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#and i was thinking about how sometimes you love people so much you want to become part of them
st4rtar0t · 2 days
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Details about your future partner
physical appearance, astrological details and more
In this pick a picture we will get to know some information about your future partner, this can even be your future spouse or somebody you will have a long term relationship with. I know you are really curious about them so why not read this and like and share if you feel that this reading has resonated with you?
Pick a picture from below
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DM for personal readings.
Picture one
Some of you may already know this person. I see that you know this person from a work setting. They are really hardworking and they put their best in everything they do. They are a master at their craft. I also see that they have had their heart broken in the past and they no longer want to take any risks. This person is really attractive and a lot of people have their eyes on them. They know how to have deep conversations and I also see that they hate small talk. They are always energetic and have a youthful smile. However they have a sense of mystery around them. It's like they are always Hiding a part of them from others. They are family oriented and they will always put their family before anyone else. I also see that they are just your type. They are really protective of the people they love and they will do everything in their power to help others around them. You may Meet this person through social media or through an online platform. I see that you guys will be talking a lot to each other. For some of you, this person is already stalking you and you can feel it. The only reason why this person isn't approaching you is because of their past relationship. This person is really attracted to you and they want to have long term relationship. They only date to marry.
Physical attributes: dark/tanned skin, buzz cut, brunette, ginger hair, puppy face, golden retriever energy, sharp jawline, narrow eyes, thick eye lashes, blue/brown eyes, wide nose.
Key words: childish, eyes on you, watching, spiritual union, lust, lesson, co-worker, short trip, water body, fox, R,A,T,M,O. Explorer, possessive, lots of love, overflowing love.
Astrological details: Virgo rising, Taurus moon, Mars in Aries, Venus in 2nd house, Gemini Mercury, Neptune in 12th house.
Picture two
They are definitely spiritual and if not spiritual then they are definitely interested in being a better person every day. I also see that they have deep understanding of human heart and are quite empathetic. But that doesn't mean they'll carry the burden of others. I see that they like the freedom they have. It seems as if you already know this person or you will be getting to know them soon, sooner than you think. You first conversation may start as an argument or you may not like them at first, its giving enemies to lover vibes. You or they can be an introvert or One of you may not talk much. Some of you may have a fake account that you use to stalk people and they know about it? Or they may collect information about you before talking to you. I am getting a little to no information about them its like the universe does not want you to know about them, it may be a surprise.
Physical attributes : straight nose, beautiful side profile, big or unique ears, full lips, mole under eyes, sharp teeth, dark hair, blond hair or some, fit body.
Key words : bold choice of clothing, snap chat, sunglasses, 11, hot headed, red, T, V, X, May, October, November, pet dogs, younger sibling, gardening, leaf, watermelon.
Astrological details : Scorpio sun, Uranus in Pisces, Virgo moon, Venus in earth sign, Jupiter in 1st, mars in 4th, Libra moon, Pluto dominant,
Picture Three
( Some of you may also be attracted to picture 2)
They're kind of replaying old memories in their head at this moment. They have a tendency to always think about what could've been instead of living in the moment. Sometimes they're just not feeling it, like they're out of sync with everything around them. They feel as if the world is moving but they are frozen. but they are okay with it as long as are helping out and sharing what they've got. Their sense of accomplishment may come from helping other both financially and mentally. They're all about hard work, always grinding and putting in the work to make things happen. They don't like drama and competition, if they feel like you are competing against them they will just let you win. They'd rather keep things peaceful and drama-free. When it comes to love, they're total romantics, just going with the flow and following their heart. They may be a hopeless romantic. They have immense live for their work and they do for a living. They're always honing their skills and perfecting their craft, putting in the effort to be the best at what they do. And at the end of the day, they're someone who feels pretty good about what they've achieved, just living their best life and enjoying every moment. They are grateful for everything that comes their way. No matter blessings or blessing disguised as disasters. Just soaking it all in and feeling grateful for where they're at.
Physical attributes : coloured hair, red hair, tattoos, veiny hands, curly hair, big eyes, sharp jawline, locks, big hands, may wear boots most of the time.
Key words : Horse, 9, 24, 15, pink, water body, red velvet, Venessa, butterflies, absent father figure, garland, gold, nose ring. April, August, June.
Astrological details : Libra descendent, Uranus in 5th, mercury in 10th, Venus in 4th, Taurus Venus, South node in Virgo, Jupiter in libra, cancer rising,
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nana-au · 2 days
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Best Friends Forever!
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Suguru Geto ♡
MDNI
₊˚ପ⊹ Summary: You’re Suguru’s bff and roommate. You know him like the back of your hand – and he knows you the same, if not better! Some people may think you two are too close, but they just don’t understand. When you have a date planned and need help picking out your outfit, Suguru’s your guy! ...What’s this? He doesn’t want you to leave?
₊˚ପ⊹ Warnings: minor mention of blood, mention of pet death, possessiveness, jealousy, nipple play, thigh riding, fingering, making you beg, overstimulation, unprotected sex
₊˚ପ⊹ an: kicking and screaming and crying and throwing up and scratching my face I NEED HIM.
₊˚ପ⊹ wc: 2.8k
𓂃⊹ ִֶָ
BFF! Sugu who’s been by your side since before you can even remember! You grew up neighbors and when you both went off to college you got an apartment off campus together. It was only natural to be with Suguru. He was the only constant in your life – your anchor. 
BFF! Sugu who is so protective of you. How could he not? You two experienced life’s firsts together. You were there when Suguru took a nasty spill off his bike. His tears were hot down his face as you stayed by his side. You used the water bottle you kept on your own bike to flush the blood off his knee, giving it a quick peck. “My mom always says a kiss makes everything better. Do you feel better Sugu?” He nods his head, wiping the snot off of his face with his t-shirt. He was there when you lost your first pet and even though you were preteens and everyone made you feel dumb being sad over a goldfish - Geto made it a point to hold a funeral in his backyard. He dug a small grave for it - picking out the perfect rock for you to write its name on to place on top of its resting place. 
BFF! Sugu who makes sure you’re safe. He would never allow you to pump your own gas. He’s seen the type of guys who prowl around the gas station close to your home. He’ll make sure you get to sit pretty in the passenger seat while he fills up your car. Don’t worry about the price – he’ll take care of it. He always takes care of you. 
BFF! Sugu who knows everything about you. He knows all your favorites. Favorite color, favorite season, favorite food, favorite tv show… there was nothing that you liked that he was not aware of. He knows about things you wouldn’t be caught dead telling anyone else – trusting only your best friend. 
BFF! Sugu who is so so sooooo protective of you. Any guy he thought wasn’t the absolute best for you was quickly kicked to the curb. He’ll admit – sometimes the criteria was a little strict. The guy from your art class? His haircut was stupid. Shithead from your after school club? Believe him – he was a tool. Worst of all was the douche on your school’s baseball team. Suguru had quite the time getting you to see his point of view, but he didn’t dare say I told you so as you cried in his arms retelling the embarrassment of catching him cheating. 
BFF! Sugu who learns to relax in college. You were a woman now – you no longer needed his constant guidance. He would genuinely smile as you talked about all the friends you were making in your major. How funny your coworkers at the concession stand job you worked every football game were. The fact you had a date with a friend of a friend – your girl friend had vouched for him. He was a good guy. Geto was glad you had people looking out for you. He couldn’t wait to meet him. 
BFF! Sugu who helps you pick out the cute little outfits for your dates. You were so beautiful, that guy was truly lucky. But even his luck couldn’t match Suguru’s as you put on a little show for him – trying on every tantalizing option. 
BFF! Sugu who loved watching you dress up so much he bought you more. You didn’t even need a date to have a fashion show! He just loved seeing that color on you. Oh! – And don’t even get him started on the skimpy little dresses with the ruffles. They were made for you. He couldn’t decide whether your plump butt or your squishy boobs looked better hugged by the fabric. He had to use his large hand to hide the bite he gave to his bottom lip when your cute little panties peaked through the bottom of a particularly short one. “Maybe that one is good for around the house,” he proposed. 
BFF! Sugu who had to swallow his need when you begged him to rate your lingerie. “I didn’t realize you two were at that point in your relationship,” he would try to laugh off his distaste. 
“I’ve told him no to sex for so long, I’ve been thinking maybe it's time…” you trailed off. You played with the hem of your dress as you stood in front of Suguru on the couch. He was sunk comfortably into the loveseat, legs spread wide and one of his muscled arms stretching across the back of the couch. The other on the arm rest. “Ok princess. Let’s see the options,” he spoke.
BFF! Sugu who couldn’t make it through the first set. The white lace left little to the imagination, a black bow adorned above your cute mound. “You trying to make me sweat?” A dark chuckle broke through his lips. “Sorry?” you asked him, not hearing him correctly. How silly you were to think that just because he was a friend that made him any less of a man. A hot blooded man at that – with eyes that glued to your nipples visible through the thin fabric. “The dresses were one thing, princess, but this? Don’t play dumb,” his dark eyes were now impossibly black. You were staring into the voids that indiscreetly roamed your body. It was entirely silly of you to now try and hide yourself from his hungry gaze. 
BFF! Sugu who doesn’t let you leave. You were no match against his strong grip as he pulled you onto his lap. “You’re leavin’ me no choice,” he assured you, pushing you down hard against his thigh. You tried to push away but his hands on your waist locked you in. “No choice,” he reminded you. You swallowed thickly, realizing you were completely helpless as he began guiding your hips up and down his thigh. The rough material of your panties rubbing deliciously against your clit. “Sugu s-stop,” you begged him, all breathy and hot against his ear. “You want me to stop?” Of course! He was your best friend. You didn’t want him making you feel better than you ever thought possible by just rubbing your pussy against his leg. “But you look so cute like this,” he pouted at you, “Humping my thigh like a puppy. I’ll let go – but you better stop moving your hips,” he tutted at you. You didn’t have it in you to keep your eyes open to watch yourself continuously rut against him even after he removed his hands. It wasn’t your fault his muscled thigh felt more pleasurable than any toy you could ever buy. 
Geto had plenty of girls at your school talking about their experiences with him. You spent your entire teen years hearing about his ‘magical tongue’ and ‘horse dick’. For the majority of your life you had little interest in getting to experience that part of your best friend – that was until the bastard from the baseball team. The absolute snore fest he put on for your first time was jarring. Maybe you were so used to hearing how life-changing Suguru’s hips were that you had high expectations... 
No – you were not purposefully trying to get Geto to want you. He genuinely gave good advice when it came to what looked good on you. Ok so maybe you were pushing your luck with the lingerie – but Suguru was always so level-headed. It was scary how quickly he caved.
It was even more frightening listening to his taunts hot in your ear, “Why aren’t you stopping?” You couldn’t stop now – but you would. Just a little longer. You’d find the strength to stop soon. “Tell me you want me, or I’m stopping this,” he threatened and your form shook. “Please don’t,” you begged him. “Don’t what?” he lifted your chin, making you look at him “Don’t s-stop t-this,” you squeaked out.  
BFF! Sugu whose rumors were true. His tongue was magical. His hands flew down to your hips, helping you roll deliciously against the fabric of his sweats while his wet muscle was hot against your nipples. He used his teeth to pull down the fabric so he could taste your bare bud against his tongue. He suckled and licked your sensitive nipple causing your arousal to seep past the lace of your panties. You began to soak his sweatpants but he wasn’t gonna have you stopping anytime soon. He pulled your hips into tight circles against him, overwhelming your nub. His teeth nibbled at your nipple and you jerked up at the sudden shock. His grip was bruising and you wanted – no needed more. “Sugu.. more.. need more” you sounded so pathetic. 
BFF! Sugu who was left with little choice! His princess wanted more and more she was going to get. His head kissed your entrance, barely pushing in past the tip. You mewled, nails digging into his shoulders as he teased himself into you. “You think you can take me?” he asked you and you nodded fervently. He was thick and long – even his tip felt like he was tearing you in two. You wanted to be absolutely broken. “M-more Sugu,” you begged, trying to move your hips to sink down further. He kept you still – only allowing you to move if it was him dragging you down against him. Your slick was dripping down the rest of his cock, you were completely overwhelmed by the little attention he was giving you. One of his hands moved from your hips down to your clit, rubbing slow circles – barely ghosting above it. You were clenching on his fat tip and whining embarrassingly loud. He wanted to have you crying for his cock. He clicked his tongue at you, “I’m not convinced enough you want my cock.” He looked so unaffected as you shook, “I do! I need it, Sugu,” tears fell down your cheeks as you desperately tried to convince him.   
BFF! Sugu whose hips slapped against yours at a brutal pace. He had you pinned into the loveseat, head down and ass up. A creamy ring formed at the base of his unrelenting cock. Drool was seeping from your mouth and onto the couch, the only thing you could think about was the way he was pounding into that gummy spot that made you dizzy. “No one could make you feel this way,” he promised you, “this pussy was made for me.” His pace was bruising, his balls slapping against your clit. He pulled your hips up farther, making you arch your back. Everything was so noisy – the sound of you meeting his hips, the squelch of his cock pulling in and out, and his grunts each time he felt his tip kiss your cervix. Geto looooved watching you take him so well. Each time his cock disappeared inside of you, only to reappear as he roughly dragged out of you. He didn’t know if you were purposefully squeezing him each time his hips pulled back. Were you trying to keep him buried deep? “Your date won't mind if I leave my cum in you, right?” he teased you – knowing full well you wouldn’t be going anywhere after he was done with you. “Dripping out of your pussy at dinner,” you couldn’t fathom him being able to laugh right now. “What would you even tell him?” he was imagining the scene playing out in his mind, “My roommate thought I was looking a little empty. Needed to stuff me full,” His smile lazy thinking about how he was claiming you tonight. He was fucking your tight little hole deliciously, making sure you could never be satisfied by anything other than his cock. You pushed your hips into his, making sure he reached as deep as possible. “You want to cum, princess?” he picked up his pace – which you didn’t even think was possible – your tits bouncing at each thrust of his hips. You nodded, pleading for him to make you cum. “God – cum on my cock. Want t’feel you squeezin me,” the rough pad of his finger met your clit, helping your pleasure meet its peak. “I’m cumming, Sugu,” you cried out to your best friend. 
BFF! Sugu who wasn’t done with you once you came. You tried to claw at his hands on your hips, begging him to slow down. The tension in your tummy snapped, cumming undone loudly around him. He paid no mind to your pleas, “You can take more. You’re a good girl, I know you can.” He didn’t ever want to leave your snug pussy. He would fuck you all day if that’s what it took for him to feel satisfied. “Give me another, baby. Cum on my cock one more time. I know you can,” he was so filthy. You never had a guy dirty talk to you the way Geto was. He was demanding and unrelenting. It was alarming how much you enjoyed the filth leaving his lips. “How could you tell me to stop when she’s gripping me so tight – pussy doesn’t want to let go of me.” he threw his head back, “”S your fault I’m pounding you like this. I couldn't let you get away with showing me that little number.” The lingerie he was referring to was on the floor below you two, ripped into pieces from when he tore it off your body. He completely pulled out of you – leaving your pussy uncomfortably empty before flipping you over and folding you in half. He placed the back of your knees on his shoulder, wasting no time pushing himself back into you. The new angle took your breath away. His heavy frame held you down as his cock was unrelenting. When you looked down you could see his length slide in and out of you, your cute little pussy lips swallowing him whole. Your arousal coated his cock – all thick and creamy. You felt like you could pass out from the sight – not thinking it was possible to be so wet. His thumb reached down to your clit, rubbing harsh circles on it. “C’mon baby. I’m addicted to the way you squeeze my cock. Let me feel you cum again. Need it, princess,” he begged. He was slowly losing all control. You were so perfect underneath him, taking him like the good girl he always knew you were. You were wrecking him. Your sounds were so cute – choking back sobs as he fucked you to another peak. You were begging for him to cum inside you. You wanted to feel him coat your walls in his sticky juice. “Gonna pump you full,” he promised you. “Gonna feel so good stuffed full with my cum.”
BFF! Sugu who can’t stand watching his semen leak out of you. You were completely fucked out – chest heaving as you laid on the couch. Geto was still holding your legs up, trying fruitlessly to push his juices back inside of you. 
BFF! Sugu who needs to make sure you keep all of it. He didn’t even wait for you to regain your energy before his thick fingers are deep inside of you. “Can’t let a single drop go to waste,” he tells you. He curls his thick digits, pushing against the squishy spot that makes you see stars. “No more,” you breathlessly say. “Just one more. Need to make sure it all keeps,” you are completely overstimulated. The feelings of his fingers are heightened by your two orgasms – which only makes you come undone even faster. His fingers are lightening fast and your pussy sounds like it's made of water. It’s so loud and wet and you just can’t help yourself from cumming again. You’re thrashing against his unrelenting fingers, crying loud enough that your neighbors definitely hear. “That’s it. S’good for me,” he’s emotional watching you come undone so many times by his doing. You were his. His, his, his. 
BFF! Sugu who doesn’t even have to tell you to cancel your date. You couldn’t pick your head up after he was done with you. You were staying home with him – where you belonged. 
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quintinh43 · 1 day
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3 Times Quinn Almost Proposed + 1 Time He Actually Did
The best decision Quinn ever made was you. From the second he stumbled into that Cafe with his parents, to moving in with you, to admitting he loved you and everything else in between. It was a no-brainer that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with you. And there was no doubt in his mind that you felt the same way.
"I can't believe you're proposing," Jack said, tapping his fingers against the center console of Quinn's car. He never could sit still, and sometimes it grated on Quinn's nerves.
"Why? Do you think it's too early?" Quinn asks anxiously, running his tongue against his lips.
Luke pitches forward from the back seat to share his input, "You've been dating for like what? Five?" He asks, doing some quick math on his fingers.
Quinn nods, "Since March,"
"Ya know, we still haven't forgiven you for not telling us immediately," Jack huffs, crossing his arms over his chest.
"If it's any consolation, you are the first people I wanted to tell," Quinn says placatingly.
"Quinner, go easy on our uneducated brother, he doesn't know what the word consolation means," Luke says seriously.
Quinn snorts a laugh as Jack turns around to swat Luke on the head. "I have a bigger vocabulary than you dumbass!"
Before the two of them can escalate into a full-blown bickering match, Quinn interrupts, "Back to my problem, guys! Do you think it's too early to propose?" His fingers tap nervously on the steering wheel as he navigates to the jewellery store.
"There's no proper timeline when it comes to proposing Quinny, it comes down to when you are ready and you feel like it's the right time in your relationship," Jack says.
"I mean, you already knew you wanted to spend the rest of your life with Y/n, so this is just taking the next step towards that, isn't it?" Luke adds, adjusting his Devils Hockey cap over his curls.
"When did you two become so wise?" Quinn grumbles as he pulls into the parking lot.
"We've always been wise beyond our years," Luke says puffing his chest out. Jack flicks his cap off his head, rolling his eyes.
"Sure Lukey," Quinn snorts, running a hand through his hair.
"Alright boys, let's get this done." Jack claps, practically jumping out of the car.
It wasn't hard at all. Quinn chose a shop where he could completely customize the ring, and with access to your Pinterest board and all the rings that you already own, he knew almost exactly how he wanted it to look. The only thing he was nervous about was whether or not you would like it.
"Don't overthink it too much Quinn, you know her better than you know yourself," Jack squeezes his shoulder comfortingly.
"You could propose with a ring pop, and she would treasure it for the rest of her life," Luke adds, with a roll of his eyes.
The three of them are in and out of the shop within an hour, and Quinn is smiling his ass off all the way home.
1.
