and shoves a pile of boxes at the foot of the stairs to trip any nefarious intruders coming down, then retreats back to the couch, all the while keeping his ears primed for so much as a whisper of sound above him.

But even though it takes him a long time to drift back to sleep, the house around him remains as silent as a grave.

---

The whole thing must have been an impressively lucid dream, Remus decides the next morning. A second investigation in the light of day doesn’t reveal anything out of place: no shoe prints on the floor, no critters, certainly no people. It was probably nothing then, he tries to convince himself, just his overactive imagination needing an outlet after being a bit too jittery from all the excitement of moving.

But he finds himself pausing in the master bedroom again, something drawing him back to the space. First the chill and the strange feeling of being watched, then the mysterious footsteps? Two separate coincidences, or something more?

God, he sounded about as paranoid as Virgil. Next thing he knew he was going to be inventing his very own conspiracy theory to explain a few bumps in the night.

It really was nothing, he tells himself, shaking off any lingering unease as he tromps back down the stairs. If he starts jumping at every little noise in his old-as-shit house, he’ll be long dead before he gets the property restored. If he starts seeing glowing red eyes in the dark, he’ll start to worry. Until then, he has a mountain of boxes to unpack.

Unfortunately, said mountain does not pull a Beauty and the Beast and begin unpacking itself, leaving Remus to spend a dreadfully dull afternoon doing it instead, only the allure of building a fort out of all the empty boxes keeping him from living out of cardboard for the rest of his life.

By the time he’s finally finished unboxing most of the downstairs and getting the tv and wifi set up, most of the day has passed him by, afternoon sunlight splaying golden fingers across the hardwood.

Break time, then. He’s earned it, if he does say so himself.

He collapses onto the couch, flipping on the tv and surfing through the channels until he finds a rerun of some low-budget horror film from the eighties. Perfect. Nothing like a bit of mindless tv to rot his brain just that much more. Settling back more comfortably into the cushions, he pops open the bag of chips he’s snagged from the kitchen and pulls out his phone, beginning to scroll through his notifications.

Modern multitasking at its finest, truly.

But he’s barely a minute into atrophying his mind via social media before the tv starts flickering, volume dropping precipitously before ratcheting back up, the picture jumping to the weather channel, then a British cooking show, then the news with Spanish subtitles flashing in and out at the bottom of the screen.

Remus freezes with a chip halfway to his mouth, staring at the remote where it’s very definitely out of his reach on the coffee table, all by its lonesome. He’s no expert, but he’s pretty sure technology was not, in fact, supposed to suddenly start functioning by itself without any human input. Was his new house secretly sitting over some freaky radioactive waste? That would certainly explain why no one had wanted to buy it. Or was this some EMP disaster? Had someone decided to take out the whole country’s power grid, starting with Remus’ shitty tv?

He sits up, reaching for the rogue remote, only to pause as a chill moves over him, then past him like it’s heading for the tv, and the screen crackles, static beginning to fuzz both the video and the audio as the picture continues to leap wildly between programs.

Fuck the remote, then. Whatever freak accident has descended upon his living room, it’s time to go straight to the source.

Abandoning his snack, he stands, striding to the outlet and yanking the plug out of the wall. Silence falls immediately, the screen fading to black, but there still lingers a noticeable chill in the air, cold energy palpable against his skin and all too reminiscent of the feeling he remembers from being in the master bedroom.

“What the hell,” he mutters under his breath, casting his gaze around the room. Empty, just as upstairs had been the last three times he’d checked. He takes a step backwards, then another, and the strange chill decreases. On a whim, he pulls out his phone, scrolling through several apps without even paying attention to them, and sure enough, the hair on his arms raises as the temperature falls again, that sparking feeling of energy growing more intense as his phone begins to flicker on its own.

“What the actual hell,” he whispers again. Roman can’t have been right—this place can’t actually be haunted. There’s absolutely no way there’s a real, live—or dead, technically, he supposes—ghost in his living room right now playing fuck-up-the-electronics.

But if there is…

“Hello?” he calls, and the flickering abruptly stops, chill retreating once more. Shit. One word in and apparently Remus has already fucked things up. “Hello?” he tries again. Did this maybe-possible-potential ghostie even speak English? “I’m Remus,” he says, feeling more than a little crazy for introducing himself to his empty living room. If Roman ever knew of this, he’d die laughing and then Remus really would have a ghost haunting his ass.

He wracks his brain for something to say. If he were a ghost and a stranger started moving all of their shit into his home, what would he want to hear from them?

“Um, cool house you have here. I’m not gonna like, fuck it up or anything.”

Silence.

“I’m planning on restoring it bit by bit as I have money so if you could tell me the original paint color or wallpaper patterns, that’d be dope.”

Still nothing. Apparently the ghost is not amused. Time for a different tactic, then.

“What’s your name?”

Not even a cricket chirping. Jesus fucking christ, Remus is really blowing this.

“That’s the tv—the television,” he explains, gesturing towards the device that had seemingly either fascinated or enraged his new housemate, he can’t quite tell which. “It works by… well, I don’t really know how it works. Something with waves and frequencies or some shit? But you can watch recordings, people acting or baking or doing dumb reality dating shows or whatever, so if there’s something that you wanna see…”

He trails off, surreptitiously scanning the room for any ethereal presences, but the house is quiet, the ghostly feeling fading bit by bit. Great. An actual paranormal experience and he’s gone and shoved his foot so far in his mouth he can practically feel his toes wiggling in his small intestine.

“Alright, that’s cool, no worries. Just lemme know if you change your mind.”

He waits a moment more, hoping for a disembodied voice to speak or an object to start moving on its own or his body to suddenly become possessed, but there’s nothing. Snagging his leather jacket off the back of the couch, he beelines for the door, forcing himself not to run as excitement begins to grow with every step, bubbling up around his bones. He has a ghost. A ghost, an actual fucking ghost, and he hadn’t even had to pay extra for it. No way he’s not going to take advantage of the universe handing him the sickest housewarming present in the world, never mind the fact that he might end up a walking meat suit for the spirit.

He pauses as he reaches the edge of the yard, then thinks better of it and pivots, heading for his car instead. Who knew how far ghost range was, and he doesn’t want his new roomie overhearing. He’s practically vibrating with energy as he makes his way down the long, winding drive, and he only makes it a few miles down the road before he’s pulling over onto the shoulder, hopefully well out of spirit range.

His first call rings through to voicemail, but Remus doesn’t bother leaving a message, just hangs up and tries again, only to be met with the same result. The third time, though, proves to be the charm.

“What,” the voice on the other end spits, cheerful as ever. “Fuck you, Remus, I’m in the middle of—”

“You’re still into all that weird stuff, right? Like the cryptids and the creepies and the ghouls and ghosties and all that?” Remus interrupts. He can deal with Virgil’s wrath another time—he has information he needs and he needs it pronto.

A pause, so long he’s sure Virgil has hung up on him and he’s going to have to keep calling until the emo answers his question.

“Yeah?” the distrustful reply finally comes, anger blunted by obvious wariness. “Why—”

“I need to pick your brain,” Remus cuts in again. “I’ll be there in twenty.”

---

Plan Contact The Resident Possibly Unfriendly Ghost Who Might Possess Him, or CTRPUGWMPH to be short and snappy about it, is officially a go.

Unfortunately, it isn’t off to a promising start.

Virgil’s knowledge had turned out to be more spirit lore than specifics about how to get a ghost to actually appear, although he’d been infinitely more helpful than Roman, who’d just stared at him and asked if he’d had the house checked for carbon monoxide poisoning. Remus had soundly ignored him and had left Virgil’s apartment with his head swimming with theories about why ghosts haunt particular places and an extensive lecture from Virgil about how to find any potential objects or reasons tying a ghost to the house that might provide a potential talking point to engage said ghost in conversation.

But despite digging into every crack and crevice on the internet, emailing the local historical society, even calling his realtor to ask again about the history of the property, Remus comes up with precious little. The house had originally been built in the 1880s by a local merchant, everyone seems to agree, and had been inherited by his nephew soon after, but beyond that there’s frustratingly scant information available, and he can’t find so much as a whisper about anyone dying in the home. His ghostie could be anyone, then: A Victorian builder who’d taken a tumble, a flapper girl who’d partied a tad too hard, a hapless victim of some modern serial killer who’d taken advantage of the place sitting abandoned for years to do a bit of light murdering.

With precisely zero context clues as to his new housemate’s identity, then, Remus embraces his remarkable talent of keeping up an entirely one-sided conversation as he works around the house the next few days, rambling about anything and everything related to the property he can think of, hoping something will pique the ghost’s interest. But besides a few more cold spots and flickering screens, the house remains stubbornly quiet. Maybe his ghost just needed a bit of help in communicating, though; drifting around an empty building with no one to talk to for the past god-knew-how-many years can’t have done good things to their incorporeal vocal cords.

Which brings him to Plan B: The infamous Ouija board, favorite tool of grifters and bullshit paranormalists everywhere.

And yet despite the makeshift, very high-budget seance he conducts with the two dollar board and the zero dollar candles he’s lovingly stolen from his brother, there’s once again no reply from beyond the veil besides a chill in the room that somehow radiates disapproval. Apparently his ghost isn’t a fan of pseudoscientific games any more than he is. At least they had standards, whoever they were.

But Remus is a stubborn bastard if he does say so himself, so on to Plan C it is. The used EMF meter he snags off of ebay has definitely seen better days, given the prominent crack across its screen, but the thing had been cheap and still seemed to work, so Remus wasn’t complaining. Fancy equipment was for fancy people, after all, and of all the things he’s ever been called, he’s positive fancy isn’t one of them. He sets up the device behind the tv, which still seems to intrigue his ghost every time it’s turned on, puts on the first show he can find, and forces himself to walk away. His little trap is set. Now all he has to do is bide his time pretending to busy himself unpacking a box of books in the next room—

He barely has the chance to register the tv screen flickering out of the corner of his eye before an ear-splitting shriek is rending the air, startling him so violently that he promptly drops a hefty tome on his foot.

