#and then x character got up on the table and started dancing

[gogh-with-the-flow]

I'm about to be bitchy asf.

Fanfiction pet peev: when someone is writing drunk characters and it just becomes immensely clear that the writer has never touched a drop of alcohol in their life. Or even been around people who are drunk. Specifically I'm talking about characters at parties or bars. It bothers the fuck out of me. As an alcoholic a bartender and also someone who just knows my shit when it comes to alcohol not to toot my own horn it just irritates me to no end. Like please, people don't actually act like that. Oh my god.

#and then x character got up on the table and started dancing #this isnt about anything specific #its just on my mind idk why #this is so specific but like #alcohol is my career #and my habit #vent post #not to be a hater but im gonna be a hater #also i dont want it to seem like im advocating for binge drinking or alcoholism #know your limits when it comes to drinking #drink responsibly #drink safely #like some adolescent being like #i guarantee you the did not

[talesofesther]

what once was mine | ch 1

Loki x Reader

Summary: When watching what once was supposed to be the rest of his life, in an empty room in the TVA, Loki sees someone he can't recognize; a girl who's all tenderness and loose smiles, and most importantly, she was smiling at him.

A/N: A long overdue mini-series for one of my favorite characters of all time. I had this idea when season one of Loki first came out, but never got to writing it, and now with season two coming, I decided to finally do it. There are two important things that need to be said before we head into it though; firstly and most importantly, I will not be following the show's plot at all, this story will only be focusing on the relationship between Loki and the reader, after all that's what it is about and I don't want it to be unnecessarily huge; secondly, this story will be mostly told in moments, which means that not every single scene happening between the characters will be written down in length. Lastly, I do hope you can all enjoy it. <3

Masterlist

Things felt worthless. Everything suddenly seemed unimportant. His whole life, everything he knew, felt small and frail. Because here, infinity stones were mere paperweights.

Loki scoffed as he pushed himself up from the floor, one hand coming up to tug at the collar still wrapped around his neck. This place made him feel as if his brain was melting, it was all too much, too sudden—sacred timeline, variants. A sense of utter helplessness started to weigh heavily in the pit of his stomach.

Yet he couldn't hold himself back from sitting at the single table in the middle of the dim-lit room. The checkered image of the Avengers right in front of him seemed to be taunting him.

This was still the same day, right?

Or maybe not, Loki wasn't certain anymore; it sure didn't feel like the same day.

For a split second, as he looked down at the red, round device resting on top of the table, he thought about how everything here looked so old-fashioned. It was almost ironic, for a place out of time.

Loki couldn't help himself. His curiosity got the best of him eventually. But if anyone had their whole life just a click away, they'd probably do the same.

So he watched, through glimpses passing on a screen, a life that was supposed to be his. He watched his mother die, and then his father; he watched as Thor called him a brother with a smile on his face again, and as they made earth a new home for Asgard. Loki's eyes were already a pool of tears as soon as his mother's lifeless body had appeared in front of him, they cascaded down his cheeks freely, leaving behind a damp path of a lifetime worth of mourning, now seen in less than a minute. The loss somehow felt greater, because now he wouldn't even have those moments to begin with.

But suddenly, amidst the moments of suffering and mistakes, an unfamiliar face appeared. She had a smile on her face most of the time, and even through the static of the image in front of him, Loki could clearly see the glint in her pupils, the crinkle beside her eyes. She was quite captivating, maybe that's why it took him a second to realize she was smiling at him.

A frown etched itself in Loki's eyebrows, he leaned forward on his chair as he pressed play again. Curiosity and... apprehension twirled wildly inside his stomach.

The moments with her were endless. Walks on the beach, shared ice creams, quiet nights watching a movie, dancing together in a dark kitchen, the golden rays of a sunset shining against her hair in a memory tucked away like a treasure; and even a moment of her talking with Tony Stark and the others, while her hand held tightly onto Loki's, the other Loki, that is. All of them looked futile, a simple existence Loki would never have considered fit for him; so why did these moments feel important?

Inside TVA's lonely room, Loki held his breath until his lungs ached. His heart was threatening to jump out of his chest and his eyes were stinging for a whole new reason. He could feel the shaking of his own hands. That look in her eyes, it was one of love, anyone who saw would know it. But the cause of the sudden lump in Loki's throat was the fact that this look was always directed at him. That love in her eyes, that smile on her lips; was for him.

Several minutes went by with him silently looking at the paused image of her on the checkered screen. A few stray tears rolled down his cheeks, and he wasn't sure why yet. If it was for the shock of learning that someone could love him this much; or because of the envy, the longing for something that wasn't even his, not really, he never got there after all.

There was a hole in his chest, a missing piece of something he never had. Loki didn't even know her name, yet a part of him was screaming it anyway.

He eventually moved on, and almost threw up when he watched Thanos take his life from him. Loki watched his brother cry over his lifeless body, yet he wasn't seeing her.

And despite the boatload of information thrown at him, the questions clouding his mind were only; who is she? Where is she?

Lost. Loki felt more lost than he probably ever did in his entire life. He had just watched what was supposed to be the rest of his life, yet... it wouldn't be. So what now?

He sat down on the small stairs of the room, burying his head in his hands.

And then there was this girl; smiling and laughing and holding his hand as if he had been the best thing to ever happen to her. This feeling, warm and heavy, squeezing Loki's heart, was a foreign one—he couldn't quite place why that look of pure adoration in her eyes was directed at him.

He needed to know who she was. He needed to find her and ask her why. He needed to know what she was, or- would be to him.

The sudden sound of the door opening startled Loki, he watched as Mobius walked into the room, his steps overly cautious. "Loki? Nowhere left to run."

Gulping back a sob clawing its way through his throat, Loki took a deep breath. He slowly glanced up, voice calm and defeated as he asked a question he already knew the answer to; "I can't go back, can I?"

Mobius simply looked at him, his eyes holding some kind of sympathy as he spared Loki from hearing the truth out loud.

Loki pursed his lips, his gaze slowly trailed back to the screen on his left that again adorned a paused image of the mysterious girl. Her lips were turned up just slightly, dark sunglasses covered her eyes, and she held a slowly melting ice cream in one of her hands. "Who is she?" he asked quietly.

Placing his weapon on the table, Mobius let out a long sigh, "I was hoping you wouldn't ask about her."

The words made Loki snap his head towards him, a frown coming to his eyebrows immediately.

"She..." Mobius hesitated, "she is someone almost as annoying as you."

"That doesn't answer my question." Loki nearly sounded offended. He got up then, taking slow steps towards Mobius. "She seemed... important, yet I don't know who she is."

"I'm afraid you haven't met her yet."

"Then tell me who she is."

Mobius grimaced; "I don't think it's my place to say it."

"That's absurd," Loki scoffed, "it's my life we're talking about here."

"How about we help each other then, hm?" Mobius offered, and when Loki only frowned at him, he continued; "a fugitive Variant has been killing our Minutemen."

Loki narrowed his eyes. "And you need the God of Mischief to help you stop him?"

A small smirk came to Mobius' lips; "That's right. You help us stop him. I get you an opportunity to meet her and you can ask her whatever questions you want to know."

A meeting with someone didn't feel like much for his end of the bargain, but that same voice inside Loki was still screaming a name he didn't know how to spell. He had to know.

"Deal."

⋆*��☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ

Read ch 2 here

Thank you for reading this little story. Feedback and reblogs are literally what keeps me motivated to continue posting here, so I’d appreciate it if you could take some time to reblog and comment. <3

You do not have permission to repost, copy, or translate my works on any platforms (even with credit), please respect.

Loki’s taglist:@milkiane @v1ci0us

#loki x reader #loki laufeyson #loki imagine #loki #marvel #loki series #loki x you #marvel x reader #loki x female reader #imagine #fanfic #angst #fluff #what once was mine #loki fanfic #my story #loki laufeyson x reader

[cringequeenwrites]

Smoking sessions

Sal fisher x reader x Larry Johnson

Art credit to: @plusvanity

Smut-Drabble:

None of you really spoke on what the three of you were. No one would act how they did when the sun came down, and everyone got off of work.

Larry would be the first to sit down and set everything out on the table. Rolling up a blunt in a way that seems out of character for his easy going, laid back nature. Folding the paper aggravated, yet skilled as he’s done many times before.

You would sit down beside him secondly. Sinking into the couch as you Watched Larry play with the lighter with his calloused finger tips. holding the rolled up paper to his lips. he inhaled deeply, then held his breath for a mere minute, then exhaled through his nose. The smoke vapor looked almost hypnotic to you as it danced into the air softly. It’s sight you can’t get enough of, even though you’ve seen him do this multiple times before.

Sal would be last to join. Changed into a loose wife-beater and some sweat pants. his mask off. You and Larry where the very few people who get to see him like this. it almost made you feel honored in some sense. He would sit on the end of the couch to watch Larry give you the blunt and would help you count from inhale, hold, to exhale. Larry’s hands would be lazily draped around you as you passed the joint to sal. Sally would hit it differently than larry, he would inhale, hold it, then would lay back in the couch as he didn’t really exhale, but let the smoke deep out of his mouth and nose as he talked to Larry.

Sal would reach his hand over your head to pass it back to Larry as the cycle would start over. They’d both would get more progressively handsy with you. Larry’s hands resting on your inner thigh. And Sals hand would slide up your back from under your shirt. You would let them touch you, not stopping them as they carried their conversation.

after your third or fourth hit, your shirt would have been discarded. you’d be left in just your panties. leaning back into Sal as he palmed at your breasts as Larry would slide off the couch. Lowering his head between your thighs. He Engulfed his tongue into your wet cunt. You whimper and moan into sals mouth as he explored yours with his tongue, you could feel his tongue piercing and fingertips discover your body and skin.

That’s it I go to bed now <o^o>

#sally face larry x reader #sally face larry #sally face #sally face x reader #sal fisher #sal fisher x reader #Sal fisher x reader smut #larry johnson x reader #larry johnson #Larry johnson x reader smut #sally face smut

[atpsnty]

┊𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮

xavier thorpe ; wednesday

pairing: jealous!xavier thorpe x bestfriend!fem!reader 

warnings: light hearted, extremely cheesy & overplayed crush confession, miscommunication trope at it’s finest (let’s be honest, xavier is somehow great at both communicating and not talking at all), light swearing

request: n/a

summary:  after telling him that you were asked to the dance at your school in jericho, xavier gets all butthurt.

a/n: I think this takes place after the whole monster situation, but he doesn’t like wednesday. also, don’t ask how wednesday, xavier, and y/n interact/are connected in all of this, idk either...

character credit: wednesday series

w/c: 1.2k

“I don’t even understand why you're being all grumpy right now,” you sigh as you trail behind your bestfriend. 

You’re just leaving the Weathervane café and following Xavier towards the woods, meaning you’re probably heading to his little art shack. Everything was going as it usually does – you guys laughing and catching up over your separate drinks – when he suddenly got really quiet and wanted to leave.

“Can you at least tell me what’s wrong?”

He doesn’t even acknowledge your presence anymore, seeming to be in his own head right now.

You glance at his back, his usually tall stature now hunched in on itself. He keeps running his hand through his hair as it falls in his face, which is when you notice that he’s missing the black hair tie that usually sits on his wrist.

Putting a little pep in your step to get beside him, you hold out your own wrist. Upon it lays a hair tie; the same black type that he usually keeps for himself. You started carrying them after noticing how often he sets them down beside him, only to forget doing so and abandoning them altogether.

He halts his movements before glancing at the band adorning your wrist. He stares at it for a few seconds before his gaze trails up at your face, where he stares at you for a few more. 

You guys are always comfortable around each other, you’ve been friends for a while now, so eye contact is not something you struggle with…but there was something different about the way he is currently looking at you. Like he’s analyzing you. Studying you. Looking past what lays upon your expression and trying to survey your thoughts.

You try to hold his stare, but after a bit your face starts to heat up and the moment feels way too intense, so you divert your gaze to your shoes, the tips almost touching the tips of his own.

You hear the soft sigh fall from his lips before you see his retreating steps. After a few seconds, you fall back in line, trailing behind him once again.

–

After a few more silent minutes, you reach his art studio. He opens the door for you, though still not looking at you directly, before walking in himself. He immediately finds his closest pencil and sketchbook, making little to no sounds as he sits at his desk and begins scribbling away.

You sit on the stool that accompanies a large painting canvas and watch as he frustratingly works the pencil into the paper, smudging lead with his fingers in an unrecognizable design.

After a while, the silence is almost too much to bear.

“Seriously Xavier, what is wrong with you?”

“Everything apparently,” he said abruptly while slamming down his pencil on the multi-color covered table top, “enough to not even be an option anymore.”

You squint at him, completely distraught by his sudden outburst.

“What the actual fuck are you talking about?” 

Completely lost about where this attitude even came from, you run back the conversation you were having back at Weathervane: your wellbeing, school, an upcoming dance, the guy who asked you to said upcoming dance…

Bingo.

“Are you mad about me getting asked to a school dance?” You questioned, a hint of accusation to your voice. 

“Yes, okay! I’m mad you got asked to your little dance at normie school!” Xavier exclaimed, standing up and looking down at you. 

It takes all but two seconds before you're standing as well, mixed emotions of confusion and anger boiling inside you.

“Why would you be fucking upset! If anything you should be happy that your best friend is actually liked by someone for once.” You said in an exasperated tone. Why would your closest friend be upset about you finally getting attention from someone…unless he thinks you don’t deserve it.

“Well I’m not fucking happy.” He says while looking you straight in the eyes before sitting back in his chair, placing his elbows on the table and his head in his hands.

“Why not?” At this point, anything he said would probably end with you in tears, your heart broken, or both.

“Because I wanted to take you,” he says in a soft voice before running both hands through his hair and turning to face you. “Because I want to take you,” he reiterates. 

You gape at him, eyes and lips slightly widened as you find the words to say. 

To be honest, you have had feelings for Xavier for a while. When you first saw him, you thought he was an attractive guy. His long hair compliments his face so well, who wouldn’t? But it wasn’t until you started connecting that your feelings for him truly blossomed. You loved his artsy side, he was always surprising you with drawings and paintings he made of you, alongside ones he made simply to impress you with his “bring drawings to life” ability. He was always there to cheer you up if something was upsetting you at school, and he would constantly call or text you to see how you’re doing.

After all that gaping, the only thing you could think to say was “why would you want to do that?”

He gave a small chuckle-ish sigh before replying, “have I not been obvious, because I swear everyone else could see how much I like you except you.”

Thinking back at it now, yeah the man was super obvious, but that doesn’t mean you actually believe it..

“Seriously, Y/N. I know I’m being super obvious in my flirting tactics, but that’s just because I think you like me back. I mean obviously not if you’re going to a dance with someone else, but I-”

“Who said I’m going with somebody else?” You cut him off mid rant.

“The guy-.”

“If you would’ve actually let me finish my story instead of getting all jealous and gloomy, you would have heard me say that I didn’t even say yes.” You look at him with a slight smirk. “Matter of fact, I don’t think I even like anyone fro-”

“I knew it.”

“From my school. Xavier you seriously need to let a girl finish her storytimes,” you shake your head and softly laugh before looking back up at him.

The smile you’ve come to adore is finally resting upon his face once again.

“So…you want to take me to the dance,” you tease.

“I do,” he says as if it’s a simple fact.

“Are you gonna ask or…? Because I’ve got other options to weigh if this is gonna take all da-.”

He rushes towards you and envelopes you in a hug, though this one feels different than the ones you usually share.

“Would you allow me the great honor of taking you to your normie school dance?” He finishes as he sets you back upright and grazes his thumb over your cheek.

“I would love to go,” you smile up at him, leaning into his touch slightly.

“With me though, right? The other dudes are completely out of the picture?”

“Only with you,” you giggle at his playful antics. “Just you.”

Completely ignoring the story, I am currently obsessed with Xavier Thorpe and my close friends list on Instagram has been suffering with edits for days.

I no longer support Percy Hynes White and will no longer take request for Xavier Thorpe.

#xavier thorpe #xavier thorpe x reader #wednesday #wednesday addams #xavier thorpe x you #y/n #fem!reader #wednesday show #ff #imagine #oneshot #escapism #x reader #atpsnty

[dumplingsfordays]

the phone call

pairing - Megumi x fem!reader

genre - smut

summary - you call Megumi one night in hopes of changing your relationship from being best friends to lovers and it ends very unexpectedly.

cw!: nsfw (sexual themes), mutual masturbation, pet names (sweetheart, baby), bffs to lovers, reader has female genitalia, swearing, timeskip to all characters 18+, one (1) mention of voyeurism + hair pulling + tummy bulge

note - back (sorta?) from my hiatus but I won't post content as frequently. sorry to all you beautiful people who submitted asks 😭😭 I'll make sure to do those fics asap b/c y'all are honestly lovely and overall really respectful and I appreciate it! thank you sm for being patient w/ little old me <33

art credit!

and as always, thank you for reading :))

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

Quiet sighs escaped Megumi's lips in tandem with the soft breeze outside, whistling against the glass windowpanes. Moonlight drifted across his fair cheek like a silvery veil, making his pale skin glow slightly, and his long eyelashes, a trait that wasn't his favorite but one that almost every girl constantly pointed out with jealousy, fluttered when they met the edge of the light. And then, in the peaceful summer night-

Bzzt. Bzzt.

The raven-haired man sat up in his bed with sudden urgency, hand moving quickly to his phone on the nightstand and picking up.

"Hey, 'Mimi," your sleepy, half-awake voice came from the speaker. "Sorry to bother you but it's kinda important."

Upon hearing your voice, he relaxes - he lays back down and stares at the blank, white ceiling. "Yeah?"

"Uhm, I just wanted to talk to you about something..."

God, your sleep-laced voice was so gentle, sweet, alluring, even. He couldn't help but sneak a hand towards his abdomen to lay it on his stomach.

"Hey, 'Mimi, you there?" You ask all of a sudden.

"Oh, uh, yeah, I'm listening, don't worry."

You must be at your desk working, then, he thought, since you're up this late. Wait, no -- he heard the shuffling of bedsheets or something similar a moment ago. That was you, right? Were you also in bed? Did you also have the ghost of a smile dancing on your lips? Was your hand also laid down on your abdomen? Was it slowly creeping further and further down, until-

He shakes his head, rousing himself from his thoughts.

God, Megumi, what the hell are you thinking? They're your best friend, nobody thinks about their best friend getting off!

...Well, something about that scene was... arousing, almost, to him. The mere thought of you, laying on silk bedsheets and rubbing your clit to his voice, sent a shiver up his spine and he snaked his hand under his boxers. Well, guess he was doing this.

"So, um..." you continued, sighing, "I was thinking. I know that it's probably too late into the night to even be discussing this, but..."

"Yeah?"

He lets out a small grunt afterwards as his fingers come into contact with the sensitive skin of the tip of his semi-erect length.

"...are you okay, 'Mimi? Are you working out or something?"

"Ah, no, I'm just..."

Just, you know, casually touching myself to the sound of your voice. Nothing wrong with that at all. There's definitely nothing wrong with jacking off to your best friend's voice.

"Just, um. Moving my, uh..." His eyes glance around the room and lock onto the bedside table. "My table."

There's a small lilt to your voice as you laugh softly and clear your throat before speaking, and Megumi swears that he just got lightheaded from the rush of blood to his nether region.

"Okay... I was just thinking about, well... this. Our friendship."

He tries not to sound too strained and breathy when he replies, starting to slowly move his fist up and down his leaking cock. "What about it?"

"Well, I think that, um.. you're a really nice person. And I really like you. And recently, I was thinking about what it would be like if we, um..."

You pause, biting your lip. Should you really finish your sentence? What if he takes it the wrong way?

"You can say it. I won't judge, y/n."

"Thank you..." you laugh briefly and breathlessly, fidgeting with the skin on your torso. His words were innocent, but it was the tone in which he was speaking that made your thighs twitch slightly and your mouth dry up. Christ, Megumi always made you feel things that you knew you shouldn't be feeling towards a friend who probably only liked you as one. "I, well... I was thinking that it would be nice if we hung out at some point. Maybe, like... go out on a date, or something... I understand if you don't like me in that way, or if you're too sleepy to decide yet, but I just wanted to put that out there..."

His eyes widen a bit as he hears the word "date", and he subconsciously tightens his grip around himself, Adam's apple bobbing up and down as he swallows. So you were interested in him, too.

"I'd... I'd love to."

He forces down a quiet groan as he hears the pitch of your voice rise slightly in excitement. Unbeknownst to him, your hand slides down your lower abdomen, gliding across your upper thigh.

"R-really? You're not kidding or anything, right? I mean, like... please don't worry about making me feel good about myself or anything, just..."

You hear him laugh softly on the other end, which makes that spot between your legs throb even more intensely.

"Of course," Megumi replies, trying to sound as put-together as he can. "I won't lie to you about stuff like that."

Smiling, you sigh in relief and your hand comes into contact with your inner thigh. After a brief pause, he speaks up again, his voice a little deeper.

"So.. anything fun happen recently in your life? Any new books you've read, or interesting gossip you've heard?"

Your head tilts to the side as a scenario pops into your head at his words. Him, laying next to you, whispering into your ear as his fingers caress your--

"Nope..." you laugh, a little shakily due to the intrusive thought. "But there was this one thi--"

He makes a quiet noise of pleasure and you choke, your fingers finally touching your slick cunny and rubbing it gently.

"...M-Mimi, did you... are you...?"

"Christ, I'm sorry, I-- fuck. I'm sorry, y/n, I didn't-- God, I..." he sighs, regret clear in his tone as he apologizes. "You probably think I'm some creep or something now. Feel free to cancel the date, I don't deserve it anyway after all this."

You swallow and you feel your face redden in embarrassment before answering, whispering.

"Actually, I... I, um, I'm not mad. I-I'm doing the same."

"What?"

His reply is instantaneous, his voice a mix of nervousness, shock, surprise, with the undeniable tinge of arousal. You were going to be the death of him someday.

"I-I'm doing the same. I know it's weird, I..." you trail off, sighing. "I'm sorry too."

"Can we..."

Megumi's trembling all over now, his cock unfathomably hard and standing up at attention in his fist, which begins to pump up and down a little more rapidly. You can hear it very faintly from your phone and you practically gush at the sound.

"...can we, um... keep doing this? And talking? I just... I think that since you're interested in me and I in you, we can satisfy our urges, I guess..."

"Please," you shiver, voice getting softer and more desperate as he talks.

"Fu-uck..." he groans out, biting his lip and looking down at himself. He decides to finally remove his boxers and strokes himself under the blanket, leaning into his phone's microphone as he pants softly.

You, in your own bed, whimper at the expletive -- you knew his voice was attractive, but this? Him swearing, and in that rough yet pleading tone, too, made you unimaginably wet.

"Can you... can you describe it? Please?" you choke out, toes curling as your fingers press against your clit slightly.

You hear him groan at your words again before he replies.

"I-It's standing up real tall 'n warm, sweetheart... it's fucking throbbing, all for you... God, I just wanna bend you over and... shit... just shove my cock into your tight pussy..."

You moan quietly as you imagine the absolute filth of the scenario, how deep his thick cock'll reach inside you... he'll probably be thrusting into you so hard that people on the street will hear the rhythmic slaps of skin on skin from the window of your bedroom all the way up on the fifth floor. And, oh, God, what if he grabs your hair and pulls on it, twisting your back and pulling his face closer to yours to meet you in an intense kiss, teeth clacking and tongues intertwining in this passionate dance for control?

"You're gonna feel so good around me, baby... maybe clench as I play with your clit and press my hand to your stomach to feel that little dent of my cock... you're gonna feel so fucking warm and wet around me..." Megumi groans loudly as his hand does a particularly satisfying stroke around his length, smearing slightly sticky precum in his fist. "Christ, I can already imagine it... I'm so fucking close..."

"Me too," you cry out, rubbing tight circles around the sensitive skin and thighs quivering from the electrifying pleasure. "I'll feel so good, 'Mimi, so full..."

His fist travels up to his tip, continuing the up-and-down motion as he moans shakily. "y/n-- I-I'm gonna-- fuck, think I'm gonna come--"

You whimper in reply, toes curling and forearm flexing. At long last, that wave of heat crashes down on you both, him groaning shamelessly as thick cum spurts from the red tip and onto his fist, and you gasping for air, moaning as you reach your respective peaks. Your body trembles as you're thrown around mercilessly by your orgasm and he can tell very clearly by your voice -- it's high-pitched, desperate, and borderline wanton.

As you both calm down from your highs, the movements of your hands and arms gradually slowing down, you giggle breathlessly.

"This was... ah, certainly something..."

You hear his voice, deep and comforting as he chuckles, through your phone speaker.

"Indeed it was."

"...But we're still going on that date, right?"

Megumi laughs. "Obviously."

#jjk #jjk x reader #jjk smut #megumi fushiguro #jjk megumi #megumi x reader #megumi smut #megumi x y/n #megumi x you #megumi fushigiro #fushiguro x reader #jjk fushiguro #smut #holy shit I literally did not watch s2 because I'm so busy but god damn I'm still simping #this was a pretty short one but idrc sorry ;-;

[whatstruthgottodowithit]

Comfort Zone

Fandom: Harry Potter

Pairing: Sirius Black x James Potter x Remus Lupin x Reader, Marauders x Reader

Characters:  Sirius Black, James Potter, Remus Lupin, Reader

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 2751

Summary: You and the boys go out of your comfort zone.

Tags/Warnings: PolyMarauders, Marauders, F/M/M/M, Post Hogwarts, Maraduers Era, Poly, Kissing, Angst, Fluff, Arguing

Notes: I am trying to get the other evans girl finished but the ideas wont stop and I have no self control x

MASTERLISTS // TAG LIST

‘You know he’s going to say no right?’ Remus said, watching you as you pulled the pie from the oven and placed it on counter top. James looked up from where he was lounging on the sofa, laughing as you scowled.

