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identitty-dickruption · 2 days

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I really appreciate ur vocal stance about harm reduction. If u have a moment, could u perhaps link to, or talk about how harm reduction works with alcohol?

Thank you, an I hope u have a good day:)

of course! while I’m now completely sober, I wouldn’t have been able to get here without harm reduction, so it’s a very personal thing to me. that being said, to be clear I also see harm reduction as an objective good, even (especially!) if it never leads to sobriety

the thing about alcohol is that a lot of it is tightly regulated on account of it being a) legal, and b) easily accessible. so you don’t necessarily have the same safety concerns as you’d have with other drugs. it’s pretty easy to keep track of how much you’ve had, because most countries have some form of “standard drink”, which legally has to be printed on labels etc

other than that, harm reduction is fairly similar with alcohol as with other drugs. the way I was taught about it was to break harm reduction into three parts: mindset, context, and substance. before you can work on setting harm reduction goals, you need to understand the facts of when, where, and why you drink, and it can be helpful to work within those categories

mindset (how you feel)

what thoughts and feelings usually lead up to drinking?

are there thoughts and feelings that are likely to lead to a worse experience when drinking?

what are some other ways you cope with those same feelings?

harm reduction in this category usually means practicing self-awareness around this stuff. if you know you’re more likely to have a bad time if you drink while angry, you can set yourself some goals around not drinking while angry (or drinking less when angry). it also can help to set up some safety barriers so that drinking is less likely to hurt yourself or others

context (social + built environment)

where do you usually drink the most? how safe are these places?

are there people you drink more around or who encourage unsafe drinking behaviours?

what environments make you feel safest when drinking?

this is where most of the harm reduction work happens with respect to drinking. not drinking with people who encourage unsafe drinking can make a major difference. as can having an accountability partner, not drinking when alone, or otherwise planning ahead to keep you as safe as possible

substance (facts of what you’re using)

how much do you usually drink?

how much is safe for you to drink? at which point do you usually start to feel unwell?

what is the best way for you to track how much you’re drinking?

what other substances might be involved? how will they interact with alcohol? (including prescription medication!!)

this also includes knowing what overdose looks like, and having a plan for what you will do in case of overdose. being aware of what a certain amount of alcohol is likely to do to your body can also make it easier to drink safely

IN GENERAL: it’s important to be realistic with yourself. setting goals you know you can’t meet right now is a fast train to burnout, shame, and disappointment. even doing ONE thing to make yourself safer is GOOD. the safer you are the better, and whatever that looks like is good

I hope this has been helpful! feel free to ask any other questions about this either way :)

#asks #addiction #sorry this is so long. oops!

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thisbluespirit · 1 month

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New seasonal challenge up at TARDIS Library, the Dreamwidth Doctor Who reccing community!

Simply comment in the sign-up post, receive 5 random characters (we have lists for New Who, Classic Who & various spin-offs you can choose from), then rec 5+ fanworks for at least 1 of those characters at the comm to complete the challenge, receive a banner, and share the love for some excellent fannish creative endeavours!

You will need a Dreamwidth account to post recs to the community, but they're free to sign-up for, with no strings attached, if you'd like to take part. <3

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layaart · 3 months

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posting a new substack newsletter soon

(and also looking for a new newsletter system to leave substack, if anyone has suggestions?)

#ideally somewhere I can transfer subs over without people needing to make an account (not patreon/ko-fi) and also free still

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hidekomoon · 2 months

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as a kid i remember playing a lot of interior design games and i was wondering if some of these still exist? kind of like dolldivine dress up games but for homes/rooms

#and also: free & without the need to make an account #just easy fun 1 time games #dolldivine #interior design #doll divine #games #home decor #computer games #online games #i have no idea which tags will find the people who can help me :S

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avaantares · 1 year

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Fanfiction Authors: HEADS UP

(Non-authors, please RB to signal boost to your author friends!)

An astute reader informed me this morning that one of my fics (Children of the Future Age) had been pirated and was being sold as a novel on Amazon:

(And they weren't even creative with their cover design. If you're going to pirate something that I spent a full year of my life writing, at least give me a pretty screenshot to brag about later. Seriously.)

I promptly filed a DMCA complaint to have it removed, but I checked out the company that put it up -- Plush Books -- and it looks like A LOT of their books are pirated fic. They are by no means the only ones doing this, either -- the fact that """publishers""" can download stories from AO3 in ebook format and then reupload them to Amazon in just a few clicks makes fic piracy a common problem. There are a whole host of reasons why letting this continue is bad -- including actual legal risk to fanfiction archives -- but basically:

IF YOU ARE A FANFIC AUTHOR WITH LONG AND/OR POPULAR WORKS, PLEASE CHECK AMAZON TO SEE IF YOUR STORIES HAVE BEEN PIRATED.

You can search for your fics by title, or by text from the description (which is often just copied wholesale from AO3 as well). If you find that someone has stolen your work and is selling it as their own, you can lodge a DMCA complaint (Amazon.com/USA site; other countries have different systems). If you haven't done this before, it's easy! Here's a tutorial:

HOW TO FILE A COPYRIGHT COMPLAINT FOR STOLEN WORK ON AMAZON.COM:

First, go to this form. You'll need to be signed into your Amazon account.

Select the radio buttons/dropdown options (shown below) to indicate that you are the legal Rights Owner, you have a copyright concern, and it is about a pirated product.

Enter the name of your story in the Name of Brand field.

In the Link to the Copyrighted Work box, enter a link to the story on AO3 or whatever site your work is posted on.

In the Additional Information box, explain that you are the author of the work and it is being sold without your permission. That's all you really need. If you want, you can include additional information that might be helpful in establishing the validity of your claim, but you don't have to go into great detail. You can simply write something like this:

I am the author of this work, which is being sold by [publisher] without my permission. I originally published this story in [date/year] on [name of site], and have provided a link to the original above. On request, I can provide documentation proving that I am the owner of the account that originally posted this story.

In the ASIN/ISBN-10 field, copy and paste the ID number from the pirated copy's URL. You'll find this ten-digit number in the Amazon URL after the word "product," as in the screenshot below. (If the URL extends beyond this number, you can ignore everything from the question mark on.) Once this number has been added, Amazon will pull the product information automatically and add it to the complaint form, so you can check the listing title and make sure it's correct.

Finally, add your contact information to the relevant fields, check the "I have read and accept the statements" box, and then click Submit. You should receive an email confirmation that Amazon has received the form.

Please share this information with your writer friends, keep an eye out for/report pirated works, and help us keep fanfiction free and legally protected!

NOTE: All of the above also applies to Amazon products featuring stolen artwork, etc., so fan artists should check too!

#fanfiction #ao3 #piracy #dmca #pirated fanfic #please signal boost #i'm mad but also laughing that my dmc fanfic is now a 'number one best selling novel' lol #i'm also a traditionally-published author #so this is both hilarious and deeply insulting to me

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taikeero-lecoredier · 1 year

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Inactive Twitter accounts will be deleted

So like I understand the need to free up usernames that were taken and then never used again, but what about accounts of people who died ?

Its unclear if the criteria for an inactive account’s deletion is both “No log in for years AND zero tweets made by the account as a whole,aka empty accounts”

It could very well be “No login for years and zero tweets made during this inactivity”

Which would sucks cuz theres a lot of cool stuff made from accounts who are inactive, and again, all that some families have left from their deceased loved ones is an inactive twitter account.

Back in 2019,this concern was brought up, and Twitter said they wouldnt delete accounts to free up names without making it possible to memorialize accounts of a deceased person first.

Now, Under Elon, i dont know if it will be made.

So if you know an inactive account you really loved.. make sure to save its tweets into the wayback machine, take screenshots, etc.

Just in case.

Also they dont even specify how many years. We’re left in total darkness regarding questions we have.

Also im encouraging you to please REBLOG as to further warn people.

Also hey maybe if enough people Ask Elon about not deleting inactive accounts who do have content in them maybe hell only delete accounts who are empty ??

#twitter #elon musk #account deletion #i really hope im worrying for nothing but with the new ceo you really cant be sure #taike speaks

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dreamlifebunny · 6 months

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how to script your dream life and use it with any method!

hello friends! today i want to share with you how i personally script my dream life, and how this script is both my void list, states list, and precursor to almost every manifestation method i've ever used. i love scripting because it is not only a method in and of itself but it is also a simple list of everything you desire that you can now manifest using any method you love!

check back later for a link to my scripting templates. in the meantime, here are the steps to creating your perfect script from scratch with examples! all you need is a place to write it down.

step one:

time to brain dump! at the top of your page, write out every desire that comes to your head in list format. don't overthink it and don't worry if they sound silly or unrealistic; remember, absolutely anything is possible! you can write out a few desires to start or go hardcore and write out hundreds, whatever you feel inspired by. you can always come back to this step later. here is my example:

step two:

now its time to get organized! look at the desires you've written and figure out what subcategories they fall under. for example, "my eyes are light blue and gorgeous" could fall under the category of "appearance," and "i have $100,000 in my bank account" could fall under the category of "wealth and items." feel free to use any category name that makes sense to you.

step three:

now that you have a couple of categories written out and understand the structure of the script, your mind might start to have even more ideas. "ooh, now that i see revision is a category, there are a couple more things i'd like to revise..." or "why stop at one SP when i could have everyone chasing after me?" for step three, we go a little deeper into these categories and add more details of what our dream life will look like. you can also add new categories that pop into your head - in the example below, i've added "the world and society" and "skills and abilities."

note: the reason why i broke this up into multiple steps instead of just writing "write out all your desires at once" is because our brains can be mean to us and make us procrastinate if something isn't done "perfectly," so that's why adding an extra step is important to bypass the perfectionism.

optional steps:

because scripting is such a creative and expansive process, we might think of ideas we'd like to manifest in the future but not right now/not instantly. i like to organize my script further by adding another category: "future manifestations." these are ideas that i would love to manifest at some point later on but not necessarily while my dream life is manifesting right now.

another idea is separating categories even further into "instant manifestations" (manifestations that happen right now without things needing to unfold) or "perfect timing manifestations" (manifestations that slowly unfold naturally and linearly), if you want to get specific about how they show up in your life! however, these steps are completely optional and just fun details for specificity, and i can make a more detailed post on this later.

how you can use your script with any method:

scripting has been used as a successful manifesting and shifting method on its own forever because it specifically addresses one of the most important steps in the manifesting process - deciding what you want! by writing out what you want in your dream life, you can now decide that your script will manifest on its own or you can use any method under the sun to fulfill yourself within:

the void state: if you enter the void state to manifest, you could affirm "i have everything in my dream life script"

affirming: you can affirm "everything in my dream life script has come true"

visualization: you could create an imaginative scene where all of your desires from your script are fulfilled, or you can imagine looking at your script and smiling because everything came true

subliminals: you can create a very simple subliminal where all of your desires are included, or even a sub where the only affirmation is "i have everything in my dream life script"

the possibilities with scripting are absolutely endless. i hope that this guide has given you the inspiration and direction to write your own wonderful and unique script. now, go and get your dream life!

have fun! bunny 💕

#law of assumption #neville goddard #manifestation #edward art #manifesting #loa #loassumption #dream life #scripting #reality shifting #manifest #master manifestor #dream girl #that girl #bunny's originals #script

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sabertoothwalrus · 3 months

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so I’ve been gaining a lot of insight into the animation industry recently, especially in regards to pitching & the creation of new shows. There’s a few ways to go about it.

First, there’s pitching to a studio. When you pitch, it has to be SHORT and CONCISE. You may write a lovingly detailed pitch bible that perfectly breaks down episodes and characterizations, and it might barely even get read. First impressions, first impressions, first impressions!

Most peoples’ first projects don’t get picked up. I’ve heard a few stories from directors that said they tried pitching a story they’d had for years, which got rejected, to then spend a week or even several hours in their car coming up with a new idea, only for that to get greenlit.

But that’s not the end of it. Just because a show gets greenlit, doesn’t mean it will ever get finished. There’s lots of things that can happen. Sometimes, unexpected major world events (like… a global pandemic) can cause projects to get chopped. Sometimes, a CEO change or studio merge means a single person can decide a project “no longer fits with the company’s brand.” Sometimes, the one producer that was rooting for your project gets laid off, and no one else cares enough, so it gets shelved. Sometimes, a streaming service decides to create an animation department, and then they decide they don’t want it anymore. Sometimes, the studio will be simultaneously be developing another project that was too similar to yours and they just didn’t think to tell you until they decide yours is the one with less potential.

On top of that, almost everyone in the industry is saying that “studios just don’t pick up original content anymore.” Studios want something they can franchise, something that will bring in money. New content is risky. Established fanbases are safer.

However! Studios can still be a very good thing. They can be unionized. They can provide better benefits and resources. They can have connections and infrastructure and a larger volume of workers. At a studio, you can divide the labor and produce more in less time. Longer episodes, longer seasons, more consistency in quality.

But this comes with all of the disadvantages of having more in the kitchen.

The alternative is indie animation.

With indie animation, you have total freedom. Full artistic control. It doesn’t even matter if your idea sucks ass, because there’s no one to tell you you can’t make it. You could make it anyway, and you can make it whatever you wanted.

The thing is, making animation is hard. In my production class last semester, the average maximum animation one person could make in that timeframe was 30-60 seconds, and that’s not even counting background design, sound design, or cleanup/color. To make a 5 minute animated short, you should probably have at least 5 people.

And it is CRUCIAL you have a production manager. Ideally someone who’s not already doing art for the project. Most projects without a production manager will fall apart pretty quickly. Once the adrenaline and impulse-fueled motivation wears off, you need someone to hold you accountable and enforce deadlines and proper time management.

Speaking of time, that’s also hard to get. The more people you have, the more likely schedules won’t line up. Most people will have school, or other jobs.

And it costs MONEY!!!!!! You either have everyone work for free and volunteer their time & energy, or you establish a business as a proper indie studio, with people who may or may not have experience on how to handle paying someone else’s salary. And the money has to come from somewhere, so you have to rely on crowdfunding like patreon or kickstarter. (This, by the way, is why I could never fault an indie animation for releasing merch with their pilot.)

And like, maybe you wanna do a series, and all your friends agree to volunteer their labor and time to make the first episode, but it was unanimously not sustainable. Deciding not to produce a second episode until you can raise enough money is not being suddenly greedy, it’s attempting to compensate people rather than expecting them to be continuously taken advantage of.

You have to consider your output as well. There are some outliers like Worthikids, who afaik does all his animation himself, and afaik can work on it full-time thanks to his patreon subscribers. And he still has only produced a total of 30 minutes of animation (for Big Top Burger specifically) in the past 4 years. This is an IMPRESSIVE feat and this is with using a lot of 3D as part of his pipeline!!

Indie animation also has the complication of being more accessible for fandoms. When you’re posting your Official Canon Content on youtube, it doesn’t look a lot different than the fandom-created video essay in the sidebar next to it. What’s canon vs what’s fanon becomes less distinguishable. The boundaries are blurrier. When the creator is just some guy you follow on twitter, it’s easier to prod them for info regarding ships and theories and word-of-god confirmation. They don’t have a PR team or entire international tv networks to appeal to. And this is when creators get frustrated that their fans snowball and turn their creation into something they don’t recognize (and no longer enjoy) anymore.

So it’s tricky.

Thankfully, the threshold to learn animation is fairly low nowadays!! There are TONS of resources online to learn it on your own without forking over a couple hundred thousand to a private art college. There are conventions and discord servers and events where you can network, if you know where to look.

I know it can seem discouraging in the face of capitalism, but I think that’s all the more reason why it’s so important to BE DETERMINED about animation!! We’re already starting to see the beginning of an indie animation boom, and I think it’s a testament to humanity’s desire to tell stories and create art. Even if there’s no financial gain, we do whatever it takes to tell our stories anyway.

#animation #2d animation #indie animation #long post #not 100% sure why I made this post #all this to say: I’m still not sure what direction I want to go towards for my own show #ngl!! i think im confident i could get people to like my show. i think I could find an audience #i have some experience at this point getting people to like my ocs #its just a matter of MAKING the damn thing

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lucyandthepen · 8 months

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salted caramel | lmh ( m )

you hadn’t been aware that mark’s jealousy followed the rules of baseball — three strikes, and he snaps?

read the first part here!

pairing: barista!bf!mark x reader verse: college!au rating: r warnings&tags: unprotected sex, mentions of creampies (although not an actual one), hickeys, possessiveness and jealousy, exhibitionism, sort of phone sex in conjunction with said exhibitionism, oral (m!receiving), mark has an understated but unending obsession with mc’s stomach, tummy bulges, we always love an implicit bigdick!mark, donghyuck is kind of a little shit and basically he has to cross a few lines for this “plot” to get to where it gets word count: 20.3k

a/n: this is a bit rushed and panicked because I basically wrote it in a feverish 2.5ish days… i’m so sorry that the pacing might be a little off, especially since I can never tell if it’s actually too fast or not. this is also unedited and unbeta’d but oh well because i never edit my stuff before posting and just re-edit when I re-read! regardless, i hope it’s something that you can enjoy, and i couldn’t pick between sweetest bf ever!mark and hottest mf ever!mark, so i guess you get a little bit of both!

if you liked it, please consider reblogging to support (especially because this may get flagged for mature content)!

You should have noticed it the first time, but in your overall defense, you find most things that you take note of about Mark Lee to be more on the highly positive and greatly endearing side — or, maybe, you just have a tendency to paint him in that kind of light.

You can’t really help it; he’s still got that halfway shy, softly adoring look in his eyes whenever he sees you, which is more often now than ever before, and you just can’t do anything but reciprocate, if only to see his eyes grow a little brighter. You wonder if Mark’s aware that if this were a Shakespearean scenario, you’d easily fall on your sword for him without question, for as long as he asked, but you don’t think there’s any pressing need to remind him — not with the way you spend most of your free time figuring out ways to be with him. You’re certain he should know, what with the fact that every time he looks at you, even just a glimpse, your gaze is always on him, ready to make eye contact whenever he turns his head — something he often acknowledges with one of those signature blushes that spread like wildfire across his cheeks, up to the tips of his ears.

It also should be unmistakably clear that you’re head over heels for him, given how at least once a week, he’s got his face buried between your legs in an attempt to hear the thing he wants you to say the most (see: his name, in varying pitches and decibels) — but if he doesn’t notice then, you can’t hold it against him; Mark’s mouth is so attentive that you doubt his mind is anywhere else apart from what inch of you his tongue is going to meet next in that moment. At least, that much is true for you.

He should at least know, what with you waiting for his classes to end so you can walk to Starbucks for his afternoon shift; you even race the twenty-minute distance to the Department of Mathematics, still holding your European Renaissance History textbook from your last lecture, just to make sure you’re there right as he gets out — a fact he has to know is an act of devotion, considering how often he finds you heaving for air and leaning your back against the brick wall outside the Accounting 150 Lab. Even his professor knows you as Mark Lee’s admirer, which is all well and good, but if you had the breath to spare, you’d correct his terminology for accuracy. Girlfriend. You’re Mark Lee’s girlfriend.

It’s a fact you don’t mind reminding him of but that you actually have to do quite often, because when you call Mark the appropriate counterpart — boyfriend — his eyes still widen, like he’s hearing it for the first time. It’s cute, just like everything else about him. You just have to wonder, at times, if he doesn’t believe you.

Whatever. It doesn’t matter; you’ll just keep telling him.

You don’t have any classes with Mark this semester, which is a shame, considering your favorite pastime over the last few months had just been to stare at his side profile and wish he’d look over so you could kiss him, but the fact that you spend almost every day with him now, using that time to remind him of how much you want to kiss him and actually getting it to do it right then and there, pretty much more than makes up for your previous schedule of daydreaming.

However, hanging out with him doesn’t always mean you’re just with him; you came to learn this after the first week of the new semester, and you’ve now gotten used to the fact that with Mark Lee sometimes comes his band of tall, often loud friends.

The loudest by far is Lee Donghyuck, the mysterious figure last semester that you’d only known by one syllable, now easily recognizable (and no longer enigmatic by any means to you) by his booming voice and even more demanding personality. He’s supremely outgoing, a trait you can’t say you mind, but there’s an interesting contrast between Mark, who tends to say things after carefully considering his ideas, and Donghyuck, who seems to just burst out in fits of impulsive rambling that often leads to some kind of semi-structured debate. It kind of gives you whiplash, in a funny, slightly perplexing way.

The whole friend group likes to meet up at Starbucks while Mark is on his shift, and now that they’ve come to know you as that girl Mark didn’t teach a single thing in College Algebra to but still somehow got lucky with (something you’ve wasted immense efforts into correcting but have ultimately failed to do so), you now find yourself sitting with them, all somehow waiting for who appears to be the nucleus of this group to stop taking coffee orders and hang up his (cute, but you’re the only one that thinks so, actually) green apron.

Again, you don’t mind it; new people aren’t an issue to you, and you’re also interested in finding out more about Mark through those closest to him. You get to see the few ways they’re alike in contrast to the staggering number of things that make them amusingly different from one another. Despite the broad spectrum of their intersecting interests, you’ve come to learn, through the conversations you’ve had to sit through over the last month, that they have varying opinions on said interests. For instance, you know they’re all into video games, Japanese manga, and long-winding fantasy movies, but every conversation takes flight the moment there’s even a spark of dissent from one person — and the source, usually (and quite unfortunately), is Lee Donghyuck himself.

Today is no exception.