“Shit,” he breathes, surging back into the living room, but the noise has already stopped just as suddenly as it began, replaced by a frigid chill permeating the room. Maybe he should have thought twice about scaring the resident phantom without first hiding any of his valuables. Hopefully he won’t wake up tomorrow to find his tv shattered. “It won’t hurt you,” he calls, though the EMF meter indicates a distinct lack of any supernatural presences. “It just makes noise to let me know when you’re nearby, yeah? Totally harmless.”

No response, but for once he doesn’t mind, not when there’s excitement dancing white-hot across his nerves. There really is a ghost or spirit or demon or something here, and he hasn’t just been imagining things.

Fuck, this house is single-handedly the coolest thing that’s ever happened to him, even if he does now have to worry about his haunting buddy getting a bit of revenge on him in the middle of the night.

But Remus survives safe and sound into the next day without so much as a supernatural scratch on his skin. Bloody payback didn’t seem like his ghost’s style anyways, not when their favorite activity seemed to be pressing as many buttons as possible on the tv remote at once. Curiosity is still nipping impatiently at his heels though, urging him to explore this latest avenue of potential communication more, so he sets up the EMF meter again, this time in the master bedroom where the spirit seems most inclined to spend time if the continued pacing in the middle of the night is anything to go by.

A brilliant plan, only minorly ruined by the fact that the device is nowhere to be found when he goes searching for it the next morning.

“Are you disappearing things, ghostie?” he asks the empty bedroom. “Gonna zap me into another dimension next?”

He’s joking, but as his hunt through the house reveals neither hide nor hair of the EMF meter, he can’t help but wonder. Had the ghost really just yeeted the thing into the ether? Or maybe it was right where he’d left it in the middle of the bedroom, but had been turned invisible like the spirit themself? What kind of ghostly superpowers did he even have, if any—

He comes to an abrupt halt as he emerges out the back door onto the porch, a laugh spilling past his lips as he surveys the myriad bits of metal and broken plastic strewn around him. Looks like he’s found his EMF meter. Apparently his ghost wasn’t nearly as endeared to this technology as he was anything with a screen. He glances up to the master bedroom window over his head, shading his eyes from the sun.

“Fair enough,” he calls, still fighting down amusement despite himself, and there’s the faintest shimmer in the air above the balcony, reminiscent of a heat mirage despite the cool morning air. “No more screeching little boxes.”

Left with zero information about his ghost’s identity, a useless Ouija board better repurposed as a doorstop, and the remains of his one piece of official ghost-hunting equipment, Remus concludes his only option is to embark on Plan D. Said plan isn’t so much an strategic approach as it is a wild hail mary to find any way to communicate with his ghost that didn’t involved hurling objects from balconies, as much fun as such an activity was, but then again, Plan D did sound delightfully dirty, so he’ll take the trade-off.

The internet, of course, is the place to turn to for highly questionable ghost advice, and it only takes a single google search to find message boards teeming with it. Half of it is clearly bullshit, he quickly discovers as he trawls through post after useless post, and the other half is baseless theories without any semblance of evidence to back them up, but just as he’s about to call it quits and move on to whatever the hell Plan E is, an old thread catches his eye.

‘Old Ghost Caught By Photography?’ the title reads, and Remus skims through the post, intrigued despite himself at the detailed claims the author had been able to capture the image of a Victorian spirit by using an antique camera and photography methods from the end of the nineteenth century. He pores over the attached images, searching for the slightest hint of photoshop or manipulation, but everything seems legit. And it made sense in some weird, probably illogical way, he supposes, that ghosts might only be spotted by using technology from their day and age—historical continuity in the metaphysical realm or some shit.

It’s the best lead he has after hours of searching, and really, he’s just spent a very hefty chunk of change buying a whole-ass house; what was the harm in dropping a few more dollars on some vintage photography equipment?

Which is precisely how he finds himself crammed into his makeshift darkroom in the tiny closet under the stairs several weeks later, holding his breath as he carefully begins to look through the latest batch of negatives he’s just finished processing. It had taken an obscene amount of research, a healthy dose of trial-and-error, and more than a few failures to figure out the intricacies of the dry plate photography process, but he’d gotten there in the end, even if the most he has to show for it is a few suspicious blurs in a couple of images.

Maybe this whole idea of capturing ghosts in photos was just as bullshit as the others, he muses as he examines yet another empty picture of the dining room, or maybe his ghost wasn’t from the same era as the camera he’d bought. Maybe his ghost simply didn’t want to have his photo taken, or maybe—

His train of thought abruptly derails as he picks up the next plate.

Holy shit. Holy shit.

The image is still a negative, the reversed colors lending a certain eeriness to the picture under the red darkroom lights, but there, right smack in the middle of the photo—a figure. An actual human figure, clear as day, looking right at the camera. Remus whoops, nearly knocking over a vial of chemicals with his elbow as he dances backwards in pure giddiness. Oh fuck yes , there is a ghost haunting the place. His ghost, now that he owns the house. His ghost who is…

He pauses, forcing himself to focus on the figure in the photo even as he feels like he’s about to vibrate right off of his bones with excitement. Spectacles, clean-shaven, dark hair neatly styled. Neat trousers, white shirt, trim waistcoat, and a decidedly fancy ascot, the whole ensemble distinctly old-fashioned. Victorian, then? Or Edwardian? Or some historical reenactor who’d met an untimely demise in costume? And it does seem to be an untimely demise; the man looks to be in his mid- to late-twenties, unless he’d found some ability to look whatever age he wanted in the afterlife.

Regardless, he can’t make himself focus on fashion for long. He has a ghost to talk to. Fighting his way out of the cramped closet, he bounds up the stairs, forcing himself to slow to a respectable jog as he darts into the master bedroom. He stops in the middle of the still-bare room, trying and utterly failing to keep his hopes in check.

“Hello? Ghostie?”

No response.

“Mr. Glasses and White Shirt?”

His skin prickles, the hair on the back of his neck raising. Aha. There he was.

“Hey, what’s up?” He turns in a slow circle, searching for any sign of his specter, any flicker of light off a spectacle lens or a flash of a shirtsleeve, but the room is as empty as ever.

“I have a photo if you’d like to see it.” Could ghosts not see themselves in mirrors or was that only vampire lore? And if he couldn’t see his own reflection, did the ghost even remember what he looked like?

He raises the picture, proferring the negative to the vacant room, and holds his breath. Nothing, for several long moments, and then the chill edges closer. Remus bites his lip, barely able to keep himself from bouncing on the balls of his feet at the prospect of a ghost being within arm’s reach.

“I wasn’t trying to be creepy or anything, I just wanted to see if you were real or if I needed to go check myself into a padded room, you know? I’m Remus, if I haven’t said that. What’s your name?”

Several more excruciatingly long moments that Remus is sure has to be the longest span of silence in history, then—

“Hello.”

The voice is thin and slightly hoarse, quiet enough that Remus has to strain to make it out, but it’s as unmistakably real as the form that flickers into existence right in front of his eyes, identical to the man in the photo. He’s distinctly transparent, the edges of him not quite defined, fuzzing out around the edges like the ambient glow of neon signs, but he’s here and he’s real and this is so fucking cool that Remus could keel over right here and now from excitement and join the ghost in wandering around the house for all eternity.

“Holy shit,” he breathes, because if there was ever a time for swearing, by god this is fucking it, and the spirit withdraws slightly, already guarded expression closing in further. “No no no, it’s good,” he rushes to assure him, resisting the urge to reach out and try to touch him. “Good holy shit. Complimentary holy shit.”

The ghost doesn’t seem entirely appeased, but he tilts his head slightly, something like curiosity sparking in his eyes as he evaluates Remus.

“Why are you not frightened of me?” he finally asks, and Remus has to fight back the absurd laugh bubbling up in his chest. He’s being questioned by a century-old ghost in the middle of his haunted home. Life really was delightfully freaky.

“No offense, man, but you’re not exactly terrifying. I mean, I’ve been here what? A solid month? And you haven’t even tried to pluck my eyeballs out or anything.”

Another unreadable pause. Is he just giving the spirit ideas? Were his eyes about to be forcibly unmarried from his skull à la eagles tearing out Prometheus’ liver?

“Do you want me to be afraid of you?” he asks after a further absolutely unbearable five seconds of silence.

“No,” the ghost admits after a moment of clear hesitation, “but previous residents certainly have not appreciated my presence here.”

Remus scoffs. “That’s their problem. Some of us are smarter than that.”

The other man’s head tilt deepens, something akin to puzzlement furrowing his brow, as if he can’t fathom why having a ghost is actually the most badass shit on the face of the planet.

“Can I ask you some questions?” Remus asks, exhilaration still racing along the underside of his skin so intensely that he can barely stand it. “You can ask me whatever you want, too.”

The ghost nods, although he still seems cautious as one hand fiddles absently with his ascot. “I suppose that would be alright.”

Twenty questions with an undead spirit. Remus’ life really was getting better by the minute.

“Did you used to live here?”

“I did, many years ago.”

“Did you own the place?”

“At one point in time, yes. It was truly a beautiful house in its day, and a wonderful place to reside.”

Oh fuck yes. If having an old-timey ghost who can give him historically accurate advice about restoring the house isn’t the coolest fucking thing that’s ever happened to him, he isn’t sure what is. He has half a mind to start grilling him on paint colors and wallpaper prints and the original hardwood, but—

“Did you die here?”

The words are blurting out of his mouth without even bothering to detour through his brain on the way out, burning curiosity eclipsing any thought that perhaps asking about death isn’t exactly acceptable ghost etiquette. He barely has time to register the change in the spirit’s expression, the visceral upset written across his features clear as day, before he’s gone in between one breath and the next, vanishing back into whatever thin air he’d come from and leaving nothing but a biting chill in his wake.

Shit shit shit. He’s finally gotten the ghost to trust him enough to show up and talk and then he’s gone and ruined it within the span of two minutes all because he had all the self-control of a sieve trying to retain water.

