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shuaflix · 8 months

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kim mingyu’s (unhelpful) guide to losing your virginity

❝ you’re telling me that you, Miss Dick Repellent, had sex with Captain Chastity By Choice over here. ❞

PAIRING ▸ kim mingyu x fem!reader

GENRES ▸ smut, fluff, humor, college au, best friends to lovers au, friends with benefits au

WARNINGS ▸ profanity, alcohol consumption, rated m for mingyu, slow burn, he fell first but she fell harder but then he tripped and ate shit, probably the most self-indulgent thing i’ve written, mingyu and mc are both virgins, sexual content, sexual tension, protected and unprotected sex (i would not advise doing the latter), lots of teasing and banter, oral (f. and m. receiving), fingering, wall sex, couch sex, public sex, mingyu discovers what pasties are, soonyoung orders 20 connect fours, they are avid enjoyers of the barbie movies

SUMMARY ▸ after accidentally telling your friends that kim mingyu took your virginity (he didn't), you’re shocked when he proposes to relieve you of the fabled v-card for good (he does).

PLAYLIST ▸ perfect by one direction • spell by niki • fatal flaw by ellise • give me a kiss by lolo zouaï • step? by bibi

WORD COUNT ▸ 31,273 words

AUTHOR’S NOTE ▸ someone (fia) once told me i write too many college aus. i said yeah ur right. and i’m gonna do it again

“BIRDS AND BEES CANNOT PHYSICALLY FUCK.”

You sounded more distressed than informative while you were trying to reason with your longtime best friend, Kim Mingyu. He, on the other hand, appeared visibly worked up over this childish level of argument you two were having.

“It is a metaphor,” he said. “Everyone knows birds and bees aren’t screwing each other up in the trees.”

You still couldn’t wrap your head around it. Hours ago, you had fucked yourself over after Kwon Soonyoung had casually brought up the topic of body counts. After everyone in your friend group went around listing theirs (Soonyoung: 3; Jungwoo: 3; Minghao: 2; Vernon: 5), you accidentally blurted out that your body count actually existed—one, to be exact.

This was a problem because, to everyone’s prior knowledge, you were a virgin.

Sure, you kissed a few guys before—maybe had a few heated makeout sessions—but you never really went all the way. Yeah, Mark Lee was coming onto you freshman year, but before he could start sliding his hand down your pants, you nearly screamed and killed the vibe. It was safe to say that Mark never thought about trying to get with you again.

After being barraged with questions about who finally claimed your v-card, you decided to blurt out the one name that felt the safest to you.

And that was Kim Mingyu.

Now, you and Mingyu had been friends for a long time, dating back to your freshman year of college when he wound up being your dorm neighbor. After about a month of Mingyu only knocking on your door to use your printer or air fryer, your relationship finally upgraded to having semi-deep conversations and going to the dining hall together. Eventually, Kim Mingyu became a staple in your life—or perhaps more like a pesky gnat you couldn’t get rid of.

Either way, since you figured that Mingyu was equally as sexually inexperienced as you were, you felt as though your safest bet was to keep your secret with him. This way, the both of you could finally not be labeled as the friend group’s token virgins.

To make matters worse, though, you didn’t expect your friends to have such a dramatic reaction to the news. They were convinced that you and Mingyu were going at it every night. In reality, he was only coming over to your apartment at the dead of night because his fridge had been broken since September. You made a pact with him that you two would take turns cooking every other day, and today was his turn.

(You secretly looked forward to the days when he would cook. Mingyu’s culinary skills were surprisingly top-notch. You were pretty sure his flavor palate was 250% more refined than the average human, considering he could tell apart regular butter from I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.)

So, while Mingyu was frying salmon, you were bombarding him with questions about sex. After all, if you were now living your life as a self-proclaimed non-virgin, then you had to educate yourself on the birds and the bees.

That was where the argument arose because what the fuck did the birds and the bees have to do with anything?

“So why do they use the birds and the bees?” you asked. “Why don’t they use, like, the butterflies and the bees? You know, pollination? I feel like that makes more sense.”

“It’s ‘cause birds hatch eggs, which is supposed to symbolize, like, female ovulation,” Mingyu explained, “and bees pollinating flowers is for male fertilization.”

You leaned back in your seat, absolutely mind-blown. Mingyu took your silence as understanding and turned on you, pointing his large cooking tongs in your direction.

“You’re way too innocent to be telling everyone we slept together,” he said. “I’d start watching porn or something, ‘cause asking me about the symbolism of the birds and bees isn’t gonna cut it. That’s middle school behavior, Y/N.”

Your cheeks heated up with embarrassment. “I’m not innocent! I know how sex works; I just don’t understand how you like… you know, do the deed.”

Mingyu snorted. “You can’t even say it properly!”

“Can to!” you fired back before folding your arms across your chest. “I just choose not to because of my Miranda Rights. You know, my right to remain silent and all that.”

“I don’t think that applies here.”

“It can.”

“Yeah, okay. But not when Soonyoung asked about your body count?”

“You’re not still upset about me telling the group we slept together, right? I swear it was a total—”

“Of course I’m upset, Y/N,” he interjected. “I wanted my first time to be my first time, and you just told everyone we fucked like it was nothing.”

Yeah, it was safe to say that the tension between you and Mingyu had been growing for a while. You two still hung out as usual, but he would sometimes drop passive-aggressive comments about your fuck-up that would make you feel miserable for the rest of the day. There wasn’t anything you could do but apologize, especially when Mingyu insisted that you two keep up the farce so that your friends wouldn’t get on your back for being a liar.

You could tell he cared—deep, deep down—about how this would affect you. Honestly, he was too good for you.

“Anyway, we can’t do anything about it now, so let’s drop it.” He sighed, and the only sounds you could hear for a moment were the fan running and the salmon sizzling on the pan. You waited until Mingyu started plating the food. “Dinner’s ready.”

For a few minutes, you two ate in utter silence. The only sounds in the room were the occasional scraping noises of fork against plate.

Mingyu decided to speak up. “I submitted one of the pictures I took to an art gallery.”

“Oh, really? The sunset ones you took when you went camping with Jungwoo?” you asked.

“Yeah, a few of the ones I developed looked really good, so he suggested I try sending them in. They haven’t reached out yet, but I’m hoping they put it up for their exhibition.”

“That’s sick. I’ll go see it with you if they put your work up.”

You two relapsed into silence after Mingyu hummed appreciatively. He was back to chewing his thoughts away while you wanted to crawl in a hole and die.

“I fucked up, Gyu,” you admitted. “I really fucked up. I’m sorry.”

He smiled one of those lopsided, easygoing grins that could put anyone at ease. Yet, you still felt disheartened that he knew exactly what you were referring to.

“It’s whatever. At least you saved us from being asked if we’re still virgins.”

“I feel like I’m living a lie,” you grumbled. “It’s been eating at me for the past week. I might just fess up to Soonyoung.”

“You do know he’s gonna get mad at you for lying about something so petty.”

“But it’s even worse if he finds out later on!”

Mingyu just hummed in response, brows knitted together like he was pondering over something.

“Yeah, I guess,” was all he said, ending the discourse as he set your plate of food down in front of you on the dining table. You poked at the delectable salmon with your fork. “Don’t worry about what Soonyoung thinks. Sex isn’t something you can just jump into if you’re not ready.”

“But I am ready,” you complained between mouthfuls of food. “Every time I’m in the mood, I get so close and then chicken out. Maybe I’m just not doing it with the right person.”

“That would also be an important factor.”

You shook your head to dismiss the topic. “Whatever. Maybe they won’t bother us about it now that they think the deed’s done.”

“Maybe,” Mingyu echoed, although clear uncertainty hung in those syllables.

Once, in high school, you lied to your P.E. teacher about being on your period so that you wouldn’t have to participate in swimming for a week. On another occasion, you lied to your parents about going to your friend’s house to work on a group project so that you could actually drink alcohol for the first time.

Lying to Kwon Soonyoung was a whole other realm of difficulty.

It had been less than a day since you and Mingyu brushed off your lie that blew out of proportion. You were stupid to think that it wouldn’t haunt you further because Minghao wore a simpering smile on his face as soon as he saw you and Mingyu walk into the library together.

As soon as you two took your seats at your friend group’s respective table, Soonyoung and Jungwoo immediately started hounding you with more questions. Mingyu was clearly irritated—whether that was because he didn’t want the topic brought up again or he didn’t appreciate Soonyoung getting distracted from their little app developing session, you had no idea. They must have been excited now that they had both of their targets to harass.

“You are never willing to put out,” your bewildered friend rambled, “and you’re telling me that you, Miss Dick Repellent, had sex with Captain Chastity By Choice over here.”

“Wow,” Mingyu spoke up. “That was, like, the worst possible way to phrase that.”

You frowned. “Dick repellent?”

“C’mon, everyone here knows about the whole Mark-gate incident.”

You rolled your eyes. “Look, whatever went down between Mingyu and I just… happened. I have nothing else to say on the matter.”

“You know what just happens?” Vernon Chwe, who normally kept his two cents to himself, decided to blurt out. “Losing your passport. That’s the kind of thing that just happens.” The sour tone his voice took on indicated that he was still bitter about showing up at the airport with Boo Seungkwan for his Italy trip last summer without his passport. “But sex? That doesn’t just happen. It’s a process.”

“Unless you were under the influence,” Minghao added. Then, he turned to you and Mingyu with curious eyes. “Were you drunk? High? Coked out?”

Obviously, you and Mingyu weren’t smart enough to cover all the bases of your lie, so neither of you planned out a story beforehand. Taken by surprise, he ended up stuttering, “N-no?”

“So it didn’t just happen,” Jungwoo said with a grin. “You two knew what you were doing.”

“I think you guys are making this way deeper than it actually is,” you replied. “We were just horny and things ended up going that way. That’s all there is to it.”

Minghao snickered. “I don’t believe that for one second.”

“Well, you should,” you started, voice rising along with your temper, “because Mingyu’s hot, and it’s perfectly normal for a young woman to want to have sex with someone who looks like a walking wet dream!”

Your table fell silent, and you suddenly wished you had dramatically stormed away after your (loud) confession. There was nothing subtle about the judgment and concern in everyone’s eyes, but most importantly, you were horrified to see Mingyu’s equally horrified reaction to your outburst.

“Walking wet dream,” Soonyoung parroted in a quieter voice, amusement tugging at his lips. “I’m gonna make that his contact name now.”

Jungwoo shrugged. “Well, I guess it checks out. Mingyu did say he found Y/N cute for a while.”

Your cheeks burned. He found you cute?

Mingyu, who was now blushing tomato red, covered his face with his hands and groaned. If you weren’t so mortified about embarrassing yourself and Mingyu in front of your entire friend group earlier, then you might have found him a little adorable.

So, you fucked up. Again.

You played out your conversation with your friends about five different times, thinking of various outcomes that could have taken place instead. If you didn’t blurt out the first thing that came to your head on impulse, then maybe you wouldn’t have dug a deeper hole for yourself.

Plus, you had to deal with Mingyu now.

Jungwoo’s words kept parroting in your head like a broken record. Cute. What did that mean, anyway? Squirrels were cute, and you were hoping you had enough sex appeal to not be put on the same tier as squirrels.

Of course, you ended up leaving the library after mumbling some excuse about having to attend a professor’s office hours. Although that was a complete lie, your friends seemed to buy it. You thought you were off the hook until you received a text from your friend.

mingyu: can we talk later?

You didn’t know what to think. If this lie of yours ended up breaking your friendship with Mingyu for good, you weren’t sure if you would ever be able to forgive yourself. So, you settled for curling up on your couch and spooning ice cream into your mouth until the pain subsided.

It was nearly midnight when the knock came at your door.

When you opened it, the very man you didn’t want to see was standing big and tall. You were tempted to close the door on Mingyu, but there was no point in pushing him away even more.

“I forgot to reply to your text,” you said.

“I know.” Mingyu looked you up and down, which you couldn’t help but blush at, but you figured he was just eyeing your Hello Kitty pajamas. “Can I come in?”

You opened the door wider, allowing him to step inside. “Are you here to yell at me?”

“No, although I should after what you pulled,” he teased, and you were grateful that he sounded lighthearted again. The tension was still thick, though, and you were certain it was because of the indirect confessions of attraction you both let slip. “I’m here to make a proposal.”

“What is it?”

Mingyu shrugged off his jacket, revealing his toned, muscular arms. You wondered just how much work he put into bulking up at the gym, and then your thoughts started to drift elsewhere. Thinking about how buff his chest was, thinking about how broad his shoulders were, thinking about how—

“A solution to both of our problems,” Mingyu interrupted your thoughts as he took a seat on your couch. He pointed at the bowl of ice cream you left on a cushion. “Is this cookies and cream?”

“Yeah, you can have some.” You took a seat next to him and inquired, “So… explain.”

“Okay, uh, well…” He trailed off, trying some of the ice cream after fiddling with the spoon for minutes. “Hey, this is really good ice cream.”

You gently pushed his spoon down before he could scoop more into his mouth. “Gyu, get to the point already.”

“I never noticed your coffee table was such a nice shade of brown.”

“Mingyu.”

“Could this be mahogany?”

“Mingyu.”

“Alright, alright.” He sighed, turning his head down ever-so-slightly. You were a little terrified that he was going to go on a spiel about ending the friendship, but then he said, “We’re both in predicaments. Our friends won’t leave us alone about the sex thing and you’re still heated about being a virgin. I mean, I’m also tired of my partner being my right hand, so like…”

Oh god. Mingyu was going to ask you to have sex. Kim Mingyu was about to get in your pants right now.

And were you against it? Not at all. The only thing that worried you was that you weren’t sure if you were ready—for sex and potentially blurring the lines of friendship between you and Mingyu.

“So, what are you getting at?” you asked, trying to play off your unnaturally high-pitched voice with a cough.

“Well, after that uncomfortable conversation earlier, I was just thinking… I clearly find you attractive and you find me attractive,” he said, and when he ducked his head a little, you could see the tips of his ears flaming red. “I’m saying I’m down for you to be my first.”

You willed yourself not to stammer over your words as you said, “I thought you wanted your first time to be special.”

“I do,” he mumbled. “That’s why I started thinking about it seriously after you called me a—”

“You don’t have to repeat it,” you cut him off quickly, your face feeling hot again. “But yeah, I’ve always thought you were hot—um, objectively. I didn’t think you thought the same about me, though.”

“Yeah, I do,” he replied shyly, “but I also know you’ve tried to have sex multiple times and back out whenever you get close.” Before you could respond, Mingyu pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and set it down between you two. “That’s why I made this.”

You eyed the paper curiously, glancing at Mingyu for his approval to go ahead and open it. When he gestured for you to do so, you picked it up and unfolded it.

(EX) VIRGIN CONTRACT

Both parties may request whatever they want to try

Either party may approve or deny the other’s request

The contract ends at either party’s request

The friendship must not be ruined, and if the friendship is ever in danger of being ruined, the contract will be terminated.

“I figured it would be less intimidating with you since we both have no idea what’s going on,” Mingyu continued. “This way we can explore whatever we want without judgment.”

(Mingyu would never admit it to you, but part of him was eager to see you underneath him with that shy expression of yours melting away into pure, unadulterated lust. And you would never admit that you wouldn’t exactly hate that.)

“I’m not gonna lie,” you started, “I think we would be bullied even more for this.”

“That’s the unspoken rule number five,” he explained. “We keep whatever this is between ourselves. I know you struggle in that area, but—”

“Oh, shut up.” You couldn’t help but giggle as you set the paper down. “I don’t know…”

“Take your time to think it over.”

“Actually, I’ve made up my mind. Let’s do it.”

Mingyu did a double take, his features curiously pulling together. “Um, I meant that you could take a few days. Not milliseconds.”

There was a reason as to why you caved quickly. Your thoughts had been running at a billion miles per hour for the entirety of your conversation with Mingyu. You were confident that your decision was well-calculated.

Did you want to fuck Mingyu? Yes.

Were you terrified of possibly ruining your friendship? Absolutely.

However, considering the conversation had already happened, the course of your friendship had drastically changed already. The only thing even more potentially damaging than bringing physical intimacy into the relationship was rejecting this offer. If you turned Mingyu down now, your interactions with him would soon fizzle into awkward, cordial small talk.

“Hey, I think it’d be fun,” you decided to say instead of giving him the rundown of your internal crisis.

“Really? You’re sure?”

“I wouldn’t agree to it if I wasn’t. I mean, it’s a big proposal.”

He gave you one of his lopsided smiles. “Right. I didn’t wanna rush into it or anything, but I think we should talk about it more when you’re ready.” Mingyu picked up the remote and handed it to you. “So, wanna get back to our Barbie marathon? We’re on Fairytopia, right?”

“Yeah,” you agreed, taking the remote from him with a touch of disappointment settling into your bones. Part of you was hoping he would get to it right away. “Yeah, we can talk about it later.”

You two did not talk about it.

It had been approximately six days and Mingyu had not reached out once about your contract. You were starting to think that you should have added some sort of clause about response time because the silence was killing you.

The next time you saw him was at a Kappa Sigma party. Soonyoung and Jungwoo always extended an invite to you, which was nice because that meant you could walk right in without being checked out and approved by some frat brother. You would normally drag Shin Ryujin along with you, but she insisted that she wouldn’t be able to wake up for her midterm if she went out to drink. Thus, you figured you wouldn’t show up, but after seeing Mingyu in the background of Minghao’s Snapchat story (which was a video of Vernon snorting a line off some girl’s stomach), you got your ass out of bed and threw your sluttiest top on.

Thirty minutes later, there you were, listening to Lee Chan ramble inside of the Kappa Sigma house. Ten feet from your target: Kim Mingyu.

“I got scammed, Y/N,” the frat brother, who was deep in five beers and four vodka shots, ranted to you while occasionally slurring his words. “Soonyoung ropes me into joining for friends, but I already knew all the people in the frat, anyway!” He paused to take another swig of his beer. “Zero benefits! Zero!”

Although you enjoyed Chan’s company, you were really trying to get Mingyu’s attention. Since walking in and waiting for him to approach you didn’t work, you were going to have to march up to him directly. Unfortunately, the drunk freshman in front of you was not helping one bit.

“That blows,” you replied sympathetically, “but at least you get to party, and you don’t have to worry about finding housing.”

Chan scoffed. “Yeah, if I’m not a sober monitor, then I just get alcohol poisoning. I can never win.”

For the next thirty minutes, you ended up listening to Chan drone on about how the world was against him. Eventually, he started to realize that he didn’t have it all that bad, and then he passed out after you helped him to the couch. You gave up on trying to get Mingyu’s attention; all of your attempts had been in vain, and you didn’t want to embarrass yourself.