A week later, Quinn picks up the ring. It's even better than he imagined it would be in real life. As his car pulls into the driveway of the lakehouse, he sees you out front with his mom, helping her tend to her garden.
You kneel in the dirt, sunglasses perched on your nose, and a canucks cap on your head. Smiling and laughing with Ellen as you both pull weeds from the ground. Quinn's heart beats out of his chest with happiness, and he's struck with the urge to kneel in the dirt next to you and present the ring to you right then.
When you notice that he arrived, you grin widely, giving him a wave. There's dirt smudged across your nose and under your nails, and Quinn thinks the ring would be a lovely accessory to your mud-stained hands.
The outline of the ring box feels warm in his pocket as he approaches you and his mom, "Hi babe," he greets, dropping a kiss to the top of your head, and it takes everything in his bones not to get down on one knee and pull out the ring right now.
"Hi Mom," he says with a quiet smile, giving her a kiss on the cheek. Her eyes twinkle knowingly.
"Jack and Luke are napping upstairs, and the two of us are going to start lunch as soon as we're done this."
Quinn nods, "Lemme change and I'll come help you two," he runs up the stairs, tucks the ring box safely at the top of his closet and changes into shorts and a t-shirt to help you and his mom in the garden.
2.
Quinn never expected to be the guy who obsessively walked around with his engagement ring in his pocket after he bought it. But here he was, on the boat, with the ring sitting in the glove compartment. Which you had complete access to.
Jack had called him an idiot, stating that a number of things could've happened, from you finding the ring accidentally, or it falling into the water. Or maybe even a shark eating it. Luke was quick to call Jack an idiot, saying that there were no sharks in Lake Erie. Jack rolled his eyes and flicked Luke in the forehead saying it was to emphasize how stupid Quinn was being by bringing the ring with him onto the boat.
Quinn is currently in the driver's seat, you're on the wakeboard, and the rest of the boys are littered around the boat, whooping and cheering as you throw the rope and tip backwards into the water with a salute.
Trevor whistles low with admiration, "Wow, Mrs. Huggy is a professional,"
"She's not Mrs. Huggy yet, but she will be soon," Quinn mutters under his breath just as you climb the ladder back onto the boat.
It takes a minute for the words to register, but as soon as they do Trevor's jaw is on the floor. He stares back and forth between you and Quinn.
Jack, Quinn, and Luke wear various degrees of alarm on their faces, hoping and praying that you didn't hear anything.
"Damn, guys, was I that bad?" You laugh nervously, and you take in the looks on their faces. You unzip your life jacket and squeeze as much water out of your hair as you can.
"He-" Trevor starts pointing at Quinn, but before any words can actually leave his mouth, Jack is tipping Trevor over the edge of the boat and into the water.
You burst into laughter, and the boys seemingly return to normal as a soaking-wet Trevor climbs back into the boat, muttering obscenities under his breath. "Alright, who's next?"
"Me," Quinn says, desperate to get away from Trevor's pointed smirk, "You're driving," he says, pushing you gently into the driver seat where he was previously seated.
"Are you sure you want me to drive?" You ask skeptically, brow raised.
"O'course babe, there's no one I'd trust more." Quinn punctuated his sentence with a kiss on your cheek. Jack makes an offended noise, that sounds like a dying bird of some kind and you laugh at him.
Quinn rolls his eyes at him as he zips his life jacket and gets into the water for his turn on the wakeboard. He gives you a thumbs up, and parrots the movement, before slowly accelerating. You stand at the wheel of the boat, half twisted towards the back, so you can keep an eye on Quinn.
Quinn stands easily, and you smile accelerating a bit more. You turn in patterns that aren't too sharp but still make nice big waves for Quinn to ride. He's grinning like a madman. You maneuver the boat in a manner that gives him a wave to jump off of if he wants to.
He takes the opportunity, sailing through the air and managing a half spin before he hits the water. You drive around him in a slow circle as he resurfaces.
"That was fucking amazing! Where did you learn to drive a boat like that?" Trevor asks admiringly.
You shrug, cheeks heating under the praise, "My dad taught me," you say, crawling to the back of the boat and offering Quinn a hand as he climbs the ladder, "Been driving watercraft since I was like, twelve or something," you grin, squeaking as Quinn shakes his wet hair out in your direction, "You should see what I can do on a jet ski."
Jack whistles heartily, "We might have to take you up on that one of these days,"
"Sure, Jack, if you think you can handle getting your ass beat by a girl," you smirk. Jack scoffs offendedly, and Luke cackles from where he lies at the front of the boat.
Quinn is smiling so hard, his eyes crinkling at the corners, "I think we have to upgrade you to Captain for the summer, that was the best boat driving out of all of us," Quinn praises, pressing his lips to your hair.
"Seriously!" Jack says excitedly, scrambling for a life jacket, "That looked so fucking fun, no one can ever make waves like that! I'm next." He says jumping in the water before anyone can protest.
"Don't let this one get away Quinner," Luke says, tipping his hat in your direction, "Or I'll take her from you," he throws an over-exaggerated wink in your direction, you giggle and Quinn rolls his eyes. As if the shithead wasn't with him when he bought the ring.
Quinn eyes the glove compartment, where the ring is stored, and thoroughly debates how proposing right now would play out. A sharp whistle from Jack pulls him from his thoughts, and he takes his spot at the back of the boat as Jack spotter.
You resume your place in the driver's seat, and for the rest of the evening, that's where you stay.
Quinn almost has a heart attack when he sees you reach for the glove compartment, but Luke manages to fake trip into you just in time so that Jack can sneakily snag the box and relocate it to one of the other boat compartments.
3.
The house is completely full, with a bunch of the boy's friends who are visiting. Everyone is camped out around the fire pit, nursing beers and laughing loudly. You are curled up in Quinn's lap, head pillowed on his chest while you listen to all of the boys talk about their fondest memories.
You play with the strings of Quinn's hoodie, while he absent-mindedly traces patterns on your arm. His chest rumbles with laughter and his arm tightens around you, as Jack tells a story from when they played together for Team USA. An overwhelming wave of gratitude washes over you. You're grateful for everything in life, and most of all Quinn.
"You're quiet tonight," His lips are pressed against the side of your head, and the comforting baritone of his voice soothes your soul, "doing ok?"
You nod, bringing your fingers up to trace his jaw, "just thinking,"
"Penny for your thoughts?" He speaks low, his words only for your ears, the crackling of the fire, and hearty laughter fade into the background and at this moment it's as if you and Quinn are the only two people who exist.
He was a way of doing that. Making everything else disappear and making you feel like you're the only girl in the world. "I'm so grateful for everything," you answer quietly, "especially for you. Getting to experience life with you, being able to support you, having you there to support me- and just everything that you do and have done for me. You know?"
Quinn's heart swells so wide he thinks it might burst out of his chest. Before he really knows what he's doing, he's slipping out of the chair and kneeling in front of you. You huff because you were enjoying being curled into him.
His hands are on your thighs, and your hands cup his cheeks, thumbs tracing over his cheekbones. Neither of you has noticed that the laughter has died out, and everyone is watching the two of you. Their faces are a mixture of disgust and confusion.
Jack and Luke look downright horrified, sharing a look and exchanging silent words with their eyes.
"Will you m-" Before Quinn can complete his question, Luke is scrambling out of the lawn chair that he and Duker are curled up in and tackling Quinn to the floor.
"BEE!" Jack screeches, adding to the dramatics as he stands on his chair and points in the direction of where Quinn and Luke lay in the grass, "THERE'S A FUCKING BEE!"
There was no bee.
At Jack's distressed yelling, half of the boys are out of their chairs, running around and swatting at the heads of the non-existent bee.
You hold your stomach, laughing at the general chaos. It shouldn't be as funny as it is, but the sight of almost twenty grown men screaming about a bee is pretty hilarious.
"You are welcome you fucking numbskull," Luke hisses in Quinn's ear, as he helps him back up. Quinn gives him a sheepish smile of thanks. Were it not for his brother's antics, he would've regretted that being how he proposed for the rest of his life.
Once the general chaos dies down and everyone is back in their chairs calmly, you speak up with a smirk on your face, "You guys do know Bees are not nocturnal right?"
Quinn looks pointedly at Jack like he's an idiot. As if Quinn has the right to call him an idiot when he almost proposed to the love of his life in front of twenty hockey boys around a campfire on a Tuesday night.
"How do you know that?" Jack asks, crossing his arms over his chest with a pout.
"Yeah," Trevor scoffs, "Seems untrue,"
You snort, taking a sip of your beer, "I'm an elementary school teacher, dumbass, the science unit about bugs is practically ingrained in my brain. Bees are definitely not nocturnal."
"Nope, there definitely was a bee," Luke chimes, "I literally saved Quinn's life."
"Yeah, I saw it too," Dylan adds with a nod.
"It was basically the size of Quinn's head," Cole adds, "really Y/n/n I don't know how you didn't see it," Cole says matter-of-factly.
"I can't believe you guys are trying to gaslight me about bees right now," you snort, nuzzling further into Quinn's warmth.
"I heard it buzzing in my ear, babe," Quinn says seriously.
You roll your eyes at him and tuck your head under his chin and he wraps his arms around you securely, pressing a kiss to your hair, while you argue with the guys about Bees for the next half-an-hour.
+ 1
Quinn slips out of the bedroom to let you finish changing, he pads down the stairs to where his family waits in the kitchen. Jack presents him the ring box, that he had decided to keep with him after the boat incident. Quinn tucks it into his pocket with a deep breath.
"You ready Quinner?" Luke asks, squeezing his shoulder comfortingly.
"Yeah," Quinn nods, breathing deeply.
"She's gonna say yes," Jack reassures, giving Quinn a pat on the back.
"I hope so," Quinn says nervously.
His dad chuckles, "Don't worry kid, you're doing great compared to how nervous I was when I was proposing to your mother,"
Ellen laughs fondly, "It's true, he was so nervous he forgot to pull out the ring, and then when he finally did, he dropped it."
Jim rolls his eyes, but the smile stays. Quinn laughs at that, then all his anxieties are bubbling to the surface and spilling past his lips before he can stop them.
"What if she doesn't like the ring? What if she says no, and she thinks it is too soon? What if I fall on my face? What if I lose the ring? What if-"
Jack squishes his cheeks together to keep him from talking. He tips his forehead against Quinn's staring deep into his eyes. "Breathe with me, Quinn,"
Jack takes exaggerated breaths, and Quinn follows his lead. Jim and Ellen quietly slip out of the room, leaving the brothers to themselves.
Once Quinn's breathing returns to normal, Jack lets him go. "She loves you with her whole heart, Quinn. You have nothing to worry about," Luke says, bonking his head against Quinn’s affectionately.
"Thanks, guys," he murmurs, running a hand through his hair with a sigh.
Everything goes smoothly in Quinn's opinion. Even when he practically forgot his whole speech. But if he had to do it again, he wouldn't change a thing.
-
Yeah so this ended up being like 2.9k words....
Anyways enjoy friends!
So it's basically a fic but lazy.
Part of This Universe
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kiwisbell · 1 day
Text
helen ; chapter five
be seeing you
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Si vis pacem, para bellum. Or, the choice.
series masterlist | my masterlist pairing: joel miller x f!reader tags/warnings: 18+ (MDNI), john wick AU, hitman!joel, husband!joel, established relationship, artist!reader, love as worship, sacrilege in the name of romance, flashbacks, graphic violence, guns, blood + injuries, tess cameo, childhood/religious trauma, criminal underworld, secrecy/lies, betrayal, ANGST, bamf miller bros, smut, fingering, joel is an emotional munch, shower sex, unprotected PIV, handjob, male whimpering, conflicting emotions, orgasms aplenty, Big Angst and Big Sad but also Big Epiphanies, ambiguous ending, i'm getting emotional writing these tags, it feels so final, the typical alcohol/smoking/profanity, dividers by @/saradika word count: ~ 9.3k a/n: hi, friends. i can't believe we're already at the end of the main story, and tbh if i think about it too much i'll probably cry. i want to thank @cavillscurls for beta reading this chapter as always and giving me the guidance and support i need. we'll have an epilogue after this chapter, so there's still more to look forward to, but nonetheless, i hope you enjoy and thank you so so much for reading. xoxo prev | next
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Her eyes are so sad, you think, stepping back to take in the full scope of the canvas. It’s doused in paint from corner to corner, still wet to the touch, the woman and her lover intertwined so thoroughly that it’s difficult to tell where they both end. It’s in shades of glum blue and flecks of angry red and brown where his eye watches you. But it’s her eyes that cannot lift to meet yours. It’s her lashes that fan across her cheeks as she casts her gaze toward the bottom edge where the canvas is wrapped taut around the wood. 
The sun will soon rise, but you haven’t slept. The contours of the sky are washed in a haze of greys and pale blues and light pink and the air smells warm, heavy—a storm about to roll in. The clouds on the horizon are thick with a blackening rage. You sit in the alcove by the window and put your temple to the cool glass. You yawn. Joel does not come back.
“Do you think it's true,” you asked him one night, your head on his chest, hand on his heart, “that art makes nothing happen?”
Joel, drawing shapes on your back, dozing off in the golden light of the sunrise, frowned. “Someone tell you that?”
“It's something my art teacher used to say,” you told him. “No matter how much it moves people, it doesn't do anything.”
“Your art teacher sounds like a fuckin’ downer.”
You laughed, hiking your thigh up over his hip and playfully biting his jaw. “So it's bullshit?”
“I think,” said Joel, tucking his chin to kiss the top of your head, “that your art makes people feel. It brings ‘em together. It's important because it's yours.”
You propped your head up on his chest and threaded your fingers through his too-long hair, overdue for a trim. A curl draped over his forehead, his beard patchy and soft under the pads of your fingers. “Sometimes I wonder why you chose me,” you said. “I wonder why the universe brought you to me.”
Joel shook his head, guiding his rough, callused fingers up your arm, curling them around your wrist, gently prodding your veins. “Wasn't the universe,” he said quietly. “Wasn’t a choice. I was yours the second I saw you. So, I guess it's your fault.”
You just rolled your eyes and kissed him, mouth to smiling mouth. 
Your paintings may be yours, made with life and energy and colour, but when they are finished, they don’t move. They are stagnant as a heavy rock beneath a cliffside, washed over and over again by the cresting waves, its salt stolen for the water, eternal damnation to a fate of non-movement. And sometimes an artist will walk under the cliff, shove their easel into the fleshy ground the way a man erects his country’s flag in the earth he has stolen, and paint the rock. The artist is moved by the breathtaking colours of the shore and the way the wind flutters through the grass. But the rock does not budge. It never will. 
Your art will never erupt from the boundaries of the canvas and tell you what it means. The lovers in your painting will not tear open their mouths like the seams holding a wound together. They will not tell you what they want, need, crave. They are you, and that is what you hate—because dimpled flesh and lustful fingers and the press of his mouth to her throat cannot tell you what you’re supposed to do. 
You had become complacent in his love for you. You had let him press his worn hands to your body and pull your soul out through his mouth and you had been a wife, while all the time there was a stranger who occupied his heart, a spirit in an abandoned body. All the time, he'd been haunted. And although you had loved him, your love had not been enough to exorcise the guilt and trauma, pecking at him, an eagle at his liver. 
Crossing the room and sitting back down in front of the easel, you press your fingers to the corner of the canvas. The paint is cool to the touch, and you leave behind fingerprints where your signature should be. Pulling your hand back, you examine the accumulation of colour, the blues and reds swirling into the deep purple of a bruise, the bodies on a canvas that may only ever mean something to you, and you wonder, Is this all I am? A cautionary tale, a love lost? A fucking footnote at the end of a clause that reads: “See, for example, the one who never loved deeply enough to make it count”?
You bring your hand to your face to wipe away the tears beneath your eyes and blink hard at the sting, realising you’ve smeared paint across your cheekbones. 
In the bathroom, you scrub furiously, the cloying scent of it clinging to your throat and your tear ducts, washing away the evidence of their entwined bodies, their love, your pain. 
Once, you tried to get Joel to paint. You sat behind him on your bench, your legs bracketing his hips, your paintbrush in his hand. 
“I don’t know where to start,” he said.
Your lips brushed the shell of his ear as you spoke. “There’s no rulebook.”
He tried to turn his head and kiss you, but you nipped his ear in reproach. “Remember when you took me out driving at the airstrip because you wanted me to feel the road? Think of this like feeling the canvas. Go on, cowboy. Make nothing happen.”
Joel’s painting still hangs over your shared bed. The intruders never found it, or never cared enough to destroy it. It’s a candle, just a candle, its lines imprecise, the paint unevenly applied in places, the shine of the flame more orange than yellow. But it’s a painting, so the candle always burns. He titled it Love. 
The pain still sits low in your chest, pulling down your heart as if tied to it by a string. But Joel is still out there, fighting his way back to you, the way he always has, always will. You look down at your left hand, clutching the edge of the marble vanity, and decide to clean your wedding ring. 
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“I’m sorry, brother,” says Tommy, turning the gun on Joel. 
“What the fuck are you doing?” growls Joel, struggling against his bonds. The clip rattles faintly in his brother’s hand as a tremor courses through him. 
“He’s following my orders,” says Cabrera, clapping his hand down on Tommy’s shoulder. “Fascinating what a man will do when he must consider his family’s well-being.”
Joel sucks on his teeth, his eyes not once leaving his brother. 
“It's my son,” Tommy says through his teeth. “It's Maria. If I don't do this—”
“Yeah? You gonna kill me, Tommy? Is that why your hand’s shakin’?”
“Shut your goddamn mouth,” his brother snaps. “You think I want to do this? I gotta save my family, Joel. You know what that's like.”
“All I’ve done for you,” says Joel, his hands curling into fists behind his back, “and you put a bullet in my head?”
“Not just your head, Joel,” says Cabrera. “When we're done with you, we’ll take your pretty girl as payment for my son’s life.”
Joel growls like a dog, blood roaring in his ears. “Kill me yourself, you goddamned coward. Kill me yourself and don’t you mention my wife again, or I swear to Christ—”
“You take His name in vain a lot for a nonbeliever,” says Cabrera, pulling his sleeves through his coat and setting his teeth as he looks toward Tommy once more. “Do it.”
“Yeah, brother,” Joel says darkly, “do it.”
Tommy nods once, planting his foot and pivoting. Five distinct sounds of handguns cocking echo throughout the warehouse as Tommy points the barrel between Manuel Cabrera’s eyes.
“Now that I’ve got a gun to your head,” he says evenly, “you can go ahead and pull that contract.”
Joel at last twists his wrists free of the ropes that bind them and shucks down the sleeves of his jacket to rub the raw skin. Not one soul does a goddamn thing to stop him as he rises to his feet. His chest heaves, his open lungs coarse and wet with a brittle rage, his exposed heart throbbing red, transparent as the stained glass windows of the church.
God does not tolerate anger, said the Sisters, again and again, bringing down the whip across his back. Sinew and bone and skin peeling back to lay bare some tender part of him they sought to rot out. Put your energy into His worship.
Slowly, Cabrera lifts his hands, sneering. “Your wife,” he warns, “and your unborn son—”
“Are family,” says Tommy. “Just like my brother. Now tell your guys to put down their guns and I won't kill you where you stand.”
Joel joins Tommy at his side. “Took you long enough,” he says under his breath. 
“Got held up,” he says. “Your wife’s a good artist.”
“Yeah, whatever. You bring me a gun?”
“I’m sure you can find one yourself.”
“Jesus, Tommy. I’m too old for this.” Joel turns to Cabrera and glares at the same stubborn arrogance that once gleamed in his son’s eye. “You pull the contract, and I’ll leave for good.”