“Wait,” he calls, casting about in vain. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.” Well, apparently his subconscious had, but that hadn’t been his intention. “Please come back. You can ask me as many invasive questions as you like.” Nothing. “You can haunt me for revenge, if you want.” Utter silence. “Are you gonna hurl me off the balcony like my EMF meter?”

There he goes again, giving the specter ideas, although really, being yeeted out of a window by a ghost would be a damn cool end if he does say so himself. He lingers in the room for several long minutes, forcing himself to keep quiet lest he miss the spirit’s hushed voice, but there’s nothing but the faint sound of a bird twittering outside.

“Alright,” he finally relents, disappointment pooling in his stomach as he glances down at the photography plate still in his hand, the negative serving as indisputable evidence that the encounter hadn’t just been a fever dream. He’ll find a way to make things right with the ghost somehow, one way or another. He has to. “Just come spook me if you change your mind.”

Taglist (let me know if you’d like to be added or removed!): @darth-does-stuff

#thomas sanders sides big bang 2023 #tssbb2023 #sanders sides #ts remus #remus sanders #ts logan #logan sanders #ts roman #roman sanders #ts virgil #virgil sanders #intrulogical #loceit #ts fanfic #the art of saying goodbye #my fic #rosepetal writes

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eruden-writes · 2 years

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Room & Board - Part 8 - (Tabaeus x Reader)

Anon submitted this prompt: For the prompt submissions a vampire that feels guilty after feeding/attacking someone so they leave obscenely valuable ancient artifacts as payment/an apology?

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x x x x x

After the ordeal of dealing with Jemma and setting up a cage for the gliders, the following weeks, ironically, were quiet.

Or maybe you were just so laser-focused on finding a house, nothing else permeated your thoughts.

Tabaeus and you continue the established feeding schedule. They still ‘snacked’ when they could get away with it. However, they did honor your denials. An unforeseen benefit of the sugar gliders was Tabaeus wasn’t prone to lonely wanderings to find you when you went to work. It was honestly a relief. The day after he brought the new furry family members home, you’d been so concerned they’d show up again. It was almost eerie when they didn’t.

Your real estate search also eventually bears fruit.

The house you find, the one that calls out to you, is an old house, built in the 1800s, with four bedrooms and two bathrooms. A lovely shade of blue, with a large porch and fenced-in backyard. There’s even two stone gargoyles that keep watch from the stoop.

It is located downtown, in an older part of the city. Which essentially means a diverse neighborhood filled with old homes, remodels, renters, and homeowners along with families, childless couples, and singletons.

With two stories, plus a basement and attic, it’s roomy enough for your - grudgingly - growing family- …er, roomateship? Plus there’s a detached garage and roomy kitchen with plenty of storage for appliances. Off the dining room, a greenhouse is attached. The basement is unfinished, which means Tabaeus is less likely to sleep there, but the freezer the previous owner left behind made up for it.

Strangely, it has been on the market for the better part of a year. Either no one had placed an offer or the owner was excessively picky. Regardless, you contacted your real estate agent and asked for a tour. You and Tabaeus walked through the house, pointing out little things you liked and little problems that would need fixing.

By the end, however, the two of you agreed it certainly felt like home. From there, it had been back-and-forth discussions, inspections, and negotiations. It looked like the closing was on the horizon. Which meant gathering the additional funds together for the house and closing costs was needed.

That led you to your current undertaking with Tabaeus. Which entailed the two of you bumbling about in the local sewers.

“Why in the world do you have a cache of treasure here?” It’s not the first time you ask the question and it likely won’t be the last. Every inch of your body is covered in clothing, plus a mask to fight off the stench of the sewage. The acrid scent still manages to get into your nose and you’re certain you’ll have to burn the clothes once you get back to the apartment.

Tabaeus throws you a look, as if to say ‘Are you genuinely asking that of I, your amnesiac vampire friend?’ Their expression is no less stormy than yours.

They are dressed in just as much as you, in a dark hoodie, their hair tucked under the hood, and long pants and boots. Only their red glowing eyes are visible above their mask. An odd comfort, you realize.

Your expression doesn’t falter and they sigh, shoulders slumping as they turn their flashlight back down the corridor. “I honestly do not know. I just know it is here.”

“Well, hurry it up. We’re not even supposed to be down here.” You hiss, jumping out of the way of a rat scurrying by.

“Patience,” Tabaeus sighs, swinging their lone beam of light to and fro. They’re mumbling to themselves, their gloved hand tracing the wall. There’s no way a hidden compartment or room is down here, you think. There’s literally no way. The city would know about it! And if the city knew about it, it would’ve been pilfered a long time ago.

Something pinged at Tabaeus’s memory as they started to stride with more purpose. You followed after them, weakly hoping this wasn’t an utterly useless endeavor. It would just figure that, once you pursued a house, your vampire patron would run dry in finances. Or just not be able to find their literal treasure trove.

You’re not sure how they managed to do it, but you watch as Tabaeus’s touches a certain spot in the wall and twists a nearby knob. For a breathless second, you tense, waiting to hear the clatter of broken pipes or heightened water pressure. But you hear the sound of metal and rock shifting and your eyes widen as an entryway slides open in the wall.

Tabaeus glances to you over their shoulder, a teasing smirk in their voice as they hold out their hand to you. “See? The universe rewards those who hold their tongue.”

You accept their hand, but shoot them a sharp look. It only makes their smirk broaden as they turn to lead you through the darker-than-pitch corridor. Your heart pounds as the world around you turns to deep shadows. There’s no way to spy any silhouettes or make out faint shapes of pipes or gaskets. It’s all so dark. And quiet. You don’t even hear the skittering of rats.

It grows even darker as the door slides shut behind you. You jerk, turning to look, but only see a blanket of black. Fear dances in your stomach.

Sensing your apprehension, Tabaeus gives your hand a squeeze. “I am here.”

“I know,” you mumble as you turn back around, your face flaring with embarrassed heat. Their presence is part of the problem, though. They are a vampire. They feast on your blood. And though you two have grown closer, more amicable, you’re worried where this all will end. It may not be tomorrow or in the year or even in ten years, but Tabaeus could always turn on you and then go on with their life.

Whenever you think of the disparate lifespans between you two, you find yourself wondering if you made a mistake.

“I believe this is it,” Tabaeus says, rousing you from your thoughts. “Shield your eyes a moment.”

You do as they say, before you listen to Tabaeus fumble in the dark. There’s a click and you see lights flash behind your eyelids. Carefully, you squint open your eyes, letting them slowly adjust. After a few rapid blinks, your eyes widen.

It appears to be a huge corridor, with a tiled ceiling - plastered with cobwebs - and arching buttresses. Thankfully, it seems relatively dry, with no oozing sewage to squelch underfoot. It’s not until your eye catches the dip in the floor, where railroad track is laid, that you realize this is an old train station or, perhaps, a closed section on a route. You take a few steps farther down the line. The lighting casts a slightly yellow tint on everything in the vicinity. And there is certainly a lot in the vicinity.

Furniture, racks of clothing, mannequins, shelving. It’s a mishmash of things from different decades, perhaps even eras. You try to peer down the corridor, but the haphazard piles seem to go on forever with only carefully carved paths between their bases. The mingling scent of dust and mildew hang heavy in the air, along with rotting wood, but there’s perfumes you wouldn’t expect. Faintly, you wonder if there’s colognes or potpourris in the mess of miscellany.

Tabaeus suddenly appears again at your elbow and you jump with a yelp.

“My apologies,” they say, offering you an awkward smile. At some point, they had lowered the mask they wore and it hung beneath their chin. In their hands is a large wooden box, an ancient latch on its side.

You nod to it. “What’s in there?”

“Replenished funds!” With a flourish, they open the lid to show off the contents. Inside are more gold coins and jewelry and gems. Much of it looks about the same time period as the other payments you’ve taken from them.

“Why don’t you live here?” The thought strikes you quick and you glance around again. It is roomy and, with a little bit of elbow grease, you’re certain it can become a livable place. Heck, there was probably an old abandoned train car somewhere further down the track. “I’m sure there’s enough things to live comfortably and you could probably head up top for… food, when you need it.”

You stumble when you think of what Tabaeus would have to do to survive in this place. Without thinking, you rub at the spot on your neck that has grown bruised from multiple feedings. The courage to let Tabaeus feed from somewhere else has yet to take root.

“There are a number of reasons,” Tabaeus admits, closing the wooden box. Their shoulders hunch a little as they gaze about, their fingers playing with the latch of the box in their arms. “It is grimy and dusty. Not to mention rather isolating.”

At that last point, they wince. You can’t help the curiosity needling through your thoughts. Thus far, Tabaeus hasn’t mentioned other vampires nor anyone else for that matter. Even if his amnesia was a result of a long sleep, you think there’d be someone they’d remember.

“Besides, I have found I quite enjoy being in the presence of others. Especially you.” You focus on Tabaeus again. They smile crookedly at you, their red eyes flickering from your gaze to your reddening cheeks. More than once, Tabaeus has admitted to enjoying how your cheeks color.

Needing to break up the sudden warm heaviness surrounding you two, you scoff, “That’s me, your little blood bag.”

That draws Tabaeus’s eyes back to your own, an ember in their red depths. “You’re my amata trinkaĵo, actually.”

“Oh, yes, I’ve been upgraded to a drink instead of a bag,” you snort and roll your eyes. Tabaeus had actually taken to calling you Amata on occasion. And each time, you shot them a dirty look. In return, they’d only grin.

This time, however, Tabaeus’s smile is soft and a little sad. They notice your stare and instantly reel back, clearing their throat as they cast their eyes about.

“Can you hold this? I might be able to find other little bits that are fairly valuable,” they ask, holding out the wooden box to you. With a nod, you relieve Tabaeus of the crate, grunting as you realize how heavy it is. They don’t seem to notice your struggle as they turn, off to investigate further.