After talking to Vernon briefly, though, you found the opportunity to strike. Jungwoo announced a game of rage cage, so you were going to expertly place yourself next to Mingyu. Since everyone else would be focused on the game, you would use that chance to invite him to talk privately later.

Your plan was going smoothly until you stood next to Mingyu and realized he was a shot away from blacking out.

“You look like you’ve been through the trenches and back,” you said.

“Can’t tell where the floor is.”

“Under your feet.”

“Wow, you’re right.”

He was most definitely not in the right headspace to have a conversation about the contract—or to have any conversation, really.

“I’ve been wondering if you’d show up,” he continued. “I wanted to see you.”

Curse your heart for fluttering pathetically.

“You did?” you asked.

There was no time for Mingyu to respond because everyone around the table started screaming at you. When you turned your attention back to the game, you realized the red solo cup was in front of you and Vernon was about to stack you.

“Careful, Y/N, Vernon’s been on a roll,” Minghao taunted, eyes lit up with amusement as he watched you fumble with the ping pong ball.

“I have,” Vernon confirmed. From across the table, he smirked at Joshua Hong, who you figured was his victim from the last game.

Your lips curled up in a lazy grin. “Yeah? Let’s see if you can stack me even once.”

So, you lost. Miserably.

Vernon was on a roll, and you formally apologized for ever doubting him. (You apologized after getting stacked for a third time, but Vernon didn’t ease up on you. He was a ruthless killing machine.)

On top of the six times you got stacked, you also ended up being the unfortunate bitch cup receiver. You downed it without too many complaints; you were past the point of scowling through your drinks. It would have been less pathetic if you hadn’t talked yourself up so much.

On the bright side, you and Mingyu had gotten so drunk that Soonyoung ushered you two into his room to sober up. Since Chan had already thrown up on the couch, your friend decided that it was better to make sure you were in close proximity to a toilet.

Soonyoung instructed, “Remember, if you feel like throwing up, make sure you go to the—oh my god, Chan, keep your clothes on!”

He groaned and slammed the door shut so that he could chase after his intoxicated friend. You were just thankful that you weren’t that drunk. The room was starting to spin, however, so you were dreading waking up with a headache in the morning.

“You were terrible today,” Mingyu mumbled. His shoulder brushed against yours, and you ended up leaning against him. “But I’m glad you sucked ass.”

Your lips curled in distaste. “What the hell?”

“I only got stacked once thanks to your god-awful performance.” He let his head hang so that he could suck in a sharp breath. “Wow, I feel like shit.”

“You’re such a bitch,” you complained. “I was gonna ask you something serious, too!”

“Oh, really? What is it?”

“Well, I’m not gonna tell you now!”

You almost stammered at the end of your sentence when you saw Mingyu’s puppy eyes on full display. Despite the pleading look on his face, you couldn’t help but notice the way the stray rays of sunlight that poured into Soonyoung’s room were catching onto Mingyu’s honeyed skin. It made his dark brown eyes look like melted amber.

You weren’t sure if it was the alcohol making you feel hot or if the humidity was created by the drunk college students packed into the house like sardines, but Soonyoung’s room felt balmy. Your shirt clung to the sweat beading your back, but all you could think about was how close you and Mingyu were.

It seemed as though he was thinking the same thing. “We should open a window or something.”

“It’s so hot,” you whined. “Feels like a sauna in here.”

“I know. Soonyoung never opens the windows, even though there’s no air conditioning in here.”

“He should invest in a fan.”

“Yeah, that’s why I like your place. You have a nice cooling system.”

You laughed. Mostly because you had very different intentions for this conversation, and here Mingyu was, talking about your air conditioning.

You were sobering up, but you still felt drunk off Mingyu’s attention.

Like he was sharing a secret, your best friend leaned in close to your ear while trying to suppress a giggle. “Should we get out of here?”

“And go where?”

“Your place. Duh.”

“I don’t know if I can even walk downstairs,” you mumbled, suddenly afraid that he was going to think you were a bore.

“I can,” Mingyu said, and before you knew it, he was kneeling down with his back facing you and his arms reaching back. You just stared at him for a moment before he shot you back a questioning look. “What’re you waiting for? Get on.”

You sort of let your body fall against his, but Mingyu helped you regain your balance almost immediately. He gripped your thighs firmly while you looped your arms around his neck. When he stood up, you almost gasped upon realizing how high up you were. It was in that moment when you were suddenly hyper-aware of how massive he was, how strong his back muscles were, and—

He yelped. “Bug!”

—how this man was terrified of everything under the sun.

If you had Mingyu’s height, you wouldn’t let anything stop you. But here he was, cowering even as he towered over the tiny spider that was crawling across the floor.

“You have got to be kidding,” you deadpanned. “You can so easily step over it.”

“They jump.”

“Name one instance where a spider’s ever jumped on you.”

He stiffened. “Uh, never. But that’s because I avoid them at all costs.”

Eventually, with some persuasion and promises of ice cream at home, Mingyu did manage to step over the beast, which was a common house spider. Kim Mingyu struck gold in the gene pool lottery. It was only fair that he had some stupid-sounding fatal flaw.

You whispered instructions on how to sneak past the crowd and giggled into his ear while he tried to creep downstairs and walk out the front door. Thankfully, the house was so packed that hardly anyone noticed you and Mingyu leaving. Only a few guys outside greeted him, but they were simultaneously puking their guts out.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to the party?” you asked as your chin rested on his shoulder. You were genuinely curious because Mingyu always invited you if there was a party. “I only found out when I saw Minghao’s story.”

“Uh… I was about to text you, but then Soonyoung wouldn’t shut up with the teasing and I didn’t wanna make you uncomfortable if you showed up,” he admitted, and, from where you were, you could see the tip of his ear turning pink. “But I was hoping you’d come on your own.”

You tightened your grip on him. “I wouldn’t have felt uncomfortable.”

There was silence for a while between you two, and you felt like the balmy night air was thick with undiscussed feelings. A topic that you and Mingyu were mindful about skirting around, even when the aftereffects of liquid confidence still coursed through your blood. You could hardly even realize it yourself.

Your chin rested on his shoulder. Mingyu had given you piggyback rides before—back when you two were freshmen and still a little shy around each other. The first time was when you ended up twisting your ankle during a Halloweekend party, resulting in Mingyu offering to carry you back to your dorm. You hadn’t had many guy friends before college, so the thought of casual physical contact with a man was strange to you back then.

Everything slowly started to feel natural between you and Mingyu. Now, it was as if someone took a hammer and smashed your perception to pieces. The air was suddenly stifling and you were overly-conscious about how Mingyu’s chest swelled whenever you adjusted your hold on him.

He set you down once he reached the front door of your building. You had mostly sobered up by now, though you were certain you would lose your footing if you took the stairs instead of the elevator.

By the time you two had reached your door, you were already going off on some tangent about how you technically had more sexual experience than Mingyu, despite your total confusion over the actual mechanics of intercourse.

He kicked off his shoes before walking into your living room. “I think you’re underestimating me. Just because I’m saving my first time doesn’t mean I have zero experience whatsoever.”

“Saving it for me,” you teased.

“God,” Mingyu hissed, pinching the bridge of his nose as if your words were truly headache-inducing (but it was mostly to hide his blush). “I never should’ve told you that.”

“Hey, you can’t take it back now.” A giggle bubbled from your lips. “You think I’m cute.”

“I didn’t say cute.”

“I’m repeating exactly what Jungwoo told me.”

“No, he downplayed it for you. I told him”—Mingyu had turned to you fully, placing his hands on your shoulders and letting them slide down to your forearms—“that you’re…” It was as if he snapped out of some sort of trance, shaking his head to stop himself from rambling. “Never mind. Forget what I said.”

“What?!” you exclaimed, pushing at his chest. Hard. “You can’t just say that and back out!”

He winced, shooting you those puppy dog eyes that always made you melt. “I’ll tell you one day.”

“And that day better be today, ‘cause—”

“One day,” he repeated. “It’s too late now. We have a busy day tomorrow.” Mingyu squeezed your forearms gently before letting go and fishing out his phone and keys from his pockets. “I’ll take the couch.”

“Whoa, hold on. What do we have tomorrow?”

The corner of his lip raised in amusement, nearly going unnoticed. “We have that contract to get to, don’t we?”

Obviously, you weren’t able to get any sleep when Mingyu’s words kept sending butterflies to your stomach.

It took an hour of tossing and turning for you to finally get some sleep. That smirk of his kept replaying in your head, flashing behind your eyes over and over again until you forced yourself to blink the image away.

When you woke up in the morning, it was because Mingyu gently tapped your shoulder until you stirred. Since it was a Saturday, you were hoping to sleep in, although the sunlight making Mingyu’s tanned skin glow under its rays was a pleasant sight to wake to.

He grinned, flashing his brilliant white teeth. “Morning.”

“Good morning.” You yawned. “Was the couch comfy?”

“Yeah, I fucking love your couch,” he said, “but it did get a little lonely out there.”

Your chest seized for a moment. Was that an invitation? Or was he suggesting that you could have joined him? Not to mention you could detect the faintest trace of longing in his eyes.

It was too early in the morning for you to think straight, though, so all you could do was that breathy laugh of yours—the one that always sounded frazzled and nervous. Laugh and change the topic.

“So, why’re you up so early?”

“I gotta meet up with Jeonghan real quick, but I’ll drop by later,” he explained. “Forgot I agreed to go to the gym today.”

You remembered Jeonghan—the cute senior from Kappa Sigma that always brought a different girl to their parties. You had spoken to him once or twice after Soonyoung introduced you. It was all small talk, though, nothing of significance. The only distinct memory you had of Jeonghan was how Soonyoung sent him home in an Uber during one party he was blacking out at last year only for Jeonghan to take that Uber right back to the party.

“Alright,” you mumbled, voice still thick with sleep. “You can take the spare key.”

“Say less.”

After Mingyu left and you stretched in your bed for a while, your phone went off with several texts from Minghao. Some of them were from last night, but you had passed out by the time he started sending them.

hao: dude where are you hao: AND WHERE’S MINGYU hao: we’re about to uber back soon hao: soonyoung said he left u guys in his room and now ur both missing?? hao: wait jk i forgot i have ur locations hao: BRUH hao: oh my god hao: u gmfu hao: psa i will be extremely annoying until you spill everything

hao: GOOD MORNING hao: RISE AND SHINE hao: now spill

y/n: good morning. y/n: dot dot dot

hao: bitch hao: i'm onto you

y/n: 😀 y/n: wanna get breakfast? y/n: we can go to that new açai bowl place that opened up near campus y/n: i can spill then

hao: sure i’ll pick you up in 10

The açai bowl place was unfortunately mediocre.

You were not impressed with the range of toppings and neither was Minghao. You two ended up settling for your regular orders with several inclusions left out. To top it off, the bowls were insanely overpriced, leaving you and Minghao thoroughly unsatisfied.

You sat at one of the tables with him, scooping granola into your mouth as you listened to him talk about his experience at the party. Apparently, Vernon started to black out as soon as they made him do a keg stand, so Minghao and Jungwoo took the liberty of taking him home and tucking him in bed. Soonyoung was scrambling around the house because the party had gotten so out-of-hand that one of the neighbors called the cops on them.

You ended up explaining how you and Mingyu ended up going home, fighting down the heat spreading across your face whenever Minghao would shoot you a knowing look. It was as if he was saying, Oh, man, you two are practically already dating.

“Yeah, and about that,” he started and cleared his throat, “you two are still virgins, right?”

Your jaw went slack for a moment, and all you could do was stare at your friend until he let out a questioning hum.

“What?” Minghao continued. “Okay, I haven’t told the others about what I noticed or anything. I just picked up on it last night.”

You frowned before asking, “You picked up on… my v-card?”

“No.” He scoffed. “I picked up on the way you and Mingyu were acting around each other. If you guys actually had sex, there’s no reason for you to act all shy whenever Mingyu comes near you. So, I concluded that either you two haven’t fucked or you caught feelings for him.”

You swallowed hard. For the most part, Minghao had pieced it together perfectly, but you were unsure about his last presumption.

First of all, you had zero idea that you were acting shy in front of Mingyu last night. Sure, there were moments where you felt like your heart dropped to your stomach, but you didn’t think it was noticeable enough for other people to pick up on it.

Second of all, you were pretty sure you were just caught up in the excitement of potentially having sex with Mingyu. Minghao was probably mistaking your anticipation for an emotion too complex for you to feel for your best friend.

Lastly, he caught your virgin self red-handed. Since you still hadn’t established a proper story with Mingyu yet, there was no way you could defend yourself now. Not when you were blanking on excuses.

“H-huh?”

“You were still acting like Little Miss I’ve Never Felt The Touch Of A Man, is what I’m saying.”

You frowned. Okay, rude.

“Fine. You got me,” you replied, sighing in defeat. “We’re both still virgins. I really fucked up when I started running my mouth in front of you guys.”

Minghao almost seemed alarmed for a moment, but his expression relaxed. Slowly, his smile tugged into a proper laugh. It wasn’t enough to wipe the mortified expression off your face, though; in fact, you felt even more humiliated.

“I knew it,” he said. “I knew there was something fishy about your story!”

“Please don’t tell the others,” you begged. “Soonyoung’s gonna hate me if he finds out I lied to him.”

Kwon Soonyoung was especially sensitive about lying. Most people were, of course, but Soonyoung prioritized trust in his relationships, whether they were platonic or romantic. Once, when he found out his ex-girlfriend lied about where she would go on Friday nights, he broke up with her a week later.

You weren’t sure how he would react to your lie, but you weren’t enthusiastic about finding out.

“You’re gonna tell him eventually, though, right?”

You sighed. “I know I have to eventually. I just have to find the right timing. Things got complicated between Mingyu and I, so I’m trying to figure that out first.”

Minghao took a sip from his Coca-Cola. “What happened between you and Mingyu?”

You swallowed down a mouthful of açai and granola before explaining, “So, basically, to clear up the lie about Mingyu and I, we’ve decided to lose our virginities to each other.”

“You’re losing your virginity… to cover up a lie?”

“No! I mean, technically yes, but, like, I just think—”

“Listen,” he interrupted. “I know you’re terrible at math, but let’s put two and two together here.” Despite the offense drawn across your face, he continued, “Mingyu’s been saving himself for that ‘special someone,’ so obviously, he wouldn’t just lose his virginity to anyone.”

“You’re saying he’s gonna back out?”

“I’m saying—” Minghao cut himself off and a smile spread across his face. “You know what, I’m gonna let you figure that out for yourself. My work here is officially done.”

“What?! You can’t just say that and give me no context!”

He folded his arms across his chest. “Vernon told me not to meddle, so I’m going to keep my mouth shut until you see it for yourself.”

“See what for myself?” you asked with an exasperated sigh.

“You’ll see.”

When you got home, Mingyu was already in your house with a large whiteboard in the center of your living room. Before you even opened your mouth to ask where the hell it came from, he explained that he “borrowed” it from the community room downstairs. (You made a mental note to return it before anyone noticed it missing.)

Your head was still turning after your conversation with Minghao, and you weren’t all that great at hiding your expression. As soon as you made eye contact with Mingyu, you could tell he knew something was up.

“Did something happen?” he asked.

“Nothing, I’m fine,” you replied as you shrugged off your jacket. “How was the gym? Also, why the whiteboard?”

He grinned. Scrawled on the board in blue Expo marker were both of your names as headers for columns. Mingyu handed you a black marker and stood with one hand gripping the top of the board.

“Step one,” he started. “We write down anything we wanna try, and then we approve or veto the options.”

You uncapped the marker. “Anything?”

“Anything.”

“No judgment?”

“No judgment.”

You started writing down whatever desires you had pushed down for years. Albeit short, you figured they covered all the bases. Weeks ago, you wouldn’t have dreamed of admitting any of them to Mingyu; now that your relationship with him took a turn, however, it wasn’t so hard to reveal them.

Next to you, Mingyu was shamelessly jotting sex positions down like he had them memorized. You peeked at his list out of the corner of your eye and nearly did a spit take. The first one on your list was kissing, but Mingyu had started off with anal.

Although he agreed to zero judgment, you were finding it hard to feel the same way.

Once you two were done, you stepped back to look at the whiteboard with its two complete lists side-by-side. Mingyu’s list was considerably longer than yours, but you stood by your own. You felt as though yours was more natural, more gradual.

Y/N

Kissing

Neck kissing

Touching

Penetrative sex

MINGYU

Anal

Cowgirl

Wall sex

Public sex

Phone sex

It had come to your attention that Mingyu, like every other man, was incredibly horny.

You had been worrying about the act of sex itself for ages, and your best friend was suggesting something far beyond your capabilities? You weren’t even considering doing anal in the next ten years, let alone for the sake of your contract.

Mingyu snorted. “Kissing.”

“You said no judgment!”

“I thought it was cute, that’s all,” he said, holding his hands up in surrender.

“Anyway, anal?” You scoffed. “I don’t know if your list is exactly beginner level.”

“Well, that’ll just make you an expert by the end of this, won’t it?”

You couldn’t stop your cheeks from heating up. “Okay, how about we start with my much more reasonable list, and then we can get to your scary, intimidating one once we actually, um… do the deed.”

“You have seriously got to start just saying sex.”

“Shut up.”

Mingyu’s smirk was not helping your blush one bit, so you just pretended the embarrassing warmth spreading across your chest didn’t exist. Instead, you grabbed the whiteboard eraser to wipe off the ink from the word anal.

Your best friend slash fuckbuddy let out a petulant whine, so you smacked his bicep.

“I approve of the others for now,” you started shyly, “but we start yours after my list is finished. Do you have anything from mine that you don’t approve of?”

The question wasn’t very sensible, considering all of your list was a prerequisite for more than half of Mingyu’s list. However, after your conversation with Minghao, you were still unsure if Mingyu actually wanted to go all the way with you.

“Nope,” he answered, smiling at you with questioning eyes as if his answer had already been clear as day. “Your list is pretty tame, y’know? Not that it’s a problem or anything.”

Before you could answer, he sucked in a sharp breath and looked over at the board again. “Actually, maybe we should get rid of your first one. It might mess with, uh, rule four.”

Ah, the fourth rule: The friendship must not be ruined, and if the friendship was ever in danger of being ruined, the contract would be terminated.

You were devastated that it had come back to bite you in the ass.

In an attempt to veil your disappointment, you shrugged and turned your head away so that your best friend wouldn’t see the rejection clouding your eyes.