“Dude, you’re crazy,” Zhong Chenle practically seethes. Whether by sheer coincidence or actual desire, he’s the one who most often finds himself staring Donghyuck down, trying to bend the latter’s will into admitting defeat. Donghyuck, on the other hand, has mastered the art of looking supremely unperturbed, especially when Chenle is in the heat of his rage. “The ninth was the worst, hands down.”

“Art and rendering were so solid.” Donghyuck raises a finger, and you’re not sure if it’s to start off a list or to shut Chenle up. You don’t want to ask, anyway, too busy finding amusement in the shifting expressions of despair, rage, anguish, and murderous intent on the latter’s face to speak up. You presume that’s why everyone else isn’t stopping them — or maybe they’re just preparing their own defenses and points to raise. “Intuitive combat and flawless combo chains. The fucking open world? Which other installment in the franchise offers that much depth in the gameplay?”

“Depth? Do you even hear yourself right now?” Chenle grips his head so tightly that when he pulls his hands away, there are actual red marks across his forehead and temple, and his bangs are askew. “What kind of depth comes from cloned movesets? The character designs are so stupidly traditional too. And—”

“There’s a unique kind of beauty in familiarity.”

“The open world was a disaster,” Chenle plows on. “It was so empty, and the map was the farthest thing from intuitive. It’s quite literally the worst thing KOEI has ever done. That’s exactly why they went back to the limited map strategy in later installments. Even the spin-offs.”

“I thought the grappling and ambush systems were pretty intuitive. Ingenious, even.”

It’s a singularly amusing sight — Chenle is one insult to his pride away from imploding, and Donghyuck is just checking the dirt under his nails like he’s waiting in line to take his school ID photo. Park Jisung, one of the quieter ones in the bunch, tries to diffuse the tension by clearing his throat and going ‘I actually really liked the Age Of Calamity Zelda one they released with all the different campaigns,’ but that just goes unnoticed by either party.

“You once failed an ambush play just because you were stuck behind a wall you couldn’t scale. Don’t say shit about the ambush and grappling mechanics.”

“Unlike some people sitting around this table, I learn from my mistakes. That’s also probably why some people — not naming names — just can’t appreciate the artistic beauty that is Dynasty Warriors 9.”

Donghyuck doesn’t even look up from his cuticles when Chenle explodes.

“You’re fucking impossible!”

“Can you guys relax?” Lee Jeno, who had somehow miraculously found the space and silence in the breaths between the entire argument to doze off, opens one eye, only slightly irate. “You’re making a scene over a dead game franchise.”

“It’s not dead; they’re on hiatus,” both Chenle and Donghyuck chime in together, apparently finding a moment of unique solidarity to shoot Jeno down before going back to glaring daggers at each other. Jeno shrugs, gives everyone else at the table an I tried kind of exasperated expression, and settles back into his seat, the one eye already closing before he’s fully folded his arms across his chest.

Your eyes wander away from the group over to the counter. You’re thankful for the fact that most of the time, you just get invited to share a table with them without necessarily being trapped in the middle of a conversation — especially one as heated as the one Chenle is prolonging while jabbing his finger accusingly at Donghyuck, as if he’s trying to pin a crime on the latter instead of just explaining why Donghyuck’s opinion is ‘borne of ignorance.’ When they’re all caught up in their business like this, you end up being able to revel in your more or less unobstructed view of Mark behind the barista’s station, where he’s busy piping an extra helping of whipped cream on top of a strawberry frappuccino for a kid that’s already jumping up and down next to the pick-up station.

The biting winter had already given way to the first signs of spring, and the Starbucks Mark works at has a supremely effective central heating system that allows people to shed their coats. This works in your favor, considering Mark wears nothing but a button-up shirt over his apron while he works, and he’s got this habit of rolling up his sleeves so they don’t catch any stains. You’re pretty sure he has a second motive, though; surely, he’s aware of how the view of his arms, muscles tightening under his skin whenever he even lightly grips something, drives you crazy. You’d bet a month’s allowance he’s doing it on purpose so that you start entertaining the thought of yelling at everyone in the branch to fuck off so you can grab him by the front of his stupid shirt so you can kiss his stupid face. Or ride it.

And for some inexplicable reason, he still has the audacity to act like there’s nothing amiss. When he looks up at you right after pushing the frappuccino towards the little girl, his eyes still brighten, almost innocent in their gaze, the corners of his lips turning up surreptitiously, hiding the smile he seems to save for only you from everyone else in the room.

You smile back, but when he turns away to take someone’s order, you let out a heavy sigh and take a long sip of your vanilla sweet cream cold brew until you start reaching the last dregs of it under the ice. Your brain pretty much cries out in protest, but you know it deserves as much as a mental cold shower for entertaining the thought of asking him to bend you over the counter at five-thirty in the afternoon in a Starbucks.

Stupid Mark. Stupid brain. Stupid fucking people in the room.

The warm breath in your ear alerts you to a slowly approaching presence, but you don’t have the reflexes to turn back to its source before it starts talking.

“Got anything to add to either of our cases, ___________?”

“What?” Your palm comes up to rub your ear as Donghyuck pulls away, laughing lightly. You’re sucked back into the foreground of the conversation, but you’re just as lost now as you had been before you started tuning them out in favor of your lust. “Uh — no. Sorry. To be honest, I know nothing about… sorry, what were you guys talking about again?”

“See, that’s how normal people act,” Jeno grumbles, both his eyes flying open this time. “Instead of hosting a presidential debate about Dynasty Warriors.”

“Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” You’re quick to add, and Jeno looks mildly amused at your attempt to still mollify the rest of the group. “I’m sure I would have liked it. If, you know, I actually had been introduced to it at any point in my life.”

“And if you had, I’m sure you’d have the taste to assert alongside me that the seventh installment was revolutionary,” Chenle sniffs, but he’s looking more pointedly at Donghyuck, who’s still ignoring him, save for the fact that he’s now looking at you instead of at his nails (which doesn’t feel like such a great upgrade).

“Nah, she’d be on my side. ___________ looks like she’d appreciate a good, scenic open world and grappling system. Right?”

“Uh…” you say smartly.

“Man, shut up.” Chenle throws his hands in the air before he stands up, his chair scraping against the floor as he pushes it back with astounding force. “Got me so pissed off I need to pee now.”

You have no idea what the correlation is between getting annoyed and needing to use the bathroom, but even if you wanted to bring up your doubts — which you don’t — Chenle is long gone before you can get your thoughts together. It’s only when he’s out of earshot that Donghyuck leans in, almost conspiratorially, to whisper to you again.

“Actually, I think the ninth sucks too. But isn’t it kind of funny how worked up that fucker gets?”

“To be honest, I’ve never known anyone with quite your talent in riling people up,” you admit, and even though you’re not sure what kind of meaning you want attached to that, you notice that he decides to take it as a compliment all on his own, his chest puffing out in pride. “Too bad I have no idea which opinion is really right, or I’d weigh in, too.”

“Not a Dynasty Warriors kind of girl, then?”

“No one is, Hyuck,” Jeno snorts, shaking his head. “You two are the only people I know who still played that past the fifth installment.”

“Fair. I nurture a love for old franchises.” Donghyuck leans back, looking supremely satisfied at how he’s managed to tick off one of his most important ‘to-do’ points of the day. “So what’s your poison, ___________?”

“What’s that mean?”

“You a Gardenscapes kind of girl? Tekken? Maybe you like some good ol’ fashioned LoL?”

“I honestly don’t have the hand-eye coordination to play,” you confess. “I know Mark likes to play PUBG from time to time. I mostly just sit and ask questions, though. The few times I tried playing with him, I swear any normal person would’ve cried. He had to babysit me like crazy. It was a miracle he didn’t throw me out.”

“She even tries to play with him,” Donghyuck whistles lowly. “Dude, how’d Mark get a chick like you?”

“Meaning?”

“You’re way too good for that dope.” His laugh is light and good-natured. “Never thought a moony-eyed weirdo like him would actually wind up with his dream girl — which he’s called you, more than once, by the way. Fucking disgusting, but… I get it. Doesn’t make it less crazy or weird to hear, though.”

“Sorry to put you through that.” You smile, using your straw to stir the contents of your cup. A warmth spreads through your shoulders and down your arms to the tips of your fingers as you digest what Donghyuck’s just said to you, and you find your eyes trailing back to Mark, who’s pulling off his apron. His eyes are already fixed on you, and when you lock gazes, he mouths a wait for me that makes you want to squeeze the life out of something in pure joy. You settle for a soft sigh. “I guess it won’t help if I say your friend over there’s my dream guy.”

“It absolutely will not,” Donghyuck groans, faking a gagging noise that has you laughing. “But tell you what — if you ever get tired of Mark playing PUBG and ignoring you like the clown he is, I’ll find you someone else more your speed.”

“No thanks,” you snort, taking the last sip of your drink. “More than that, I’d just want to be some kind of helpful to him if I ever play with him again.”

“We can help you with that too,” Jisung volunteers. “Jeno taught me the basics. I’m sure he can teach you too.”

“Yeah, and I’m guessing you’d be a better student than mister “how come you didn’t tell me I had to focus the crosshairs myself” over here,” Jeno chuckles, surreptitiously pointing at Jisung when you cast him a questioning look.

“I’m pretty good at sneak attacks myself.” Donghyuck makes a show of pretending to slice your neck before grinning smugly. “We’ll take care of you. Mark won’t know what hit him next time.”

“What’s happening to me next time?”

You feel Mark before you see him, his hand landing on your head lightly and smoothing your hair back in an idle, gentle motion to announce his presence. You look up at him, already beaming, and he returns the favor as his hand settles on your shoulder.

“We were just talking about replacing you. Both as a friend and as a boyfriend, for your poor little dream girl here who’s just too nice to turn you down.” Donghyuck lies like it’s second nature; you wonder if that’s a Finance major thing or just a him thing.

“And you’re offering that to someone who didn’t ask for it?” Mark snorts, nudging Chenle’s bag over so he can sit in the empty spot.

“She’s so caught up in your sticky little web that she can’t struggle against you.” Donghyuck feigns a heavy sigh that suggests he feels sorry for you before he puts a hand on your free shoulder, shaking his head in a convincing kind of pity. “I’ll save you, so don’t worry. Mark can’t keep his grubby hands on you forever. Whenever you need to be saved, I’ll come a-running to free you.”

There’s a tightness on one shoulder that disrupts the balance of your torso, and you find yourself leaning closer to Mark. Your hand finds its way to his knee, giving it a light squeeze under the table, and his grip loosens by a fraction. Donghyuck’s as quick to let go as he is to hang on.

“We were just talking about PUBG,” you correct, and Mark’s eyes snap to you. “I was asking for help — you know, so I won’t drag you down the next time I join in?”

“I don’t mind whatever you do in-game.” He’s quick to comfort you, even if you don’t actually need it, but it feels warm and cold “I’m just glad you wanna try it with me.”

“No, but I kind of want to learn too. So it can be fun for both of us. Also so you don’t have to keep avenging me after five minutes,” you laugh. Mark cracks a smile then, and you don’t realize his expression had been slightly harder until it softens under your gaze.

“Then I’ll teach you next time.”

“No, I want to surprise you with how cool I get. And then next time, I’ll even beat you.” You turn to Donghyuck, slightly unsure. “Uh… I can beat him, can’t I?”

“If you play different teams, yeah,” he confirms. “Trust me. I’ll help you kick his ass.”

“Or we’ll both kick yours,” Mark chuckles, his grasp now tightening and loosening intermittently. He’s massaging your shoulder lightly, and you end up sinking deeper into his side. You don’t miss the slightly nauseated amusement that passes across Donghyuck’s face nor the way he mouths ‘sap’ to Mark, who ignores this comment in its entirety.

“Yo, hotpot at seven? Renjun’s asking,” Chenle announces as he returns to your table, his phone in one hand and a crumpled paper towel in the other. “Jaemin can’t make it, though. Study group or whatever shit he always says.”

“I’m down,” Donghyuck immediately replies, and Chenle’s eyes shoot heavenward, like he’s already asking for the divine strength to not sock Donghyuck in the face later.

“Can’t,” Jeno yawns, both his arms outstretched as he tries to move the sleep out of his spine. “Pre-test tomorrow.”

“Dude, it’s a pre-test,” Donghyuck rolls his eyes. “You don’t have to study if they’re just testing how much you know before studying.”

“Gotta study all the same.”

“I gotta pass too,” Jisung looks actually apologetic. “I promised my mom I’d help her move some stuff to my aunt’s place tonight.”

“Boring,” Chenle grumbles before turning to the both of you. “Lovebirds?”

“Rain check,” Mark shakes his head. “Family dinner. My brother’s home for the weekend. How about Monday instead? Most of us can’t make it anyway. At least Jaemin doesn’t have study group either.”

“If that’s even what that weirdo’s doing,” Chenle sighs, already punching in a message to send to Renjun. “Fine; I’ll ask about Monday. You guys better actually reply to the goddamn group chat. I can’t coordinate in six different private chats ever again.”

“You can put my name down already,” Mark casts you a sideway glance, and you nod immediately. “Two names, actually.”

“I’m good on Monday too. When we see each other again, I’ll bring some prospects for you to sift through,” Donghyuck adds to you, and you laugh. “Cool guys. Jocks. I know this upperclassman all the girls say is really hot. I think I still have his Messenger from when we did a group discussion last semester.”

“I’ll have Mark look at them so he can reject them all for me,” you promise. Donghyuck feigns affront before looking at Mark in utter disbelief.

“How the fuck did you snag a girl like this, man?”

“I’m pretty sure she once told me I… what did you say?” Mark glances at you amusedly. “I had some moves, I guess.”

“You mean stutter and blush in her presence?” Donghyuck can’t decide how to look at you without being even the slightest bit offensive; he just settles on incredulity. “And that won you over?”

“Most powerful move in the Mark Lee playbook,” you shrug, grinning. “Had me from the first ‘um,’ and he’s had me ever since.”

“You lucky son of a bitch,” Donghyuck snorts, and neither of you misses the slightly abashed but unmistakable smugness in Mark’s face when you lean in to rest your head on his shoulder.

The second time it happens is on that Monday, in a far more noticeable capacity. You just aren’t quick enough to read the signs, as usual.

But in your defense (again), it hadn’t felt all that significant.

“Fuck, this is spicy,” Na Jaemin sucks air in through his teeth and lets it out in a sharp whistle that’s broken by a laugh that’s not necessarily at anything funny. Maybe he’s just laughing at the sheen of sweat across his forehead that he has to wipe off with the other side of his napkin.

Miraculously, the hotpot plan pushes through, with no small amount of effort in coordination on Chenle’s part; he’d even texted you just to make sure he’d gotten the head count right, despite the fact that Mark had already confirmed your attendance twice over. Even the often elusive Na Jaemin, who always seems to have one or another study group to attend on most nights, manages to come and is currently busy mixing his peanut sauce in his little bowl with such vigor that you can’t help but wonder if he’s not trying to drown the mala-flavored strips of meat in it completely.

“That’s why I said you need a bowl of water for dipping, you dimwit,” Donghyuck points his chopsticks at Jaemin’s messy plate in a way you can only describe as nagging, even if that’s actually impossible. “You’ve got super mala breath now.”

“Don’t know about me, but I can smell yours all the way from over here,” Jaemin quips back with an easy kind of nonchalance, hastily ducking the balled-up napkin that goes flying across the table. It lands on the floor behind his chair harmlessly.

It’s nice, you think, that Mark’s friends like to invite you to their outings now; despite all the jokes they’ve made at his expense, they’ve been consistently open to having you around. You’re not necessarily the type of couple that acts in a way that disgusts people into moving to a completely different table anyway, and you allow their conversations to unfold easily without ever interrupting, so you think that this arrangement works for all parties involved.

They’re even louder outside Starbucks, you’ve come to note; the restaurant is significantly busier than the cafe anyway, filled with people on their company dinners, so Mark’s friends all seem to want to rival that boisterous energy. Weirdly, you like it, even when they’re already half off their seats and one (Chenle) is just about to strangle the other (Donghyuck). The laughter flows freely, and there’s a messiness to the whole affair that makes it impossible to feel uncomfortable.

Even Mark pipes in occasionally, offering his opinion on topics he knows much more about than you, and you can’t help but admire how everyone listens to him when he starts to speak, even if he has nothing realistically important to say. His friends might find it odd that you’d been so drawn to him, but they just don’t know that even they’re victims of Mark’s natural magnetism, also falling quiet and eager to hear his voice, his light-hearted laugh, in response to the things they say.

But even when he’s mostly distracted by conversation, there’s a part of him that continuously pays attention to you in his own way. He nudges his ginger and soy sauce bowl towards you with the side of his wrist so you can dip your beef in, even if you’d adamantly declined him giving you your own bowl of it in the first place (you’d always thought you were peanut sauce or nothing kind of girl, but one sneaky venture into Mark’s sauce proved you wrong). His hand hovers over your head when you drop your chopsticks and bend over to pick them up from where they’ve rolled under the table, making sure you’re bump-free when you resurface.

And his palms always, always settle somewhere on you, no matter what he’s doing. If one hand is busy feeding himself, the other is intent on warming your thigh, passing over the denim in slow, steady strokes. His fingers tickle your knee when you laugh, just to make you laugh a little harder — you’d even almost kneed the table at one point, much to Huang Renjun’s alarm. But the most common place for his arm is around you, fingers lightly bunched into the side of your shirt, like he’s worried loosening his grip on you further will cause you to vanish. It keeps him close to you, keeps his scent and warmth washing over you in gentle waves, so much so that you often have to remind yourself that he’ll be the target of much light-hearted mockery if you so much as lean into him and rest your head on his shoulder.

But it’s hard to resist it, especially when his hand seems to be intent on outlining every curve on that side, passing over your hip and dipping into your waist. The motion allows him to slowly but surely lift the fabric of your shirt, up until there’s just enough of an opening for his palm to slip under, and suddenly it’s much warmer on that side, with the light roughness of his hand grazing at your skin. His fingers always stretch apart, like he’s trying to feel as much of you as he can, and the pads of his digits have a tendency to graze the plane of your stomach — his nails sometimes even travel featherlight just next to your navel, etching out words you can’t really decipher. Like he’s writing a message just for you.

It makes you feel like no matter what he’s doing, a part of his mind is always on you.

“You guys want to see that new horror movie? The Ghost Within, I think it’s called,” Jisung asks the group from over at the other end of the table, having to raise his voice significantly to make sure it isn’t swept away by the raucous laughter from across the restaurant. “I think it’s coming out in a week or two.”

“I’d be okay with it,” Renjun shrugs, although he doesn’t look enthused. “Kind of looks like a cliche horror with all those cheap jump scares and shit, but I’m down if you all are.”

A wave of assent passes over the group in general, but you notice Mark doesn’t immediately respond. You take this opportunity to lean in and confess your stance.

“If I have to sit around and watch a ghost pop out at me from a big-ass movie screen, you may never again see me in the same wonderful light you do today,” you warn. “Remember me as I am, not as I will be, Mark Lee.”

He snorts, coughing lightly as a mixture of ginger and fishcake sticks in his throat. “Yeah — we’ll pass, I think.”

“Scaredy-cat,” Donghyuck teases, and you’re surprised that Mark doesn’t come to his own defense. There’s something romantic in him not wanting to be the one to sell you out, but you suppose there’s also a kind of chivalry in being the one to take the bullet.

“Actually, I’m the one who can’t handle it well,” you smile in apology. “Sorry. I don’t have much of a reputation, so to speak, but what elegance may be attached to my name, however misplaced, is something I really want to maintain. At least until I graduate.”

“In short, you don’t want Mark to see you scream and cry,” Chenle deduces. You can’t even find fault in him figuring it out so quickly.

“Bingo.”

“Well, we can solve the problem,” Donghyuck claps his hands, getting everyone’s attention for no good reason. “__________, you sit beside me, and Mark can sit on the far end of the row. With how dark it is, he won’t see anything, and I get to sit next to a cute girl in a movie theater. Win-win.”

“Thanks for the offer,” you laugh, shaking your head. “But it’s not a win-win if I accidentally grab your hand out of instinct.”

“It is to me,” Donghyuck winks, and you feel Mark’s hand stop brushing over your stomach. His fingers curl in lightly, almost like he’s trying to make a fist but can’t quite get to that point out of personal restraint. “Or better yet, you could do what we all think you should do and dump Mark for someone you won’t be ashamed to cry in front of. I, for one, would not even bother to comment on whatever emotions you’re going through in the middle of a movie, so what do you say? It’s a pretty sweet deal, in my humble opinion. Me versus Mark Lee. The showdown of the century, right here in Hai Di Lao.”

You’ve noticed that the more Donghyuck piles onto his little teasing rampage, the more forcefully Mark tugs you over; his fingers aren’t just skimming over your skin but have now grown into the habit of gently pinching it, as if begging for your attention. It feels nice but also a little urgent, although it’s hard for you to understand why; the whole foundation of this group is built on teasing each other until someone (Chenle) snaps and lobs a bottle cap at someone else (Donghyuck), so it should be normal for Mark to be at the receiving end of some light banter.

“Should we ask the hostess to referee the match, then?” You ride along with the joke.

“No way. You’re the one calling the shots.” Donghyuck sits up a little straighter, putting on a smug face. “Okay, pick, __________. Me or Mark; who’s got the better punches?”

You make a show of acting thoughtful, even tapping your chin to pretend considering it deeply, but there was never any doubt on your choice. Still, you can’t really decipher the sudden slowness, the light tremble in Mark’s palm as it travels to your hip, where it settles, heavy, over the curve.