‘You don’t know that,’ you countered, moving to grab the potatoes that were near spilling over.

‘I know Padfoot,’ Remus said, placing his book down. 

‘We all know Padfoot Moony,’ James said rolling his eyes before he clambered out of his seat and came towards you, his hand dancing along your waist as he watched you cook.

’Exactly,’ you said, ‘and I know that he can be persuaded.’

‘What by a good meal,’ Remus said with a raised eyebrow, coming towards you too, resting his elbows on the counter as he eyed the pair of you. 

‘By a good meal and dessert,’ you mused. James chuckled, ‘she might have a point there.’

‘All I’m saying is don’t get your hopes up,’ Remus said softly watching as your face fell in a frown, not relieved by James touch as he kissed your temple. 

‘Moonys right sweetheart,’ James said softly. You looked at him, worried that the hopes you’d pinned on this might’ve been in vain.

‘It’ll be fine,’ you said unsure who you were trying to convince, ‘I’ll make a good case for it you know me.’

The boys shared a look as you busied yourself obliviously thinking over the game plan as you finished dinner. You were just finishing up dolloping mash potatoes onto each of their plates when the fire in the living room glowed green, Sirius stepping out not a moment later. 

‘Hey,’ he said, shrugging his leather jacket off and coming towards you, placing a kiss on your temple as he said, ‘something smells good.’

‘I made your favourite,’ you said, gesturing to the steak and ale pie on the counter top, ‘pop it on the table will you. Dinner will only be a minute.’

‘How about that for service eh Pads?’ James ribbed, taking his seat at the table as did Remus with Sirius joining a moment later, placing the pie in the centre. 

‘Can’t complain,’ he mused as you placed their plates down, dropping into a seat yourself as Remus started to dish out the pie you’d made. 

It was quite the squeeze, your tiny kitchen feeling even tinier with the four of you around the table, but you loved it like this. It hadn’t been the plan of course; James and Sirius had moved in once leaving school and as your relationship developed you and Remus had sort of never left but you wouldn’t trade it. Even if it meant you had to run your wants and needs by everyone you loved, something you were building up to ask about but as Sirius looked at you your nerve went and instead you said ‘so how was work?’

‘Fine,’ Sirius said, ‘got a good case today.’

‘Yeah?’ you asked.

‘Yeah apparently there’s been quite a few dragon eggs smuggled into the country. Don’t know where from yet of course but should be interesting.’

‘That is interesting,’ you said, trying to figure out how to steer the conversation back around.

‘What about you?’ Sirius asked, taking a bit of pie. 

‘Oh you know not much,’ you shrugged, ‘got the flat tidy.’

‘Just you?’ Sirius said looking at James who hadn’t been paying attention until then but glared at the inference. 

‘It’s my day off,’ James protested. 

‘Your day to be a lazy git,’ Sirius teased and though you knew he was joking there was an edge to it that you frowned at especially when James pretended to shrug it off. It was funny to you how your roles within this little thing could be defined so quickly. How even though Sirius had no more a claim over you than the others he was still so certain to make sure you weren’t being taken advantage of, the one you turned to when you needed help. How James was your relief, the one who kept your spirits up, who made you laugh even if he couldn’t make a bed or pick up a pair of socks to save his life. And Remus was the one you shared your worries with. The one who made you feel heard and seen in a house full of boys.  

‘Rem helped when he got back,’ you said reassuringly. 

‘See,’ James said,’ besides I thought you wanted practice looking after something I’m just giving you opportunity.’

‘Why would she want that?’ Sirius asked confused. 

‘No reason,’ you said far too quickly to ever be casual. You’d been gearing up to ask but seeing the conversation teetering on a row you’d decided to postpone until James opened his big mouth. Sirius’ eyes narrowed.

‘What is it?’ he asked.

‘Nothing,’ you lied, ‘I mean I don’t know what he’s on about.’

‘Sweetheart,’ Sirius said, his voice low and daring. You looked to James and Remus to find them interested in their meals, no help to you even as Sirius said, ‘alright what’s going on?’

‘Well,’ you said nervously, ‘I wanted to ask you something.’

‘Why what’s wrong?’ Sirius asked worriedly.

‘Nothing bad,’ you said placing your hand on his reassuringly.

‘Jesus mate lighten up,’ James teased. Sirius rolled his eyes but elected to ignore him, his gaze falling on you as he said, ‘what is it love?’

‘It’s just well I’ve been thinking,’ you said.

‘What about?’ Sirius asked.

‘Well about us,’ you said bashfully, ‘about this little thing we’ve got going on.’

‘Right,’ Sirius said dubiously.

‘And I was just thinking that it might be nice if we expanded a little,’ you said meekly.

‘Expanded?’ he asked, thoughts whizzing visibly behind his eyes. 

‘Yeah,’ you said. 

‘Like someone else?’ Sirius asked glancing at James and Remus before back at you. 

‘No, no of course not. I don’t want anyone else but you lot you know that,’ you said, squeezing his hand. That appeared to trigger something as he said, ‘you’re pregnant?’

‘What?’ you and James baulked, with Remus inhaling a piece of broccoli at the same time which made him cough and splutter as you protested, ‘no of course not!’

‘Well what else could it be?’ Sirius protested, glancing at Remus to make sure he was okay before his eyes went back to you.

‘Not that Jesus,’ James huffed, thumping a still watery eyed Remus on the back to help dislodge the issue. 

‘Well excuse me for jumping to conclusions when you’re obviously all in on whatever this is,’ Sirius said irritably, gesturing between the three of you.

‘That’s cos we won’t say no,’ James countered.

‘I never said yes,’ Remus said, his voice still weak as he glugged down a drink of water.

‘Yes to?’ Sirius asked.

‘I want a kitten,’ you said quickly realising there was no point beating around the bush anymore given the anarchy that had already been caused. 

‘What?’ Sirius asked as if he hadn’t heard you.

‘A kitten,’ you reiterated, ‘I was thinking about it and don’t you think a little-’

‘No,’ Sirius said flatly.

‘But-’ you protested but he waved you off stating, ‘you know I hate cats.’

‘You don’t know that,’ you said.

‘Yes I do,’ he said firmly.

‘How do you know?’ you pressed, ‘I mean you might do.’

‘I don’t,’ Sirius said, his tone challenging you not to talk back to him. As if this was the end of the discussion, but you weren’t done.

‘You don’t know that you just think you do because-’

‘He’s a dog?’ James finished.

‘Because you’ve never been around them!’ you corrected, ‘but I think it’ll be really good-’

‘What to have it scratching everything up and shitting in a box in the corner?’ Sirius scoffed.

‘We can let it go outside,’ you offered.

‘In the middle of a city yeah right,’ he said shaking his head. 

‘Oh Pads please,’ you begged.

‘I said no,’ Sirius said firmly.

‘Oh go on mate,’ James sighed. Sirius glowered at him, as he started, ‘just because you’re bendable to whatever she wants-’

‘Because I want her to be happy,’ James challenged.

‘Because you like pissing me off and being her favourite,’ Sirius said making James scowl. 

‘Pads please,’ you pleaded. 

‘I said no,’ he said pulling his hand out from under yours as he started to eat again. Irritated you looked away from him, looking to Remus who’s remained quiet even though he had been watching.

‘Please Rem?’ you asked.

‘I don’t know love,’ he said.

‘Come on majority rules. James said yes-’

‘James would say yes to anything that would get your top off,’ Sirius muttered.

‘And you wouldn’t?’ James scoffed; Sirius’ digs seemingly having gone too far to be just light hearted teasing. A sentiment that was confirmed as Remus, the nominated peacemaker, said, ‘lads stop it.’

Unfortunately he hadn’t said anything about you and so you looked to Sirius and challenged him, ‘okay what about a baby then?’

‘What?’ Sirius gawped.

‘See kitten isn’t as mad as that,’ you challenged.

‘She’s got a point,’ James said, making you smile smugly that you still had him on side.

‘She doesn’t have any point she’s being ridiculous!’ Sirius snapped.

‘I’m being ridiculous? You’re the one who won’t even hear me out I mean did you even wonder why I want one?’ you challenged. As the boys looked at you silently you continued, ‘I want a kitten because I want something for me. Something that’s just mine that I don’t have to share with anyone. Now I’m not saying I hate what we have going I love you all you know that. I just like our little home; I think we make it really lovely and you take such good care of me I just want something to love besides you three.’

All three of them remained silent, staring at you. When none of them spoke the weight of your words started hitting you, your vulnerability and longing now feeling more like a weakness rather than strength, as if you were in the middle of the ocean surrounded by three sharks. 

‘Fine,’ you huffed as your embarrassment caught the better of you, slamming your fork down and standing up.

‘Oh come on don’t get in a strop,’ Sirius scoffed, throwing his own utensils down.

‘Babe come on,’ James said tugging at your sleeve though you yanked it from his grip.

‘Pads is right let’s not fall out over something silly,’ Remus said, and though his was the nicest tone of the three of them it was that which made you see red.

‘Oh so I’m being silly now?’ you snapped, ‘when you won’t even contemplate doing something a little out of your comfort zone.’ 

‘You know I don’t like them,’ Sirius reasoned weakly.

‘Yeah you’ve made that clear I just thought I’d mean enough to try something you don’t like,’ you said curtly, throwing him a glare as you added, ‘I mean haven’t we all gone out of our comfort zone.’

‘That’s not the same,’ Sirius scoffed.

‘Isn’t it?’ you challenged.

‘You know it isn’t,’ he replied darkly. 

‘Feels like it’s one rule for the boys one for me,’ you said firmly. 

‘Babe you it’s not like that you know it’s not,’ James said softly. Sirius however didn’t seem to be caving, his jaw clenched at the accusation. 

‘Look,’ he started.

‘You know what forget it,’ you snapped, pulling away from the table and slamming your chair under it no doubt knocking a couple of knees as you did not that anyone complained. In fact the other boys looked worried, Remus especially as he said, ‘aren’t you going to eat your dinner?’

 ‘I’m not hungry,’ you lied, storming off to your bedroom, the door slamming behind you.

As James and Remus looked towards Sirius they found him on his feet too, grabbing his coat from where he’d hung it and shrugging it on. 

‘Mate come on,’ Remus grumbled. Sirius ignored him, heading to the fireplace.

‘Where are you going?’ James asked, turning so that he could see him.

‘Out,’ Sirius said and before they could protest he disappeared through green flame. 

✵✵✵

‘I still don’t think they’re good together,’ James said, his voice rumbling against your belly where his head was resting, your fingers running through his messy locks soothingly.

‘I don’t mind them,’ you said, trying not to giggle and tease him about the fact he’d maintained he had no interest in watching the soap you were currently watching.

‘Hmm,’ he muttered neither in agreement nor rebuttal. 

Before you could say anything though the door clicked open, making him lift his head from your stomach, and Sirius appeared in the doorway. Though James had been on your side, telling you how he agreed Sirius was being unreasonable he straightened up, no doubt aiming to be peacemaker as he said, ‘hey mate.’

‘Hey,’ Sirius said hesitantly, frowning as you refused to look in his direction. Nevertheless he cleared his throat and continued, ‘can I borrow you for a minute?’

‘Uh yeah sure,’ James said scrambling off you though as Sirius threw him a look James said, ‘oh you don’t mean me.’

You glanced their way for a fraction of a second before turning your attention back to the screen, thankful neither of them saw it. Sirius sighed and leant on the door frame, ‘are you still not talking to me?’

‘Are you still being selfish?’ you replied, your eyes still ahead, arms folded across your chest.

‘Guys,’ James sighed.

‘No actually,’ Sirius said cutting him off and earning a scoff from you. With a sigh he walked forward towards the bed, sitting down on the edge of it as he said, ‘would you just come into the living room? Please?’

You watched him for a moment, his grey eyes pleading with you in a way that made your heart thump. It was enough to make you let your guard down as you sighed and said, ‘fine.’ 

He climbed up before you heading to the door with you and James following him out into the living room. You were still miffed at him but more annoyed at yourself for being so malleable when it came to any of them playing on your heart strings. 

‘Now I understand if you don’t like it but there wasn’t much I could do at this time of night,’ Sirius said, turning to face you. Your gaze skimmed the living room, clocking Remus who was sitting on the couch but nothing that gave you any clues as to what he was talking about. As he watched you his face grew nervous.

‘Well?’ he asked, still you weren’t sure but before you could ask him what the hell he was on about you heard a little mewling chirp. Your eyes immediately flew in the direction of the noise where you found a tiny kitten trotting around on Remus’ lap, tiny claws clinging from his jumper as it threw itself about.

‘Oh my god!’ you squealed, racing forward to scoop the tiny little thing off of Remus’ lap. It wriggled about in your arms as you fawned over it.

‘Hi sweetheart, oh my god, hi, hi,’ you cooed, cuddling it to you, ‘oh my god aren’t you cute!’

‘It’s a good job he is otherwise he’d be long gone given how many times he’s scratched me on the way over here,’ Sirius grumbled, making you look up from your fit of fawning.

‘Aw sweetie do you not like the big doggy,’ you teased, earning a mew from the tiny black kitten in your arms. 

‘And yet he’s been awful fond of the big bad wolf,’ Sirius joked earning a chuckle from you all. You smiled and decanted the kitten into Remus’ arms so that you could go to him, your arms wrapping around his neck as he held you to him, a smirk playing on his lips.  That was also the beauty of your relationship, whenever you did argue or disagree about something it never lasted long.

‘Hi,’ he said, moving a strand of hair from your face.

‘Hi,’ you replied.

‘Did I do alright?’ he asked hesitantly.

‘Sirius this is amazing,’ you whispered, ‘thank you so much.’

‘Yeah well it’s good to get out your comfort zone I suppose,’ he shrugged. 

‘You might be right,’ you said, leaning in to kiss him tenderly, ‘are you sure we just want one?’

‘Don’t push it,’ he mumbled into your lips. 

SIRIUS BLACK TAGS

@caitlin1996

#my writing #comfort zone #poly marauders #Sirius black x reader #james potter x reader #remus lupin x reader #sirius black x james potter x remus lupin x reader #marauders x reader #marauders era fic #marauders #marauders fic #harry potter fic #hp fic

[prythianpages]

Dandelions | Azriel x Witch Reader

summary: it's your baby girl's first day of school and Azriel isn't ready to let her go.

warnings: fluff/angst; some suggestiveness at the end (bonus scene)

a/n: This is part of my ABBA x ACOTAR series (masterlist) where I dedicate a song to a character (: but also my Azriel x witch reader series. I really adore this song and this was the only series I could apply it to. This can pretty much be read as a stand alone imagine. All you have to know is that reader is a witch and is an established relationship with Az.

**

In the quiet hush of morning, Azriel and Melaina find themselves at the breakfast table with sleep in their eyes. The floor is cloaked in their shadows, joining one another at their feet in a vast sea of darkness.

Yet, the dance of their shadows harbor distinct meanings.

Though he tries to hide it, your keen eyes pick up on the subtle poignant unease in Azriel's demeanor. An undercurrent of melancholy taints the air, prompting you to send a reassuring tug through your bond. Azriel returns the gesture, his hand finding yours across the table. Meanwhile, Melaina quietly finishes her breakfast. Her shadows, a whirlwind of nerves and excitement, betray her impassive appearance. Today is her first day of school, the precipice of a new chapter in her life, and Azriel can't help but grapple with the realization that his little girl is growing up far too quickly.

“All done, my pretty?” You ask softly, gaze alight with admiration as her small wings flutter behind her.

She’s the mirror image of her father with her captivating hazel eyes–a perfect blend of greens and browns that remind you of the nature you’re so fond of. Two braids cascade down her shoulders and delicate bangs accentuate her sun-kissed complexion. When she was born, you had joked that you had given birth to Azriel’s carbon copy and little did you know that even her personality would match his. 

Melaina nods and you rise, taking her plate to the kitchen sink. The corner of your lips lift up into a smile when you hear Azriel ask, “Are you sure you want to go to school? You can always start next year.”

“Mel is more than ready for school,” you lightly chide Azriel, who chooses to ignore your words of consolation. 

His gaze is fixed on Melaina, a plethora of scenarios plaguing his mind. He wishes he could see what’s really on her mind–to be able to foresee any worries she may have and ease her through them. The same way he’s eased her through every milestone of her life thus far. He was there when she took her first steps, when she first got hurt from tripping over a rug that he immediately disposed of after, when she said her first word–which much to your dismay was your cat’s name, Binx. 

But now, she was ready for school. Her first time being away from home without you or him or his brothers by her side. Her first time being on her own. What if the kids in her class don’t take well to her? To her shadows? He remembers the apprehensive looks he’d receive in Windhaven when growing up and the thought of anyone doing the same to her pains him. What if they are mean to her? What if they hurt her?

The obsidian tendrils at Azriel's side stir with an eerie melody, commanding Melaina's shadows to rise. They snap to attention like disciplined soldiers heeding orders. An unspoken promise unfolds—her shadows would help guide her and protect her from any lingering stare or slightest suspicion of malintent. They return to her side as she rises to her feet, tickling her sides and causing her to giggle.

 Azriel smiles and shares her laughter, capturing every minute of it, the feeling in it.

**

There’s that odd melancholy feeling again as he stands in front of the school with Melaina on one side and you on the other. He can’t help the frown that settles over his face when she wiggles her tiny hand out of his grasp to run to her cousins. You’re following after her, tugging Azriel along with you to join his brothers and their mates at the front of the school.

“Good morning, Azriel jr,” Cassian greets her with a smile, playfully tugging at one of her braids. “Are you ready for your first day?”

Melaina lets out a huff. “Of course I am, Uncle Cas.”

Cassian then looks toward Azriel, who continues to brood, and chuckles. “It doesn’t look like your daddy is.”

Azriel glares at Cassian. You leave his side to hug Feyre and the frown leaves his face at the delighted squeal that comes from you, his shadows singing in response. He turns his head to see you and Feyre exchange smiles while you gush in excitement over her growing belly. Though Feyre looks at Azriel with a knowing smile, her words are directed to you.

“Rhys was the same way with Nyx,” she muses and out of the corner of his eye, Azriel catches his brother rolling his eyes. But he doesn’t deny it.

“So was Nesta,” Cassian adds, propping an elbow on Nesta’s shoulders. She shoves him off with a shrug before chiding after their twin boys, Cardan and Calian. The aftermath of the aphrodisiac you made–or rather, remade–for her after Azriel accidentally drank the first batch.

“I’m surprised you’re faring well with this,” Feyre says with a raised brow at you.

“Well, someone has to be the strong one,” you tease, side glancing at Azriel and squeezing his hand. 

Azriel lets out a small huff, similar to the one Melaina let out earlier. He knew you were also stressed and a little sad but you were surprisingly able to hide it better than him. But unbeknownst to him, just in case the obsidian necklace she wore was not enough, you had casted a protection spell over Melaina before she went to bed…and packed her bags with a variety of charged crystals.

The gathering of students at the school's entrance slowly disperses, and Azriel tenses beside you, acknowledging the imminent moment of having to say goodbye. Nyx, ever courteous, takes it upon himself to accompany Melaina to class. Azriel suspects Feyre's influence in Nyx's gesture, as if she intuited the added difficulty for him and you. He watches as Melaina walks back to you and you lean down, gently smoothing her bangs before placing a kiss on her forehead.

“Today will be a wonderful day for you,” you affirm for her with a radiant smile, making Azriel's heart melt at the sight of the two girls he loves the most.  He wishes that he could freeze the picture and save it from the funny tricks of time. 

Your hand delicately reaches for the obsidian crystal suspended from her neck, lifting it tenderly to your lips. There’s a flash of green light that engulfs the crystal and as you release the necklace, Azriel notices the new sparkle to it. “Love you, my pretty.”

Though Melaina doesn’t verbalize it back, her eyes radiate a golden glow and the soft caress of her shadows against your face feels like a tender whisper that articulates, "I love you too.” You pull her in close, hugging her smaller frame and lean down to whisper. But Azriel’s attentive senses still catch it.

“Now hug and give your daddy a kiss so he doesn’t cry.”

Azriel resists the urge to roll his eyes. Feeling a tug on his sweater, he leans down to meet his daughter at eye level. Opening his arms expectantly, a surge of warmth envelops him as she eagerly rushes into his embrace. A tender kiss graces his cheek, accompanied by the familiar caress of her shadows against his other cheek similar to the way they had done with you. He pulls away to look at her, holding her gently by the shoulders. He knows her shadows will do well to protect her and if those aren’t enough, her older cousins are just a couple of classrooms down the hall. But he needs to hear her say it.

“What will you do if someone is mean to you?”

Melaina’s eyes light up and she steps out from his hold. True to the goddess you named her after, she's a tiny vision of nightmares and madness, as she assumes a defensive position, her shadows dancing around her.

“Kick them in the face!” She exclaims as she raises her leg up with a glare directed toward her nonexistent enemy.  “I'll make my enemies bleed.”

Cardan and Calian follow after her while Nyx wisely keeps a safe distance, amused by the spectacle of his younger cousins engaging in an imaginary brawl. Cassian watches them fondly, striking punches of his own into the air but you’re shaking your head with furrowed brows. Azriel catches the pointed look you send his way and a subtle blush overtakes his cheeks as you’ve discovered his secret. He continues to read Melaina, those books you told him not to. 

“No, Mel, that’s not–”

“That’s my girl,” Azriel grins as he rises to his feet, feeling slightly better. He rustles her bangs fondly.

The sound of the school bell echoes through the park as a final warning that class should be beginning shortly. Azriel reluctantly shrugs Melaina’s backpack off his shoulder, the small bag looking ridiculous on someone of his stature. He adjusts it on her with careful consideration for her delicate wings and feels an ache in his chest as the backpack nearly engulfs her smaller frame. 

As the faint rustling, reminiscent of rocks shifting, comes from the bag, it is Azriel’s turn to send you a subtle yet pointed look in your direction. A suppressed smile tugs at his lips when you quickly avert your gaze and he realizes he wasn’t the only one keeping a secret.

“Off you go, my little shadow. See you later.”

Once the backpack is secured to her, she takes Nyx’s waiting hand and runs off to the entrance with him. Azriel almost frowns but then, at the top of the stairs, she turns around, waving goodbye with a small absent-minded smile.

He watches her go into the school with a surge of that well-known sadness. Tears prick his eyes and though he knows he’s being dramatic, he can’t help the feeling that he’s losing her forever. His sweet little girl who keeps on growing. She’s slipping through his fingers all the time.

**

Bonus scene

Before his family could indulge in making fun of him, Azriel grasps your hand, drawing you close as he summons his shadows. The inky tendrils swirl around you both, transporting you back to the familiar sanctuary of your home.

"If this is your reaction on her first day of school, I can only imagine what you’ll be like when she has her first crush," you say, a teasing sparkle in your eyes.

Azriel's grip on you tightens. He doesn’t want to grapple further into the inevitability of his daughter's growing independence because to him, Melaina will always be his baby girl. A subtle strain echoes in his voice as he pleads, "Don't."

Easing out of his embrace, you giggle at his dramatics, strolling toward the kitchen with a lightness in your step, intent on brewing some tea. "It's just a couple of hours, Az," you reassure him.

"A couple of hours?" Azriel echoes, a pensive note in his voice as he joins you in the kitchen.

Having taken the entire week off, he had intended to be present for every moment—dropping Melaina off and picking her up during her first week at school. He didn’t plan for much other than that and he was used to spending his days off with his little family but now Melaina was off at school, leaving the two of you alone.

The kettle placed on the stove begins to whistle, harmonizing with the new thought that brews in his mind. You’re raising your steaming cup of tea to your lips, peering over at Azriel as he walks up to you. “What? You want some?” You ask, raising your cup to him.

Azriel shakes his head with a smile. Carefully taking the cup from you, he places it onto the counter behind you. He gently but firmly holds your chin, coaxing you to meet his gaze. The faint blush on his cheeks returns, a soft hue that complements the golden brilliance in his eyes as he looks down at you with adoration because you’ve given him everything he’s ever dreamed of and more.

Still, there's an insatiable desire within him for even more moments, more shared dreams, and more of you.

“Let’s have another?”

“A baby?”

Azriel nods, attentively studying your features for any nuanced emotion. He feels relief when you smile and you voice your answer without having to say anything, flooding him with love through the bond you share. The two of you had discussed having children years ago, almost two years before having Melaina. After she was born, you mirrored each other’s desires for having more but had agreed on waiting but not too long as you wanted your children to grow up together.

“We do have a couple of hours to ourselves,” you remind him again, embracing him with arms entwined around his neck, fingers brushing through the back of his hair.

He hooks his arms under your knees, lifting you up with ease and you’re wrapping your legs around his waist. He grins when your legs tighten around him and kisses you.

“Let’s not waste another second.”

**

a/n: hope you enjoyed this as much as I did writing it <3 Sorry, I skipped ahead. I do want to eventually write an imagine for when Az & reader first find out they're having a baby. That might be the next imagine for this series.

tagging: @fxckmiup

#azriel x reader #azriel x y/n #azriel x you #azriel imagine #acotar x you #acotar x y/n #acotar x reader #acotar imagine #azriel fanfic #azriel acotar #acotar fanfiction #az!dandelions

[morwap]

𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐎𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐎 𝐌𝐄

ex!regulus black x fem!reader

nav | m.list | r.b m.list

smut

dom!reg sub!reader, p in v, cunnilingus, handjob, cheating, ex!barty x reader mention, hair pulling. c/n = character name

───────✧ 𓆩♡𓆪 ✧───────

james unlocked the door, a big smile on his face as he had booked a pretty nice airbnb for the long weekend. you and dorcas carried in snacks and drinks to the kitchen as he held the door.

you could hear peter groan as sirius jumped on his back after stretching.