“I’m just curious, but why’re you against kissing?” you asked. “I mean, I just feel like it’ll be awkward if we don’t.”

“You know, it’s the whole neurotransmitters and dopamine rush thing, Y/N,” he explained. If you weren’t feeling so miserable about your best friend turning you down, then you probably would have giggled at his random neuroscience tidbit. “It’s such an emotional act.”

Part of you understood Mingyu’s reasoning behind avoiding kissing. If you were so affected just by his words and eye contact now, then kissing him would mess with your emotions. You weren’t exactly sure if you held kissing at more of a sentimental level as Mingyu did, but you agreed that it intensified intimacy.

Before you were about to hesitantly accept his words, though, Mingyu added, “Judas, in fact, betrayed Jesus with a kiss.”

You couldn’t believe those words came out of his mouth.

“Yeah,” you started, “I don’t think these situations are comparable.”

After gingerly prying the whiteboard eraser from your fingers, Mingyu crossed out “kissing” from your column. The dried ink from the dry erase marker streaked across the board, leaving fragments of ink scattered about that he didn’t bother wiping off. (You were a little distracted by the little zap of electricity that coursed through your veins after his fingers brushed against yours.)

Without missing a beat, Mingyu asked, “You don’t have, like, crabs or anything, right?”

“You’re accusing me of having pubic lice?”

“Well, when you put it like that,” he mumbled, “I guess it sort of sounds like I am. I mean, I don’t actually think you have crabs! I just—you know… it’s good to ask.”

“No, Mingyu, I don’t have crabs.”

“Good, good.” His voice trailed off awkwardly and he leaned against the frame of the whiteboard. His unrelaxed mannerisms were making you feel nervous. “That’s always good.”

“Do you have crabs?”

“I do. Her name’s Clawdia, but with a w, like claw.”

“Mingyu,” you warned.

“I’m kidding.” He held his hands up in defense. “No crabs here. Except Clawdia, but she belongs to Wonwoo.”

You rolled your eyes. Mingyu’s roommate since freshman year, Jeon Wonwoo, was someone you surprisingly didn’t have a lot of interactions with despite him and Mingyu being best friends. Whenever you went over to Mingyu’s place, Wonwoo was normally locked up in his room, either studying or gaming away.

Apparently, he also owned a crab.

“Alright, so,” you started in a small voice, “when do we start?”

His eye contact was galvanizing, sending little currents shooting up your spine. For a moment, you felt like you couldn’t breathe. All you could think about was how brown Mingyu’s eyes were and how they swallowed you whole whenever his gaze set on you.

Normally, you could see glimmers of sunlight dancing across his irises. Now, the look in his eyes was almost ferocious, like two voids that sucked you in.

His lips were pressed together in a thin line, and you almost picked up on the raised pitch of his voice when he proposed, “How about later?”

“Later sounds perfect.”

Telling white lies became increasingly easier around Kim Mingyu.

Later never came.

You were starting to experience major déjà vu because it was so like Mingyu to chicken out after giving his word. Not one phone call or text to meet up, nor did you two bring it up in day-to-day conversations.

On one particular night, though, Mingyu sent you a semi-suggestive message, asking for permission to come over. Since you figured you would be in for a long night, you made sure to shave and spritzed yourself all over with your favorite Givenchy perfume. To your dismay, Mingyu was quick to mention that he wanted to continue your Barbie movie marathon. You begrudgingly spent your night watching Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses.

(And you swore his fingers brushed against yours under the blanket you two shared, but when you glanced up at his face, flickering with the shifting TV light, he pulled his hand back faster than it happened.)

The very moment a Barbie movie would start playing, you knew that absolutely nothing would happen between you and Mingyu. And, even if he tried to initiate anything, you wouldn’t reciprocate because there was no fucking way you would taint your wholesome Barbie marathon experience with sexual intercourse.

A week flew by without any follow-up on the contract, but you supposed you were partly to blame, too. There were several times where you could have brought up the topic yourself, but you were just as hesitant as Mingyu. Talking about it was one thing, but acting on your hormones was a feat of its own.

All the waiting and anticipation over Mingyu hopefully making a move was simply making you hornier. It was hard to even think properly whenever you started daydreaming of his lips on top of yours, dragging down your neck, moving down your body—

“—and that’s why you will be receiving twenty boxes of Connect Fours.” Soonyoung finished, causing you to snap out of whatever fantasy was playing in your head.

You blinked. “Excuse me?”

“I don’t really know how to articulate myself better here,” he said. “Twenty boxes of Connect—”

“No, no, I heard what you said,” you interrupted, “but why the fuck?”

He waved your question off. “That’s not important. What’s important is that you let me know when you get those twenty boxes.” He flashed you a grin and a thumbs-up when you just nodded, dazed. “Thanks. This is why I love you.”

You took a nervous sip from your vanilla milkshake. (Soonyoung worked for the Undergraduate Student Council, which meant you could exploit him for his free dining dollars.)

You couldn’t help but feel crushing guilt every time you spoke to Soonyoung, especially when you two were hanging out one-on-one like this. Mingyu had been harping on and on about how it wasn’t that big of a deal, but maybe it was because the thought of losing your virginity was such a huge deal to you that you kept brooding over your lie.

And, to make matters worse, all you could think about was Mingyu because you were horny out of your mind. The longer he stayed away from you, the longer you kept thinking about him. You almost wished he hadn’t initiated this stupid contract if he wasn’t going to follow through with it.

“Hey, look, it’s your walking wet dream,” Soonyoung said, and lo and behold, there he was: Kim Mingyu fitted in a sleeveless white shirt and gray sweatpants.

He was walking with Jungwoo, whom you assumed came from the gym, too. Mingyu’s hair was damp and matted to his neck, and his muscles were accentuated by a faint sheen of sweat. They didn’t notice you and Soonyoung at first, too occupied with their own conversation, but after Soonyoung hollered from the table you two were sitting at, the two men started looking around until they spotted you.

Maybe you were seeing things, but it was almost like Mingyu seized up at the sight of you.

“Y/N!” Jungwoo was looking at you as if a lightbulb just went off in his head. “I’m formally inviting you to join Kappa Sigma in Vegas this weekend.” When you were about to protest, he continued, “Apparently, Chan’s date flaked on him last minute, so he’s looking for someone else to go with him.”

You folded your arms across your chest. “So what’s the catch?”

“No catch. You get to go to Vegas for free and hang out with me and Soonyoung.”

“Seriously?”

Soonyoung grinned. “C’mon, it’s Sin City.”

Mingyu scoffed. “Wait, this weekend? Isn’t that kind of short notice?”

“It’s Vegas, and everything’s covered. All you have to do is pack a bag or two.” Jungwoo clicked his tongue before patting Mingyu’s chest. “You won’t mind, right? Y’know, since you two fucked and all.”

“Jungwoo!” you screeched, horrified by his blunt wording.

“What? It’s true.”

Mingyu lowered his gaze. “It just happened once. No big deal.”

“See, Mingyu doesn’t have any hard feelings,” Soonyoung said, elbowing you gently in an attempt to lighten your mood. “You have Chan’s number, right? Just shoot him a text when you decide.”

You nodded half-heartedly. Some sort of sick grief pressed against your lungs, snaking its way up your throat and making it hard to breathe. It grew hotter and hotter until you had to swallow it down before any tears started rolling down your cheeks.

“We gotta get to our next class,” Jungwoo said, jerking a thumb in Mingyu’s direction, “but just say yes! Think about it: free hotel, free transportation, free drinks—we’ve got you covered.”

“Yeah,” you muttered, huffy. “Maybe I will.”

You felt stupid. Completely and utterly stupid.

Kim Mingyu, although easy on the eyes, was proving to be quite difficult for your heart.

It wasn’t like you two were dating, nor had either of you even kickstarted your friends with benefits relationship, so there was no reason for you to be upset over his words. As many times as you tried to push it down, you kept seeing his twisted expression when he uttered those three words that pricked you like thorns. No big deal.

No big deal that you felt like crying your eyes out over Kim Mingyu, who wasn’t even anything to you other than a friend. No big deal that you were curled up on your couch, watching a TV show that you were barely paying attention to, but the noise made you feel less alone. No big deal that you were scooping your cookies and cream ice cream into your mouth, thinking about how it was his favorite flavor.

The stupid part was that Mingyu was just covering up your mess. You two didn’t even have sex, and he was just going along with the lie that you came up with. There was no logical reason for you to be mad at him.

And you realized that logic wasn’t often involved in matters of the heart, anyway.

A knock came at your door at approximately 9:15 p.m.—right when you were about to take a shower and drag yourself to bed. You figured it was Mingyu before you even opened it because no one else would show up uninvited.

“Hey,” he said, taking note of your disheveled appearance with an agonizingly slow sweep of his eyes. An ugly part of your heart wanted to believe he possibly could have been checking you out. “Are you busy right now?”

“I was just doing my assignment, but it’s due tomorrow, so I’m chilling.”

“Sorry, I should’ve called or texted.”

You shook your head. “No, it’s all good. Did you need anything?”

You could see him visibly swallow before asking, “Can I come in?” As soon as you opened the door wider, letting Mingyu step through the entry-way, he turned to you and let his shoulders sag. “I feel like I fucked up somehow.”

“You didn’t fuck up,” you said, keeping your back turned to him as you closed and locked your door. Your hand lingered on the door knob for a moment until you pulled away and headed to your living room, hardly sparing Mingyu a glance. “You were just covering for our lie.”

That clearly wasn’t what was plaguing Mingyu, though. Even after you clarified that he hadn’t done anything wrong, it still looked like something was bothering him. His eyes were hard and his jaw was jutting out, which was what his face usually set into when he was sulking.

“Are you really going to Vegas?” he asked, then added, “With Chan?”

You shrugged. “I don’t know yet. It sounds fun. I mean, they’re covering practically everything for me, so I might.”

The reality was that you didn’t care if you went to Vegas or not. Sure, you were more interested after finding out that you didn’t have to pay for transportation or the hotel. Plus, getting to spend time with Jungwoo and Soonyoung away from your college town sounded like a fun experience.

However, you didn’t like the idea of being Chan’s replacement date. You also didn’t want him to feel obligated to go with you just because he had no one else to go with. You also didn’t know what being his date actually entailed because you didn’t want the whole weekend to consist of his frat brothers egging him on to make a move on you.

Like Mingyu said, it was short notice. You were definitely going to feel stressed about making plans for Vegas when it was days away. Not only did you have to pack, but you had to make sure you were all caught up on your schoolwork before you spent your weekend drinking and partying. It didn’t help that you weren’t even done with your assignments due tomorrow.

Mingyu frowned. “You do realize it’s this weekend, right? And you’re probably gonna have to skip your Friday classes to make it.”

“Yeah, I realize that.” You scoffed. “I don’t see why it concerns you, though, considering you and I have both skipped classes before just because we didn’t feel like going. Do you not want me to go or something?”

“It’s completely your decision.”

“If it’s completely my decision, then why are you here? And why are we talking about this?”

He faltered, stammering over words that he couldn’t string together before saying, “Look, it’s your choice whether you go or not. I’m not gonna sit here and tell you I don’t want you to go.”

You paused. A stupid jolt of your heart made you ask, “You don’t want me to go?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You literally just did.”

Mingyu took a moment to replay his own words in his head, his expression morphing from confused to dumbfounded in a matter of seconds. He opened and closed his mouth a few times before letting out a heavy sigh.

“Okay, yeah,” he said, “but I didn’t say that to change your mind or anything.”

“Well, if you’re gonna bring it up, then at least give me a reason to stay,” you said with an exasperated breath, “or else why should I pass up a free trip to Vegas?”

He pulled away quicker than it happened. One minute you were frustrated, and the next you felt Mingyu’s soft lips pressed against yours for a brief moment. Then, you were frustrated again because it was over so soon. You were blinking away your shock as Mingyu’s hair tickled your face before pulling back.

He kissed you.

Kim Mingyu kissed you.

“You could just stay here,” he murmured in that velvety voice of his, reaching over to card a hand through your hair, brushing that one spot under your ear that made you shudder, “with me.”

Your eyes followed his movements while the rest of your body was frozen, stunned by the sudden physical contact. Mingyu’s voice grew huskier and his eyes darker, but all you could think about were how big his hands were as his fingers ghosted your collarbone.

His lips tugged up in amusement because from one glance, anyone could tell he had an effect on you. There was no denying the electric current running through your body; it was making it harder and harder for you to resist him.

You wasted no time in pulling him down by his collar and kissed him with earnest longing tucked into the corners of your lips.

He didn��t reciprocate until his eyes glazed over with lust, and then Mingyu was grabbing at your waist and pulling you closer. His touch burned, nearly making you flinch underneath the pads of his fingers. If you were being perfectly honest with yourself, there were times where you imagined his lips on yours like this—a thought that crept into your head whenever you saw girls chatting him up at parties.

In sophomore year, Mingyu had a thing with a girl named Hayoung for a few months. There wasn’t a party that would go by without you seeing Mingyu in a corner with her, whispering little secrets that they would laugh at. That was also the year when you became scarily good at hiding your lingering stares. You eventually mastered the art of people-watching without being caught.

And, deep down, you were probably jealous.

And that was probably why you felt like you were in the clouds when Mingyu’s lips were finally on yours.

The two of you were soon engulfed in a cloud of lust once Mingyu nipped at your bottom lip with his sharp canines and slid his tongue into your mouth. You let slip a sound that was something between a whimper and exhale, but it was quickly muffled by Mingyu’s mouth pressing harder against yours, licking into your mouth eagerly. It was as if your lips were molding together in perfect harmony.

It felt as though time melted away, pooling at your feet until you couldn’t move one bit. You felt Mingyu’s big hands ravage down your body while yours were looped around his neck. Just when he started tugging at your clothes, he pulled back and sucked in a sharp breath to ground himself.

You did the same, letting your chest rise and fall steadily as you stared up at him with hints of lust in your eyes that hadn’t ebbed away just yet.

A few moments of silence passed before Mingyu looked toward the whiteboard that you had moved up against the wall.

“Why was kissing on your list, anyway?” he pressed. “You’ve already done it before, so it’s not like it’s anything new to you.” You opened your mouth to respond, but nothing came out. Nothing was making sense in your own head. Mingyu stepped closer to you and let his gaze fall to your lips. “Is there another reason?”

You two were impossibly close. So close that you could smell the cologne wafting off him. Feel the cold metal of his chain against your skin.

You were positive that Mingyu could pick up on the nervous hitch in your breathing. Your stomach knotted tighter and tighter as he towered over you, and your heart bruised against your rib cage with how hard it was beating.

“I guess I just felt like I wanted to kiss you,” you admitted, dropping your voice so low that it was barely audible.

But Mingyu heard it. It was clear by the unmistakable grin that stretched across his face.

Always the gentleman, Mingyu asked, “Does that mean we’re ready for step two?”

“What’s step two?”

“Step two on losing your virginity,” Mingyu announced with a dramatic flourish of his wrist to amplify his theatrical voice, “is to set the mood.”

You were pretty sure you and Mingyu already had a good mood going on until he interrupted to announce that.

“Wait, so you were waiting for…” You cut yourself off, shaking your head in disbelief as your eyes focused on his sheepish grin.

“You have to actually want me so that we can start,” he reasoned. “I can’t, like, make you feel good if you’re not into it.”

“But you knew I was attracted to you. I literally called you a ‘walking wet dream’ in front of all our friends.”

“That’s different. You finding me hot isn’t the same as wanting to kiss me.”

“O-okay,” you stammered, “but how do I know if you feel the same way or not?”

“Well,” Mingyu started in that low, husky voice of his, setting his hands on your hips after a beat of hesitation and pulling you closer, “I could just show you.”

His breath was hot against your ear, and you felt as if it lulled you into some sort of trance as he pulled you toward him. Closer and closer until he was sitting on your couch and pulling you on top of him. Before you could even straddle Mingyu properly, he started planting kisses up the column of your neck. Each one grew more hungry than the last as he nipped and sucked at your tender skin.

This was not happening.

Well, of course this was supposed to happen, but you hadn’t exactly mentally prepared yourself for this very moment. The very moment when you and Mingyu would physically cross the line of friendship.

“That feel good?” he purred against your skin, the vibrations making the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. The fire in his stare made you feel like putty in his hands.

“Mmhm,” was all you could muster without falling apart, so you just wrapped your arms around him tighter.

You winced when he bit down on a particularly sensitive patch of your flesh. For a while, Mingyu just sucked and nipped at the side of your neck until he was pulling back and you were whining for more. His thumb brushed against the bluish-black mark he created, and you could only imagine how much concealer you were going to need to cover it up.

His lips attached to your neck again. For a moment, you thought he was going to give you another hickey until his pecks traveled up all the way to kiss a tender spot under your ear, and then you two froze for a few seconds, not knowing how to proceed. Mingyu’s lips tugged into a frown as he looked at you with an inquisitive hum.

His gaze fell to your lips. “Should I just—”

He cut you off with a swift, experimental peck to your lips. A small smile tugged at his lips when he saw how flustered you looked after.

“Mingyu,” you said in a small voice, “I thought you said no kissing?”

“I don’t care anymore.”

Once again, his lips chased yours until he successfully captured them in a searing kiss. You immediately melted in his hold, and even though part of you was screaming at the other half to stop and think about what you and your best friend were doing, all you cared about was the way Mingyu pulled you closer by the waist, higher onto his lap.

Yet, although you were unbearably horny, you still flinched when Mingyu’s fingers slid under your shirt and sprawled out against your bare midriff.

He froze instantly and then drew his hands back until they were resting on your thighs. You couldn’t help but let out a disappointed sigh, curling your hands into fists so that your nails were pressing crescent-shaped indents into your palms.

You shook your head, your breath stuttering in your chest. “I’m sorry. I’m all good. I just need to—”

“No, no, don’t apologize,” Mingyu said, reaching over to brush your hair out of your face. His other hand stayed on your thigh and gave you a comforting squeeze. “We’re doing this at your pace, remember? We can stop whenever you want.”

But even though he said the right words to put you at ease, you still couldn’t help but feel frustrated with yourself. You just didn’t understand why you had that mental block keeping you from going further. The mixture of discontent and irritation painted across your face was clear as day. But you didn’t want to feel like an idiot in front of Mingyu, so you uncurled your fists and placed your hands on his chest instead.

“Can we try again tomorrow?” you asked shyly.

A single angry tear slid down your cheek, which Mingyu took notice of and promptly wiped from your face with his thumb.