“Do you think you’ll remember anything if you poke around here?” The question comes so sudden and soft to your lips, you almost think Tabaeus didn’t hear it. But, they did, and they stop suddenly, turning their eyes back to you. It’s a roundabout question that you hope will stir their memories or a nugget of information to research. “There’s got to be tons of memorabilia here.”

“I… do not know.” A complicated expression creases at Tabaeus’s face, their eyes drifting from one item to the next. It wasn’t a complete refusal, though, and they wander toward an old wardrobe. You watch as they pull out the drawers and shuffle through them. Papers, knick-knacks, photos. Picking every little thing up and examining it carefully.

“Some things stir memories,” they admit, after a long few moments. You perk up, edging closer to them, though your loot weighs you down. Tabaeus tilts a photo toward you and you squint, looking over an array of faces frozen in time. “I feel I know these people. As if I grew up with them, but I cannot tell you their names or what year this was taken in.”

They flip the photo back into the drawer it came from, before pulling out another paper. It looks like a letter, typed up on an old-timey typewriter. “And this here. I recognize the name Reginald Taylor. He was a chemist at a general store on Gooseberry Boulevard. Where that is, though, or how long I knew him, I have not the foggiest.”

With a sigh, Tabaeus drops the note into its home drawer. With another look cast about the corridor, creases of wretchedness continue to mark their features.

“What is it?” You start to lift your hand to touch their shoulder, before realizing you’re still hauling the gold around.

“There are many bad memories,” Tabaeus shakes their head, taking a few steps away from you. Their expression is strained and you think you see their eyes growing glassy, wet. “Deaths by feeding and other means. Blackmail. Extortion. Cruelty.”

You’re not sure what to say, so you just remain quiet. Though your mind races with questions and theories.

It’s when Tabaeus speaks again, their words making your stomach lurch, your worries solidify. “I… I do not believe I am a good person.”

“What?” Without thinking you take a step closer. Your heart pounds and a spike of adrenaline has made you grow hot. A small fear of betrayal lashes in you - they said ‘am’ not ‘was’ a bad person - but you hold it down. “What did you remember?”

At that, Tabaeus’s eyes dart to your face. A pained expression crosses their features briefly, before they manage to push it away. Their eyes draw away from you, their shoulders hunching. “Must I speak of it?”

Boldly or foolishly, you take another step forward. Your voice hardens. “Am I in danger?”

“No, not from me,” Tabaeus startles at the accusation, their eyebrows drawing upward. “Never from me.”

You press on, ignoring how a nervous flutter at those two words joins the pounding of your heart.“ Do others pose a danger to me?”

Tabaeus’s lips pressed together, looking sad and wretched. Once more, their eyes flicker away from you, their fingers fidgeting with each other. “That I am not sure of.”

“I would appreciate knowing whatever you know, Tabaeus.” They flinch at the hard sharpness in your tone, but it’s something that has to be said. Your mind is going a mile a minute, trying to confirm Tabaeus is a threat or make excuses for them. The longer you look at the misery dancing on his face, you sigh. “The memories may not be yours. They may be that of those you’ve fed on. Or maybe you have some sort of tactile memory powers.”

That makes curiosity cut through their gloom. “Tactile memory powers?”

With a shrug, you try to explain as simply as possible. “It’s like the ability to see memories tied to an object.”

“Have you heard of such things?” Skepticism has Tabaeus’s eyes narrowing, obviously not believing you.

“I mean, in comics and stuff.” Now it’s your turn to shrug. You’re suddenly aware that you’re still holding the box of valuables, your muscles aching from holding it. “You’re literally a vampire, so I figure we keep our options open?”

“That is true.” They do not sound convinced, though. Their dismal gaze scans the room, the furrow between their eyebrows deepening.

An awkward silence falls between the two of you. Tabaeus quietly wanders off after a polite amount of time, digging through items on the far side of the corridor. Still holding the box of treasure in your hands, you’re not entirely certain what to do. Carefully, you set the valuables down on a larger trunk. After letting your arms rest, you decide to poke about the area yourself.

Half of your brain is looking for valuables or anything of interest. Any old little oddity or fascinating book or strange gadget. The other half is looking for information on Tabaeus. Photos, documents, anything that may lead to information.

“I know you are searching ways to kill vampires.” Tabaeus’s words, coming from behind you, makes you freeze.

You spin around, staring wide-eyed at Tabaeus. Suddenly, you are very aware you are underground, in a hidden place only Tabaeus knows of. Without thinking, your eyes dart around, hoping to scope out an exit. However, your brain starts wondering if the mounds of items are hiding dead bodies in their depths. Are those bad memories that keep Tabaeus from living here actually the souls of his victims?

“My apologies! I did not mean to startle you. I am not angry about it, I understand the need to protect yourself,” they rush to explain, their own eyes widening as they realize how worried you were. You believe they would raise their hands in supplication, if it weren’t for yet another box in their grasp. Warily, you stare at it, wondering what it could hold.

“I recalled this being here. Tied to those awful memories.” Tabaeus mumbles before you can ask. Slowly, as if they were approaching a scared animal, they hold the box out to you. It takes you a breath to realize they’re offering it to you to take. With lips pressed tight together, you don’t take the box, but instead flip the lid open.

As you look at Tabaeus, a rush of confusion swarming your brain, they look away. Their shoulders jerk, as if to hunch in on themself, but holding out the box keeps them from performing the action.

“What is this, Tabaeus?” With a shaking hand, you reach into the box and pull out a wooden stake. It’s old and gnarled looking, but there is a heft to it that isn’t like other modern day wooden items you’ve held. There’s other items in the box, as well.

Herbs and vials, bits of silver, a cross, a mirror, bound bags of who-knows-what, and more. At the very bottom, under everything, is what looks to be a notebook - perhaps a journal - with a crackling leather cover.

Their answer surprises you. “From what I remember, this is a vampire hunting kit.”

“Why would you have this here?” It didn’t make sense to you. Why would they have things around that could kill them? Though a small, dark part of you answers.

“I may have killed a few vampire hunters in my time.” Tabaeus shrugs, as if taling about murder is no big deal. Though, you wryly suppose it’s more self-defense, if these hunters were trying to kill Tabaeus. Your momentary amusement is gone when they voice what that dark part of you guessed, “Or perhaps it is just something all vampires keep. In case eternity becomes too great a burden.”

You gently place the stake back into the box, closing the lid with a snap. “And why are you showing me this?”

“It is yours. For your protection.” It is not a threat, you realize. Their words are too soft, their eyes downcast, their body language submissive for them to seem dangerous. “A token of my sincerity that I will never hurt you, but if I ever do, do not hesitate to use what is in this box.”

The logical, paranoid part of you snorts derogatorily at the statement. There were any number of ways a sly vampire could sully a vampire hunting kit. The wrong herbs, fake silver, tap water in place of holy water. And it wasn’t as if you hadn’t left Tabaeus alone for long swaths of time for them to concoct such a ploy.

You had already begun stashing a cache of items at home and planning to grow anti-vampire herbs in your new greenhouse. Getting stakes was even easier, you’d found out, after being pointed toward the varieties available in the camping eisles. Nothing in lore said it had to be a wooden stake.

It is a struggle to believe Tabaeus would put together a fake vampire hunting kit. It seems too maliciously conniving. But, you suppose, if this was all an act, you wouldn’t know what Tabaeus would or wouldn’t do. Now would you?

Although, you are very curious to know what was in the journal. That is the only reason you relieve them of the box and offer up an uneasy smile to them, “Thank you, Tabaeus. I appreciate the understanding.”

For once, they do not reply. They merely nod, humming an acknowledgement, as their gaze refuses to meet yours.

“We should head back home. I’m sure Bjarka and Liuva are missing you.” You attempt to lighten the mood, balancing the much lighter box on your hip. With an nod to the heavier treasure-filled box, you ask, “Can you take that one? You’re stronger than me.”

With a silent nod, they shuffle to the other box and heft it in their arms. You can’t even tell if it weighs anything to the vampire. There’s no strain to their muscles, no bowing of their back.

Tabaeus finally looks at you and opens their mouth, as if to say something. But it instantly snaps closed and they look away from you.

“What?” You take a step closer to them, cocking your head as your free hand lightly touches their arm. The touch draws the attention of their eyes. Slowly, their gaze travels up your arm and tingles follow their path.

“Will you miss me?” Their words are soft, almost lost under the buzzing of the overhead lights. “When we part, I mean. Whenever that is.”

You raise your eyebrows, trying to ignore the heavy grief painting the air around Tabaeus. “Are you planning to leave me?”

“No.”

There’s no ‘not yet’ or any other implication they ever thought to leave you. Just a simple ‘no.’ You wonder how far into the future Tabaeus has thought, has planned. Are they thinking just a week ahead? A month? A year? Ten years?

The thought brings a rush of conflicting sensations, warring for dominance in your chest. Overwhelming emotions make you feel the slightest bit dizzy. Abruptly, you pull your hand from Tabaeus and turn back the way you came, crisply saying, “That’s better to ask when your leaving is inevitable, don’t you think?”

You feel Tabaeus’s eyes on your back. It makes those rush of contrary feelings spike and you swallow down uncertain tears. Finally, their feet start to shuffle after you and they say, a little defeatedly, “Yes, I suppose you are correct.”

The two of you walk in silence, both carrying your own heavy baggage as you traverse the dark. When Tabaeus turns the lights off behind you - your hand already on the fabric of their jacket to be guided out - the forgotten world of items is plunged back into darkness.

You can’t help but feel the two of you carry much more than the two boxes out of that place, though.

x x x x x

If you like what I create, please consider my patreon or my ko-fi!

Comments, tags, and reblogs are real motivators for me, too! (●ˇ∀ˇ●)

#exo writing #vampire #vampires #2nd pov #2nd person pov #exophilia #monster lover #vampire x reader #monster men #monster datemate #monster romance #monster fudger #ugh tumblr srsly?#anyway got some drama after last chapter's lolz #enjoy!#room & board #tabaeus x reader #tabaeus #monster x human

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clavissionary-position · 11 months

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House-hunting with Gilbert

modern/domestic au, crack, sexual content MDNI

He wears a v-neck sweater for this. Not because he likes it (he does), or because it's weather-appropriate (it's not), but because he enjoys the thought of you going through the entire day wondering why he chose to wear it. You learn sometime around sunset that he just really likes v-neck sweaters.