Cabrera’s laugh weans out in the air like rings of smoke. “You think you can really leave, Joel? You think that there won't be consequences for what you've done to my son?”
“Yeah,” says Joel, “I think I’ll take my chances.”
“And you?” Cabrera’s lip curls up at Tommy, whose gun no longer wavers in his grasp. “I promised your wife and child security. You’re willing to throw that away?”
“My wife and child are safe because I don’t take deals from men like you,” says Tommy. “You trusted a Miller to turn on his own blood, Manuel. That was stupid. Now pull the contract.”
“So this is your great suicide mission.” Cabrera smiles, a man who knows he has lost or a man who still expects not to. “A man who has seen Hell does not willingly descend back into its depths—not unless he likes the taste.”
Joel feels the corner of his mouth twitch, a wound on his cheek reopening. “Maybe I do,” he says plainly. “Maybe it’ll taste even better when I take you down with me.”
The gleam in Cabrera’s eye shifts as his gaze flickers behind Tommy. Night has since descended, and yet the predator’s eye glints in anticipation of the hunt. Joel turns and shoves his brother out of the way—just as the shot rings out. 
He hears Tommy’s breath punch out of him as they both hit the concrete hard. Joel tears the handgun from his brother’s grasp and puts a bullet between each of the two men behind them. He rolls behind one of the hulking bodies and holds up his weight as a shield against the incoming bullets. Tommy takes the dead man’s gun and fires at the remaining three assailants. Only one shot misses, but Joel sends his brother a look anyway and finishes the job. 
“Rusty,” grunts Tommy, pushing himself to his feet. 
Joel grimaces as he accepts his brother’s outstretched hand, his wrists bleeding from the relentless rub of the ropes. “He ran,” he says, grinding his teeth. “Goddamn coward. Just like his son.”
“Yeah, you’re welcome, by the way,” says Tommy, giving Joel the dead man��s gun and snatching back his own. “Saved your ass.”
“And he got away.” Joel kicks his chair, and the clattering echo of metal reverberates like a choir off the cavernous walls. His hands flex, open, closed, open, closed, until they make tight fists and he can see nothing but red and the silver moon mocking him through the broken windows high above. 
“Joel…”
For a moment, he hears the young boy his brother once was, whispering across their shared bedroom to him in the middle of the night when they were both meant to be asleep. 
Joel… Are we going to be okay?
“I gotta finish it, Tommy,” he says quietly, his hands shaking loose. Parts of him bite and sting, touched by new and old wounds alike, and he wants to come crawling home to you. He wants to curl into your side and wash away the blood in your cleansing pool, daisy and honeysuckle, some faraway field where you are the warden, where he knocks on the door to be let in, to be gathered, covered in white, buried, unearthed. 
“Was he right?” asks Tommy. “Do you… enjoy this?”
Joel casts his eyes toward the ground, his trembling hand, the gleaming band on his ring finger, his skin speckled with blood but the metal pristine. “I don’t know,” he says. 
This is who you are, Cabrera would tell him. The Sisters: Your place is here, under God, under His word. And God Himself, silent as the air, the ringing in his ears only ever quieted by the soft brush of your knuckle across his cheek, the whisper of My Joel in his ear. 
“Think hard on it,” says Tommy, “because you may like it, but you’ve gotta consider if your revenge is worth more than what you’ve already got. And if you choose wrong, Joel, you’re gonna lose no matter what.”
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A figure leans stone-still against the wall by the hotel room door, the gleam of a blade in the soft light the only indication that it is not a mere shadow. 
“Hey, kid,” says the apparition. 
Joel nods in greeting. “Tess. Could get in trouble with that knife out in the open.”
“You expect me to keep your girl safe with just my fists?”
“You make it sound like you couldn’t.” Tess snorts, and Joel places fifteen gold coins in her waiting palm. “I appreciate you doing this.”
Tess peels away from the wall. “You and your brother are paying me good money to babysit a door. I think I can live without the thanks.”
“Still,” he says, “you did us a solid.”
Tess, who itches at the prospect of gratitude as much as any other gun-for-hire, shrugs. “Everyone’s saying you’re coming back. That true?”
“Just visiting,” says Joel. “On my way out soon.”
Tess flips one of the coins and turns it over and over across her knuckles, evidence of a restless energy that’s always made Joel’s eye twitch. “One way or another, huh?” she says.
“One way or another.” He shakes her hand and watches her retreat down the hall, still twirling the godforsaken coin, before he turns toward the door. Joel presses his forehead briefly to the cool wood and turns the key to seek the field that awaits him.
A key rustles in the door and Joel steps through, closing it gently behind him. Judging by the quiet click of the lock, he expects you to be asleep, but you jolt upright from your seat in the alcove and cross the room toward him.
He meets you halfway, his right hand flexing at his side. You inspect him: the gash on his cheek, the bruise on his jaw, the blood splattered on his white shirt. He makes no footfalls as he walks but you can hear every stride like thunder between your ears. You feel his hand at the back of your neck, cool from the night air, rough as the underside of a shark’s belly.
The moment coils taut between you as your hand reaches up to grab the lapel of his jacket, and he smells of iron, cologne, Joel, some paint. Maybe that smell is you, stuck underneath your fingernails, embedded in your blood. Maybe this is a mistake, maybe you could never help but fall, maybe it never mattered anyway, and you’re already snipping the final thread, unwinding the spool, and kissing Joel Miller like it’s the first time. 
He let out a small groan, tasting the first drop of water in a drought, steadying you with his arm around your waist, his hand cradling your head. He’s gentle, exploratory, careful not to jostle, to shock you out of it. You feel his heartbeat thud, strong, calm, steady behind his clothing and skin and muscle, and your body caves.
It’s coming home, you realise, your arms snaking around his neck, fingers tousling the messy curls on his head. It's the warm press of his hand to your spine where it begins to curve inward. It's a soft mouth, a plush lower lip, made for slow mornings and black coffee, for the aching release of a thumb pressing deep into a muscle knot, a wound. Old aches soothed in the space where bodies meet, beginning to colour the slate-grey world. 
It’s the exchange of gasping breaths when you pull apart, his mouth still vaguely chasing yours, opposite charge. 
You hold him tighter, swallowing the lump in your throat, your hands squeezing his shoulders. "Are you…"
Joel inclines his head. "Yeah."
"Did he..."
"Yeah."
Need pulses. Supernova. Bright as the moment of obliteration. "Can you—"
He nods vigorously. "Yeah."
Joel’s kisses are like raindrops: velvet-soft to the touch—his hands bringing the hem of your shirt up over your head, his fingertips scorching, branding, grazing the supple swells of your breasts—before the crescendo roars in your ears and he loses himself to the storm. He always does. 
There is nothing reserved about the way he shows his love. Lightning crackles across your skin where he touches you, baring you to him, his lips making a map of you, mouthing at your jaw, your throat. You hear yourself hum at the press of his lips to the spot beneath your ear, detaching from your own body, absconding with the pleasure of being close to him and leaving the fucking world behind. 
Joel staggers forward so he can press you to the wall and begins to sink to his knees. Your breath catches as he pulls down your ratty bottoms, your cotton panties, his mouth burning into your hips and your belly and the ring on your finger. 
“Joel,” you say brokenly as he clutches your fingers. Tears prickle, pressure building behind your nose, and he shakes his head, unfurling your palm like a bud in bloom and kissing its heel. Wordlessly, you watch him, your eyes shuttering, blood singing. 
Don't hurt me again. 
He understands even though the words cannot come alive on your tongue. He squeezes your hips, his thumbs dumpling your flesh, his forehead falling to your belly. 
“I’m yours,” he says. “I’m whatever you want.”
Your legs haven't forgotten the way they part so easily for him, one thigh on his shoulder, opening the core of you to his waiting mouth. His lips part, his tongue wetting them, glistening, and your stomach tightens at the sight of his eyes so black. 
You could easily cower. His hands are stained with blood. His knuckles are split. But your terror has become an arid thing, no kindling to burn, no oil to ignite. Watching him now, as eager to please as he always has been or maybe more so, on his knees like a supplicant, the hairs on your arms do not rise in apprehension. Your body does not squirm in fear. You see a broad horizon, the sun outside spilling its golden blood over the city, and you see all of him in a way you never did before. 
He’s Joel, who grew up in darkness, lashed and beaten for not believing in a false god. He’s a man who has lied and killed and yet he is no liar, no killer. He holds you as he always has, your body liquid in his hands, your mouth proclaiming the word he will follow. You're the truth he's always told. 
It still unsettles you to see the dark eclipse that warm brown, to watch his desire consume the hypnotic shapes in his irises, and wonder if that cavernous black was the last thing so many men saw before he snuffed out their lives. But there's nothing of the death shudder in the way you guide your fingers through his hair and beg him—
“Please.”
He brings his mouth to your core and parts your folds with his thumbs, slowly gliding his warm, wet tongue through your slit. You die a hundred little deaths in the split-second of that first touch, that first agony.
You sigh, your head thudding against the wall as he licks through you, his hands holding your hips in place, keeping you from writhing. Joel flicks his tongue over the sensitive pearl of your clit, the pleasure searing, and you tug at his curls to push him away even as you cry out, More, please, please. God, I need more.
He obeys you as easily as breathing, though you suspect he can barely hear your pleas, opening his mouth and flattening his hot tongue to your clit. You gasp, your core pulling taut, your eyes locking with his as the muscle undulates over, over, and over again. 
“Oh,” you whimper, your hips bucking to meet his face. He groans, his mouth working your clit, closing his lips over it and sucking. You cry out, your leg kicking, the sounds of the world muffled in his stifling closeness. Your thighs begin to ache, tensing and relaxing a hundred times over in the throes of his attention. 
And his fingers are gliding across your hip, seeking the warmth between your legs. You gasp his name, your hips flexing, as he collects your wetness on two fingers. 
“Let me in, baby,” he says softly, pressing a kiss to your puffy clit. It relaxes you enough to welcome the press of his fingers inside you, sinking to the knuckle, curling up against the spot he would know in his sleep. 
You whine, your body keening toward him, tugging his face back toward your pussy. He obliges with a quiet moan, and you think he needs this just as badly. 
The obscene squelch of his fingers inside you rings in your ears as he licks and sucks at your clit, his free hand grabbing desperately at your ass to keep you fixed to him. You’re crying, “Yesyesyes, Joel, please—fuck, that's it,” the pleasure stuck in the grooves of your brain. Absentmindedly, you reach for his hand and clasp it tight, your engagement ring digging into his palm. He holds you with the same fervour as he coaxes you higher, his face buried in your pussy. He grunts and groans like it's his own pleasure he seeks, his battered knuckles stinging. 
“Joel… Joel, oh, I’m…”
He knows, of course, from the telltale squeeze of your thighs around his head, the relentless crushing of his fingers in your own, your body tightening for him, cavitating, unwinding—
You come with a shout, your throat raw, writhing in his grasp as he keeps sucking, keeps licking, rubbing, pressing. You're dizzy by the time your head lolls to the side, your muscles twitching, eyes glazed, and Joel is there, pulling his fingers out just to place them on his tongue and swallow you down. 
Your breath rattles through your lungs. Joel presses his lips to your inner thigh, beard soaked in your arousal, moustache glistening. His mouth soothes your sore muscles and your eyes begin to droop. 
“You need a shower,” you say, your tongue like lead in your mouth. You gently pass your thumb over a cut on his cheek and frown. “You're all bloody.”
He nuzzles his face against your thigh, inhaling you. “I know.”
“You were gone so long.” Your voice quivers, pressure prickling behind the bridge of your nose. “I thought…”
Joel rises to his feet, his hands cradling your face. “I’m all right,” he says. “I’m here, and I’m safe, and I’m so goddamn sorry.”
You shake your head, pressing your lips together so the sob will not escape. Tracing his face with your fingers, broken in places, healing in others, you see the echo of a boy who didn't know his place in the world. You see the haunt of days gone by. A ghost still occupies the cage of his ribs. 
“I think you should tell the little boy that still lives here,” you say, putting your hand on his chest. “Tell him he’s alive. Tell him that he made it.���
Joel lowers his head, watching the way your fingers splay over his heart. He puts his hand on yours and pushes, and you feel the strong thump-thump-thump of his heartbeat. 
“He knows.”
You lean forward and put your mouth to his temple. “Shower, Joel,” comes your whisper in his ear. 
He nods, wrapping his arm around your waist and guiding you into the bathroom. The water hits you both true, scalding, the drain circled with red. He’s naked, his back to you as he sets his hair and lets his wounds bleed what they need to. 
You lift your hands and trail them down his broad shoulders, your forehead dropping between his shoulder blades where your name is inked into his back. Joel’s muscles idly flex, his palm flat against the shower wall. His body shudders when you press your lips to the name on his back. 
Wordlessly, you bring your arms around him, caressing his side, careful of the new bruises. Your other hand drops to his steel-hard cock and you begin to slowly stroke him. The noise that wrenches free from his throat is half pleasure, half agony, his hips bucking into your fist. You bump your nose against his back, your years-old sign to Just relax, and Joel hides his face in his bicep as you work your hand over him.
“G—fuck,” he grunts. “Goddamn… honey, I—”
You squeeze him at the base and twist your hand up and down the length of him, the weight warm and heavy, your thumb coaxing out a bead of precum. Your cheek is warm on his back, your arm struggling to reach around the width of him, your chest humming at the sound of his gruff moans. 
“Let me…” He cuts himself off as you speed up your strokes, and you can feel his abdomen tense. “Fuck, let me make you feel good. Shit… let me…”
“Joel,” you say, “for once, stop trying to be my hero.”
His head falls back and you press your lips to his throat, nibbling the sensitive spot behind his ear: the old scar, that tiny circle, that hairless patch. He groans your name, and you’re smiling despite yourself, your mouth curling against his warm, tender skin. 
“Inside me,” you whisper, the pace of your fingers over his length slowing to a crawl. “Remind me how it feels.”
He turns his head to look into your eyes, his lashes dewy, blinking hard to flick away the water, brow furrowed. His moustache bristles as his lips part in a question he does not (or maybe cannot) articulate, and you’re fractured into pieces by the intricate curve of his nose, the freckles on his jaw, the silver strands in his beard. A rough hand cups the back of your neck and another takes you by the waist, and you’re flattened to the wall, your hand braced on the glass next to you as he kisses you deeply. 
Consuming, heady, warm—you give in, your hands avoiding the delicate skin of his wrists where he’s been bound, helpless. Sighing softly into his mouth, you let his kiss humble the part of you that still needs the walls you’ve built from the marrow of your anger. It circles the drain, lead-filled paint, as you remember under his hands how it feels to live.
You reach between your bodies, your leg wrapping around his waist, and slide the head of his cock through your weeping slit. Joel sucks in air through his teeth, the water lashing his back like a whip, and he surges forward, grasping you by the waist and sinking his cock into your tight hole. 
You cry out his name, burying your face in his throat and baring your teeth. Your name leaves his mouth in kind, an apparition, sounds you barely recognise anymore. As you take him inside you, the memory of who you were with him pounds at your ribcage, begging to be let out. And you covet them, selfish as you are now for fucking him this way, needy and impatient, your fingers tugging his wet locks. 
You see no point in scooping out the marrow; there is still sweetness stuck to the bones of your old life with him. Instead, you coat your teeth in this, the slow drag of his cock, the depths he reaches so easily, so knowingly. His fingers prod the bruised flesh of your hurt and yet you still guide him inside. You still pull his hair and kiss his throat where his Adam’s apple bobs and you still let him hold you close enough to splinter. 
He’s grabbing fistfuls of your ass and sucking on your throat, his thrusts sloppy as he tries to hold back, to make you come first, but you tighten, clenching down on him, making his groans pitch up into whines. 
“Joel,” you gasp, your needy fingers prickling his scalp where you pull his hair. His teeth graze your throat and you want him to bite, you want him to sink in deep, you want his jaws to latch onto your skin. You want him never to leave again. 
He comes hard. His hips buck, pushing so deep he disappears into your body, and you see the blues, browns, reds of your painting as he empties all he has left inside you. 
Panting, he drops his head to your breast, his open mouth still scattering weak, worn kisses over your skin. Your lungs expand under his palms, fingers stuck in the grooves between your ribs, his body an offshoot of yours, not the other way around. In the ringing afterlife of your pleasure, you vaguely feel him mouthing words you cannot hear. You run your fingers through his hair and enjoy the battering of the scorching water as it melts you both into one.
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Later, in the sticky, humid silence of the bathroom, steam still swirling around your heads, fogging the glass, you trim Joel’s hair.
"Do you ever get scared?" you ask him, the shhhick of the scissors gliding across a chunk of his hair. "Do you ever go out on a job and think to yourself, What if I slip? What if this is it?"
Joel huffs. "It's not so much about myself as making sure the other guy goes down first."
“I think I’d be scared.” You twirl a lock of hair around your finger and let it fall over his forehead. “I don’t think I’d be able to look into someone’s eyes and take their life.”
He casts his eyes to his lap, flicking off some hair from his thigh. “One time, I thought it was over. I wasn’t quite seventeen yet, runnin’ drugs for some gangster. He sent me to El Sauzal to discreetly transport a couple kilos out of the city; someone had snitched and he didn’t want any rival gangs to find his stash. But the people there, they… They didn’t know any better. There were mothers, kids. Innocent people, y’know? Just strays. I decided I’d come back for ‘em.”
Your stomach twists. “What happened?”
A muscle in his jaw ticks. “I was too late. By the time I got back, the whole goddamn city was on fire. The people were either dead in the streets or close to it. They didn’t do anythin’ wrong. They didn’t ask for any of it. But they were weaker, slower. I couldn’t walk ten feet without seein’ some kid wrapped up his mother’s arms, burned to a fucking crisp. So, I came back with weapons, marched into the gang’s territory, and I killed ‘em all.”
Days ago, you’d be afraid of the man whose back warms your belly where you stand just behind him. You would hesitate to reach out and put your hand on his shoulder the way you do now. But you curl your fingers over the muscled curve of his arm and his head falls back against you, spidering open, his gooey molten centre bared for you.
Joel. Just Joel. 
“Did you see the painting?” you ask him quietly. 
“I see everything you do,” he says. “It's beautiful, baby.”
You drop your gaze from his face in the mirror and set down the scissors on the vanity. “I can't pretend to understand what you've been through, Joel, and that makes things even harder. All I've ever wanted is to love you, to take your pain, and all this time there's been so much I never even knew about. And I’m sorry.”
Joel’s hand comes to cover yours, clasping your fingers. They’re warm, rough, but you do not sense the phantom blood. “If I’d told you from the beginning,” he says, “maybe I never would've hurt you in the first place. All those years I thought I was protecting you from myself, I was hurting you—the one thing I swore I would never fuckin’ do.”
“Joel…”
“Baby, don't apologise to me,” he says firmly, putting his lips to your knuckles. “Never apologise to me. And don't you let me off easy.”
“Have I ever?” you say with a halfhearted smile. 
“Yeah,” he says, “the day you let me marry you.”
You scoff. “Oh, please. Wedding planning was hell on earth for you.”
“Just because I didn't like the photographer—”
“You didn't not like the photographer, Joel. You wanted to draw and quarter the photographer.” 
He huffs like an angry dog, frowning at you in the mirror. “He kept puttin’ his goddamn hands on you.”
You laugh, brushing your thumb over the patch in his beard to indicate you're finished. “He was posing us, cowboy.”
Joel rises to his feet and closes the scissors away inside the drawer. “Posin’ you, sure.”