“It’s a complete knock-out,” you finally announce, grinning. “Championship belt goes to Mark.”

“Man, if I had a girlfriend as straight-shooting about her feelings for me as you are about your feelings for Mark, I’d propose in a day, max,” Jeno groans, half-exasperated and half-amused all at once.

“Man must’ve saved a nation or something in his past life,” Donghyuck grimaces. “No way he deserves a girl this hot and crazy about him. Hey — got any tips on stopping natural disasters or something? I could use a sexy, loyal girlfriend in my next life. Or maybe I’ll just poach yours in this one and see what it feels like.”

“I would actually deck you, so don’t even try it,” Mark snorts, his arm now winding full around your waist. You’re flush against his side, and he uses this opportunity to do something he doesn’t often do in front of his friends: show explicit affection by pressing a light kiss just behind your ear. It tickles, his breath grazing your earlobe, and you giggle, squirming in his hold. All he does is smile and pull you in tighter.

The bill’s split eight ways, but Mark’s fishing out cash to pay for your share even before you can get your wallet out from the bottom of your bag; it’s one of those quick, instinctive moves he likes to use on you, where he pushes the money and sends the bill back to the staff before you can even protest in full, so you have to settle on thanking him by returning the earlier favor — landing a peck on his cheek, which flushes a warm and contented pink the moment your lips make contact.

You just pointedly ignore the snickers that run around the table, particularly from Donghyuck and Jaemin.

The group splits ways at the front of the school dorms; most of them head in after their goodbyes, while Chenle backtracks towards his apartment building off-campus, mumbling something about how he hopes his roommate’s in because he accidentally left his key in the bowl next to their doorway. Mark should be piling in with the rest into the dorms, but he has a habit of insisting that he take you to the subway station; you’ve long since given up on convincing him against tagging along, mostly because he looks slightly hurt whenever you try to get him to stay put. You’re not going to complain anyway; for as much as you like being around Mark’s friends, it’s even better when you have this little slice of alone time despite the hassle it brings him.

Your fingers are linked when you walk under the street lights, the campus road leading to the station entrance significantly less busy at this time of evening; it’s cool enough for you to have an excuse to press yourself into Mark’s form, and he accepts this additional burden with an immense amount of grace, his arm finding its way around you again. Two minutes later, his palm is pressed against your bare skin once more, rubbing small, gentle circles just above your pelvis.

A part of you wonders if you’ll be able to do this — lean in, flush against him — when the summer heat starts to stick, but rather than really worrying about the logistics, you realize you’re more hung up on the idea of spending this summer with him.

“Sorry,” Mark murmurs out of the blue. Your eyebrows shoot up, and he looks down at you sheepishly. “Isn’t hanging out with my friends kind of driving you crazy?”

You hum in thought before shaking your head in resolution. “Not really. Not in a bad way, at least. I like how close you guys all are — and how big the group is. It’s usually just Yeji and Jisu with me, and they’re definitely not as rowdy. The change of pace is pretty fun.”

“Yeji and Jisu,” he echoes. “Your best friends. I haven’t met them yet, have I?”

“Not yet. Jisu started a part-time job across town, so we can’t get our schedules to align right just yet.” Your hip collides gently with his. “Should I let you, though?”

“One day… I think it would be nice to hang out with a less migraine-inducing crowd for a change.”

“I’ll tell them, then. They want to meet you.” You crane your neck up slightly, lowering your voice into a hushed whisper that’s completely unnecessary. “They want to know if you’re as cute as you look in your pictures.”

Mark draws back, laughing incredulously. “How do they know what my pictures look like?”

“I stalked your Instagram and showed them,” you answer simply. He throws you a funny look that’s equal parts disbelief and amusement. “They liked that one with the Spider-man costume.”

“Please don’t,” he groans, passing a hand over his face. “I should have taken that down, but I didn’t think anyone would care.”

“Why? I like it.” Your hand’s the one that manages to slip under his sweater this time, fingers trailing down his stomach; you feel him suck it in for a second in surprise before he lets out an exhale.

“I can’t ever understand what’s going through your head,” he chuckles, and you think it’s unfair that he manages to extract your hand from under the fabric while his is still firmly pressed against the side of your stomach. “You saw that and still wanted to date me?”

“Mark Lee, you simply underestimate how much I adore you. It’s kind of hurting my feelings at this rate.”

You’re just a few inches shy of the circle of light cast by the subway station sign. Your feet try to bring you forward, but Mark lingers behind, just outside the curve of soft white on the pavement, and his hand slips from under your shirt. You turn, and his hand skims down your arm instead, fingers locking around your wrist. With the slight distance between you, it looks like you’re caught in motion.

“I still can’t wrap my head around it sometimes.”

“What?”

“I just look over at you and feel like it’s not real. Like you’re going to disappear, and I’m just going to wake up from a dream and see you the next day, just some other stranger who doesn’t even know my name.” He licks his lips, and you want to reach out and kiss him already, but you know he isn’t done talking. “And I’m going to remember how much I liked you in that dream, but you won’t ever feel that same way.”

“You know I’m right here, though, don’t you?” Your fingers mimic his, squeezing around his wrist. “You can feel me. I’m here with you.”

Hesitation flashes across his face even when he nods, and you notice his eyes flit down to his shoes before looking back up at you — a habit of avoidance you know he’s trying to correct. “Sometimes I have to wonder if they’re right.”

“If… who’s right?”

“Them.” He jerks his thumb back in the general direction of the school dorms. “The guys. You know — when they ask me how I got a girl like you… the truth is, I don’t even really know. They can’t believe it, and it’s so crazy to me that I still sometimes can’t myself. So I start wondering if—”

You don’t let him finish this time; it’s rude to interrupt, you know, but you also know that what he’s about to say is probably something neither of you wants to hear anyway. Your lips connect with his, firm and demanding, and his words die in his throat, melting into a soft groan that vibrates against your skin. When you pull away, you don’t create the same distance, and Mark’s hands find their way to your waist, slightly trembling.

“They’re wrong,” you murmur, a quiet strength in your voice. “So stop wondering and just be with me.”

A smile starts tugging on the corners of his mouth, and the next moment, he’s nodding in assent, in wholehearted agreement, and the next kiss you share is one he starts, far more gentle than earlier.

“Next time I catch you entertaining nonsensical thoughts, there’ll be consequences.”

“Are you threatening me?” His laugh is colored with incredulity.

“Yes.” Your tone is firm, but your grin gives away too much of the jest. “Maybe I’ll ground you for a week, or something really childish.”

“I’d take it if you were with me.”

“That’s not how it works,” you snort, gently flicking the tip of his nose. He scrunches it on impact. “You’d be in solitary. You must reflect on your actions and all that nonsense. Meanwhile, I’ll be out having some good hotpot with everyone else.”

“If that happens, promise me one thing, then.” He maneuvers your stance until you’re both back in the blanket of darkness, just out of reach of the subway entrance. “Don’t sit next to Donghyuck.”

“And let him and Chenle give me an earful about how bad-slash-good the first Human Centipede movie was all over again? I think not.”

“No, really.” Mark buries his face into your neck, and you hear the quiet inhale as he breathes in your scent. On instinct, your hand comes up to thread through his hair, nails gently scratching at his scalp. “I don’t want you sitting there and hearing him talk your ear off about how much I don’t deserve you or that he’ll help you find someone better.”

“You know he’s just joking — and I’m just joking, right?”

“Just promise me.”

You pause, wondering if it’s in your best interest to tease him for whatever act he’s pulling, but there’s a shortness to his breathing that makes the whole situation feel weirdly tense. He’s really waiting for something — an answer. The right answer, maybe.

“I promise,” you finally say, and you know you’ve said the correct thing when Mark’s lips press a soft kiss to your collarbone, like he’s sealing in your vow.

On the third time, Mark pretty much gives up.

The strangest thing is that it starts at a time when you’re not even actually together; if you had to pinpoint the exact moment, it probably had to be when Donghyuck had walked you to the dorm from library. No — maybe even before that. Somewhere in the time you’d spent in there, he’d thought up yet another way to push Mark’s buttons. You just didn’t really know the exact minute he’d first seen you with Jung Jaehyun.

You don’t know how Jaehyun does it; he skips half his classes and somehow doesn’t even get in trouble, let alone fail. You’d only met him last semester, but he was just about the only person who was halfway familiar in your Anthropology 120 class, so you thought you could at least feel comfortable enough to chat with him about the weather or what had happened in the last meeting. You don’t expect him to strong-arm you into being something of a literal proxy for him; the first week of the semester, you’d spend almost each lecture period gnawing on your nails and fretting over the fact that your signature for attendance looked nothing like his. By the second week, you’d already come to realize that it doesn’t matter because he had only attended one lecture — the first one — thus far and your professor was as clueless about Jaehyun’s handwriting as you. By the fourth week, you had resigned yourself to being his slightly unwilling associate for his random escapades, allowing him to copy off your notes and turning in his homework for him.

Now that you think about it, that’s probably how he does it.

You sacrifice your free time for him today, caged up in a library for pretty much the afternoon. You can’t help but resent him, not just because the whole room is stuffy and the librarian keeps passing by, clucking to remind people not to litter between shelves, but also because you’d much rather do things that are important to you — like pretending to flirt with Mark for the first time when you place your order and watching him act like it’s the first time you’re saying something so sweet to him, except he’s definitely not pretending. Instead of watching Mark’s face color that cute shade of pink and that sweet little smile pull at his mouth until he’s basically biting his lips back to stop himself from grinning, you have to bore yourself with the sight of Jaehyun trying to decipher your handwriting.

“You should really be more legible with your strokes.” He has the audacity to chastise you as if he’s the one doing you a favor by giving you constructive criticism.

“You should really come to class more often,” you bite back, although there’s no real heat to your words. You just look out the window and watch the sun sink down behind the university hospital building, wondering if there’s a chance you’ll still be able to catch Mark before his shift ends.

“Would if I could.”

“You actually fucking can,” you say tiredly, and even the way he turns the page is so impossibly slow. “Can’t you just take a picture?”

“Nah; writing it down carefully really helps my retention of this kind of stuff.”

“So take a picture and then write it down carefully.”

“With your ridiculous handwriting? I’d probably fail.”

“So come to class and write it yourself!”

Your hiss increases in pitch, and it calls the attention of the librarian over to you. She swoops in, clicking her tongue, but she’s not even looking at you. Her eyes are zoned in on Jaehyun, who meets her gaze with so much innocence it’s hard to imagine you’d wanted to smack him two minutes ago.

“Jung Jaehyun,” the librarian snaps in an undertone. The slow, punctuated way she says his name suggests she knows him fairly well — and not in a great way. “I see you’re back in here after your probationary period.”

“Sorry for the trouble, Mrs. Park.” He grins up at her, looking anything but apologetic. “I promise I won’t get in your way again today.”

“And this one—” She points to you, and you point to yourself in shock at being pointed to, and Jaehyun’s pointing at you and mouthing ‘this one’ with excessive mirth in his eyes. “Isn’t another one of those girls you plan on defiling my sacred space with?”

Jaehyun says ‘we didn’t defile anything’ at the same time you say I’m going to throw up, and the librarian just adds to the noise by shushing you on top of that jumble of words.

“I’ll be keeping a close eye on you two,” Mrs. Park warns before stalking away, tutting at a library assistant for wrongly shelving a volume of Encyclopedia Brittanica.

“Please, Jaehyun,” you groan, crossing your arms over the table and flattening your forehead against them. “Just hurry up. Release me.”

He ignores you, still leaning closer to your notebook to decipher your handwriting. “I would like to set the record straight and make it known I didn’t fuck anyone in the library.”

“What’d you get probation for, then?”

“Just making out.” You notice he has the energy to grin wickedly even without meeting your eye, even while he’s still scrawling on his own notebook, and you groan something incoherent and irate once again. “What are you in such a big hurry for, anyway?”

“Has it ever occurred to you,” you grumble, raising your head. “That some people might want to do better things than sit here and watch you write stuff for ages?”

“No,” comes his simple reply. You bop your head onto your arms a few times in the hope that the impact will shake you out of this nightmare and you’d find yourself waking up in Mark’s arms instead, but you have no such luck. “By better things, do you mean fucking Mark Lee in someone else’s bedroom? That’s real defilement, by the way.”

“How’d you hear about that?” You squeeze your eyes shut and growl under your breath. “Fucking Youngho.”

“You doing that too?”

“Shut — please, would you hurry?”

He pointedly purses his lips in an effort to keep himself from letting out what you can only assume is, by the glint in his eyes, a witch’s cackle. “Almost done, man. Relax a bit. So did you guys get together — like, together together?”

You initially contemplate not telling him, but Jaehyun’s nosiness is probably going to reveal the truth to him sooner or later anyway. “Yeah. What’s it to you, though?”

“Nothing. You’re lucky.”

For the first time today, you feel like Jaehyun has finally said something right. “Yeah — yeah, I am.”

“I bet his friends don’t seem to think so.”

“Is this something you know because it’s a guy thing or because you’re so nosy that you just can’t help but listen in on every other juicy conversation around you?”

“A bit of both,” he chuckles. “Mostly just because I know Lee Donghyuck was giving him a hard time about it last semester.”

“I noticed that too — a bit, anyway. But it’s just banter, I think.”

“Probably. Imagine being his friend and getting a girlfriend; it’s like… the perfect ammunition for teasing. But I’m pretty sure half of the things that come out of his mouth are jokes meant to annoy.”

“What about yours?”

“I get it,” he sighs, shutting your notebook resolutely. It makes a thud that alerts the librarian two tables away, and she glares at you like you’re climbing onto Jaehyun’s lap in the middle of the References on the Korean War aisle. “I’ll set you free. Thanks, by the way, for letting me copy from you. Same time next week?”

“Or how about you look up the schedules for our classes and actually come instead of piggybacking off of my efforts and making snarky remarks about my handwriting while you’re taking advantage of my goodwill?”

“Sounds like too much effort on my end,” he yawns, waving you off as you stuff your notebook into your bag. “Later, ___________. Say hi to Mark for me. The normal way — not the girlfriend way, please.”

You stick your tongue out at him before you make a mad dash for the door, ignoring Mrs. Park as she shushes your footsteps on the marble. You’re so intent on fishing your phone out of your bag that you almost ram the door into the person standing behind it.

“Oh, fuck— Jesus, I’m sorry, I wa— wait, Donghyuck?”

“Great to see you too, ___________.” He rubs his jaw where the edge of the door grazed it. “You in a rush?”

“I was just about to go see if Mark was still at Starbucks.”

“His shift’s probably almost over. I’m headed back to the dorm if you wanna tag along.” When you nod, he starts leading the way, breaking the silence again soon after. “Were you in a study group, or something?”

“No,” you jerk your thumb backwards towards the minuscule form of Jaehyun, who’s now busy wasting time and space playing something on his phone where you’d left him. Donghyuck’s eyebrows shoot up. “He’s my classmate who never comes to class. I was just lending him my notes.”

“Oh, Jaehyun, yeah.” Donghyuck snaps his fingers. “We were classmates last semester. He never went to class either, but I don’t know who he mooched off of to pass. You guys close?”

“Not really. I just fell into the trap of being too nice to him.”

“It’s funny,” he hums, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “Jaehyun seems more your speed. On paper, at least.”

You can’t help but look taken aback, and Donghyuck laughs at your expression. “What do you mean, my speed?”

“Not sure.” He pauses, trying to find the right words to explain himself. “Someone who’d fit more into your social circles. Someone who probably likes Formula One and considers men’s health magazines to be classic literature.”

“That’s your impression of my social circle?”

“You know what I mean. People like Jung Jaehyun or Seo Youngho. I literally thought you were dating him last semester, so it was totally crazy to hear you asked Mark out.” He scratches the back of his neck. “Like… you asked him out. Not even the other way around. That’s ridiculous.”

“Why?” You know he doesn’t mean anything bad by it; Donghyuck has next to no filter, and something about him being unable to process your relationship is honestly a little funny. “A girl can’t ask a guy out?”

(You try not to think too hard about the fact that up until you’d cornered him in Youngho’s room, you had been praying to whatever god could hear you to convince Mark Lee to do the romanticist thing and ask you out.)

“Nah, dude. Like… a girl like you asked a guy like him out.”

“I didn’t ask him out because he was a guy like that,” you say pointedly. “I asked him out because he was a guy I liked. I wouldn’t have asked anyone else out if it weren’t him.”

Donghyuck falls quiet for a while, and only the crunching of the leaves underfoot accompanies your walk. “You really like him that much, huh?”

“I’m crazy about him.” His nose scrunches up like he’s been hit with a horrible smell, and you laugh. “Can you stop giving him a hard time? Or tone it down? I know you probably don’t like it—”

Donghyuck’s chuckle is light and easy. “I’m not teasing him because I hate it; let’s be clear on that. I actually really like that you guys are together. I’ve never seen him this happy with anything or anyone.”

“Then why are you—”

“Because he’s Mark.” A devilish grin creeps up his features as he holds the door to the dorm lobby open for you. “And teasing him is my favorite thing to do.”

You shake your head; you can’t help your amusement, but you’re not sure you fully understand this kind of friendship. You suppose if Mark is okay with it in its totality, then there isn’t much you can say to change it either.

The next twenty minutes pass in comfortable back-and-forths; Donghyuck is, as you already have learned, an expert conversationalist, and while he doesn’t aggravate you the way he does Chenle, he does manage to navigate a quick-fire kind of exchange of thoughts and information that allows you to see the speed at which he thinks. There’s barely any lag between when he digests what you say and when he responds. You suppose there’s a measure of wit in that, but it’s also a little bemusing to see someone speak without at least running it through the conscience checker every once in a while. You decide you’ve never met anyone quite like Lee Donghyuck before.

He’s in the middle of asking you what the Anthropology professor is like because he’s planning on taking it as an elective if he can when you notice a familiar figure pushing into the lobby, backpack swinging on a folded elbow.

“Mark!” The brief confusion on his face morphs into a surprised joy when he spots you on the couch, even though a bit of it lingers upon recognizing that Donghyuck is seated next to you. He walks over in long strides, and your posture straightens to meet his palm as it comes down gently against the crown of your head again; it bumps lightly, causing the both of you to laugh.

“Hey, you.” His voice is warm and fond in its greeting, and you beam up at him. “Did you have a busy afternoon?”

“Unfortunately. Did you just get back from your shift?”

“I passed by the co-op to check out the new university letter jackets. Design’s pretty dope.” He nods towards the elevator. “You wanna head up for a little bit?” You almost get to respond before your companion cuts in instead.

“Hey. Can’t you see we’re having a riveting conversation over here?” Donghyuck sniffs, making a show of hitting Mark’s shin lightly with the heel of his shoe. “Have some respect.”

“Is the conversation so riveting that I can’t take my girl for the evening at all?”

You mouth out a no, but Donghyuck’s flair for dramatics has him humphing and shoving Mark’s hand away from your hair. “Yeah, man. At least let us finish up.”

“What’s this even about?”

“How Jung Jaehyun asked her out in the library today,” Donghyuck replies easily. You start, shaking your head immediately, but Mark’s jaw slackens a little upon hearing this. Donghyuck continues loudly over your protests, and you can’t keep your voice straight because you’re adamant and yet, somehow, still laughing incredulously in your shock. “Oh, dude, let me tell you. He had his arm around her like this — and he was giving her the bedroom eyes… I wouldn’t have blamed her if she folded, honestly.”

“Mark, no,” your stupid gasp comes out as half a giggle as a result of Donghyuck trying to reenact his imaginary scenario. He’s slung his arm across your shoulders and pulled himself in, doing his best expression of a pleading dog’s gaze, which is both perplexing and hilarious. “He’s just kidding—”

“Then he got all close like this—” Donghyuck presses his forehead against yours, and the view he allows himself blocks him from having to look at Mark. You, on the other hand, are still trying to resist a misunderstanding, your palms up and every part of your body that can move shaking vehemently, but you can see Mark’s face turn a violent shade of red you can’t remember having seen from him before. “Spoke all low — you remember he had that sexy, husky voice, right? ”

“He’s just messing with you,” you wheeze out, trying to extract yourself from Donghyuck’s hold, but he only tightens his arm around your neck, almost to the point where you can’t inhale properly.

“And he said ‘you’re the hottest chick I’ve ever seen—’ then you know what he did, Markie?”

Mark doesn’t respond; you’re not even sure if he can, considering his Adam’s apple is bobbing dangerously like he’s one misstep away from exploding. You laugh again, stupidly, because you don’t know what else to do; you know Donghyuck’s teasing him, and you know Mark usually takes it in stride, but you’ve also never seen the latter look so focused on anything that didn’t involve a math problem or eating you out. “No, really, nothing hap—”

You don’t even have the space to finish your sentence. Donghyuck’s too quick when he grabs your face and plants a comedically sloppy kiss on your cheek, bursting out in laughter when he pulls away. You can only sit there, probably as stunned as Mark looks, raising your hand slowly to wipe the spittle Donghyuck left behind in his wake.

“Oh, Jesus,” Donghyuck rasps out between snorts. “Your face is priceless, man.”

“Not funny,” Mark grumbles, and there’s a hoarseness to his voice that makes you feel like it’s barely controlled.

“Also not true. I just bumped into her on the way from the library. We were talking about one of her classes or whatever.” Donghyuck dramatically wipes the tears from his eyes, and you sigh, nudging him. “Sorry, sorry. I couldn’t resist. Man, don’t even worry. She’s downright crazy about you. Even if Jung Jaehyun had asked her out—”

“Anyway.” Mark reaches down, lacing your fingers together, pulling you up and closer to his side like he’s worried you’ll catch Donghyuck’s crazy. “If that’s all of it…”

“Yeah, yeah. You two lovebirds go moon over each other already. I just love seeing your face like that.”