And khaki pants. It's the early 2000s. You have khaki pants too. You're twinning in the worst way. Unless you're a fan of khaki pants. Then you're twinning in the best way.

The neighborhood in question is a quiet, established suburb with some of the houses veering into three stories. Like a tale told in three acts, you say, in pursuit of some deeper meaning to the droll task of house-hunting. Gilbert laughs, and it sounds like drops of rain bouncing off a tin bucket someone left under a leaky roof. Interpret that however you wish. He enjoys your adorable insights. This he makes known to astounding effect by back-hugging you and whispering into your ear in the most not-rated-G way while you're in the middle of maintaining flustered, steely-eyed, serious-adult eye-contact with the balding real estate agent.

Tiles are important. Bathroom tiles, tilework on the porch. Gilbert has something saucy to say about every little thing, and you start to wonder if he's just not committed to this whole new-house thing. You'd assumed you were both on the same page considering how animated he was about what married life for you two would look like in the confines of suburbia. He, being Gilbert von Obsidian, did verily use the word 'confines'. You appreciated the double-meaning in the context of his statement, while only appreciating one of those double-meanings. "Gilbert," you said, using his full-name to let him know you're serious. "That makes you sound like a serial-killer." Prompting him to leaky-roof-bucket-laugh sweetly and say: "Hm. That's a good idea. I'll think about it."

Turns out he doesn't actually hate all the tile-work. He's just concerned about what he believes you two can reasonably renovate or replace on your modest budget, especially after factoring in other aspects of the house-buying process. It's not that you don't have the same concerns, but jeez, Gilbert. Cut those tiles a break. They're non-sentient, and that's the worst thing for a tile to be.

For the houses that have pretty rose hedges separating their yard from the neighbors, Gilbert makes every attempt to "magic" some of the roses into their beautiful dark counterparts. You don't notice him doing this for the first several houses. Around mid-afternoon, he seems a little bummed that you haven't noticed his mischief, so he finds a bathroom with okay-tiles to sequester you and bite all his feels out. Weirdly it is some of the hottest sex you guys have had in months. You're having some weird thoughts about that v-neck sweater now.

The poor, balding real-estate agent, who absolutely knows what prospective homeowners do when they slip into a bathroom for a closer look, asks if maybe you two have taken a liking to this house. Gilbert smiles with the wattage of a premium light-bulb and says no. You know Gil well enough by this point to fail to correctly ascertain several things because you're blinded by your own love for him (don't worry, this goes both ways), but you know for a fact that he feels bad for toting the agent around the neighborhood like this, even if Gil is going full-force on the Difficult Customer persona. It's adorably awkward of him in the most elegant way. He's been taken advantage of in the past by salespeople who've tricked him into ridiculous cable packages and horrendous multi-level-marketing schemes. No more, he told himself.

This is before he met you and fell back in love with his own kindness. So even though he tells the real-estate agent "no" in regards to this house. He follows it up with "I'm tired. We're using the bedroom for a nap." And he takes you by the wrist and sweeps you away past a row of windows with a suspiciously clear view of a hedge of roses that have been altered to reflect Gilbert colours, British spelling.

And then you guys have sex in that room too. So I guess you gotta buy the house now

#ikepri gilbert #gilbert von obsidian #ikepri #ikemen prince #gilbert von obsidian x reader #ikepri gilbert x reader

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briarpatch-kids · 10 months

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Do you have a tag specifically for the homeowning/getting a home while disabled type posts? Me and my partner really need a place to live, but we can't afford average rent of 800-1000 and my last job left me "more" disabled (heart problems and spine made worse) so now only one of us can work entry jobs, any info on it helps so much.

I don't, I'm sorry but I'm really bad at tagging. I'm always happy to answer any questions though.

When we first bought our house at 100k, the mortgage, including taxes and fees, was $574 a month and we needed to pay about $6500 in fees when we bought it. My credit sucked at the time, so we originally had my husband only on the loan and I think he was making about $12 an hour full time.

When we refinanced, I had fixed my credit and he was making $15 an hour, and the house raised enough in value that we were able to borrow $85k, which raised our mortgage to $1000 a month including taxes and fees, but we used that money to pay off debts and buy a car and get a new roof, cedar siding repaired, all the outgoing plumbing redone, and the house painted, along with a bunch of other stuff we needed so it was worth it and we could afford the payment. Unfortunately we had someone in the house who used us and a significant chunk of the money went to that person, but that means a lot more could be done with that money in different circumstances and you should consider that too.

Now we're kind of slowly doing cosmetic things like tearing down 4+ layers of wallpaper and removing carpet and painting it candy box colors as we can afford to. A $30 gallon of paint here, a box of plaster patch there... it's a bit embarassing when people see it under construction, but the young couple spending decades restoring a broken old house is kind of a type of Guy so it's more socially acceptable than I thought.

#homeownership #(ill try!!)

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mlobsters · 9 months

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flipping between documentaries in the background while i paint and movies. i've got the big short on right now and like. wow what a cast. but also

the way this is framed, like no one else could see it coming. but OH MY FUCKING GOD. yes we could!! we KNEW about all the subprime mortgages. we SAW house prices climbing up astronomically.

they just had people go out to miami in this movie to check on homeowners in these mortgage bonds.... i'm fucking losing my shit because

I OWNED A HOUSE IN MIAMI IN 2008*

if you were paying attention at all, you knew about the housing bubble. it was fucking insane. how could some fucking 28 year old IT person in miami know about this and UGH--

listen. if the bernie madoff story taught me anything, it was that the desire for money makes people put massive blinders on. to things they should really know better about, considering their JOB is to know these things.

so yeah. people were talking about it, it's not like i had my nose to the grindstone researching. i was just paying attention to the news and the housing market around me. but $$$$ > everything

it was motherfucking disgraceful what they did to people, getting them into these horrible loans and fucking their lives over.

aaaAAAHHHHHHH

*(bought the house with ex in 2003 before all this, was a traditional fixed rate 30 year. got divorced, he bought me out of the mortgage and had to try to sell the house post-crash. did eventually sell, at a small loss)

#the big short #personal #2008 financial crisis

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seat-safety-switch · 2 years

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I’ve considered living in a small town for quite some time now. Where I live is just too big, you know? I’d like to live somewhere in the mountains, maybe. Work at a one-hour-photo or a video rental store. Like all of this never happened. Go to work wearing flannel, just absolutely don’t get involved in anything.

There are, of course, benefits to living where I do. For one thing, there’s a functioning network of freeways, and they have good lighting. This makes it easier to work on my car on the side of the road at 3AM, whereas rurals would have to be worried about the unnoticed approach of bears, or at least wolverines.

The urban parts stores are also open a little later, and the impersonal nature of big-city commerce means that you can freak out the squares without having to deal with the same front-desk guy again in a few months. You don’t necessarily get more parking space, either: many small towns have overactive homeowners’ associations and tiny lots, preventing you from taking full advantage of all that beautiful nature around you by stuffing it with decrepit Internationals.

I think what I like most about the small town life is that you can know all of it. Not the deep, dark secrets of the folks around you, of course. Some people go decades without realizing that all of the other adults in the village are involved in some sort of sadomasochistic team-sex cult that sacrifices the people they kidnap to the corn. I’m sure there are lots of indicators, and even overt hints, but somehow it just never gets picked up on. A big city just has too many things – you’ll head back to the East side and a whole new set of Asian fusion restaurants will be open, challenging your comfortable lifestyle with the concept of seasoned roasted potatoes.

Ultimately, I don’t think it’s likely that I’m going to move out there anytime soon. The closest small town is nearly an hour’s drive away, and if we’re being honest with each other, it’s pretty unlikely my shitbox Plymouth will make it all the way there. And I’d probably have to patch up the big hole in the trunk so my collection of MotorWeek VHS tapes doesn’t fall out.

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9r7g5h · 6 months

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Omegas Are Doing It For Themselves

Fandom: My Hero Academia, Boku no Hero Academia

Rating: E

Genre: Omegaverse Smut

Summary: Izuku doesn't need some random alpha to make a den for him. He has a good enough job to buy his own house, buy his own furniture, and make his own nest inside his den, thank you very much. But damn it if his neighbor wasn't hot enough to consider inviting inside.

Words: 6,835

Izuku had known, the moment he walked into the townhouse, that it had to be his.

While the desire to buy something for himself had been a whim, a thought that had fluttered past his mind while trying to find a place for his newest figurine in his too small apartment, the research hadn't been. The strange working hours so he could go on walk throughs and tours with his realtor hadn't been. The working and reworking of his budget a dozen times to make sure he could afford the mortgage he had gotten pre-approved for hadn't been. And while many times he had wondered if following the whim was a good idea or not, the moment he had walked into that townhouse, he had known.

Screw what everyone else said - it didn't matter that he was single, that the mortgage alone would take up half his salary and he'd have to rely more on his side gig than he would like, that very few young omegas his age bought a house for themselves without anyone's help. This place, this cute little townhouse, was his.

He didn't need some knothead alpha to make him a den to nest in. He could make his own den for his own nest, and anyone who didn't like it could fight him.

He was tired of living cramped in that tiny studio that also took up almost half his pay, even if it was closer to work. Tired of no walls, his bed, nest, and table all being the same thing (and sleeping and trying to have a heat in crumbs was disgusting). Tired of his home feeling cramped with two people sitting down inside of it, tired of the shitty landlords and inconsiderate neighbors, just tired. He didn’t need a mansion, didn’t need acres of land that he had to keep up with; he just wanted a room for his bed, space for his nest, somewhere to put his merch collection, and a place to put a damn table.