“hey i just wanted to see if you were okay, ya know with regulus being here and all—“

you cut dorcas off with a little laugh, “yeah d its fine, i mean we both have moved on clearly”

dorcas smiled and nodded before rubbing your arm then walking back outside.

moved on was not what you would describe it, regulus was here with a girl he had a met not to long ago, a fling, you could tell by how she acted. it was exactly how you used to act.

maybe he did this to make you jealous and to ruin your time, that was the only justification that went through your head.

you packed the fridge with the food and put things on the counters.

“y/n! where do you want me to put your stuff?” remus yelled, you already knew the sleeping arrangements, you and peter on an air mattress while remus, sirius, dorcas and marlene in a room. james and lily have their own and so does regulus and c/n.

“just put it by the couch!” you yelled as you watched sirius walk in, you grabbed a water and tossed it to him. sirius smiled then looked behind him then looked back at you, giving you an eyebrow raise. a warning sign.

“yeah its up the stairs, second room on the right” regulus mumbled. you watched as she walked up the stairs and regulus stopped to talk to sirius. you could tell he was out of breath from carrying things, you grabbed another water from the fridge and put it on the table before walking to the living room.

to say the tension was strong whenever you and regulus were in the same room was an understatement.

it was getting dark out, everyone was outside while james cleaned the grill for tomorrow and sirius and marlene tried to get a speaker to start working.

you sat next to lily, you both chatting about random topics while scrolling and showing each other different cats at a shelter. you would occasionally look to the other seats and make eye contact with regulus, it only made you wanna roll your eyes when he would at you then at her then back at you. he would get closer to her, having a stare off with you until you looked away.

music started to lighten the tension, marlene had pulled you up to dance with her while she was shit faced drunk. sirius got remus to join in. regulus watched you, thinking that maybe you just didnt care.

the fun ended with marlene throwing up on the other side of the fence and dorcas having to go put her in a bath. mary had called lily to check up on you guys, she wasn’t able to come since she had a wedding to attend.

hours passed and remus was the last to leave living room to you and peter, you sat down on the edge of the air mattress, peter already fast asleep, you had showered before coming to bed and now put on lotion.

the only thoughts you had were of regulus as you started to lay down. you couldn’t sleep a few hours passed until you heard footsteps.

regulus sat on the couch, his elbows on his knees. he cant remember what made him come down here, maybe to get a drink but now its led him here and he cant say he’s mad about it.

“are you doing this to fuck with me? to make me jealous?” you asked in a yelled whisper, sitting on the edge of the air mattress. you made sure not to move too much since peter was next to you with earplugs in.

“what? am i doing this to fuck with you? what are you talking about?” he whispered, his brows furrowed. “you started talking to barty again, what was i supposed to do while you were out flirting with your ex boyfriend?” he added.

“literally what the fuck are you talking about regulus” you scoffed, the last time you saw barty was when you gave him some of his clothes that was still in a box in your closet, it was socks and a few plain white tees but he had messaged you about it since it had his favorite belt and hadnt been able to find it for almost 6 months.

“sirius told me he saw you, how you got in his car and was all up on him, told me all about how you were all giggly and touching his arm, i thought we had something” he argued, making hand gestures.

“we do have something, we always have had something, all i did was give him a box of clothes if i was thinking about getting back together with i would've told you” you whispered, you touched his arm.

“i would never do that to you, regulus i told you everything” you added as a tear pricked your waterline, his head tilted slightly as he closed his eyes and sighed.

you missed him, god you missed him.

“i’m sorry, i should've asked you” he sighed, his hands going to yours. just touching him was like being teased, you missed his hands on you.

you swallowed, you didn’t know if it was the right time and you think he had the same idea.

regulus looked at you, you two were so close, his hair was just the slightest bit damp and he still smelled so strongly of his body wash and shampoo. He wore a plain black tee and sweatpants that was fresh out the dryer.

he leaned in closer, you didn’t want to move more than you already have in case of waking peter.

you tilted your head back as he leaned in more, his lips touching yours. god it felt so good.

your tongue intertwined with his as you two kissed, his hand came to your jaw. you tried to get closer to him. you heard peter groan and you pulled away.

peter rolled over and started to snore.

“cmere” regulus whispered and guided you up and into the kitchen.

your lower back pressed against the counter, as he locked your guys lips together roughly, his hands going up your shirt.

you tried to rub yourself against his groin. regulus groaned into your mouth as he unclipped your bra. he moved around your body until he was able to slip the bra to the ground then undid the knot on your pj pants.

regulus trembled in your grasp as you palmed him, he was getting harder and harder in your grasp. he bit your lip lightly before pulling away.

“turn the fuck around” he panted, his hands moving you roughly and pushing you to bend over the counter. regulus drops to his knees, his fingers slipping down your pj pants and panties.

you could feel his lips on your ass cheek, he bit softly which made you laugh and mumble an “ow,” regulus smile before spreading you open for him.

his tongue met your cunt, making you shiver, your clit throbbed as he sucked slightly. his hands massaged you gently, he did circles around your clit then moved his tongue up and down your vulva.

one of regulus’ hands moved to your cunt, his fingers teasing around your cunt before finally pushing in.

your hand that was gripping the counter went up to your mouth, his fingers were long and soon enough he could fit two in. your legs trembled and you were getting close. minutes passed and then you were on the brink.

regulus pulled away and slowed his fingers. you whined when his fingers left you. you soon felt his lips on the back of your neck. you could feel him press his cock against you, you reached back and slid your hand into his waistbands, he was fucking leaking.

he moaned against your skin as you stroked him, his hand gripped your hand and guided it while the other one held your hip. regulus let go of your hand and pushed his sweats down a bit.

“turn around i wanna see your face” he whispered and let go of you. you kicked off your bottoms before turning. regulus spit in his hand and stroked himself, you watched his chest as he breathed heavily.

you got onto the counter, thankfully it happened to be perfect height.

spreading your legs for him, waiting, you are beautiful.

regulus pressed his tip against your cunt, sliding in as his other hand did circles on your clit. his head tilted back slightly and he bit his lips. his stomach tightened and his eyes closed.

you watched his cock go into you. your hand gripped his forearm.

“youre amazing” he mumbled, looked at you and you leaned in, lips molding together in a fevered rush.

regulus started thrusting, noises caught in your throat, his other hand held the back of your head, guiding it how he wanted.

he started to quicken his pace, his fingers gripping your hair hard. you moaned in his mouth.

a noise from upstairs stopped him, pulling his head away from you and his hand moved to cover your mouth. he slowed his pace but didnt stop completely.

“regulus?” you heard.

he looked at you and then reached to turn the sink on then off.

“yeah?” he said. she stood at the top of the stairs. it was dark the only light being from a nightlight that was next to you.

“you okay?” she asked.

“yeah im just getting a drink and im on the phone with evan, hes having a rough night, go back to bed” he lied on the spot.

“oh alright” she yawned and walked back.

you kissed his neck, nipping at his skin. he started to pick up his pace again.

“im sorry” he whispered, his hands rubbed your sides.

“its okay” you said, you pulled on the hem of his shirt and sucked on his collarbone, leaving a dark mark.

his fingers went fast on your clit, getting you closer and closer.

“i love you” regulus said.

you kissed his cheek, “i love you too regulus” your fingers slipping into his hair.

your brows furrowed as the coil in your stomach snapped. cunt clenching down on him and pulsating. you bit your lips together.

“inside or on your stomach?” he asked hurriedly.

you ignored him.

his eyes closed tightly, “imma need an answer baby quick” he whined.

“stomach” you panted as you came down from your high.

regulus thrusted a few more times before pulling out. your hands went to his cock, jerking him off to the pace he was going before.

he cursed as he came, cock throbbing and now becoming super sensitive.

soon he had cleaned you and himself up and wiped down the counters then you two ended up cuddling on the couch. he whispered in your ear, telling you how he missed you and that you were the best thing to ever happen to him. it was nice, so nice.

you had moved once he fell asleep, getting back to your spot on the air mattress. regulus moved closer to the edge and reached his hand down to grab yours.

“goodnight” he mumbled.

#marauder era #marauders #regulus black angst #regulus black fancast #regulus x reader #regulus fanfiction #regulus black fanfiction #regulus black fic #regulus black fanfic #regulus black #regulus black x reader #regulus black smut #regulus black x reader smut #regulus black x you #smut #marauders smut

[badgerbl00d]

hey I've fallen down a rabbit hole of reading your fics and it's 3am here but they're so good!!! I'm in love ✨✨✨💕💕 i was wondering if I could request a story with Zoro but the reader's ex is there and she doesn't miss him but she runs into him for the first time and she's hurt after he disappeared on her, maybe he's with a bunch of his friends. Zoro comforts her, maybe even embarrasses the ex while they fight off some enemies and stuff. Sorry i know I'm rambling on, but ahhhh i would love to see this come to life! thanks again! :)

hands off

☆ characters: roronoa zoro

☆ up next: captain's girl; shanks x reader

☆ summary: you have an unexpected run-in with your no good ex boyfriend but unfortunately for him, you have zoro with you

☆ a/n: lovedddd writing this! i love writing protective zo :3 thank u for this ask! requests are still open

☆ key: e/n = ex's name

It was a busier night than you and the crew had seen in a while. You were all desperate for a day off of chores and the open ocean so Nami suggested a brief stop at the closest island. 

You’d broken off in groups to spend some time on land and you Zoro and Robin had made your way to a dive bar in town. 

It was a welcome stop– the ship only had sake on it. Franky and Brook had finished the gin during a card game and Sanji had finished off the bourbon in a recipe. 

The three of you found a seat and you took a moment to sink into the torn leather cushion, breathing in the smell of old cigarettes in ashtrays and beer. The neon lights washed you in a warm hue and Zoro couldn’t help but stare at how the blinking lights shifted on your face, changing the shadows of your eyelashes danced on your cheeks. 

He got up, realizing Robin had taken note of his staring and made his way to the bar ordering a drink for himself. 

You and Robin were talking, he could hear your giggling and tried to drown the warmth that erupted in his tummy by downing the drink.

You walked up behind him and hugged him from behind, “Zo-ro!”

He loved the way you said his name, stretching out the first syllable and emphasizing the second. Zou– ro!

“Hey, Y/n,” he said, biting back a smile.

“What’d you order?”

“Sake.”

“Shocking! Gimme a sip.”

He handed you the small bowl, his heart beating faster when your fingers touched.

He watched you sip it and wince as it went down.

“Still gross.”

It was too much to be around you, you were intoxicating and he knew if he spent too much time around you after having had a few drinks he’d most likely say something stupid and embarrass himself. 

He started getting up, awkwardly trying to get you off of his shoulders. 

You let go and took his seat. 

“Here,” he dug around in his pockets and handed you a few bills and several coins.

You shot him a puzzled look.

“Get yourself a drink, since you didn’t like mine.”

“With…” you paused and counted the money, “Three berries and sixty-four.. no, sixty-five cents?”

He shot you a look and snatched the money up, grumbling as he went back to the table. 

A man in the bar quickly took Zoro’s place once he’d walked away and started up a conversation with you, much to Zoro’s irritation. He went and sat with Robin, sipping his drink and playing a game of checkers with her. 

An hour or so had passed and you, sociable as ever, had talked to almost everyone in the bar. 

Robin playfully nudged Zoro in your direction, who was absorbed almost entirely in his sixth cup of sake of the night. 

You were sitting alone at the bar now, ordering yourself a drink. 

Zoro furrowed his brow and took another big sip of his drink, pretending not to understand what Robin was hinting at. 

“Hmph,” he muttered, still not wanting to admit to Robin that his crush had been found out. 

A sudden impulse to go to you and declare his feelings bubbled up in his chest and against his better judgment, he stood up trying to gather the courage to go up and sit with you. It’s not like it would have been weird–he was closer with you than the rest of the crew and he knew you better than anyone (at least that’s what he let himself believe). But tonight, for some reason, he had been feeling nervous around you. He told himself that maybe it was your new perfume, floral and saccharine, and dizzying every time he caught your intoxicating scent or the dress you were wearing that hugged your body in all his favorite places, not that he looked, of course, or maybe it was your hair which was framing your face, now glowing in the soft light of the bar and pink with the warmth of alcohol that was driving him absolutely mad at the thought and sight of you. 

“Better hurry,” she said, getting up to leave, “Looks like a few other people already want to take the open seat next to her.”

A group of younger boys in the corner pushed one of their group toward where you were sitting, sending flirty remarks your way. 

“I’ll see you two back on the ship tonight.” 

You ignored the boys behind you, rolling your eyes at their antics. 

“Mint gimlet, miss,” the bartender said, handing you a drink, winking, “The gentleman over there sent it.”

“Oh? Well, thanks,” you said, looking to see who had guessed your favorite drink. 

Your heartbeat picked up, thumping with a quick, erratic beat against your chest. You felt goosebumps cover your skin and your stomach churned. 

Him. 

It had been two, or was it three?, years. God knows you’d tried contacting him; dozens of letters, calls, messages, just wanting to know what happened. Had you done something? Was he in trouble? Did a year of your life mean nothing to him? All that time, all those kisses and conversations and messy beds and lazy mornings. All the petty arguments and fights and the tears you’d cried in front of him. You had told yourself that there was no way he’d have thrown it all away. But six months after you’d last seen him, leaving your bed in the early hours of the morning, kissing your forehead and promising you dinner that night, he’d responded to one of your letters. 

It was some shitty, half-assed excuse—something about new opportunities and not wanting to tie you down, being your own person. 

A lump in your throat began forming at just the thought of it. 

You looked away from him, blinking back tears, but it was too late. He was headed your way. 

Well, you thought, the least you could do was ignore him. 

He sat one seat away from you, smiling at you like a schoolboy in love. You wanted to break your glass over his head. 

“Hi, sweetheart,” he said, placing his hand over yours, “How are ya?”

He was halfway through a beer, a drink that you now associated with his memory. 

You clenched your jaw and looked straight ahead, ignoring him entirely. 

“At least taste the drink, I know they’re your favorite.”

Zoro, who had been closely watching this entire interaction noted how you tensed up the moment he sat down and placed a steady hand on the handle of his sword. He paused for a moment, closely observing the scene that was playing out before him. He watched you push the drink in front of you away and your soft smile fall into a frown. 

“Leave me alone.”

The man reached over and placed his hand on your thigh and gently squeezed, eliciting visible disgust from you. 

Pushing his hand off you repeated yourself, “Leave me a-lone.”

Zoro was already making his way toward you from the other side of the room, his blood starting to simmer at the sight of your unwanted visitor. 

He stopped at a table about twenty feet away from you, deciding he would wait a bit more before taking any action– he was, after all, somewhat intrigued. 

The man was laughing, but you had never looked so angry.

“I am sorry, sweetheart,” he heard him say, “Let me explain what happened, just hear me out.”

“I don’t care what happened, and I will not hear anything out so long as it’s you speaking,” you responded.

“Did ya miss me? At least answer me that.”

Your hands were balled up into shaky fists, “No.”

The man laughed again, grabbing your drink from in front of you and taking a sip, “Yes, you did. Look how worked up you are! Don’t know how to respond to the sight of me, huh? Am I as handsome as you remember?”

You suddenly felt a large hand on your shoulder and turned to look up and see Zoro, relief sweeping through your body. 

“Hey, Zo,” you said, smiling at him.

“Mind getting me a beer?”

“Not sake?” you asked. He laughed, a lot more than normal, but insisted it was the beer he wanted. 

Tension between you and your ex was already at an all-time high, and your apparent closeness with Zoro wasn’t helping.

The bartender placed the beer in front of you and you pushed it over to Zoro who grabbed it and sat in the empty seat between you and your ex. 

“You know him?” Zoro asked, taking a generous sip of beer. 

You didn’t respond for a second, but eventually nodded, “Yeah.”

“Want me to move?” 

You could see E/n glaring at Zoro. 

You bit the inside of your cheek and looked up at Zoro who had an unreadable sort of expression on his face, something between irritation and apathy. He looked straight ahead and didn’t look at either you or the man to his right. 

Several moments passed without an answer and he turned to look at you, “Didn’t think so.”

“We were having a conversation,” your ex nudged Zoro’s arm. 

You knew the look on Zoro’s face, it was that sort of glazy-eyed focus he fell into before fighting. 

“E/n, we’re done talking.” 

“Are you sure this guy isn’t bothering you, Y/n? I felt like we were close to… reconnecting.”

Ugh, go away.

“Well, we weren’t,” you said.

Zoro stayed silent, sipping his beer, but you could tell he was very aware of everything going on around him. 

“Alright,” he said, getting up. He grabbed his coat and walked over to you, leaning over your shoulder, his chest to your back, and pressed a kiss to your cheek. You watched Zoro’s fist clench out of the side of your eye.

You shifted uncomfortably in your seat, “Get off.”

As much as you hated the man, you knew Zoro was very capable of escalating things very quickly and you wanted to avoid causing a scene. 

You felt a small rush of wind on the back of your neck and the cool edge of a blade settle there. 

Uh-oh.

So much for staying calm. 

“Step away from her,” Zoro snarled, “Now.” His sword was extended behind your head and the point was resting on E/n’s chest. 

He put his hands up and smirked at Zoro, “Let’s not get too confident here, buddy.”

He pushed his jacket to the side and rested his hand on the gun that sat on his hip. He drew it slowly and dragged his finger to rest on the trigger.

You remembered that stupid gun and the fight that had ensued when you’d accidentally touched it.

Zoro laughed, loud and bold.

“I’ll have your hands cut off and skinned before you can pull the trigger. Make this a lot easier for yourself and leave.” 

Zoro didn’t look anywhere other than his face. His arm was steady and the sword didn’t waver even an inch. Confident and unwavering, he resembled a tiger before it kills. 

Your ex placed the gun back in its holster and turned to shoot you a pathetic smile, “Are you sure you want me to leave? You won’t see me again.”

You won’t see me again.

For a moment, all that hurt resurfaced. The striking realization that this was it. Your relationship was done and would never be what it had been again. This moment, right now, was truly it. You prepared yourself to say something, anything. But there was a growing lump in your throat so you stopped yourself from answering. You’d never forgive yourself if your voice broke now. 

Zoro moved in front of you, blocking you from his view, “You’re conversation with her is done. You can talk to me and lose your life in the process or you can leave.”

“Bitch,” he muttered under his breath, still looking at you and turning to leave. 

Before he’d even finished saying the word you watched Zoro’s sword cut through the air quicker than you could process, leaving him standing over your ex-boyfriend who was now clutching his bleeding chest on the floor. 

You shot up, suddenly nauseated by the exchange and the unnerving satisfaction you felt. 

Blood was soaking through his shirt and puddling in his palm, his breathing heavy and ragged. 

You grabbed Zoro’s arm and he turned to look at you. His complexion completely changed the moment he looked down at you, concern pouring from all of his features. 

Are you okay? he asked, his eyes speaking for him. 

“Let’s go, Zo,” you said, tugging on his arm, “There’re marines in town.”

He nodded, lowering his sword but he didn’t sheath it. 

“Just give me one more second.”

Zoro crouched down and nudged him with the handle of his sword like a cat playing with its prey. 

“I know you’re alive, so listen ‘cause I’m not gonna repeat myself,” he drew his sword and brought it up next to his ear. You watched silently as he visibly flinched. Zoro brought the blade down to rest on his shoulder, and slid it toward himself, wiping the blood off of the sword and onto his shirt. 

“If I ever see you again. Any time, any place- I guarantee that I will be the last thing you see on Earth. Understood?”

Zoro didn’t move at all, not a muscle, not an inch. He stayed watching the man like a hawk, clutching his bleeding chest until he gave a slight nod. Had you blinked you would’ve missed it. 

Zoro stood up, dusting off his knees and sheathing his sword. 

He turned toward the door and grabbed your hand on his way out taking you with him. 

The urge to turn around and look bubbled up inside you—to see him as devastated as you had been, to see him experience the pain you had felt. 

And as though he had read your mind Zoro gave your hand a squeeze.

Keep walking, he told you. 

You steeled yourself and walked out hand in hand with Zoro, whose hand was warm with speckled blood. 

He led you around the side of the bar, stopping only when you were tucked away in the alley. 

It was silent, neither of you saying anything. 

You looked up at him, making eye contact finally. He seemed somewhat embarrassed, his cheeks were fairly pink. 

You figured maybe he was regretting his rash actions but he was only really freaking out about having held your hand for so long. 

“Zoro…” 

“It’s nothing, really. He was a dick. Ex-boyfriend?” he said, trying badly to hide his jealousy.

It was funny– how he could go from quasi-murderer to shy schoolboy in minutes.

“Something like that,” you replied, looking away from his face, messing around with the hem of your shirt. Your eyes were starting to water again. 

“Hey, hey,” he said, leaning down to take your face between his thumb and forefinger, “What did he do? I’ll go back and kill him.”

You laughed, sniffling in between, “He just… He left me with no explanation and showed up out of nowhere today. It was so long ago I shouldn’t care. I don’t! But seeing him all of a sudden was just-”

Zoro wrapped his arms around you and pulled you into his chest where you let several more tears flow, staining his shirt.

He petted your head, holding you close to him with his free arm unsure of what to say. 

“‘m sorry, Y/n,” he muttered, shuffling his feet, “I shouldn’t’ve asked.”

“It’s okay!” you insisted, wiping your eyes with the backs of your hand. 

Zoro, who’d only known you for a few months, had defended you and your honor without a second thought. And though he’d probably been a little excessive your heart swelled at the thought of how he’d stood up for you. 

““Sorry about your shirt,” you muttered, patting the stains on his chest where you’d soaked his shirt with tears, 

He looked down and smiled, “It’s ok. It’s an old shirt anyway.”

You laughed, “Yeah and it’s not super clean either.”

His cheeks grew pink and he lightly punched your arm.

You suddenly grabbed his hands in yours, surprising him.

You squeezed his hands extra tight and looked up at him, “Thank you, Zoro. Seriously. I don’t know why I didn’t knock him out myself and I never shut down like that but I– Thank you.”

Zoro nodded, giving you a small squeeze back. 

“I would do anything for you,” he admitted. More to himself than you. 

Warmth crept up your neck and into your face. 

“I mean– ‘Cause you’re my crewmate! I’d do anything for any of you guys, obviously. Maybe not Sanji but, well, yes him too just don’t tell him I said that.. But I meant, as in, like,” he rambled suddenly realizing what he’d said. 

His hands still in yours you pulled him down, crashing your lips into his. The sudden addition of his full body weight on top of yours sent you both falling backward, stumbling until your back hit the brick wall behind you. 

“Oh, shit– sorry! Sorry,” he said, pulling away from you.

“No, don’t be! I shouldn’t have….”

“Kissed me?”

“Pulled you so hard,” you responded, your hands still holding the other’s, “Thank you. I hope that shows I really mean it.”

His eyes were looking anywhere but yours and his cheeks were a furious shade of pink. 

His hands were still in yours and he gently shook yours off.

“Zoro?”

He stayed silent, embarrassed and unbelievably happy, and wrapped his arms around you again. You were pulled into his chest and he stayed quiet, hugging you tight. 

Ah, you understood, he didn’t want you seeing him so vulnerable. 

“You know,” you said, your voice muffled by his chest, “I can’t kiss you again if you hold me down here.”

You felt him tense up and his arms stiffen around you. 

“Fine with me,” he grumbled.

“You’re blushing, huh?”

“.........No.”

“Then let me out.”

“Will I get a kiss?”

“Thought you didn’t want one.”

He pushed you off his chest and started marching back in the general direction of the Thousand Sunny, grabbing his bandana and wrapping it around the lower half of his face, leaving you behind.

You laughed and ran behind him trying to grab the bandana away from his face which he was holding out of your reach. 

You could see the ship in the distance and Zoro had started laughing too, getting more and more comfortable with the pink hue of his face. 

Sanji and Nami were a little further down the way yelling at Luffy who’d ran off with a bag of groceries. 

You paused for a moment, looking at all these people who loved you and, all of the sudden, the past wasn’t all that important. 

Zoro turned, noticing your absence. Nami had spotted the two of you and was waving. 

“Coming?”

#zoro x reader #zoro x you #zoro x y/n #roronoa zoro x reader #roronoa zoro x you #roronoa zoro x y/n #zoro #roronoa zoro #zoro fluff #zoro smut #zoro romance #zoro fanfic #roronoa zoro one piece #zoro roronoa #one piece zoro #roronoa zoro smut #roronoa zoro fluff #one piece

[ollie-lolly]

18+ Obey me cast smut headcanons

18+ Don't take my warnings lightly love~

most of Obey me cast x gender neutral reader

Warnings: My opinion, dark kinks, swearing, talking about smut in detail, minors don't interact

Note: Consent is important kids! In all these situations consent is used. Later side characters are not displayed here, since I am not at that part in the story. Reblogs and constructive criticism is always appreciated!

Concept: How I believe sex would be like with the characters! A lot of these are shared opinions by the Obey Me community.

Word count: 858~

Lucifer

-Hard dom for sure

-Will sub for you under certain circumstances

-R.I.P the bed

-Uses you as a stress reliever (with consent)

-Loves tying you up

-Daddy kink

-Brat tamer

-Secretly likes it when you act out

-Is willing to share you with Diavolo

Mammon

-Switch but with a sub lean

-Loves lap dances

-Wil try to use money during sex

-Strip games, especially poker

-Would love a sugar daddy/mommy lifestyle 

-Would love being the sugar daddy but would also love you playing that role

-Praise kink 100%

-Will want cuddles for a long time afterwards

-You are his human. No one else's, so sharing is off the table

-Just really wants to make you happy

-Loves watching you play with yourself

-Also is a brat in the sheets, if ya catch my drift

-Loves the pain <3

Leviathan (This being very long is my way of saying happy birthday to my baby boy <3)

-I also believe he is a switch with a sub lean

-Tail fucking

-Two cocks

-Underwear thief

-Loves being degraded and praised so…go to town!