Mark snorts, yanking on Donghyuck’s earlobe punitively, and the latter cries out sharply (and a little exaggeratedly) at the pain. Mark doesn’t even seem to care; he leads you to the elevator and punches in his floor. You barely have time to call out a belated ‘bye’ to Donghyuck, who acknowledges it with a raise of his palm, before the doors slide shut.

It’s a slow elevator, given that it’s an old building, and the first couple of floors pass without much noise between the two of you. You’re not unaware of how tight Mark’s grip is on your hand, but you don’t comment nor take it against him. By the fourth floor, you’re raising his hand up to your lips and pressing a kiss against his knuckles.

“Nothing happened.” You confirm his unasked question, and you see a modicum of tension leave his shoulders. “He was just messing with you because he thinks it’s funny.”

“Yeah, I know.” Even if he says it like that, there’s still lingering doubt in his voice. “Were you with Jung Jaehyun today, though? Is that why you didn’t show up?”

You nod. “He was copying my notes for Anthropology. Guy barely shows up to lectures, so he borrows my stuff. I can’t believe he hasn’t been suspended yet. Or punched in the face by the people he leeches off of.”

“No kidding.”

You step out on the sixth floor with him. Even if you already know where Mark’s dorm is, you let him lead the way, and he ushers you into an empty and dimly lit living space while taking his shoes off. His roommate barely seems to be around; you’ve seen him all of two times, and it doesn’t look like he’s here either right now. You pause anyway, listening to any signs of life just to be sure, but when you both confirm that there’s no one but the two of you, you busy yourselves with turning on the lights and plugging in the water dispenser.

You work in relative silence; it isn’t anything unusual since you’ve done this a million times, and you’ve come to learn that small talk isn’t necessary when you’re just washing your hands or opening the refrigerator aimlessly even if you know you both plan on ordering in. But there’s a weird aura around Mark that you’re not sure how to place; he doesn’t seem like he’s mad, but there definitely seems to be something off — a problem, at least, that you’re not sure you know how to ask about.

So you just try to diffuse whatever it is by completely ignoring it.

“Pizza or Chinese?” You ask, flopping onto the couch as he plugs the television into the outlet. He looks up at you, and you notice his eyes are slightly dazed, like you’ve just woken him up from a dream. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” His voice is hoarse the first time he says it, so he clears his throat and tries again. “Yeah, sorry.”

“What’s on your mind?”

“We just had pizza, so I’m thinking Chinese is the better option. Cream shrimp? Fried rice? Not the salted fish one, though, maybe.”

You hum in assent, but when he straightens up from behind the television, you extend your arm to him, attempting to clarify yourself. “I mean, what are you thinking so hard about?”

“Nothing.” His answer’s a little too quick. A moment of awkward silence passes where you telepathically tell him you know he’s lying and he has to come to terms with his horrible lying skills, and he sighs, crossing over to the couch and settling beside you. Immediately, he tangles your fingers together, belatedly returning the favor from the elevator and brushing his lips across your knuckles. “He didn’t ask you out, right?”

You know he knows the truth, so you decide to bat your own question back at him in an attempt at rhetoric. “What would it matter if he did? The answer would have been the same, real or imagined.”

Mark pinches the bridge of his nose, inhaling slowly. There’s a red flush on his neck that’s only started fading, it seems. You reach out and skim your finger along the vein that runs down the side of his throat. “I know. I don’t like it all the same. I hate… even thinking about it, actually.”

“Really — nothing happened. If you don’t count the fact that I almost strangled him for keeping me there — which I’m sure you’d agree doesn’t count as anything in favor of him.”

“I heard Jung Jaehyun’s kind of a playboy.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

“Nothing. I don’t know.” His head lolls to the side, and his eyes hold a sadness that pulls at your heart. “It means he really could have made a pass at you. Or you could have — I don’t know. In the end… I just worry.”

“Don’t you trust me?” Your lower lip juts out, and his eyes widen slightly, his head shaking before his mouth can even work out a proper response.

“No — I mean, yes, absolutely. It’s — I mean, it’s just—” He inhales again to gather his wits, two fingers still rubbing his forehead. “I trust you, without a doubt. I don’t trust other people — not around you. Not Jaehyun, or Youngho, or—”

“Or Donghyuck?” You smile a little apologetically at his embarrassment, clear on his face when his eyes stray from yours. “Mark, you know he’s only messing with you, right? I thought it was a funny thing for you guys.”

“It’s not funny if it’s about you,” he mumbles, more to himself than to you. He looks up at you again, chewing on his bottom lip. “I know. I’m trying to control it. Sometimes… I don’t know why it gets under my skin. I guess it’s because it could happen — you… finding someone else. I kind of hate the thought of that.”

“And if I said I hate it even more than you?”

His gaze softens, something like relief passing over his features, but the rest of his body still holds a significant amount of tension; you know by the way he’s running agitated circles on the back of your hand. You gently tug on his arm, allowing yourself to use it as an anchor to shift your weight. Mark makes a soft noise of inquiry but says nothing more, waiting until you’ve maneuvered your body to settle on his lap.

The view is reminiscent, and you can see that the core memory you share flashes through his mind too. A small smile, still somewhat reluctant, plays on Mark’s lips, and you hate that it’s all you get right now, so you rectify this by leaning down and leaving a small, chaste kiss on them. You pull away much too soon, and his head follows in response to the distance, chasing your lips until you’re realistically too far to reach. His arm extends instead, swiftly tucking your hair behind your ear.

Your fingers close around his wrist, and your head turns, continuing the kiss against his palm — short and firm.

“Stop doing that.”

His eyebrows fly upward in questioning, his other hand freezing in its trail up your thighs. Even his breath seems to catch, and what’s left of it comes out as a raspy whisper. “Stop being jealous? I’m… I’m trying.”

You shake your head. “Stop being sexy when you’re jealous.”

The ‘what’ he seems to want to ask dies in his throat, his mouth only able to form half of the word before you interrupt, your lips taking in the rest of the syllable. When you kiss him this time, there’s a slow hunger to it; your teeth find his lower lip even before he’s able to get into the rhythm of kissing you back. You just want him to know — everything about him drives you wild, even when he doesn’t know it.

You’ll never grow sick of the taste of him, you’re sure; today, he tastes even more enticing, the hint of something rich mixing in with the stronger flavor of coffee on his tongue. It’s familiar and comforting, and it’s only when you break away, both your faces flushed from a prolonged lack of air, that you puzzle out what the taste is — the lingering aftermath of a vanilla sweet cream cold brew, one he must have prepared in anticipation of you this afternoon.

You briefly squeeze your eyes shut and thank whoever’s listening for the gift of Mark Lee.

“Mark,” your murmur, your voice much softer, intent on coaxing him into releasing his worries. “You know, right?”

His ‘hm’ is only half-there in focus, the rest of his attention on his hands, which have found their way to your ass and have started digging his fingers into the flesh beyond your jeans. You have to tilt his head up with one finger under his chin, and there’s a whirlpool of emotion in them: curiosity, desire, and, interestingly, a quiet, almost suppressed kind of anger.

“If it isn’t you,” you whisper. “Then there’s nobody else.”

You see his jaw tighten, feel his grip against you do the same, and his brow furrows, like he’s trying — much too hard, and for no good reason — to stop himself from tipping over. You don’t like that either; if he’s there, you think, you should take him over the edge.

“But if you want them to know so badly, then…” You tilt your head to the side, exposing more of your neck, bringing the expanse just a little closer to his mouth. “Why don’t you go ahead and put your claim on me?”

You swear you see his pupils dilate right before he presses his mouth to your skin. With a low, almost pained groan against your neck, he latches his teeth in lightly, and you feel the soft sting, the increase in pressure the moment he starts sucking a mark just above your collarbone. There’s a wet, messy pattern to his movements, always punctuated by the sweep of his tongue to soothe your flesh. Even with that, his movements are slow and careful, still gentle in the way he’s handling you, but you feel it anyway — all of his tension’s concentrated in his grip, the way he keeps you close, hips pinned against him as if he’s worried anything less will cause you to disappear.

“Every time you worry, remember you can do this.” You pause, your breath catching in a lilt as his teeth dig in a little more fiercely. “You’re the only one that can.”

His lips detach with a soft groan, fingers squeezing your ass tight for a moment. Warm breath cools against the damp patch on your neck, and a second later, you feel his mouth graze against the few inches of skin, sensitive and slightly raw. “I know. It’s just not fair.”

You hum in questioning, but he doesn’t answer immediately; his mouth busies itself just under the mark he’d surely left, already starting up the same routine. You’d let him, and you want him to, but you want to hear his voice more. Your fingers tangle into his hair, and you use that hold to ease his head back, urging him to look up at you. It’s almost a mistake, seeing him like that — lips slightly swollen and definitely slick with his own saliva, parted just a little to reveal teeth he’d been desperate to nip your flesh with again. It crosses your mind that Mark has a mouth made for kissing — no, that isn’t accurate.

A mouth made for you to kiss.

“What’s not fair?” You ask softly. Even now, he takes his time in answering, his eyes falling close for a second; you watch him swallow, lick his lips, breathe in before he speaks, and all of those mundane things he does somehow make you lose your mind all the more.

“How badly I keep wanting you,” he breathes out, his eyes slowly opening. “And how it makes me think everyone wants you just as much.”

His hands leave the curve of your ass, traveling up your shirt, resting against your sides. He holds you like he’s careful in trying not to break you, his fingers spread wide to make sure his thumbs almost meet against your stomach, but there’s a smoldering headiness in his gaze that tells you he’s thinking a little too hard about wanting to break you.

“I touch you like this, and I think that everyone would kill to do the same.” His fingers squeeze against your flesh, inching upwards until they rest just under your breasts; his thumbs stroke the curved underline of your bra. “I think about kissing you and it feels like everyone’s thinking it at the exact same time. I look at someone next to you, even if you don’t know them, and I wonder if they want to pull you close, if they want to feel you against them just as much as I do. When I—”

He inhales sharply between his words, and the exhale comes out somewhat shaky. For a moment, he grits his teeth, jaw flexing in an attempt to keep himself in check. You worry he doesn’t want to continue — doesn’t want to let you hear it, but it feels so important that you can’t let it go. “Tell me.”

“When I think about fucking you,” he breathes out, voice barely audible. “Whenever I look at you and think about how much I want to feel you around me, feel you cum around me… I just know everyone else wants the same thing, and it’s driving me crazy because… because they can’t.”

It’s there again, flashing in his eyes — a determination that reads almost like fury.

“They can’t,” he repeats, his voice firmer. “I won’t ever let them. Never.”

You don’t stop him this time when his mouth reclaims your skin. You let his thoughts fuel the need in his movements, allow yourself to move only in reaction to what he does — the tilting of your head to give him more room, the tightening of your fists against his shirt to keep yourself steady. A surprised mewl leaves you when you feel his teeth pinch against your flesh again, and it’s harder, sharper this time, his quiet anger finally dictating his strength. You grapple for words, but they come out in weak gasps.

“It doesn’t — doesn’t matter,” you manage to whimper out. “How many people think that way, how much they want me that way. I only ever want you.”

His breathing is caught, warm, in the pocket of space just between you and his mouth; it tingles against your skin, tickles your senses into heightening. Your fingers unfurl, pressing against his chest, and you can feel his quickened heartbeat thrumming under your palm.

“God, please,” he murmurs, the soft peck of a kiss landing against your collarbone. “Please, tell me.”

“Mark, I’m yours.” There’s no teasing in how you say it; it was never meant to rile him up. It even escapes sweetness, the romanticism it usually comes with when you remind him on any other occasion. This is a promise to him, something you’re reinforcing as fact, something that can’t ever change. “I’m always going to be yours — no one else’s. I’ll never let anyone have anything that’s yours. Ask anything, take everything you want. I’ll never say no to you. Only you — always you.”

You know something’s different in a number of ways; his arms circle around you, but instead of keeping you firm and stable in his lap, they’re tight, squeezing a whine out of you, holding your torso flush against his. His face never leaves the crook of your neck, but you hear — feel — something there — a soft growl of need, of frustration that begs release. Suddenly, you find yourself off the couch; you barely have the presence of mind to wrap your arms around his neck and tighten your thighs against his sides before he’s carrying you to his room, kicking the door open and letting the rebound of the impact against his wall slam it shut behind him.

You’ve been in Mark’s room before, so there’s absolutely no need for you to take in the scenery when he sets you down on his bed. It doesn’t matter anyway, even if this were your first time; Mark’s crawling over you, his face flush and eyes sharp with hunger, and he looks so enticing that you wouldn’t want to pay attention to anything else around you anyway. His limbs cage you in, arms on either side of your shoulders and his knees just by your thighs, and you don’t really know why he’s already panting, but it just makes you want him all the more.

“Never,” he groans out, leaning down to nose against the patch of skin his mouth had worked on. “I’m never going to let anyone take you, ever. You’re all mine.”

His name fades on your lips, carried away by a moan when his mouth reattaches itself to your neck; it moves, almost frenzied, to renew the mark he’d left, make it a deeper red, a slightly bruised purple. You’re usually careful not to do anything that will require any attention or cover-up after, but Mark seems a little too far gone to care, and you realize you like him best this way.

Even with all the attention he gives your neck, his fingers are busy; they work on the button of your jeans, sliding them down with the help you offer by raising your hips. They only reach halfway down your thighs, his reluctance to come back up for air stopping him from peeling them off completely, but it’s all he seems to need for now.

Eager fingers ease between your thighs, two at once, pressing against your folds. You’re unable to spread your legs like you usually do, but this tightness makes you all the more sensitive, and you keen as his digits fit themselves into your slit. Frustratingly, they don’t move right away, and you have to raise your hips again just to get some sort of friction. Even then, Mark doesn’t take the hint — or, perhaps, the bait — keeping a light pressure against your clit without doing anything else. His focus is still on your neck, now slightly aching under his lips, and when he finally pulls away, you see a look of triumph on his face. He tilts his head back slightly to admire his work — the blooming dark patch you’re sure he’s left where your skin tingles the most.

“If I said I wanted to mark you all over, would you let me?”

“What makes you think I wouldn’t ask for it?”

He chuckles, tightening the pressure of his fingers against your clit; you say something that sounds halfway between ‘Mark’ and a sob.

“I want to, so badly.” He admits, gaze still fixed on your neck. “I’d want to see you walk out of here, walk into class covered in them. I’d want people to ask you how you got them, and who gave them to you. And I’d want you to say it proudly — that it was me who did it. That I fucked you all night and made you mine over and over again.”

“Why don’t you?” His eyes snap up to you, a small smile forming on his lips. “I want to say that too. Let me brag about having you. Let me tell everyone how good you always make me feel. Then you can tell everyone who doesn’t believe you, too — how I let you take me every single time. Show me off and tell them to look at how you made me yours.”

Another laugh escapes him, but there’s more disbelief than humor in it; he seems to find it amazing, that you can just agree with what he says, no matter how strange he thinks it is.

“Show you off? If I mark you in other places, do I have to show them every part?”

“Do you not want to?”

“I want to, and I don’t.” He pauses, slightly amused, and you know he’s remembering the first time you fucked. “I don’t them to see your body, but I want them to see what I did to it. I don’t want them to look at what’s mine, but I just want them to know it is.”

“Then you can fuck me in front of everyone and make them watch you ruin me completely.”

He shakes his head, even if desire flashes clear across his features. He busies himself with actions while he mulls it over, tugging your jeans down alongside your panties and casting them aside before he straightens up. His eyes rake over your form; you’re bare from the waist down, your shirt halfway ridden up, the underside of your bra peeking out from under the hem. Again, his eyes land on your neck, and his smile widens slightly.

“Can’t.” He decides finally. “You’re too pretty for that.”

You hum thoughtfully, and he raises his eyebrows. He doesn’t move, even when you sit up, shifting yourself so you can tuck your calves under your thighs — not even when you reach out to undo his belt or tug down his zipper. He only reacts a little when your hand presses against his hardness through his boxers, the girth now easily familiar to your palm.

“What about something like this?” You ask, inching closer to the edge of the bed. You’ve started slow strokes against him, the fabric creating extra friction, more heat under your palm, and you watch his jaw clench as he swallows back a soft grunt. “Would you let them watch me do this for you?”

“Let me think about it,” he chuckles softly, and you nod, letting your fingers work to make your point. You don’t have to undress him completely to get what you want; all you need is to tug down the front of his boxers to free him, and you already have him wrapped in your palms, stroking his shaft to full hardness.

“Think faster,” you urge, and he shakes his head, slightly bemused. “Are you telling me you wouldn’t even want them to watch me jerk you off?”

“At least give me a full minute.”

You laugh lightly, whispering a ‘fine’ before you press a soft kiss against tip. He inhales sharp through his teeth, already sensitive, and you waste no time in letting your tongue flick out against the smooth head. He doesn’t need the lubrication, realistically; his precum’s already leaking from the tip, mixing in with your saliva as you run your tongue around it. All you do is make him a little messier, a little slicker, your spittle running down his length.

Taking Mark in your mouth is a demanding task, but one you’re always up for; there’s something uniquely satisfying about letting him fill your mouth, inch by inch, and watching his breathing hitch and stutter until your lips are closer to the base than to the head. What you can’t reach, your hand always squeezes around, eager to make sure he feels good completely. His expression is sublime when you draw your head back the first time, sucking as you do so — his eyes are half-lidded, and he doesn’t stop the moan that falls from his lips. His gaze is fixed on you, hazy but still able to drink the sight of you in, and you’re not sure how, but you almost feel like you could get off to watching him watch you taste him.

You try, somehow, vaguely conscious of the movement of your hips; you’re grinding at nothing at first, so your knees give way just enough for you to press yourself against his sheets. It’s slightly uncomfortable, a strain in your thighs that you’re not really used to, but you don’t care; Mark’s sharp inhale at seeing you attempt to grind your pussy against his mattress is pretty much as arousing as anything else. His cock twitches hard in your mouth, and you suck just a little harder, a little messier, your head bobbing down to meet your hand, still firmly wrapped around his girth.

The room’s filled with nothing but slick sounds and soft groans; Mark’s hand has found its way into your hair, tangled into a makeshift ponytail, and while he isn’t guiding your mouth to do anything, you can feel his hips stutter then start to move, pulling back when your head does. He tries to hide it, tries to keep himself steady, but pride blooms in your chest when you note that he can’t; he wants to feel like he’s fucking into your mouth, into your hand, the way he does when he takes your pussy.

It’s relatively quiet for that time, nothing but muffled moans from you that mix in with his noises, but you only realize you’d been waiting for an answer to something when he speaks up again.

“It’s… still a no for me.”

Your movements slow, your gaze lifting to communicate your mild confusion to him. You don’t want to ask; you just don’t want to lose the taste of him on your tongue just yet. He looks down at you, smiling with overflowing tenderness, almost like he’s apologetic.

“Even just this — you’re too pretty when you do it.” His hand reaches down, thumb stroking over your cheek. “I can’t let anyone see what you look like when you’re like this. They’ll keep thinking about you doing it for them. And you’d only do it for me — right?”

You nod immediately, your response causing your mouth to slip down his shaft just a little more. It elicits a guttural noise from him, one that fuels you into sucking him just a little harder, your enthusiasm overtaking your restraint. His fingers have let go of your hair, stroking it back into smoothness, almost comforting in their movements.

“God, I wish you could see yourself; you’d know what I mean,” he continues to murmur, his voice just a little louder over the eager, wet noises you’re making. “How pretty you look with your mouth wrapped around me. How perfect you are when you’re kneeling like this for me — how happy you look when you’re sucking me off. I can’t share that with anyone. Fuck — not ever.”

Your mouth draws back, completely this time, and your tongue presses against the underside of his cock. You lick a long stripe up his shaft, moaning softly at the light throb you feel, and you watch him tip his head back. The groan that follows soon after is almost close to a frustrated growl, ending in a whispered ‘shit’ before his eyes land back on you. He watches you press kiss after kiss against his tip, coaxing the precum out even more, and you take special care to leave more down each inch of his cock until you’re finally able to release your hold on his base so you can leave the last one there.

His hand combs your hair back before it falls to cup your chin, his thumb swiping at the corner of your mouth to gently clean up the froth of spittle there. You smile up at him in thanks, and his thumb sweeps over the seam of your lips to follow the slight curve.

“So pretty,” he repeats, and your cheeks glow pink under the palms that caress them. He leans down, pressing a kiss to the tip of your nose. “Pretty as hell, fucking perfect — and you’re all mine.”

You kneel up again, chasing his lips with your own, and he locks you in his arms as his tongue slips its way past your teeth, the aroma of coffee still on it. He leaves today’s taste of him against your tongue, on the ridges of your teeth, until you feel like you’ve all but consumed him, and you whimper softly when he pulls away, urging you to turn around and lean back into his chest.

His mouth reattaches itself to the same spot; it’s like a home base for him, and he breathes in your scent from there before giving the same patch of skin a light suck, almost as if he’s worried it’ll fade in a few minutes’ time if he doesn’t give it attention.

“Show me.” Hands slide down to your hips, squeezing them lightly, like a prompt for your response. “Show me how pretty you are for me.”

His palms never leave you, not even when you detach yourself from his chest and bend down; your elbows meet the mattress, but your hips stay raised, giving him a view of your pussy. Your gasp easily turns into a moan when his digit dips into your wetness again, his other hand pushing gently at your asscheek to keep you open.