But in that townhouse, that wonderful townhouse, he could host. He even had some of his friends come with him to pick up the walkthrough paperwork, watching as they comfortably spread out between the living room and kitchen to peek at his potential new home. That had been the deciding factor.

So despite the anxiety and the wonders if it was a good idea and the fact that he had to drain his savings to make even the smallest down payment, at twenty-six Izuku Midoriya became a homeowner of his own little townhouse. His own little den.

And it was just as perfect as he had imagined that first time he had walked in.

Well. Mostly.

It wasn't the house, no. The house itself was perfect - one room turned into an office so he could work from home, a guest room so his mom and friends could stay, his bedroom soft and warm and dark with blackout curtains. Enough room to actually display his collection. Couches and pillows and blankets and a table. Even space for a hamster cage, one of the ones he had seen on Pinstagram, made from bookcases bolted onto a table to create a little rodent palace for the cute little fluff ball, more than enough room for it to live and him to not feel guilty leaving it alone for his quarterly heats. The house in and of itself was perfect.

No, what made things difficult was his neighbor.

In the apartment there had been a mutual understanding with his neighbors. They didn’t talk to each other outside of emergencies, handed over any mail that might have gotten mixed up without any complaints, and generally stayed out of each other’s business. Maybe a polite ‘How are you?’ if they were in the elevator together, candy for the kids at Halloween on a stepstool, a pat on the head for the dogs going out for their walks, but that was it. His only major interactions with them had been when they had all called the fire department together when one of the dumpsters had caught on fire, and that had only been to ask if anyone knew what the actual complex’s name was or to yell at the dumbass trying to throw his beer in.

Good, normal neighborly interactions.

But here?

Tenya and Ochako had reassured him that it was pretty normal that the HOA had shown up not too long after the three of them had pulled into the reserved spots for his home, the small truck with all his belongings paralleled parked to not block the road. The packet was small, thankfully - just shared dues for park upkeep, instructions on where to put trash and recycling, one of the least restrictive organizations he had found in his search. But what hadn’t been normal had been the woman turning straight towards Tenya, ignoring Izuku as if he didn’t exist as she fell over herself to greet the alpha and Ochako.

“You must be Mr. Midoriya, pleasure to meet you! And this must be Mrs. Midoriya. You two are such a cute couple, it warms my heart to see you joining our community! Though, I don’t think I remember seeing your name on the registration paperwork, Mrs. Midoriya?”

“That’s because there is no Mrs. Midoriya,” Izuku said with a smile, his tone that fake cheerful as his scent turned bitter. He hadn’t bothered with blocker patches, figuring he could start scenting his home as he went, though now he would have to open the windows. Izuku slid in between them, taking the hand that had been outstretched towards Tenya and shook it himself, ignoring the startled look on the woman’s face as he took the packet of paper with his other hand. “No other Mr. Midoriya either. Thank you so much for bringing this by. I’ll make sure to set up my automatic pay by the end of the week.”

Whether it was the smell, the slight hint of his fangs, or the unimpressed glares from his friends, the woman left fast, leaving the three of them annoyed but at least alone to continue unpacking.

"I'm sure it was just a misunderstanding," Ochako reassured him, pressing her wrist against his in a way that helped him relax, pack and friendship in his new den almost making him purr. "I'm sure it won't happen again."

Only it did. Again, and again, and again.

“Is it really that weird that a single omega is buying a house for themself,” Izuku asked as he flopped onto the floor in front of the couch, Tsu’s finger’s immediately starting to card through his curls in an attempt to tame them. She, Shinsho, and Todoroki had shown up later that afternoon, pizza and beer in tow as an apology for not being there sooner. Between the six of them they had managed to unload the truck and get most of the big items to their correct locations, but not without a lot of nosey neighbors stopping by to put their noses where they could get bitten off.

“So, when’s your alpha coming to join you?”

“You must be renting from the guy who just bought the place.”

“Did your parents buy it for you? They totally bought it for you.”

“So the six of you are all living together as a pack? That’s nice.”

“You know, my niece is looking for a place. You’re a single omega, you shouldn’t be living alone, and have all that space, and she’s a doctor, so you should rent out some of the rooms to her.”

It had been non-stop, and those had just been the ones Izuku himself had run into. He knew for a fact that the others had been questioned to a similar extent, and in the end he had had to take Tsu’s offered scent blocker patches. Now his house smelled like a lake during the summer - a nice smell, refreshing and familiar and calming, but not him. He loved his pack, but he would have to go out, buy neutralizers, and scrub everything before he could give it a proper scenting.

The worst of all, though, was his neighbor directly to the left. He’d been lucky to get the end unit, so he only had the one attached neighbor, but was at this moment wondering if this was, in fact, a good idea. There was no one on the other side but a patch of grass, no one who could possibly hear a ruckus if something happened...

Izuku shuddered as he remembered those red eyes, locked on the group the entire day, and made a mental note to have Mei come put in a security system. She’d done her own, knew all the ins and outs that were way better than the company ones, and while he doubted he’d need it, the extra level of security would do him some good.

“To be fair,” Shinsho pointed out, bringing Izuku back to the conversation he’d started, “it’s not like anyone our age ever expected to be able to buy a house, besides Credit Card here,” he paused throwing a pepperoni at Todoroki, “so you’re literally an outlier here. Plus, you have a baby face. Some of them probably thought you were some college kid.”

“It’s not that much of a baby face,” Izuku pouted, his tongue popping out as Ochako walked over from the kitchen just to poke his cheek. “Oh, like you can talk.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Ochako teased. “I embrace my roundness. No one would know I can flip them just by looking at these cute lil cheeks. Just like no one knows by looking at your face that they could bounce a book off your ass.”

“‘Chako!” A dirty napkin bounced off her side as she laughed, Izuku flushing as his so-called friends voiced their agreement. “Traitors, all of you. Get out of my den, none of you are allowed back.”

“Try not to take today’s events to heart, Izuku,” Tenya said seriously, ignoring the muttered demands. “I am sure this is just a misunderstanding that will be settled between you and your neighbors, and once it is settled you will greatly enjoy your time living here. You managed to accomplish something quite wonderful for yourself, and you should feel proud, even with the lackadaisical welcome. Now, let us forget this unpleasantness and cheer for our good friend’s new den!”

“Here here!”

*~*

Tenya was mostly right. By the time Izuku had gotten most things unpacked and at least put in the proper room, if not the proper spot, the neighborhood had adjusted to the single omega living among them. The kids and their dogs especially seemed to flock to him, entranced by the new person who was happy to throw their balls back to them and use a stick to fish them out of the decorative pond near the park. He occasionally got comments about setting him up with an alpha, but everyone at least seemed to accept that his house was his own.

His direct neighbor was still creepy as fuck though. Randomly throughout the day Izuku could feel him watching him whenever he went outside, his windows and blinds wide open, not even trying to hide his staring. He was scowling too, the furrows between his brows deep enough to collect water for a drought if he tilted his head back when it rained. From the smell that came out of the open windows, he was clearly an alpha, or at the very least a beta that packed with enough alphas that their scent clung to him.

A nice smell, Izuku would begrudgingly admit, the one time a breeze had blown it directly into his nose while he had been breaking down boxes to take to the dump. A smell he wouldn’t mind having around more often, if the carrier wasn’t so fucking creepy.

But whatever. Creepy neighbor aside, Tenya had been right, and once he had settled in, Izuku had loved it just as much as the first time he had seen it. And now it just needed the finishing touches.

Most of them were easy. Place the order, and the furniture companies he so carefully researched and staked out had it at his door just a few days later, some assembly required. But the hamster cage? The little hamster palace he had been dreaming of since college and he had found out they were a thing?

That he had to do on his own.

While bunnies had always been his favorite, Izuku knew he wasn’t suited to care for one, not just yet. He wanted a yard, somewhere to set up a pretty hutch for the rabbit to sleep in, more than enough room for the creature to roam in safety. While his home was perfect for him, he had long since accepted that it wasn’t for a rabbit, and so had moved on to his next favorite fuzzy little pet, one a bit more manageable when his heats took him out of commission for a few days each month. And damn it if he wasn’t going to be the best hamster dad in the damn world.

It took almost a week - a few days to hunt everything down and buy it, another few to build the beautiful monstrosity he was going to bold into his wall to ensure it wouldn’t fall over. But eventually it was done, done and everything he, if he was four ounces of fur, bones, and anxiety, could ever want. Now all he had to do was get the damn thing inside.

“The hell you doing, Deku? You’re going to hurt yourself trying to pick it up like that.”

At first Izuku had ignored the voice - clearly it wasn't talking to him, though so far he hadn’t met a Deku amongst his nosey neighbors. However, when a set of hands grabbed the other end of the cage and tugged, nearly pulling him off balance and onto his ass, he quickly had to reassess as he turned, teeth bared at the person trying to steal his creation. He’d worked hard on it, damn it, and he wasn’t going to let someone steal it from him!

His creepy neighbor just raised his hands, the pacifying gesture at odds with his own curled lips. This close it was clear he was, in fact, an alpha, the tantalizing smell Izuku had occasionally caught now filling his nose. Whether it was welcomed he wasn’t entirely sure, given the circumstances, but at least he knew. Knew and filed away for later, because the creepy neighbor was speaking again, and royally pissing Izuku off.

“You should wait until your alpha or pack can come and help you move this. It has to weigh a shit ton, you’ll hurt yourself otherwise. No-”

“Why,” Izuku interrupted him, seething at the continuous secondary sexism he’d experienced since moving in, “does everyone just assume I need an alpha? I can do this by myself, thank you very much, so if you could please move, I’d like to get inside before it gets cold.” Not that it was likely to get cold in the middle of summer, but still. He was pissed off, tired from having spent the day building in the sun, and just wanted to be done.

Instead, the man before him just tilted his head, a look on his face as he considered Izuku. “Glasses or Peppermint aren’t your alpha?”

“Tenya and Shoto?” Izuku clarified after a moment, the other man shrugging as if he neither knew nor cared about the names. “They’re pack, not my mates.”