“Of course.” His eyes were a little wide, like he was momentarily buffering while he was trying to figure out how to comfort you. His eyes darted around the room before they settled on the TV remote you kept neatly on top of a stack of books on the coffee table. “Wanna continue our marathon? I think we’re on Island Princess now.”

After you nodded, Mingyu gently helped you off his lap so that you two could watch the movie together. As he toyed with your remote, you couldn’t help but glance at his arms, watching his biceps flex under his shirt. You thought about how they were just circled around your body, and you soon wished his touch was back on your skin.

A short while into the movie, Mingyu’s hand found itself on top of your knee, and you bit back a small smile as it stayed there for the rest of the night.

Mingyu spent another night on the couch—accidentally, because you two fell asleep in the middle of Barbie and the Island Princess—but, this time, you ended up spending the night right next to him.

Of course, nothing happened other than you tossing and turning a few times due to Mingyu’s snores and prying yourself out of his grip so that you could nestle into your blanket. It was an unfortunate fate that you and Mingyu wound up waking up on opposite sides of the couch.

You kept your eyes screwed shut after you woke up, though, choosing to wallow in your own thoughts for the first ten minutes of your day. You couldn’t get over what happened between you and Mingyu last night, and it was making you dread the thought of facing him once you opened your eyes. You were praying that he wouldn’t regret what went down.

It made you feel better that he didn’t shy away from you during the movie. He even made some light jokes about what you two did, which, at the very least, made you glad that he wasn’t having second thoughts.

(“I don’t know why they didn’t call you Captain Chastity By Choice,” Mingyu blurted out while scooping popcorn into his mouth. “We already knocked out half your list.”)

“Morning,” he grumbled in that husky morning voice that made your stomach feel like you were free-falling off a cliff. His soft, sleepy eyes gave you a once-over before he said, “I know you’re awake, Y/N.”

You had been peeking at him through barely-open eyes, but you gave up your farce and straightened up to face him properly.

“Good morning,” you greeted back. “Sleep well?”

He hummed before leaning in to peck your lips—a gesture that caught you off-guard because you didn’t think he would just start casually kissing you whenever. It felt far too intimate for you to brush it off as hormones acting up. You didn’t have the time to ask Mingyu why he did that before he started complaining.

You thought back to the whiteboard where Mingyu crossed out kissing, leaving behind faint traces of dry ink.

“Sort of,” he replied with a pout. “You stole the blanket! I had to curl up in the corner because I was freezing.”

He was rubbing small circles on your thigh with his thumb as he spoke, and you wondered if he knew the effect he had on you.

“By the way,” he continued, “I have an idea.”

“What’s your idea?”

“Let’s not make sex our goal. We can start slow today—maybe just foreplay until you’re comfortable with me.” He straightened up and crossed his legs so that he could face you. “No one’s taken the time to make you feel comfortable first, right?”

You recalled your list of unsuccessful trysts, starting with good old Mark Lee, who unfortunately became reduced to an inside joke in your friend group. After that, you were only intimate with two other men in your college years.

One was Choi Yeonjun, who you stopped while he was in the middle of stripping down so that you could make your escape. He was hot and all, but your nerves caught up to you by the time his tongue was down your throat. The other was Lee Minho, who was an absolute sweetheart, but you ended up calling an Uber to take you home after you saw his (somewhat intimidating) hard-on.

They were quite embarrassing recollections.

“You’re gonna spend the whole day making me feel comfortable?” you asked, and there was a hopeful gleam in your eyes that made Mingyu feel like he was a supernova among stars.

��If that’s what it takes.”

You had to appreciate Mingyu’s commitment.

After making pancakes for you and showing you Reddit stories on TikTok as you ate (which you also spent nearly an hour dissecting afterward), he got right to pulling you onto his lap and tracing a path up and down your forearms. Of course, he let you keep scrolling through his TikTok because you had gotten so immersed in the Reddit stories. Mingyu offered commentary as you two listened to each one under your new favorite profile of the hour.

“Her boyfriend invited another girl to his team dinner?” Mingyu gasped upon hearing the further details, still ghosting his large hands along your arms.

“Not the asshole,” you confirmed at the end with an adamant nod. “He was totally shutting her down when she told him she was uncomfortable.”

“He’s definitely got feelings for the other girl.”

You nearly sucked in a breath at his words. For whatever reason, the very mention of feelings made your nerves feel like cut wire. It was probably because whatever you and Mingyu had become was toeing the line of situationship.

Later, you ended up laying on top of him as a random Disney movie played on your TV. You didn’t exactly remember the process of you two choosing what to watch, but neither of you paid any attention after Mingyu slipped his hands past the hem of your shirt. The pads of his fingers burned against your skin as he drew circles on your bare waist.

“Higher,” you whispered.

Mingyu hummed inquisitively, peering down at you with an amused smile. He ran his hands up your torso so that his fingers rested right under the underwire of your bra.

“Like that?” he asked, and the teasing inflection in his voice made it clear that he was waiting for you to beg for more. And, oh, he loved the look on your face as you fought down your embarrassment. You shook your head before he cooed, “No?”

“No,” you echoed, “higher.”

Mingyu’s fingers slid up just enough to feel the wiring lining your bra cups. He frowned and moved one hand to the small of your back, snaking his hand up until he was holding onto the clasp.

“Mind if I get this out of the way?”

“Go ahead.”

He unclasped your bra with expert precision, his fingers working effortlessly to undo the hook. Your eyes were practically bugging open as you felt the fabric fall from your chest, wondering where in the world Mingyu learned how to do that. You didn’t have the mind to ask, though, because as soon as your bra straps came loose and fell down your shoulders, Mingyu’s hands cupped your breasts and squeezed experimentally.

This was probably the farthest you had gone in terms of physical touch, and you didn’t feel strange at all. Something about Mingyu’s touch was comforting, like the warmth of the sun enveloping you whole.

He rolled your nipple between his thumb and pointer finger, making you wince upon contact. You didn’t realize you were so sensitive already. It was clearly affecting Mingyu, too; you could feel something hard poking your thigh, and from what you gathered, it was impressively large under his sweatpants.

“So,” you started, a little too nervous for your liking, “all this is supposed to help me feel comfortable during sex?”

“Yeah, I worked it all out in my head,” Mingyu said between intervals of circling your nipple with his thumb and kissing your neck. “This is all part of my extremely helpful guide to helping you lose your virginity.”

“I wouldn’t call it extremely helpful, considering you’re a virgin yourself.” You laughed when Mingyu pouted in response. “What? I’m just saying I don’t think you have the credentials.”

“I will in”—he proceeded to check an imaginary watch on his wrist—“two business days.”

Two business days, as in the two days Soonyoung and Jungwoo had left for their Vegas trip. Mingyu was determined for you both to lose your virginities by then, although he reassured you over and over again that you could always speak up if you needed more time.

You had been getting several updates from Soonyoung and Jungwoo throughout the day. Apparently, Chan ended up going stag, but last night you saw two girls draped over him on Jungwoo’s Snapchat story. It made you feel a little less bad about turning down being his date.

“Plus,” Mingyu continued, “I have no problem getting naked right now. You’re the one who’s holding back.”

There was a challenging fire in your eyes. “You have no problem?”

“Nope.”

“Alright.” You put your hands over Mingyu’s and pushed them away from your body. “Then strip. Getting comfortable being naked means we have to actually be naked, right?”

“That means you have to undress, too.”

“Fine.”

He looked amused. “Fine.”

Fuck.

You were nervous.

And surprisingly, it wasn’t the thought of being naked in front of Mingyu that made you nervous, it was seeing your best friend completely nude that had you worried. It was no surprise to anyone that Mingyu was a looker, and you weren’t sure you were ready what he looked like under those clothes.

Mingyu gently moved you off of him and stood up to start stripping off his pants and shirt. His shirt came off in a single, swift motion, revealing his toned, muscular body. Years of work were etched in the grooves of his abdomen, his soft stomach complemented by strong muscle. Mingyu was never the type to show off his body at the gym, but you were starting to wish you were prepared for how gorgeous he was.

Next, he pushed his sweatpants down until the fabric swamped his ankles. You swallowed hard when you saw the growing bulge in his boxers, but seconds later you were looking at how his hard cock stood right up as soon as his boxers had been discarded somewhere across your living room floor.

He was huge.

“Your turn,” he murmured.

You felt your pulse race.

“That’s not fitting inside me,” you blurted out, cheeks heating up with embarrassment. “There’s no way that fits inside me.”

“It’ll fit, Y/N,” he replied softly, reaching forward to take your hands in his. “I’ll do everything I can to make it fit comfortably, and if it doesn’t work out, then we can just keep trying at whatever pace works for you.” You looked skeptical but Mingyu held up his pinky finger. “Promise.”

There was no room for you to doubt him when he was looking at you with those big, hopeful eyes. So, you hooked your pinky finger with his and smiled when he helped you take off your shirt, still keeping your fingers interlocked.

Since you normally slept without a bra, your torso was fully bare once your shirt was off, so Mingyu nearly choked on his spit when he saw you. You moved your free hand to slide your shorts down while his eyes were fixed on the swell of your breasts.

“Can I motorboat your tits?” he asked bluntly.

You snorted immediately, taken aback by his straightforward question. Not only that, but your pinky fingers were still hooked together—a rather intimate gesture followed by a vulgar question.

“Whoa there, Sex Education. Let’s take it down a notch.”

He chuckled before sitting back down on the couch. You thought he would’ve wanted to take care of his hard-on, but Mingyu just held out his arms to you.

“What?” you asked, letting him grab your waist and pull you flush to his chest. Your brows furrowed more when he grabbed the TV remote from your coffee table. “What’re you doing?”

“We have to finish Barbie and the Island Princess, don’t we?”

You gave him a look before it clicked for you. This was all part of Mingyu’s plan to make you feel comfortable—pushing your limits and then settling for something that would put you at ease—so you cozied up to him and let him play the movie.

A demure smile stretched across your face. “Only if we can cuddle.”

“As my lady commands,” he joked, and then you were both laughing.

(And, spoiler: he did more than cuddle.

The way he kissed you made you feel like you were standing on hot coals. His tongue was halfway down your throat and his hands ran up and down your sides. You kissed him until your lungs burned for oxygen and you had to pull back for air. Mingyu peppered love bites all over your body and, by the end of the night, you two were a tangled mess of limbs on the floor with your sweat matting your hair down.

But, most importantly, you two finally got through Barbie and the Island Princess.)

There were a few reasons why Mingyu was roommates with Jeon Wonwoo.

He specifically chose not to room with someone in the friend group for two reasons: the first reason was because Wonwoo’s living habits aligned more with his, and the second reason was to avoid any possibility of ruining the friendship dynamic. Mingyu had his fair share of horror roommate stories, dating back to freshman year when his roommate in the dorms lived like a slob and muttered borderline psychopathic threats in his sleep. You remembered countless nights when Mingyu would knock at your door and ask if he could sleep on the floor.

For Mingyu, Wonwoo was his only saving grace since sophomore year.

You had gone to their room a few times, but you never overstayed your welcome. Although Wonwoo never complained, you felt guilty every time he walked out of his room with AirPods in. It was like he knew to block you out when he heard you coming in.

Today, since Mingyu had been working on code all day, you offered to bring him boba from the farmer’s market that you went to with Ryujin.

You double-checked the label on the side before handing him the drink. “Strawberry matcha.”

“Thanks. I’ve been deprived of boba since fall semester.” He grinned as he tore the plastic wrapping his straw was in. Mingyu popped the straw into the sealing film and took a sip before handing it to you. “Want some?”

“Sure.” You graciously took the cup to sip the delicious fruity blend. Shyly, you added, “It’s also a thank you… for last night. You actually helped a lot.”

You could tell Mingyu was fighting down a smirk; you could practically hear it in his tone. “Oh, did I?”

“Yeah, I actually did feel a lot more comfortable after all that.”

He flashed you a bright grin. “See? It’s the guide.”

“Uh-huh, sure.”

“I’m serious! It’s effective, isn’t it?” He set his drink down to turn his chair and look up at you properly. “You may think I thought of all that on a whim, but I really put extensive thought into it.”

You had to give him credit for the whole scientific method thing he had going on. You wondered if Mingyu’s consecutive six years of participation in the science fair had prepared him for this very moment.

“Extensive thought,” you echoed. “What? Did you write it all down in a notebook or something?” You laughed it off like it was a joke, but when Mingyu’s expression didn’t budge, you realized that you had hit the nail on the head. “Oh my god, you wrote it down!”

Mingyu huffed. “It’s not even that big of a deal! Writing stuff down helps me organize my thoughts.”

“Well, can I see it?”

“Hell no.”

“Just tell me which notebook you wrote it in.”

“No, ‘cause then you’re gonna look at it later.”

Mingyu thought he was subtle enough to pick up the notebook in front of him and move it away from your reach. Rookie mistake.

Your eyes followed his movements.

“That’s the one, isn’t it?” you asked, pointing at the red notebook that you’ve seen Mingyu jot notes down in before. He always carried it in his school bag, and you were starting to piece together why you hadn’t seen it around lately.

“N-no.”

“You’re such a bad liar, Gyu.” You hardly noticed his hands finding the backs of your thighs and pulling you down to straddle his knees. “Will you ever let me see it?”

“Maybe,” he replied, “or I can just show you what I have planned.”

It was then when you realized that the front of Mingyu’s jeans did look strained. The visible outline of his bulge made you unconsciously clench, which he smirked at once he felt the pulsation against his leg. You weren’t even sure if he was fully hard, but you could definitely feel him through your cotton shorts once you were pulled onto his thighs.

His lips found yours in seconds. Days ago, this was something you were hesitant about doing, but now it came more naturally. Your hands moved in a familiar path from his chest to loop around his neck, and then it was like a switch turned on for your best friend.

You broke from the kiss for air and you both looked down, foreheads touching as Mingyu grabbed your ass with rough hands and helped you grind down on him. Your head clouded over, and all you could think about was moving your hips to meet his so that you could chase the growing ache between your legs.

“That’s right,” he rasped. “That’s a good girl.”

Oh, if he knew the effect his words had on you. You were shamefully ruining the front of his jeans with how aroused you were.

At this point, his hardened length felt massive under you, so you lifted your hips to see just how big his pants had tented up. Mingyu’s grip on you loosened and he lowered his head, embarrassed. Before he could apologize, though, you got off his lap and sank to your knees.

Ever-so-sweetly, you asked, “Can I help?”

You swore you had never seen Mingyu look so blown away in his life.

“A-are you sure?”

“Of course.” You pouted. “You’ve been doing so much for me, and I wanna make you feel good, too.” You balanced your forearms on his knees and grinned up at him, watching his Adam’s apple bob nervously. “So, can I?”

“Please,” he nearly whimpered, fumbling with his zipper to get his jeans and black Calvin Klein boxers down. You helped him out graciously, tugging the fabric down to his ankles and marveling at his cock once it sprung up, curved slightly to your left. Mingyu nearly fell apart when he saw you between his legs, letting out an eager groan. “Jesus Christ, Y/N.”

“You’re really big,” you mumbled, tracing his v-line accentuated by his taut muscles, then his hip, and then the long vein that ran down his shaft with your thumb.

You weren’t even sure if you would be able to take all of him in your mouth. Plus, this wasn’t exactly your area of expertise. You knew this wasn’t Mingyu’s first time receiving head, so you were slightly intimidated. You were slightly terrified about possibly not being good at sucking dick, but you figured your mouth could do a better job than his right hand.

But you had already come this far.

Mingyu’s hand carded through your hair, pulling it back from your face. The gesture only made your confidence falter, wanting to just melt like putty in his grip. You reached out to wrap your hand around his shaft, surprised how rock-hard it was. That just made it all the more nerve-wracking to take him down your throat.

He seemed to pick up on your hesitation, gently asking, “Want me to talk you through it?”

You looked up at him and nodded, flushing hotly when you saw his sincere eyes gleam with amusement.

“Open your mouth,” he instructed, grabbing your jaw and gently pressing down on your bottom lip with his thumb. You obeyed and parted your lips just enough for him to slide his thumb into your mouth. “Wider.”

You complied. Mingyu adjusted his hips quickly before encouraging you with a nudge to put your mouth over the head of his cock. You wrapped your lips over his tip, licking off the precum that beaded his slit, and Mingyu hissed sharply.

He let out a sharp breath and let his gaze fly to the ceiling, gripping the arm of his chair. “Fuck, Y/N.”

Mingyu calling out your name so desperately only spurred you to take more of his cock until it hit the roof of your mouth. You were addicted to the sounds of his whimpers, relishing each high-pitched whine from him as you licked the underside of his head. Before, you thought the act of giving head was just extra work for women, but now you were starting to see why it was so addicting. Every moan and cry from Mingyu just made your pride inflate.

You looked up at him through your lashes to see the breathtaking view of his head thrown back and neck veins strained. Mingyu’s hips bucked up slightly, but he fought down his moans to make sure Wonwoo didn’t hear anything.

“Sorry,” he grunted out, eyes screwed shut in pure bliss. “Couldn’t help it.”

You pulled off of him for a moment to reply, “I don’t mind if you do it again.”

“Really?” His voice was almost breathless, half-surprised and half-excited.

You nodded, and Mingyu regained his composure a little so that he could sit up and slide his hand into your hair once more. Your lips wrapped around his cock again and sucked gently on his impressive length. His fingers buried themselves into your hair for leverage so that he could hold onto you while he started slowly moving his hips into your mouth.

With the way Mingyu was moving, you could feel the head of his cock hitting the back of your throat and making you gag. He looked at you for confirmation to continue, so you nodded eagerly and sat up higher on your knees to take him in fully.

The first push into your mouth he did was meek—just enough to get the tip of his head down your throat. You tried to relax your throat to take him in easier, blinking back a few stray tears that were brought on by your gag reflex. The second push was a little stronger, getting a little deeper, which roused a moan out of you. Mingyu must have felt the vibration in his cock because he groaned and bucked his hips into your mouth rougher. His thumb found your bottom lip and rubbed it gently, as if he was prying it open wider.

“Fuck, Y/N, your mouth feels so good,” Mingyu breathed out, soft grunts and curses falling from his lips as he went faster.

His free hand wiped away the tears that started streaming down your cheeks. You were past the point of slight discomfort now, and now you were too focused on listening to Mingyu’s pretty moans to think about anything else.

Without any proper warning, Mingyu’s entire body tensed up and he let out a loud groan, shooting his cum down your throat. He threw his head back, and then his whole body relaxed. His grip on your hair tightened and loosened. You squeezed your eyes shut and swallowed down his load before you pulled off of him, watching his chest heave as he tried to control his breathing.