You think he’s about to slip his finger in, the tip brushing against your entrance, and you tense in anticipation, but it doesn’t happen; he continues to run his finger down your slit, careful not to linger against your clit for too long. The result is that you tighten around nothing, and you hear him suck in a breath as he watches your hole grow smaller for a second. You laugh breathily, resting your chin against the backs of your hands, one folded atop the other. “Pretty enough for you to fuck?”

“Do you have to ask if you already know?”

“I want to hear it anyway.”

His finger slips into your hole, finally, and you keen softly as he breaches the first ring of tightness. He doesn’t really move it, just tests your tightness, feels you contract around him as if to know what his cock will feel in a few moments.

“Your pussy’s too pretty not to fuck,” he manages out, and his throat sounds as tight as you feel. “Seeing it like this… makes me think there’s no way anyone can resist. It’s exactly why I can’t let anyone see you like this.”

You hum as his finger presses in deeper, and you know it’s nothing in comparison to the real thing, but you like feeling that mild stretch, the depth it reaches all the same. “How should we let them know, then? That I’m all yours.”

His finger stills, and you hum softly, swaying your hips to shake him out of whatever trance he’s in. He’s grown quiet, but there’s a thoughtfulness in this pause, like he’s seriously considering your question. You laugh lightly, ready to tell him you’re just egging him on until he fucks you, but he slips his finger out of you, leaving you clenching around nothing again. You can’t help the confused noise that comes out of you, but you at least know he isn’t completely backing away, his other hand still firmly on your ass.

“Mark, what—”

You get your answer in the thud that interrupts your question — he’s tossed his phone onto the bed, having it land next to you. Something in your blood runs hot, and your fingers tremble when you pick it up. You see yourself reflected in the blackened screen — excitement in your eyes, your lips glossy from your blowjob.

Mark’s silent as you let the meaning of his actions settle; wordlessly, he slips his finger into you again, followed by another one this time, and you shudder in pleasure at the difference in the stretch. He doesn’t ask, but you can tell he’s wondering if he’s gone too far— if you think he’s crazy. He lets his fingers stay anchored in you, unmoving, waiting for you to say something, but from where he is, he just can’t know the smile that passes your face.

Finally, he tries to speak up. “We don’t have to— I just meant—”

“What’s your passcode?”

He breathes out, the exhale quivering as much as you probably are. “Your birthday.”

Your smile only widens when you tap the screen to life and see a picture of you — you don’t even remember when he’d taken it, but it’s a shot of you sprawled on his bed, bundled in his blanket and reading something that looks oddly like your textbook for your European Renaissance History class. It’s grainy and dimly lit, a stolen photograph of you, but it makes your heart swell, and you laugh lightly as you key in your birthday; the screen unlocks, allowing you access to all his applications.

“What’s funny?”

“Just thinking about how you should replace this wallpaper.”

“To what?” He sounds bemused.

“The view of me you have now.”

His fingers curl in you, pressing down against your walls, and you push your hips back in a bid for more friction; you hear him hiss out a ‘fuck’ under his breath, and his hand digs harder into the flesh of your ass.

You open Mark’s contacts, scrolling down aimlessly. Most of the names, you don’t recognize, but you see a few familiar ones crop up here and there. He doesn’t ask, only starts pumping his fingers into you in quiet anticipation, wondering how far you’re willing to take it, how much you’ve bought into this crazy idea.

“Mark,” you call out, and he hums in response. “You trust me, don’t you?”

“With my life.”

“So if I called Donghyuck right now—” His fingers hook into you, the delicious pressure on your walls making you squeak instead of finish your sentence immediately. You twist your torso to meet his eyes, and you’re slightly surprised but not at all displeased to see something crazed lingering in his gaze. “How much of a show would you want to put on for him?”

He shifts his weight, his knee sinking into the mattress as he slots it between your legs. This change in position allows him to angle his fingers a little differently, driving down into you with a force that makes you squirm. You almost forget you’ve asked him something again until he leans in closer, his murmur almost drowned out by the slick sounds of his finger pressing into your hole.

“Just… enough for him to know you’ve always been mine.”

Your thumbs are shaking when you scroll through his contacts again, up and down until you find the right name — Lee Donghyuck — and Mark watches you intently, wordlessly, as you press his number, start the call, and put it on speaker.

The wait feels like an eternity, with Mark’s finger slipping in and out of you in a steady, languid pace as you watch the line connect, but in reality, Donghyuck really only answers after the fourth ring. “Yo, Mark.”

His voice is casual, lacking in any sort of expectation; you can hear explosions and gunshots in the background, and you’re willing to bet he’s in the middle of an action movie. You’re proven right when you hear random English babbling soon after.

“Hi, Hyuck.”

“___________?” He sounds genuinely confused that it’s you that greets him. “Where’s Mark? You okay?”

“He’s right here with me; don’t worry.” Your voice is a soft croon, and he has to lower the volume of the television to be able to hear you better. “We’re totally fine. What are you up to?”

“Watching Resident Evil. Uh, is there a reason you called?”

You want to draw out the lie of something casual for as long as you can, but Mark doesn’t let you. His fingers push, suddenly forceful, into you, and you let out a soft cry into the receiver. You look back at him, eyes wide with amusement, and he shrugs, having at least enough sense to look slightly abashed at his experiment.

One moment, you’re listening to a female voice shout something, and the next, Donghyuck’s side of the call is silent except for his breathing. When you don’t bother explaining what had just happened, he takes matters into his own hands.

“Hello?”

He sounds equal parts affronted and amused, like the shock of it has tickled him. You can’t help it; you laugh too, but it’s quickly cut off by another whine when Mark pulls his fingers out. Donghyuck makes an incredulous noise.

“Now, what the fuck is all this about, you freaks?”

“You kept wondering why I ended up asking Mark out,” you evade his question with another one. “Should I tell you why, if you’re that curious?”

“No way. Have fun, weirdos,” he laughs, and the line goes dead a second after.

You snort out a laugh, and Mark mumbles something that sounds vaguely like that was crazy before he leans down and presses a kiss to the small of your back. You make to turn so you can finally face him, but you’re distracted when his phone screen lights up again, and Donghyuck’s name flashes across it.

You exchange amused glances before you pick up the call, and you don’t even get a ‘hello’ out when his voice rings out, sharp and clear.

“But pretending I am,” he says, as though he hadn’t hung up the call a few seconds ago. “Exactly what kind of answer would I get?”

“The kind that’ll hopefully shut you up for good,” Mark pipes in instead of you.

“What’s that even going to sound like?” Already, Donghyuck’s activated whatever toggle in him that gets him to push Mark’s buttons. This time, though, you can’t say it works against you; you feel Mark inch closer to you, and a moment later, the fat tip of his cock nudges against your entrance. “I bet you can’t even get her to yawn, man.”

Mark doesn’t have to respond; you do it for him when he pushes in, torturously slow, as if to draw out your moan. It works a little too well, with you keening into the phone, and yet no part of you is acting for his sake. As familiar as the stretch is, it’s not something you’ve ever been able to commit to memory fully, and it feels like a new breaching of your tightness each time. Your legs fold in slightly, a useless movement that attempts to get you adjusted to his size faster, but Mark interprets it as discomfort, his hands tightening on your hips.

“You okay?” He sounds genuinely worried for a second, forgetting that Donghyuck’s still on the line. Your cheek brushes against his sheets as you nod, trying to meet his eye even in this position to let him know you’re being honest.

“Fucking big, Mark.” You hear Donghyuck tsk from his end, and you laugh breathlessly. “You don’t like knowing he’s big?”

“I just hate that fucker,” Donghyuck quips back easily, but there’s no seriousness in his voice. If anything, it sounds a little raspy, with him clearing his throat soon afterward.

“Well, I’m crazy about him,” you whisper into the call, and your breathing hitches as Mark finally bottoms out, groaning at your tightness. “I’m crazy about the way he touches me, the way he tastes. I’m crazy about how big his cock is, how deep it gets when he’s inside me, how he stretches me out — fuck—”

Your verbal rampage is cut short by a loud moan as Mark draws his hips back and pushes forcefully into you; you haven’t fully adjusted, and you’re even tighter now from what you’re saying, so the friction inside you is nothing short of delicious. He starts a pattern of thrusts, not bothering to build up from his usual slow and steady pace — hearing you talk that way and knowing that Donghyuck is listening is enough to get him to abandon self-imposed restrictions.

“Mark,” you whine out, accidentally pushing the phone a little further away as you reach out blindly for him behind you, and he catches your wrist to let you know he’s there. “Mark, fuck, it feels so good—”

You tighten around him as if to prove your words, and he growls in response. You find yourself having to press your cheek in a little harder into the mattress as he gathers your wrists together into one hand, pinning them to your lower back, and it’s with that hold on you that he leverages his thrusts, pumping into you a little harder each time.

You’re not completely unaware of your surroundings, but it takes a while for you to process the sounds coming from the phone’s speaker — labored breathing, the sound of a zipper being pulled down. You want to wonder if this is working a little too well, but nothing comes from your mouth apart from soft whimpers, and it’s all the cue Mark needs to be the one to fill in the relative silence himself.

“You’re so fucking pretty,” he whispers, and you feel his lips press between your shoulder blades. It feels like a chaste kiss at first, but he leaves his breath there, still flitting over your skin as he continues to speak. “I’ll never get tired of how pretty you are — how pretty you always sound for me. Doesn’t she sound pretty, Hyuck?”

“Fucking pretty,” Donghyuck agrees, though his voice sounds somewhat distant. You can only sob back a quiet ‘fuck me, harder, harder,’ in response.

“Can you imagine how much prettier she looks under me?” It’s almost a full-blown conversation now, but even if Mark’s addressing Donghyuck, the rest of his attention’s fully on you. He adjusts his stance, still keeping his hold around your wrists as he angles himself deeper into you, causing you to cry out and squirm in pleasure. With your face pressed against the bed and his weight driving down into you, you feel utterly trapped, in the best kind of way. Mark, in the way he is now, is inescapable, almost incorrigible, and he pistons deeper into your pussy, his free hand brushing your hair away from your shoulder so he can leave a kiss against it. “Bent over, legs spread just a little, all for me to take. Pretty little hole wet for me, and so fucking tight. Can you imagine that?”

“I’m doing it right now.”

“It’s a thousand times better in person. Trust me.”

The same hand slips between your thighs, two fingers spreading your folds apart; the middle one circles your clit in a pace that matches his thrusts, sudden and shocking, and you arch your back upwards slightly with a choked noise. He finally releases your wrists, and you claw at the sheets helplessly to keep yourself somehow upright as the force of Mark’s hips, their impact against the backs of your thighs, pushes you forward, closer to the phone again. The stimulation is merciless, endless, and in the haze of your pleasure, you wonder if you should make Mark a little more jealous everyday if it gets him to act this way.

“Mark, I…. I’ve been— s-since—”

“Not yet,” he whispers, his teeth sinking into your shoulder as if to bring you back to reality. You shudder at the pain, the pleasure that accompanies it, and when you squeeze your eyes shut for a moment, you notice that a few tears escape your eyes. “Hold out for me a bit, okay? Please. It’s not enough. Not yet enough.”

You wonder if ‘enough’ is a concept the both of you even understand when it comes to wanting each other; already, you feel desire pooling in your stomach, threatening to spill from you, and clenching around him isn’t helping you stop it the way your body seems to think it’s supposed to. It also doesn’t help that Mark’s fingers are relentless, one still drawing tight, heavy circles around your clit, and the other creeping up under your shirt to tug down the cup of your bra, letting a breast spill into his warm palm. He kneads with an unusual — but not unpleasant — roughness, and you squeak out incoherently as he tweaks at the hardened bud of your nipple, pinching it between his thumb and forefinger.

“Hold on for me a little,” he continues murmuring, even after you shake your head and whisper ‘can’t’ to him over and over. “Do it for me. Tell Donghyuck — tell him how good it feels. How much you want to keep feeling me inside you.”

You don’t even know what to say; the pleasure that washes over you, the new kind of roughness that Mark exhibits has you drawing a blank, and you can only whine in a last attempt at protest, only for your tongue to start moving on autopilot, fueled by your want.

“It’s not enough,” you echo — and even if it feels like it is, even if it feels even more than you can possibly handle, something tells you that it’s true. “Not enough — need to feel you more, Mark. God, I want to feel you stretch me out, fuck my little hole into the shape of your cock— until no one else can fuck me but you—”

“What,” Donghyuck breathes out, his exhale coming across as static. “The fuck.”

You don’t have to explain; your babbling’s doing most of the work in that regard anyway, and you can tell by the wet, staccato noises on the other end that Donghyuck can easily piece together the scenario anyway. He’s jacking off to the both of you, something in your mind whispers, and the notion of that alone has you tightening around Mark’s cock. The change doesn’t go unnoticed, and his fingers sink deeper into your flesh; you cry out softly when you feel a jolt of pleasure as he gives your clit a sudden pinch.

“How much tighter can you get?” He sounds incredulous but also, interestingly, proud — there’s a smug tinge to his voice that arouses you even more. “Does it feel that good?”

“Fuck, yes,” you breathe out, the syllables quivering in your throat. “So good I’m going to lose my mind. Let me — God, please, let me—”

“Not yet,” Mark mumbles, and you whimper as he slows and slips out of you, his hand gently rubbing your folds in what feels like comfort — a small apology for his overt enthusiasm that you don’t even really need. “Just a little more. I need to see it.”

“See what?” Donghyuck’s voice is barely above a whisper, hoarse and pretty much muffled by the sound of his hand pumping his own shaft. Your head’s light, so your body moves on its own when Mark inches away slightly, giving you room to turn yourself around and lay on your back. You’ve barely even settled when he lifts your hips, dragging you closer to him and easing your thighs apart to slot himself between your legs.

His cock weighs heavy, pressed up against your folds, and he pushes his hips in a superficial thrust to get them to spread. His eyes fall briefly on your swollen clit, the wetness that you left on his shaft, even more of it still leaking from your hole. When he looks back up at you, there’s something triumphant in his gaze.

“Fucking gorgeous,” he coos, so lovingly it’d be hard to imagine his cock still sliding against your folds if you couldn’t feel it yourself. “I’ll never get enough of your perfect pussy — so perfect that it was made to take me.”

“See what?” Donghyuck presses, an impatience now coloring his voice. Mark chuckles, nodding at you and mouthing silently. Tell him.

Your inhale’s shaky, quivering like the rest of your body, and you don’t ever break away from Mark’s gaze, even as you speak.

“His cock fucking me in my stomach.”

Donghyuck’s ‘Jesus fucking Christ’ is drowned out by your cry of need as Mark pushes back into you. There’s no lag time now, no wait for any kind of adjustment; he takes you in one motion, until you feel his hips hit the backs of your thighs again. Your walls flutter around him, unable to process his size fully, and all that comes out of you is a string of messy mewls that’s constantly interrupted by the wet sounds of his thrusts.

Your body feels almost weightless, the only thing you can understand being the feeling of his cock pumping into you, stretching you out further. You’re only able to shake yourself out of the reverie when you feel his hands push back against your thighs, folding you in half, before they crowd atop your stomach.

“God, I need to feel it,” he groans out, his palms skimming under your navel, searching. “Please — do it for me.”

Even with your brain muddled, you don’t even have to try to figure it out; you let him feel it every time he asks. You inhale, deep and slow, until your stomach sinks, and the walls of your stomach flatten against his cock, which pauses briefly in its movements as he revels in the newfound feeling.

“That’s my girl,” he murmurs, and you flush in pleasure, in satisfaction at his praise. “Love seeing my cock inside you.”

He adjusts himself before he starts pumping into you again, burying his shaft all the way to the hilt each time; each thrust is followed by a soft sob from you, and you reach out, planting your hands on top of his. You obviously can’t feel his cock under your palms, but you don’t have to anyway; the fit’s tight enough that it feels, ridiculously, like he’s fucking your whole body, like he’s pressing into the deepest part of your core. You just want him to feel it more — the movement of the bulge under his hands, the resistance it has to push through to get to your stomach.

“Love feeling me inside you,” he continues, and his breathing stutters then, signaling that he’s also barely hanging on. “Love seeing how pretty you look when I rearrange your insides.”

You mouth out a disbelieving ‘what the fuck’ that earns you a simple smile, but Mark’s unrelenting in his movements anyway, his palms completely covering your stomach.

“Dude, I wanna see it too,” Donghyuck reminds you both of his presence when his voice comes through the speaker. “Put her on video.”

“No way,” comes Mark’s swift, firm reply. Donghyuck makes a noise of protest. “This is just for me.”

“Selfish as hell, calling me without really sharing.”

“The point wasn’t really ever to share.”

Mark’s hands suddenly press down on your stomach, and you stifle a soft scream; the pressure increases tenfold, as does the tightness of the fit, his cock brushing against your walls in a way that makes you feel breathless — it makes you feel used. Your hands fly up, fingers locking behind his neck, and you squirm under him, knowing fully well that you can’t escape anyway — not that you really want to, anyway.

“Mark,” you warn him again, your voice thin and airy. “I can’t anymore — I really—”

“I got you,” he murmurs — something you’ve come to learn he always says, always wants to let you know. He’ll be here until you break, until you can’t take anymore. “One second, okay?”

“Bro, what? Are you serious—” Even Donghyuck sounds confused, although his voice is tight too; he must be close, your mind weakly registers, but it doesn’t matter. Mark, albeit reluctantly, slips one hand away from your stomach — for a good cause, he must think, and you learn what it is when he ends the call, effectively cutting off Donghyuck’s complaints. Your eyes widen in confusion, but all Mark’s gaze is to you is reassuring, gentle, and he leans down to press a soft kiss to your lips before he answers your unspoken question.

“Can’t let him hear you cum,” he murmurs against your mouth. “That’s only for me, isn’t it?”

You nod, letting the movement of it brush your lips against his. “You’re the only one I’ll cum for — the only one that can make me.”

Above your head, his phone is trilling noisily; the vibrations course through your back, weak but persistent, and for some reason, it heightens your arousal all the more. Mark ignores it completely, single-mindedly focused on pistoning into you with the bulk of his strength. His hands push down just under your navel, increasing your awareness of the feeling of his cock, him fucking you, coaxing out your climax.

“Do it. Show me how pretty you look when you cum for me.”

You don’t think it’s possible for him to inject any more strength into his movements, but he proves you wrong time and time again; the wind’s knocked out of you as he braces himself and fucks you harder, sharper into the bed, and the only noises you can make are weak whimpers and choked sobs. Your mind’s so overrun with pleasure that your climax hits your body first before your mind fully parses it; your back arches again, and you mewl out something broken, something that sounds like his name as you come undone.

Mark still doesn’t relent, the tremble in your legs somehow only inspiring him to put more power in his thrusts. Even through the dazedness that comes with all the stimulation, you can see the fine details you’ve come to know so well — the tightness in his jaw, the growing flush across his collar, the quick heaving of his chest. He’s close too, so close he’s just holding himself back out of sheer force of will to make sure he can watch you come down from your climax completely. You don’t know why he has to, but you want to see him let go too, and you scramble for words, for more touch — pressing your thighs firm against his sides to keep him close, locked — just to get him there.

“Will you mark me up one last time?” You breathe out. He reacts almost instantaneously, moving to lean down and press his mouth against the still-untouched side of your neck, but your palm on his chest stops him from doing so. Surprise crosses his face, followed by slight confusion. You squeeze your thighs against him, trying to make your point, but even then, his brow furrows. “Mark me — inside.”

His eyes widen, and his hips stutter before they resume pace, his fingers digging into your stomach almost painfully as he tries to keep himself in control. “I— no, you know I can’t…”

“Do you want to?” You egg him on, your hand dropping from his chest to land on top of his again, adding to the pressure until you’re sure he can feel every small movement, every throb of his own cock inside you. “You can, you know — make me yours, from the inside out.”

“God — we can’t; you know we’d be in so much trouble.”

“But I’d let you anyway, if you wanted to. Do you ever think about it, Mark?” Your fingers toy with his, almost like you’re having a casual conversation instead of a situation in which he’s deep inside you, already aching for release. “Fucking your cum deep into me, letting it seep into my stomach — making sure no one else can fill me up?”

“Jesus,” he growls, and he reluctantly slips his hands out from under yours to grip your thighs. Realistically, he has enough strength to peel them away, have you release him, but his hold just tightens, not really making any motion to do so. You see the thought flash in his eyes, serious even just for a moment. He thinks about it all the time.

“Think about it,” you urge, your voice soft but close to a demand. “And every time you do, remember one day, you will — because you’re the only one that can.”

He tilts his head back, letting a growl rip from his throat, and he finally manages to push your thighs apart. You let him, let them fall apart so he can slip out of you. You watch him shift upwards, his knees on either side of your torso, and you’re met with the erotic sight of him fisting his cock in front of you, urging himself into completion. You do the only thing you can think of to help; you open your mouth wide, pushing your tongue out, silently asking for his load.

“Even when you do that, you’re fucking pretty,” he groans out, and his thumb presses his cock down, resting the underside flush against your tongue as he rocks his hips. “How much prettier are you going to look with my cum all over your face?”

He doesn’t have to wait long to find out, and you don’t have to respond; he gets the answer he wants with one last thrust against your tongue, and you close your eyes briefly, allowing yourself to drink in the taste, the smell of his cum as it streaks across your cheeks, all over your lips. You hear his release as it comes too — the soft rumble from his chest, the release of air that gently whistles through his teeth.