-Needs constant reassurance so please give him some.

-A great way of easing him into it, is sexting and phone sex

-All the hentai he has seen definitely fucked his expectations up

-He also got like a couple of dark kinks because of it

-Hentai addiction, but will imagine you as one of the characters

-Is really into cuckolding, but is too shy to say anything about it

-When figuring out a kink you have to help him out since he is too shy to talk about it

-Does not last long in the beginning, but you can help him build it up over time

-There is a good chance that he is a virgin. He does masturbate a lot though

-PERVERT 

-You have to start intimate moments because of his insecurities

-That being said, when he is jealous that is definitely not the case

-Will want to have sex in the infamous bathtub

-Whether it is actually going to happen is up too you 

-But if you are willing to do it in said bathtub he will put tons of soft blankets and mattresses in there

-Role play

-When he role plays as a character he likes he is way more confident 

Satan

-Hard dom just like his daddy

-Uses you as a way to relive his anger and frustration which is often

-Always with consent

-Pet play <3

-Cockwarming while reading -Fucks you while reading

-Reads smut in public places

-Also fucks in public places <3

-The library is a popular pick, so uhh have fun? 

Asmodeus

-The definition of a switch

-This man has tried it all

-Certified sex god

-A sex toy collection larger then Diavolo's castle 

-Voyourism and exhibitionist

-Would be the most likely to share you sexually

-Especially with Solomon

-VERY experimental

-Very high sexdrive so goodluck!

-Has his little checklist in his room of where you have and haven't fucked yet

-Moans his own name

Beelzebub

-The definition of a service top

-Food play

-Good at head

-He is super sweet and gentle with you 

-Is obviously willing to share you with Belphegor

-2 for 1 deal!

-Will suggest doing it in at the gym or sport locker rooms

-Does not like to do it often, but will do it more if you want to!

Belphegor

-Switch

-Hard dom and power bottom 

-60% of the time will let you do most of the work

-A wild card you never know what to expect

-Might play with the concept with consent

-Knive play

-What i am trying to say, is that he likes his sex dark if that makes sense

-Has fantasies of kidnapping you with Beel

-Will use his powers to make you dream about sex

-Gets turned on when he sees you sleeping

-Will fuck you when you are asleep if you give him your blessing

Diavolo

-Soft dom

-R.I.P the bed and the floor, and.. you get the jist

-This man fucks and he fucks HARD

-Breeding kink 

-Please read my sugar daddy fics of this man to get a better idea of how he is like

Barbatos

-Also a service dom

-Will stop in the middle of sex if Diavolo or visitors need him

-He is a busy man, so don't expect a lot

-Tail fucking

-This man is a mystery, so he will definitely keep you on your toes

Simeon

-Switch?? Maybe soft dom

-We don't have enough in game material to make confident statements

-The only way you would get there is by a very very very motivated corruption kink

-Congrats! You made him fall from grace

-Will still keep a lot of his angelic traits when he falls. He will be gentle

-Secretly has a lot of pent up anger so good luck with that

Solomon

-Switch 

-He is a wild card man (just like Belphegor)

-You can never quite expect what is going to happen next

-Definitely puts his powers to good use

-If you are okay with it, he will invite Asmo to join in

-May or may not be your side hoe when you are in the human realm for a little too long

(Plz i need someone to write about this and tag me)

Started on and finished on: 8th of april 2023

#obey me #obey me x reader #obey me suggestive #obey me brothers #obey me brothers x reader #obey me smut #obey me headcanons #obey me shall we date #om! #obey me leviathan #obey me lucifer #obey me mammon #obey me satan #obey me x y/n #obey me x mc #obey me x gender neutral reader #obey me lucifer x reader #obey me lucifer x mc #obey me mammon x reader #obey me mammon x mc #obey me levi x reader #obey me leviathan x mc #obey me leviathan x reader #obey me satan x reader #obey me satan x mc #obey me beelzebub #obey me belphie #obey me belphegor #obey me barbatos #obey me barbatos x reader

[justagalwhowrites]

TikTok Trend

Beautiful decides to take part in a TikTok Trend with Joel. A New in Town drabble.

^We're borrowing Mr. Ben for a late-40s Joel, OK? I desperately need more gifs of Pedro's Joel from that era, I'm too reliant on other characters and actual Pedro gifs for these fics GIVE ME SOMETHING PLEASE

Pairing: Joel Miller x Female Reader from New in Town

Warnings: Not much! Age gap but not the focus of the fic (reader is 36, Joel is 48). No use of Y/N. Minors DNI 18+ only.

Length: 1.4k

A/N: I got stuck thinking earlier how Joel would react to the "call your boyfriend your husband" trend and this is how I think it'd go. This is set about 3 months before the last chapter of New in Town. This can be read as a stand alone fic with the understanding that reader is Sarah's best friend and Joel and Reader have an established relationship of about a year.

“So what’s this for again?” Joel asked as he sat down at the picnic table in the park. 

“It’s a TikTok challenge,” you said, settling in beside him. Joel opened the paper bag the two of you had just gotten from a food truck and started taking out the tacos, putting some in front of you and him. 

“Right,” he said. “And… I’m sorry, baby, but what’s the point?” 

You laughed as you set your phone against your water bottle so it was propped up and ready to film. 

“There isn’t really one, I guess,” you said. “It’s just a fun little video you make and then share. Those interns I have until May are all about it, they were showing me some of theirs the other day. Figure if I work in marketing, I gotta keep up with the trends!” 

Joel smiled a little. 

“So this is the kind of shit Sarah does, huh?” 

“Yeah, she does,” you laughed again. “Her and the interns made one for the company social page the other day, actually.” 

“Can I see?” He asked, interest suddenly piqued. 

“Sure,” you picked your phone back up and found your company’s TikTok, scrolling to the video and handing it off to Joel. 

“We work in marketing, of course we over analyze every ad we see,” Sarah said through your phone, a small smile on Joel’s face as he watched. 

It made you smile, too. One of the fun parts about being in the strange middle ground between your boyfriend’s and best friend’s ages was serving as a bit of a translator between them. Joel still didn’t quite get TikTok. Sarah didn’t understand why her dad refused to go all in on streaming and still had cable. You, at least, could see both sides. 

But this TikTok effort had nothing to do with Sarah. You did try to keep up with the trends on social media to better craft campaigns and content - capitalizing on trends meant that you had to move quick and you couldn’t afford to be out of touch - but your personal TikTok account was mostly empty. It was pretty private, anyway, shared with only a few close friends like Sarah and Maria. All it had were a few reposts of things you liked, some montages of video snippets from you and Joel’s first vacation together, that sort of thing. 

“You should do some of the trends!” Jason, one of your interns, said earlier that day. 

“Just being in the loop on trends is plenty for me,” you waved him off but smiled. “I don’t need to participate.” 

“But it’s fun!” Kenzie, your other intern said. “They’re not all dances and stuff, you know…” 

“I know,” you said. “But it’s just not what I want to spend a lot of time doing is all.” 

“Some don’t take much time,” she said, opening her phone and scrolling for a second. “Here, this one’s easy. You said you have a boyfriend, right?” 

“I do…” 

“Cool,” she said. “So all you do is record yourself making a video where you call your boyfriend your husband, just to see how he reacts. No crazy edits or anything, it’s super easy.” 

You caved after some light convincing and came up with a plan to get Joel in front of the camera. You told him it was a spicy food challenge, just to see which of you handled the heat better and, while you knew he wouldn’t really get the point, you knew he’d be supportive. He always was. 

But there was something about this trend in particular that made you a little nervous. It’s not like the two of you hadn’t discussed marriage. You’d been together a year now, you’d just moved into his house. It had definitely come up. But it had come up in the way that far off things do, something that might happen some day if things fell into place in just the right way. You didn’t want to push it, didn’t want him to feel rushed or obligated, especially since you’d only been cohabitating about a month. Bringing up marriage - even like this - made you nervous. 

“OK I think I get it,” Joel handed you your phone back after watching Sarah’s video twice. “But we’re not doin’ that same thing, right?” 

“Nope,” you said. “We’re going to see who handles the spice better.” 

“Think we both know which one of us is gonna win that one, Beautiful,” he teased, nuzzling his nose against your temple before kissing your cheek. “Us southern men are made of sterner stuff…” 

“Yeah yeah,” you rolled your eyes but smiled, leaning close to him. “We’ll just see about that.” 

You set your phone up to record again, propping it against your water bottle. 

“Here, you gotta get in close because the TikTok format is vertical,” you said and Joel adjusted so you were half beside and half in front of him, his arm going around your waist, hand finding your hip, thumb slipping up below your shirt to find your bare flesh above the band of your pants and brushing you slowly, sensually there. You gave him a look. 

“What?” He asked, brows raised, smile barely contained. 

“Don’t act all innocent,” you shook your head. “You know exactly what you’re doing…” 

“C’mon,” he said. “Let’s make your little TikTik video…” 

“TikTok,” you rolled your eyes but adjusted yourself, your heart pounding. 

“Whatever the kids are using now,” he said. “Because the sooner we’re done the sooner I can get you home…” 

“Alright, I’m going to record,” you cut him off. “Behave yourself!” 

“Always do, Beautiful.” 

You rolled your eyes again but took a deep breath, leaned forward and pressed record. 

“Hi everyone,” you smiled, watching the recording of you and Joel as it was made on the screen. “I’m here with my husband and we’re going to do the spicy food challenge…”

“Your what?” He cut you off and you turned so you could see him a little better. 

“What?” 

“Did…” he paused, looking at you like he wasn’t sure if you were losing it or he was. You weren’t sure if that was good or bad. “Did you just call me your husband?” 

“Yeah,” you shrugged, turning back to the camera. “Anyway, my husband and I both really love spicy food and…” 

You didn’t get a chance to finish your sentence. Joel grabbed your chin almost roughly, pulling you around to face him and all but crushed his lips against yours, clutching you close, kissing you deep and hard, like he couldn’t get enough of you. When he finally let you go, you looked at him and laughed a little, watching him. 

“What was that for?” You asked. 

“You wanna call me your husband?” He asked, a serious look on his face. “Beautiful, we will go to the courthouse right this damn second, don’t tempt me…” 

“Joel, it’s 7 p.m.,” you laughed. “The courthouse is closed.” 

“Don’t care,” he said, giving you a quicker kiss this time. “C’mon, we’ll grab Sarah on the way, see if Tommy wants to meet us…” 

“That’s all it takes, hm?” You teased, heart pounding but for a good reason now. “Just me slipping up and calling you my husband and you’re ready to run down the aisle?” 

“Baby, I’ve been ready to run down the aisle for about a year,” he pressed his forehead to yours. “Just been waitin’ on you to catch up.” 

“Well,” you kissed him softly. “I’m more than caught up. But think I’m still gonna make you ask.” 

“Good luck stopping me,” he said, kissing you again, longer this time, needier, until you pulled away with a groan. “Forget this food challenge, I gotta get you home and devour you. Let’s go, wife.” 

You laughed and stopped the recording on your phone, saving the video to drafts as Joel gathered up the food. You made the mental note to edit out that last part before posting, no need for the interns or Sarah to know quite that much about your sex life. 

“Sorry for ruining your little video,” he said as you started back toward the car. “We can try again later, promise to actually behave myself then…” 

“That’s alright,” you smiled, lacing your fingers with his. “I already got everything I need.”

#fanfic #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x oc #new in town

[word-wytch]

Don't Stand So Close To Me — Chapter 14

Eddie x Teacher!Reader

Chapter 14/? 18k. Series Masterlist

✏︎ An invitation to The Hideout answers some long burning questions.

✏︎ Series Summary: Forced to move back home to Hawkins after your fiancé cheats on you, you begin to fall in love again with an audacious 20 year old metalhead, only there’s one problem — he’s still in high school and you’re his English teacher.

While you struggle starting over in a place you never thought you would return, Eddie struggles feeling stuck in a place he can’t manage to leave — until you offer to help him. Of all the lessons learned, the most important are the ones you teach each other.

✏︎ Series CW: forbidden romance, slow burn, true love, smut (18+ mdni), internal conflict, student-teacher relationship, 10 year age gap, mutual pining, sexual tension, emotions, drama, angst, character development, happy ending :)

Chapter CW: kissing, heavy petting, jealousy, protective!eddie, drinking, smoking, fluff

Tuesday, December 10th 1985

Winter crept in like a lamb. It nipped at your ankles when you got out of bed, beckoned you to hibernate in the warm cocoon of soft sheets and heavy blankets. The room was a lightless cave, the sky still as dense as midnight. Feet shuffling blindly at the floor to find your slippers, you clicked on the small lamp atop your nightstand to offer some light to your habitat. 

Standard routine — making shadows on the wall as you brushed your teeth, emerging out the door to the dark hallway, squinting under the harsh light of your kitchen. Two eggs over easy. Two pieces of toast. One phone that hung to the right of your small kitchen table like an omen as you dipped the crust into the yolks. Looming. Waiting. You swallowed a feeling with your next sip of coffee; flutters that danced down your throat and settled in the pit of your stomach. 

By the time you returned to your bedroom, the sky touched your sheer curtains with the palest blue. Your clothing was already laid out neatly on your dresser, poised like soldiers in a row — thick ribbed stockings; plaid wool skirt; stiff white blouse; cream knit sweater. 

As you suited up, stripping yourself of warm pajamas to brace the chill of your formal attire, your eyes drifted to an object on your desk. Powder blue and collecting a fair amount of dust; an IBM Selectric II typewriter. It was more or less a decoration now, pushed against the wall to make room for piles of papers in need of grading. Still, you liked the way it looked; cheery against the drab apartment wall, like something a real writer would have.

It was a trusty old thing, still chugging along despite countless college essays hammered into the grey keys. It had been your only company in the wee hours of many mornings such as this one, only then there had not been sleep to separate you from the night before. Sturdy and dependable, it captured your imagination too, letter by black inked letter. 

Fastening the buttons of your blouse in a methodical rhythm, you could almost trick yourself into believing it was any other morning, except today there was something else you needed to do before you left, and the clock on your nightstand let you know in glowing red that your window to do so was closing.

Cold linoleum creaked under your stocking feet as you padded into the kitchen, stomach twisting into knots as you approached the phone. If you were going to do this, it had to be now. 

Running your finger down the laminated tabs of the well-loved address book on your counter, you flipped to the section labeled “J”. After scanning a dozen hand-written names, you found the one you were looking for. It was a mess of chalky white-out and hasty scribbles. Last name replaced, same with the phone number and address. You weren’t sure why you didn’t just write it all fresh under “P”, perhaps it was something about not wanting to erase the history entirely.

You took a deep breath and snatched the phone off the receiver. Pressing the cold plastic to your ear, you glanced down at the numbers in blue pen and whispered them quietly to yourself as you slowly, hesitantly, clicked them one by one into the cream button pad on the wall. 

You stared across the kitchen in sober contemplation of your life choices as the phone rang. Again. And again. And again, until a familiar, groggy voice answered.

“Hello?” 

“Hey! Janet!” you greeted brightly, sounding far too awake for 7:06 AM. In your nervous haste, you almost forgot to tell her who was calling. 

“Oh… hey there,” came a hesitant voice on the other line, a sharp squeal cut through the static followed by a hush.

“Hey, um, I know it’s like, super early and totally last minute but I wanted to catch you before I left for work. Listen, I’ve had a hell of a week already and I was wondering—and I totally get it if you can’t, but—well I was wondering if you’d be up for going out tonight. Like say around eight-ish?” You bit your lip and grimaced, twisting the gummy cord around your finger. 

The pause was filled with the rattling of tiny fists against plastic. “Oh! Well let’s see,” she said in a voice that was suddenly very awake. “The kids will be asleep by then, or at least they should be,” she chuckled, “and Bob doesn’t go to bed till after eleven anyway, so I’m sure he’ll be fine if I escape for a few hours. I mean I’ll check with him but I really don’t see why not.” 

It was equally as promising as it was a relief; the excitement that crept through her voice. 

“Great! Yeah, I figured you could probably use a night out.”

“Oh gosh, you don’t even know the half of it,” Janet laughed. “So where were you thinking? You wanna just go to Pal-Joeys again?”

Pacing toward the counter, you braced to offer your suggestion. “Actually, I was thinking we could go to The Hideout, I hear there’s a band playing tonight.”

“The Hideout?” she asked through an incredulous smile. 

“I know,” you breathed nervously, “it’s not really our um, regular haunt, but that’s kinda why I want to go, you know? Shake things up a bit. Everything’s just been feeling so… routine lately, you know?”

Janet’s sigh was deep and heavy. “Oh trust me, I know.” A bright coo crackled through the telephone line. 

“Like, I kind of want to just…” you coiled your finger deeper into the phone cord, glancing at the glaring red clock above the stove, “I dunno…pretend to be somebody else for a change.” 

“You know,” she started, a quiet mischief creeping into her voice, “I could really stand to be somebody else for a night too.”

You paused in your pacing as a smile cracked across your face. “Glad we’re on the same page.”

“Gosh, do you know your birthday was the last time I went out? Seriously! And before that I don’t even remember. Sometimes I look around and it’s like, man I used to be fun. You remember when I was fun, right?”

You chuckled, drifting back to memories of truths and dares, of creeping down her dark basement steps with freshly painted toes. “You still are fun, Janet.”

“Well maybe you can help remind me because sometimes I look in the mirror and I swear I don’t even recognize myself. Really! I swear I see my mother more and more and that’s what’s really terrifying.” 

“You mean you don’t see Bloody Mary anymore?”

Janet’s cackle would have woken the whole house had it not been wide awake and eating Cheerios already. “No that’s just at my parents’ house, remember?”

You snorted, leaning back against the counter. “I think we screamed so loud we woke the neighbors. I swear that bathroom is haunted.”

“That’s what I’ve always said! You feel like you’re being watched, right? My parents still don’t believe me. Oh well, not my problem anymore.”

You laughed, the knot in your belly releasing slightly before you glanced at the clock again, 7:13. “Crap, I’ve gotta get going. So I’ll see you at eight tonight? At The Hideout?”

“Yeah, should be fine. I’ll call you if anything changes. Ah!” she squealed, “I can’t wait.”

“Glad you’re excited,” you chuckled, gripping the smooth plastic. “Ok, see you later.”

“Bye now!”

You hung the phone back on the receiver and stood in the blaring silence of your kitchen, frozen by the impact of your choices. It was real now. In a matter of about thirteen hours you would be getting in your car, driving down a dark road, and parking it at a seedy bar where you would see Eddie for the first time in public. Your feet felt glued to the floor, but as the clock blinked to 7:15, you willed them to move.  

Before taking the dark road that led to a seedy bar, you would first need to get in your car and take another road — to work.

You cursed the cold. Cursed it as you hurried across the parking lot to find your car covered in fractals of frost. Cursed it vehemently as you worked the glass with your feeble plastic scraper, shaving holes just big enough to see out of your dashboard and rear window as the clock on your wrist ticked on minute by precious minute. You cursed it audibly when you turned the key and the engine whirred, and whined, and refused to turn over. It must have heard you, because after the fifth time of stomping on the brake and snapping your wrist forward, the engine roared to life.

You rode in on a wave; a daze like the fog that escaped your lungs in shallow breaths. The sun rose above the frozen farmlands, casting its golden-pink light across the empty fields. Out here the roads stretched on for miles. Flat and straight, with little variance in elevation. There was nowhere to look but straight ahead. No curves to surprise you, just you and the rumble of the salt-dusted road, bumping along in silence as an anxious fog rolled across the landscape of your mind. 

A sea of students swept you through the front doors of Hawkins High and into the bustling office. Amidst the flurry of ringing phones and voices settling into the cadence of their roles, you grabbed your punch card and stamped the date and time in line with the rest. Pushing the metal handle of the heavy glass door, you exited the humming reprieve of the office and into the din of the main hall. Your boots made hollow clicks against the glossy tile, wind at your face as you marched forward, dodging roughhousing students and hall monitors rushing toward them. 

Goodness was a mantle. A strap that dug into your shoulder; heavy with books, and papers, and responsibility. You wedged your thumb beneath it, shrugging it up onto the padded wool collar of your coat as you strode on, vision locked ahead as chaos swirled around you.

Your mug left a ring on the big desk; a remnant from where you’d sloshed it coming down the hall. You’d tried to be careful; slow and deliberate in your pacing when you left the teachers lounge with it, but when a blur of wild curls drew your gaze, your footing faltered. At least you missed your shoes. 

Coat hung on its solitary hook and grade book stationed at the center of the desk, you took your place in front of it. Clutching your clipboard, you glanced across the rows of desks, down at the rows of names, beside the rows of boxes that your green pen would fill with neat little P’s and A’s like it did every day. Bell after bell, swipe after swipe of your eraser at the board, the fresh sticks of chalk dwindled to nubs. Question after question, the patience in your voice grew thin. 

Between the bells at the top of fourth period, you stood poised like a sentinel outside the door to your classroom. Arms folded across your knit sweater, you sighed, shifting your weight back and forth between your tired feet, offering gentle smiles as your students filed through the threshold of the door. You smelled him before you saw him; the waft of leather and cigarettes with notes of shampoo more prominent than usual. 

Against the flow of traffic, Eddie Munson brought his salt-licked combat boots to a halt in front of you. Thumb hooked under the heavy strap of his backpack, he offered you a smile so broad it crinkled the corners of his eyes and made your knees want to give. 

You tightened your arms around your sweater, over the hard plastic of your faculty lanyard, and breathed a shy, girlish greeting. “Hey.” 

“Hey,” he mimicked, shifting his weight with a less than subtle restlessness as his dark eyes drank you in. They darted back and forth between yours, plush lips parted and primed with words. You felt them brimming impatiently behind his eyes, saw them in the pink flash of his tongue as it darted out to wet his lips. 

Out here in the bustling hallway, with eyes that watched and voices that echoed off the polished tile, Eddie edged a bold foot closer, dove in, and ghosted the shell of your ear with his burning question.

“Will I see you tonight?”

The words were a low, hot rumble — rippling from your ear down your spine, pooling deep in your belly. His heat thawed your shoulder as he hovered there, lingering for each aching second it took you to eke out your response. 

“Yeah,” you whispered into his curls.

Pulling back with a blinding grin, he tipped his head and ducked into the door of your classroom.

The slam of a locker made you jump. Arms crossed to shield your pounding heart, you stood there in the middle of it all, swimming in a sea of passing bodies, struggling to keep your head above the waves. It surged with images of a lighted stage, of bottles, and tables, and a dark corner for both of you to hide in. The bell echoed loudly down the hall, shrill enough to wake you from the dream you were surely having. Donning your mask, you took a deep breath and dove in, shutting the door behind you.

______

Eddie swung open the heavy back doors to his van, piercing the darkness with the dull yellow overhead light. Gravel crunched under his boots as he leaned in to grab the first amp from the stack, like a pile of black Christmas presents awaiting unwrapping. The night air bit at his fingers, stars twinkling in the patches where the clouds gave way above the tree line. Tightening his grip around the thick gummy handle, he hoisted it and followed the pale path the moon offered out of the side parking lot toward the patio behind The Hideout.

It wasn’t much; a stout fence in dire need of a paint job that caged in a few meager picnic tables. They still had umbrellas in the middle, wrapped tightly like mummies for the winter. He knew the back door would be open, it always was. Turning the weathered knob with his free hand, he welcomed the heat that wafted toward him. He could almost say he welcomed the piss smell coming from the bathrooms as his heavy boots thumped down the dark linoleum hallway, but that would be a stretch. Accustomed was a better word. Familiar was a better word. 

Stale beer and cigarettes soon drowned it out as he entered the dimly lit bar, stopping to plunk the heavy amp down to his left on the stage, which was little more than a raised platform painted black. The thud drew the attention of the five usual suspects at the bar, and Eddie wondered which one of them was responsible for playing “Free Bird” on the jukebox.

Bill raised his hand, tipping his baseball cap back in a friendly nod as his fingers splayed. “‘Ey, Eddie!”

He returned the gesture of a single raised hand and flashed a smile before turning down the hall again. Eddie took a deep breath at the door to calm his pounding heart before pressing it open. He couldn’t believe he had been crazy enough to suggest something like this. That soon enough, you would be perched atop one of those rickety stools at a tall, sticky table, watching his every move, listening to his every note. The chill of the night air was a welcome thing, sobering and distracting from the heat that was creeping up the collar of his thick, leather coat. As the gravel crunched under his boots again, headlights blinded his vision. 

He could hear the bass pounding from the outside of the small sedan as it rolled up beside his van, followed promptly by another. After a moment of squinting, the headlights shut off with the rumble of the engine, leaving him in the darkness once again. Seatbelts clicked and laughter emerged from the open doors as his friends tumbled out into the parking lot. 

“What the fuck took you guys so long? We left at the same time,” Eddie groused.

Dave lumbered over and sighed, a smirk playing on his broad features in the moonlight. “Jeff had to take a shit and he parked me in.” 

Jeff rolled his eyes, swinging the door shut with a huff as Gareth laughed into the night air. 

Eddie sighed, glancing toward the tall stack of amps and drum heads sitting backlit in the rear of his van. “Ok, well we’ve got like forty minutes to get our shit together so start hauling.” 