“F-fuck, I’m sorry,” he apologized profusely. Still winded from his own high, Mingyu was stumbling over his own words. “I didn’t… didn’t think it would happen that fast.” He opened his eyes again and nearly fell apart at the sight of you. “Fuck. Did you really swallow?”

You nodded, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Yeah, I remember Jungwoo told me before that spitters are quitters, or something like that.”

The tension was thick in the room. Although you intended for your comment to lighten things up, the look in Mingyu’s eyes only darkened.

“Come here.”

You could only squeak in surprise as Mingyu pulled you up to kiss him, his rough hands cupping your cheeks. He didn’t seem to care that he was tasting himself on your tongue, and the act only made you moan against his lips. Seconds stretched into minutes before he pulled back.

“My turn,” he said. “Take off your shorts and get on the bed.”

You were reaching to tug down your shorts before he had even finished talking. After sitting down on the edge of your bed, your fingers flew down to tug at your underwear, but Mingyu got to it before you did. He knelt so that he was between your thighs, looking up at you carefully as he slid the cloth past your ankles and lifted one of your legs higher before propping it over his shoulder.

He pulled you in by the hips, dragging his nose up your middle thigh until it reached the apex of your legs. You looked down at Mingyu, breath hitching as you put your other leg over his free shoulder. His hands slid up your thighs and gripped your hips tightly. His long fingers were splayed out at your abdomen, and you felt your stomach flutter.

“No one’s ever gone down on you, huh?” he asked, and you confirmed his statement with a shake of your head. “Just sit back and let me do all the work, then.”

Your nerves caught up to you for a moment. You started to overthink, wondering if the position you were in was unflattering, or if you even tasted good down there, or if Mingyu was only doing this because he felt obligated.

But then he circled your clit with his tongue and you couldn’t think at all.

You cut yourself off by slapping a hand over your mouth, trying to muffle the moan that threatened to slip. Your train of thought had completely derailed when Mingyu licked a long stripe between your folds. His eyes were half-lidded, clouded with lust as he flattened his tongue against your cunt to taste you better. A soft groan from him vibrated through your core and up your spine.

Your back arched almost immediately. “Oh—oh my god.”

He started kissing your cunt, and god, it all felt so dirty. You had never felt this way before, and now that you knew that Mingyu’s tongue could make you feel this good, you were starting to see the full appeal of sex. He paused to suck on your clit, and you felt like you were short-circuiting while he ate you out like a man starved.

A pressure started building. You grew anxious and shot right up, tugging on Mingyu’s hair. He was unaware of your panic at first, and then he lifted his head once he felt you tap his shoulder repeatedly. Once his mouth was gone, though, you felt that pressure ebbing away.

“Something wrong?” he asked. “Need me to stop?”

You had to push down all of your shame to admit, “I think I have to use the bathroom.”

To your surprise, Mingyu just laughed. “The bathroom?”

“I’m serious!” You flushed, and the warmth that prickled your skin was different this time.

“I promise you, that’s not what you’re feeling,” he said, rubbing your thigh with his thumb in slow circles. His voice was gentle, like he was trying to soothe your nerves. “Just trust me and let that pressure keep building. Eventually, it’s gonna reach a point where it can’t hold itself in anymore, and then you’re gonna feel really good.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, so just relax for me, okay?”

You let out a shaky breath, nodding before sitting back in your previous position where you had your elbows propped up. Mingyu returned to your cunt with an experimental lick, lasting all of two seconds before he resorted back to his rough kissing and sucking.

You held onto the sheets for dear life as Mingyu plunged his hot tongue into your core, reaching a specific spot that made your eyes roll back and your toes curl. He kept your hips pinned to the mattress as he licked into you. His nose brushed against your clit with how close his face was. It was the final push to send you over the edge, and the warmth that had been building up finally unleashed into blinding white pleasure.

You came hard. The force of your orgasm nearly knocked the wind out of you, and your back was lifting off the bed as Mingyu tried to hold your hips down with great effort. The warmth of it coursed through your entire body, causing the surface of your skin to bead with sweat and cling to the sheets you were laying on.

And, as a photographer, Mingyu had taken pictures of countless gorgeous views that he’d come across in his lifetime, but the sight of you falling apart because of him was, by far, the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

He pulled back to rub your clit in gentle circles while you were being pulled and swept away by the undertow of your orgasm. Mingyu murmured sweet nothings to keep you grounded, but you couldn’t process any of his words as your ears rang with white noise.

You blinked slowly as you came down from your high, whining as soon as Mingyu took his hand away from your sore clit. Before you were going to praise him for how good he was with his mouth, his lips returned to clean up the mess you made. You could only writhe and whimper as Mingyu licked at your soaking cunt.

He pulled back to grin at you, his lips and chin glistening with your arousal. You had always thought Mingyu looked attractive, but he was godly like this. Your heart raced just by looking at how his dark hair fell into his face and how his canines showed in his smile.

“Earth to Y/N,” he called, waving a hand in front of your face. When you snapped back into reality, you shot him a questioning look. “I was asking how you’re feeling.”

“Good—great,” you corrected, and then you let out a blissful sigh. “Amazing.”

“Great.” He grinned. “Ready for round two?”

“Round two?”

“Yeah, beautiful. You didn’t think we were done yet, right?”

“Jesus Christ, Y/N.” Ryujin looked mortified upon first glance of the bruises that littered your neck. “Are you hooking up with a leech?”

You had gone over to Ryujin’s apartment to drop off one of the prints she got from the farmer’s market and left in your car. Naturally, you ended up spending the evening there. Since you were so eager to share what had happened between you and Mingyu (telling Vernon or Minghao simply wasn’t an option right now), you ended up spilling everything that went down.

From the contract to you and Mingyu going down on each other earlier today, Ryujin hung onto every single word of yours with her jaw hanging in an almost comical way. She was shoveling handfuls of Hot Cheetos into her mouth as you gave her a detailed rundown of the story.

“This is so messy,” she gushed. “I love it.”

“It’s not messy!” you defended, and then added, “Okay, it’s a little messy, but we agreed to stop if it ever starts affecting our friendship.”

“So, you think sucking and fucking isn’t going to affect your friendship at all?”

You stayed silent.

“You should know that cross-contamination in the friend group most likely leads to disaster,” Ryujin continued as she popped a Hot Cheeto in her mouth. “It’s all fun and games because you guys think you’ll be able to maintain the friendship, but as soon as someone catches feelings, it’s over.”

A heavy sigh fell from your lips. “To be honest, I’m a little worried.”

“Worried?”

“We had this whole rule against kissing and it lasted, like, a week,” you explained. “I mean, we didn’t even do anything during that week, so I guess it lasted, like, five minutes. The rule was supposed to be there so that we wouldn’t catch feelings or anything, but Mingyu completely ignores it now. I’m not reading too deeply into this, right?”

Ryujin pondered in thought for a moment before redirecting the question back to you. “Do you want it to be deeper than it is?”

You frowned. “Huh?”

“Like, think about it,” Ryujin said. “Remember when you had a little crush on Mingyu during freshman year? Well, sometimes attraction doesn’t go away, so maybe your old feelings are coming back up now that you guys are, like, hooking up. Probably doesn’t help that Mingyu’s considered conventionally attractive.”

Sure, you had your occasional moments of weakness bubble up to the surface. It was something you tried to keep under wraps, but you were sure Mingyu could pick up on it whenever you were being extra touchy after intimacy.

They were never really of concern to you, though. You figured that you and Mingyu would live out the rest of your lives in parallel lines, neither of you crossing over to the other. It was what made your relationship with him rather simple, really. You would never cross over to his side, and he would never cross over to yours.

That was, until the contract was put into place.

“I don’t know…” you trailed off, and Ryujin clearly wasn’t pleased with your answer.

“Y/N, imagine him kissing another girl,” your friend instructed. She motioned for you to close your eyes, so you groaned and did as she said. You cleared your head to make room for whatever visualization she was making you do. “Imagine him kissing that girl from the Kap Sig party last year. The one who was all giggly and talkative when Mingyu was with us, and then she ignored us after he left.”

“Oh.” You made a face, not even wanting to picture that in your head. “Yeah, I don’t like that, but that girl was bitchy. I don’t think that necessarily means I have feelings for Mingyu, though.”

“Now, imagine him kissing the most likable girl you can think of,” she said. “This girl is the perfect match for Mingyu. She’s gorgeous, and she has a shoulder tattoo—the kind he went crazy over in freshman year. Not only that, but she’s smart. She takes good care of him. She brings him and his friends cookies whenever she bakes. She’s the kind of girl that everyone can’t help but adore when they meet her for the first time.”

You tried to really picture it in your head this time.

You imagined Mingyu next to someone who would be in his league, someone who made people want to stop and stare. You imagined how he would be complimented wherever he went for him and his girlfriend being such an attractive couple.

You imagined him making dinner for her and eating together. You imagined him laughing at inside jokes only the two of them knew about. You imagined him watching Barbie movies with her.

And it made your heart twist painfully.

You decided to shrug it off instead, saying, “If he’s happy, I’m happy.”

“Enough with that shit,” Ryujin deadpanned. “I’m here for drama. Give me something to work with, at least.” She shook her head disappointedly, and you couldn’t help but laugh at her. Once you simmered down, she continued, “But, in all seriousness, I think you should really be careful with whatever you and Mingyu have going on. It won’t end pretty if someone catches feelings while the other person doesn’t.”

You pressed your lips together in a grim line. “You’re right. I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Anyway, back to the juicy stuff,” Ryujin said, inching closer to you while hugging her knees. “What else did you guys do?”

“We sixty-nined,” you whispered, as if it was some scandalous bit of gossip. “He was the six; I was the nine.”

“Okay, never mind, let’s tone down the juicy.”

You woke up to several Snapchat notifications from Jungwoo. They were all sent at four in the morning, and most of them were just him running through the streets of Las Vegas at night without his shirt on. You were mildly concerned, but you figured they were just having fun.

You tapped through the other snaps Jungwoo sent you. Soonyoung blacked out on a bar counter. A hooker sitting on Chan’s lap. Jeonghan with several hundred dollar bills in his hands. Another snap of Jeonghan with the caption stating that he lost all his money.

Then, it struck you that it was their last day in Vegas.

“We have one more day,” you informed Mingyu over the phone, “and then we have to start seeing each other secretly.”

“That’s kinda hot.”

“No! Not hot! I don’t know about you, but I experience crushing guilt whenever I have to sneak around them, like when I lied about us sleeping together.”

“Technically, we’re already doing that.”

You snorted. “You know what I mean.”

“By the way, not contract-related, but you should come over right now,” he said. “I have some good news to share.”

“Is it about your pink eye scare?”

At around two in the morning, Mingyu texted you a picture of his puffy eye and claimed he was “allergic to pussy.” You sent him back a picture of you flipping him off.

It turned out to be allergies, but Mingyu was completely convinced he had pink eye—all thanks to WebMD. You had to listen to him freaking out for thirty minutes until he calmly informed you that his eye wasn’t puffy anymore.

“Not funny,” he warned. “Okay, kinda funny, but—okay, wait, point is, you should come over.”

You giggled. “Okay, I’ll come over. See you soon.”

You hung up the phone to get ready, feeling oddly excited about going over to Mingyu’s. Ryujin’s words from last night started to get into your head, making you wonder how you truly distinguished your relationship with your best friend. Because why did you feel the need to put on makeup to see him when you had never thought about that in your four years of being friends? And why were you taking extra long to pick out an outfit that was supposed to be casual?

You were deep in thought all the way to his doorstep, only letting it dissolve into the backwaters of your memory once the door opened to Mingyu’s excited face.

“They chose my submission,” was the first thing he said, his eyes shining.

You didn’t even have to ask for clarification. Right away, you knew exactly what he was talking about: the sunset photograph he submitted to the exhibition. It had been all he was raving about for weeks.

“Oh my god!” Your eyes were wide as you looked down at your hands helplessly. “I don’t have anything for us to celebrate with! Hold on, I can run to the store and buy, like, cake or—”

“Slow down.” Mingyu laughed. He grabbed you gently by your forearms and grinned. “We don’t need to celebrate anything. Just promise me you’ll come see my photography.”

“Of course.”

“My submission was for you, so you have to go. Promise?”

If it was even possible, your eyes grew even wider. “It was?”

“You’ll see.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Anyway, the gallery opening is in a few days. I’ll text you the address and time later.”

“Alright.” You held out your pinky to interlock with his own. “I promise.”

Mingyu wrapped his pinky around yours and grinned before tugging you by the same finger into his apartment. You followed him into his room, eyeing how strong and wide his back was. You were starting to fall back into dangerous imaginations again, wondering if he was going to make a move on you again now that you two only had a day left. Not that you would admit it to your best friend, but you were hoping something would happen.

“Wonwoo found out Clawdia was getting lonely, so he’s out looking for a pet store that sells hermit crabs,” Mingyu explained. “He was on my ass about it, too, because I said crabs are probably fine being on their own. I mean, they’re called hermit crabs. How was I supposed to know they’re social creatures? Misleading name, if you ask me.”

Although you were (partly) engrossed in his story about Wonwoo’s pet crab, your eyes couldn’t help but linger on the red notebook on Mingyu’s desk.

He picked up on what was distracting you before you could even tear your gaze away, saying, “You’re so nosy.”

You made a face. “No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are.” His shoulders slumped as a retired sigh escaped his lips. You could see that you had been wearing him down over the notebook, so he bargained, “Alright, I’ll show you on one condition.” He plopped down on the edge of his bed. “I want something in return.”

You were most definitely taking his words the wrong way because your cheeks were heating up while Mingyu remained completely impassive.

“Something in return?”

“Yeah, I want an answer,” he started, a hint of a smirk playing on his lips. “When exactly did you start finding me cute? Or, in your words, a ‘walking wet dream,’ right?”

You barked out an unamused laugh. “Yeah, there’s no way I’m telling you.”

“Notebook,” Mingyu reminded.

Suddenly, you were elated about show-and-tell.

“You first,” he insisted. “I assure you, mine is regrettably more embarrassing.”

“The first time I found you cute…” you trailed off, trying to recall the exact moment you started appreciating your best friend’s attractiveness. “I’d say it was in freshman year when we went on the hike together during orientation week. You were all sweaty and wrapped your arm around me when we took a group picture at the top. I was going crazy about it to Ryujin, but then we became good friends, so I just pretended I never felt that way.”

“Freshman year?” he asked, wide-eyed. “You thought I was cute back then? I was a baby!”

“We were eighteen. Don’t make me sound like a creep.”

Mingyu laughed. “I just can’t believe you thought I was cute back then. I didn’t even think you thought about me like that.”

“It was our first week and I was cut loose from my parents.” You shrugged. “Plus, I think every girl in our orientation group wanted to get in your pants.”

“Not Ryujin.”

“No, she was still dating that guy from her high school, remember?”

You scrunched up your nose at the memory; back in the first few months of your freshman year, Ryujin always ditched you and Mingyu at random points during the night because her controlling boyfriend would call to make sure she wasn’t out and about. He was especially suspicious of Mingyu for being an attractive, well-liked man. You found the whole thing ridiculous because her boyfriend was keeping her from having fun and making friends.

To make matters worse, Mingyu ended up finding out Ryujin’s boyfriend was cheating on her after seeing one of his mutual friends post him on her private Snapchat story. It was a picture of them in bed together, and he completely denied it when confronted. You and Ryujin bonded the most during the week she planned to dump her boyfriend, and she ran straight to you once she did. After she cried her tears and used up all of your tissues, you two had your own beach bonfire to burn all of the gifts he got her.

You still remembered how you and Mingyu were back then. Since you two were still new friends, things were still a little shy and awkward. It wasn’t until your third year that you and Mingyu got closer, starting to hang out one-on-one instead of with Ryujin. Since she got busy with internships and her club activities, Ryujin grew a little distant from Mingyu, although they were still on good terms.

“Alright,” you said, impatience sticky like honey on your tongue, “your turn.”

“Ah, right.”

Mingyu walked over to his desk and picked up the notebook. You watched how he rubbed the back of his neck before turning back to you, and his head was turned so that you wouldn’t catch sight of his blush. (You noticed, though.) He flipped past several pages, eyes skimming through math formulas and physics problems before he landed on a page with several scribbles and arrows.

“It’s, like, this page and a few more,” he explained. “Knock yourself out.”

(You decided not to point out that it was more like ten pages.)

You grinned, thrilled, and laid out the notebook in front of you so that you could take everything in. Right away, Kim Mingyu’s Guide to Losing Your Virginity was scrawled at the top. You snorted, grabbing a pencil from his desk to write Unhelpful before Guide. He watched you nervously as your eyes flitted from note to note, your smile growing bigger at certain things he wrote.

A poorly-drawn arrow from how to make y/n feel comfortable to make sure she knows she can take everything at her own pace made you feel something warm and fluttering in your chest. You couldn’t believe Mingyu put this much effort into making you feel good—so much effort that he had entire pages in his notebook dedicated to brainstorming how to pleasure you. You had never been so focused in your life as you read through what he penciled in, and one idea in particular caught your attention.

suggest REALLY sexual things so she feels more comfortable sharing what she wants to do. this will probably make her judge (bully??) you but it’s for good reason

“You’re kidding,” you said, eyes still fixed on the notebook. “You made your list that long just so I wouldn’t feel awkward?”

Even though you asked the question, you were barely listening to him as your heart pounded in your chest and your blood rushed in your ears. You didn’t even have half the mind to see the shy expression painted over Mingyu’s face because you were so locked in on the notebook. His stammering and backtracking became background noise as you were hyper-focused on the words he wrote.

Somehow, this felt bigger than any emotion you had experienced before.

You were consumed, and it scared you. Sweltering in the overwhelming feeling of longing and possibly something more. And you realized that even if you ended up with someone else after all this, a part of you would always belong to Mingyu—the part of you that watched Barbie movies and liked coming home to a dinner for two.

Was it presumptuous for you to assume that Kim Mingyu could possibly harbor romantic feelings toward you? Was it safe to say that maybe you felt the same way?

“—but now that you’ve seen it,” you finally heard him say (after taking a few seconds to register his voice), “can we take out phone sex from the list? I was never really big on that.”

You looked up at him and laughed, a touch distracted because you were still caught in the tide of your own revelations. But you laughed like you were eighteen again, sitting in Mingyu’s dorm room and listening to him recount one of his hilarious stories about him getting lost on campus or being chased by seagulls.

And now you were twenty-one, sitting in Mingyu’s apartment and giggling like you were eighteen again.

Everything melted away, and all you could think about was how badly you wanted to kiss Mingyu.