When you open your eyes again, Mark is looking down at you, a warm flush creeping up his cheeks and ears again; he’s breathless, panting as he comes down from his high. From the daze of his climax, a slightly sheepish look of apology crosses his face, and he reaches down, seemingly without any real plan, to clean you up, only to withdraw, slightly bemused, when you shake your head.

A laugh escapes him when you shimmy out from under him, straighten up, and extend your arms upward, puckering your lips in slight demand. You think he might reject you, but Mark doesn’t even hesitate longer than a second. He swoops down, capturing your lips in a fierce kiss, and your thighs press together tight as you enjoy the feeling of his tongue swiping away his cum from your bottom lip before he takes it between his teeth, sucking softly as if to clean you completely.

When he pulls away, his head dips into your shoulder; again, his face turns to press against the mark he’d left, and his teeth nip at the soft bruise that’s already begun to blossom. Satisfied by the soft noise you make at the sensitivity you feel from the contact, he breathes out, long and steady, against your skin.

“Just… can’t get enough of you,” he finally exhales, pressing another kiss to your neck; it’s gentler, situated just under your jaw.

“You don’t ever have to think about having enough,” you whisper, leaving a light nuzzle against his shoulder. “Just always think about having more.”

He lets out a breathy laugh, but he nods, accepting your offer anyway. A moment of silence passes, where you’re wrapped up in each other, his weight against you in a blanket of heat, and it stretches to what almost feels like an eternity — if not for the phone suddenly ringing again, Donghyuck’s name coming up on the ID. You both start, and Mark reaches over, fumbling with the sides of his device before he finds and toggles the silent switch.

“Seriously,” he grumbles, watching the call drop just for it to start up again, the screen flashing.

“We kind of left him hanging, to be fair.”

“No fairness.” Mark tosses the phone to the foot of the bed, where it lies, facedown and buzzing. “He got more than he deserved today.”

You watch him as he slips off the bed, rearranging himself before clipping his jeans button back into place. He whispers a gentle ‘be right back’ and exits the room, leaving the door only slightly ajar. You hear the water run in the bathroom, and a few moments later, Mark returns to your side, holding a damp towel.

He leaves a kiss after each light swipe across your face, as if to apologize for the pain he thinks he might be causing; you laugh, partly because it’s ridiculous, but mostly because you like it. He cleans your mouth last, even though there’s already nothing left, just so he has an excuse to leave a long, lasting kiss there.

You think it’s the last you’ll get for now, but he surprises you by bending down even further, hiking your shirt up your torso again. His hand rests on your thigh, keeping himself balanced as he presses a flutter of kisses around your navel, lingering at the exact spot that sits above where he knows his cock hits every time he bottoms out in you.

“One day,” he whispers into your skin before he looks up at you, his eyes shining. “I’ll really make you all mine.”

“Dummy.” Your voice is just as low, and you pull his head up again, enjoying the brush of his hair against your hand, the swoop of his jaw under your palm. “How many times do I have to tell you?”

“Every single day, considering I’ll never get tired of it.”

You hum, not one to deny him of what he asks anyway; you push him back onto his calves, climbing back onto his lap; it’s your favorite way to be near him, you decide, with almost nothing between you, almost everything of yours touching everything of his — like you fit in him perfectly. You rest your cheek against his shoulder, feeling their soft rise and fall as his breathing steadies, and you squirm a bit, if only to make sure his arms are locked securely around you — to make sure he won’t let go. Just like that, in his arms, you say it again — a truth, a fact, and a promise.

“I already am.”

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inkskinned · 1 year

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100,000 dollars is not a lot of money.

it is also a lot more money than i will ever have. my student loans make up half of that - they're coming back, i'm told, like we all bounced back recently. the other day while paying for gas to go to work, i overdrew my account without knowing it.

i sat in the car and looked at the charge and tried to do the math. where the fuck is the money even going? i don't live extravagantly. i live in a hole in the ground, in an apartment the size of a sneeze; covered in ants. yes, i wanted to live close to a population center. maybe that's my fault. i've downloaded the apps and i've spoken to the experts and i've cut back on excess. i can't help the pharmacy bills or the medical debt.

i have a good, well-paying job. when i googled it to see if i was getting a fair salary, i found out i'd be making "upper middle class" money. which doesn't make sense - is "upper middle class" now just "able to afford a one-bedroom without a roommate". when i was younger, upper-middle meant a nice big house and a backyard and vacations and not flinching about eating at a resturant.

i was talking to my friend who is a realtor. he said 100,000 dollars is extremely cheap for housing. he's not wrong. 100,000 dollars would change my life. 100,000 dollars also won't really buy you anything. it could get you out of debt, potentially, if you were lucky and had a certain amount of scholarships to tack onto your degree. you could pay off the car and then have enough left over for "spending" money. how fucking amazing. one vacation, maybe two if you're thrifty. and then - like magic - the money would evaporate into nothing. people would sigh and tell you see, you should have put it into savings! like "upper middle class" people can't afford to value "actually living" over squirrelling wealth. you should spend your life only in scarcity. like that is what made the rich people all their real "actually a lot of money".

100,000 dollars would literally set me free. it also would just set me back to "earning normally" instead of paying down debt into infinity. god, do you know how many of us just want that? that our first thought is we could stop scrambling and just be free of debt if we won the lottery? that we don't even necessarily need to stop working - we just wouldn't have to worry about failing or falling?

and. at the same time. 100,000 dollars is next to fucking nothing.

#writeblr #me paying my taxes this year:#haha good to know im literally doing more for my community out of my tiny apartment #than most corporations will do in their entire scope! :) these motherfuckers will NEVER pay taxes!!!#bc they lobby others to be sure we CHOKE :) !!!#i hope this is clear like. this isn't someone being like ''haha if i got 100k it wouldn't be a big deal''#it's more like. the gap between corporations and the ppl WORKING in those corporations #has become HORRIFIC. 100k to the company i work for is like. pocket change to them.#and it is LIFE CHANGING for me.#they could cut me a check for 100k tomorrow and not even budge their margin of error

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sincerelyrki · 9 days

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say it, you’re mine

your brothers best friend has always been there for you, even when you ask him to fake date you to make your ex back off.

pairing : brother’s best friend! sunghoon x fem!reader

warnings : suggestive. making out in public. sunghoon marking the reader (biting, etc).

wc : 1.1k

a/n : first time posting a written work in this account… kinda scary ngl. i’m not tagging my perm taglist on this post because it’s only for smaus. not sure how i feel about this one so please feel free to leave feedback <33 my asks are always open ;) also pt 2?

“Is he still watching?” Without looking away from your lips, Sunghoon nodded in confirmation, his bottom lip pulled between his teeth as he hummed at you.

“I think we need to make it more believable, will you let me kiss you?” Your eyes widened as Sunghoon grabbed your belt loops, unhesitatingly pulling you into his chest.

You looked up towards your brother's friend in shock, the thought of your ex watching fading with the overhead stereo.

Sunghoon felt your breathing hitch as he leaned down, his head tilting as his lips ghosted against your warm cheeks. “I promise, one kiss and he’ll never look at you again.”

Sunghoon wasn’t lying, he’d been waiting years for this moment to arise. A moment where he could press against you, feel your smoother lips melt into his as your cute noises sounded out from between his lips.

He could practically feel himself starting to throb, his need for you growing as the reality of the moment flourished throughout his veins.

His breathing now matched yours, his mouth almost salivating the second you nodded your head. “You promise he won’t bother me again?”

Sunghoon barely managed to swallow his scoff of disbelief, a daunting smile growing on his lips as he shook his head at you.

“Baby, have I ever lied to you?” He once again leaned in, this time towards your lips. He paused for a second, his nose brushed yours, his minty breath filling your senses.

“No one would ever bother you again.” A wolfish grin grew on his face as he saw your confusion grow, your innocence stirring an undiscovered feeling beneath his skin.

“I promised, didn’t I?” He softly cooed, his hand lifting to wrap around your bottom jaw. His thumb traced random circles against your soft skin, his calloused fingertips tracing down until it reached your chin.

In a needy daze, you nodded. Your patience wore thin the longer his lips hovered over yours.

A quiet whine left your lips as his thumb gently pressed against your bottom lip, putting just enough pressure to make it shape under his touch.

With his thumb still firmly pushing against you, he pressed his lips to yours with an open-mouthed kiss. He used his finger to pull your lips further apart, his entire hand moving down to gently wrap around your neck as his tongue wrapped around yours.

Sunghoon tilted his head to the side to get a better angle, his lips never leaving yours. He used his other hand to push against the back of your waist, pushing you further into him.

The second a small noise left your lips, Sunghoon was almost sure that he had popped one against you, his chest heaving as the noise reverberated down his spine.

The vibrations travelling from your lips to his was something he’d never experienced before, but it was just enough to create a dangerous addiction.

“You taste so good” Sunghoon whispered out in between kisses, his voice coming out almost unintelligible due to the state of his lips.

“Fucking want to kill everyone who’s ever kissed you before, you’re only mine.” You pulled back to breathe, heart racing as black dots filled your vision due to lack of oxygen. “Say it, say you’re mine”

Sunghoon pressed one last kiss against the corner of your lips before sucking a spot near your ear, your pulse directly beneath it.

“Say it” He almost growled, his teeth pressing deeper into your skin. You gasped in a pleasurable pain, eyes squeezing closed as your mouth dropped open in breathless pants.

“Only yours, I've only ever been yours.”

Sunghoon gently licked against your indented skin, your words pushing his mind into a deeper, unknown, mindset.

His sucking grew more deprived, and the feeling of not being close enough to you entered his mind in a spiralled web.

Sunghoon had never been as thankful for a club as he was now, the ability to kiss out without getting an odd look thrown his way driving him crazier than he thought was possible.

He looked up from under his lashes, only his eyes visible from over your shoulders. His eyes connected with the very ones of your long-forgotten ex, the other man’s jaw dropped as he glared at the two of you.

Sunghoon held the eye contact, making a show of trailing his hand up the bottom of your shirt, your back arching to accommodate his touch.

His cold hand contrasted your warm back, a quiet gasp leaving your lips as he transferred his cold body temperature to yours.

Sunghoon felt his pride growing the longer he watched your ex's reaction, his cheeks burning red as he cursed the two of you under his breath.

“More, please” Your needy whine brought Sunghoon back, his gaze softening at your begging. Sunghoon pulled off of your skin, small bite marks littering your once spotless neck.

“After you” Sunghoon threw you a teasing smile, his hand wrapped around yours as he slightly bowed in front of you. A quiet giggle of amusement left your lips at his dramatic play, heartwarming at the sight of his genuine smile.

Sunghoon allowed you to pull him through the crowd, his body almost completely pressing against your back as he trailed behind you.

Sunghoon looked over his shoulder, and with an exaggerated smile, he winked at your ex.

He should’ve known Sunghoon would leave with you, known that you’d always end up with him.

The loud shout followed by a glass breaking was enough for your wasted friends to notice your departure, shocked looks getting thrown around as they placed the dots together.

“I’m going to kill Sunghoon.” Your brother stood from his chair, his eyes rapidly moving across the entire room in search of his best friend.

His other friends shared looks, Jake taking the initiative to grab onto your brother's shoulder. “She’s safe with Sunghoon, you know he won’t let anything happen to her.”

And he was right. Sunghoon would never let another person touch you, especially not after he finally made progress with getting with you.

“You’re right, he’s probably helping her brush her teeth or something.” From behind your brother's back, the rest of his friends all shared looks, only nodding with false hums of agreement as your brother looked toward them.

“He’s definitely putting something in her mouth” Jake grunted in pain as an elbow got dug into his side, small snickers leaving his lips as your brother shot alarmed looks at him.

“What does that mean?” At the lack of response your brother grew more anxious, his voice raising a few decimals, “Jake? What does that mean?”

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 year

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Company that makes millions spying on students will get to sue a whistleblower

Yesterday, the Court of Appeal for British Columbia handed down a jaw-droppingly stupid and terrible decision, rejecting the whistleblower Ian Linkletter’s claim that he was engaged in legitimate criticism when he linked to freely available materials from the ed-tech surveillance company Proctorio:

https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/ca/23/01/2023BCCA0160.htm

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/20/links-arent-performances/#free-ian-linkletter

It’s been a minute since Linkletter’s case arose, so I’ll give you a little recap here. Proctorio is a massive, wildly profitable ed-tech company that sells a surveillance tool to monitor students while they take high-stakes tests from home. The tool monitors the student’s computer and the student’s face, especially their eye-movements. It also allows instructors and other personnel to watch the students and even take control of their computer. This is called “remote invigilation.”

This is ghastly in just about every way. For starters, Proctorio’s facial monitoring software embeds the usual racist problems with machine-learning stuff, and struggles to recognize Black and brown faces. Black children sitting exams under Proctorio’s gimlet eye have reported that the only way to satisfy Proctorio’s digital phrenology system is to work with multiple high-powered lights shining directly in their faces.

A Proctorio session typically begins with a student being forced to pan a webcam around their test-taking room. During lockdown, this meant that students who shared a room — for example, with a parent who worked night-shifts — would have to invade their family’s privacy, and might be disqualified because they couldn’t afford a place large enough to have private room in which to take their tests.

Proctorio’s tools also punish students for engaging in normal test-taking activity. Do you stare off into space when you’re trying through a problem? Bzzzt. Do you read questions aloud to yourself under your breath when you’re trying to understand their meanings? Bzzzt. Do you have IBS and need to go to the toilet? Bzzzt. The canon of remote invigilation horror stories is filled with accounts of students being forced to defecate themselves, or vomit down their shirts without turning their heads (because looking away is an automatically flagged offense).

The tragedy is that all of this is in service to the pedagogically bankrupt practice of high-stakes testing. Few pedagogists believe that the kind of exam that Proctorio seeks to recreate in students’ homes has real assessment merit. As the old saying goes, “Tests measure your ability to take tests.” But Proctorio doesn’t even measure your ability to take a test — it measures your ability to take a test with three bright lights shining directly on your face. Or while you are covered in your own feces and vomit. While you stare rigidly at a screen. While your tired mother who just worked 16 hours in a covid ward stands outside the door to your apartment.

The lockdown could have been an opportunity to improve educational assessment. There is a rich panoply of techniques that educators can adopt that deliver a far better picture of students’ learning, and work well for remote as well as in-person education. Instead, companies like Proctorio made vast fortunes, most of it from publicly funded institutions, by encouraging a worse-than-useless, discriminatory practice:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/24/proctor-ology/#miseducation

Proctorio clearly knows that its racket is brittle. Like any disaster profiteer, Proctorio will struggle to survive after the crisis passes and we awaken from our collective nightmare and ask ourselves why we were stampeded into using its terrible products. The company went to war against its critics.

In 2020, Proctorio CEO Mike Olsen doxed a child who complained about his company’s software in a Reddit forum:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/07/01/bossware/#moral-exemplar

In 2021, the reviews for Proctorio’s Chrome plugin all mysteriously vanished. Needless to say, these reviews — from students forced to use Proctorio’s spyware — were brutal:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/09/04/hypervigilance/#radical-transparency

Proctorio claims that it protects “educational integrity,” but its actions suggest a company far more concerned about the integrity of its own profits:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/16/unauthorized-paper/#cheating-anticheat

One of the critics that Proctorio attacked is Ian Linkletter. In 2020, Linkletter was a Learning Technology Specialist at UBC’s Faculty of Education. His job was to assess and support ed-tech tools, including Proctorio. In the course of that work, Linkletter reviewed Proctorio’s training material for educators, which are a bonanza of mask-off materials that are palpably contemptuous of students, who are presumed to be cheaters.

At the time, a debate over remote invigilation tools was raging through Canadian education circles, with students, teachers and parents fiercely arguing the merits and downsides of making surveillance the linchpin of assessment. Linkletter waded into this debate, tweeting a series of sharp criticisms of Proctorio. In these tweets, Linkletter linked to Proctorio’s unlisted, but publicly available, Youtube videos.

A note of explanation: Youtube videos can be flagged as “unlisted,” which means they don’t show up in searches. They can also be flagged as “private,” which means you have to be on a list of authorized users to see them. Proctorio made its training videos unlisted, but they weren’t private — they were visible to anyone who had a link to them.

Proctorio sued Linkletter for this. They argued that he had breached a duty of confidentiality, and that linking to these videos was a copyright violation:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/10/17/proctorio-v-linkletter/#proctorio

This is a classic SLAPP — a “strategic litigation against public participation.” That’s when a deep-pocketed, thin-skinned bully, like Proctorio, uses the threat of a long court battle to force their critics into silence. They know they can’t win their case, but that’s not the victory they’re seeking. They don’t want to win the case, they want to win the argument, by silencing a critic who would otherwise be bankrupted by legal fees.

Getting SLAPPed is no fun. I’ve been there. Just this year, a billionaire financier tried to force me into silence by threatening me with a lawsuit. Thankfully, Ken “Popehat” White was on the case, and he reminded this billionaire’s counsel that California has a strong anti-SLAPP law, and if Ken had to defend me in court, he could get a fortune in fees from the bully after he prevailed:

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1531684572479377409

British Columbia also has an anti-SLAPP law, but unlike California’s anti-SLAPP, the law is relatively new and untested. Still, Proctorio’s suit against Linkletter was such an obvious SLAPP that for many of us, it seemed likely that Linkletter would be able to defend himself from this American bully and its attempt to use Canada’s courts to silence a Canadian educator.

For Linkletter to use BC’s anti-SLAPP law, he would have to prove that he was weighing in on a matter of public interest, and that Proctorio’s copyright and confidentiality claims were nonsense, unlikely to prevail on their merits. If he could do that, he’d be able to get the case thrown out, without having to go through a lengthy, brutally expensive trial.

Incredibly, though, the lower court found against Linkletter. Naturally, Linkletter appealed. His “factotum” is a crystal clear document that sets out the serious errors of law and fact the lower court made:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aB1ztWDFr3MU6BsAMt6rWXOiXJ8sT3MY/view

But yesterday, the Court of Appeal upheld the lower court, repeating all of these gross errors and finding for Proctorio:

https://www.bccourts.ca/jdb-txt/ca/23/01/2023BCCA0160.htm

This judgment is grotesque. It makes a mockery of BC’s anti-SLAPP statute, to say nothing of Canadian copyright and confidentiality law. For starters, it finds that publishing a link can be a “performance” of a copyrighted work, which meant that when Linkletter linked to the world-viewable Youtube files that Proctorio had posted, he infringed on copyright.

This is a perverse, even surreal take on copyright. The court rejects Linkletter’s argument that even Youtube’s terms of service warned Proctorio that publishing world-viewable material on its site constituted permission for people to link to and watch that material.

But what about “fair dealing” (similar to fair use)? Linkletter argued that linking to a video that shows that Proctorio’s assurances to parents and students about its products’ benign nature were contradicted by the way it talked to educators was fair dealing. Fair dealing is a broad suite of limitations and exceptions to copyright for the purposes of commentary, criticism, study, satire, etc.

So even if linking is a copyright infringement (ugh, seriously?!), surely it’s fair dealing in this case. Proctorio was selling millions of dollars in software to public institutions, inflicting it on kids whose parents weren’t getting the whole story. Linkletter used Proctorio’s own words to rebut its assurances. What could be more fair dealing than that?

Not so fast, the appeals panel says: they say that Linkletter could have made his case just as well without linking to Proctorio’s materials. This is…bad. I mean, it’s also wrong, but it’s very bad, too. It’s wrong because an argument about what a company intends necessarily has to draw upon the company’s own statements. It’s absurd to say that Linkletter’s point would have been made equally well if he said “I disbelieve Proctorio’s public assurances because I’ve seen seekrit documents” as it was when he was able to link to those documents so that people could see them for themselves.

But it’s bad because it rips the heart out of the fair dealing exception for criticism. Publishing a link to a copyrighted work is the most minimal way to quote from it in a debate — Linkletter literally didn’t reproduce a single word, not a single letter, from Proctorio’s copyrighted works. If the court says, “Sure, you can quote from a work to criticize it, but only so much as you need to make your argument,” and then says, “But also, simply referencing a work without quoting it at all is taking too much,” then what reasonable person would ever try to rely on a fair dealing exemption for criticism?

Then there’s the confidentiality claim: in his submissions to the lower court and the appeals court, Linkletter pointed out that the “confidential” materials he’d linked to were available in many places online, and could be easily located with a Google search. Proctorio had uploaded these “confidential” materials to many sites — without flagging them as “unlisted” or “private.”

What’s more, the videos that Linkletter linked to were in found a “Help Center” that didn’t even have a terms-of-service condition that required confidentiality. How on Earth can materials that are publicly available all over the web be “confidential?”

Here, the court takes yet another bizarre turn in logic. They find that because a member of the public would have to “gather” the videos from “many sources,” that the collection of links was confidential, even if none of the links in the collection were confidential. Again, this is both wrong and bad.

Every investigator, every journalist, every critic, starts by looking in different places for information that can be combined to paint a coherent picture of what’s going on. This is the heart of “open source intelligence,” combing different sources for data points that shed light on one another.

The idea that “gathering” public information can breach confidentiality strikes directly at all investigative activity. Every day, every newspaper and news broadcast in Canada engages in this conduct. The appeals court has put them all in jeopardy with this terrible finding.

Finally, there’s the question of Proctorio’s security. Proctorio argued that by publishing links to its educator materials, Linkletter weakened the security of its products. That is, they claim that if students know how the invigilation tool works, it stops working. This is the very definition of “security through obscurity,” and it’s a practice that every serious infosec professional rejects. If Proctorio is telling the truth when it says that describing how its products work makes them stop working, then they make bad products that no one should pay money for.