Dave groaned, cracking his back with a twist of his hefty torso. “Ugh, can you at least let me hit this doob before you put me to work?”

On any other night, Eddie would have welcomed the suggestion, but his nerves were traveling to his hands now and he itched to move them. “Dude, it takes us like an hour to set up, we don’t have time right now. We can smoke after we get this shit on stage.”

Jeff quirked his brows suspiciously, “Dude, since when do you care that we’re on time for anything?”

“Yeah seriously, we’re late like every week,” Gareth added.

Eddie balked, searching for the answer in the treeline, one that excluded you. “It just—if we’re ever gonna play anywhere else besides here we’re gonna have to start getting our shit together.”

There was a lukewarm pause as the band considered his answer. By the looks on their faces, Eddie wasn’t entirely sure if they bought it, but it was the best he could come up with and the statement was true. Dave broke the silence with an exasperated sigh. “Come on. I’ve been jonesing since we got to Gareth’s. His mom is so anal we can’t even smoke outside.”

“That’s ‘cause you reek when you come back in,” Gareth defended.

“At least I don’t reek of ass like you,” Dave chortled.

Jeff didn’t miss a beat. “That’s debatable.”

Gareth’s cackle wafted into the frigid air as he pointed a pale finger at Dave.

“You wanna find out the hard way?” Dave’s eyes glimmered wildly as he hooked an arm around Gareth’s shoulders, locking him into a power noogie position.

Gravel shuffled under their stumbling feet. “Let go of me you asshole,” Gareth gritted through a strangled laugh. Jeff only egged them on, howling uproariously like he had tickets to the show. 

Eddie dragged his hands down his face with a deep, seething breath as Dave ground his thick knuckles into Gareth’s mop of hair, kicking up rocks and pivoting as Gareth attempted to pry away. This was his circus, his monkeys, and he would have to step up and be the ring leader if they were going to take the stage at all tonight. “CUT IT OUT!” he hollered. 

Dave paused, arm still locked around Gareth’s neck. “Come on, we’re just having a little fun. You remember fun, right?” 

Gareth groaned weakly, looking up at Eddie with pathetic eyes. “Who’s we?” he choked.

Eddie’s expression didn’t budge from its scowl. With a roll of his eyes and a resigned huff, Dave released his arm and Gareth stumbled backward, gasping. “Fine, captain killjoy.”

A heavy plume of fog left his nostrils as Eddie stormed toward the back of his van, weaving his arm through a thick ring of cables to rest on his shoulder before hoisting another amp from the stack. Gravel shuffled behind him as the others followed suit.

You were risking a lot to come here. The last thing he wanted to do was disappoint you.

______

The silence gnawed at you, filled you with an itching discomfort as you thumbed your dresser knobs. Staring into your open shirt drawer, you faced off with your biggest decision yet — what to wear tonight.

The chasm of options laid before you in neat, folded rows. An excavation site of cardigans, and turtle necks, and things you hadn’t unearthed in years. You ran your fingers through the layers of folded cotton, peeling them back with deep consideration. 

Nagging thoughts crept in like whispers over the softly ticking clock, pinball plunger pulled and ready to fire. With a determined huff, you stepped back from your dresser and padded down the hallway, out into the living room. 

Your skirt pooled around your stocking feet as you crouched down in front of the long wooden cabinet that housed your records. Fingers dancing over the worn cardboard spines, you flipped them softly forward as you perused one by one, walking steadily until one of them fell open to a scene; a painting of a man hunched over with sticks tied to his back that hung on a wall of peeling paper. You paused, pulling it out to scan the track list. This would do.

Placing the the record softly on the felt pad, you lowered the needle to the ridges, and with the press of a button, a crackle roused the room. 

Hey hey momma said the way you move

Gonna make you sweat, gonna make you groove

A smile, like a crocus peeking up from the snow, bloomed across your face. You cranked the volume, wrapping yourself in a sound that would carry to your bedroom. 

Your fingers found the tiny metal tab behind your waist, and with a downward tug of the zipper, your wool skirt became a puddle on the floor. Peeling back the layers, your tight sweater joined it in a heap, your thick stockings lay deflated on the pile, the buttons of your stiff blouse worked free until it was a crumpled afterthought. The chill that kissed your skin was a welcome thing. Goosebumps raised like the current flowing through you as your near-naked silhouette danced across the wall to approach the open drawer once more. 

Emboldened with a curious delight, you began to dig. Past the crust of crisp blouses, beneath the squishy mid-layer of cardigans, down into the sub-layer of camisoles and tees, deeper and deeper until finally your fingers made purchase with a soft treasure. 

It fell open as you unearthed it, the solid black gone grey from washing, the white letters and arched angel cracked and faded: Led Zeppelin — United States of America 1977. 

It happened on a Sunday in April, which began as most Sundays did, with you hunched over your powder blue typewriter in a race between the clock and the keys. You had it down to a science. At the speed you were typing, a rough draft could be finished by dinner, and the final could be churned out by cutting into a few hours of your sleep. A worthy sacrifice, as your final grade was on the finish line. This, like countless others, was how you planned to spend your day — until your roommate found you. 

You remembered the way she leaned against the wooden frame of your bunk bed, amused, watching the paper you hammered with black-inked letters grow longer and longer. Finally she spilled it; as of an hour ago, she was down one boyfriend and up one ticket, and now it had your name on it. When she dangled it between you and the tidy rows of text, your hands froze over the keys. 

You eyed the invitation — temptation printed on a neat, orange strip. Free admission, at a price.

The show was sold out. It had been for a long time. 

Your class was at 9:00 AM tomorrow. A late paper took twenty percent off your grade. 

You loved the band dearly, had a bigger crush on Robert Plant than you’d openly admit to anyone. Fights had broken out over tickets nation wide. You had no idea when they would play the states again.

The clock ticked on beside you, the long hand grazed past three. Maybe you could churn out the rest  in the next few hours. Maybe the rough draft would be enough. But the realist in you knew neither would happen if you seized the ticket. Your grade would never recover, your streak of straight As you’d kept since grade school would come to an end. Your GPA would dip for the semester.

On April 17th, 1977, you left your paper sitting unfinished in the typewriter to see Led Zeppelin play Market Square Arena. You didn’t know it then, but it was the last time they ever would.

On April 18th at 9:00 AM, you showed up to class with empty hands and a brand new shirt. 

You had altered your souvenir; taken scissors to the collar so that it draped off your shoulder. Time and your washing machine had made Swiss cheese of the bottom hem, so you cropped it. You admired the handiwork as it draped off you now, the way the black strap of your bra peeked out from the slope of your shoulder like a coy secret. 

Pulling open the lower drawer—opened far less frequently than you would like—your knuckles grazed the bottom of the smooth wood interior as you peeled back the layers of folded denim. A crease of black jumped out from the sea of blue, and you examined it. It had a nice worn-in fade for only having lived in your dresser a few years, a flatteringly high waist, and most importantly, tapered legs that could easily be tucked into the tall, black boots sitting in the back of your closet. Your bare legs welcomed the barrier against the chill, and you caught a glance at your rear as you hiked them snugly upward. They hugged you in all the right places, as the music electrified the air, you transformed.

A vision of you — sprawled across a blanket on the quad with your face in a book. Making shadows on your dorm room wall while transmuting fantasies to black-inked pages. Strolling down a lamp-lit street, face to the stars, fueling your wild imagination. Here, in your reflection, the ghost of you looked back.

You painted her darker than normal, swapping the usual chapstick for a deep, dusty red exhumed from the bottom of your makeup bag. Eyes smoked and cheeks dusted, you drew out the beauty from angles of your face with every stroke.

Coat donned and purse in hand, you paused at the front door, glancing over your shoulder, down the hallway, toward your coffee table piled with papers. There was another ghost of you here — tucked into her slippers and cozy robe with the voices from the television as her only company, flicking her green grading pen down rows of questions. 

On December 10th, 1985, you left the papers sitting on your coffee table to see Corroded Coffin play The Hideout. With a decided twist of the handle, you pushed out into the cold night air. 

Light pooled in sparse puddles as your boots echoed off the rough pavement. Stillness whispered on the wind as crisp remnants of fall scuttled across the asphalt. The apartments behind you were a tapestry of glowing squares, pictures of the rest of Hawkins tucking into their slippers and washing their dishes, grabbing their blankets and turning on their televisions. 

You grabbed your keys and unlocked your car, and when it roared to life with a swift flick of your wrist, a strange exhilaration coursed through you. 

It rose like the moon over the barren fields, thrumming in your chest, spreading to your limbs, alight with something wild and teeming as you drove past rows of lighted windows—vignettes of tired routine—and stopped at the same red sign you did this morning. Your fingers twitched over the turn signal leaver — an impulse to flick up, to turn right, to settle into the familiar rhythm of your muscle memory. This time you pressed down, pressed your foot to the gas, and cranked the wheel left.

Cruising boldly down the straight and narrow road, fields and farmland faded in your rearview mirror and soon there were trees on the horizon; dense and dark. Gripping the wheel as the silhouette closed in, the corners of your mouth drew upward, pulled by a wild, awakened force. Headlights illuminated pale, naked limbs. Eyes beamed back at you from the shadows. You cranked the volume on your stereo, and as you braced for your first bend, something deep within you—dormant and restless—howled.

______

The water was so cold it burned. Eddie cursed the old plumbing, instantly regretting having the decency to wash his hands in the first place. Soap just barely rinsed, he twisted the lime-scaled handles and shut it off. With a trembling hand, he grabbed one of the last paper towels. Gareth’s kick drum echoed down the narrow hallway, thundering just like his chest. He glanced at his watch again. 7:56. 

Eddie took a ragged breath, chucking the crumpled paper at the overflowing trash bin in the corner. It bounced dejectedly off the wall and onto the dirty tile. With a deadpan glare, he left it where it lay. Hands barely dry, he felt for the flask in his pocket. Screwing the tiny cap and flicking it open, he tipped it back. Eddie welcomed the burn. It chased down his throat and settled in his stomach with a warmth that radiated, instantly numbing his nerves.

Meeting his own eyes in the tiny, smudged mirror, he gave himself a final glance over. His curls were holding; fresh and clean from this morning, fluffed by the icy wind in the trips from van to stage. 

Here, in the dingy confines of The Hideout, words like freak and loser lost their stick. Words he could shake like a dog at the door. He’d fashioned them like armor in the daytime; a shield in hallways and in lunch lines. What was stickier were feelings. The feelings that came with chewed pens and answers left blank. The feeling of lectures slipping like a sieve through his brain. The feeling of stares and stifled laughter, of staring numbly at the board, of filling the silence with bullshit instead of an answer. 

Microphone feedback squeaked outside. The dull, heavy walk of a bassline. Laughter. Cymbals. That kick drum again. Eddie took another swig, searing the flutters in his stomach.

He wanted to be good for you. Seen under stage lights instead of fluorescents. 

Good like an answer he knew.

-

You saw the sign first, peeking from behind the trees — simple, effective, and yellowed with time. The Hideout: a hole in the woods. Tucked around the bend you now braced against, it sat like a neon beacon. The chipped, grey exterior faded into the shadows, leaving only the holy glow of Budweiser and Miller Lite signs to guide you to the promised land. 

Pulling into a spot along the narrow parking strip, you faced off with your destination. Looming and real. Frozen as reality stared back at you in the glare of your blinding headlights, you gripped the steering wheel and looked around. There were a few other cars beside you, but none of them Janet’s. Around the left of the building there appeared to be more parking, and the stout silhouette of a two-tone van you did know the owner of. Pinballs hammered in your chest. 

When you arrange a time to meet someone, you are always punctual. Perhaps a life organized by bells on timers trained you to be this way, but the thought of entering alone filled you with dread, and part of you wondered whether you should wait out here for her. Your hands were starting to shake, and not from the cold. 

The list of crazy things you had done in your life was a laughably short one, but this made the top by a long shot. As you turned the radio down and sat in the wake of your rumbling engine, the questions grew louder. Serious questions about where you thought this night would go, about where you wanted it to go and if you would truly go there. 

Suddenly your headlights felt too bright, like a beacon drawing eyes from the woods, or even more terrifying, eyes from the building. You promptly flicked them off and waited, staring dead ahead at the chipped grey siding. It was fine. You were fine. At least you could no longer see your breath. You could hide here as long as you wanted. 

-

“Alright man, it’s doob o’clock,” Dave said with a satisfied stretch as he took in the stage setup.

Eddie ripped another frantically scribbled setlist out of his spiral notebook and shoved it at him. “No it’s eight fifteen and we still need to do soundcheck,” Eddie scathed, glancing at the door. “You can start by plugging your mic in, Jesus Christ.”

Dave huffed annoyedly through his nose, squatting down to find the cord with exaggerated difficulty. “Yes sir,” he mocked. Eddie shot back a testing glare. “Dude, what’s up with you tonight? You’ve been on one since Gareth’s.”

“Yeah, you ok man?” asked Jeff.

The knots tightened in his stomach as the attention of all three of them closed in around him. “Just—let’s just get our shit together…please,” he deflected.

-

Glancing around frantically, you wondered, for the hundredth time, where the hell Janet was. You couldn’t be that surprised that a woman with two small children was late, but your exhaust was making a smokescreen of the parking strip, and you wondered if anyone inside had noticed, if anyone could hear the low rumble of your engine and questioned why this strange woman was idling. With an irritated sigh, you turned the key, leaving you in deafening silence and leeching cold. You could hear your breathing now, your pounding heart, the squeaking of leather as you shifted in your seat. What one of the kids got sick? What if she called after you left? 

What if she isn’t coming?

Eddie’s eyes lingered at the door as he clicked the pedals with his feet, plucking a soft, testing melody into the mic. His watch glared under the stage lights, confidence fleeting with every minute that ticked by. Gareth snapped his foot petal with a deep thud. Dave walked out a bassline before squealing feedback made the whole bar flinch.

The strum of a chord made you jump. Booming and electric, you heard it through the walls. They were starting. They were starting and you weren’t there. Gripping the steering wheel, you tossed your head back in an anguished sigh. You sure as hell weren’t going to stand him up. As you glanced around the parking lot one last desperate time, the bitter conclusion rose like bile — you may have to do this alone. Seatbelt clicking under your gloved thumb, you steeled yourself for the cold, for the eyes of strangers in a strange new place. With a decided pull of the handle, the door opened to the frigid night air, and you emerged from the heat into the unknown. 

You met your reflection in the glass of the entrance as your hand gripped the weathered knob. Pinballs fired off at lightning speed — a jackpot multi-ball bonanza. Checking your hair one last time with eyes locked on your own, you turned the handle with a determined sigh.

A bell dinged above your head, and winter’s chill gusted in on your heels.

The whole room turned at once — at you. You, from the front of the classroom. You, from behind the big desk. You, in the doorway of The Hideout. Across a dark sea of scattered tables, poised on an altar of sound and light, Eddie Munson smiled at you — brighter than all of it. 

The door fell shut behind you. Hot under the gaze of what seemed like the entire bar, it suddenly felt like you were the one on stage. Standing there like a deer in headlights in your long wool coat and clean black boots, you surely must have looked as out of place as you felt. Shoulders rolling back to counter your thrumming nerves, your boots left the rug and found the tacky linoleum as you approached the bar that lined the left wall. 

Eddie busied his shaking hands with tapping another test melody into his mic, pausing when he heard a voice over his right shoulder. 

“Is that…?” Jeff pointed toward the back of your head.

Gareth’s eyes lit up in recognition. Dave peered over with a shit-eating grin. “Did you invite her?” he mouthed.

Eddie’s face betrayed him, burning like it did under the fluorescents. Burning to greet you at the bar, for the liberty to patronize it, to offer you something more than his aching gaze. 

“No,” Eddie lied, “but I may have told her we play here on Tuesdays.” He struck the strings with the weight of his frustration, drowning out any further questions with the opening chords to the first song on the setlist. The others took their cue with chuckles and shaking heads. Heart pounding like the kick drum behind him, Eddie’s fingers found the frets, tugging a muscle memory from deep within as his eyes stayed fixed on you. 

There was an older man in a sweatshirt behind the bar. The owner, you figured, by the way he was standing — arms crossed, stance wide, unafraid to take up space. By the way he was looking at you, like he wondered what would drive a new face to his establishment on a random Tuesday night in December. From the glances the others passed between them, the feeling seemed unanimous. 

“How can I help you?” he half shouted against the chugging chords, leaning against the bar with a curious smile.

You braced with your brightest grin, placing your gloved hands down flat on the waxy bar. “Hi! Yes—um,” you scanned the selection under the neon lights, the liquor bottles of all shapes and sizes reflected in the dirty mirror behind them. The bar back was tightly cluttered with old stickers and hand-written notes taped behind the cash register, with half-empty bottles of bitters and bobble heads nodding to the palpable vibration. Having no interest in standing there awkwardly while he fixed you a cocktail, you selected a bottle of Coors. 

He nodded and ducked to open the steel, magnet-plastered fridge beneath the cash register. 

Your gaze, like a magnet, drew back to the stage. It was all you could do just to watch him — the way his curls fell gently at his cheek, the way they bounced with every strum. There was a tension lingering just under the curve of his lashes. The music was fast and loud, purely instrumental. You recognized nothing about it but the genre. Head dipped in concentration as his left hand tapped a frantic melody into the frets, he raised his eyes bravely to meet yours.

He wasn’t the only man staring. It was hard to ignore; the man in the baseball cap to your right as you stared right through his line of sight. You pinched off your gloves and shoved them in your pockets to occupy your hands.

A bottle cap plinked against the bar top. “Two bucks,” the owner stated, slinging a towel over his shoulder. 

You fished through your purse, feeling those eyes on you as you opened your wallet, as you slid the bills right under his gaze across the waxy counter. You snatched the cold bottle and raised it to your lips. Turning over your shoulder, your eyes clung to Eddie on stage, to his tendons as they flexed to pick a rhythm at the strings. His was gaze a soft and yearning thing, a contrast to the sharp and punchy chords that left his fingers. 

“You know these guys?” the man in the cap asked finally, pointing to the stage. Your eyes shot toward him in surprise, lips still pursed at the bottle. He had that working man sort of look. Average features, subtle crows feet, a whisper of sandy stubble across his strong jaw. His grey-blue eyes were gentle, but brimming with a heated curiosity.

You used the much needed swig to buy yourself a second. Did you? The cold, bready fizz sparkled down your throat. You supposed you didn’t have to specify how you were acquainted. “Yeah,” you answered simply, plugging your mouth with the bottle like a dam.

A bell rattled behind you. Grateful for any disruption, you whipped around quickly to break the connection. Janet lit up as soon as she saw you, a mixture of relief and apology playing out on her face as she strode across the room. Tight blonde curls emerged from her lowering leopard print hood. “Oh my god I’m so sorry,” she lamented, arms opening to embrace you. 

Relief washed through you like a warm buzz. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it!” you said as your nose took a dive in her soft, perfumed curls. 

“Sarah would not stop crying, it took forever for me to finally get her to sleep. I swear babies have a sixth sense, they always know when you have fun plans,” she said through a laugh. Her lashes were long and thick with mascara, eyeshadow a solid sky blue so vibrant that it popped even in the dim neon glow. 

Janet ordered a margarita. There was nothing new to speak of, really, over the electric roar of the band, but you tried to listen. Intently, you tried to listen to the new words her son was saying, to offer some lukewarm update about how work was going, but your eyes had their own agenda.

The rolled cuffs of Eddie’s tight, acid-washed jeans bunched against the pull tabs of his boots as he tapped the rhythm with his heel. There was no jacket for him to strain against, no flannel to constrict him, no sleeves on his T-shirt in December. It was more than you’d seen of him yet. Ink flexed with each generous swell of his bicep, and with every attack, he would flash you his ribs through the hand-hacked holes. 

“Mmm,” Janet mumbled, sipping off the top of the very full, salt-rimmed rocks glass. “Come on, let’s get cozy,” she said with a wink and gestured toward the tables. The air was thick with smoke wafting from the bikers at the bar. Eddie tapped out another lick and peered through a few stray curls as you followed her across the room to a high top, back and center.

You wanted to be closer. Close enough to see the umber of his eyes, the ridges of his knuckles as they plucked the strings. There were a few shorter tables down in front, back about five feet from the stage. But as the beams of light bounced off the glossy wood and over the seats in blinding white, you were grateful for the shadows ten feet would afford you. 

Janet stripped off her coat to reveal a tight black dress with long sleeves and sequined, padded shoulders. It hugged just above the knees of her sheer hose, punctuated with sharp ankle boots. 

“Look at you all dressed up! You look stunning.” You meant it, she really did.

Janet’s smile was a shy deflection, but hiding just beneath it, a glimmer of belief. “Thanks, this thing’s been sitting in my closet for like a year now. Can you believe it? I just felt like, you know, if I’m going out I’m gonna dress up goddamn it,” she laughed, punctuating with a slap against the table. “We coulda gone to Benny’s, I still woulda worn it.”

You laughed, for the first time since you’d talked to her that morning. Unbuttoning your coat, you let it drape over the metal back of the stool behind you. 

“You’re not looking too shabby yourself,” Janet said with a wink before taking a sip.

“Honestly I’ll take any excuse I can get to dress down,” you said with a sheepish huff, propping your elbows on the sticky table before bringing the bottle to your lips. 

A nervous crackle wound its way through Eddie’s stomach at the vision of you. You, perched on a stool in a dive bar. You, in jeans and a t-shirt. You, arching forward just enough to grace him with a sliver of your back. It was real — you, here.  He soured a note, and those words he shook off came creeping back in as he fumbled through the next lick. But you didn’t seem to notice. You propped your cheek against your knuckles and let the warmth of your eyes usher his doubts away. 

When the song came to a ringing conclusion, Janet’s cheer was uninhibited, clapping her hands above her head. It drew eyes from the couple seated at one of the lower tables, from the bikers at the bar, from the band. Your applause was more demure, but you couldn’t mask the brilliance of your smile. 

“Thank you, thank you,” Eddie said into the microphone. “Looks like we really have a crowd tonight. Seven drunks.”

The room erupted with hollers and cheers. 

The bassist muttered something to the other guitarist and the two shared a laugh, casting their eyes towards you. Suddenly your face grew very hot. Of course they recognized you, Jeff was in your second period class. You anticipated this, and yet it was the realness of it all that shook you — the hard stool beneath you, the stares you could feel as your finger idly traced the cold condensation on the glass. Pinballs fired off at rapid speed. You drowned them with a tip of the bottle. 

Eddie shifted, clicking the pedals with his foot. “Ok, so this next one is uh, definitely not an original.” He breathed a laugh into the microphone, glancing up at you — at your shoulders, hunched in shy defense, at your worried brow and downcast gaze. He wished he could reach across the room, lift your chin with his words and draw you from your shell. “Anyway, you’ll uh, probably recognize this one,” he said, to you.

Eddie nodded to the band, counting off silently before they struck a chord together — a low, droning thing, gritty and slow as the bass walked steadily over the foundation. Eddie swayed back and forth, rocking in time with the beat like a march, resting his heavy-lidded gaze on you. Across the divide of scattered seats, you — at the small table, saw him — on the big stage. His nimble fingers struck the chords with an ardent conviction, and the ice in you began to thaw. 

Suddenly the beat changed pace. Gareth smacked his drum sticks together to count off, and the first two chords sparked instant recognition. A smile rose up in you — a wild and thrumming thing, radiant and rising until it cracked through. 

You knew what was coming. Two chords, quiet taps for a count of sixteen, and then those two chords again, like a one-two punch, booming and building with anticipation. Again, and again, as the energy rose in the room. You caught the wicked glint in his eyes as his hands—those hands that fidgeted and fumbled with dog-eared pages and chewed up pens—wielded power. A surge of electricity swirled through your stomach, crackled because you knew what was next. 

Eddie took a deep breath, and opened his mouth. 

Generals gathered in their masses

Colors. Warm and bright, tingling like a shockwave from your chest down to your seat. 

Just like witches at black masses

In your secret daydreams, you often wondered what his voice sounded like in song. 

Evil minds that plot destruction

Tried to guess from his deep hums and brilliant laughter.

Sorcerers of death’s construction

Now, it suspended in the air like a battle cry, reaching out across the chasm of tables and chairs.

In the fields the bodies burning

Surging like a wildfire.

As the war machine keeps turning

Swirling through the darkness like a strange magic.

Death and hatred to mankind

Reaching out like it wanted to touch you. 

Poisoning their brainwashed minds

And so you let it.

Oh lord, yeah!

The music rocked and swelled. Like a balm reverberating through the air, it softened the hunch of your shoulders. Like an antidote, it dissolved the knot in your stomach. Like an arrow, it pierced the shell of you. 

Janet took a generous sip of her margarita and bobbed her head to the rhythm. You caught her gaze from across the table and shared a laugh, a mutual knowing through squinted eyes and shaking heads that this was, in fact, a Tuesday night in December, and the two of you were here.

As the cold drink warmed your limbs, you became acquainted with the hard curve of the stool beneath you, with the of rings left behind on the glossy table, with the crowded ashtray. Acquainted with the smoke that wafted through the air and the darkness that enveloped you like a blanket. The music settled over the room, and as you settled into that heavy buzz, you started to get the feeling you might actually enjoy yourself tonight.

Janet needed no convincing. Her first margarita went down easy, leaving nothing but the ice and her hot pink lipstick on the rim before they finished their fourth song. When she returned from the bar with one in each hand, she placed the extra in front of you. Her treat, convinced they were better than Pal Joey’s, insisting that you try it even with a few sips still lingering in your bottle. 

It surprised you — the balance of lime, and liquor, and something else you couldn’t quite place. It surprised you how it easy it melted the tension in your stomach, how it encouraged you to lean in a little more, to let your shoulders drop.