You sat up on your knees and wrapped your arms around his neck. You didn’t think you had ever looked at Mingyu with such unadulterated desire in your eyes.

Craving. Longing. Yearning.

All of it was festering inside you.

“You’re such a dork, Gyu,” you murmured before pressing your lips to his.

This time, when you kissed him, you felt like all of the stars in the sky hung below the clouds just to witness this very moment. Mingyu was stunned for a few moments before he brought his hands up to pull your face closer to his. His nose brushed against your cheek, and you let a giggle slip between soft pecks and deeper kisses.

He pulled back for air, labored breaths falling from his lips before he found you again. This time, the kiss was deeper, rougher. Adrenaline coursed through your veins as Mingyu held you tighter, squeezing your sides so hard that you were arching up against his body.

You had always tried to push down hope before it was born, but the way Mingyu held you made you feel like you were on top of the world. You wanted to believe there was longing in the way his hands ran up and down your body, but you were too scared that you were mistaking his lust for something more.

Even as he pulled away once more to catch his breath, keeping his eyes flitting between your eyes and lips while his forehead was pressed against yours, you so desperately wanted to believe that there was something more behind his affectionate gaze. Something real.

It was when he pressed a chaste kiss to your nose that your hope bloomed in your chest like a valley of flowers kissed by spring.

His hand found its way behind your head, bringing you back to him for more. You felt like you could be there forever, just exchanging wordless affection and holding each other close. Mingyu moved over you so that he was suspended over your body, starting to lick into your mouth once your back hit the bedsheets. You accepted it almost immediately, parting your lips so that your tongue could dance with his.

Then, you were whining against his lips, begging for more. The sloppier and dirtier your kisses got, you were desperate for more skin-to-skin contact. You hooked your finger into one of his belt loops and tugged him closer, which resulted in Mingyu grinding his hips down against yours.

“You want more?” he asked, more raspy than coherent, really, and you could only nod in response as you pulled him closer. Mingyu peppered kisses from your jawline to the column of your neck, leaving behind love bites that you would need a lot of concealer and color corrector for later. “I don’t wanna rush—”

“No, Gyu,” you urged him, tugging him forward by the front of his shirt. “I need you.”

His voice came out in a breath. “Need me?”

“I want you. I want you to be my first because I… I trust you.”

He grinned brightly, canines on full display while his hair was a tousled mess above you. You were pretty sure his smile would be imprinted behind your eyelids forever.

His hand slipped under your shirt and ran up your back, maintaining eye contact with you and looking pleasantly surprised at the absence of your bra.

He pressed a tender kiss to the side of your neck before helping you pull off your shirt. Mingyu’s face was set in a grin before his smile slowly fell, replaced by a look of utter confusion. His brows were pulled together in perplexion as he stared at your tits.

Or, more specifically, the pasties over your nipples.

“Oh, my bad,” you said, unfazed, “I forgot I still had those on.”

“What is it?”

“Seriously? You’ve never seen a nipple cover?” you asked, making your best friend yelp when you peeled the adhesive off your skin. Mingyu shrunk back with a wince before you placed the silicone in his hand. “It doesn’t bite.”

He weighed it in his palm carefully before placing it on his bedside table. “Looks like a chicken breast.” Then, he looked back at your tits. Instead of bedroom eyes, there was genuine concern in his gaze. “It didn’t hurt when you ripped it off, right?”

You stifled a laugh. “No, it didn’t hurt. My boobs are all good.”

You took his hand and placed it over your left breast for good measure. He squeezed experimentally, but you were certain he was just still in shock over the nipple cover. This would normally be when you shrunk in on yourself, but Mingyu discovering the existence of pasties was far too entertaining for you to shy away.

“Good,” he said before he sighed, a little too dreamy to convince you that this was purely platonic. The lighthearted moment settled back into tension. Barely loud enough for you to hear, Mingyu murmured, “You’re so pretty like this.”

You wondered if your eyes were as big as they felt. “You think I’m pretty?”

“You don’t?” He frowned, as if he was offended that you weren’t seeing what he was. “I think you’re beautiful.”

He said it before, but you thought it was just a pet name because he was in the mood. Now that he was saying it so sincerely, looking at you like you were his entire world, you felt like you had turned into putty in his hold. Your nerves were practically on fire under your skin.

“You’re sure about this, right?” he asked again, brushing a loose strand of your hair behind your ear. When you nodded, he readjusted his position so that he was underneath you, moving your hips so that you were sitting on top of him. “Just let me know if you wanna stop.”

“It’s your first time, too,” you said softly, reaching out to trace his jawline. “Are you ready?”

“Oh, I’ve been waiting.” He smiled before pulling you down for another long kiss.

He kissed you for what seemed like ages, running his hands all over your body and teasing you with kisses to your neck and jawline when he pulled away. While he was getting a condom from his nightstand, you wondered how you could ever get enough of him if this was what sleeping with Kim Mingyu was like.

While you both were a mess of limbs, you managed to remove every article of clothing from each other until your bare bodies were pressed against each other. He tore the silver wrapping of the condom off to slide the lubricated rubber over his cock. Of course you had seen him naked before, but you still couldn’t get over how wonderfully sculpted his body was. He had to have been blessed by a Greek god.

Mingyu held you close to his chest, his eyes raking your body again and again until you felt weak in the knees. When he hovered over you, lining up his cock with your soaked cunt, you had to swallow down your anxiousness.

Questions billowed in your head, floating about until they turned into butterflies and flew straight to your gut. What if he didn’t fit? What if you couldn’t take all of him in? What if it hurt?

But Mingyu had always been so reliable, so comforting. You felt safe in his arms, even if you had been working yourself up over this very act for years. You wanted to be brave for him.

“Are you ready?” he asked once more—just to be safe because he was right there. This was your last chance to back out and he wanted to make sure you truly wanted this.

You nodded with firm self-assurance. “Yeah, I am.”

“Okay, bear with me here,” he replied, the tips of his ears going pink as he tried to laugh off his awkwardness. “I’ve never exactly done this before.”

You laughed. “Me neither. We can figure it out together.”

His lips tugged into a small smile. Mingyu leaned down to press a soft kiss to your lips before he tried pushing his cock into you, guiding it with his entrance. It took him a few tries to work the head in without accidentally slipping out. The first stretch you felt wasn’t painful, but there was mild discomfort that you pushed down.

But then Mingyu couldn’t push into you any further. Your excitement fizzled and your emotions were swinging dangerously into a pit of worries.

Your best friend was a problem-solver, though. He hummed inquisitively before repositioning himself at your entrance.

“Wrap your legs around my hips,” he instructed. “I think that’ll be easier for you.”

You did as he said, tucking your legs around his hips and hooking your ankles together. Your arms hung loosely around his neck, playing with the ends of his hair and twirling them around your fingers. You bucked your hips up once to indicate you were ready, not realizing that it would make Mingyu grunt instead. You could feel your core pulsing from how badly you needed him.

After sucking in a shaky breath, Mingyu started pushing into you once more. Your arousal made it easier for him to slip inside, finally pushing the head of his cock past your folds. You cried out, tightening your grip on Mingyu as you adjusted to his size. You hadn’t even gotten his full cock in you yet.

Mingyu eased his way inside you for what seemed like ever. He didn’t care about how long he was taking or if he was getting impatient; he calmly took the time to work his cock into you. The long vein that ran down his length made you shudder as it brushed against your walls.

“That feel good?” he rasped, looking into your eyes for any signs of pain.

You nodded eagerly. “Y-yes! Please keep going.”

Your body was hot. Feverish. It felt like your pleasure was building up slowly—a dull ache at your core that grew as Mingyu pushed deeper inside you. He lowered his head to kiss your neck at the same time, nipping and sucking at your tender flesh while you moaned and writhed under him.

Finally—finally, finally, finally—Mingyu’s hips pressed flush against yours and you bit down on your lip to keep yourself from screaming out. The pain was sharp, almost dizzying, but after Mingyu held you and kissed you all over until you relaxed, you felt it subside slowly. He sighed happily, bucking into you slightly to feel how deep he was. You buried your face into his chest once you felt the room going a little fuzzy.

Aching, gnawing pain.

Deeper and deeper, but the pain built with each push into you. One certain thrust made you feel as though you hit a peak, but then you felt yourself coming down. You closed your eyes through it, taking deep breaths until the pain had mostly alleviated, a new feeling of pleasure rushing through your body.

He didn’t say anything for a long while, just letting you take things at your own pace. It was only until you begged him to move that Mingyu complied and started moving his hips.

With an experimental, shallow thrust, you let out a whimper and let one of your legs unhook from the other, letting it lay on the bed instead. Mingyu held your other hip up and started thrusting slowly into you, making sure to keep his pace exact so that he didn’t slip out again. Your pleasure was building up fast, like a spell of vertigo that left your head spinning and your body flushed.

“F-feels so good, Gyu,” you cried out, and then you couldn’t say anything at all once his tongue pried its way into your mouth. His lips slotted against yours perfectly, like both of your lips had been specifically molded to fit each other’s.

He thrusted deeper. Some of his thrusts hit that golden spot inside you that made your world turn blinding white. You were dangerously close to an orgasm with how good he was making you feel.

Mingyu sped up his thrusts, holding your hips and dragging his lips across your skin to leave love bites along your collarbone and shoulders. With the way he shifted your hips to pound in at a better angle had your legs shaking and your eyes rolling back into your head. You were far too sensitive to last long, especially since this was your first time experiencing such pleasure.

Realizing that your muscles had started involuntarily twitching, Mingyu thrusted into you deeper and caged you in his grip. You were teetering on the precipice of a release, holding onto his strong arms for leverage—something to ground yourself while you about to dive into your own ecstasy.

The brute strength in his thrusts led you to falling over the edge, jolts of pleasure coursing through you as you chanted Mingyu’s name over and over again like a prayer. The force of your orgasm nearly knocked the wind out of you, making the world before you go blurry as Mingyu fucked you through your high.

You nearly didn’t register him moaning out, too, his lips framing your name as he came. It felt as if you had short-circuited, laying underneath him helplessly as you rode out your orgasm. The current tugged and swept you away, sending aftershocks of pleasure to your sore cunt.

You blinked twice to reorient yourself, coherence bleeding back into you. It was when Mingyu kissed your forehead that it finally clicked for you.

You finally lost your virginity.

“Thank you,” he whispered against your temple. “That was incredible.”

You nodded, dazed, about to thank him back before you noticed that something was running down your hip. You touched the liquid curiously, wondering if you had just been that overstimulated, but what you found on your fingertips was blood.

You shrieked.

“What happened?” he asked, eyes wide before he saw your hand. He chuckled lightly. “Oh, I see. This is normal after your first time; it’s no big deal.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, don’t sweat it.”

Mingyu didn’t seem to understand the gravity of the situation, though; he was smiling delightedly while you were a panicked mess. Blood was gushing out of the very place Mingyu’s cock was buried, and you were humiliated because of your new position as Human Ketchup Bottle.

“Wow,” he cooed sarcastically, rubbing your hips gently, “it’s like you’re my personal little volcano.”

“Oh my god. Please shut the fuck up, Gyu.”

After helping clean you up and a few more sessions of you two gushing over how good your first time felt, you and Mingyu laid in bed together, side-by-side. He had gone on several tangents about how it was nice that you two didn’t feel awkward around each other and that he was almost worried because he heard a lot of horror stories about people’s first time.

Apparently, Vernon’s first time was quite unmemorable because it was a quickie in a hot tub. He had never considered the friction caused by the water being uncomfortable, so it wasn’t one for the books.

To your surprise, when Mingyu headed to the kitchen to get you some water, you felt strangely hollow. As your eyes grew unfocused, the ache from the penetration was more clear, and you started to feel a little empty.

No one ever talked about what happened after sex. No one ever talked about how, shortly following the aftermath of your first time when you were coming down from the dazzling glow of your orgasm, the only thing you could feel was overwhelming vulnerability.

It was like you had been flying up in the clouds, got too close to the sun, and dropped right into a void of sadness. You were bordering on a feeling of emptiness as you stared up at Mingyu’s popcorn ceiling.

Then, the bed dipped next to you. Mingyu came back with a glass of water for you and one of his sweaters—the black Ralph Lauren one his mom got him for his high school graduation. Yeah, he was definitely starting to outgrow it, but he kept it hung up in his closet, anyway. Something about it being sentimental to him.

“You good?” he asked in a gentle voice, setting the glass of water on the nightstand. He slid onto the mattress next to you, wrapping a strong arm around your waist. “You look a little out of it.”

“I’m better now,” was all you said, smiling contently after placing your arm on top of his.

“Did something happen? Did I do something?”

It wasn’t that you didn’t want to tell Mingyu how you were feeling; you just didn’t know how to. There was nothing he had done to upset you at all, and the night had been incredible. You were still over-the-moon from losing your virginity to your best friend. That was why the wave of sadness that hit you afterward was strange and foreign.

“No, no, it’s just…” You sighed. “I just felt really sad for a few seconds. Like, don’t get me wrong, that was the best feeling ever, but after you went to go get water and stuff, I just got really sad.”

Something flashed across Mingyu’s face. It was the look he always wore when he was correcting someone or explaining some nerdy bit of information he knew. You were anticipating him to go on some tangent about heightened emotions peaking during sex would lead to a crash—something along those lines.

But then, he simmered. His expression was immediately replaced with understanding as he squeezed you tighter. Mingyu must have known that you just wanted to be comforted, not talked to, so he just tucked his head into the crook of your neck.

You felt warmer. Safer.

“Do you feel better now?” he asked.

You sucked in a breath. “Much better.”

Somewhere between your mumbles and whispers of conversation, you and Mingyu ended up drifting asleep in each other’s arms.

It was around twilight when you woke up, dusky purple streaming through the windows and across Mingyu’s peaceful face as he was deep in slumber. You turned your gaze back up, staring at the chipped paint and grooves in the popcorn ceiling, feeling as if you were drowning in your own emotions.

The feeling settled in your chest. It was always there, like a dull ache, but now it was loud. Pounding.

You were in love with Kim Mingyu.

You ran into Ryujin later—much later. It was well after you went back to your apartment and had a meltdown over your newly-recognized feelings for your best friend.

After you talked yourself through your feelings for nearly an hour, you realized that you couldn’t handle this problem head-on. You needed the assistance of your favorite cookies and cream ice cream from Ben and Jerry’s, so you walked to the nearby grocery store in sweatpants and a jacket.

While you were trying to balance three tubs of ice cream in your arms, Ryujin happened to wander into the freezer section, looking mildly concerned at the sight of you. She was pushing a cart full of groceries with her glasses sitting low on her nose.

“Need any help there?” she asked, moving aside her bag of cilantro to make space for your ice cream.

“You were right,” you admitted, and you nearly sounded hysterical with how breathless and frazzled you were. “I’m in love with him.”

“Oh shit.”

“Yeah.”

“That explains the ice cream.”

“Totally overshot the much simpler feeling of just liking someone, or being attracted to someone,” you rambled, allowing her to take the tubs of ice cream from your hands. “It couldn’t even just be a silly little crush, either. I’m just… in love with him.”

“So, what’re you gonna do now?”

You paused. “Would it be reasonable for me to think about it after I see him again?”

“Reasonable? Absolutely not. Stupid? Probably.”

“Well, that’s what college is for, anyway.”

“I support you,” she started, “even if I think you’re a dumb bitch.”

“Thanks, Ryujin, I think.”

The golden rule about being in your twenties was that it was the prime time to be young, dumb, and make stupid decisions.

The stupid decision you settled on for today was inviting Mingyu over when you really should have been taking some time to figure out your feelings for him. You knew very well that this would fuck with your emotions, but you had to give in to your carnal desires. Now that Mingyu had relinquished you of your virgin title, you couldn’t get enough.

You had always wondered what it would be like when you finally lost your virginity. Part of you thought it would be some sort of final form that you would achieve, but it wasn’t exactly all that different. Society overvalued deflowerment, you figured, but there was something that rang true.

Your face glowed a little brighter. Whether that was because of your recent confidence boost or your post-sex elation, you weren’t sure.

But now, you were in a predicament: you wanted more. Naturally, that led you to calling Mingyu and subtly asking if he wanted to come over.

That was how you ended up with your chest pressed against the wall while Mingyu’s body was caging yours. His strong chest was against your sweat-beaded back, and you swore you could feel every muscle of his keeping you from budging. It took him a few valiant efforts to fit his cock inside of you, and you had to reposition yourself several times for him to find a good angle. Once he had slid into you with ease, though, he started thrusting into you with vigor, soft grunts falling from his perfect lips.

(You realized Mingyu wasn’t able to get enough of you, too. He walked in, exchanged a greeting and gave you an update on Wonwoo’s crabs before his rough hands were turning you around and holding you against the wall. While his lips worked on your neck, you managed to sputter out some nonsense about being happy for Wonwoo’s new crab, Clawmander.)

“You’re wet,” he observed, his tone frank and even.

“Excellent observation, Sherlock Holmes.” You managed to gasp out the words before Mingyu’s cock hit that perfect spot inside you that made your vision curl with darkness at the ends.

“Jesus,” he hissed, lips brushing against your left ear. You let out a sound that was somewhere between a whimper and a moan while he used his free hand to rub your clit in torturous circles. “I didn’t think you’d get this worked up over me.”

You didn’t answer him. This wasn’t the right time or place for him to hear the true reason. Plus, you could hardly string any words together when he was making you feel so good.

“Don’t cum just yet,” he muttered, and you whined when his cock slid out of you. When you turned around to ask him what his deal was, Mingyu lifted you up effortlessly and carried you to your couch. He had you straddling him while his hands rested on your thighs. “I want you to ride me, beautiful.”

Intimidation settled in. Mingyu could see it in your eyes—the way they refocused and your gaze flitted around hesitantly.

And, because Mingyu was just a tenderhearted, loveable ray of sunshine, he added gently, “If you want to, of course.”

Your eyes went lust-lidded as you wrapped your arms around his neck. You just wanted to make him proud.

“Sit back,” you told him, and you lifted your hips so that you could sink down on his throbbing cock.

Mingyu sucked in a sharp breath, holding your hip with one hand and helping adjust his length with the other. You winced, still not used to the penetration, but the initial pain was less sharp than it was the first couple times. Once you felt the mild discomfort replaced with the hot pleasure you were chasing just minutes before, Mingyu helped you start moving your hips up and down on him. He let go of your hips to throw his head back and run his hands down his face, agonized that he couldn’t fuck into you himself.