The court absolutely flubs this one, too, accepting the claim of security through obscurity at face value. That’s a finding that flies in the face of all security research.

So what happens now? Well, Linkletter has lost his SLAPP claim, so nominally the case can proceed. Linkletter could appeal his case to Canada’s Supreme Court (about 7% of Supreme Court appeals of BC appeals court judgments get heard). Or Proctorio could drop the case. Or it could go to a full trial, where these outlandish ideas about copyright, confidentiality and information security would get a thorough — and blisteringly expensive — examination.

In Linkletter’s statement, he remains defiant and unwilling to give in to bullying, but says he’ll have to “carefully consider” his next step. That’s fair enough: there’s a lot on the line here:

https://linkletter.opened.ca/stand-against-proctorios-slapp-update-30/

Linkletter answers his supporters’ questions about how they can help with some excellent advice: “What I ask is for you to do what you can to protect students. Academic surveillance technology companies would like nothing more but for us all to shut up. Don’t let them silence you. Don’t let anyone or anything take away your human right to freedom of expression.”

Today (Apr 21), I’m speaking in Chicago at the Stigler Center’s Antitrust and Competition Conference. This weekend (Apr 22/23), I’m at the LA Times Festival of Books.

[Image ID: A girl working on a laptop. Her mouth has been taped shut. Glaring out of the laptop screen is the hostile red eye of HAL9000 from '2001: A Space Odyssey.' Behind them is a tattered, filthy, burned Canadian flag.]

Image: Ingo Bernhardt https://www.flickr.com/photos/spree2010/4930763550/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

Eleanor Vladinsky (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Canadian_flag_against_grey_sky.jpg

CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

#pluralistic #security through obscurity #copyfight #education #cdnpoli #whistleblowers #pedagogy #canada #intimidation #corruption #slapp #ian linkletter #proctorio #censorship #remote invigilation

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vaspider · 5 months

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An important definition of terms:

As far as I'm concerned, an assimilationist is someone who believes that queer people must assimilate in order to advance the cause of queer rights. An assimilationist creates a dress code for marches like the Mattachine Society did, fights against queer self-expression at Pride because "it holds back the movement," and believes that the only way for us to move forward is for all queers to live as cishet people do, but with little rainbow flags taped on.

An assimilationist is not "someone who wants the functions and institutions of cishet society to be available to queer people." It's someone who believes the only way to live is assimilated into cishet society, and anything else "holds us back." It's someone who wants Sylvia and Marsha to march at the back, and who prizes cishet aesthetic over practical liberation.

A liberationist is someone who believes that queer liberation is not contingent upon public performance of identity.

Let me repeat that, so we're absolutely clear: a liberationist believes that queer liberation is not contingent upon public performance of identity. ANY IDENTITY.

That means a sufficiently cishet identity and a sufficiently "respectable" identity, but it also means a sufficiently radical identity. If you actually believe in queer liberation, you don't just believe in liberation for people who look, act, and believe like you. You believe in liberation for people who genuinely want to get married, have babies by IVF and live in the suburbs as well as for people who want to live childfree on an anarchist trans commune/Llama farm.

I hear people use the term "Assimilationist" and "Assimilationist Victories" to dismiss as meaningless those victories that are insufficiently radical for their tastes, and that to me is only proof that those people are not actually liberationists in any meaningful way. In liberation, there must be room for people who actually do just want to get married and live quiet, content lives going to their kid's baseball games.

The difference between Assimilationist thought and Liberationist thought cannot be simply replacing "we need to blend in" with "we need to stick out." It cannot simply replace "we must be integrated into cishet society" with "we cannot ever integrate into cishet society and anything which permits us to do that if we so choose is insufficiently liberationist." That's the organizational equivalent of yelling YOU'RE NOT MY REAL DAD, and I'm fucking over it, y'all.

My liberation doesn't have to be your liberation. Your liberation doesn't have to look like mine. What matters is that we are helping each other up the mountain and making long-term plans to get to where we can, and that we recognize that every choice we make is going to leave someone behind, and we account for that and plan for that so we don't leave them behind forever.

We cannot regard gay marriage or gays in the military or instituting a nationwide right to transition or any of our future goals as an endpoint. They are only goals part of the way up the mountain.

We don't get to the top until we are all free to live as we choose without government or societal interference or sanction, and without having to perform an identity for those rights and respect. The freedom to be ourselves must include the right to "blue hair and pronouns" but it also must include the right to "your kid's school plays and a duplex in a suburb." The latter is not an assimilationist lifestyle unless you try to enforce it on everyone.

I'm so, so tired of people acting like they're radical thinkers for poo-pooing the civil rights advances that the community has achieved through literally decades of work as "assimilationist victories." That's not clever, cute, or correct. Every. Single. One. Of those victories is written in tears and sweat and blood. Every single one is wrapped in the funeral shrouds of people who died fighting for it. Every single one was achieved not by assimilationists alone, but neither by people who think the only true victories are the ones sufficiently pure in their leftist credentials.

It is extremely possible and indeed likely that if you judge queers by their aesthetic, you will miss partnering with some of the most radical people and shackle your movement to people who cloak regressive politics in radical language. I've heard some truly noxious words come out of mouths framed by snakebites, and I've known extremely radical thinkers who look like your grandma. And I gotta tell you, in those local elections which keep school boards free from Moms For Liberty? The latter are useful people for liberationists to know and have in our camp, those people who think like liberationists but look like your grandma or your auntie.

Enforcement of aesthetic as a condition of liberation is assimilationist thought. It doesn't matter if the assimilation is to pink hair and tattoos or polo shirts and khakis - enforcement of aesthetic and philosophy as a condition of liberation is assimilationist thought. It's just replacing one kind of demanded conformity with another, and when we say "none of us are free until all of us are free," that also means free to be fucking boring if we want to, full stop.

We talk a lot about how much work goes into being disabled, how much work we have to put into making appointments, and fighting bureaucracy, but this is also true of queer life. Freedom comes with ease, with being easily able to update paperwork, with being easily able to find employment and housing, with being easily able to create the family structures we want to live in. When all of us can wake up in the morning assured of security in our beds, food in our bellies, meds in our med trays as needed, and a day ahead of us filled with chosen purpose and chosen meaning, which ends with us back in the bed of our choice at the end of the day, fulfilled in purpose and secure in our homes and chosen families, then we are free, and not before.

You may notice a seeming contradiction in this, in that my liberationist philosophy has room in it for the very people who are currently annoying the fuck out of me by demanding allegiance to a leftist aesthetic over practical liberation (that is, a movement based in harm reduction and long-term strategy over adherence to leftist purity of thought).

This is not a contradiction.

It is not a bug. It is a feature. My liberationist ideals mean that people have to have the right to be wrong without their liberty hinging on being right, that's all. :)

#and fucking obviously there is no room in liberationist thought for fascism #so don't start #spider's essays

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flowercrowngods · 2 months

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it's yearning steddie get high with the others and make out about it hours (smut-ish)

Eddie hates being reminded that making promises to himself, and only himself, is pretty much useless if the only person holding him accountable to stick to his promise is one Eddie fucking Munson. Because that guy can’t be trusted.

Especially not when it comes to Steve and his stupid perfect hair, his stupid perfect dimples, his preppy fucking everything, and — perhaps most importantly — the breathy note his voice gets when the boy replaces his beautiful piece of brain with Eddie’s finest weed.

Steve in all his sober glory is unbearable at best, sure, that’s old news. But high? When the pained frown he’s not even aware of until he complains about a headache smoothes out and the tension in his shoulders disappears? When his scars no longer pull at every movement and he can hold himself again in the way he used to before everything — broad movements with a clumsy little edge to them that have Eddie’s heartstrings play rope skipping with his sanity.

That. That’s it. That’s it for Eddie.

And it’s no surprise that it’s also what leaves him helpless in the face of Nancy hopefully suggesting they get high again tomorrow night; all of them. Offering Eddie the chance at getting to see that tension fall away again, and that pale smile be replaced with an easy, genuine, lingering one — dreamy and so fucking pretty.

Luring Eddie with the most beautiful insanity.

So he says yes, despite having promised himself that he wouldn’t. Not after what happened last time. With Steve all the way up in his space, brushing his hair behind his ear with wonderment, trailing his hand down that lock until he forgot what he was going to say. What he was going to do.

Forgetting, too, that Eddie was sober, because he wanted to watch Steve without getting caught — but Steve, all high and sweet and tactile, apparently decided to do the same. He looked. And touched. And smiled and breathed and stayed right there. Fingertips dancing around the frayed ends of Eddie’s hair.

Something shifted — first between them, then around them. And then between them again when Eddie stepped back and turned away, in desperate need of a cool drink to stave off the feeling of being caught, of being trapped, of being so fucking gone on the prettiest god-damn boy in all of Indiana. And of having said boy look at him like that.

They shouldn’t get high again. They shouldn’t.

But he knows it helps with the pain like their meds never do; he knows it helps Nance sleep better, breathe better, exist in this post-apocalyptic world that doesn’t even remember the apocalypse, whose only reminders lie in the scar tissue of some teenagers and some graves that nobody knows are empty.

He knows that if he says no, they’ll find someone else to provide; and he doesn’t like the thought of that. Not one bit.

So it’s not even the thought of Steve’s dazed little smile that gets him to agree, nodding at Nance with an easy smile, saying, “Sure, let’s do it.”

But it is the thought of Steve’s dazed little smile, his breathy voice, his tactile nature that comes out even more when he’s high out of his mind like he knows he’s floating and needs someone to anchor him, and the memory of that stolen little moment, that makes Eddie curse himself to all hells once Nancy’s blooming smile is out of sight and he’s free of judgment to kick the kitchen counter beside him with a hearty curse.

He can do it. He can. All he needs to do is not stay sober this time, take the edge off and get out of his head about all of this, because he’s actually far less likely to do anything stupid under the influence, and also not look at Steve All Eyes On Me Harrington.

Easy.

Right?

Totally.

Except, as it turns out, ignoring Steve is both easier and harder than Eddie expected. The thing is, he’s good at diving into any conversation with just about anyone, making it larger than it needs to be until everyone in the room will give him funny looks but still roll with it, because Eddie Munson is just Like That, right?

But Steve doesn’t give him funny looks. Oh, they’re far from fun. There’s something in there that reminds Eddie of a kicked puppy in those fleeting moments that he lets his eyes meet Steve’s, never letting them linger, never letting them take him in and hold him and bask in the sunlight that is stored in those… Those beautiful, beautiful eyes. And that pretty, pretty face.

A face that shouldn’t look so sad.

He wants to ask what’s wrong, ask him if it’s a bad pain day, ask him if he didn’t sleep last night either, or if something happened. But how is he supposed to ask, to let any words come out of his mouth, when Steve just won’t look away. When he’s looking at Eddie like that again, when the little something that has shifted between them suddenly becomes massive enough to steal all the air away from his lungs and make his arms tingle in a way that he knows will only get better if he gets to wrap them around Steve.

He can’t. So he doesn’t. He doesn’t ask. But he doesn’t look away either, and he knows he’s already lost. He knows he broke this promise he made to himself.

But it’s fine, maybe, if the slight twitch in the corners of Steve’s lips is anything to go by. Like he, too, wants to say something but can’t. Like he knows Eddie is the same. Like his heart is racing, too, and he tried not to look but they’re so stupid and looked anyway and now they can’t—

“Guys?” Robin interrupts their little moment, the bubble bursting with a loud snap of her fingers that makes Eddie physically flinch.

He looks at her, spooked to shit and gasping because he does not do well with sudden loud noises or the impromptu bursting of bubbles — not after everything that happened.

“Shit, sorry, oh my God!” Robin’s there immediately, reaching for his hand, Nancy laying hers on his shoulder, Jonathan making himself known with a gentle little, “You’re fine, man.”

Eddie regains his footing and breathes away the panic, thinking that maybe getting high today wasn’t such a bad idea after all. He hands Robin the baggie and stuffs his hands into his pockets, making himself a little smaller by muscle memory alone.

Steve’s hand comes to rest between his shoulder blades — reassuring and warm. Like a flower, Eddie rises to follow it. He catches Steve’s smile out of the corner of his eyes and wants to rest his face against it. Wants to feel it against his skin. Wants to feel it shift into something deeper. Something real.

God, he’s so hopeless.

Good thing that Robin’s got the blunt under control, because Eddie does not trust his hands right now.

They grab the snacks and drinks and head outside to where Steve and Robin laid out pillows and blankets on the lawn, framed with dimly glowing white Christmas lights that Robin insists upon whenever they do this. Makes it feel a little less fucked up for her. Like we’re doing this because we want to, and not because we need it to sleep or to cope with the pain or whatever, you know? Put pretty lights anywhere, and it’s a choice.

Eddie has to admit that she has a point there, but the truth is he’ll smoke anywhere, fairy lights or no. Although there’s something, a capital-s Something about watching Steve framed by a thousand little lights smoothing out the worry lines on that beautiful face and making him seem all the more angelic for it.

Eddie actually called him angel once — the first time they did it like this. Made Steve smile like nothing else Eddie’s said to him since. Or anyone else for that matter. If he were any better at feeling the ground beneath his feet and the air in his lungs, he’d call him that again. Make him smile like that again.

But the ground is shifting and air is always scarce these days, with Steve’s hands on his body so fleetingly, so accidentally leaving marks on scar tissue, making Eddie wish he could feel more of Steve’s warmth there.

Making him wish he could ask. Touch me higher. Lower. Longer. Make it last. Make it count. Let me feel it, just for a second. Let me feel it where they didn’t steal chunks of my skin and my soul and, apparently, my sanity.

Argyle is the first to spread out on the blankets with a hearty groan that leaves everyone with a fond smile, gathering around him in a semi circle of amusement. He makes grabby hands at Robin, or maybe at the unlit joints she’s safekeeping — but either way, she follows suit, cuddling up to Argyle and in turn making grabby hands at Steve, who does as he’s told and laughs in that gentle, melodic way that they so seldomly hear these days.

Steve’s eyes fall on Eddie then, but a surge of worry and panic overcomes him, half expecting Steve to follow Robbie’s and Argyle’s example and reach for Eddie next. Or not reach for him. Either way, Eddie doesn’t want to find out, his heart beating in his chest at the endless possibilities stowed away in his overactive imagination. Instead of waiting for Steve’s next move, he sits down right here at the opposite end of the blanket, reaching for one of the pillows so he can hug it to his chest and have something to hold on to, just to keep his hands busy.

“Just don’t crush the goods there, birdie,” he grins, watching Nancy and Johnathan find a place to sit, too. He scoots over to make room for them, moving further from Steve in the process and feeling the distance in his chest. It’s so stupid. Fucked up, really.

“Oh, the goods are plenty safe, my dude,” Argyle says, earning himself a giggly groan from Robin that sounds a lot like, Gross!

Jonathan throws a pillow in Argyle’s face, which he deftly catches with just as salacious a grin.

Eddie tunes them out for a moment as he catches Steve’s eyes boring into him. He cocks an eyebrow and inclines his head, silently asking him what’s up in way less magical a way than he has with Robin.

He doesn’t really expect Steve to react in any way other than maybe a shrug or a brief, reassuring smile that really has no meaning other than, I’m fine, except for all the ways you know I’m not.

But Steve doesn’t smile. And he doesn’t shrug. He keeps his eyes on Eddie and fucking pouts. Looks like he’s not even aware of it, his eyes a little glazed already, seeming far away. Far away and right here and looking so fucking sad about it. About the few feet between them and Eddie being all the way over there.

It’s a bit like the moment they shared earlier, with Steve looking so sad and Eddie wanting to do something about it. He couldn’t then. But now…

Eddie’s breath hitches a little as he mirrors Steve’s position, falling backwards and leaning on his elbows., never once dropping his eyes. Stretching out his legs until he can nudge Steve’s ankle with his foot. Watching as those eyes snap down to the briefest contact in surprise, watching as Steve looks caught. And watching, too, as his lips twitch and his foot slowly, incrementally moves closer to Eddie’s like he can’t help it. Like he needs to touch him. Always, always needs to touch him.

And Eddie can feel it there, so he doesn’t move away. He wants to hold his hand, wants to run his fingers through his hair and for Steve to do the same. He wants to breathe him in, wants to live in a Steve-filled world and feel welcomed in it.

But he can’t. Because they’re not like that. And because this moment is not like that. And Steve is… Well, he is like that, he’s pretty sure. But maybe not for Eddie. Maybe not like that.

Steve’s foot is warm against his, pristine white baseball socks so stark a contrast against Eddie’s; threadbare and black, with more holes than fabric these days. He can’t really help the wave of embarrassment that washes over him, or the urge to pull back his feet and hide them in his shoes again. Sacrifice the warmth for safety.

But then Steve seems to notice just a second after Eddie does, and he smiles. Huffs a little with it, like it just bubbles out of him. Eddie wants to lean across the blanket and chase it. Chase the fondness and keep it there forever.

And that’s another thing about Steve that is so very fucked up: he doesn’t let Eddie hide. He doesn’t let him trade warmth for security, because — smile in place — Steve slowly moves his feet along the side of Eddie’s like he’s playing fucking Connect the Dots with the holes in his socks. It’s ridiculous.

It’s ridiculous, and Eddie is helpless. He’s so gone, a hundred percent. He’s so fucked up over that silly boy and the way he smiles at the most lamest of things.

It’s not his fault that he leaves his feet where they are, the warmth of Steve’s slow, teasing touch shooting electricity up his legs that leaves him with goosebumps and a sudden case of uncomfortably tight jeans.

He’s glad there’s still a pillow in his lap. And he’s glad, too, that the night is dark enough, the fairy lights not bright enough, to reveal the flush rising to his cheeks as it feels like the bravest thing he’s ever done stay like this. To have Steve looking at him like this. Eyes hooded and intense. Like he sees right through Eddie. Like he likes what he sees.

With a dull click, Robin’s Zippo pulls him back to reality in what must be the gentlest of ways, and Eddie manages a smile as he watches her gently place the doobie between Steve’s lips before she lights it, one hand on his cheek. Their faces light up, leaving the rest of the world in the dark, and Eddie is struck with how good they are together.

There’s something in the way she lights the joint for him, some kind of love language from the girl who burnt down the hell dimension below them and left it in ashes, and the boy who held her hand through it.

She holds his eyes as the flame dies and something passes between them as Steve slowly closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Takes that first hit.

Eddie’s smile falters as he watches, the glowing cherry coming to life and lighting up Steve’s face, revealing that relaxed little smile on his lips as he holds it in for five, six, seven before exhaling around it in a slow, drawn-out way. He blows it in Robin’s face like he always does, and Robin laughs and shoves him back, like she always does.

And Eddie wants to trade her place. Like he always does. Eyes transfixed on Steve as he takes the next hit and pulls the joint from between his lips. Holding his breath again. And Eddie wants to be held like that. Wants to fill Steve’s lungs like that, wants to leave an aftertaste that is both sweeter and biting as he does to Steve what that first hit does to him. Leaving him all soft and gentle and so, so at ease, his eyes droopy and all those lines of pain and worry smoothed out by him. Eddie. On his lips. In his mouth. Fuck, anywhere, really. Everywhere.

He follows Steve on his exhale, his head getting a little dizzy with the lack of air, but still he is slow to breathe in again. It feels strangely intimate, watching him like this. Watching as that tension falls away and he hums a little around the bud — relaxed and relieved and appreciative. It feels like they’re the only people left in this town, in this state, maybe in the whole world.

Eddie wants to stay alone like this forever, chase Steve’s breath and wish it would hit his face like that, caress his cheeks until the air around them claims it and erases all traces of Steve; but not from Eddie’s skin. Never from his skin.

But they’re not alone. And Steve opens his eyes. And Eddie is caught.

Still he doesn’t move, doesn’t look away as Steve blows out the smoke, sweet and earthy in the air between them as it slowly finds its way to him across the blanket. He imagines that he can feel it as the smell grows stronger, imagines the smoke to feel warm against his cheek as he breathes it all in, holding those hazel eyes in the dark that refuse to look away from him.

It’s like that moment the other day in Steve’s kitchen when he was so close Eddie could smell all of him, frozen as he was, rooted to the spot — too scared to move and reveal himself, reveal all of himself, all the ugly truths and dreams. His wishes. His desires.

Why do you keep looking? Eddie wants to ask. What are you looking to find? Am I just an experiment to you, are you looking at yourself through my eyes? Say something. Anything.

But Steve doesn’t. He never does. Steve Harrington isn’t really the type to just say what’s on his mind, too used to Robin by his side to just read it all and react in her own way. Too used to Dustin, who’d do the talking for him. Too used to just letting his eyes, his arms, his posture convey his message.

Too used to people knowing him. Getting a good read on him. But not Eddie, because Eddie never learned how to fucking read people like Steve Harrington cast in pretty light and relaxation. Angry, he can read him no problem. When he’s pissed, when he’s annoyed, when he’s sad. Tense. Worried.

But not this. Never this. This intensity, this steady gaze resting only on him. He never looks at Robin like that, and he doesn’t fucking look at anyone else lately.

It’s driving Eddie insane.

It’s too much.

He snaps when Steve passes the joint back to Robin, and sits up to pull his feet back to himself, covering them with his hands to pretend the warmth is still there. Frowns at the holes in his socks, feeling more exposed than ever. He curls in on himself a little, pretending to be very fascinated with a little thread that’s come loose in the blanket beneath him while the others hold casual conversation around him.