“You don’t have a mate?”

For a long moment Izuku said nothing, just stood there staring at the alpha. He had crossed his arms, looked away, his scowl was once again deep and angry as he shifted from foot to foot, waiting for an answer - lightbulb! He wasn’t creepy (he was, he’d spent all this time just staring, but in hindsight now Izuku could see it was almost kind of cute), he was interested and shy. Izuku shook his head as he bit back his laughter. “No mate, though I’m not really looking for one at the moment. So if you could move, I need to get everything inside.” Same words as earlier, though a bit softer than before. Before his neighbor could try and interfere again, Izuku hoisted the cage up onto his shoulder, glad that even though he was short he was still stacked and strong, able to handle the weight on his shoulder with minimal struggling.

Though crap, he should have remembered to choose the other shoulder, the scar on his right arm screaming at him from the pressure. He was ok, it was just a few feet and he would be inside his home, his den. He was safe there, and could keep up appearances until then. Giving the man a pleasant smile, forcing his face to keep the expression, Izuku nodded as he turned away. “It was pleasant to meet you...”

“Katsuki. Katsuki Bakugou.”

“Nice to meet you, Katsuki. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to get into my den.”

He didn’t run from the alpha. He walked, quickly, so he could alleviate the pain that was threatening to bring tears to his eyes. Ignoring the pleased smirk on Katsuki’s face as he watched him go.

*~*

‘Shy,’ Izuku quickly learned, was the wrong word to have applied to Katsuki. While Tenya and Shoto could be aggressive in their own ways, protective if some asshole tried to step in on the pack when they were out having a good time, Katsuki seemed to always be aggressive and protective. Towards his house, towards the tiny garden he had set up on the border between their front doors, towards his own pack (a rowdy group that Izuku could occasionally hear through his living room wall). And, surprisingly, towards him.

If Katsuki wasn’t so fucking hot he would have already called the cops and gotten something on file. But damn if that man didn’t make his dick twitch and his ass slick, now that he had gotten a good look. Especially since he’d seemed to have taken Izuku’s “...I’m not really looking for one...” as a challenge. Logically he knew he should be concerned, he’d had one conversation and had shown he wasn’t interested, but-

“You’re a blanket whore,” Ochako said, her disapproving words losing their impact from her cozy nest. He could barely see her eyes from where she was cuddled, her purring deep and satisfied with the quality of nesting material Izuku had been given. “You haven’t even really talked to him yet and you’re letting him buy you with blankets.”

“I’ve talked to him,” Izuku protested from his own pile of fabric, S.A.M. cupped carefully in his hands. His thumb ran gently over the hamster’s back as he chewed on some treats, breaking apart the largest of the pieces to be stored in his cheek pouches before nibbling on the smaller ones. “I told him my name wasn’t Deku.”

“You sure? That’s all I heard your nerds yelling on move-in day. Either way, I like it. You’re Deku.”

“I told him I wasn’t comfortable eating anything he cooked for me yet.”

“‘Fraid I’d poison yah? Don’t worry, Deku. I won’t do anything to you you won’t like.”

“And that I’m allergic to most pollen.”

“Oh shit.” That had gotten an actual apology, the fresh bundle of flowers Katsuki had shown up at his door with quickly tossed like a football across the road. He’d actually looked upset, his normal cocky “So that’s how you want to play it” smirk from his other failed courting gifts gone, leaving Izuku feeling bad as he left. So, when he’d returned a few days later with a soft, beautiful blanket, Izuku couldn’t help but accept.

Every other day saw a new one, the blanket handed over with just a few words and a spike of pleased scent as it was accepted, leaving Izuku with a plethora of fabric.

He should be concerned, he knew that, but there was something sweet about his previously creepy neighbor. Sweet and hot and he just smelled good, and even if Izuku wasn't looking for an alpha, could have his own den and could make his own nest, that didn't necessarily mean he had to reject gifts from someone. Didn't mean he couldn't be attracted, couldn't look and appreciate and enjoy the attention, right?

Right.

Squirming out of his nest, Izuku carefully placed S.A.M. back into his cage, watching as his pet scampered off to add the treat to his food hoard, his golden tufts of fur disappearing under the bedding. Their pizza would be there any moment, and better to be ready than make the poor delivery person wait for him to fight off the blankets when they were already there. The last time he'd made the guy wait had almost resulted in a confrontation between the delivery guy and Katsuki, the alpha about ready to rip out the other man's throat for "being a fucking creep and standing around like a perv."

Pot meets kettle in a Wamino's uniform, but ok.

Though, as Izuku grabbed his wallet and neared the door, he paused at the sound of voices on the other side. Already sure he knew what he would find when he opened the door, Izuku forced away the smile that tried to tug at his lips and allowed the annoyance to cover his face instead. Because he was right; when he opened the door, Katsuki and the pizza guy were in some weird standoff, his and Ochako’s dinner caught up in the crossfire.

“Look, dude, I can’t just give you pizza that isn’t yours,” the delivery man, Dairoji, if Izuku read his name tag correctly, protested, even as he eyed the bills clutched angrily in Katsuki’s fist. “You’re his neighbor, sure, and you claim that you know the guy, but this could just be some ploy to get free shit and I’m not risking my job on that. So you can just back off.”

Oh, he liked the balls on this kid - it was clear he was a beta, the same one from last time if Izuku remembered correctly, but even his duller nose should have been able to pick up the scent of pissed off alpha over the smell of the pizza. Most people would have backed down, found a reason or a way to get out of there, but this kid was standing his ground even though Katsuki had at least half a head on him and a more than decent set of muscles. It was impressive.

But not impressive enough to distract Izuku from the fact that he was hungry.

“If you’re done pissing on my pizza, can I have it, please? Ochako and I are just getting to the good part of the movie.”

“Don’t forget S.A.M.,” Ochako yelled from inside the house, her head poking out from her nest. “He was enjoying those yogurt drops and the drama!”

While Dairoji had the good grace to look cowed being caught, Katsuki just huffed and crossed his arms, his glare never leaving the beta. “Tell this asshole to let me pay for it and then we’ll be all good, Deku. Until then, no.”

“Come on, man, you-”

“I already paid online.” To say Katsuki deflated would be an understatement. His arms dropped, his shoulders drooped, even his hair seemed a bit less spiky. The glare he turned on Izuku seemed almost offended, though his eyebrow raised at the sight of Izuku’s wallet in hand. “I still need to tip.”

Immediately Katsuki shoved a few bills at Dairoji, using his free hand to jerk the pizza free with a growl. To the kids' credit he finally walked away, muttering about "crazy ass possessive alphas," "aggressive courting," and "not getting paid enough for this shit." The moment he was in his car Katsuki relaxed, turning back towards Izuku with his cocksure grin, as if nothing had just happened. He held out the food, puffed up and proud, looking like he expected praise and some kind of reward for providing an already paid for pizza and terrorizing the delivery man again.

He reminded Izuku so much of his aunt’s pomeranian after it ran off the mailman that he couldn’t help but laugh, doubling over as the cackling brought a stitch to his side he had to clutch.

“The fuck, Deku? Am I some joke to you?” Once again the smell of displeased alpha, this time tinged with hurt, buried deep as Katsuki tried to force bravado through his clenched teeth. Shaking his head, Izuku forced a few deep breaths, stepping forward to cup Katsuki’s cheek in one of his palms. He was still giggly, still smiling from his laugh attack, but he forced his words to be as steady as he could make them.

“Not a joke, no, but it’s still funny to see you square off with a college kid for a pizza for me.” A huff was the only response he received as Katsuki finally relinquished the pizza to Izuku, turning on his toes to storm back to his own home. He wasn’t upset, but it was clear he wasn’t happy about how things had turned out. “The blankets,” Izuku called out, just before he turned and disappeared into his own door. “They make really nice nests.”

The smell of pleased alpha was strong and immediate, lingering even after they both returned to their own homes.

“You’re really going to fuck him, aren’t you,” Ochako said, stealing her half of the pizza and digging in. “Blanket whore.”

*~*

Normally Izuku didn’t curse. Iida’s mini heart attacks and not so mini lectures whenever someone swore had basically beaten the practice out of their pack, with very few circumstances deemed “acceptable” by him. Sure, occasionally when in pain a few would slip out, or when a particularly hard video game came around, and on board game night all bets were off, but in general? Not that often.

But fuck heats. Fuck heats and fuck whichever one of their primordial ancestors decided a heat cycle was the most efficient way to breed, because he would find a way to go back in time, find them, and gut them like a fish for making him go through this. It wasn’t even like he could commiserate with Ochako on this - her heats were three days of being uncomfortable every four months, shorter if Tenya was available to fuck the heat out of her. Tsu and her monthly periods seemed more empathetic to his plight, both of their internal organs taking on a mind of their own for breeding.

But either way, none of his pack seemed to get that his preheat was his uterine pouch literally opening, leaving him sore and grouchy and more than ready to stab a bitch if he didn’t get a dick and ice cream in him in the next hour. Not necessarily at the same time, though now that he thought about it... Damn it he was hungry for something, and couldn’t tell what.

And worse was that, normally, he could get through the next few days with porn, heat aids, and enough sugary processed foods to make his mother sick. That had been his process the last few years, since he had broken up with his college boyfriend right before graduation and everything since had either turned out to be a bullshit first date or him just too busy with work and friends and everything else to try and find someone. But now, now there wasn’t just a hot as fuck alpha right next door, there was an interested hot as fuck alpha right next door, one who had been clearly courting him for the last few weeks, and Izuku just knew his normal process wouldn’t work.

He needed that Kat-dick-suki, and if he didn’t get it right then and there, he was going to go feral.

Thankfully he didn’t need to wait long - just like clockwork the alpha stopped by to drop off his latest courting gift, newest scented blanket in hand. Even if Izuku hadn’t seen him make the short walk through the cracks in his curtains, he could smell him through the door. Could smell his strength, could smell his dedication, could smell that dick he’d seen the outline of once when he’d worn nothing but sweatpants to go to the mailbox stands. He didn’t even wait for Katsuki to knock; he just opened the door and pulled him in, slamming the alpha against the wood and used him to close it, pressing his face against his scent gland.