“He was afraid to touch you. Probably thought you’d take off his hand. And the pictures turned out great.”
“Yeah,” he says, a smirk twitching at the corner of his mouth. “Way the sunlight caught in your hair, your eyes… I don't know. Beautiful.”
He was so shy the first time you kissed him. Cheeks flushed, eyes cast toward the ground, the wind ruffling his curls where it blew over the water. He was made in an artist’s image, you thought that night, the details pored over like paperwork, the sparkle in his eyes something the painter covets. But the portrait has never wilted in the years you've known him. It's grown older, sure, but it is not old. He's still shy sometimes; he still looks down when he smiles, and he still turns his cheek when you tell him he's beautiful. 
“Do you…” He rubs his palms over his thighs, looking up at you through his lashes. “Do you wish you could go back?”
It's your turn to sit. You drop into his chair, your arms curling over the back of the seat, and watch him on his journey to his knees. “I don't know, Joel,” you tell him. “I think about that day and part of me wants the magic of it back. I want the breeze and the sun and the white canopy and I want you sliding this ring on my finger. But knowing what I know now…”
“You wouldn't have married me,” he says like it's the only answer. His eyes are wet and sad and they sparkle so bright in the day. 
“I wish I’d known,” you say plainly, bringing his hand to your cheek and resting it over the cool wedding band. “I wish you would have told me everything. I wish you didn't make me question your love, even for a second. I wish you could have spared me all this anger I have—all this pain.”
He’s stone-still, a figure in a portrait, and you brush your fingers across his cheek. “But killing isn't what you are, Joel. It’s what you do. And I’m so tired of being angry.”
You say it fiercely, your tongue sticking to the roof of your mouth, your throat tightening. You swipe your thumbs under your eyes and meet your husband’s eye. “I love you more than my anger and my hurt have room for. And if I can love you this hard, if I can feel all this pain and still be that same girl who fell for the guy from the restaurant, then I can let myself get hurt all over again.”
Joel shakes his head, cupping your face in his hands as his eyes brim with tears. “Oh, baby…” 
“I know it's never been an easy marriage,” you say, your voice breaking, “and I’m always travelling, and I know that I can get snippy and we bicker, but I wouldn't go back to that day, Joel, because I wouldn't change anything. Even if I have to feel all of this again, I wouldn't take it all back.”
His inhale shudders through him and your heart lurches out of your chest. “I don’t deserve that,” he whispers, his thumb stroking your cheek, catching a tear that falls. “I’ve hurt you too much to ever be worthy of what you've given me, sweetheart. I ain't a good man, or even a decent one. But fuck, if I can be good for you, I’ll pray to whatever God they want me to. I’ll scrape my knees and put my hands together and fake it ‘til I’m someone you want. I swear it, baby.”
“Joel.” You gently pry his hands away. “The life you've lived, the things you've been through… I can't change any of it. I can't be what you need all the time, and fuck, I want to be. I do, Joel. But this life is something you have to figure out yourself. Nobody should force you to believe in something that's only ever caused you pain.”
He never told you about the tattoo; you had to find it yourself. Shucking the hem of his shirt up over his head, two weeks separating the last time you’d been able to indulge in his body, you trailed your fingers up his back and paused at the sound of him hissing through his teeth. 
“Easy, cowboy,” you cooed. “Are you all right?”
Wordlessly, he turned, taking your hand and lifting it to the reddish skin around the black ink. You gasped, your fingers jolting backward as if struck by a feeler of lightning. 
“Joel,” you said tremulously, “please don't tell me you were drunk and this was an impulse decision.”
“Guys in the Marines would get tattoos that meant somethin’ to them. Easier to carry around with you when you're away.” Joel met your gaze again, your tearful eyes, and brought your knuckles to his mouth. “Tell me you want it gone, and it's gone.”
You shook your head, a laugh snaking past the lump in your throat. “Selfishly, I think it’s very sexy.”
He chuckled, kissing the breath from your lungs. 
The memory is heavy in your stomach. It's something you'll have to roll around in your mouth a thousand times before the taste begins to dissolve. 
“I need time, Joel,” you tell him. “I need to wrap my head around things. I… I can't be the girl you want right now.”
Joel brushes his thumb over your chin. “You have always been the girl I want,” he says. “If you need time, you have it. If you need a warm body, you have it. I’m whoever you want me to be. And if it ain't a husband, then… then that's okay. But I can’t promise you that I won't stop tryin’ to get my wife back. That’s not who I am.”
You sniffle, twirling the ring on his finger. “You’ll get sick of it. The waiting.”
He smiles so softly that you can feel a bud begin to bloom in the core of you, nourished by the way he keeps his hand on your thigh, absently rubbing the sore muscles there.  “I waited my whole life for someone like you to come along—someone who could give me the purpose I’d been lookin’ for. I can wait another lifetime. I can wait a thousand.” 
“You’ll resent me. You’ll start to hate me.” You don't know why it comes pouring out of you, but the gates are brittle wood and they snapped in the torrent. “I’m an angry drunk. I smell like paint half the time. I travel for work.”
Joel just studies your face, some inexplicable calm etching out the agony. “You take your coffee with milk and sugar and you can't stand it black, but you make it that way for me anyway. You sleep until noon when you're jet lagged and I sit up in bed just to watch you dream. You lie in my arms on the couch at home and ask me about my day even when you're noddin’ off. You dreamed about love when you were a little girl, the way it happens in books. You told me in your wedding vows that you'd found it with me. You think I could resent a girl like that?”
He smiles like it hurts and heals all at once, like it's a foregone conclusion, like you were meant to be loved by him. 
“Time doesn't mean a goddamn thing. I know the girl I see in front of me now. Time won't change how much I love her.”
Flipping through the list of potential venues, Joel tucked into your side, you said, “We’ll have an outdoor ceremony. No churches.”
“Baby, I won't burst into flames if I step inside a church.” Joel playfully flicked his tongue over your nipple, obscured by his T-shirt. “Tommy, on the other hand… things he's done…”
You laughed, gently pushing at his head. “No churches,” you said again. “I don't care how much more we’ll have to pay or travel to get around it. You're my husband. You're my comfort, and I want to be what's comfortable for you. Understood?”
He looked up at you, his lips parted as if on the precipice of speech. You beamed, bringing his face to yours and kissing him deeply. 
“But if the wind knocks over the gazebo, you're not getting your dick inside me on our wedding night,” you said against his mouth. Joel shook his head, yanking you on top of him and tearing the shirt from your body. Your binder landed with a flutter of loose pages to the floor. 
“You didn't kill Cabrera.”
Joel lowers his eyes. “No. He got away.”
“So there's still a contract on your head.”
“For now.”
“So,” you say with a sigh, crossing the room and digging through your bag, “you have to go.”
“I have to go,” he echoes, following you like a shadow. “No matter what… I’m finishing it. Tonight.”
You pull the switchblade from your bag, open Joel’s fist, and place the cool wood hilt in his palm. 
“Goddammit, Tommy,” he says under his breath. “He shouldn't have…”
“But he did,” you say. “He said I should be the one to have it. I think it should be yours.”
He curls his fingers over the hilt and flicks open the blade. It's light, but it seems to weigh him down. You rest your hand over his. 
“Do what you need to do.”
He drops his forehead to yours and closes his eyes, soaking in this final breath exchanged between your silent bodies, dipping his fingers in the sanctified waters and coming out unscalded. 
Bill calls Joel not a moment after he steps onto the street outside the Continental. 
“That's a heavy price on your head.”
“Yeah, Bill, I know.” He breathes in the cool air, like cigarette smoke, his nostrils stinging. Trash and a new, fresh breeze carried into the city. Nothing that stays here ever thrives. “Stayed alive so far.”
“So I hear,” grunts the Manager, “and leaving behind a hell of a lot of cleanup.”
“I won't stick you with the check,” says Joel. “It's my business.”
“I don't conduct business inside this hotel,” says Bill, “which is why I won't tell you that a certain helicopter at a certain helipad is refuelling as we speak.”
Joel smirks, flicking out his cuff to check the time. “Any reason why you aren't tellin’ me this?”
“I like you, Joel. Despite myself.” 
Silent, he waits for more. 
“Besides,” Bill continues, “we live and die by honour. And you've saved my ass more than once.”
Joel snorts. “Which time are you thankin’ me for?”
“Just take my goddamn advice and leave this world. For good this time.”
“I will,” says Joel. “One way or another. Thanks, Bill.”
High above the ground, sitting in the alcove by the window, you watch storm clouds gather over the city, darkening the sky, the sun, and your Joel, so far away, slouching calmly toward whatever end he will choose. 
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It's raining. 
The first time you kissed him, a downpour suddenly swept up the both of you and you'd scrambled underneath a bridge by the water. You both laughed until your ribs were sore, holding hands as you ran, a soaking wet playbill above each of your heads for cover. 
“At least the show was good,” you shouted over the roar of the rainfall. 
Joel was mesmerised into stillness by the colours of the traffic lights in your eyes, how they shifted over the planes of your face. Starting to think like an artist, you'd tease, and he'd lean into it, a planet circling its sun. 
“It was all right,” he said, taking the playbill from your hand. “You could catch a cold. We should get a cab.”
“Always my hero.” You grinned up at him, your eyes scanning his face in that particular way they did, as if ingesting the sight of him to later put the lines to a canvas. “Did you have a good time, Joel? I mean, really. You won't offend me.”
He grimaced. “I, uh… well, see, I’m not the best judge, and… I guess—”
“Joel.”
There was a gleam in your eyes that could have been amusement or could have been hunger. He doesn't remember. He only saw you tilt your chin and lower your eyes to his mouth, to that one place the Sisters always called vulgar, obscene, a place meant only for His word—
“Can I kiss you, Joel Miller, or will you keep being all heroic?”
It was soft, gentle, exploratory. Your mouth opened his like a wound, setting the scorching blade of your lips to the gash, staunching the blood. You healed and burned him, one hand on his back beneath his jacket, the other cupping his face. It reminded him of the statue that lived in the theatre underneath the church where all the boys and girls trained. An angel cast in white marble, cradling the face of Saint Eustace. The statue was chipped where his eye was meant to be. 
He remembers the way he shuddered when you touched him like that. He remembers the chill that started in his feet and crept up his spine. Something like coming alive, settling back into his own body—no longer a spirit haunting the shell of a home but a man. 
You pulled back, but Joel curled his hand around the back of your neck and kissed you again, deeper, maybe a little too eager, too inexperienced—but you gasped, fingers curling in his hair, your body curving into his. Your noses bumped when you separated, and he remembers laughing. 
The rain is nothing like that night. It's the lash of a whip across his face, seeping colour from the world instead of infusing it with light and movement. The water by the docks slaps against the concrete and boats rock and groan against their mooring. The lights of the city are distant now. 
Joel steps out of the car. 
He marches toward his target, cocking the pistol in his hand, and calls out a name. It gets lost in the roll of thunder across the sky and lodges in his chest. 
Cabrera waits on the landing pad, looking wraithlike in a long black coat and a pair of leather gloves. His pilot fuels the helicopter nearby. Neither of them hear Joel’s voice in the air. The rising sun is what gives him away—or maybe the gunshot, as he lifts his arm and pulls the trigger. 
It does not pierce flesh. It ricochets off one of the rotor blades. He had aimed slightly to the left. 
The pilot scampers off into hiding, but the slash of the bullet through the rainfall is enough to get the attention Joel wants. Cabrera reaches inside the lining of his jacket and fires a single shot. Joel can feel it tear through skin and muscle, but it doesn't hurt. 
“Joel,” greets Cabrera. 
“Manuel.” 
His chest heaves, his jacket soaked through, the cold sinking bone-deep. 
“Let's finish this.”
The glimmer in those depthless black eyes is the panther at the hunt, relentless in its hunger, licking its chops at the sight of a challenge. For all the coward’s blood in his veins, it still pulses at the prospect of winning. 
“Like men,” says Cabrera, tossing his gun aside at the same time Joel does. “With honour. No more guns.”
And it's laughable: the thought that there is any honour left in a world like this. A world where children are beaten and lashed and trained to hold a weapon too big for their hands. A world that burns villages, butchers families, and still claims that without rules, we live with the animals. 
A world as unruly as this cannot be ruled. He never truly considered it until he saw the sad gleam in your eye, felt the empathetic touch of your hand on his face, and began to realise that maybe he should be furious. 
But because he already knows he's going to win, Joel lets his opponent land the first blow. 
The blood is tangy, near-sweet, as he swipes his forearm over his mouth and smears crimson on his shirtsleeve. It tingles faintly on his lips and crackles, warm as the melt from a late-winter snow. He feels it settle in the grooves of his palms, the hairs of his beard. He’s drowning in it. 
Cabrera hits hard, but he’s slow. He’ll take five punches in the time it takes to wind up for one. Joel brings his arm up to block the next and delivers a blow to the sternum with his knee as his opponent’s guard drops. Wide open, Cabrera stumbles a few steps back, choking down the telltale wheeze of being winded. Joel marches forward, relentless in his crusade, grasping him by the scruff of his neck, teeth bared like a mad wild dog, and bears his skull down on the side of the railing. Around them, the wind howls and lashes at his clothes, but he still hears the pained scream as if it were poured into his ears. 
Cabrera drops to his knees, and Joel grabs him again, bashing his head repeatedly against the steel bar, the lapel of an Italian leather coat bunching between his fingers, tainted by rainwater and the fist of the man who's come to take his life. 
And fuck, Joel wants to make it last. 
But there's a knife in his opponent’s hand, conjured from the darkness of his coat pocket, and Joel must release him to avoid the lethal slash of the blade. Blinking blood and lashing rain from his eyes, the man lunges with a snarl, and Joel recovers from his lost victory, stopping him with his fingers curled around his opponent’s wrist. He brings his hand to the crook of Cabrera’s elbow and uses his leverage to snap the bone.
Yowling, Cabrera drops to his haunches, the knife clattering to the ground. Joel, chest heaving, stands over him, flexing his fingers as he readies his fist for the killing blow.
His name leaves Cabrera’s bloodied mouth, accompanied by a mouthful of crimson-tainted saliva spat on the ground at Joel’s feet. 
“Joel…” He lifts his head, cradling his broken arm, and sneers. There’s a chilling glow of satisfaction in it. “Did you get your perfect life, Joel? Do you really think you’ve won? It won’t ever stop. Not after you’ve killed me, not after you’ve killed all of them. Is that what you’re going to do? Kill them all?”
He could. He has done far worse. He has spilled blood for gold coins and superficial alliances and someone else's revenge. He has stalked, stolen, lied, killed, and he could finish this now, so easily, with the flick of a blade. 
But the song of death does not call to him now. 
For so long he had trudged, unmoored, through heavy crimson blood. Like pulling at the seams of velvet, he'd sewn more lives into the sea of red and he never looked behind him to see the souls trying to pull him down at the ankles. He didn't know purpose until he saw the way the candlelight flickered in your eyes, until he tilted his head to the side and realised your smile was a new kind of beautiful from each angle. 
The rain sticks to his lashes and he thinks of an old song of prayer the Sisters used to chant. He remembers curling his fingers around one of the rosaries that hung from the large cross in the cathedral and wincing in anticipation. He thought he would burn—that the metal would leave a red stain on his palm. It never did. 
Maybe that's why he never believed. Surely, if there was a God, Joel Miller would have burned by now. 
He thinks of shopping for furniture and date nights and lazy mornings, tangled in bedsheets. Your mouth, smiling against his, whispering I love you across the breakfast table. Dancing—or swaying, more like—under the kitchen light. Loving easily, never feeling as if he must grab hold of the cross and burn himself upon it just to feel. 
Joel turns the switchblade in his hand, lurches forward, and plunges the knife into Cabrera’s chest. 
There is no noise but a faint gurgle from his mouth, his hand weakly rising to grasp the hilt. Joel drops to his knees and fishes Cabrera’s cell phone from his pocket. 
“The blade is stuck in your aorta,” he says. “If you pull it out, you’ll bleed out and die.” He puts the rain-slick screen in front of Cabrera’s face. “Pull the contract.”
A few feeble taps are all it takes, and Joel Miller is no longer a target. His name glares back at him on the screen, from two million to nothing, not the boogeyman any longer but something akin to a civilian. Joel tosses the phone into the water and turns to leave. 
“See you in hell, Joel,” Cabrera chokes, still grasping the shiny wooden hilt of the blade.
He barely hauls himself into the car, which chokes to a rumbling start. There's blood seeping through his shirt where Cabrera shot him, and his fingers shake as they pull away from the wound, the red so bright, so alive. Joel grits his teeth and squeezes his eyes shut. 
If there’s a God, he thinks, I hope you fucking hear me now. 
Tell me that we don’t get what we deserve. Because there is nothing I deserve in this world if I cannot keep what I’ve found.
His fingers trembling, smearing blood across the screen, he makes a call. 
And your voice on the line, soft, sticky with sleep, whispering his name—just his name: Joel?—is what wrenches the first sob from his throat. 
Joel, you say, like it means something, like it's precious. A jewel pressed from dusty black coal. Come back to me. Come home. 
So he does. 
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paper-mario-wiki · 2 days
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transfems can be women but you are not, you're an agp
(i actually blocked the original person who sent this and then resent it to myself on anon to keep the presentation fitting since i would like to share my perspective on this anyhow. here's what i would have said to this straw-man argument-haver if they weren't already blocked!)
TL;DR: you're wrong with both of the things you asserted in your statement. 1) i am not an AGP which is because 2) AGP's are exactly as much of a woman as i am.
what meaningful categorization could you put on someone to fit the description of "autogynophile" that precludes them from womanhood without inherently being contradictorily transphobic? "it turns them on to think about being vaginally penetrated" yeah i bet a lot of cishet woman fantasize about that too. "they only changed their identity because they like being a lady so much it helps them get off" okay? and? this is not a categorization which is inherently predatory, so who cares? gender is, irrevocably, an invention. it's a farce. it's nothing, we made it up, that's the whole point of agreeing that people can change it if they say they want to.
drawing a social line by the physical distinctions of "do they have penis or the other one" is as arbitrary as separating people by right handedness and left handedness or the eye color they were born with. the social expectations, behaviors, and woes are a consequence of the fact that everyone has been taught "this is just how it is, and it makes you different in every way, and this is how it's always been, and this is how it'll always be", same as the way people keep using fiat currencies (the US dollar for example), despite them being backed up by no singular tangible thing in any way that matters, aside from the word of the person who controls it.
and sometimes going along with that stuff is fine! i mean not the money, but the other one. the gender one. i like to be called a woman, while also knowing that "woman" is an invention. "pretty" is also an invention, and i love to be called that. "sonic the hedgehog" is an invention that people talk about using the same verbiage they use when describing real, tangible, breathing creatures, despite the fact that sonic the hedgehog exists conceptually and not physically (not including physical representations, which are not the same thing).
i think agp's are also women. if i could read someone's mind and they said "hi im a woman" but i knew they were thinking "im actually a man" i would still say "hello woman" because they might as well have given me their name for all the difference it makes in how we interact moving forward. if someone has no intention or probability to harm themselves or anyone else, i couldn't care less.
all that being said, you're wrong with both of the things you asserted in your statement. 1) i am not an AGP because 2) AGP are exactly as much of a woman as i am. it is a meaningless category coined by bigots and only given credibility by people with bigoted views.