Eddie noticed it, peeking out from under the coyly dipping collar of your shirt; bare and soft as you leaned against the table — your shoulder. He missed a note. Cursing silently, he glanced down at his fingers and tapped into that deep, subconscious part of his brain again where they knew just where to go. But when he closed his eyes to find it, the image remained painted to his lids — a ripened fruit, tempting but too far to taste. Across it, a stripe of black hazard tape, a trail he itched to follow. 

There was a hunger in you, stirring more with every song, with every decadent flash of his pale ribs. He was good. Stadium good. Those nimble fingers tapped the frets, making them sing in a way that made you wish you were wire and wood, looking at you in a way that made you think he wished the same. He stroked the neck of his instrument with a reverent touch, attacked the strings with a holy power, like a wingless angel with a spotlight halo. You whispered a silent prayer, venerating him from your faraway pew in the only way you could — with your eyes.

The animal stirred in its icy den, roused by the warmth of his voice as it stretched across the bar. It stirred in that place you rarely acknowledged, rarely indulged as you considered what other talents his hands might have. You considered the shades of those sighs and swallows he took before painting the air, considered what they might sound like if he showed you. It settled and throbbed in that low, blooming place, and you smothered the feeling with a cross of your legs.

Busying yourself with what remained of your beer, you shifted your shoulders to face him directly, leaning your free arm against the metal back of the stool with an ease that Eddie considered looked almost as good on you as the shirt did. Your lips lingered on the rim of the bottle before parting with a soft pop. He swallowed.

There was a gap between you; a sea of scattered tables and wide open ears and eyes amongst them. What could he possibly say from his position? From a microphone on stage? A thousand words ached on the tip of his tongue and he swallowed them with a sloppy chug of water as the applause bought him a moment to consider. 

The white lettering across your chest jumped out at him from the shadows like a bright idea. Eddie swiped droplets from his mouth and turned to his bandmates, bringing them into a huddle as the noise drowned out what he was saying. Whatever it was, after some deliberation, they seemed in agreement about it.

You hadn’t seen Janet like this since the summer between your junior and senior year of college. She was always a happy drunk; talkative and bubbly, spilling over with laughter and the sort of wild enthusiasm that a child at a carnival might have.

“I wanna dance,” she said longingly, glancing toward the stage as she slumped in her seat. 

“Maybe we can go to a club next time,” you joked as you downed the remainder of your sweating drink.

The band assumed their positions again. Eddie tapped the pedals with his feet and rolled his shoulders back with a deep, collecting breath. His eyes found yours across the room, brimming with such a longing you wondered anyone else could sense it too. After the longest second, he snapped his head over his shoulder with a steely conviction and nodded off a count before making his attack — the opening riff to Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love”. 

Your hands shot to your face.

Suddenly Janet perked up, inspired by the catchy rhythm and her own suggestion. “We should dance! Will you dance with me?”

You balked, shrinking down. “There’s like… six people here! I don’t think it’s really that kind of—”

“Oh come on, please? What’s there to lose, huh?”

Oh, only my last remaining shred of dignity in front of my students. But you couldn’t say that. “Janet,” you hissed. “We are not—I can’t—”

Her three margaritas had a different opinion. They reached across the table and grabbed your hand. “Come on, live a little! That’s what we came here to do, right?” 

You buried your face in your other. The truth was you wanted to. You wanted a closeup of that smart smirk, of the sweat beading down his temple as he strummed the punchy chords he hand-picked just for you. You wanted the fantasy, the memory, the experience. It was convincing — her pouting pink lips and pleading eyes, almost as convincing as the tequila coursing through your veins. The truth was you left your better judgement at home on the coffee table. To her giddy satisfaction, you surrendered. Dragging you from your seat, she led you to the front of the stage.

Eddie’s smile could have blinded you, even through the shy web of your fingers. Cheers erupted from the bar, from the whole band, as Janet shimmied her sequined shoulders to the beat.

Eddie opened his mouth again, this time with an ardor you could feel in your bones.

You need cooling, baby I’m not fooling

He crouched down to level with your eyes. I’m gonna send ya back to schooling

You lowered your hand to mask the girlish grin that cracked across your face.

Way down inside, honey you need it

They were breathtaking up close — his eyes. Sparkling with an energy you’d never seen before. Rich umber alight with something you couldn’t quite place, too mesmerized by the promise his tongue wove through the air.

I’m gonna give you my love

I’m gonna give you my love… oh!

He straightened with a backward toss of his head, and you found the word you were looking for in the droplets that flung from his curls. Power. 

Wanna whole lotta love?

Wanna whole lotta love?

Janet—having an absolute field day over the spectacle—offered you her hand like she wanted to tango. Freeing your face with a brave sigh, you accepted with a slap of your palm in hers. She tugged with a childish delight, and you took your cue — spinning into her waiting arm and shooting back out with a flourish dredged up from some long forgotten place. The room became a blur of sound and light, of cheers from the bar and the stage. You stilled to find your footing, landing on his eyes. 

You’ve been learning, and baby I’ve been yearning

He dipped down again. All them good times baby, baby, I’ve been lear-er-nin’, he punctuated with a shake of his head. He could see the whole vision of you, bright and clear under the stage lights. A wildness lingering just behind your eyes, a fragment unseen until now. It pounded at the cage of your chest, rose up in the shallow breaths you caught before Janet snatched you away again. He swore—silently on a deep inhale—that he would do everything in his power to coax it out of you.

Way, way down inside, oh honey you need it

I’m gonna give you my love

I’m gonna give you my love

You couldn’t remember the last time you really danced. The last time you felt a rhythm with your body and followed its blind inspiration. No rhyme or reason, no plans or choreography. It felt awkward at first, like trying on skin fresh from the wash. Feeling your feet shuffle against the tacky linoleum, finding the rhythm of yourself with a room full of strangers as witness.

Somewhere between the beams of light and the wink of Eddie’s rings beneath them, you found it. Like a memory rising up, sweeping through you like a current. Visions of a stadium, roaring as a lion struts the stage with his golden mane, as he commands a sea of thousands with his voice. There was an animal in you too, wild and careless. 

It grew wilder when the music dropped to nothing but percussion. When the room fell away to nothing but the heat from Eddie’s eyes, sparkling with play. It made your hips want to sway a little more, your legs want to dip a little deeper to match his wildness with your own. Imbued with a sudden, potent energy, he struck his wicked instrument as the rhythm and melody unraveled. 

Janet took it in stride, leading you in a rocking shimmy as you swayed to the change in tempo. Light danced on her sequined shoulders as she tipped her head back in a blissful cackle. You followed her lead, eyes fixed on her with a surging power in the knowing of whose eyes were fixed on you.

The air was a cool kiss against the sliver of skin where your shirt left off, daring you to show a little more. With a twist of your arms toward the spotlights, you blessed him with the dip of your back — the alluring shadow of your spine that trailed into the high waist of your jeans. He panged with the urge to follow it, fell to his knees and wailed through his fingertips.  

You broke from Janet’s pull to face him, eye-to-eye level, watching reverently as the sweat glistened in his clavicles, as his pelvis jutted into his weapon to eke out his solo. Howling for you with each stroke of its neck, each bend in its strings as you matched his rhythm with your hips. A secret world, just you and him, the rest fading out into nothing. He swore, like a spell in each note that he wove through the air, that somehow he would make it last.

From his knees, Eddie grabbed the mic off the stand, and with a wordless nod earned by years of friendship, Jeff took over the melody. To the delight of the crowd, he stripped himself of the weight of his instrument, setting it carefully off to the side. 

You’ve been cooling, baby, I’ve been drooling, he crooned as he crawled forward.

All the good times, baby, I’ve been misusing

You played with him there. With your shoulders, with your eyes locked no more than a foot from his. Desperate to touch him, you worshiped every bead of sweat that fell from his temple, every wet curl that strayed from the nape of his neck and hugged the strong angle of his jaw. What left his lips next dripped with such fervent intention you that you couldn’t keep your hand from your face.

Way, way down inside

I’m gonna give you my love

I’m gonna give you every inch of my love

I’m gonna give you my love

He was pure energy; raw and manic. Free in the way that wild things are. He snatched your breath away, dragged it to his den and had his way with it as he queried the chorus to you. There was wildness all around; in glinting sequins and megawatt smiles. In the flashes of limbs under the lights. In the rhythm you carried with your whole body now, moving in a way that was both so foreign and natural all at once. 

You wondered how it looked from the outside; you and him. From the bar it might have looked like drunk spontaneity. From the stage it might have looked like a stint of support for the arts. You wondered, with a twinge of fear, if the others could feel the longing too or if you had masked it well enough as a performance. 

The music dropped out to make way for the final lyrics.

Way down inside, he belted into the silence, punctuating with a deep inhale. Woman, he shouted, locking eyes with you for a pregnant second as the world came to a halt, you need… he drew a deep breath in the space the two chords allowed him before wailing the final word at the ceiling — loooooooove!

You felt it with every cell of your body in one suspended moment. Felt—for the first time since you could vividly remember—truly and completely alive. With a crash of cymbals and an electric instrumental boom, the rhythm—and the world—reconstituted around you, swirling with a vibrant energy that swept you away.

His dark eyes opened with a wicked glint, and his next breath left his chest as a command. 

Shake for me, girl. I wanna be your backdoor man!

You obeyed with a shimmy of your shoulders and the room went wild. 

______

Janet left you with a tight, perfumed hug. A gentle reassurance that yes, she was fine to drive home. She left you in the vacuum of slamming guitar cases and distant voices as the jukebox picked up where the band left off. Left you to sober up to how idle and awkward you felt sitting at the table you once shared with her, picking at the peeling label on the wet, empty bottle.

When you heard footsteps approaching, a part of you was grateful for the prospect of someone—anyone—to talk to, though it wasn’t who you hoped. Instead, it was the man in the cap from the bar.

“Hey, love the shirt,” he remarked, glance lingering a little too long over the text across your chest.

“Thanks,” you said shyly, gaze drifting back to the bottle.

He stepped closer, setting his can on the table. “I take it you went to that concert?” 

“I did, it was really last minute actually.” You told him the story. You told him with your words and gestures, twisting in the tall stool to face him, but it was Eddie that drew your eyes. Crouched down with one knee bent beneath him and the other straining against denim slits, he collected his pedals into a tiny, vintage suitcase. There were words coming out of your mouth, but faced with the rigid angles of his thighs, you were helpless but to stumble over some of them.

It was then that you noticed he had already been staring, though not at you, at Bill — with a simmer behind his eyes.

“Man, I woulda killed to go to that show. I was working a double when tickets went on sale and a buddy of mine said he was gonna camp overnight for us. Well, he ended up getting into a fight with his girlfriend and flaked out. ‘Course they were sold out and closed by the time I left work.”

You expressed your genuine sympathy.  

“Boy I was pissed at him then, but even more pissed after Bonham died. Like damn, that was my last shot, man!”

“I’m sorry you had to miss it. It was quite the show.” You told him what you could remember. The setlist, the stage, what they wore.

Eddie watched closely, carefully darting between you amidst the gathering of cables and closing of metal latches. He watched your hands come to life like he loved so much, like you always did when you were explaining something with fond enthusiasm. Helplessly, he watched the way Bill leaned closer, the way his hand and forearm made themselves at home on your table. The simmer hissed and bubbled behind his eyes.

“Anyways, it’s good to see such a lovely new face around here. One with great taste, I might add. Made my night.”

The simmer kicked up to a full, licking flame. 

“Oh, well thanks. I don’t get out much,” you said with an awkward chuckle.

Bill stepped closer, as if his next point was something he had to lean in for. “By the way, and I hope this isn’t too forward, but… you’re a great dancer.”

Eddie watched your hand dive behind your neck, your face contort into a feeble smile, your shoulders hunch, your eyes glance down. He could hear the distress in your beautiful laugh and he boiled so hot he could have seared a hole into the back of Bill’s head.

He extended his hand. “I’m Bill, by the way.” 

Eddie wrapped the cable in hasty circles around his forearm. Heat rose behind behind his tight lips and exited in short fumes.

“Hey man, have you seen the drum key anywhere?” Gareth called from behind him.

It barely registered. The world was a fragment now. A red-hot, narrowing tunnel reduced to a singularity — Bill’s hand. 

Bill’s hand; hovering like a salacious invitation, too close to the soft swell of your belly. That open, rugged palm — weathered, experienced, and free. Free to reach into his wallet, to reach across the bar, to hand you a drink, to wander all sorts of places where Eddie could not.

You, ever polite and always accommodating, reached back.

He touched you. 

Eddie’s vision narrowed red. Helplessly, he watched Bill’s fingers snake around the back of your hand and squeeze, linger at your palm as they released. A coil wound through his body. It rose up like bile — up through his spine, into his shoulders that rolled forward and back with a deep, seething breath. Up, up, into that primitive space at the base of his skull where words and civil manners had no place.

“Can I buy you a drink?” 

Eddie dropped the cable. 

The world blurred in the wake of his target and in five swift steps he was at your side. “Hey, Bill. Uh—” his senses ebbed back to him with a curious look from the man he’d shared countless drinks with. A man he would call his friend had he not breeched a sacred distance, a contract he knew nothing of. His vision was clouded, the coil tight and hot. 

“She’s um,” he continued quietly, a murmur he had to lean in for. An urge seized his hand. The urge to claim, to slip across the divot of your back and pull you close where you belonged, to but the noise from the stage and the eyes that followed forced his hand deep into his pocket. He swallowed his frustration, hoping the simmer in his eyes would be enough to convey what he meant. “She’s with me, man.” 

A throb from that low, blooming place, rose up in a full body yes. In the arch of your back, in the dip of your eyes as you caught the desperate heat from his. 

Bill blinked in honest surprise. “Wait, you mean,” he pointed between the two of you, eyes darting back and forth with a confusion that only deepened the insecurity of everyone involved, “you’re—”

“Yes,” Eddie hotly interrupted. The coil in him released slightly, a low rumble replaced by a surge that settled in his cheeks at the trembling, nervous laughter in your voice. 

Flutters roared through you all at once, spinning the room well beyond the scope of the liquor that lingered in your veins, heightening your senses to the warmth radiating from the aching nearness of his body to yours.

“Well, hey man, we were just talking—”

“Yeah—well,” he glanced at you, an apology playing out in the widening of his eyes as the coil cooled to sobering embarrassment. He wished he could bury himself, open a trapdoor and take you with him. A parade of stomping feet and slamming cases trudged on behind him from the stage. He prayed the din was enough to mask the conversation. 

“It’s ok!” you nervously exclaimed to both of them. “Really. Besides, I—I need to sober up anyway before I go home, so… it’s really ok,” you soothed to Eddie specifically. 

Eddie’s pulse thrummed in his hears, his body a livewire of stress and embarrassment. “Ok. Well, I just, um… thought I’d let you know,” he concluded to Bill, desperate to string together some semblance of dignity. He dipped his head toward you until his voice hummed lowly in your hear. “It’ll just be a few more minutes. I gotta get the rest of this shit cleaned up, and then we can, um—” his eyes darted back and forth between yours in wordless exasperation.

“Yeah,” your body whispered, overriding any protest of your noble mind. To what you were agreeing to was unimportant. Whatever he wanted.

Eddie nodded and pivoted toward the stage in a swift exit.

In the wake of his absence was an awkward pause, a space Bill was quick to fill with words. “Well, um, it was nice to meet you,” he said with an awkward dip of his head. 

“Yeah, you as well,” you said, a feeble anchor to the spinning room. Bill’s gaze hesitated with a flash of disappointment before returning to the bar. It was all you could do to just stand there a moment, heart pounding in stunned realization as the space whirled with the clammer of footsteps, the thud of equipment, the clinking of glasses. Suddenly the weight of your aloneness in the middle of it all was crushing. You retreated to the down the short hallway and ducked into the bathroom.

She’s with me.

She’s with me.

She’s with me.

In the muffled quiet of the dimly lit reprieve, the words echoed louder than ever. You were almost afraid to check your reflection, to look yourself in the eyes and face the person who ached to hear them repeated, but you did, and she surprised you. Something about the way your lipstick feathered clean in the center from the kiss of the bottle, the way your mascara settled at your lower lashes in the delicate lines beneath. It was oddly flattering, like the shadow of a good time. 

You liked who you saw, and perhaps that scared you most. 

Jeff’s laughter echoed down the hallway and the pinball trigger snapped again. What the fuck am I doing?

You would ask yourself this question as you pressed the tip of your boot to the dirty toilet handle, as the cold water woke your skin, as it dripped onto the salt-stained tile, as you dropped the soggy remains of the last two paper towels into the overflowing trashcan. 

When the clammer of footsteps and slamming of the back door faded to nothing more than distant murmurs from the bar, you slowly cracked the door and peered into the empty hallway. Your boots clicked tentatively against the tacky linoleum, emerging from the shadows as you drew a steady breath. The stage was dark, the men perched on stools had their backs to you, all roaming eyes cast down over drinks — all except one.

Eddie stood in the middle of it all; hands on hips, damp curls clinging to his neck, chest still heaving from movement and stress. He locked eyes with you, and you could feel relief in his sigh from the apron of the hallway.

Your smile was a shy, timid thing, blooming to a helpless grin as the softness of his features heightened into focus with each progressive step. As the distance between you closed to less than a foot.

“Hey,” he breathed like a soft apology.

“Hey,” you answered, like you always did. A nervous crackle of anticipation wound through your gut.

“I um,” Eddie wrung a hand behind his neck, flashing a dark tuft of hair that made the animal in you stir. “I need to cool down,” he admitted with a raw, candid urgency. He patted his pockets. “I’m gonna step out for a cigarette… if you… wanna…” he nodded toward the back hall. 

Yes. Anything, the animal growled. You simply nodded and went to grab your coat. 

Eddie snatched the heap of leather from the railing by the stage and draped it over his arm. He ushered you forward with a sweep of his palm through the air, catching your eyes with a softness that threatened the strength of your knees. A giggle escaped you — honest, uncontrollable, automatic. Clutching your arm with a coyness that surprised even yourself, you shuffled in front of him, the towering presence of his closeness like a tingle at your back, a safety in the thud of heavy boots behind you. 

The night air was a cold refreshment, a sobering reprieve from the hot, smoke-dense air of The Hideout. Your lungs helped themselves, filling to the brim, releasing just a little of the tension that was mounting before you arrived. It left you in a thick fog, drifting out into the empty patio, catching the glow from the singular bulb posted by the door. Eddie pulled it shut with a soft thud and shrugged on his coat in a rattle of zippers and chains.

Silence. A howl of the wind through naked limbs. A sigh that left both of you at once. 

Eddie dipped his head in subtle reverence as he crossed in front of you, placing his hands on the short, wooden fence to your right. He paused a second, drawing a deep breath before spinning around to face you, hands splayed in an open plead. “I am so fucking sorry.”

Your mouth hung open. “A-about what?”

He ran a hand through his hair with a ragged sigh. “About Bill, about how I acted, a-about…” he swallowed, “what I said…”

An O trembled on your lips but never made it out. “It’s fine, really—”

“It’s…it’s not. It’s just that,” he huffed, “Bill was hitting on you a-and you just looked so uncomfortable and…” it drove him fucking crazy. It lit his blood on fire. It made him want to grab a man who’d bought him countless drinks by the collar and ram him into the wall. 

You stepped closer, close enough to see the whites of his eyes in the darkness, the shadow of his pinching brow. You’d be lying if you said it didn’t stir something in you. Hearing those words. Hearing the ones he said now in profuse apology. “Eddie,” you soothed.

He closed his eyes; a split-second relish of his name on your lips. “It—” he sighed. “It wasn’t cool, to say that…” he shook his head before meeting your eyes in soft earnestness, “in public.”

The breath froze in your lungs. Out here the world fell away to the rustle of trees, to a darkness that cloaked you like a blanket. You were alone. Truly alone. A question tugged at your heart, twinged on the tip of your tongue but felt still too bold to leave it. What would he say, then, in private? 

It played out like a tape behind his eyes — the curl of Bill’s fingers around your hand. It was such a simple gesture, benign outside of context. Yet there was something deeper, something that wound like a serpent through his gut. It struck, and stung, that in one fell swoop, Bill had touched as much of you as he had. That Bill could do as much in public as he could only manage beneath a shadow. 

“Anyway, now that… that’s out of the way,” Eddie shook his head as he fumbled with the zipper of his pocket, curls feathering his delicate cheekbone, gaze cast down in weakly hidden shame. He procured a box of cigarettes, thumb flipping it open with an ease earned by years of habit. Popping one into his mouth, he paused before snapping it shut. “Y-you want one?” he mumbled. It seemed rude not to ask, but the question felt dumber by the second as it hung in the air. You were good. Good like 6 AM coffee, like the early morning sun. Good like the buttons on a crisp, white blouse. Yet here he stood, hand extended, offering what little he could — an experience.

Goodness was a mantle. A weight that kept your shoulders back, your lips pressed tight, your head cast down, your feet in slippers, your curtains drawn. Eddie Munson stood beside you, rugged and regal like a dark knight, arm outstretched in humble offering. With hesitance, you eyed the invitation. 

Out here you could be anything — a vagabond, a runaway, a princess escaped from her castle. A woman who spends Tuesday nights at dive bars and smokes cigarettes with men in leather jackets. Anything you wanted. 

You wanted to taste it. You wanted the flame, and the smoke, and the raw, ragged air that wound through your lungs and left like a beacon that soared toward the sky.

You wanted to be bad for him, and so you accepted.

The cigarette almost dropped from Eddie’s mouth in shock. He fumbled another from the box before tucking it into his back pocket. With a flourish, bending in its presentation as if it were a single rose, he offered it to you. 

Never in a million years could you have imagined it. You, in a position like this. Him, in a position like that. Least of all that it would be so wildly romantic.

You accepted with the tips of your fingers, your index and middle, brushing ridges of his knuckles with feather-light indulgence. They closed around the offering, pausing for an aching second before drawing away with it. 

Eddie closed his eyes, so quickly he could have masked it as a blink, but you caught it. The sigh, the swallow, the batting open with a burning hunger as he relished in the barest fulfillment of what he’d been craving since he saw you this morning — to touch you.

The cold nipped at your knuckles as you took in the foreign sensation between them, admiring it like a sinful adornment under the moonlight.

With a flick of his thumb, the parentheses of his mouth lit up in a warm glow. He took a few quick puffs, smoke billowing from his nose and the corners of his lips before taking a long drag. Satisfaction exited his lungs in a deep sigh, a billow that rose toward the twinkling sky. He turned his attention back to you. “Here,” he offered gently, beckoning you closer with a gentle come hither motion, readying his lighter.

You held your hand out gingerly, willing the trembling of your fingers to cease with little success. 

Eddie closed in, bringing a finger to his lips as a gentle suggestion. “Put it in your mouth,” he said, unable to suppress the boyish grin that surfaced from the words. 

You did as he told you, held it in your smirk, searched for your next instruction in the depth of his eyes but found only delight. Delight in the whole sight of you; the way it dimpled the swell of your lips, in the attention of those dutiful shoulders, like you wanted to be good at misbehaving. Delight in the fact he was teaching you something.

Eddie leaned closer. “Like this,” he instructed softly, framing his own with his long, ruddy digits before taking a quick drag. Obediently, you mirrored him, like a natural smoker would, like they did in the movies and inside the bar. 

The flame ignited between you, flickering in the wild wind. Eddie cupped it with his other hand, forming a shield with the curve of his knuckles — gentle and protective. The fire caught the tip of the slender roll, but his palm was far more captivating. Inches from your face, you could study it closer than ever, plush and glowing — the broad heart line, the soft meat of its heel. 

A deep inhale had smoke ghosting over your tongue. Eddie pulled away to reveal the ember and you took your cue. The drag you took, long and determined, left you coughing. 

Eddie couldn’t suppress his chuckle, couldn’t mask the crinkle of his eyes as you—from behind the big desk and before the big board—were swallowed in a clumsy cloud of smoke.

“Are you laughing at me?” you asked through a giggle of your own.

Like oxygen to a flame, his laughter only brightened.  “I’m sorry, you’re just… so…”

“So…what?” You gave him a look, trying to suck your dignity back through the end of the cigarette. 

A million words ached on the tip of his tongue. The wind ripped across the small, frozen field, shyly disappearing in the treeline. Out here there were no bells, no footsteps, no concrete walls to listen. Eddie watched those fingers of yours pull away from your lips, blow a billow toward the open sky, and one in a million came tumbling out.

“Beautiful.” 

A puff retreated back through your lips, froze in your lungs. The truth hung like smoke in the cold night air, rolled around in your chest, warmed your body from head to toe. Eddie plugged his mouth with another draw to prevent more from slipping out. 

There was space for the truth out here. Space like a vacuum, vast and quiet. A shyly muttered “Thank you,” was all you could manage to fill it with.

Eddie raked his fingers through the damp curls at the nape of his neck, cheeks pinking visibly, even in the dim glow of the single light on the other side of the patio. He leaned against the fence and met your eyes again, nervous breath rolling over his plush lips.

His movement, like a magnet, drew your feet across the pavement. Deeper into the shadows with the gentle pull of his eyes. The tobacco settled in your body with a comfortable heaviness as you drank him in, and you suddenly grasped the appeal.

Out here he seemed even taller, shoulders stacked over slender hips as he leaned into the fence, an ease that washed over him with each generous draw, like the stress was rolling off into the shadows. Out here he took on a different posture, different than the one under fluorescent lights. Different than the one in the small chair next to you, the one with hunched shoulders and downcast eyes.

You tapped the ash of the cigarette off with your finger, like a natural smoker would. He smirked at the gesture, and you caught the twinge of pride in it this time. 