Fuck he smelled good. Already Izuku wanted to claim him, wanted to sink his fangs in and keep the alpha for his own. Something Katsuki didn’t seem opposed to if the pressure against his thigh was anything to go off. Forcing himself to pull back even as his hips ground forward, his own dick rubbing against Katsuki’s thigh, for some level of relief, it was almost infuriating to see that cocky smirk on his lips.

He shifted and rolled his hips directly on Katsuki’s, that smirk immediately falling as he whimpered at the friction, his eyes blowing as the smells of sex and arousal and attraction overwhelmed him.

“There’s a spare key on the hook,” Izuku said lowly, returning his face to Katsuki’s neck. He lapped at the gland, purring at the taste, the smell, the way Katsuki’s hand tightened on his shirt. “Come join me in my nest, or I’ll come get the key when my heat is over. Either way, lock the door.”

A slight nip, dragging his claiming fangs against his skin - “Oh fucking hell” - before pulling back. Already Katsuki looked wrecked, his hand searching behind him for the lock, unable to keep his eyes off of Izuku as he slowly walked away. Each step was watched, cataloged - the motions of a hunter with prey in sight. Eventually his hand found the latch, flipping the deadbolt, making it clear he wasn’t leaving anytime soon.

Izuku smiled, lips wide and teeth bared, turning on his toes to lead his chosen alpha to his nest. He wasn’t against being fucked on the table or the floor, maybe a few rounds on the couch, but this first one he wanted in his nest, his first fuck in his first nest in his first den with his chosen mate.

He made it up the stairs and most of the way down the hall to his room before he was caught, Katsuki’s arms wrapped tight around his waist in an almost loving hug before he growled, shifting them so he could press Izuku against the wall, caging him in with his chest and one arm. The other pulled at his clothes, forcing his arms up so his shirt could be pulled over his head, Izuku arching into Katsuki’s eager tongue on his chest while the same hand that had just thrown his shirt somewhere to the side pressed at his pants. Pressed at and into, both of them moaning at the feel of his fingers sliding through the slick that ran between Izuku’s cheeks, soaking through his underwear and down his thighs.

“Fuck, ‘Zuku.”

“Nest, now.”

Katsuki made him wait just long enough for his pants to be pulled off, clothes left in a wet pile in the hall before he lifted him into his arms, Izuku’s thighs hooked over Katsuki’s forearms, his arms around Katsuki's neck, everything open and dripping in a way that left them both a mess. At any other moment he would have been embarrassed, embarrassed about his dick rubbing against Katsuki’s pecks, about his ass dripping slick on his abs, about how he was being held up so easily and could be fucked standing. Now was not any other moment, forcing his own whine as Katsuki walked the last few steps into his room.

While his bed was nice, a good mattress for sleeping that did wonders for his back, his nest was a goddamn masterpiece. Every blanket he'd been gifted had been woven together on top the stain proof pillow base, creating warm walls and a thick floor that was heavenly to lay on. And most likely fuck on, something they would be experimenting with now. Izuku whined again as Katsuki knelt, laying him in the center of the nest, crawling in after him so they were nose to nose, actually facing each other for the first time since Izuku pulled him in.

Katsuki kissed him. Slow and sweet, a change from the pace they'd been going at, the pleased smell of all parties involved sinking into the fabrics around them as they just, for a long moment, kissed. A moment that broke as they kissed and Katsuki's hand reached between them, grabbing Izuku's dick and giving a long, quick stroke, drawing a gasp he took advantage of, moving his lips to Izuku's neck to revenge for the little display earlier.

His mouth found his gland and sucked hard, leaving Izuku keening as Katsuki's hand never stopped stroking, a steady pace that had his hips squirming for more, for a tighter grip, for more speed; it was all just enough to get him close, to have his balls tight and his ass dripping slick like nothing else, but not enough to actually push him over the edge.

"Kat-Kacchan."

Izuku whined as Katsuki moved, because he was stopping, no, this wasn't what he'd wanted, come back. The whine was cut off with a nip to his thigh, his legs spread further apart, and suddenly he couldn't think, could barely breathe, could only focus on the heat around his dick, the tongue and suction working together to somehow pull his brain down his spine and out with his cum, fingers in his ass spreading and crooking and stroking until-

Fuck

There was no mercy, Katsuki kept his fingers right on the prize the moment he found it, rubbing and stroking and circling no matter how much Izuku tried to squirm away, no matter how hard his hips kicked and bucked, Katsuki's unfairly thick forearm holding them still. His fingers kept going and his tongue kept going and his mouth kept going as everything inside Izuku just kept going and going curling tighter and tighter his legs locked around the alpha's head so he couldn't pull away even if he wanted to hands in his hair holding him still as he fucked his mouth the best he could and

He broke.

Izuku sobbed as he came down Katsuki's throat, head tilting back as the tears finally escaped his eyes. Gentle hands helped him lay back into the welcoming plush of the nest, unwrapping his legs from Katsuki's shoulders, his hands from his hair. Again Katsuki was hovering over him, this time using his thumb to wipe some of Izuku's spend from his lips and chin, licking it back into his mouth to leave his hands clean. Katsuki smirked, a smirk that Izuku had to react to - even worn out he still bared his fangs, snapping a little at the guest to his nest. A chuckle Katsuki's only response, leaning down to brush his lips over his cheeks, down the side of his jaw, kissing away the tears.

Kitten licks and little nips down his neck and across his chest brought Izuku back to half chub, had him squirming again before those hands found his hips, helping him to turn over onto his hands and knees. Izuku happily went, spreading himself, looking over his shoulder to watch as Katsuki took himself in hand and lined up the tip. "You ready," Katsuki asked in between kisses down his spine.

"If you're not in me-"

Whatever threat Izuku would have come up with was cut off as Katsuki pushed forward, the head popping in, both of them pausing to enjoy the stretch and the warmth. Slowly Katsuki began to rock his hips, just as much of a grind as a push, slowly feeding himself into Izuku with one hand on his hip, the other coming up to cup his shoulder for leverage.

Only...only that hand didn't curl around his muscles like Izuku expected. Didn't find the support that would let Katsuki set up a demanding rhythm that would leave them both beyond satisfied. No, instead that hand fell between his shoulder blades, gently but insistently pressing down.

That alpha bastard wanted him to present. He wanted him to submit in his own nest. In his own den.

Fuck that noise.

Bending his arms, frowning as Katsuki let out a pleased croon, Izuku pushed up, his legs shifting to throw them both back so Katsuki was on his back in the nest, caught off guard and the wind knocked out of him. It stung, Katsuki's dick having jerked free, bobbing tall and proud between his thighs, but a part of Izuku preened at the sight of the alpha under him, behind him as he repositioned himself and looked over his shoulder, lip curled to show his fangs as he put him in his place.

"You're in my nest, in my den. I'll take your knot how I want."

Dropping down, Izuku's head fell back as he worked Katsuki's dick into himself, quicker than the alpha had been doing so, bouncing and rocking until he was seated on his hips. Gods, he was ruined for his toys. He'd need to go up at least two sizes to get anywhere close to the dick stretching him now, to the beginning of the knot he was lazily grinding down again. Behind him Katsuki was whimpering, swearing, tiny little rolls of his hips as he tried to keep up with Izuku's moves.

"Fuck, 'Zuku, please." Oh, that was something he could get used to, Katsuki begging for him. Maybe later, when he wasn't so needy himself, hard and dripping and aching for that knot.

His thighs set a punishing pace, not giving Katsuki any warning as he pushed up before dropping back down, letting gravity do half the work aa he fucked himself on his dick, enjoying the sight of Katsuki's feet scrambling for purchase on the edge of the nest. Already he could feel the knot beginning to swell, pressing at his rim, sending jolts up his spine as he bounced and clenched down on it. It wouldn't take much more to make Katsuki pop, a quick glance over his shoulder confirming it. He was panting, eyes glazed, one hand twisted in the blanket by his head while the other was on Izuku's hip, steadying him, already looking so fucked out and so ready to cum Izuku was almost impressed he hadn't. Katsuki's own hips were finally in the game now that his feet were firmly planted, thrusting up in time with each of Izuku's drops, pushing them deeper and quicker together, fuck he was close again, everything inside pulsing and tensing and ready to tip over that edge with the alpha with his alpha-

Katsuki was pressed against his back, when he'd sat up Izuku wasn't sure, but with one last thrust his knot caught, the hand that'd been on his hip wrapped around his dick, lips on the nape of his neck as he spilled over Katsuki's hand, over their laps, dick twitching and pulsing as Izuku was filled and plugged, hot and thick and no where to go but for it to keep going in.

It would have been unpleasant otherwise, the slight buldge in his stomach Katsuki rubbed with his clean hand, his other preoccupied by his mouth as he licked it clean, but right now all Izuku could do was lean back and enjoy. Enjoy the warm hands that rubbed his stomach and thighs, that turned his head for kisses that tasted of himself, enjoy the way they carefully shifted so they were spooning, careful not to upset the knot still lodged in his ass.

"I think I'll keep you," Izuku muttered sleepily, snuggling back into the warm arms wrapped around him, one hand drawing comforting swirls on his swollen stomach. "Maybe having an alpha in my den won't be so bad."

"I'll make it the best you can imagine."

*~*

For a moment, just a moment, Izuku was worried he would regret his decision the next morning. He'd been doing so well, doing all of this for himself, did he really need some alpha coming along and ruining it?

His worries were reassured by the sight of S.A.M.'s playpen set up on the kitchen counter, Katsuki talking to his pet while cooking breakfast, feeding him little pieces of cheese and vegetables as he worked. "Don't tell your dad I said this," the alpha said quietly, running his finger gently down the hamster's back, "but you're almost as disgustingly cute as he is."

Yeah, no, he was keeping him.

[END]

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