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zanarkandskylines · 2 days
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listening to fortnight got me thinking about bakugo and reader having a very brief fling, something that happened in the past during their 20s, but stuck with both of them for years.
i touched you for only a fortnight i touched you, but i touched you
fast forward to living in the same city, the two of you now in your 30s and end up becoming neighbors by happenstance. you're both married to other people since you only talked in shared friend group settings after said fling.
all my mornings are mondays stuck in an endless february
you watch his wife water her flowers in the garden out back while making coffee in the kitchen every goddamn morning. you have no clue why it irks you so much, that the sight of her stupid smile makes you wanna punch her lights out.
occasionally, you run into bakugo at your mailboxes after a long day at work. small talk is the only thing you two can muster - a comment about the weather or harmless compliments about each other's appearance.
"sure rained like hell yesterday."
"nice sweater, your wife buy it for you?"
"god, it's too fucking hot today."
"that dress looks nice on ya."
one night, both of your spouses are away when a storm comes raging through the city. your power goes out, leaving you in the dark because your stupid husband forgot to replace the generator. from your windows, you see bakugo's household has power and decide to hightail it over for some company.
he answers the door with a confused look on his face. "the fuck you doin' in the rain? get in here!"
bakugo makes you a coffee to share with him in the kitchen, bullshitting through the night like you used to do as twenty somethings. it felt natural, your heart soaring as you watched him laugh and retell jokes from the past. when the conversation died down, you blurted out something you didn't plan to vocalize to anyone.
"i think my husband's cheating. sometimes i just wanna kill the bastard."
caught off guard by your admittance, bakugo quirks an eyebrow at you in response. "little extreme, but i'm sure that could be arranged."
"would be cheaper than a damn divorce. that asshole would take everything from me."
he snickers, taking another sip of his coffee. "think my wife's doin' the same. comes home late and shit, never can tell me why."
"how'd we get stuck with this shit luck?" you retort, forcing a laugh from your tightened chest.
"could be worse. we're neighbors, that's fuckin' lucky for me."
i love you...it's ruining my life.
"oh? i'm starting to think that's not a coincidence anymore."
bakugo sets his mug on the countertop, turning to face you while crossing his arms over the broadness of his chest.
"might'a convinced my wife to move here. thought maybe we could be friends again."
"so you bought a fucking house next to me instead of just calling to go to dinner?" you ask mockingly, a smirk on your face as you awaited his bullshit answer.
he shakes his head with a grin of his own. "sure did."
i love you...it's ruining my life.
"how come you never ask or invite me over then? we're literal neighbors, kats."
"pretty sure my wife's scared of ya. plus, i want time with you, not us."
that makes your heart skip a beat.
"hell of a way to say you miss me." you pause before setting your own cup down on the counter. "i'm glad you're here."
"me too."
right as he's approaching you, the front door swings open.
"babe, i'm home!" his wife calls, handful of shopping bags. she sees you standing in the kitchen aside bakugo - you give her a soft wave.
"oh, hi. i didn't expect company tonight."
"her dumbass husband forgot to replace their generator. just helpin' her out."
she gives him a glare, tilting her chin up at him, almost condescendingly, as she assesses his answer.
"how unfortunate. stay as long as you need, i'm gonna go put this away."
and with that, she leaves for their bedroom to unload her shopping haul. once she's out of earshot, you turn to bakugo and chuckle under your breath.
"oh yeah, she hates me."
bakugo rolls his eyes. "let her be miserable, it's her strong suit. come on, let's go take'a look at that generator."
the generator works just fine, you unplugged it before coming over.
you were curious if there was a spark leftover between you two, only to find the fire was not only stoked, but never fully extinguished.
blasty tags; @slayfics @maddietries @queenpiranhadon @starieq ✨
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1d1195 · 2 days
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Neighbors Extra V
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Read Neighbors here | ~2.5k words
From me: based on this ask. Takes place probably in between Part 5 and Extra I
Warnings: a little angsty, a little fluffy, enjoy 💕
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It was the stretch of bad weather that did it. Played a trick on his mind. It hurt to think about those weeks without his favorite people. He knew what bad weather could do to people and he knew how it could affect him. It was weird, the night before he rather enjoyed the sound of rain against the window, the slight chill in the air contrasted with the warmth coming off her from the bed. Now it seemed like a curse.
“Harry?” Rory called, hearing the thunder in the middle of the night. It made his heart ache to know Rory called Harry’s name and not for Mumma the way he usually did. Harry rolled out of bed pressing a swift kiss to her forehead despite his negativity settling into the pit of his stomach. He made his way for Rory’s room. He forgot about the frustration he felt about her and the weeks that she chose to separate them. Rory needed him.
“S’matter, lad?” Harry asked sitting on the end of his bed. There was relief in his eyes that was visible in the low light of his nightlight. That relief made Harry’s heart clench. He put his hand on his leg atop the covers and squeezed his shin.
“Is... is Mumma scared?” He asked softly.
Harry tilted his head curiously. “Mummy’s sleeping,” he assured him.
“Oh... um...” Rory was so little looking in his bed. “Mumma gets scared with thunder sometimes,” he explained. “I usually go sleep with her to keep her safe.”
Harry blamed the lateness of the hour for his slow-moving brain cells and not understanding what Rory was trying to tell him faster. “Oh?” He nodded. “I see. Well, do y’want t’come check on her?” He asked standing beside his bed and pulling the covers back.
He nodded eagerly; it was punctuated by a crack of thunder that practically shook the house. His eyes widened with fear while trying to be brave. After his little hospital stay, Harry noted how nervous Rory seemed sometimes—especially when it came to his mum and making sure she wasn’t nervous too. “That was scary,” Harry admitted and scooped Rory into his arms quickly, tucking his head against his shoulder.
“You’re scared of thunder?” He asked incredulously but didn't move his face from Harry's neck.
“Isn’t everyone?” Harry smirked without Rory seeing. “Y'know that Mummy is, me...s'like you’re the bravest one of us."
Rory squirmed a bit in Harry’s arms--like the weight of his phobia and subsequent fake-bravery was too much for him. “I think I’m a little afraid of thunder,” he whispered to Harry. Harry nodded and squeezed him.
“S’okay. S’brave of you t’want t’check on Mummy anyway.”
“I didn’t know if I was allowed to,” he admitted.
“Allowed?” Harry repeated.
“Because Mumma has you now.”
Harry didn’t want to have this conversation in the middle of the night. Not when he was feeling frustrated with the love of his life’s actions. Not when the weather was souring his mood. Not when Rory felt scared, and he didn’t know how to fix it completely.
“Rory,” Harry sighed stopping outside the bedroom. “Mummy and I are always going t’need you,” he promised. “You don’t have t’change how y’do things because m’here,” he pressed his lips against the little one’s forehead.
"Okay," he nodded.
Harry smiled at him again, ran his hand through his hair comfortingly before he headed back in the bedroom. He knelt on the bed and deposited Rory in the middle. She hadn’t moved. Probably tired from being perfect all day, Harry presumed. Rory nestled into the middle of the bed and Harry smiled softly, feeling more tired, thankfully, than when he woke up. His mind didn’t need to reel with more feelings of frustration before he fell back asleep. “Night, Harry,” Rory whispered.
Harry smiled as he drifted off. “Night Rory.”
*
The rainy night turned into a rainy day. Harry was quiet. She noticed it immediately. When she woke up with the help of her internal clock at six-thirty, she realized Rory’s little face was staring back at her. She blinked in surprise, wondering when he got there. Harry’s hand was resting protectively on Rory’s little rib cage and her heart melted so thoroughly she thought she would cry.
Swallowing the emotion in her throat she snuck out of bed to start breakfast as Rory would surely wake up with the help of his own internal clock in about thirty minutes. The rain and dark clouds made her think of her trip to the hospital in the middle of the night, quickly she shook her head of those thoughts.
As if on cue, Harry and Rory descended the stairs as she poured juice for them. “Hi Mumma!” Rory smiled excitedly. Harry released him and he scurried over to hug her legs. She bent and kissed the top of his head before returning to the scrambled eggs on the stove.
“Hi love bug,” she grinned. “Did you sleep okay?”
Rory glanced back at Harry and nodded. “Harry said I was really brave about the thunder.”
She was surprised she didn’t wake to the sound of it and moreover the sound of Rory’s little worried voice because of it. She pursed her lips and glanced at Harry as well. “Yeah?” She asked quietly.
Harry nodded. He pressed a kiss to her temple and grabbed the three glasses of orange juice to settle on the table. “Rory was braver than I was,” he repeated. “He wanted t’make sure y’were sleeping okay. Because y’get scared in the thunderstorms sometimes.”
Her heart clenched with love for the little one. More for Harry for going along with every little detail and every insecurity Rory shared with him. She smiled and nodded. “Thanks, cutie pie,” she ruffled his hair as he held onto her leg still.
Harry sat at the table. Normally, she wouldn’t have paid much attention to the position, but he didn’t really look up from his phone. He didn’t look up when she said breakfast was almost ready—when he usually hopped up to get plates, silverware, etc. Rory followed over to Harry. Joined him by sitting right on his lap, Harry moving instinctively to hold him as they examined Harry’s phone.
“Honey, can you ask Harry if it’s okay first—he might be doing something for work or—”
“S’fine, kitten,” he mumbled, interrupting her without further explanation.
“It’s highlights from the soccer game,” Rory explained.
Biting her lip, she suddenly felt a bit intrusive. Quietly, she set plates in front of the pair and then ate her own food in near silence—save for the cheers and announcers coming from Harry’s phone. It felt odd to feel left out. For so long it had been her and Rory. Perhaps she was imagining it, but she swore Harry almost seemed... annoyed with her.
After Rory started playing on his own, she would ask. Or maybe when Rory went to sleep tonight.
For now, even if she was a bit anxious about Harry’s coldness toward her, she couldn’t help but adore how sweet Harry and Rory looked at the other end of the table. The same concentrated expression on their faces as they watched his phone screen. Her heart was so full it felt illegal to be that happy. Harry kissed the back of Rory’s head without fanfare, without thinking. His phone propped against the flower vase while he ate his breakfast with one hand.
Just as quietly, she snapped a picture of the pair of them. One to send to her family as well as his for sure.
*
Rory and Harry were nearly inseparable the whole day. It allowed her to get a lot of cleaning and laundry done that had been neglected since Rory couldn’t play in the yard with the unending rainy weather. In the late afternoon, Rory asked that they play a few rounds of Candyland. So, they did. Harry smiled at Rory the whole time and chuckled every time her turn brought her back to the Peppermint Forest when she was almost to the Candy Castle.
It almost felt mean spirited.
But the boys went to play again in Rory's room after Candyland. Harry even got Rory to take a bath without the usual argument that ensued when she did. Their little day spent together right under her nose made her a little jealous—although she wasn’t sure who she was jealous of when she thought about it. They paused to have leftovers for dinner (because it was Saturday, and that was their routine) While they played, she read some of her long-neglected book that was often set to the side for room to play with her son.
“Rory wants you t’say goodnight,” Harry said quietly as he flopped onto the couch grabbing the controller off the coffee table. She blinked, glanced at the clock along the wall of the dining area and shook her head at how rapidly the time had moved.
“It’s eight already?” She asked, mostly to herself. There was no arguing, no ‘one more story,’ not even a good night kiss as had happened many nights before when Harry put Rory to bed.
He nodded anyway, scrolling through movie and show options on Netflix without even looking at her. She eyed him suspiciously the entire time she ascended the stairs to Rory’s room. “Hi Mumma,” he grinned happily. He smelled clean and fresh. His room was tidy (thanks to Harry’s kind reminders as they played, she was sure). Rory was perfect. But she may have been a bit biased.
“Hi baby,” she smiled. “Did you have fun playing with Harry today?” She asked.
He nodded. “We played so much,” it was as if he realized it all on his own and how weird of a day it was to have a playdate right near her without hardly including her.
“You did,” she grinned and kissed his forehead. “I love you. Sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite.” She had said it to him since the day they met Harry and he had asked for clarification.
He grinned and rolled over sleepily. “I love you, too, Mumma,” he yawned. She turned his light off, ensuring the nightlight remained on. She closed the door and returned to the living room. Harry was unmoved; legs outstretched on the coffee table.
Harry shifted as she removed her book from the sofa and placed it beside Harry’s feet on the table. He was silent. Her discomfort amplified and she turned to him. “Are you...okay?” She asked. He nodded, still unspeaking. She bit the inside of her lip. “Uh...Harry, it really feels like—”
“It was really unfair,” he mumbled. His gaze was unmoving from the TV but he wasn’t watching.
“What was—”
“You just...stopped talking t’me. Y’didn’t tell me why. Rory had t’come t’me in secret t’invite me t’his game,” he reminded her. “I know why y’did,” he looked at her squarely for the first time all day. “But it hurt. And I never really got t’grieve it because you came back but it hurt,” he repeated. Her chest ached, feeling like he pierced a whole right through it.
“Harry,” she whispered, an apology forming.
He shook his head. “Y’don’t have t’say anything. S’over and m’not...” he sighed. “M’really not mad, kitten. M’not. S’jus’ the crummy weather made me think of it. Playing with Rory all day made me think ‘bout all those weeks I didn’t have with him. S’not fair and s’not anyone’s fault. M’jus... sad.”
Her heart felt shattered. “But—”
“You don’t have t’say anything.”
But she felt like she did. Harry resenting her felt like a very real possibility and it terrified her. “You’ll resent me.”
“Of course I won’t,” he turned to her with such fierceness in his eyes she felt as if the sun had finally broke the cloud barrier after their long weak of rain. “I know why y’did it. But m’sad about it,” he grabbed her hand. “I trust you that it won’t happen again,” he kissed her knuckles. “M’sorry I was cold today. I jus’ never got t’process or tell you how it felt.”
Well, if it was worse than this moment--and she was sure that it wasn’t even a fraction of the anguish and hurt Harry felt at the time--then she didn’t want to ever make him feel that way again. Didn’t want to experience it herself in any manner—even if Harry very much deserved to make her feel the way she made him feel.
“Harry,” she repeated. “I don’t know what to say,” she admitted. Tongue-tied, confused, and unsure. Things she rarely felt since she had Rory because she couldn't. “I... I don’t know how to—”
“Kitten,” he squeezed her hand. “M’not mad. M’not going t’hold it against you. But I needed to tell you, so I don’t.”
“Harry,” she felt like a broken record.
“Beautiful,” he echoed in the same tone. “M’not mad,” he promised.
She crawled across the couch, curled in his lap and nuzzled against him in a way that a grown woman had no business to do. Tears stung behind her eyes and her breath felt shallow in her lungs. “I was an idiot,” she whispered hoping it would ease the ache, the fear she felt of losing Harry when she had only started to have him.
“Oh, kitten,” he cooed. “Y’might be the most intelligent woman I’ve ever met,” he assured her running his hand up and down her back. “I was mean today. I shouldn’t have done that.”
“You should have punched me in the face.”
He chuckled. “Never in a billion years, love,” he brushed her hair out of her face. “You didn’t need t’do it, but I get it.”
“I didn’t. I shouldn’t have. I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”
“M’telling you, you don’t need to. I won’t behave poorly like I did today again.”
Her heart felt so broken--she was afraid to speak. Worried it would just come out in a mess of sobs that Harry would unfairly have to comfort. “I can’t even believe you’re apologizing for your behavior. It was my own doing.”
“Angel,” he kissed her forehead, the tip of her nose. “You did what you thought was best as a mum. M’never going t’fault you for that; just...” he smiled and shook his head. “Tell me beforehand next time, yeah?”
She snorted. “I won’t ever let there be a next time,” she vowed. He winked at her, cupped her face with his hands that she missed gently caressing her and touching her in between playing with Rory, all day long. Gently, he pressed his lips to hers to seal the promise.
--
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kingkaizen · 9 hours
Text
𝓻𝓸𝓾𝓰𝓱𝓮𝓻
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∘ desc: although things are going great with your boyfriend nanami, sometimes you think he's too nice in bed. who better to ask for some pointers than from nanami's opposite, gojo satoru <3
∘ ft: nanami & gojo
∘ word count: 2.7k
∘ includes: voyeurism, threesome, pussy slaps, spanking, face fucking, edging, dacryphilia, dirty talk
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Nanami is the best boyfriend that you’ve ever had.
No matter everything that you’ve been through together in the last three years, nothing has ever made you doubt the amount of love you had for each other. You absolutely adored everything about him. After being friends for years before getting together, it wasn’t hard to fall so deeply in love with the man that he’s become. Being able to come home to him is everything that you’ve ever wanted and more.
But, of course, all relationships come with their issues.
When Nanami received a message from you saying that you had to talk, his heart immediately dropped. What could he have done wrong? Was today a special day that he forgot about? Did he accidentally leave the toilet seat up? What could possibly be it? He rushed home from work, unlocking the front door to see you sitting on the couch.
“Is everything okay?” Nanami questioned, slipping his shoes off and placing them neatly on the floor along with pinning his coat on the rack. “Your text worried me.”
“No, Kento. Everything is fine, I promise, come sit with me.” You gestured to the cushion next to yours, trying to keep him calm. You knew that texting him like that would elicit this concerned reaction, but what you’re about to say could not be said through a simple text message.
“Kento, when I say this to you, I need you to know that I love you so much and you are an amazing boyfriend okay?” Nanami nods his head slightly, eyebrows slowly coming together in complete anticipation of what’s about to come out of your mouth.
“I want you to start being rougher with me in bed.”
Finally coming out and saying it, you felt like a weight being lifted off of your chest. Nanami always treats you like glass, in and out of the bedroom. Although you love how gentle and loving he is with you, you need something more. You can’t help but think back to all of the times that he would come back home from work, irritated about something that happened. How good it would feel for him to take out those emotions on you. But, knowing your sweet boyfriend, that thought would never cross his mind. 
“Am I not satisfying you enough? I thought you enjoyed our intimate moments together…” Nanami responds, his brain thinking back to every single night you’ve spent together in the past. Why hasn’t he seen this before? Knowing that he hasn’t been satisfying you in the way that he thought hurt him much more than he was willing to admit right away.
“No, that’s not it at all. You know that you always make me feel good. I just want to change things up a bit, that’s all.” You placed an encouraging hand on his thigh, prompting him to look up at you. “I know you, Kento, don’t think too much into it. I love every moment that we have together, I just want us to try something different, that’s all.”
Nanami took in all of your words, making a pact to himself that he will change things for the better. He understands what you want, he’s just not sure how to fully give that to you. How he is in bed is exactly the way he is outside of that: sweet, loving, and overall just concerned. He would never forgive himself for hurting you in any capacity, so living up to your request will be a challenge for him. Who better to ask than his complete opposite in every single way?
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“She wants you, Nanami Kento, to be rough?” Gojo almost can’t help but laugh at the thought. It’s not laughable because Nanami doesn’t have a rough side to him, Gojo of all people would know how it feels to be on the opposite end of that. The funny part is that he can’t imagine him being rough towards you. Even from an outsider looking into your relationship, anyone could see how he treats you.
“I didn’t tell you this so that you could laugh at me, Satoru, I’m asking for your help.” This request from Nanami also humored Gojo. Finally, after all of these years, Nanami is actually voluntarily asking for his help.
“How exactly do you expect me to help you? Do you need me to demonstrate?” Gojo laughed as he said this, waiting for Nanami to show some sort of disagreement in his face.
That look never came.
“That is actually exactly what I want you to do. I know the type of history that you two have, I’m not an idiot. All of these years since we’ve all been friends before we started dating, I would see the way you would look at each other. I know that there is chemistry there and I wouldn’t be surprised if you have been intimate before.” Nanami looked at Gojo, seriousness etched across his face. “I want you to show me how to treat her the way that she wants to be, I only want her to be happy.” As much as Nanami hates to admit when Gojo is better than him in any sort of way, he knows the truth when it comes to this. He sees how other women have fawned over him, and it must be for good reason.