Out here he could be anything. He could be clever and daring; a roguish enchanter. A man who casts spells with his fingers and charms with his words. Anything he wanted.

He wanted to make your eyes light up. 

Eddie took another drag, hollowing his cheeks before sending out smoke in deliberate puffs with his tongue. It left his mouth in rings, hovering in the gap between you before drifting across the patio.

He got what he wanted. A gasp left your lips, eyes twinkling brighter than the stars. “What?! I didn’t know people could actually do that!” You exclaimed, delighted like a child on Christmas.

Eddie blew the rest off to the side and returned a blinding smile. It was more satisfying than the cigarette — the fact that he could do it, make your face light up. The fact that he had the power.

“How do you do that?” you asked, ever inquisitive.

His instructions were simple; take a big drag, hollow your cheeks, make the shape with your mouth, and push the smoke out with your tongue. Simple enough, from the sound of it.

Your first attempt failed, miserably. Uproariously.

“The shape is critical,” he reminded through a chuckle, “it’s gotta be like, a perfect O, not an oval.” His eyes lingered over your lips as you tried his suggestion, struggling to will his mind away from the gutter.

Your smile made it hard to maintain. “Wait—wait, hold on I think I got it.” You tried again with great focus, sending out puffs with your tongue that looked nothing like rings. It was worth it though. Worth making a fool of yourself for the amusement that colored his face, for the bright laughter it earned you. “Ok, fine. Maybe not.”

It looked good on him, just like it did on stage. This knowing that drew his shoulders back, made him lean with a powerful ease. The knowing that he was really good at something, that he could show you.

“It’s a bit advanced,” he said with a wink before taking another deep drag. He puffed a ring and cast it forward with a push of his hand, like a spell through the air. It broke on your nose and you relished in the soft sensation of his life-force ghosting over your face. 

It was all you could do just to look at him — rugged and regal in the way that only he could be. It was dangerous and thrilling; how alone you were right now. His aura pulled you closer, eyes tugging at those burning questions, serious questions at war with your lingering buzz. You broke the silence with the truth; soft and sincere. “You’re insanely talented, I hope you know that.” 

The curve of his lashes dipped shyly with a little puff through his nose. They raised with a sparkle that cut through the darkness. “Thanks, it uh… comes a lot easier to me than chemistry.” He tapped off his ash on the pavement.

You tucked your free hand into your pocket with a bashful shuffle of your feet. “Well, good thing rockstars don’t need to know chemistry then.”

Eddie scoffed and gave his eyes a quick roll, unsuccessful at hiding the brilliance of his smile. Heat crept up his neck, and he soothed it with a wring of his hand.

There was a gap between you; a space you were too scared to breach. The two of you filled it with shy chatter as your cigarettes dwindled to nubs. It was easy, to talk to him. About music, about anything. Easy because you gave each other turns to take it; the space. It almost made it easy to forget who you were to each other before you came out here, who you would go back to being tomorrow.

The cold was wicked and relentless; biting at your knuckles as you tapped the last ash. Even the tobacco’s heavy warmth sinking to your feet couldn’t stave it off. It was a Tuesday night in December, and the wind made sure to remind you. 

Eddie followed your eyes toward the door. “It’s ok,” he reassured. “Nobody comes out here. We’re safe.”

His words sparked a tingle in your chest, a pulse of heat; low and thrumming. Neither could halt the shiver that seized your limbs. 

“You ok?” he asked gently, stepping close enough to almost feel the heat from him.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” You blew on your hands, rubbing them together feebly to fight the cold. You were stubborn to surrender, determined not to end your stolen moment by succumbing. 

It was all he could do just to look at you. You, shaking like a leaf in the wind. You, with longing eyes and trembling lips. You, with your soft skin and softer soul. His fingers burned, wrestled with the silence, and the distance, and the howl of the wind through the trees. They warred with the ticking clock, with the chill against his precious moment, with the threat of it winning. Suddenly his fingers—bolder than they’ve ever been in his life—twitched to animation. They toyed with the cold metal zipper at his neck, and in one decided tug, he opened up for you. “Here,” he offered. 

You froze, more than the cold could ever manage, as you eyed the invitation — the warm leather cave, the exposure of his heaving chest. Your lips parted but words would not come. You wanted it — the heat, the tight embrace, to be wrapped in his aura, to feel his laughter with your palms. 

Your noble mind as it cast its disapproval like a shadow toward your heart, but your hands and feet were deaf to it. Boots shuffling boldly against the rough pavement, they filled the gap between his. You accepted with the tips of your fingers, delicate and tentative, like his skin was a hot iron and yours at risk to burn. You watched them disappear into the darkness, felt the soft cotton warmth as it enveloped you. With trembling slowness, you traced the divots of his ribcage, settled into them like grooves, felt him gasp into your palms when the ice that you’d become found the velvet, heated skin under his arms.

“Sorry—”

“Hah—hmm—no-no it’s ok,” he grimaced, pinning your hands beneath his arms to stop your recoil, as if the pain of the freeze hurt less than the pain of its absence. “I—ah—I asked for this.” His chuckle was a warm vibration, a flutter as the cage which housed his heart contracted. 

A shiver racked your body as you thawed. Whether it was nerves, or fear, or the chill that had settled deep in your bones long before you stepped foot outside, you were helpless to control it.

“Come ‘ere,” he breathed with equal care and need.

You submitted, tracing his contours as he pulled you closer — head against his solid shoulder, into the soft pillow of his hair, into the source of his scent: leather and tobacco and the sweet, salty musk of his skin. You closed your eyes and basked in it, nose buried in his curls, drawing in deeply to steady your rattling chest. 

Broad palms splayed across the fabric of your coat, pulling you deep into the comfort of his heat, tracing your waist to settle in a place they burned to be — your lower back. “It’s ok, you’re ok,” he murmured into your hair, bracing you tightly as your whole body shook.

You could have died here, buried yourself in his arms and made him your tomb. They would find you in the morning; frozen like a sculpture. Left out for all of Hawkins to see, to point and say terrible things. It wouldn’t matter. You would have died happy.

His heart was pounding with disbelief. You, here, in his arms. You could feel it through your coat, hammering against your chest, into your palms at his back. Eddie felt your breathing slow, your body soften and relax. He crooked his forearm firmly to your back, to the place where it belonged, fingers curling like a cage around your waist. Out here he could be anything — strong and stable, a haven for your tired bones to rest. Anything, for you.

In the dark leather cave there was a landscape for your hands to study. The satin liner grazed your knuckles as your hands explored the angles of his shoulder blades with tentative slowness — down along the muscles of his back, the dip of his spine, the birdcage of his ribs; expanding and contracting, deep and steady. 

He was real, here, in your arms. Two swelling lungs. One beating heart. Two hands that clutched the wool barrier between you. One solid shield of a chest. One humming column at your cheek. Eddie Munson; wildfire. Close enough to thaw you. Close enough to burn you to the ground.

Your hands settled at the slim taper of his waist. Pliant and yielding under soft cotton, swelling with each ocean breath. His cage around you tightened, and you breathed him in, felt him swallow, felt his hips slot against the groove of yours with sensed belonging.

The animal in you keened with curiosity, emboldened by the dark. Your hands wouldn’t dare beyond the roadblock of his belt, but they would move in slow strokes up and down his back. A gentle comfort, a mask for your indulgence.

A quiet moan rose up in him, one he couldn’t swallow. The best he could do was cloak it in a sigh. It hummed against your ear; your cheek so close to the crook of his neck you could almost taste it. You breathed him in again, lips pressed to his soft curls against tough leather as the smoke, and musk, and crisp night air filled your lungs. 

His hands were less patient; dipping toward the slope of your hips, pawing at thick wool, thumbs drawing aching circles there. It earned an arch from your back, a grasp from your hands at the soft cotton barrier. 

There was an animal in him too, preening at the cant of your hips, at the rub of your neck against his. With a dip of his chin he could sink his teeth in, but his noble mind willed it away, settled for the scent of you instead — soft like powder, warm and inviting. The heels of your palms drifted toward his belly, and the animal threatened to rear below his belt.

“Ah,” it leapt out his throat.

Hands freezing before reaching the healthy swell, you drew back from his shoulder, checking in. Your lids hung with visible weight, pupils blown by more than just the lack of light, dizzy from his touch. He could do that with his hands, he thought; a split-second revel before concern sobered your features.

His disappointment was palpable, like he’d burst some great bubble. “Mm—no, it’s fine, please—” please don’t stop. His arms around you tightened, eyes pleading with words he wasn’t bold enough to utter, even in the darkness.

A shadow of guilt fell across your face. Guilt for your greedy hands, for your lost control, for your bad behavior. It was a pitiful sight; worse than the one he saw yesterday. Worse because it was here. Worse because he was closer than he’d ever been before.

There was a gap between you; space for the cold to seep between your hearts. Space for the fear that he’d broken the spell. That you didn’t see him anymore, but your student instead. 

You thumbed his soft cotton shirt, buried in the shelter of his coat. Eddie Munson — frenetic and compelling. Beautiful in the way that wild things are. Breathing life into your numb hands with each  ragged swell. You studied him closely; his soft cupid’s bow, his pink, plush pout, the angles of his worried jaw, the pining in his eyes.

Want. A wild, elusive thing. A summer wind. An admission at a cost. Want didn’t budge. Want looked you dead in the eyes and tightened its grip.

Eddie knew what he wanted, burning like a question on his tongue. He knew he had to be the one to ask. He was terrified — of the question, of the asking, of the fact that he may never get another chance. Your hands grappled with it, clung like they feared he would vanish. He felt the ache in them, the want, the fear, the frustration. It opened up a narrow passage, and he entered with the boldest thing he had ever done.

He asked you with his forehead first. A gentle nod forward; the softest collision. A tickle of curls. A rock back and forth of his strong, sturdy brow. A smile even you couldn’t hide. Your hands released, settled at the dip of his back in quiet permission.

He asked you with the bridge of his nose. A delicate slope. A tender nuzzle. Rigid bone under soft flesh. Cold, round tip. Roaming the map of yours with heated intention as he swayed like a dance in the moonlight. You closed your eyes, surrendered to the fantasy. Felt the heat of his cheek, the pang of his palm at your back as he pulled you closer.

He asked you with a tilt of his chin, and brought time to a halt.

There was a gap between you. A fractional distance bridged by the ghost of his breath. Within it; every party that you never went to, every basement you were never led away from, every page you never shared, every experience you never had. Goodness was a mantle, heavy from a lifetime on your shoulders. 

What did freedom taste like? The question brushed across your lips like a warm invitation. You were desperate for the answer. Wanted it more than anything, ever, in your whole entire life. Wanted it for you, for only you. For once.

Eddie asked the question. You closed the gap. 

A sigh left both of you at once. One you could taste this time, humming against the plush cradle of his lips. Freedom could have melted you. It threatened the strength of your knees, but his arms were stronger. Locked against each other in the shadows you borrowed, your lips began to explore, to express every secret wish the two of you had dreamt apart. 

Freedom tasted tentative at first. A slow drag of his lips, a languid slip that rippled to the dormant parts of you. Catching like tinder as they grazed over yours, hot with an ache you could taste. It was sinfully exquisite; tasting the curve of his smile, the hyper-real rasp of his stubble as those lips—the ones that shot you smirks from down the hall and spilled over with song—found a rhythm with yours. Broad palms clutched the wool at your waist like you’d slip through a crack if he didn’t hold on.

Freedom was slick. It tasted like cigarettes, like a thousand unsaid words ushered past the border of your mouth. You could taste every one on his tongue, soothed them with the slickness of yours. Every aching word, dripping in each soft caress. Diving like a dance, echoed in the soft, wet smacks when you parted. You devoured them like you were starving. Every sigh, every hum, every color that left his lungs slipped eagerly down your throat. 

The wool at your back was a nuisance. Eddie pawed at it, desperate to feel the shape of you through the fabric, to store it in the vault of his mind, to play with it later in private. He halted his hands at your hips, willed them decent, rationed with the small working part of his brain that your lips would have to be enough. He relished in the way you accepted him. The way you spread for him, parting eagerly for his tongue. The way your lips closed around him, rocking as he prodded like you’d done it before. Like you wanted to elsewhere. 

The spell was broken. The line, miles away. There was a hunger in you, sudden and surprising, roused by the very first taste. Eddie palmed your hips with an urgency that stirred you. Like a bear in the spring, thawed by the heat of his touch, you devoured him. Devoured him with the wholeness of your splayed hands, tracing up his pounding ribs, dragging across the expanse of his broad chest. It heaved under your touch; solid muscle under soft cotton. You devoured his moan; a hot, strangled thing that escaped his plush lips. Like a match to the strip your tongue, you ignited. 

His hands lost their patience. Breaking from your waist, they dove behind your ears to cradle your face. Your face. Your jaw, your delicate cheeks he caressed with the rough pads of his thumbs, as if the swell of them—the rigid bones under soft skin, the absolute realness of you in his arms—could wake him from the dream he was surely having. He was tasting you, tasting the want on your tongue. More satisfying than a four course meal, more satisfying than anything he’d ever tasted in his life. You wanted him. More than that, you savored him; the taste of his hot, eager tongue as it slipped against yours.

Freedom was delicious. Bold and complex, acrid and rich. Full bodied. A smooth, sweet finish. You could have drowned in it. Drowned in the angles of his hands, in his tender strokes, in the sopping heat of his mouth. Drowned in his eager sighs, in his scent. Drowned completely if he hadn’t held your head above the surging waves. 

Eddie was good like a midnight snack. Good like a wide open road. He was good at this. Good at knowing how to ask and answer. Good at at finding the rhythm of you. 

You broke for air, stilling against the bridge of his nose, afraid to look him in the eyes just yet, to break away from the safety his shadow provided. Safe from the world, safe from consequences, safe from the thoughts that battered at the door of your mind. Safety was fragile and fleeting. You knew it, he knew it. Your breath mingled in hot bursts as you steadied your spinning world for a quiet moment together. You felt him smile—heard it—big and bright as it cracked across his face. The air stung your cheeks when he took his hands away. Leaning back against the fence, he tugged you closer, further into the safety of the shadows, enveloping you in the crook of his heat. 

It was good like this — the angles of you and the angles of him, fitting like they always belonged. It felt safe to explore them, to paint his pounding chest, down the soft swell of his belly, stopping at his hips. With a thick bob of his Adam’s apple, he closed the gap again. It was chaste this time, peppering your lips with space to breathe between each kiss. They were slow and savory, steady and sure. They lingered long enough for you to get another taste, to capture that plush Cupid’s bow and let it melt across yours, to flick your tongue over his soft bottom lip and taste him there too. 

You could taste his need when he greeted your tongue with his own. It was safe to show it here. Safe to let the animal inside him bare its teeth. Safe to let the animal in you do the same. It growled when he nipped at you, hooked its claws through his belt loops and tugged. It was a quick, testing thing, and your sound let him know that he passed. He lapped it up hungrily, soothed it before inflicting another.

It ached in a frightening way, in that deep, low place. Throbbed awake with each delicious bite. It scared you how quickly the path was veering south, but the pooling warmth encouraged his travels, let him go wherever he wanted. When his lips strayed far enough to track your jaw, a shrinking voice shrieked danger, but the rest of you simply submitted. 

Claws braced denim and leather, offering yourself with a tip of your head. Reverently, he accepted, setting his pace with a dizzying slowness. He worshiped you with every latch, every press, every lingering smack, darting his tongue out to taste the forbidden angles of your jaw. It was greedy but good. To him, to you. Letting go this much. Letting him go this far. The trail cooled in the night air, and he settled at the precipice of your neck.

His breath alone was enough to melt you; heavy with the weight of his new position. Heavy with desire, with the weight of thousand fantasies he never thought would come to pass. He drank in the cocktail of your scent; concentrated, warm, deliciously real. In the throws of your own heaving chest, sobered just barely by the pregnant pause, you awoke to your position: open, vulnerable, completely at his mercy. 

He tasted your swallow, felt your breath hitch when his warm, wet tongue found your pulse. Lathing there a moment, lingering and slow, he savored you. Savored the ridges of your neck, the way your head lolled to the side, like a feast laid out for him. He stored the image in his mind, packaged it carefully for when he would surely be starving again. His lips soothed where his tongue left off, over and over until your strangled sound stirred a fiending hunger. He bared his teeth, and you shattered. 

Freedom was falling apart in his arms. Crumbling into pieces and letting him grapple you whole. Letting him capture you in his maw and lap up your ruin. Letting him, letting him. His teeth dragged dull and slow, tingling every waking cell, turning you to putty completely. He dragged a moan out of you. A full one, loud and clear. He tucked it away, buried it deep alongside your squirms and your touch. 

The door opened.

Cold air shocked your lungs. Head snapping over your shoulder, you broke his latch and Eddie hissed a curse at the separation. With daggers, you both assessed the intruder. 

The silhouette of his cap gave him away. He might have even kept on walking but the gasps and the shuffling feet made him turn. “Oh shit,” Bill flinched back in surprise. “Sorry man I thought you left.”

Eddie’s arm tightened instinctively, pulling you as close as he wanted to earlier. Reflexively, you pushed away. It was a strange tug of war — his pride and your fear. “Yeah—no we’re still here,” he snapped.

You swallowed your pounding heart, sobering completely under Bill’s gaze. Suddenly your claws retracted, your hands felt wrong where they rested, shame bit at your neck along the cooling trail he left behind. 

Even in the backlit glow of the singular light, you saw it painted clearly on his features — the judgement, the disbelief, the questions rising up but not daring to come out. “Well um, sorry to interrupt. Have a good night,” Bill said with an awkward raise of his hand before making quickly for the parking lot. 

Footsteps faded over gravel and left a silence in their wake, thicker than the stillness from before. 

Eddie breathed a sharp sigh through his nostrils, brows lowered as he seethed toward the parking lot. The cold was setting in again. Your nose, and ears, and fingers stung with it. The rest of you stung worse; chest numbing, caving like a can under the weight of what you’d just done. 

When the flick of distant headlights made you brave enough to face him, frustration painted his features. He pawed at your coat, desperate to salvage what he could of his precious moment. “Anyway, where were we?” he muttered, eyeing your neck with a tilt of his head like he was about to dive in again. 

Your hand at his chest stopped him, and the look in his eyes was wounding. “Eddie,” you warned softly. A slow, heavy sigh left his nose, one you could feel with your palm. “I need to go.”

Crestfallen after a desperate, hesitant second, his arms went slack. Your hand dropped, leaving a fierce chill behind. One more, his lips begged, but struggled to release. Please. 

It hurt, to crumble like this after all you had built. With the roar of Bill’s engine, the fantasy shattered around you. The carriage became a pumpkin, your gown turned into rags. Shrill bells rang out in the distance, coming surely as the sun would rise. Pinballs thundered as that sweet oval face—the one from the back of the room and the chair next to yours—pouted with lips still swollen from where you had broken your contract. 

“I’m sorry,” you mouthed. 

Gathering himself with a deep breath, he straightened to a dignified height, conviction filling the cracks in his composure. “I’m not.” 

It was terrifying — the prospect, the consequences. What it meant for you, for him, for the world you’d have to face tomorrow. 

Most terrifying of all was how good it felt to hear him say.

______

A/N: Thank you all for your patience on this one. It took me nearly all summer to finish but I'm really proud of how it turned out. Please let me know what you think! I've missed hearing from and connecting with all of you. Next one won't take nearly as long, I promise. 💕

Taglist: @mermaidsandcats29 @toxicjayhoo @ooo-protean-ooo @jadequeen88 @wroteclassicaly @kissmyacdc @mantorokk-writes @loveshotzz @storiesbyrhi @cursedyuta @trashmouth-richie @carolmunson @keeponquinning @munson-blurbs @blueywrites @alottanothing @bebe07011 @idkidknemore @alizztor @godcreatoreli @ethereal27cereal @munsonsgirl71 @emxxblog @siriusmuggle @sidthedollface2 @big-ope-vibes @dollalicia @lma1986 @catherinnn @eddiemunson4life420 @readsalot73 @barbiedragon @ladylilylost @3rriberri @princess-eddie @nightless @eddieswifu @thew0rldsastage @chaoticgood-munson @hanahkatexo @eddiemunsonsbedroom @beep-beep-sherlock @averagemisfit03 @vintagehellfire @haylaansmi @sllooney @lunaladybug734 @callingmrsbarnes @ajkamins

______

MASTERLIST ⎮ AO3 ⎮ KO-FI

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie munson older reader #eddie munson smut #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x teacher!reader #stranger things fanfiction #eddie munson angst #eddie munson fluff #don't stand so close to me

[lainsshop]

Tears To Shed ୭ৎ

Pairing: Alastor x Zombie ! Reader

Tags: angst(?), fluff, out of characters(?), established relationship, corpse bride n probably more..

Song: Tears To Shed - Corpse Bride

A/N: I need more Rosie and Alastor interactions to be honest like.. I already miss them😭 anyways please enjoy this!

“Why so blue, dear?” Rosie asks as she puts a cup of tea onto the table. You were currently sitting at Rosie’s lounge feeling melancholy over someones comment to your relationship with Alastor, most of the time you didn’t care but this one- stung in your imaginary heart.

You see, you met Alastor when you two were alive, somehow and someway you both got together and your relationship bloomed to the point he proposed to you but- you got killed before your wedding even started. So, imagine the joy you felt when you encountered him again in Hell.

“Maybe.. he’s right, maybe we’re too- different.” You sighed. “Maybe he should have his head examined,” She suggested as she took a sit in front of you. “I could do it.” You wanted to smile at that but- “Or perhaps he does belong with someone else.” You looked at your cup of tea. “Someone who isn’t lil’ miss/mr non hearted,” You mocked yourself as you stand up to look at a mirror near you two. “Someone with rosy cheeks and a beating heart.” You murmured sadly.

“Oh, those people are ten a penny,” Rosie rolled her eyes as she follows you behind and puts her hand on your shoulders to try to comfort you. “You’ve got so much more, darling! You’ve got- you’ve got..” She looked around to try to find the right words for you. “You’ve got a wonderful personality!”

She smiles to you through the mirror. You truly wanted to feel better after hearing that but negative thoughts were still ruining in your head, Rosie sees this and sighs.

“What do those wispy lil’ brats have that you don’t have double? They can’t a candle to the beauty of your smile!” She croons as she places you down onto the chair, placing her index fingers in the corners of your mouth to make you smile.

“… how about a pulse?” You looked at her. “Overrated by a mile-“ She slightly scoffs. “Overfed, overblown!” She makes a gesture making the idea of a pulse uninteresting. “If only they knew the you that we know—“ You sighed as you stand up again, crossing your arms to think. “And those silly little creatures don’t even have a ring! And they don’t play piano or dance or sing!” She carefully grabbed one of your hands, and with a graceful motion, she twirled you into a seated position.

“No, they clearly don’t compare,” “But they don’t look like they’re decaying-“ “Who cares?” She interrupted. “Unimportant! Overrated, overblown! If only they could see how special your relationship with him can be,” She drags you through the mirror and adjusts your wedding clothes. “If only they knew the you that we know..” You gently push her away.

You went to Rosie’s balcony and hug yourself to try to find comfort. “If I touch a burning candle I can feel no pain-“ You begin to sing plaintively. “If you cut me with a knife it’s still the same..” You moved your hand to the sky, fingers curling into a determined fist, as if reaching to grasp it.

“And I know they have a heart and I know that I don’t-“ You placed your hands on the railing, feeling the cool metal beneath your fingertips. “Yet the pain here that I feel, try and tell it’s not real.. it seems that I still have a tear to shed.” You touched your right cheek, feeling your eyes water a bit.

Rosie couldn’t help but feel sympathetic for you but she couldn’t just give up on cheering you on! “The sure redeeming feature from those little creatures is that they have a heart! Overrated, overblown, my dear friend!” She grins a bit wider as she stands next to you. “Everybody knows that they don’t know how to use that heart but you, sweetheart, even without a heart you can express it well with him!” She pointed out.

“Who cares? Unimportant! Overrated, overblown! If only they could see how special your relationship can be,” She grabbed one of your hands again and lead you inside the building. “If only they knew the you that we know..” She put you in front of the mirror again as she handed you a bouquet of flowers.

You looked at yourself, you imagined yourself walking through the aisle but- “If I touch a burning candle I can feel no pain, in the ice or in the sun it’s all the same,” You handed the flowers back to Rosie. “Yet I feel my heart aching—though it doesn’t beat its breaking,” You looked at yourself in the mirror as you fixed your hair and dust off your attired.

“And the pain here I feel- try and tell me it’s not real, I know that I don’t have a heart..” Rosie couldn’t help but hug you.

“Yet it seems that I still have some tears to shed..” You sang.

୭ৎ

You were now at the hotels lobby after your visit with Rosie, sitting at the pianos bench playing a few keys letting your mind wonder around.

“Ah! There you are, my dear!” A familiar voice you know enters the building, Alastor, your lover.

He walks towards you, the radio static getting a bit louder. You didn’t looked at him though, you continued to with what you’re doing. Alastor tilted his head a bit, curious about your reaction just now.

“Something wrong, my dearest?” No respond. Usually he would try to poke you just to get a reaction of you but your mood seemed different to him, he could read you like a book!

Since you’ve met when you were alive till now. He could sense that you were upset with something and he knew exactly what so he took a seat next to you and started to play a few notes.

You perfectly recognized them and looked at him with a surprised soft look and he just smiles at you as he continues.

You looked back at the piano and started to join in little by little, playing the song that used to play together when you were alive also being the song that was suppose to be played at your wedding.