You placed one hand on his chest and let your body hover over his as you fucked yourself on his cock. Then, Mingyu decided to pull you flush to his body and buck his hips up on his own. You cried out from feeling him deeper inside you, but then you were moaning into the curve of his neck.

“You feel so good around me,” he whispered into your hair. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for this.”

You pulled back, still bouncing on his dick with spurts of clarity returning to you. You were still dazed from how good he felt inside you, but Mingyu’s words were trying to reel you back into proper coherence.

“H-how long?” you stuttered out.

Mingyu smirked up at you, but before the fluttery feeling returned to your chest, you were paralyzed with fear when you heard a loud knock followed by the door handle turning. Your oncoming orgasm came to a halt and dissipated immediately after.

You and Mingyu repelled like magnets; you winced as he practically manhandled you off his lap and scrambled away, so you pushed him off the couch as payback. You only had time to pull your blanket up to cover your bare chest before Soonyoung appeared in the doorway. Mingyu, butt naked, was perfectly facing the front door, and he could only cover his crotch with both hands in time.

Cue Soonyoung screaming, then Mingyu, then you.

For a few seconds, it was a perfect choir of discordant screeching.

“What the hell are you doing here?!” you yelled as Mingyu tried to duck out of the way. He eventually realized there was no immediate escape and just turned around, making Soonyoung sigh heavily and cover his eyes with his sleeve when he saw Mingyu’s ass on full display.

“Well, my… my Connect Fours—”

“You could’ve knocked!”

“You told me I could come over and pick them up!”

“You still could’ve knocked!”

“Don’t blame me; I am the victim here! Normally, you’re in here watching a rerun of Jersey Shore, so I wasn’t exactly thinking, ‘Oh, what if Y/N’s actually getting dicked down by Mingyu right now?’ No! Because no one tells me what’s going on anymore!” Soonyoung argued. “I just came here to get my Connect Fours, not for front row seats to the Magic Mingyu show!”

“I’m sorry.” You sent Mingyu an uneasy look, and then you grew more concerned as you watched him manage to awkwardly wrap most of his body with the white drapes at your windows. You turned back to Soonyoung. “You didn’t see too much, did you?”

“I just saw Mingyu’s asscheeks on full display!”

Mingyu pouted, taking great offense to Soonyoung’s panic. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“Okay, I’d rather see your asscheeks, like, on purpose,” he replied, exasperated, “not like this! My eyes feel violated.”

“Soonyoung,” you whispered harshly, and, if looks could kill, you were sure your friend would be six feet under. You waved your hand, motioning for him to leave as the situation was becoming increasingly awkward. “I’ve only got ten of the boxes so far. I’ll text you when the rest come.”

“Right, right,” he mumbled, turning to grab the large package at your entryway. “I’ll just take this and go, then. Let me know when the rest come.”

You sighed. “Yeah, of course.”

“By the way, how big is Mingyu’s dick? He won’t tell us how—”

Mingyu, who looked horrified at this point, raised his voice so high that you nearly burst out laughing from how squeaky it sounded. “Can you leave already?!”

“Before I go,” he said, “I’ll see you guys at Kap Sig for the Beerlympics tomorrow, right?” After he was met by two piercing glares, your friend realized that this was probably not the time nor place for this conversation. “Sorry! Just text me if you decide to show up!”

Soonyoung closed the door behind him loudly to make it known that he had left, and you and Mingyu relaxed once he was finally gone.

“I’m gonna lock your door,” Mingyu started, all huffy and flushed with embarrassment, “and then we can get back to what we were doing.” While he was making sure your lock was secure and walked back, he kept lecturing, “You know, you should really keep your door locked all the time. You never know what’s going to happen.”

You heard him loud and clear, but your mind was still buzzing with questions from what he said before you two were walked in on. All you wanted to know was how long he had been waiting to sleep with you, and you were so curious that you weren’t even feeling humiliated anymore over Soonyoung nearly seeing you naked.

“How long have you been waiting?” you asked. When Mingyu only gave you a confused look, you clarified, “You said it earlier while I was on top of you.”

“Oh.” He rubbed the back of his neck before his lips stretched into a smile. “How about this: I’ll tell you when you come to see my work in the gallery.”

You folded your arms across your chest. “Fine, but I was gonna show up either way.”

“See, that’s what I like about you.” You were too busy blushing to notice that Mingyu had already made his way between your legs and was hovering over you. He peeled the blanket off from your body and put it over the head of your couch. Tapping your knee, he said, “Now, open up, beautiful. Since you were doing so good for me, I’ll make it up to you.”

It was the next day around noon, and the remaining ten boxes of Connect Fours arrived at your door in another giant package. You texted Soonyoung that he could come pick them up (and wait for you to open the door).

You still hadn’t cleared things up from yesterday when he walked in on you and Mingyu, so you weren’t sure how to look him in the eye without feeling absolute shame. Not only that, but the guilt from your lie had been swirling in your chest constantly now that you were hit with the reality that Soonyoung had already perceived your strange friends with benefits relationship with Mingyu.

After you spent practically the entire day with Mingyu yesterday, even driving him to 7-Eleven for munchies at 3 a.m., you ended up getting the green light from him to tell Soonyoung everything. He knew that the guilt was weighing on your chest, and you both concurred that you would feel much better after coming clean.

After all, Soonyoung was one of your best friends, and you didn’t want him to keep deceiving him, no matter how big or insignificant your lie was to him.

When Soonyoung arrived at your door, making sure to knock three times, he greeted you with his usual cheery smile.

“Hey,” he said with an awkward edge to his voice. “Proud of me? I knocked this time.”

You went over this conversation about a million times in your head, thinking of different possible scenarios and outcomes that could happen. For each one, though, there was no eloquent way to bring up your lie without you sounding like you were overcompensating by rambling.

Just rip the bandage off, you told yourself.

It was hard to find the words, though, and your brain couldn’t figure out how to smoothly deliver the news.

Soonyoung looked like he didn’t know what to do, considering you had been staring blankly at him for several seconds without saying anything. “Is this a bad time?” he asked after a pause.

You shook your head quickly. “No, I have something I need to tell you.”

“Yeah? What’s up?”

You gestured for him to come inside, and Soonyoung took off his shoes before walking into your apartment. You felt yourself flush when he intentionally avoided sitting on your couch and just stood between your hallway and living room.

Soonyoung liked to joke around most of the time, but even he could tell that you were trying to bring up something serious. His arms were folded across his chest, the bewilderment in his eyes coalescing into sympathy. You intended for this to be honest, clear communication, but your breath was getting short and your eyes were darting to your feet before you could even get the words out.

This was deeper than your lie. You could admit that you were a liar, but something inside you withered at the very thought of admitting that there was something going on between you and Mingyu. Something that crossed the line of platonic friendship but kept its distance from romance.

So, before anything else, you blurted out, “I lied about being a virgin. Mingyu and I didn’t have sex.”

Your voice was thick with emotion. For a moment, your friend just stared at you, unblinking.

“Huh?” He sounded utterly confused as he rubbed the back of his neck. “I didn’t want to make things awkward and bring it up, but didn’t I walk in on you and Mingyu yesterday?”

“No, I’m talking about the time I told you I had sex with Mingyu.”

“In the library?”

“Yes.”

“So you guys didn’t have sex?”

“Well, technically we did, but—”

“Wait, let me get this straight,” Soonyoung said, pausing before he continued, “so, you’re a virgin?”

“No.”

“No?”

“I was a virgin, but now I’m not. The timeline got fucked.”

“Wait, so, you were a virgin when you told me you weren’t a virgin,” he recounted, to which you nodded in response, and you could tell a few of the pieces in his head fit together when he finished, “and then you lost your virginity.” You nodded again to affirm his statement and your friend let a low-pitched whistle slip. “Wow, that is some crazy lore.”

Fiddling with your fingers, you asked, “Are you mad that I lied to you guys?”

“Mad? No way,” he said. “Like, sure, I don’t really understand why you lied. I guess you had your own reasons. It’s not like it’s a bad thing to be a virgin. There’s no way I’d be mad over something like that, though.”

“I was worried because I thought you hated liars,” you explained, and although you didn’t mention his ex-girlfriend, it seemed as though Soonyoung knew exactly what you were talking about.

“I care about lies that hurt, and, hey, you told me eventually,” he said. “I’m not gonna hold it against you for not telling me about something you weren’t ready to share.”

He worried at his lower lip before adding, “You didn’t lose it to Mingyu because of what I said, right?”

You felt like a weight was lifted off your shoulders, and your breathing steadied. You didn’t even realize how fast your heart was beating until you could feel every muscle in your body relax.

“No, of course not.” You finally cracked a smile. “To be honest, when you guys grilled us about it in the library, it did set things in motion. I don’t regret any of it, though—except lying to you guys about it. I’ve been wanting it to happen for a while now.”

“Good. You should probably tell the others when you’re ready, too.” He gave you a warm smile before amusement seeped back into his eyes. He turned to pick up the large package of Connect Fours and said, “Congrats to you and Mingyu, by the way. I always knew you two would get together.”

You nearly got whiplash from how fast you turned your neck. “Soonyoung—what?”

“Yeah, I mean, he’s been crazy for you ever since freshman year. I figured he would eventually grow a pair and ask you out,” he elaborated. Once Soonyoung hoisted the box up and turned around to look at you, he froze when he saw the dumbfounded look on your face. “Oh, shit. You’re not dating him, are you?”

“No, Soonyoung. No, I’m not.”

“Oh… my bad.”

Around twenty minutes after Soonyoung’s slip-up, you decided you would go with him to Kappa Sigma’s “Beerlympics,” which you hadn’t exactly been banking on showing up to. When you were informed about it yesterday, you had to research online to make sure that no, Soonyoung wasn’t speaking some alien language.

You never really understood half the things Soonyoung and Jungwoo talked about in relation to their fraternity. It usually went in one ear and out the other. It was always something about chapter meetings, pledges, and the sort of nonsense that made you wonder if you two were even living in the same world.

Before you decided to go, Soonyoung had to guide you to the couch to sit down and process your thoughts, which you figured was a great feat for him considering he was still traumatized from walking in on you and Mingyu.

Even after you stared blankly at the wall, though, you still couldn’t fathom the thought of Kim Mingyu liking you all these years. And, you didn’t outwardly admit it to Soonyoung, but the thought of your best friend liking you back made you inexplicably happy.

After you quickly changed into more appropriate clothing, Soonyoung and you walked over to frat row, passing by several large fraternity houses before arriving at the male-infested Beerlympics event. Your friend was still carrying his box of Connect Fours, which kept rattling as you two walked.

Yesterday, you were considering not going, mostly because you committed to going to Mingyu’s exhibition today, too. He had texted you the details, informing you that it would be early in the evening, so you weren’t going to spend longer than a few hours at Kappa Sigma.

Plus, now that Soonyoung had accidentally revealed the feelings Mingyu was harboring for you, confessing to him was weighing heavy on your mind. You desperately needed to tell your friends about your feelings before you ended up self-combusting.

In a matter of minutes, you were sitting between Vernon and Jungwoo on the couch, watching Minghao and Soonyoung shotgun a Coors Light. The box of Connect Fours was currently being used as a drink stand.

“You just came back from Vegas,” you told them, “and you’re already hosting a Beerlympics?”

“What did you expect us to do? We only drank hard alcohol in Vegas,” Jungwoo explained. “It’s only right that we come back and drink beer.”

You rolled your eyes, incredulous. “You guys can’t be serious.”

“By the way,” Vernon started, “is Mingyu coming? I haven’t seen him in a while.”

“You went to the gym with him yesterday,” Minghao pointed out.

“And that was in the past.”

Soonyoung cleared his throat once he was done with his beer. “Speaking of Mingyu… Y/N has something to tell you guys.”

“Right.” You cleared your throat before announcing, “I’ve gathered you all here today because someone said something he wasn’t supposed to.”

“And that someone was me,” Soonyoung mumbled, dejected.

“Wait,” Jungwoo interrupted, “we need context.”

Although you talked to Minghao before about the pact between you and Mingyu, you still hadn’t explained the whole ordeal to Vernon, Jungwoo, and Soonyoung. As you rambled on about how Mingyu proposed the idea and you two started becoming friends with benefits, Soonyoung’s face fell more and more as he realized he had royally fucked up. Vernon, on the other hand, despite having been kept in the dark this entire time, kept a placid expression on his face while the other three boys lost their shit.

You went on to explain the whiteboard, the notebook, how scared you were about ruining your friendship with Mingyu, and how Soonyoung walked in on you two and accidentally revealed that Mingyu had been crushing on you for a while.

“There’s no way you actually wrote all that down on a whiteboard,” Soonyoung said with an incredulous laugh. When Minghao pointed out that your whiteboard (that you still hadn’t returned to the community room) was literally in the living room, your friend cried, “I can’t believe I didn’t notice that!”

“Yeah, it was front and center when you walked in on Mingyu and I,” you said.

“To be fair, Mingyu’s ass was very distracting.”

You folded your arms across your chest, staring the four boys down. “Okay, well, that’s my side of what happened. It’s your turn to spill what you know.”

They all looked at each other warily before Vernon decided to break it down for you. He explained how Mingyu had been crushing on you ever since you two were in the same orientation group, and your breath caught in your throat because that was exactly when you also found him cute. Apparently, since you had become good friends with Soonyoung and Minghao shortly after (and later, their respective roommates: Jungwoo and Vernon), Mingyu didn’t try to read into your closeness too much.

All of the pieces were connecting in your head—all of the little moments and things he said that you brushed off as a coincidence. Every realization was like a firefly in your head, flickering and blinking under dim light until it shone bright and clear in total darkness.

Every time he called you beautiful. Every time he kissed you. Every time he looked at you like you were all he wanted.

Mingyu saying he wanted his first time to be with someone special wasn’t just a previous notion of his that he discarded once you two made the pact. You were the someone special he wanted to be with.

And god, if only he knew how badly you wanted to be with him right now.

“Alright, Y/N, do not tell Mingyu about any of this,” Soonyoung warned. “I’ve survived Jungwoo’s stupid ‘ecstasy water’—fuck you for that health violation of a drink, by the way—and I’m not letting Kim Mingyu be the reason why I end up six feet under.”

“I’m gonna have to tell him I found out from you, Soonyoung,” you argued. “There would literally be no other way for me to find out if it wasn’t from one of you guys.”

Vernon was quiet before he suggested, “What if we throw Jungwoo under the bus?”

“Yo, that’s hella smart,” Soonyoung praised before giving Vernon a high-five.

“I would prefer not to be thrown under the bus, thank you,” Jungwoo deadpanned.

“We are not throwing Jungwoo under the bus,” you agreed. “Besides, there’s been something that I’ve been thinking about for a while, too.” You paused to pour a shot for yourself, downing the contents of your red solo cup in one go. Wringing your hands together, you confessed, “I think I like Mingyu.”

“Oh, wow.” Jungwoo nearly choked over his words and held out his cup to you. “Pour me a shot, too. I’m gonna need it.”

Minghao decided to take over, asking, “As a person?”

“As a… man.”

“Well, men are people—sometimes.”

You groaned, unlacing your fingers to drop your face into your hands. You couldn’t believe you were saying this at the Kappa Sigma house, of all places.

“I—well, yeah, obviously. I just… okay, the point is, I sort of realized I really like him, and I was scared because I don’t know how this is gonna affect the group dynamic.” You felt your face growing hot as you talked about it, but you continued, “I wasn’t going to say anything, but what you guys just told me changes things, I think. I feel like I really need to tell him how I feel, if that’s okay with you guys.”

(You took another shot.)

You had never said the words out loud—not even to yourself. Your emotions felt more real now that they were out in the open for your friends to hear. Amidst all the booming music and drunken shouts in the house, your friends were silent.

“Why’re you asking us for permission?” Jungwoo finally spoke up. “We aren’t gonna be dicks and say you shouldn’t ask him out just so we can keep our friend group as it is. Just ask him out.”

(Another shot.)

“What he said,” Vernon agreed. “If Mingyu’s crush on you didn’t affect our friendship for four years and your crush on him didn’t make things weird, then I don’t see why you have to hide how you feel.”

(You gulped down your fourth shot.)

By the time Minghao started harping on about how you should be following your heart, you were starting to feel the alcohol settle. It ran through your veins, thick like molasses, until you felt sluggish. Then, spurred by your determination to confess your feelings, you rose up to your feet.

“I’m gonna do it,” you breathed out.

“When?” Soonyoung asked.

“Now.” You stopped to gather your belongings—your phone from the Connect Four box and your bag from the couch. “I’m gonna go see him.”

“Let’s call you an Uber,” Jungwoo said, and when he realized he was probably the most sober out of his friends, he dragged himself off the couch. Apparently, he was drinking in moderation after nearly getting alcohol poisoning in Vegas and dealing with a nasty hangover. “Okay, I’ll call you an Uber.”

Jungwoo walked you outside, waiting with you on the sidewalk until your Uber arrived. He recounted some of the highlights of his weekend in Vegas to you, and you listened intently even though you could feel your heartbeat drumming in your ears. You weren’t sure if it was because you were intoxicated or your nerves over potentially confessing your feelings to Mingyu.

When your Uber pulled into the driveway—a white SUV that was large enough for you to assume that Jungwoo accidentally booked an Uber XL.

As you were getting into the passenger’s seat, Jungwoo held the door open long enough to tell you, “Hey, I’ll let you in on a little secret: Mingyu never really cared for watching movies until he met you.”

While your Uber driver took you to your destination in silence, you were certain your heart was glowing brighter than any sunset out there.

The gallery was empty when you arrived—eerily quiet. A long, white table sat at the foyer where the front desk was. Plates of what you suspected had cookies on them were left littered with crumbs. The gallery assistant seated at the front desk must have been a student working part-time because her nose was buried in a textbook, hardly noticing you walking inside the building.

Your buzz was wearing off by now and your stomach had dropped in a deep pit when you realized that you were late. You swore you had timed it right. Mingyu told you to be there at 5 p.m., and yes, you were twenty minutes late, but you didn’t expect the whole venue to be cleared out.

Maybe everyone else was just late. That had to be it, right?

When you tried to look up Mingyu’s location on Find My Friends, he was miles away and looked as if he was on a trail.

You decided to call him, wondering why he hadn’t texted you yet. You were too disoriented in the car to give him a heads up, but he would normally text you, anyway.

After three rings, he picked up. “Hello?”

“Mingyu!” you cried in a hushed voice. “Am I late? Did you leave already? I can’t see anyone here.”

“Where?” he asked. “Uh, if you’re talking about Beerlympics, I didn’t go because I had a project due tonight.”

“No, the gallery. You said it started at five, right?”