“I’ll teach you how to fuck her like a slut.”
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The sight of two shirtless men is enough to excite anyone. After telling Nanami what was on your mind, this is the last thing that you expected him to do. Of course he brought this up to you before this moment, always wanting to ensure your comfort. It was hard to disagree, you’ve been with Gojo years prior but it was never anything serious. Always flings, Gojo was never the “relationship type”. 
“So gorgeous, my love.” Nanami always admired how ethereal you looked, both in and out the bedroom. He caressed your face, planting soft yet firm kisses on your lips, growing more and more passionate by the second. Gojo was sitting on the chair in the corner of the room, watching with an intense gaze. You would think that having another man watching the two of you would freak you out, but it weirdly turned you on. Gently, as always, Nanami laid you down on the mattress, fingers finding their way to your covered breasts, exposing them to his hungry mouth. After moving the fabric, his lips puckered around your nipple, tongue pushing on the hardened nub as you ran your fingers through his hair.
“Kento, I need you so bad.” You whimpered, the impatient side of you coming out already. You know Nanami, you know that it doesn’t take much begging to get what you want. You know how bad he wants you too, he can’t help but fully oblige to every word you say.
“I know honey, I’m going to give it to you.” Nanami had no self control when it came to you. Gojo rolls his eyes in the corner, finally making his presence known.
“Nanami, you can’t let her talk to you like that.” Gojo slowly began to touch his growing bulge through his pants. “It’s like you already forgot everything I told you.” He stood up and walked towards the two of you, Nanami moving to the side. Gojo gently gripped your chin, turning your head to look him dead in his eyes.
“If you want something from him, you’re going to have to earn it.”
You nodded your head, his authoritative tone sending a wave of pleasure throughout your body. Following his discrete directions, you kneeled in front of your boyfriend, fingers playfully toying with the zipper in his pants as you pulled it down along with the rest of it. You kissed his hard length through the last piece of fabric still left on his body, looking up at him through your lashes.
“D-Don’t tease me like that, (y/n)”. Nanami loved this obedient side of you, even if he wasn’t the reason you were acting this way. Before he could even process, Gojo lightly tapped the side of your ass, sending a slight sting throughout your body.
“Tease him like that again and you’re gonna have to make yourself cum. Now say sorry.” Gojo threatened, backing away once again to see how this unfolds. By now, he has fully released himself from the confines of his pants, fingers wrapping around his girth as he slowly began to pleasure himself at the sight.
“I’m sorry.” You looked up at Nanami once more, pulling away the last piece of clothing separating your awaiting mouth from his leaking tip. 
“I’m sorry what?” Gojo sneered.
“I’m sorry sir.” Your pleading voice made Nanami groan, watching as you finally began to wrap your lips around the tip of his cock. You began to put your tongue to work, swirling it around his head while keeping your lips firmly around the top, sucking in. Nanami could tell that you were still in a teasing mood, refusing to go any lower than that. Suddenly, you could feel his hand find its way to the back of your head, forcing you to let more of him in. Nanami would never do something like this normally, his forcefulness with you turning you on tremendously. Gojo laughed, approving of Nanami’s sudden confidence boost. It’s arousing to him too, watching you take all of him so deep in your mouth, gagging on his length as he throws his head back.
“That’s it, take it all.” Nanami grunts, “I love how messy you look, choking on me like that.” He could feel you moan around his length at his words, thighs rubbing together in anticipation of what’s to come. “I know how wet you are already, if you want some help you have to ask for it okay?” 
No matter what, Nanami is still always keeping your needs in mind, noticing how soaked you're starting to become. He removes himself from inside your mouth, allowing you to fully breathe. You look so beautiful, tears threatening to spill from your lash line and saliva coating around your mouth. He helps you back up to your feet, leading your body to lay backwards onto the bed, callused fingers catching any tears that manage to slip. “Tell me what you want.”
Your gaze moved from his eyes over to Gojo. “I want you both. Please sir, just touch me.” You felt pathetic as you begged, your core pulsing with need. You’ve never felt this sensitive before, everything feeling that much more intense given how hungry the two men in your presence are. 
“Aww, what a little slut you are.” Gojo grinned, making his way closer to you. “What do you think Nanami, has she been a good girl for us? Should we give her what she wants?” Gojo’s fingers began to rub on the outside of your panties. “Look at how wet she is for us.” Gojo showed Nanami your slick on his fingers, watching it glisten underneath the lowlight. 
“I think she has been a good girl.” Nanami smiles at you, so proud of how well you’ve been doing for them. “Go ahead, Gojo, you can touch her.”
“Finally.” Gojo quickly moved your panties to the side, the coolness of his touch catching you off guard as he teased the inside of your folds. “You don’t understand how torturous it was watching you without being able to touch you yet.” He makes quick work of finding your clit, slowly rubbing his thumb on your pearl as he watches you begin to writhe underneath. “Don’t forget why you’re here slut. You wanted to be treated like this so bad and now you got it. Beg for it.”
“P-Please Satoru, please touch me. I can’t take it anymore, I need it so bad.” You pleaded, beginning to feel helpless underneath him. Gojo smirked, plunging his slender fingers inside of you unexpectedly. You felt your body arch up in surprise, a gasp leaving your mouth as pleasure began to consume your body.
“So fucking greedy.” Gojo began slowly at first, catching a rhythm. “Look at how she’s drenching my fingers.” Nanami rubs himself at the sight, growing impatient. You’re too far gone to notice, feeling your own orgasm already beginning to slowly creep up in intensity. Before you know it, you're cumming all around his fingers, eyes rolling to the back of your head. Gojo quickly pulls his fingers out, not doing anything to help you ride it out. “Who told you that you could cum?” He taps his hand against your pussy repeatedly, watching you moan in a mix of pleasure and pain and you slowly come down from your high. “What a fucking whore.”
“I’m sorry sir, I couldn’t -fuck- I couldn’t help it.” You sob, looking at Nanami. You’ve never seen him look so angry. He didn’t say anything to you, only twirling his finger around, motioning for you to flip over. You quickly follow his que, not wanting to do anything to tick him off further. You can’t fully process that this is happening, your Nanami actually treating you this way.
You fucking loved it.
You felt his familiar touch rub over your ass as you got on all fours, arching your back slightly. He groaned at the sight of your wetness, glistening core almost calling out to him. He rubbed his tip against your folds, feeling your hole try to suck him in. Meanwhile, Gojo is sucking your juice off of his fingers, loving the taste of you.
“Get on with it Nanami, if she wants to be punished so badly then so be it.” Gojo made his way in front of you, rubbing the tip of his cock against your plush lips. “We told you what would happen if you didn’t listen, right? You have to be a bit smarter than that sweetheart.” The syrupy tone of his voice didn’t match his actions as he parted your lips with his head, feeling you wrap your lips against his girth. With that, Nanami finally pushed himself all the way in, moaning in unison along with you. Gojo could feel the vibrations of your moans against him.
Nanami gave you no time to adjust, pounding his entire length into you with such force that caused your mouth to hang open in shock. You felt so good, brain completely fogged over with no thoughts other than the complete monster that Nanami has become. He’s never fucked you like this, usually preferring soft thrusts over the hard pounding that he’s subjecting yourself to now. You suddenly felt a sharp slap on your ass, his large hand rubbing the sting away almost just as quickly as he placed it.
“Don’t ignore Gojo now, honey. I thought a slut like you would love to have two thick cocks filling you up this way?” Nanami questioned, picking up the pace which made it so much harder for you to focus. Gojo wasn’t having that. He placed one hand on each side of your face, holding it in place for him to thrust his hips against you. His cock filled your mouth, spit sloshing everywhere as your face got messier and messier.
“Fuck (y/n), you’re doing so fucking good for us princess.” Gojo moaned, the sounds coming from the room overwhelmed his senses. The bed creaking, you struggling to take Nanami while also pleasuring Gojo, and the sound of Nanami’s balls slapping against your ass sounded like music to his ears. Nanami couldn’t believe how hot this all was, feeling as your walls began to quiver around him.
“You’re gonna cum again baby?” Nanami asked, gripping your hips tighter as he felt himself get even closer. Gojo was already almost there, hips beginning to stutter as he watched you cry out. All you could do is whimper in response, the knot in your stomach growing tighter and tighter. Nanami made it there first, his thrusts becoming more erratic as he spilled himself inside of you. Ropes of cum flooded in as he fully pressed himself against you, beads of sweat threatening to drip off his nose. Gojo soon followed, shooting his load into your mouth as you took it all.
“Such a good girl.” Gojo mused, wiping the side of your mouth when he finished. He proceeded to kiss you, tasting himself on your tongue. Nanami pulled himself out slowly, watching in delight as his seed slowly dripped out of you. You whimpered at the now empty feeling, your orgasm slowly starting to retreat.
“You’re not going to finish me off?” You angrily turned to Nanami, watching the smirk begin to creep up his face.
“Not unless you beg for it.”
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© kingkaizen | do not copy, steal, or duplicate!
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adorabluesposts · 3 days
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I’m a massively hopeless romantic and hopelessly in love with our short paranoid chaotic duck loving king and the THINGS I WOULD DO TO THIS MAN JUST BECAUSE I LOVE HIM SO MUCH.
Anyway thoughts about he’d react to constant affection because my love is physical affection and maybe sometimes giving him handmade gifts because nothing beats time wasted on handmade shit. I LOVE THIS MAN SM ITS TOO MUCH 😭😭😭
I WANNA CONSTANTLY SHOWER HIM WITH KISSES AND PRAISES PLS.
Basically requesting a fluff with all of the above 💀💀
I also love your writing style sm, hope you’re having a great day/night
buckle up cause this is gonna be SWEET!
Thanks for the appreciation on my writing, I'm still working on it 😭💖 love this sm. This is for the physical affection ppl 🫶🏻
a/n:.. added some acts of service love language too I'm so sorry 😭
NOT PROFFRED.
PROOFREA. PROOFREWD. I can't spell.
NOT PROOFREAD.
(I managed)
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divider by @al-of-the-stars. NOT MINE!!
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It's not a surprise Lucifer's a sucker for physical attention. Not in a sexual way, just hugs and holding hands in the most unusual times.
At first you started off with 'baby steps', occasionally giving him a kiss on his cheek or lips, holding his hand or playing with his suit when he didn't expect it, just to see how he'd react.
He would get flustered, turn into a blushing mess and pretty much feel like his knees would give oit at any minute. He would never admit what an impact you had on him, though.
When the showers of affection got more frequent and he realised what you were doing, every chance he'd get he would basically invite you to do those things for him. He loved tricking you into thinking he didn't know what your love language was and , even if he still got all flustered and was still surprised because he, obviously, didn't know what to expect (a kiss or a hug), he convinced himself he was just acting so flustered to trick you, again.
Of course Lucifer's love for you gets more and more powerful with every kiss.
His wife left him, after all, so he needs all the affection you can offer. He really loves you.
Even though you noticed he still wears his wedding ring sometimes, you know how hard it is to let go, and you showering him with affection actually helps him get through it!
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"Good morning, handsome!" You shower his sleepy face with kisses as he slowly wakes up, watching his grumpy face turn into a weak, tired smile.
"Morning" He smiles and cuos your cheek as you pull away, pushing you back in for a kiss.
He notices you're all dressed already and raises an eyebrow, sitting up. "Where are you going?"
"Well, Your Majesty-" He smiles at you, loving how intimate it sounds when you call him that, "-It's Monday. Meaning I have work to get done."
He frowns and you laugh. "Bummer."
"I made you breakfast, so you might as well get changed." You ruffle his hair as he struggles to put it back in place, even if it was tangled already and playfully huffs at you, lecturing you on how his hair must always be perfect as you leave the room.
When he joins you in the kitchen, you gasp in awe, like every morning. You go up to him and praise him for being so good looking, pestering his face with kisses and telling him how you're falling in love over and over again.
He lovea it truly, holding your waist as you praise him. He looks at you with lovesick eyes and a goofy smile and only let's go when hinger takes the best of him. He praises you back, too, for being such a good cook (or not burning the kitchen down.. in certain people's cases aka me).
Before you leave, he makes sure to leave one of his ducks in your bag , knowing that by now you have millions if them in your office, as you leave one of your handmade gifts, drawings, or sweets in your shared room.
He almost never wants to let you go to work, turning the radio on to twirl you around in the kitchen and kiss your face or hands until it gets so late you either have to run to work or make him open up a portal for you.
It's not his fault he just loves the way you love him.
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Ive never written something so fast in my entire life. THE THINGS LUCI DOES TO ME OMG.
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cerise-on-top · 3 days
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what if the 141 boys had a ridiculously tall husband. like. a little bit taller than konig, probably. and he's really scary to people, actually!!!! but not his s/o , nuh uh, he's disgustingly sweet to his beloved.. sorry i'm rambling, i think (jokes and idiocy aside i adore your headcanons <3)
Hey there! Thank you, that's very kind of you! Also thank you for sending in a request for a male reader, you're one of the first ones and I was very excited to write about a male reader for once :D
TF141 With A Very Tall Husband
Price: He didn’t really think he’d ever be dating someone much, much taller than him. Sure, he doesn’t particularly mind, but he’s not short either, with him standing at 1,88m himself. It makes him feel small at times, especially if you’re pretty muscular too. He doesn’t get insecure about it in the slightest, oh no, but it’s weird to be so much shorter than your loved ones. However, he’s pretty used to scary people by now. Ghost isn’t exactly a delight to have around at first when you don’t know him either, so he knows how to deal with scary people. Might ask you to tone it down a little bit when you’re scaring other people too much, he doesn’t particularly wanna attract attention like that. But you being a sweetheart towards him? It melts his heart. He knows what you’re like towards people that aren’t him, so it makes him smile that you’re willing to do just about anything for him just to spend some time with him. You wanna trim his beard? There’s a good chance you’ve got some experience with that anyway, so he really doesn’t mind it as much. Hell, he probably trusts you more than his own barber at times. Besides, it’s a nice little bonding activity. If you have a beard then he’ll offer to trim it for you as well. Price isn’t really opposed to being the little spoon, or just being held in general. Quite the opposite, you being this tall sometimes puts him in a cuddly mood where he just plops down into your arms. Gently scratch his scalp and there’s a good chance he’ll even fall asleep on you. He’s so used to being everyone’s protector, it feels nice to be protected for once. But he won’t always settle for being held either, it’s his job to make you feel safe and sound as well, and thus he will take on the role of cuddler as well. Will fight you for that role, actually. Price is a real sweetheart towards his loved ones as well, so I think the two of you would fit well together. His mere presence demands respect in the right people, which can sometimes scare others. So, from time to time, you might both scare other people together. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally.
Gaz: He makes so many jokes about you being this tall and feigns being hurt about being much shorter than you are. You’re his behemoth, his leviathan and his ziz. Loves calling you the names of monsters that are said to be pretty big, it’s endearing to him. Besides, you’re scary enough that some people call you a monster anyway, if just for your height. If anyone ever were to call you that in front of Gaz, then they’ll end up with a black eye. No one gets to call you a monster but him. While he won’t always approve of you scaring everyone, Gaz does have a few friends that he wants you to get along with, he won’t particularly do anything about it either if that’s just what you’re like. Might try to make you seem a bit less scary by being a bit more affectionate with you in public. Holding your hand, giving you a peck on the cheek, giving you a hug. Those kinds of things. He actually loves you being this tall since that means you can pick him up and spin him around. He’s not been picked up ever since he was a little boy, so he definitely wouldn’t mind you showing off to him just how strong you are. Is also always looking for an excuse to hold your hand. Oh, seems like he forgot just how big your hand actually is and how much it engulfs his. Remind him for a moment and hold his hand, will you? Gaz is a sweetheart towards his loved ones anyway, if you look past the fact he will sass anyone to show his affection, so he loves that you’re so sweet towards him. Though, sometimes he wishes you were about the same height so you could actually share each other’s wardrobe. But hey, at least he gets to wear your extremely oversized shirts and hoodies, one of his favorite things to do. Another thing he also adores is just sitting in your lap when you’re home together and will also place your hands so that you’re holding him in your arms. If you’ve got really warm hands then he’ll place them atop his thighs to keep himself warm. Gaz isn’t the warmest person out there, but that just means you get to warm him up yourself. Is actually a lot cuddlier because you’re this tall and will become your personal blanket.
Ghost: He feels kind of perplexed about you being so much taller than him. Ghost is 1,95m, he towers over pretty much anyone, so how dare you be so much taller than him. Pretends to hate you being this tall, actually loves it. Sometimes he dreams of sparring with you under the moonlight to assert his dominance, even though there’s really no need to since you’re such a sweetheart towards him. He probably just needs to ask and would get anything from you. He really doesn’t mind you scaring pretty much everyone off, he has the same effect on people he doesn’t know. That just means there’s less people to worry about in his life for the time being. You’ll be spending a lot of time alone with each other that way, which he really likes. Though, maybe don’t scare his teammates too much, he genuinely likes them and wants them to be well too. Though, it’s kind of hard to properly scare them anyway. Ghost is usually a pretty quiet man when there’s no need for chit chat, but he doesn’t mind hearing your voice. In fact, he might get worried if you suddenly stop talking and will ask you what’s wrong. If you’ve got nothing to talk about then he’ll ask some questions so he can continue hearing your voice. He also blushes from time to time when you suddenly give him some sugary sweet compliments. He’s a grown, scary military man, he really shouldn’t be, but it’s just so endearing, especially when you, even bigger and scarier, call him your little honey bunny. It actually motivates him to do house chores. Not that he won’t do them anyway, but you calling him embarrassingly domestic names makes him just a tad bit soft, which leads to him trying to be a good husband. You may cuddle him since he trusts you, but he will also want to hold you from time to time. Life is a constant give and take, so prepare to be cuddled. Won’t particularly ask for cuddles, though, since he’s kind of too embarrassed to admit he’s touch starved. To you it’s blatantly obvious, though, which is why you initiate those cuddling sessions. Ghost appreciates it and sometimes hides a smile in either the pillow or your neck. As long as you don’t see him being silly, all is good.
Soap: He used to hate you being this tall. Soap may “only” be of average height, but he’s the tallest in his family, which he was actually pretty proud of. He towered over his father, even. And then he joined the military, where quite a few people were taller than him. And then you had the audacity to introduce yourself to him. You, the tallest man he’s ever met. It hurt his ego. Ever since you got together, though, he slowly got over it. You’re just such a sweetheart, how could he hate you over something as trivial as this? However, nothing could ever stop him from trying to pick you up and spinning you around. Soap is a pretty strong lad too, he’ll make it work somehow. You will feel tiny and cared for too. There’s a good chance he can’t reach your lips to kiss you. Yes, he could just ask you to bend down, but where’s the fun in that? Climbs you like a tree instead. He’s also always thinking of that one post where, instead of asking their boyfriend, the person should just punch him in the stomach. He won’t do it, but he remembers it every time without fail. He doesn’t mind you being scary either. Hell, Ghost is also a pretty scary guy to have around when you don’t know him and he’s one of Soap’s closest friends. Besides, he knows better anyway. You’re a total goof and the biggest sweetheart this world has ever seen. You being scary towards others just means that he’s got you all to himself all the time. Soap is a clingy guy, so you can expect him to cling to you like a koala from time to time. Actually, that was a lie, you should expect him to jump at you and hold onto you very often. Cuddles over safety. You’re likely also one of the only people on the planet willing to hear him out when he’s talking about his passions. And he could go on for hours every time. Explosives, weapons, whatever show you’re watching together, all is fair game. See, you’re one of the biggest sweethearts to him because you actually listen to him, despite him going into great detail about it all. You may not always be able to understand him when he’s talking chemistry again, but you hear him out anyway, and for that alone you’ve won his heart. He also sits on your lap while talking. You’re his little throne now that he takes immense pride in.