This was a bad idea. He’s so fucked.

Part of him debates if he should leave, if he should just call it a day and bid them goodnight. The other part of him wants to just close the distance between him and Steve and settle in beside him so the weight of that gaze won’t fucking wear him down any more.

But knowing Steve, that wouldn’t work.

Knowing Steve, nothing works.

Feeling pathetic and small, Eddie lets himself fall to his side, hiding his face behind Nancy, whose hand comes to rest in his hair, combing through it just a little bit. Allowing him to collect himself. This isn’t new, and they don’t really question when Eddie just randomly lies down anywhere, or if he just stops talking all of a sudden.

It’s why they do this, after all. No judgment. No questions. Just the sweet, sweet release of Mary Jane.

It helps, having her hands in his hair like this, grounding him. It helps, finding no question or worry in her eyes as she looks down at him with a little smile — her way of including him in the conversation. He smiles back, just a little bit, and closes his eyes to better focus on her hand rather than the moment. She chuckles when he begins to purr, and then the smile stays a little longer.

After a while, when she offers him the joint, Eddie shifts to lie on his back and gazes up to find the clouds have cleared and revealed the night sky behind them. It’s pretty, the summer sky, and he takes a long drag trying to think of nothing else. A hot wave of smoke hits his lungs, and it tickles a bit just like it always does, but the urge to cough it back out has been gone for years. These days, his lungs allow the warm embrace of the smoke and allow him to hold his breath as long as he wants, feeling a pleasant buzz after the fifth drag. It’s the good stuff after all. Munson’s Finest.

He passes the joint back to Nancy, too comfortable to get up and pass it to anyone else, trusting her to do it without complaint. She does. She’s an angel like that. Puts her hand back in his hair and plays with his overgrown bangs a little while Eddie just stares up at the sky.

Steve’s talking, but the words don’t really translate. It doesn’t matter, though. Just hearing his voice is enough for Eddie to sort of drift into a pleasant sphere of nothingness, his chest tightening a little with it. Always, always tight when he hears that voice. Like his heart has grown three times its size and his ribcage didn’t get the memo that Eddie Munson is hopelessly, helplessly, endlessly gone for a boy who refuses to look away.

The thing is, Steve has always looked. Always. Even in the Upside Down. The first time, and the second. And then, the third. And Eddie wants it to mean something. Wants it to mean everything, or at least carry that possibility.

But there’s no way to find out. There’s only him and the stars and Nancy Wheeler’s hand in his hair after his life took several wrong turns that left him with more scar tissue than skin these days, and the horrible realisation that, after the world ended and rebuilt, he can fall in love. That he can want. That he can have these cravings that he’d always heard everyone else talk about, wondering if that was just another layer of freak to him, or if he was simply Like That.

They’re lonely realisations, he finds. Alienating, in a way. Because not only does he not know how to navigate Harrington, no, he’s a riddle even to himself right now.

All he knows is that he wants to touch. To hold. To kiss. To crawl into him, on top of him, beneath him, and pull his own name from those lips in tiny little gasps that have nothing in common with the frantic gasps of panic after their first stint with the hell dimension. He wants a do-over. He wants a chance. A real fucking chance to have all these smiles, all these looks mean something.

Arm outstretched, he reaches for the blunt again, taking it from whomever has it right now, aiming to shut off his brain a little more. Not to suppress it, but to shut it off. Even if that means he has to finish this thing. It’s fine. They have more. They always have more, because Jon and Argyle have an unreal fucking tolerance.

With a chuckle, Nancy bypasses his hand and puts the joint between his lips and ignores his indignant hum.

“Treat yourself”, she says, her voice wonderfully slow and lower in pitch. “I’ll be right back, yeah?”

“‘Kay.”

The warmth of her hand leaves his scalp, and with her body gone — getting up in way too swift a motion even for sober people — the night air seems a little colder. Eddie shivers a little, refusing to look at anyone, and just takes drag after drag, deciding he’ll finish this one. It’s his weed after all.

By the sounds of it, Robin is already lighting the next one. Good girl. Smart girl. Best fucking girl in the whole wide world.

Thick clouds of hot smoke waft through his lungs and all the way through his body up to his brain, leaving his arms and legs with a tingling feeling and his head with a pleasant buzz and tunes out most everything else around him. It’s great. It’s good. It’s wonderful.

It’s why he doesn’t realise that the air is warm again and a body shielding him from everyone else until there’s a hand in his hair again. He opens his eyes to snark at Wheeler, but—

It’s not Wheeler. It’s Steve. Knees pulled to his chest, chin resting on top as he smiles down at Eddie.

Neither of them says a word, but Eddie’s breath hitches. Stops, stutters. Just like his heart. And yet all he can do is stare up. Wonder if it’s real. Wonder if it’s real.

“Is this okay?” Steve whispers, fingers barely touching Eddie’s skin as he sort of plays with his hair.

After a beat or two, Eddie nods, careful not to move too much. Careful not to chase those fingers and all the things they could mean.

“Good.”

And then Steve pulls the joint from between Eddie’s lips, and Eddie wants to warn him because this one’s close to the end and bound to be stronger, but it doesn’t seem to faze Steve as he just sucks in the smoke like it’s the first lungful of air he gets after a long day stuck inside. Smiling around the bud as it dies between his lips, he presses it into the grass beside him, extinguishing the last of it.

He exhales, and Eddie can make out a tiny cloud of smoke against the night sky, watching as it wanders toward him. He waits for Steve to say something. There is what feels like intent in the movements of his hand, in the sudden appearance by his side, and in the way he— he fucking looks at him again. The sky is full of stars, the backyard full of fairy lights, and Steve Harrington is looking at him.

“You okay?” Eddie asks at last, breaking the silence, wondering if his voice always sounds so small, so quiet, so endlessly tiny. Wondering if Steve even heard.

But he did, because he smiles again. He did, because his hand stills. Touches Eddie’s skin. His scalp, his temple.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, looking from Eddie’s eyes to his own hand with something akin to wonder. Or marvel.

And Eddie shivers again when that hand travels down. Caressing his cheek, definitely with intent. Electricity shoots through his body again, and the intensity in Steve’s eyes leaves him with goosebumps. He doesn’t move. Doesn’t dare. Barely even swallows as Steve bites his lip absently and moves on, trailing from Eddie’s cheek down to his...

He’s touching his lips, and Eddie doesn’t breathe. Steve runs his forefinger along Eddie’s bottom lip, and in another world would he open his mouth and nip on his fingers or gasp at the touch and be better at this, be so much better at everything. But in this one, he lies motionless as Steve just fucking… explores.

And his touch is so light, it’s so gentle, so sweet on the rough scar tissue, and yet so absent, it doesn’t have to mean anything. He could pull back his hands now and claim that Eddie had something there. He could pull back and live his life unchanged. Leave Eddie behind in this state of paralysis, changed irrevocably, and be safe.

But that’s not what Steve does.

Steve was never one to choose safety over bravery, and he has the scars to prove it now. The permanent stiffness of his back that barely lets him feel anything these days. The set in his jaw when he breathes through the pains phantom and real, the crease between his brows when the memory pains flare up.

But his back is hunched in comfort now rather than in pain, and his shoulders are at ease. His lips are lightly ajar around a barely-there smile, and the skin between his eyes is smooth. Eddie wants to reach out and trace it, wants to caress it in the hopes that it’ll stay smooth forever.

He’s so pretty. Golden light catching his skin in all the right ways, leaving him positively glowing with that look he gives Eddie. That look.

Eddie’s never felt so exposed. So vulnerable. Laid bare, ready for dissection and willing to be taken apart in the hopes of letting him find what he wants and take it. Rip it right out of his chest. Now that he has Steve’s hand on his skin in the lightest of touches that’s anything but fleeting, he knows he would let him take anything he wants. Knows he would be helpless to stop him.

Helpless in the face of that gaze that trails down to his lips now, if only to follow his fingers.

“Steve,” Eddie breathes, barely moving his mouth at all around that single syllable.

Golden hazel eyes flit back to his, and they widen a little. Like suddenly it’s Steve who’s caught.

What are you doing? Eddie wants to ask. What are we doing? Don’t stop. Never stop.

But words are for moments lighter than this one. Words are not meant for a world that’s changing.

Maybe that is why Steve puts his hand on Eddie’s chin, tipping it up and turning his face toward him in a gesture so tender it’s almost possessive. Electricity shoots through Eddie again and the air between them is sizzling with it, sizzling because Steve is moving, shifting, dipping his head, his hand coming to rest on Eddie’s throat to keep him from moving away — except there is no force in his touch, and Eddie could still run.

He could. He should, maybe. Like last time.

But he is suspended in time, chained to the ground by the weight of Steve’s gaze and the hand on his throat, and his heart is beating so hard, so fast, that he is sure Steve can feel it. Imagines that those fingers move to find his pulse. Imagines that they find their home there, imagines that they hear the tales of stolen hearts and desires that leave his blood rushing.

Imagines that Steve falters a little, hovering just above Eddie. Dreams of it all, dreams that this is real and that he can have this, just for tonight. He nods, and it’s a tiny little thing, far from enough to ruin this moment or wake him from his dream.

But then Steve captures his lips with such care that Eddie snaps back into his body and realises that this is no dream. Steve is kissing him. Hovers above him with one arm resting in the grass above Eddie’s head, his other hand pulling Eddie’s face towards himself and being oh so gentle about it.

A whimper escapes him when this new reality settles inside his body, leaving him reeling and pulled towards a world of possibilities as those lips, those warm lips, rest so indulgently against his.

No longer chained, Eddie carefully lifts a hand to Steve’s head, because Steve can feel him there, too, and because he doesn’t want this to end. Because he needs to touch. All night, all week, all this time he has needed to touch. To cradle. To hold.

To keep.

Steve hums, and those lips pull into a smile before closing around Eddie’s bottom lip. The first touch of Steve’s tongue has jolts of electricity and arousal zinging through Eddie’s body again, lingering this time and making a home in his legs that begin to tingle with want.

Eddie opens his mouth, tilting his head a little to get a better angle, and is rewarded with the careful, addictive touch of Steve’s tongue against his. It makes Steve smile again, just for a second — but long enough to make Eddie’s heart jump.

He chases those lips when they pull back, capturing them with a little hum as he realises he comes more and more unchained, regaining feeling and control over his body, his mind, his scared little heart. Steve doesn’t hesitate to reciprocate, pushing Eddie’s head down into the grass again with an urgency that Eddie is beginning to understand matches the hunger he’s feeling.

The hunger that is reserved only for Steve. It leaves him breathless, leaves him with the sudden need to gasp for air, but then Steve’s tongue is in his mouth again and maybe he doesn’t need to breathe ever again.

He loses himself in the wet slide of their tongues that feels so sensual it’s almost obscene, and all he can do is tangle his fingers in Steve’s hair and keep him right where he is while Eddie himself lies boneless, all the blood rushing down, down, down. Every nip of Steve’s teeth as he devours Eddie so entirely and yet so innocently, so sweetly, so carefully, and every time he sucks on his lips or his tongue results in another wave of intense arousal. And Eddie is stuck in the riptide of it.

It doesn’t take long for the first moan to break the silence, a gasped little thing, almost like an afterthought, and he’s not sure if that was him or Steve; but he doesn’t really care either way, because he’s so hard, he feels like he can come from just Steve sucking on his tongue alone.

And isn’t that an enticing thought.

“Steve,” he whispers, not entirely sure what he’s going to say, or if that’s really all he needs to say. All that’s left to say. Steve, Steve, Steve.

The only response he gets is a breathy little, “Fuck,” and it sounds like a revelation. Like an epiphany. And Eddie wants to hear it again, wants to swallow all the little noises and murmurs and everything Steve will give him.

“You’re so—“ Steve begins, interrupting himself with another deep, hungry kiss. “Fuck. You’re…”

“Yeah?” Eddie counters, breaking the kiss by pulling on Steve’s hair a little. “I’m what?”

Steve hesitates, panting breaths dancing over Eddie’s skin and he smells so fucking good. Eddie wants to lick the aftershave and perfume and sweat off his neck and keep the taste on his tongue for days. Dark, blown eyes wander over his face, and the hand that was on his throat comes up to rest on his cheek again in a gesture so gentle that it almost gives him whiplash. The hunger is gone — or, not gone, but unimportant now.

Steve smiles, hazy but genuine and so, so sweet, eyes zeroing in on Eddie’s no doubt swollen lips.

“Been wanting to do that forever.”

Eddie’s heart jumps, falters, falls. Just a little. Just the rest of the way. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Wanna kiss you forever.”

“Yeah, well,” Eddie breathes, voice barely there because his breath has well and truly been taken away, and this moment feels so fragile. So easily broken by quick movements or thoughts that are just a little too loud, just a little too soon. “‘M not gonna stop you.”

Steve’s eyes snap back to his, and there’s something in there that not even the weed could ease away. “Yeah?”

Eddie nods, frowning a little, wondering what makes him so unsure.

“Cool,” Steve says, and it’s almost nonchalant and definitely charming in that way he always is. Makes Eddie laugh a little, his other hand coming up to wipe a strand hair out of his eyes. “So…” He trails off.

“Hmm?”

“Wanna stay here? Or go inside, or…”

And then it’s not arousal that overcomes him but worry. And guilt. And a bit of fear, because that’s not what this is for him. Not like this. Not when they’re high, not for the first time.

He swallows, schooling his face to cooperate and not give it all away right now, not give away how helplessly gone he is for that boy and how he would do anything Steve wants, how he would take anything he can get and try to make it be enough. But instead of choosing the easy thing and betraying himself, he moves his hand from Steve’s hair to his cheek, melting at the way Steve leans into it, moving his face to press a kiss to Eddie’s palm.

“Steve,” he says, and his voice is shaky again. And small. So, so small. “That’s not what this is for me. I don’t… I wanna kiss you forever. And more. Much more. But not… I don’t—“

“Not while we’re high? Inebriated?” He says the word with a chuckle, referencing the way Robin will always use big words when she’s hammered. There’s a gentle sort of understanding on his face after the chuckle, though, and Eddie melts a little again. “Wanna do it right, hmm? Wanna treat me right and make sure I won’t regret it, angel?”

Eddie whimpers at the sudden use of that nickname, because he’s not, but he does. He didn’t realise until Steve said it how scared he was — is — that Steve will regret this. The kiss. And anything that might follow.

Not trusting his words right now, he can only nod, wondering if his eyes are as blown as Steve’s are. If Steve thinks he’s pretty, too.

“God, you’re unreal,” Steve whispers, coming down again to press a kiss to Eddie’s forehead, brushing them down to the tip of his nose. He leans into those kisses, tips his chin up to chase it, but Steve pulls away again, his thumb tracing the pout he leaves behind on Eddie’s lips.

“You’re one to talk,” Eddie grumbles, watching the delight on Steve’s face and deciding that he’s addicted now. Fuck the weed, fuck everything else. Steve can get him just as high.

Along with that thought, reality works its tendrils into Eddie’s consciousness again, and he looks around the backyard around them — but there’s only him and Steve out here on the blanket, framed as they are by the fairy lights.

“Hang on, where are the others?”

Steve huffs, his face shifting into an expression of fond amusement and gentle annoyance. “Last time I checked, Robin and Argyle were raiding the fridge, Nancy was lying on the living room carpet, marvelling at how soft it is, and Jonathan was just kinda spaced out on the couch with a bowl of chips. Don’t think they’re gonna come out here again in the next half hour or so.”

“How convenient,” Eddie grins, wondering just how obvious the two of them had been all this time. Wondering, too, if it can really be that easy. If he can have this. If they can; after everything they went through.

“Hmm,” Steve hums, his body shifting so he’s half lying on top of Eddie now, positively vanishing any and all thoughts Eddie could have spared anyone else. He would worry about the hard-on he’s sporting, but it becomes obvious very quickly that Steve has the same predicament. It’s enticing, feeling him against his thigh like that, and Eddie has half a mind to do something about that, especially when Steve keeps shifting against him. “So. Do you wanna make out some more before we light the next baggie? It’s fine if not. We can just… I don’t know, cuddle or something.”

“Steve,” Eddie says, pulling on his hair a little bit to underline his deadpan. “What about I wanna kiss you forever was unclear?”

“Hey, I said that first,” Steve retorts, digging his fingers into Eddie’s sides, making Eddie squeal and squirm right into his arms. “I also kissed you first,” he continues, sounding so damn smug about it. Eddie’s never wanted to kiss him more. “So I’m winning.”

“Hmm, I don’t know about that,” Eddie murmurs, pulling Steve all the way on top of him, his hands finding his way to those magnificent thighs, so firm underneath his grip. “‘M feeling pretty lucky right now.”

“You think you’re so smooth,” Steve hums, dipping his head to hover just above his lips.

“Is it working?”

“Unfortunately.”

They’re both laughing when their lips meet again, but that doesn’t deter them from kissing and tasting and swallowing moans like they’ll find new purpose in each other. Like they’ve already found it.

Just like Steve’s hand finds his, weaving their fingers together and pressing him further into the grass. Eddie holds on tight, not ready to let him go anytime soon, and marvelling at how sensitive his hand has become.

There is no urgency in the way Steve slowly begins to move against him, grinding their crotches together in slow, sensual motion like waves of the ocean gently lapping at the shore. Eddie meets him right where they both need it most, not once breaking their kiss even when it becomes open-mouthed panting and moaning that the other is trying to chase and swallow and keep only for himself.

“You feel so good,” Steve rumbles, catching Eddie’s tongue between his teeth and pulling a high-pitched whimper from him. “So fucking good, Eddie.”

“Don’t stop, Stevie, fuck.” He’s panting, his legs tingling with want and need and a weightlessness he’s never known before. “I know I said— We can stop. We can stop, we can, but— fuck, I’m close.”

“Yeah?” Steve taunts, and oh, there’s purpose now in the the way he’s lifting his chest off Eddie, putting his weight behind the way he’s grinding into him. “You gonna come in your pants, baby? While the others are still inside? Means you’re gonna do this with me again later, right? Try again when we’re not high, hmm?”

“Yes,” Eddie rushes to say, working his fingers into Steve’s belt loops to keep him from stopping. “God, yes, I wanna—“

“I’ve got you,” Steve says, kissing the words right out of his brain, chasing his own pleasure, too. “God, you’re so pretty. So fuckin’ pretty, Eddie. Wanna come with me?”

“Uh-huh,” Eddie can only nod and moan around all the words he wants to say, all those cheesy fucking words that leave him all the more vulnerable for how true they are. The tingly feeling builds in his legs, climbing to his core, and he wonders for a split second if Steve can really make him come like this — worries that somehow it’s not enough and that he’ll ruin this, that he’ll fuck it up and make it awkward between them because he doesn’t actually have any idea how his body works when someone else is taking the reins.

But then Steve kisses him like that again, sucking his tongue into his mouth, holding his hand and groaning when Eddie moves in just the right way, and the sizzling pleasure finally finds its release.

Eddie comes with a broken groan that Steve swallows greedily, panting into his mouth as, shortly after, his hips begin to stutter in their movements and he follows Eddie off the brink of this beautiful madness. Steve was always beautiful, there’s no question about that. But like this, face slack, kiss-swollen and spit-slick lips open around a silent moan as he grinds his trapped cock against Eddie’s, wrecked with aftershocks as his orgasm washes over him? He’s a fucking revelation that makes Eddie’s eyes roll into the back of his skull, over sensitive as he is and yet so helpless against Steve’s aborted little motions.

Getting high on weed doesn’t compare to getting high on Steve. It’s a high Eddie wants to chase forever, and he starts by wrapping his arms around Steve and pulling him down onto his chest again, just to hold him. Steve purrs as Eddie’s hand finds its way into his hair, combing it away from the sweaty skin it sticks to. He cages him with his legs, too, tingly as they remain on either side of Steve’s body.

It’s stupid, maybe, and a bit much, but he wants to keep Steve like this for a little longer. Putty in his hands, his weight on top of him grounding him after that high, and allowing them both to come down slowly.

“Man,” Steve says after a while, just letting that word hang in the air as he regains conscious thought.

Eddie hums, prompting him to say what’s on his mind even though he’s scared he won’t like what he’s about to hear. Still, it’s only fair to let Steve say what he wants.

“I like you so much.”

Eddie holds his breath as he waits for the but. For the regret. But none follows. That’s really all Steve’s saying; and soon Eddie can’t fight the wave of giddiness that overcomes him.

He hugs Steve a little tighter, not entirely ready yet to look him in the eyes and face this new reality they’ve kind of just created, needing to be a little scared for just a bit longer. But still he laughs, because scared is no longer all he’s feeling. There’s so much more now. So much more.

“I like you so much right back.”

Now it’s Steve who hums, shifting to lift his head and look at Eddie, but Eddie closes his eyes before Steve can catch them.

“Said it first again.” A hand lands on his cheek again, just above the ugly scars that Steve doesn’t seem afraid to touch. “So I win.”

And Eddie is looking now. Dares. If only to drive his point home when he says, “God, you’re so fucking lame.”

“Is it working?” Steve grins, and Eddie never stood a fucking chance.

“Unfortunately.”

@izzy2210 here you go darling hehehe 🤍

#steddie #steddie fic #steddie fanfic #steve harrington #eddie munson #the spicy six get high together #spicy six #yearning hours #yearning hours but make it smut #steddie smut #i like this one so much #high yearning makeout fic #this takes so many turns and i blame the flu for it actually #tone consistency?? don't know her #dio words

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