You both looked at each other with soft eyes and- “Whoever made that comment will pay for what they did, I’ll make sure of that and also,” He paused for a bit trying to look how to say the next words that he’s about to say. “How do you feel about the possibility of marrying again, not in the sense of a second attempt, but in embracing the chance we never had when life took you away before we could say 'I do'?"

You froze at that moment, you didn’t know how to respond right away, you felt so many emotions blooming as he asked that. “… you serious?” You inquired. “You know I’m always honest with you, darling.” He grins a bit wider as he took one of your hands and place a small kiss on it.

“So?” You wanted to cry tears of joy at that moment. This is the same man who known for being a huge narcissistic, sadistic killer who also liked, and still does, to est his own people but yet- he still fell in love with you where you were alive.

Even if it took awhile to figured out his feelings for you, he absolutely adores you. You accepted all his flaws and even his weird habits, and even deep down he blames for your death but here you are.. next to him, forgiving him and still loving him the same way when you were alive together.

“Absolutely.” You smiled as a tear rolled down your cheek.

© LAINSSHOP 2024

#alastor x reader #alastor #hazbin hotel

[transmascaraa]

!valentine's day special!

they will make sure that this was the best valentine's day that you've ever had.

characters: lyney, gaming, wanderer, cyno, tighnari, wriothesley, neuvillette x gn!reader

author's note: happy valentine's day idc if you're single like me or not but happy valentine's day nonetheless. i think this is pretty cute and long and that you guys will like it<3

♡ Lyney

-he planned out the best date ever months ago. the place, the time, the date. everything.

-well, the whole thing was about his show. a show dedicated to you with a lot of hearts, rainbow roses and all with a special final trick.

-he told you to wear something nice for his "special valentine's show" the day before, so you did. a really good outfit. after the show, you'll be going to a romantic restaurant with him anyway.

-although... you looked good in anything in lyney's eyes. so, you went to his show, ready to just watch the whole thing. smiling brightly and blushing. but then lyney caught you off guard-

-he called you on stage! for his final trick!

-showing some magic trick where he proves that he can see how much someone is loved by how many rainbow roses come out of their "heart/chest".

-he started pulling them out, and out, and out...

-until something like confetti popped out of your chest! confetti of rainbow roses and a single note that he signaled you to open just after the show ended.

-then, he thanked everyone, and waited for them to leave.

-after they left, you opened the note with lyney next to you.

-"joyeuse saint valentin, mon amour<3"(google translate for "happy valentine's day, my love")

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

๑ Gaming

-honestly, you never thought that gaming was this romantic.

-well, that he could be this romantic.

-the day before, he asked you if you had time tomorrow, at 9pm, to come to one of his dance shows.

-he asked you to wear something nice, of course.

-you thought that it was just a regular show, just with maybe some pink and red colors, because of valentine's day.

-so, when tomorrow night came, and you stood in the first row of the crowd, and waited patiently to see gaming on stage for tonight.

-before him, 2 of his friends performed together, just to get the crowd excited for the final dance.

-and finally, gaming got on stage.

-dancing flawlessly, amazing everyone around. those who saw him dance that night were probably so amazed that they threw screamed after the show.

-anyways, during that lovely dance, rose petals were falling from the sky, out of nowhere! (xianyun)

-and after he finished, and bowed down along with his friends, he threw a rose in the crowd, making it specifically land in your hands.

-there was a note on it.

-"happy valentine's day, [name]!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✧ Wanderer

-he was never a fan of valentine's day to begin with.

-he found it dumb, annoying, boring, and too lovey-dovey in his opinion. when he saw couples in public he would gag on purpose to show his disgust.

-so, even after he met you, for a while, he avoided anything romantic in public. simply said, he hated PDA.

-but this time, when valentine's day was near, he actually started thinking of something for you. to make that day special. to try and fit in with mortals who celebrated it.

-he told you to dress up in random outfits for him, saying that he was bored and his phone didn't have any battery left. (it was at 87%)

-you started dressing up in outfits, he was rating them one by one. hepretty tough with you getting any good rates, but after a few of them, he saw that outfit that he was waiting for.

-"wear that tomorrow." he didn't even say that it meant "11/10" in his words. so you wore it tomorrow.

-he wasn't home, instead, there was a note on the living room table.

-"go to that river that nahida and i were at when she was teaching me about aranaras."

-and you headed out immediately, in the outfit that he told you to wear.

-finally, you got there and saw him, waiting for you. with a bouquet of sumeru roses in his hands.

-"happy valentine's day..." he muttered while he hid his blushing face under his hat.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✿ Cyno

-he was somebody who could not be seen as romantic at all. at least to others.

-he wouldn't show that much affection to you in public, but nobody knows why. not even tighnari.

-one day, the day before valentine's, he got back from a "mission", tired, and just collapsed onto bed next to you.

-you asked him if he was okay, and he nodded saying that he was tired.

-believe it or not, he was actually preparing something for you the whole day.

-tomorrow, he told you to come with him to the desert for the day. that he has something to show you.

-so, you got dressed and headed to the desert with him.

-chit-chatting until you got to a little shadowed place, with a heart shape in the sand.

-you sat down next to it, and cyno sat on the other side.

-he gave you a little bracelet in a box.

-it was purple with his name on it.

-"happy valentine's day."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

◍ Tighnari

-js like gaming, you never thought he could be this romantic

-he was always like a mom, taking care of you, scolding you if you messed something up, but definitely loved you a lot deep down.

-now, on such a day like valentine's, he promised himself not to scold you and just be affectionate.

-so, since he's basically collei's teacher, he asked cyno to take care of her for the day, while the dedication the day to you.

-he never was a big fan of the 14th of february, but he still played along with it. especially because it was you.

-that day, he suddenly invited you to go on a picnic with him, in the rainforest.

-you agreed, of course. then, got ready, and headed out to the spot.

-tighnari was sitting on a blanket under the tree, looking at some sumeru roses next to it, muttering some complaints about the akademiya.

-as soon as he noticed you, plucked one, and handed it to you as you sat down next to him.

-he even smiled back at you.

-"i hope this will be your best valentine's day ever."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✷ Wriothesley

-he liked valentine's.

-not too much, but just enough. it was when he met you that he started loving it even more.

-maybe it wasn't "mid" in his opinion anymore.

-the only reason he disliked it before was because people were too annoying with it.

-but this time, he was the one being annoying.

-he sent you a message, telling you to come to his office at the meropide, and also added "make sure you look good ;)"

-you blushed at just the thought of it, and what his message could mean.

-after you got ready, you sent him "heading out rn" and went out.

-entering his office, you see him sitting by a nearby table, that has an empty chair on the other side.

-"welcome in, my love." he greets you, and gestures for you to sit down.

-you ask him what he means, and he pulls out on of those heart-shaped boxes with chocolates on the inside.

-"be my valentine forever?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

⑅ Neuvillette

-and lastly, him.

-he didn't think much of valentine's day, just let people do their thing.

-he never celebrated it, but found it quite intriguing how just a simple date, the 14th of february, can make everything feel so lovely and sweet.

-not until he met you, now he participated in the celebration of it.

-not a single year where he'll miss it.

-he's not one to make a surprise like the rest, he'll plan the date with you.

-an aquarium. (i would collapse if someone brought me to an aquarium)

-when the day finally arrived, the two of you got ready and went out together, hand-in-hand, to the most famous aquarium in all of fontaine.

-it had all types of fish, even the endangered species.

-you were amazed by the fish, and how beautiful it was. and the underwater world itself.

-he found it quite nice, too.

-and when you got to a section with otters, ones that looked similar to neuvillette himself...

-you took a bunch of pictures with him and them, they even played with him through the glass!

-after leaving, he gave you a kiss on the cheek.

-"have a happy valentine's day."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

OH MY.

THIS IS SO GOOD AND CUTE.

I'M EXPLODING HELPPPP I CAN'T BELIEVE I WROTE THIS

#genshin #genshin impact #genshin headcanons #genshin impact headcanons #genshin imagines #genshin fluff #gaming x reader #gaming x you #lyney x reader #lyney x you #wanderer x reader #wanderer x you #cyno x reader #cyno x you #wriothesley x reader #wriothesley x you #neuvillette x reader #neuvillette x you #genshin x reader #genshin impact x reader #valentine's day #i don't know how a single fucking person like me can write such lovey-dovey shit #and like it #i think i crave love but idk #i would never confess first #anyways thanks for reading<3 #⑅⁠čikonyxo's post🎭

[shalotttower]

Permanence

Title: Permanence Fandom: Hunter x Hunter Summary: A simple evening at an art gallery turns into a daring decision to slip away from Chrollo's grasp. Word count: 2400+ Characters: Chrollo Lucilfer x Reader Notes: yandere, kidnapped reader, exploration of power dynamics, power imbalance.

Tonight you spend in the shower longer than you normally do. There're no tears, no, just exhaustion, both mental and physical that seems to be seeping into your bones deeper than ever. Waiting is the worst part. You don't know whether there will be any kind of consequences after the stunt you've pulled. You don't know if the extent of Chrollo's composure has stretched to anger - and that's after you've tried so hard to keep yourself from pushing him - or it's just annoyance. Which is not ideal, but workable.

It was supposed to be a nice, as much as it can be, evening. Just a walk through the gallery, a little bit of art admiration here, a little bit of talking there, maybe getting some dinner.

After the shower, you sit on the closed toilet lid, naked, and stare at the mirror that's still fogged from the steam. You don't like looking yourself in the eye lately, or rather what you see there. Fear doesn't become you. Neither does hopelessness. Your reflection seems foreign, unrecognizable at times when it should be familiar and safe, a thing you grew up with and are supposed to know by heart.

***

"I want to leave," you whispered when Chrollo put his arm around your waist. Yet another painting by an unknown artist; names that didn't ring a bell and suffering deities depicted on canvas twirled in an odd dance.

He didn't react immediately, so you repeated yourself. Something hinted that you should keep quiet and admire in silence, but something else entirely urged you to push. Perhaps it was too hot. Perhaps too many people were surrounding you and Chrollo's touch felt stifling rather than reassuring.

"Can we get out of here?"

He looked down at you, expression calm, and you could almost call it considering. The hand on your hipbone tightened just a notch, as if making sure you won't slip away.

"Not yet, dear. We haven't seen everything."

A sigh died somewhere in your chest before it got the chance to escape your lungs. "We've been here for over an hour," you managed. And while art usually caused pleasant emotions in you, right now it did nothing of sorts. People brushed past, paying little mind to the couple blocking one of the main hallways. You tried to not fidget under Chrollo's gaze.

Maybe he would've granted your request - who knows? Chrollo wasn't the type to deny you anything reasonable, not after almost four months of compliance - if a man had not appeared right next to you like a ghost out of thin air. You remembered him from a fine dinner, one of many. The memory was hazy, you had a glass of martini at Chrollo's indulgence which proved to be a bit stronger than expected. But the feeling, that sinking sensation of unease you got back then from the man's presence remained. As well as the smell of his cologne, leathery; it lingered behind him even after he left the table.

One look of his dark eyes was enough to make your stomach clench.

And then they started talking.

When you were a child you hated shopping with your mother. Groceries or clothing - no matter. It was not the process itself, but rather occasional encounters with other adults she knew. The chit-chats about everything and nothing could last forever, and you stood there, tugging on her hand to remind about your existence. Can we go? Can we go home, are you finished?

You weren't a child anymore, yet the impression of your own invisibility and being a silent accessory to Chrollo, although he occasionally looked down at you, brought those memories back.

The gallery room was too small. There were too many people.

The nape of your neck tingled.

You wrung your hand out of Chrollo's hold faster than any reasonable thought could stop you. He blinked in surprise, and that was the only time in four months you saw him taken aback for a small particle of a second. Before having a chance to see his composure settle back or properly regret your actions, you slipped through bodies like a fish. Stupid heels of elegant shoes with ankle straps and pointed toe tips hindered your every step. Your heartbeat hammered in your ears as if someone hit them with blunt force repeatedly. The dreadful dress he chose rustled against your legs, black velvet fabric clinging to your thighs when you tried to maneuver between visitors. You wanted to get out. Just to have some air. Just to take a breath.

"Dear," Chrollo's voice reached you from behind, but you didn't slow down. You passed paintings one by one. Saints screaming at your hasty steps and angry expressions seemed to judge you. "Dear." Louder now. People were throwing curious glances at you both.

You did not spot a waiter who stopped abruptly before you with a tray of wine glasses in time.

It was really supposed to be a nice evening.

***

You towel dry your hair until it feels acceptable enough and pull the pajama on, a silky set Chrollo gifted (replaced yours with). It is more comfortable than anything you've ever owned, but still too short on your frame and reveals way too much skin for your liking. He won't let you sleep not in the bed tonight, this much is obvious. The makeshift mattress you've made on the floor is nowhere to be seen just like you expected.

So be it.

Quietly you slip under the covers and turn on your side, facing the window. The sheets smell fresh and clean and there's even a hint of lavender underneath if you focus hard, but right now all you can focus on is getting through this night. Sleep comes quick. Or so you think because when Chrollo lies down next to you, you jerk awake. His body radiates warmth, not close enough to touch just yet, but the knowledge that it'll change soon causes a surge of nausea within you.

He shifts with a faint rustling of silk sheets. An arm comes to drape around your middle like a shackle; you move closer to the bed edge, curling yourself into a ball. It almost seems like you might fall off, and perhaps you will, really, your leg is already hanging in part.

A delicate kiss is placed at the top of your spine, bare where the shirt doesn't reach your shoulder blades. Another one follows on your vertebrae and then he pulls you flush against him. Your heartbeat speeds up and palms become cold; his - is slow and steady, like always.

"You're going to fall off," he whispers.

"Fine by me." You whisper too for some reason, despite there being nobody else to hear you.

There's a soft exhale from behind and his hand begins to rub circles on your tense stomach, lazy motions that go up to your rib cage and down to the belly button. Chrollo's breath tickles your nape and you know that if it wasn't for four months of constant touches, caresses and brushes, you would've pushed him away. Careful conditioning - that's what it is, you're not stupid. Your body knows him, his scent, his hands and voice now, even though your mind screams at them to keep their distance.

He hums when you shudder.

"Cold?" Chrollo asks. One of his fingers traces the hem of your shorts. Your hand comes over it and halts it midway.

"Please stop," you say, and it's the first time since this all started your voice is actually cracking, like an eggshell. Fragile at the edges.

He doesn't say anything but the motion ceases. Slowly, his hand retreats to come rest on your hipbone where it grants you a gentle squeeze.

Chrollo kisses the back of your head.

"Sleep," he tells you.

Easier said than done.

***

The new penthouse looks pretty much like any other you've stayed in – large bed and luxurious decor. It even has a grand piano standing in one of the corners which you have no idea how to play. Chrollo releases your hand and heads into the bathroom while you wander around, poking at things just for the sake of having something to do. A glass figurine of a little ballerina catches your attention. She seems frozen in her sorrowful stance, looking downwards to the ground beneath her tiny pointe shoes. You turn it this way and that, watching light catch on the shiny surface.

The shower starts running.

It's been only three days after the incident in the gallery and Chrollo hasn't commented upon it in the slightest. Maybe he's simply biding his time, you wouldn't be surprised.

Eventually you settle down onto the soft mattress and grab the first random book from the side table. Reading helps. Immersing yourself into fiction distracts from reality.

You thumb through the pages and find out that it's some sort of a romance novel, a period one judging by the writing style. Some duke-like character seems to be enamored with one of his maids but can't do anything about it because of social stigmas. The woman herself is poor as a church mouse yet beautiful beyond words - a bit cliché if you're honest, still there's nothing wrong with it per se, everyone can enjoy their guilty pleasures.

Chrollo emerges from the bathroom after some time, drying his hair with a towel. He moves about the room: unpacking your luggage, hanging up clothes in the closet, etc. Your eyes follow him without meaning to. There are times like this when Chrollo almost feels like a normal person. What he is doing seems domestic enough to trick your brain into short periods of blissful ignorance. Then your gaze falls onto the cross tattoo on his forehead and the illusion breaks like a soap bubble on a sunny day.

You turn another page and read half a paragraph before realizing you've absorbed absolutely nothing.

"What are you reading?" Chrollo sits by your side after he's finished unpacking. His voice is light, almost casual. Almost playful. It puts you on edge.

"Something I found." You close the book and show him the cover. "It was next to the bed."

He leans forward, glancing at the words written on the page. When Chrollo speaks, there's amusement in his tone. "Interesting."

Interesting. What's that supposed to mean? You keep your eyes trained on the text, but try as you might, the words seem meaningless, jumbled. Chrollo rests his hand on your calf. He keeps it there for a few moments before sliding it upward, slowly, toward your knee. You give him a look. "What are you doing?"

"Getting your attention," he responds with the simplicity of someone stating the weather outside.

"You have it. What is it?" It's that type of a stare he gives you that had almost transformed into his personal form of art. One that takes everything in without any effort – from your eyebrows furrowed in suspicion to the corners of your mouth turned downward into a frown.

"You know," Chrollo says thoughtfully. "I've been thinking."

Isn't he always?

He squeezes your leg under your knee, where skin is more sensitive and then you're cornered - right between him and the headboard.

"Your behavior in the gallery, dear. It was rather unexpected," he tells you and the sinking feeling turns into full blown nausea in your throat.

You knew it. Knew that he was going to get back to this, sooner or later. Fuck. "You've been behaving so well these past months and I wonder what prompted this."

Chrollo tilts his head.

"I'm sorry." You reply and shift. "I got anxious."

"Go on," he says when you don't elaborate, not sounding angry or upset, just curious. The warm thumb traces patterns on your knee cap - you hate how Chrollo does this, makes you talk when he could leave you alone and drop the subject.

You have to continue now.

"New spaces isn't really my thing, and yesterday I felt... Pressured. It wasn't intentional, I simply," you shrug your shoulders, "got overwhelmed and acted on impulse. I shouldn't have."

Your voice doesn't crack once and you're proud over that.

"Hm." Chrollo hums but it's neither approving nor disapproving, more like pondering. He moves closer so your knees bump against each other. This is dangerous territory – him being close while questioning you, you know better than to pull back now.

"You're sorry," he says, a strand of damp hair falls onto his forehead. "Are you sorry because you understand what you did wrong," each word is precise as if to drill into your head. "Or are you apologizing because you're afraid of the consequences?"

You stare at his shirt instead of his face. The top three buttons are undone, revealing a patch of pale skin. You want to button them up - knowing him, it's hardly a coincidence.

"Both, I think." You opt for honesty, because lying to Chrollo would most likely end with him seeing right through it, regardless of your efforts.

His frame effectively blocks out everything else from view: up close like this he's handsome, there's no denying it. Dark eyes framed by long eyelashes and soft lips and high cheekbones that make him look like a model out of a fashion magazine. And yet there's also coldness underneath it all, hidden behind those charming smiles and polite remarks. It sometimes gives you an uncanny impression: Chrollo seems frozen, suspended in that state of perpetual calmness, like time stopped ticking inside of his chest.

"What now?" You ask, heart thrumming somewhere deep near the bottom of your rib cage. The book lays forgotten next to you, pages bent after it slipped from your grasp and hit the mattress.

Chrollo cups your cheek with one hand, "Now we continue the evening."

Continue?

The confusion must show on your face because he chuckles. "You apologized," it feels patronizing but you try to ignore it for the sake of getting over with whatever this is. "And admitted your faults. I can overlook a single instance of defiance–especially since you explained yourself so well."

Relief washes over you, making your shoulders sag. You take the book, careful not to let your fingers brush, he seems to like skin on skin contact.

"I expect better behavior next time, dear."

"I'll try," You mutter under your breath.

His hand slips away from your thigh and moves to grab the remote - news, of course, - Chrollo watches news almost religiously every night before going to sleep. "I appreciate when you behave," he adds smoothly. "It makes everything much easier for both of us."

He settles his head on your lap, and it feels heavy, and his damp hair tickles, but you don't dare push him off.

#hunter x hunter #chrollo lucilfer #chrollo lucifer x reader #yandere #yandere chrollo #yandere chrollo lucilfer #shalott fanfiction #hunter x hunter fanfic

[neotohuu]

Baby, only look at me.

jealous dom top male oc x sub bottom male reader; age gap (oc is older), breeding kink, cr*ampie (e), ch*king (o), hair pulling, semi public s*x (e), vouyerism, characters are implied to be under the influence but everything is consensual.

note: i'm the inconsistancy king lol...i'll find my writing style some...day.

Kai sipped on his whiskey as he watched you have fun on the dance floor with your friends. He chuckled when he saw you do your dorky little dance, he thought that you were the cutest guy in the world.

You barely even drank anything but laughed and danced around like you drank the whole bar under the table, this was definitely your first time in a club.

He didn't mind your friends dancing with you as for most of the time whilst you were dancing, they were protectively looking around you and keeping away any perverts.

"Hey, (Name)! We're gonna go get some drinks, okay? You just sit here!" One of (Name)'s friends said as Kai quietly tagged along with them to get some drinks, he gave you a small kiss on the forehead before leaving.

You sat there quietly, checking your phone every once in a while whilst sipping your virgin cocktail. Then, suddenly another man slipped into the booth, you didn't look up from your phone as you thought it was Kai who sat next to you.

"Oh, you're back early, baby..." you said to the person next to you who you thought was Kai, as an unfamiliar chuckle bubbled from his throat. You snapped your head towards the man. You immediately got a whiff of cigarettes and hair gel as he leaned closer to you.

"You're calling me baby, already huh, cutie...?" His gruff voice groaned out as he scratched his stubble and was about to put his hand on your thigh until Kai came and pushed him out of the booth.

"Get the f*ck away from him." Kai sneered as you sat there, confused and scared as you held him back from proceeding to punch the other man.

The man just glared at Kai before walking out of the bar, but before he opened the door, he turned back to look at you and pointed at your pocket.

You shuffled your hands inside your pocket to find a small piece of paper that had his number written on it, you looked at the man with shock and confusion as he winked at you.

Kai saw the piece of paper in your hand and his mind just snapped.

He immediately crumpled the paper and threw it on the dirty ground as he grabbed you by the waist and pulled you to the restrooms.

You and Kai were standing close together in a stall as he started groping your chest from behind, he peppered kisses on the nape of your neck as you let out a confused moan.

"W-Wait...ngh~ What's going on, Kai...- haah~" You whimpered out as he started pinching your nipples.

"I'm claiming back what's mine." He replied briefly as he flipped you around and kissed you passionately as he pulled out his already hard cock from his jeans.

Your hands tangled on his short dark hair as he shoved his tongue in your throat. "Ngh~ c-calm down, Kai..." You muttered in between kisses as he flipped you back around and bent you over.

He tugged your pants down and groped your plush and supple ass. "This ass is mine." He grunted as he spit on his cock to lube it up a bit, your hole was presented to him in a naughty manner as your face was laid against the wall.

Suddenly, someone entered the restrooms as well, the other person entered the stall next to you both. You gulped as you stayed silent but Kai had other plans.

He teased the outside of your hole slowly with his hot tip, your eyes widened as you grasped his hand and your puffy and watery eyes look at him. He coos silently before slamming his cock into your tight and wet hole.

You gasped and held back a moan as his cock curved perfectly to hit your g-spot. He then started to punish you with his slow thrusts...the sloppy sounds and the precum dripping on the ground, the person who just went inside the other stall would've clearly known.

And your friend did. He slowly pulled out his own hard cock in his pants as he stroked himself to the sound of your soft moans and gasps.

"Slut..." Kai groaned as he held your hand in his right hand and pulled your hair harshly in the other. You moaned due to the mix of pain and pleasure, you started drooling on your hand as you tried to silence yourself.

Your hand gripped on the wall as Kai's hand gripped on your hip tightly, he started thrusting into you faster and harder. At this point, the sloppy noises and your soft, lewd moans were making it obvious what you and Kai were doing in there.

His cock was hitting you in all the right places, your eyes were watering as he flipped you around and placed you on top of the toilet cover, not even pulling out for a second as he continued fucking you animalistically.

His hands slowly traveled from your hips to your neck, his grip slowly became tighter on your neck. "H-haah~" You let out a strangled, breathy moan as you started to bounce yourself on his cock.

Kai chuckled at the sight of your fucked-out face, a loving smile on his face as he kissed your lips. You were numb in pleasure as you took short breaths whilst he choked you.

"Mm...!" You whimpered in the kiss as he pulled away from your lips reluctantly, your arms wrapped around his neck and your legs wrapped around his waist.

"I-I'm gonna c-cum...ngh...h-haah!" You moaned out loudly, not caring if anyone heard you anymore. "S-shit...how'd you become tighter? ...I'm gonna cum too, baby." Kai groaned out as his thrusts became slower.

At this point, your friend in the other stall had came numerous times in his hand, and so did the other guys at the other stalls...

But you both didn't care anymore. You knew that you were his. He gave you one last thrust before releasing inside of you, you could feel his hot and gooey seed fill you up as you orgasmed as well.

Very lewd and pornographic moans came from your throat as the other guys couldn't help but imagine what it would've been like to fuck you.

You leaned your head back, breathless as he panted softly. You turned your head away from him, a shy habit you always did after sex. He grabbed your face softly but firmly and turned your head towards him.

"Baby, only look at me. Okay?" Kai said in a quiet, possessive tone. "'Kay..." You nodded softly as he pulled out from your hole. You could feel his cum dribbling out from your ass as you struggled to stand up.

He felt proud of his work as you both got out of ths stall, messily dressed, Kai's coat draped over your shoulders as the other guys opened their stall doors to look at you.

You both didn't care anymore though, you looked at Kai with a loving smile and leaned your head on his shoulder as he grabbed your waist comfortingly.

He knew you'd only look at him.

#male reader #x male reader #bottom male reader #x bottom reader #sub male reader #oc x male reader #gay