#cod#cod x reader#john price#john price x reader#price x reader#kyle gaz garrick#kyle gaz garrick x reader#gaz x reader#simon ghost riley#simon ghost riley x reader#ghost x reader#john soap mactavish#john soap mactavish x reader#soap x reader#I doubt anyone cares but I HC Soap to be 1.78m and Gaz to be 1.81m I just forgot to mention it#m!reader#I know I'm biased but I feel as though I'm actually more willing to write about male readers than fem readers#90% of all things I see in this fandom are with a fem reader there's barely anything for male readers#still thinking back fondly on that one time I got a request for a ftm reader#but that was an eternity ago and I feel as though I'd write that request better now and with more content#I tried to write a lot for this because I was really looking forward to it#besides it was a pretty cute request too. I've actually got a request that's similiar to this one too#it's with Laswell and a reader that's roughly as tall as König#and then I've got something for Nikolai and Price as a couple#I'm gonna write some HCs for that alone and then write some more with added reader as a bonus#I know I never mentioned it anywhere but I do try to be a reader centric blog. but I can write charxchar as well#I just haven't done so since middle school I think#wait no I've written charxchar not too long ago for madcom and tf2. good times#not sure if I'll continue writing today though. I started a new anime and I'm enjoying it a lot so I might watch that instead
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Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 重啟之極海聽雷/Reunion: The Sound of the Providence/The Lost Tomb Reboot/this thing has too many names
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Reunion (I'm just going to call it that) is a 2020 action drama about the most specialest little babygirl in the tomb-raiding world, his two husbands, and the cadre of assorted weirdos they pick up as they try to follow a set of directions left by a dead (?) man in the thunder.
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Imagine if someone showed you the Mandalorian, and you were like, gee, that was a neat little sci-fi one-shot! because you'd never heard of Star Wars. That was basically my experience watching this show, having no idea that the Lost Tomb franchise (DMBJ) was even a thing. Turns out that not only is there a whole big continuity out there with these characters, but that Reunion takes place a few years after the main story's resolution. Don't worry, though -- Reunion doesn't spoil you for that resolution. It doesn't spoil you for much, period. Look, DMBJ has a weird relationship to endings, okay?
I have written a more thorough where-to-start guide for DMBJ as a whole, so if you want to consider other entry points, well, that information is there for your consideration. Yet it is my opinion that this is the best entry into the overall franchise, and a fun thing to watch just in general, and I'm here to make my case for both of those.
The rest of this rec will assume that you have no familiarity with the DMBJ series. That's okay; you don't need any. All you need is to trust my five reasons you should watch this.
1. Old Man Yaoi
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As you begin this show, you are introduced to the Iron Triangle. That's them in the picture up there. Left to right, you have: Xiao Ge, magically tattooed immortal hottie who just got back from ten years in [scene missing]; Wu Xie, our protagonist, who's just a little guy and it's his birthday; and Wang Pangzi, the literal best.
(And yes, Wu Xie is in his 30s and Pangzi is in his 40s, which is not technically old man anything, but ... look, if you watch, you'll see why I think I'm justified in calling it that.)
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They are extremely married. They are a disaster trio of disasters so disastrous that no one else should ever be subjected to their chaos. They're going to make sure lots of people are, though, don't you worry about it. Sometimes those people even deserve it.
However, because the show (tragically!!) decides that Xiao Ge has somewhere else to be like 95% of the runtime, most of the relationship you get to see is between Wu Xie and Pangzi.
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I'm saying this now as an old gay nerd who just this year celebrated her 15th wedding anniversary: I have never, never felt so represented in media as I have watching Wu Xie and Pangzi interact. There's a little wake-up song they sing together near the end of the show, and it just ... it packs so much character development into thirty seconds. These boys have been living adjacent lives for so long that they've made up their own little shared songs about the mundanities of daily living. That is just what happens when you marry your best friend and then decide to get old and weird together. Ask me how I know.
Look, if you want to know whether this show is for you or not, watch to the end of the first episode, to the part where Pangzi flips over the table. If your heart is filled with joy (as it should be), keep going.
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Love makes a tomb-raiding syndicate family.
2. A fun-filled action-packed romp of nonsense!
If you're familiar with Hellblazer canon, this will make sense to you: Reunion is Dangerous Habits. If you're not familiar with Hellblazer canon, try it like this: Reunion is a terrible place to start because it plays on your extant affection for a character who gains a terrible status effect almost immediately. It's a also great place to start because it throws you right in the action with measurably high stakes and gives you a reason to build that affection very quickly.
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I'm also going to warn you right off the bat: The plot of this show got cut to ribbons by censors.
See, the DMBJ books, being books, are allowed to get away with supernatural shit! So you've got zombies and ghosts and curses and monsters and immortality and all your other standard ooky spooky semi-urban fantasy trappings. But the DMBJ adaptations, being live-action, are heavily regulated in their content. This is why, in the early Reunion episodes, our heroes are menaced by human-looking creatures that are actually ancient mannequins made of leather that are piloted, mecha-style, by evil clams. Because evil clams are more scientific than zombies. I guess.
So yeah, the plot of this book already had to get mangled into a more "science"-compliant shape even before it made it to filming. The real problem is that a whole lot more of it got cut after it was all filmed and put together. I have read an explanation of what the actual storyline was supposed to be, and yeah, if you know what you’re looking at, you can see (and hear) the scars where major elements got hacked out with a weed whacker.
Therefore: You cannot expect this plot to make sense.
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But that's okay! You're not here for the plot to make sense! You're here to watch some characters you love run around through ridiculous and sometimes beautiful labyrinths, trying to solve puzzles you're never given enough information to understand, all in search of the resolution to a mystery that had half its guts torn out before you got to see it -- and you are here to love it. If you have ever laughed and cheered your way through a Mission: Impossible film without pausing to care too much about the plot holes it’s dodging left and right, you are in the correct frame of mind to appreciate this. Just believe that whatever engaging nonsense the show tells you is correct for the time being and go with it.
You cannot watch DMBJ and care about the laws of physics. You simply cannot.
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Do not, however, let me give you the impression that the shoddy plotting is accompanied by equally shoddy performances. A major part of this show’s incredible watchability comes from how the cast is shockingly good. There are some serious heavy hitters among the actors. A major part of why this Wu Xie and Pangzi are my favorite together is the incredible chops both Zhu Yilong and Chen Minghao have, to say nothing of their real-life affection for one another. (See that scar on Wu Xie's neck? That scar is there because Zhu Yilong commits to the bit.) Effortlessly charming Mao Xiaotong turns potentially irritating wunderkind Bai Haotian into a perfect precious weirdo baby. Wu Erbai's entire second-season character arc could have been unintentionally comedic, but veteran of queer cinema Hu Jun sells even the undignified moments as relentlessly tragic. And of course Baron Chen absolutely kills it with...
3. This giant fucking loser
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This is Hei Xiazi. That's not his name, but it's close enough. Allow me to do a dramatic reenactment of my watching his first scene:
[camera pans over to him]
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me: Ugh, I recognize this kind of wannabe badass character design. I hate his type. He's self-important, hyper-masculine, and just a big jerk, and the show thinks he's soooo cool. Barf.
[thirty seconds later]
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me: Oh no. I was so wrong. I love him forever now.
This is because he is (as indicated above) a giant fucking loser. Yes, he's a good fighter who knows lots of things. He's also a wet potato chip of a man. Sure, he can get you into a headlock, but he can also annoy you into submission, and that's honestly more fun for him. My wife has used the phrase “Vash the Stampede-coded” to describe him. My wife is not wrong.
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And the kind of ridiculous thing is, being such a loser is what wraps back around to making him cool again. He's a loser because he just doesn't fucking care. His masculinity is the opposite of fragile. You tell him to wear a dress and makeup, he'll do it -- and sure, he'll complain, but only because he enjoys complaining. He has no dignity. He’s tits-out. He's gender. He's the worst and also the best.
Hei Xiazi is a major character in the other installations, to the point where he and his boyfriend (more on him later) even have their own movie. But of course, I did not know this on my first watch, so I kept expecting the show to explain his whole deal. It does not, but you don't really need it to. He sees better in the dark. He doesn't age. He's a thug for hire. There, that's all the bio you need.
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One of the things that makes him great is that he is the least sexually threatening person ever. Across all the properties he's in, he spends a fair amount of time with women -- sometimes in very close quarters -- and they are perfectly safe around him. I actually wrote a whole post about it once upon a time (warning for tiny spoilers for a series that isn't this one) wherein I claim that not only Xiazi but Reunion in general is the television equivalent of the shirt that says I RESPECT WOMEN SO MUCH I DON'T HAVE SEX WITH THEM.
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That said, this loser does get a sort-of romance plot here -- and honestly, I find it very cute! It's not even the only instance in this series of a bisexual guy in a long-term same-sex relationship getting a girlfriend, and I like that other one too! Look, the handle of my DMBJ sideblog is @katamaricule because I joked that Wu Xie treats polyamory like a katamari, and if you don't move fast enough, you're going to be rolled right up into his gay little cuddle puddle.
This is not a show for exclusive ships; this is a show for inclusive ships. The Jiumen Association is a polycule. You don't even have to know what the Jiumen Association is to know it's true.
4. The power of friendship
This show has a lot of characters.
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I'd say the supporting cast is divided into three categories: characters who have been in previous installments, characters who have not been in previous installments, and characters who probably should have been in previous installments (or at least mentioned) but who were only created for Reunion so we have to pretend like we've known about them all along.
There is no way to tell which is which -- which is part of my argument that this series makes a good entry point to the franchise.
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Take Huo Daofu. Huo Daofu is a brilliant doctor masquerading as a donut stand operator who treats Wu Xie with all the cold disdain of a man confronting the person who left him at the altar years ago. On the one hand, yes! We do know Huo Daofu from a previous series, and we've known he's both a doctor and a bitch. On the other hand, oh, we have no idea why he's like this about Wu Xie, and we probably never will. The show just treats it like it's for an excellent reason, and you know what, from what you know about Wu Xie, it probably is.
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Consider also Jiang Zisuan. One of the show's principal antagonists, Jiang Zisuan turns out to be the brother of ... well, let's just say it's someone whose having a brother really should have come up before this. It has not come up. (And that's even before we get into the issue of his surname.) His stated identity as that person's brother is so bizarre that my favorite interpretation is that he isn't actually that person's brother -- all the flashbacks we see are just his delusions about a relationship he's completely invented. But there's no way you'd know how fucking weird this is on your first run.
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Then there's our friendly little support himbo, Kanjian, who shows up to all occasions with two tickets to the gun show and not a thought in that beautiful head. (His name just means "vest," which is par for the course when it comes to the author's naming conventions.) He was a lot more menacing in the last series (where they kept putting sleeves on him, geez), where most of what we learned about him is that you can loan him out to other tomb-raiding families. Now he's a golden retriever with great aim and a slingshot. It's an upgrade.
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The trick is, you cannot be surprised when someone shows up and the show treats them like you should know who they are, even when there's no possible way you could know who they are. I mean, for heaven's sake, Liu Sang arrives in the middle of an obvious beef with Pangzi, the origins of which are never satisfactorily explained, while also having a giant do-I-want-to-fuck-him-or-do-I-want-to-be-him crush on Xiao Ge, which is also never satisfactorily explained. Whatever, you just roll with it. He's got good hearing, a bad attitude, and questionable taste in idols. Now you're good to go.
(I should throw in a special note here that Liu Sang is many, many people's little meow meow, and not undeservedly. For a fuller explanation of why that is, please consult this other post I made.)
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Part of the fun of this big cast is the adorable interactions you get. All the characters have appropriately big personalities, and the show loves letting people you wouldn’t expect bounce off one another. It’s not your typical action-hero show where nothing happens without the protagonist in the room. There are lots of exciting combinations and tons of charming dynamics! Unlikely friendships form all over the place! Enemies become allies! Allies become friends! Friends become friends with other friends! Some friends become enemies again! You'll need a scoreboard to keep up!
This is not to say the show treats all its characters perfectly or equally -- one of the precious few main female characters doesn't even get a real name, for heaven's sake, and the less said about the brownface racism, the better. It is, at its heart, a dude show for dudes made in China, with all the troubling decision-making that implies. Where it does deserve credit, though, is in understanding that its supporting characters are actual people with personalities apart from their function in Wu Xie's narrative. Sometimes the show just asks "what if [random character A] and [random character B] had to interact?" and has fun considering the answer! Which is almost always a delight to watch, and sometimes even breaks your heart.
5. Amazing rewatch value!
And by this I mean the experience of watching this show is remarkably different once you have any understanding of the rest of the DMBJ universe.
For instance, there's a point where two characters are scuba-diving past some submerged coffins, and one character tells the other whose coffins they are. Working only on information Reunion has given you, you're like, oh, that's where they buried the guy who built this creepy place, that's a little weird. Once you recognize that name from other series, though, your reaction is far more, excuse me, they did WHAT to WHOSE corpses?
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Or another point where a character you've already met is on a train, and there's a handsome gentleman who just happens to be riding with her. He hands her his business card! Aw, that's sweet, he seems like a nice guy! Well, no, Xie Yuchen is not nice, but he is one of our allies, and he's Hei Xiazi's boyfriend, and a lot of what he's doing hits real different when you have a fuller grasp on why he's doing it and for whom. (Honestly, a major reason to watch Reunion first is so you're not fully and appropriately upset by how your black/pink gays merely have one teeny tiny scene together.)
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From the way the series treats the persistent absence of Wu Sanxing, Wu Xie's third uncle, I absolutely, 100% assumed that he was a completely new character to this installment of the series, an extremely long-lost relative that we've somehow conveniently managed to never talk about before now. So imagine my gobsmacked surprise when I went to watch a different series, set much earlier in the timeline, where the opening scene prominently features Wu Sanxing as an actual character in the present-day narrative! ...Well, sorta. Look, there's a lot of fuckery with his identity in earlier parts of the story, and fortunately you need to know none of it to understand Reunion. But when you do, it suddenly makes a lot more sense why Wu Xie talks about someone who was a major part of Wu Xie's adult life like he died when Wu Xie was nine.
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AND THE FLASHBACK SCENE WHERE A-NING GETS KILLED BY THE SNAKE, AND YOU'RE LIKE, OKAY, AND THEN YOU WATCH ULTIMATE NOTE AND IT WASN'T LIKE THAT AT ALL look, I know there are kinda reasons for this, different production companies and all, but seriously, what the fuck
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All of which to say is that the experience of watching Reunion the first time is, hey, this self-contained romp is a lot of fun! The experience of rewatching it after watching any of the other DMBJ installments is a transcendently wonderful head-clutching avalanche of one moment of recognition right after another.
And here's the thing: You will watch more. Reunion is a gateway drug. If you are interested enough to make it through all 62 episodes, you're going to be interested in watching more. Which is great. The English-speaking fandom needs more people. Come down into the tombs. It's great down here. We've got snakes and arguably unintentional homoeroticism. Join us. Join usssssssss
Are you ready for an aventure?
There are a couple different ways to watch the first half, but there's (weirdly) only one way to watch the second, so for both of them, I'm going to send you straight to iQiyi: Season 1 (32 episodes) and Season 2 (30 episodes).
And just so you’re ready when Reunion is done, here’s how you find the rest of the DMBJ series, in the absolutely non-chronological order in which I, personally, think you should watch them:
The Lost Tomb 2 (AsianCrush, YouTube)
Ultimate Note (iQiyi)
The Mystic Nine (iQiyi, Viki)
Sand Sea/Tomb of the Sea (Viki, WeTV, YouTube, also YouTube)
Also, there's a lot of movies and side series and other pieces that are worth seeing, and even a couple of full series I've left off the list, and you can just slot them in wherever. And maybe we'll get Tibetan Sea Flower someday? Look, hope springs eternal.
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They're so perfect. Perfect triangle. Perfect boys.
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justanotherlifeff · 3 days
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Love is meaningless
[True form heian era Sukuna x reader. I may have taken many creative liberties with his backstory alongside certain spoilers so be warned!]
Love is meaningless, this was something Sukuna believed for most of his life. He can proclaim it precisely because he understands it. Being born a wretched curse by his foolish starving mother was not a start to life he had appreciated, but it was what it was. Fate was that he absorbed his twin for nourishment, fate was that he was born monstrous. One can only live with fate and become stronger, after all. Of course, he had to raise himself, of course he had to get stronger to survive. The golden age of Jujutsu meant many other cursed spirits, and of course, humans were no better. Weak people shouldn’t complain about their transgressions after all. That is simply how the world is built, to please the strong.
Yet, unexpected things happen, as it is part of life as well. Some people find it in their stupid, human, hearts to love a monster. And sometimes, something as meaningless as love creeps up in a monster’s heart too if they are weak enough. Sukuna wasn’t born the king of curses after all. It was a meaningless gesture that one might call kindness, something he believed that he didn’t deserve, that started it all. Just like his mother who birthed him, this foolish girl gave him an apple from her basket when he was starving. A foolish act of kindness from a human to a cursed being. He accepted nonetheless, as a starving man would, since this was before the days when he took whatever he wanted.
The days when he was weak enough to be considerate. For some reason, you kept coming back, with food every time, and for some reason, he didn’t leave the outskirts of that village after the first few encounters. He convinced himself that it was because your cooking was amazing, not because he wanted to see that smile on your face again, not because he was getting addicted to that kindness. Why would a human be kind to the likes of him after all? Surely, he was being delusional. However, weeks turned to months, and you wouldn’t stop visiting the small cave where he was living at, since no one would give him shelter or a job due to his monstrous features. Somehow you weren’t afraid of the four arms, the four eyes, the odd markings on his body. Somehow, you made conversation with him at one point as you watched him eagerly eat whatever food you brought him and somehow, he found himself replying. Hope was something that the weak shouldn’t have and yet, he found it in you, he made that mistake.
Looking at water in streams was something he hated, because it showed him his inhumanity and made the struggles he faced his entire life be something that was acceptable. Who would care for a monster after all? And yet, one day, you looked at him and called him beautiful with a blush on your pretty little face. He didn’t know how to reply to that, as someone who never encountered a situation like that before and yet, he couldn’t sleep all night, thinking of those words. He awkwardly called you beautiful too the next day.
Small compliments turned into teasing and at one point, neither you nor he had to say it out loud that you loved each other. It was simply something that happened. However, you had to keep it a secret from the village, and he understood why. Loving something like him had its consequences as they would kill you for being with a curse. He understood the consequences but his hunger for you was far too much to ignore. It started with kisses, and then he wanted more, so much more. And you let him take what he wanted with a smile on your face, that same smile he fell in love with. Even your old kimonos started looking like ones that queens would wear, your simple hairpin was better than the highest quality jade to him. You were beautiful and you were his and that was the best thing that happened in his wretched life at the time. Or at least, he was foolish and weak enough to believe so.
During his days as the king of curses, he saw the women he fucked as no more than pieces of meat that exist for his pleasure. One might think he wasn’t capable of being gentle, of having any other expression than the ruthless and deranged smile that adorns his face. Yet, his first time was so different, as he looked upon your beauty with nothing but wonder in his eyes, not believing his own luck as you were naked underneath him, that beautiful tint of red adorning your face. Perhaps that was when he found himself loving the color red so much, it was never about the blood of the thousands he killed later in life. You looked beautiful even with your old kimonos, but you looked divine without it, and he wasn’t shy enough to keep that opinion to himself, mostly because he wanted to see that blush on your face when he says it out loud. He wanted to hear you call out his name in that affectionate and yet pleasured voice when he was deep inside you. He wanted you, all of you, even if he didn’t deserve you.
The weak gets trampled on, it isn’t something they should complain about as it is the way of life. He almost had you, the day you came to him with a worried expression on your face and told him that you may be expecting his child. For a moment, he dreamed, despite being weak. He asked you to elope with him, that he would protect you. He knew that the child he sired would be cursed too, and that you were unmarried, so of course, overall, you would be killed if he left you alone. He loved you far too much to even consider that. “Come with me, Ill take you far from here and protect you. I’ll make sure nothing hurts you or our child. I’ll get stronger for you.” He told you with that gruff tone of his. To his surprise, you agreed. However, you were a kind little thing full of hope. You wanted to see your parents one last time before leaving with him forever. He didn’t understand it, but he wanted you to be happy, so he suggested making a binding vow. A part of him felt wary as all these felt too good to be true.
The vow was simple, it was to live as long as you can. He was still new to forming binding vows, so he forgot to acknowledge the fact that breaking the vow didn’t mean much if someone else killed you. Only that your death would be far more painful. Things were peaceful, too peaceful. He ate the food you cooked him, talked with you about a future together, looked at the sun set together. Like every day, you left him after that with a kiss on his cheek. Yet, he felt uneasy enough to sneak near the village that night after hearing the commotion.
It didn’t take long to find you, as you were right there, in the middle of the village square, or at least your severed head was. The blood splattered everywhere indicated the effects of the binding vow, your entire body exploded when your head was cut. Perhaps you were weak and ended up telling your parents, perhaps somehow, they found out that you were pregnant with his child, he would never know. That village burned that night and not a single person there survived. As he stood there, watching whatever was left of you burn with the village, it was almost as if he achieved enlightenment. The weak shouldn’t complain, so he wasn’t complaining. He would get stronger so that he would be the one taking, to fill the void that was created this day. His hunger was endless because he would never eat the food you cook again. Love is meaningless, because without you, this world lost its meaning.
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pixiecaps · 9 hours
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Cellbit: Dude, this is the most difficult thing that- that I’ve had to do up until now. Solving the enigmas, dude, didn’t even come close to this. I have to lie to everyone I like. I have to see everyone who trusted me slowly becoming disappointed. I have to take that all quietly and continue saying the biggest atrocities that I disagree with just to get some information. Something!
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Cellbit: It’s like if you looked someone in the face and said the worst things you can think of knowing that you’re doing it to protect them, you know? Ultimately, you're doing it for their own good, but you're hurting them now for- for a greater good. It really sucks, dude. It really sucks. Like the things I had to say to Forever, the things I had to say to- to Badboy. The things I have to say to everyone, dude. Like everyone using my own arguments against me. (Laughs) And I being forced to try to refute my own head.
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Cellbit: And I'm trying to make things very obvious. I'm trying sometimes, like, I'm trying my best to leave books accessible in obvious places- in obvious chests. And say things that I would NEVER say to them. They know, at least deep down, they have a little suspicion that it doesn't make sense. And maybe they can read- Because Cucurucho, he has one problem. He doesn't have the social tact that humans do. He doesn’t- He doesn’t function like a human being. He has letters saying that he doesn't understand how pronouns work and doesn't know what feelings and wants are. He knows what feelings are, but he doesn't know what it's like to have feelings according to what he said. He doesn’t know what are- He has a letter where he says, “I don’t know what is want.”
Cellbit: Thinking about that, the only way I can get around it is by leaving purposeful nuances that I'm saying absurd things so that if you see me from a distance and you don't know me it looks like I'm- that I'm an asshole and I'm really fighting with them but the people who know me, who’ve been with me over these last- All this time on the island and still love me and know I’d never say those things, “No, dude, it doesn't make sense that he's saying these things. It must have some purpose. That logic doesn’t make sense.” It has to make A BIT of sense for Cucurucho to believe it but it can’t make so much sense that my friends don’t doubt at least a little bit. Those who know me know. I'm relying on that.
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pholla-jm · 2 days
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Sukuna with a S/O who has a sweet tooth/Loves eating sweets ?? :00
Like imagine most of the time they go on a date it's basically just reader and him going to different shops trying out desserts and sweets
Hello! Sorry it took me awhile! I got busy with work and my new class had just started. I decided to add some more to this. I hope you like it!! *********
Sweet Tooth
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IMAGINE: SWEET TOOTH~ SUKUNA X READER FEAT: GOJO GENRE: FLUFF cw: modern au! implied female reader, sukuna calls your woman. not proof read. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Whenever Sukuna took you out, you would make him stop for a sweet treat. It could be for the slightest thing. Groceries? Sweet treat. Getting gas? Sweet treat? 
You will use any excuse to get sweet treats. 
This time, there was no real reason to convince Sukuna that you needed a sweet treat. Only that there was a new café opening up. Taking a quick glance at what would be on their menu, you already decided that you needed to go. It had most of your favorite pastries and drinks. 
“Please, Sukuna.” You pleaded to your boyfriend with your hands clasped together. You had asked him to take you, but you knew how much he didn’t care for places like that. He didn’t like the options they provided; they always smelled so sweet. And it sometimes stuck to his clothes. 
Sukuna has already decided to go with you, though. He would do anything for you. However, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t make it easy for you. He loved to see you like this. 
“Please, I’ll make it worth your while.” 
Sukuna smirks at your words. 
“I’ll hold you to that.” 
Your face lit up at his words, “so does that mean you’ll take me?” 
“Yeah, brat.” 
“Yay! Thank you!” You say while wrapping your arms around his ample shoulders. 
Sukuna chuckles, squeezing you tight in return. 
When the time came, Sukuna couldn’t believe he agreed to something like this. Since the place was pretty new, there were a lot of people. The theme was coquette, which Sukuna wasn’t fond of. 
Sukuna settled with matcha mochi and coffee. In contrast, you had the most sickening sweets in front of you. 
When Sukuna looks at all of it, his stomach almost churns in disgust. But when he sees you gleam at the desserts and take happy bites, it erases his dislike for the sweet treats. He would spend hours in places like this to see your happy face. 
“What’s so great about these treats anyway?” Sukuna asks you. 
You were about to answer, but someone interrupted you. Someone that neither of you wanted to see. 
“Ooh, can I have some of that?” You look up to see the bright blue-eyed man named Gojo. 
“Ugh, no get away.” You say while shoving him away. 
“Awe, come on.” He pouts at you. 
Sukuna frowns at seeing Gojo. “Get away from (y/n).” 
Gojo’s eyes flicker over to the brooding man. His arms were crossed as he glared at Gojo. 
An annoying smirk now sits on his face, “why? Scared I might take her away?” 
Sukuna’s hand slams down on the table, and your face twists disgustingly. 
“Oh my god.. You’re so embarrassing niisan.” You whisper to Gojo, but Sukuna hears it. 
The anger slowly dissipates from his body, and confusion fills his head. 
“Brother?” He mumbles. 
“What? I can’t protect my little sister?” 
While the two of you bicker, Sukuna glances back and forth. 
Gojo and you didn’t look alike. Not a single feature looked the same. Some things are similar, like the hyper personality… and the major sweet tooth. 
“Well, I got to go. Thanks.” Gojo says after taking a bite of one of your cakes. 
He gives you a smug look before waving bye. 
“Ugh,” You groan before turning to Sukuna, “I’m sorry about him.” 
“Why didn’t you tell me he was your brother?” 
You look at him in confusion, “I didn’t?” 
Sukuna gives you a look, “I think I would remember something like that.” 
“Huh, sorry. I guess it just slipped.” 
“How does something like that slip?” 
You purse your lips, “well whenever I’m not around him… I just seem to not worry about him. You know?” 
Sukuna looks at you, a bit confused, which means you will explain it further. 
“Satoru and I aren’t full siblings. Same mom but different dads. But Gojo has always been the golden child. Everything is about him. He always got everything he wanted, but me? I was lucky to even be in the same room as him.” You chuckle while shaking your head. 
“So, it’s nice not having him around. I can do whatever I want without him around.” 
Sukuna nods, “and have whatever you want as well.” 
You smile at his words, “Yeah. I guess you’re right.” 
Sukuna scoffs, “of course I’m right, woman.” 
You laugh and shake your head. “It wasn’t long ago that I discovered my love for sweets. I never got sweets as a child, since Satoru hogged them all.” 
Sukuna smiles at you and leans forward. He grabs a napkin, wiping some of the icing away from the corner of your lips, “that just means I’ll have to spoil you more than.” 
Your face turns pink at his words and actions. 
“I’ll hold you to that.”
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Comfort
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Hi guys!
It was Cata's birthday tuesday, so here is a little something for her :)
It's from a request too, I really need to sort them x)
Also please Barca, win today i need it.
Enjoy!
TW : Lost, angst.
There you are. The first lost of Barcelona for this season. It’s coming at the first moment of the year honestly, you would have preferred to lose against another Spanish team than to lose against Chelsea during the Champion’s league. You still have another game to win and go to the finale, but it would be at London and pretty hard. You already know it.
Looking around you, you saw that all of your teammates are gutted. Lucy is sitting on the ground; Ona went straight to the locker room and Alexia let another players comfort her. For your point, you just stay up where you were when the whistle whistled. Your hand on your hips, you weren’t looking at something special at first.
Until your eyes went on the silhouette of your girlfriend. Cata is sitting on the ground, a little like Lucy unless that she’s leaning against the goal post. Her knees bent against her and her arms surrounding them, she has her eyes fixed on her feet.
She seems so sad that you forget almost immediately your proper sadness. Walking slowly in her direction, you try not to ignore the other people talking to you. When you reach Cata, you kneel in front of her.
“Hey” you say quietly, putting your hand on her arm.
She looks briefly at you, before shaking her head. You know that she feels guilty about the lost, but you think that every single player of the team has that feeling. You don’t say another word, getting on your feet again before helping her to get up too. You don’t want to have to do the post-game interview, so you take another way to go to the locker room.
Of course, the general mood is awful. Nobody’s talking, nobody’s looking at each other. It’s so tense that you propose at Cata to go take a shower at your apartment to go home sooner. Cata agrees with a nod, still not talking. Knowing how much she’s bubbly, happy and smiling usually, it breaks your heart.
You say goodbye to your other teammates, grabbing Cata’s hand to take her with you. Hiding under her hood, she’s still silence. People forget sometimes that she’s only 22 years old, Cata forget sometimes too you think. She’s always way too hard with herself.
You manage to get to your car without meeting fans or journalists, you usually take time to talk with the people coming to see you, but today your girlfriend’s happiness is more important than anything else.
“You want to put some music?” you ask at your girlfriend when you are on your car.
She nods, taking your phone in her hand before looking at something you both will like. You’re not really hard to satisfy honestly, as long as you can concentrate yourself while driving. When Cata put your phone down, you take her hand in yours, squeezing it lovingly.
She looks at you and make a half-smile, which isn’t so bad. You interlink your fingers and take the way of your apartment. Cata doesn’t ask you where you are going and when she realizes that you’re going to yours, she doesn’t protest either.
“Do you want me to cook something?” you ask softly when you’re home.
Cata just shakes her head, sitting on a stool in your kitchen, where she followed you. You put a bottle of her favorite Prime in front of her and try to cross her eyes before talking again.
“Pa amb oli?” you propose.
“With white onions?”
She raises a hopeful look on you and you can’t help but smile. This meal, coming right from her natal island of Mallorca is like her comfort food. You kiss her cheek softly before turning to the fridge to prepare two plates of the dish. You like it too; the first time you try it, it was when Cata took you in Mallorca to meet her family. You loved every single thing coming from this island, maybe because it’s linked with your girlfriend, who you are really fond of.
You are deep in your thought, rubbing the tomato on the bread with an ability that would have made Alexia proud, when you feel Cata’s body against yours. Hiding her face in your neck from behind, she hugs you so tight that you have the impression that she wants to come under your skin. Literally.
You smile and keep cooking, thankfully you don’t need to move a lot around the kitchen for this dish. When you are finished, you turn around in her arms and take her face between your hands. Looking at her with attention, you try to choose wisely your words, not wanting to hurt her. Or make her feel more terrible that she’s feeling right now.
“You know that we didn’t lose because of you, right?”
She frowns, not answering. That’s exactly what you thought. Right after she sights and look away, you softly pat her cheek to drag her attention in you again.
“I’m serious. No one play good today, unless maybe Alessia. We were all too scared to lose, maybe too tired too. We have 90 minutes left. We can win and go to the finale.”
“I don’t think Jona will put me on the goal again” Cata sights, shaking her head.
“Why that?” you frown.
“I didn’t have a clean sheet. In the World Cup when Misa play bad, she went to the bench for the next matches. Vilda didn’t hesitate for a second.”
“Yeah, well first don’t compare that asshole to Jonatan please” you hiss, hating hearing that man’s name. “And if goalkeepers were benched every time, they let a ball pass the net, we won’t have a lot of them on the pitches.”
She shrugs, not really convinced by what you are saying. But you don’t insist, knowing that she needs some time to figure out all of this. You chose to give her plate and follow her wherever she wants to eat. She chose your balcony, from where you have a good view on the sea and the port.
And, when you see that Cata ate her meal in five minutes, your smirk and push your plate in her direction. The goalkeeper raises an interrogator gaze on you before smiling when you signal her that she can finish your plate.
After that, she takes the dishes in the kitchen without hearing your protests that you can help her. Then she comes back, takes you from your chair in her arm, making you squeak in the process. She laughs and you can only smile. You love hearing her laugh.
When she throws you on the sofa, you already know the end of the evening. Endless cuddles in front of TV. She puts Netflix on before laying on top of you. You let her do it, drawing smalls drawing on her skin, under her top.
“I love you” she mumbles out of the blue, several minutes after.
“I love you too” you smile, kissing her head in a weird angle.
She smiles when she sees you doing it, raising herself a little to be able to kiss you right on the lips. She strokes your face with her thumb, and you find yourself blush under her gaze. It’s quite intense but you love it.
“Thank you” she whispers, almost shyly.
“What for?” you ask with curiosity.
“For being you. And have take the time to learn with my mom how to make the perfect Pa amb oli.”
“All the best for the best” you smirk.
She rolls her eyes before kissing you again several times. Just like you were losing some interest in the film you were watching and getting maybe a little too work up, she stops and smirk before laying on you again.
“You’re the worst” you groan.
“Oh? I thought I was the best?”
You can hear her smile in her voice and you roll your eyes. You don’t answer though, but you know that she knows what you think. She’s the best and you are definitively way to in love with her to be mad at her.
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soralymystaken · 1 day
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I think a lot about Lloyd and Harumi, solely because they have one of the most unique yet complex relationship dynamics in all of Ninjago, and it’s something I don’t feel like we talk about enough.
So often I see online that their dynamic is overly simplified. I so often see people arguing between them being “true-love” or “friends to lovers to enemies,” but stating it’s just one of those is overlooking all of the complexities. Even stating it as a one-sided thing from Lloyd isn’t looking at the whole picture. Of course, there can be many interpretations of how they interact. Again, that’s the reason I adore this dynamic so much. This, however, is my personal interpretation:
Also, warning, spoilers plus some swearing.
At the beginning, we see Lloyd have the whole “love-at-first-sight” trope, and we learn that Harumi invited him into the castle. While, of course this immediately is seemed as a positive interaction, later events reveal otherwise. It continues like this: Lloyd falls deeper in love with Harumi whilst she continues manipulating him to keep him on strings. She eventually realizes his feelings, and wants plays on that, making the process work exponentially better. Finally, we learn Harumi’s motives and her reasoning, and, in the episode, Lloyd is devastated. However, I have some additions on this, but I’m gonna finish up my review of canon before getting to that. We do also know that Lloyd still has feelings, though. We primarily see thing from Lloyd still trying to save her from Garmadon’s grasp along with his sadness from her death.
The next time we see her and Lloyd’s dynamic (at least as far as I want to mention,) is Crystalized. When Lloyd is captured, he apologizes. He still clearly has feelings for Harumi, and, in a turn of events, it seems that Harumi does as well, as she convinces the Overlord to spare him and to try to get him on their side.
Okay, enough about prior knowledge, lets discuss headcanons. So, firstly, I’m 100% sure that Lloyd was tormented by Harumi’s origin story. We know how high of a standard he holds himself to, and we also know how morally-driven he is. Him learning about the real stories of the real people who he had really hurt couldn’t have been taken easily. I’ve actually written a whole fic that revolves on that fact, and how Lloyd’s lingering feelings would have amplified that feeling to oblivion. Also, for people who assume he would immediately drop his feelings when he learned Harumi’s true motives, literally just look at how he talks about Garmadon and you’ll see he can’t exactly move on that easily. Things like this take time, and, again, he has guilt because of this whole thing. Moving on from a relationship when you believe you were the reason the person tried to destroy the entire world and subsequently died isn’t the same as a high school breakup. That’s fucking devastating, and especially for someone who hasn’t had the best relationships up to that point.
However, this dynamic really starts to become cloudy when you look at Harumi. Now, look: I’m like 90% sure she only had feelings for Lloyd in S15 as fan-service, but, fan-service or not, it’s canon, and therefore I’m still gonna cover it.
So, first off, when and how did Harumi develop feelings? Personally, I think there could be three main reasons. For one, gaslighting. The whole time, she was gaslighting Lloyd into loving her. Sometimes, when you keep up a lie like that for so long and with that level of commitment, you can convince even yourself of these feelings. Do I think this is the case for Harumi? Well, it depends. If you truly do believe there is a spark between them, then no. However, if you really don’t like the fact that they were given a romantic storyline in S15, then this is a totally valid reasoning.
The second reason that comes to mind is Lloyd’s persistence. Now, just to cover all our basis, reminder that “being persistent” and “never giving up on a love that could be” are not cutesy tropes and relationship goals, and no means no. I see too much stuff online saying shit like “I never gave up on her and, even though she said no 20 times, she gave in in the end.” This is not something to romanticize. If someone rejects you, fucking respect that and move tf on. That being said, though, I think that could actually be the case in this dynamic, albeit in a much less creepy way than some fuckers online do it. Lloyd clearly, even after all of the shit Harumi pulled, still has lingering feelings: a mix of platonic and romantic. I truly believe Lloyd is someone who believes that anyone can change for the better, and applies this to Harumi. The fact that, even after all the pain Harumi caused, he still searched for her in the rubble could be the reason she developed feelings. In my opinion, this is the most likely option.
The final one is a bit colder, and is for y’all who believe Harumi is evil through-and-through. Lloyd is fucking overpowered. Harumi’s reasoning to the Overlord could be just that: the reason. I personally don’t love this one as much, but if this is something you resonate with, I would totally understand why.
All of these factors strung together make Lloyd and Harumi one of my favorite dynamics. There is so much more that I didn’t even discuss here. Is it romantic or platonic or just romantic for one of them? Did Harumi develop feelings even sooner yet denied them solely because of her hatred? Is Lloyd’s relationship with Harumi less to do with Harumi herself and more-so to do with trying to rebuild a relationship with his father through her to prove he can hold onto someone he loves? All of these are questions I’d love to dive into but simply do not have time.
Hopefully you enjoyed my little rant. I love overthinking stuff like this and also love chatting about over-the-top headcanons. If you have any thoughts on this (or other headcanons you want to share), please do!
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