Mingyu was silent for what seemed like forever before he stifled a laugh. “You mean the gallery opening tomorrow night?”

You had never sobered up so quickly.

While Mingyu was laughing at you on the other end of the line, you were pulling up your text messages to confirm that he had given you the wrong details. Instead, you were met with the horrifying realization that you just read the invite wrong.

“I mean, you can still see my work while you’re there,” he continued. “I think they’ve already switched out their old art.”

You groaned. “I’m so stupid.”

You roamed around the gallery as Mingyu told you about his day, looking at all of the art pieces that were submitted. After you took some pictures of various paintings and sculptures that were on display, your eyes fell upon a sunset photograph hung up on the wall.

The very photograph you came here for.

You had seen gorgeous sunsets before, but you had never seen pictures that did them any justice. What Mingyu had captured, though, was absolutely breathtaking.

Over the foliage, the sky was a wonderful blend of oranges, yellows, pinks, and purples. The great ball of light dipped below the horizon, peeking out just enough to see its wonderful color. The rays of sunlight reached out past the frame, illuminating the treetops and the current of water that ran to the side.

To the right, you saw Mingyu’s placard fixed to the wall, hanging proud next to its photograph.

Kim Mingyu You’re My Sunset 2023 The sun’s last kiss to the sky. If there’s a world where I can watch sunsets forever, I hope she’s there with me.

“—so I’m pretty sure I’m gonna get a C on the quiz because he made us write out our code on paper. My handwriting is dogshit, so I hope he has a fun time reading mine.” He trailed off when he realized you went silent on the other end. “Y/N?”

“Where are you?” you asked, a touch distracted as your eyes drank in the words etched onto the placard.

“Huh? I’m on that hiking trail near the freshman dorms,” he said. “I was gonna go watch the sunset, if you wanted to come see it with me.”

And because you were so helplessly in love with him, it was easier than breathing to say, “I’d love to watch the sunset with you.”

It took you one more Uber and forty minutes to find Mingyu where he was waiting for you. You told him not to walk all the way back down to meet you, so you made your journey to the top on your own. You were definitely not dressed for a hike, but sunset was coming soon and you didn’t have time to stop at your apartment to change.

You waved once you saw him, biting back your smile because you didn’t want to look overly-excited to see him. He had probably been outside for a while, judging by the sheen of sweat that made his biceps glisten under the setting sun.

“You made it just in time,” he said. “Sunset’s in a few.”

Your chest heaved as you recovered from your hike up. It had been ages since you worked out properly, so part of you was glad that you didn’t let Mingyu go back down and fetch you. You surely would have had to make him stop several times for you to take a breather.

He was sitting on a large, flat rock—so smooth that it was probably the perfect spot on the entire mountain to watch a sunset. Mingyu scooted over so that you had room and you sat down right next to him, knees knocking and shoulders brushing against his.

You had never seen anything as formidably beautiful as the view before you. The sun had started to dip below the horizon, glowing a spectacular orange. Muted colors of blue and gray vanished like a skip, blurring into colors more intense, more breathtaking. Oranges and yellows blend into the canvas of the sky, soon blending with pink and red hues that made the clouds look like the seventh heaven.

It felt like the sun was setting, calling the stars out just for you two. It cast its rays onto the lake below, leaving the surface glittering with millions of golden sparkles.

This was the sight that reminded Mingyu of you.

For a while, you two just watched the sky wordlessly until you started, “I saw your—”

“What if we watched the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe for our next marathon?” he asked at the same time, but his words were stronger—more purposeful—so you answered him instead.

“We still haven’t finished our Barbie marathon,” you said. “We’re still on Barbie and the Diamond Castle.”

“But… when we finish.”

You hummed. “How long does it take to finish all of the Marvel movies?”

You tried to mentally note down all of the titles you knew with the limited knowledge you had of the Marvel cinematography. You were pretty sure you watched a good amount of them—the big ones that broke records in theaters—but you never tried watching them in order.

“Seventy hours and forty-six minutes. I checked.”

“We’d be marathoning forever.”

He smiled. “It wouldn't be the end of the world if we marathoned forever.”

You laughed, loud and clear. It was almost ridiculous to think of you and Mingyu in your fifties, sitting on a couch and watching yet another movie marathon in the measly hours of free time you had between work and other responsibilities.

And then it hit you. Your heart jumped to your throat.

You and Mingyu, doing the same things you did now in your fifties. You and Mingyu, sitting on a couch and watching another marathon together. You and Mingyu, swamped with work and responsibilities but still spending time with each other amidst all that.

You and Mingyu.

Your lungs were trees and there was a forest fire. It tore its way through each leaf, each branch, and it felt like that fire would burn forever. Burn until the sky had no sun and the world was in ruins. You couldn’t think straight as your heart raced and your breath got caught in your throat.

“Forever?” you asked in a small voice.

Mingyu’s eyes softened, more sincere and longing in them. At this point, he had gone pink beneath his golden skin. He moved his hand over yours, giving it a gentle squeeze, but all you could focus on was how the last rays of the evening shone on your best friend’s face. He was painted with sunset.

“Yeah, forever,” he confirmed. “I guess this is my way of confessing, so… Y/N, my forever marathoner, my sunset, will you go out with me?”

You were choked up at what felt like the worst possible time to be malfunctioning. “Sunset—”

“You saw it, right? The dedication next to my sunset picture?” he asked. “You finally realized that I’ve been in love with you for the past four years?”

He said the words so casually, as if he was telling you the color of the sky. But you could feel the weight settle in—the years of longing and pining.

This time, instead of just craning your neck, you turned your whole body to face him. The way he looked at you sent butterflies to your stomach, but your eyebrows pulled into a frown. You were sure that you couldn’t have possibly let it slip to him that Soonyoung told you everything.

“How did you… how did you know?”

He grinned, leaning back a little on his hands. “Before you got here, Soonyoung drunk FaceTimed me and started apologizing for exposing my four-year crush on you. He also apologized for assuming that I had the balls to ask you out.”

You scoffed a little, recalling how Soonyoung was practically begging you not to tell Mingyu yourself. It only made sense that he would be the one to fess up after all that alcohol got into his system. You made a mental note to call him out on this very moment the next time you saw him.

“Things get messy when someone likes someone else in the friend group, you know?” he continued, looking over the cliffside for a moment before turning back to you. “But, with you, I don’t think I mind things getting a little messy.”

“Do you remember when Jungwoo told you I found you cute, and I told him I really said something else?” he went on, turning his head away this time. He sounded more shy when he admitted, “Beautiful. I called you beautiful.”

“I just…” You faltered, trying to work up the courage to look him in the eye. When you did, the melted amber swirling in his eyes nearly made you stammer. “I didn’t expect any of this.”

Mingyu must have mistook your nerves for hesitation because he immediately said, “It’s all good, Y/N. I just wanted to come clean to you. You don’t have to answer—”

“No, Mingyu,” you cut him off, breathing out the words with an edge of desperation, “I didn’t expect this because I came here to ask you out.”

It was his turn to be shell-shocked. Mingyu’s pink lips parted in surprise, mouth opening and closing like he wanted to say something, but he clearly hadn’t even thought of this outcome. You watched his Adam’s apple bob nervously.

He looked at your lips, then your eyes, then your lips again. He lifted his hand to touch your cheek, fingers spreading so that he could cradle your jaw. He looked transfixed, looking at you like you were far more captivating than the sunset that was playing out for you two. His eyes fluttered shut once he closed the distance and his lips met yours.

If you were his sunset, Mingyu was your sunrise. Every time he kissed or touched you, you felt warmth spread through your whole body, making you beam brighter than any star in the galaxy.

He pulled back, but he was still so close that his nose was touching yours, both of your ragged, uneven breaths mixing in the tight space between you two. He held the back of your head and pressed your foreheads together, a gesture of his that always made you feel like you were soaring.

Your voice failed you as Mingyu’s calloused hands bunched up the fabric of your shirt to glide down your back, tracing the bumps down your spine and gripping tighter once he reached your hips. It was like he was charting a map of your body, taking note of every little curve and dip he came across.

“W-we’re outside,” you stuttered out.

“No one’s gonna catch us. I wanna show you how I feel every time I look at you,” he murmured in a low voice that only you could hear. “Lay down for me, Y/N. I want you to watch the last of the sunset while I show you how much I love you.”

You didn’t reply, mostly because you wanted to let your actions speak for you. You pulled him in for a short, chaste kiss before you scooted up on the rock and laid down for him. The solid surface was uncomfortable at first, but then Mingyu had you get up for a moment so that he could spread his jacket out for you. You laid back down and looked up, gasping when you realized you had a perfect view of the setting sun.

Mingyu tugged down your shorts and underwear, making sure to carefully fold them and set them aside instead of just discarding them somewhere. Now that you could feel the coolness against your bare skin, you were grateful that his jacket was under you. He pulled his sweatpants down past his hips and hovered over you, eyes flickering up to meet yours. They were hazy, swimming with lust, but you could see his sincere adoration, too. He refused to kiss you because he didn’t want to obstruct your view of the sunset.

“Are you ready?” he asked, lifting his middle and ring finger to his lips and licking them for extra lubrication.

You sucked in a sharp breath at that. “Please—yes.”

Slowly, Mingyu pushed his fingers inside of you, watching you bite your lip and screw your eyes shut with an amused half-smile. His thumb worked slow circles on your clit while his fingers were nestled in you.

“Open your eyes, beautiful,” he instructed. “You’re gonna miss the sunset.”

Finding a steady pace was no problem for Mingyu at all. He watched you squirm and moan underneath him as his fingers slid in and out of your cunt. His knuckles were glistening with your arousal, and Mingyu stared at where they disappeared inside you with unfocused eyes. He curled his fingers inside you ever-so-slightly, passing over your g-spot, and you arched your back at the feeling.

His name stuttered past your lips, coming out so raw and passionate that all the blood rushed to Mingyu’s cock. His boxers were tented, and you were once again intimidated by how huge he was. His bulge brushed against your thigh as he plunged his fingers into you.

You felt limp under his touch, but just when you felt prickles of heat under your skin, Mingyu’s fingers slid out of you. You nearly cried out over his false promise of a release as you dug your nails into his shoulders.

“The sky,” he whispered. Like it was instinct, he licked his fingers clean without batting an eye. An embarrassed rush of heat sank into your cheeks. “I need to be inside you for the rest of the sunset. Fuck, I don’t have a condom on me.”

You wrapped your arms around his neck loosely. “That’s okay. You can just pull out.” You looked straight into his eyes and said, “I trust you, Gyu.”

“Go raw? Are you sure?”

“Yeah, we can just get Plan B tomorrow, if anything.”

Kim Mingyu looked like he could die a happy man then and there.

He tugged down his boxers, letting his cock spring up and slap the underside of his belly. It was already huge and flushed with beads of precum collecting at his slit. Mingyu shuddered almost immediately when the cool air hit him.

He spread your legs with his large hands, and you swallowed thickly before Mingyu started rubbing the head of his cock along your slit. He made sure to smear the arousal between your legs to your clit. The last rays of the sun shone on his face, and you could see the glint of hunger in his eyes.

At this point, you were nearly begging for him, so Mingyu started pushing into you carefully. His brows were pinched and his bottom lip was sucked into his teeth while he worked his way into you, his eyes glinting with utter focus.

It was so different without the condom. Intense. Hot. The drag of his cock inside you made you falter, absolutely loving the new friction and texture you were feeling.

You swallowed down your gasp with a shuddering breath. Your tight expression slowly relaxed as Mingyu’s cock worked its way inside you. Every time you wanted to close your eyes, you snapped them back open to catch a glimpse of the blurry hues above.

“That’s it,” he cooed, the praise only turning you on more. “You feel so good.”

He started circling your clit with his thumb again, getting your walls to relax so that you immediately took more of him in. Mingyu’s cock twitched inside of you, causing that one muscle in your leg to twitch. You weren’t sure how long you were going to be able to last if he kept teasing you like this.

When his head dipped into your opening, you sucked in a breath, but he did not enter just yet. Your hips bucked up against his, and Mingyu held them down so that he could position himself without slipping out of you. A sound that was between a deep chuckle and a grunt rumbled in his chest at your eagerness.

With little preamble, Mingyu started pushing deeper into you, letting himself sink while his breathing grew short. His cock brushed sensitive spots inside you that left your toes curling and your vision going blotchy. You watched the sky grow darker and darker, vibrant orange colors blending into deep reds.

A debauched moan bubbled past your lips once Mingyu started fucking into you slowly. Each roll of his hips brought a blinding wave of pleasure that left behind a sheen of sweat coating your body. The initial sting of penetration dissolved quickly into pleasure.

You dragged your nails down his well-defined back muscles, sighing blissfully with each thrust of Mingyu’s hips. His back muscles flexed underneath your hand as his cock worked in and out of you. He tucked his face into the crook of your neck and moaned along with you, and the look in his eyes told you that all he wanted to do was kiss you, but he was adamant on making you see the sun.

“Oh my god!” you cried out once Mingyu used his free hand to lift your leg over his hip, getting a better angle so that he could plunge into you. Blinking away tears, you were nearly sobbing when you said, “I… I didn’t say it back, Gyu. I love you, too. God, I’ve loved you back for so long, too.”

All the lust in Mingyu’s gaze had melted away, being replaced by the most loving gaze you had seen in his shining eyes. He leaned down to kiss you slow—a completely different pace from how he had been fucking you. When he pulled away, he kept his lips at the shell of your ear, whispering sweet nothings.

With his hips snapping into you at a near-animalistic pace, you were quickly reaching your peak. Mingyu seemed to take notice and rubbed your clit faster to catch you up to speed. Heat spread under your skin, making each nerve ending feel like it was on fire.

“There,” he gasped out after he turned his gaze up for a moment. “Do you see it? The sun kissing the sky?”

He had been waiting so long for you, pining so hard, that when your orgasm ripped through you, Mingyu came almost immediately after. He groaned before pulling out of you, his strained expression melting quickly into bliss once his release came. It seemed as though Mingyu didn’t want to get you dirty, so he shot his load to the side where he could hide it easily.

You looked up, and you finally saw how devastatingly beautiful the sunset was with its palette of colors exploding across the sky.

Reds. Oranges. Dying glimpses of yellows. You felt like you were experiencing a sensory overload with how the colors mixed and blended together while Mingyu was helping you ride out your orgasm.

This was it. This was the seventh heaven.

While you were still twitching from your intense orgasm, Mingyu sat up so that he could fix his pants, his chest rising and falling in tune with yours. You were still sprawled out on the rock, watching the last rays of sunlight dip below the horizon. The previously colorful sky had been drowned out by black and blue, but it was still bright enough to make out your surroundings.

“I never answered you properly,” you said after you caught your breath. The clouds rolled out of view, revealing the illuminated moon that shone down on you two. You sat up, meeting Mingyu’s curious gaze and declaring, “I’d love to go out with you.”

You had never really been able to fully understand what love was. It had been a foreign concept to you for years. When Mingyu smiled brightly and kissed you again, though, it had never been so clear to you.

You honestly felt bad for the librarian.

As soon as you and Mingyu walked into the library hand-in-hand, you heard a chorus of groans from your friend group’s table. They were all jeering at you like they hadn’t been the ones convincing you to ask out Mingyu a few days ago. This time, Ryujin was also mocking you with them.

(You had asked her to show up so that you could give her the Smiski figurine she had delivered to your house. You had no idea why your friends kept ordering things and using your address for delivery.)

Soonyoung cupped his hands over his mouth and yelled, “Get a room!”

“We’re just holding hands!” Mingyu exclaimed. “You’re acting like we’re in the Victorian ages.” He waved his hand to get Soonyoung to move. “Give me some room so we can work on our project together.”

You giggled and took your seat next to Mingyu, your pinkies interlocked under the table. You were sure the honeymoon phase would wear off in a few months, but for now, you couldn’t get enough of each other. Of course, you kept most of your PDA behind closed doors so that your friends would taunt you, but you were happy with that.

Speaking of your friends, they were all over-the-moon when you and Mingyu announced that you were dating. Ryujin had screamed into your ear so loudly that you were pretty sure you experienced temporary hearing loss.

You and Mingyu also finally returned the whiteboard to the community room after erasing all of the sexual terminology on it. You two were surprised that you actually managed to knock out everything on both lists that hadn’t been canceled. Apparently, Jeonghan had been distressed over the whiteboard’s disappearance and filed a complaint to get a new one. He got his happy ending, too, when you and Mingyu rolled it back into the room.

“Y/N, Mingyu,” Jungwoo called. “Body counts—go!”

Mingyu blinked. “One?” he deadpanned. “Why would it be higher than that, dude?”

It was your turn now, with all eyes on you. Before, you wondered why you even felt the need to lie about something like that. It had all seemed like such a silly concern back then, but now you realized that there had never been a rush to lose your v-card.

Now, you could confidently say, “One.”

Because Kim Mingyu’s Guide To Losing Your Virginity really was effective.

mingyu: hey mingyu: what happens when we finish the marvel marathon

y/n: wdym

mingyu: like what do we do with our lives mingyu: 70 hours and 46 minutes mingyu: it has to end eventually mingyu: we’ve been marathoning all this time with no foreseeable end until now

y/n: what did we do before the marvel marathon

mingyu: the barbie marathon

y/n: and what did we do before that

mingyu: the disney princesses marathon

y/n: and before that

mingyu: the saw marathon

y/n: exactly y/n: we will keep marathoning for as long as marathons exist

mingyu: is that your way of saying we’re forever?

y/n: yes it is

AUTHOR’S NOTE ▸ if you made it all the way to the end, MUAH! thank you so much for reading !! and thank you to everyone who asked to be on the tag list, i was so floored by the love you guys showed the teaser ♡ first and foremost, i have to shoutout fia for being the reason i changed my magic mike joke to magic mingyu. i would also like to shoutout mingyu for existing because his existence is the reason why this came into fruition. also shoutout to you for reading this because wow!!! you sat through all those words??? i am so honored, really :’) i hope you enjoyed this, thank you for being on this rollercoaster with me, and i hope you look forward to my future works

TAG LIST ▸ @matchahyuck @playboysh-t @jintaema @hoonflrt @desi-brownie @dreaming-on-clouds-blog @xiaoting999 @staygenezy @jwlmnbt @hipsdofangirl @baeseungcheolie @everywonuu @multiplums @shinetogether17 @jeonsrv @chickenstripsonapole @nunchuckd @florcix6 @stariszn @kissesfrmwonwoo @yikesmary @neejaatjeh @chansdimplesmile @mewiththemess @cookiechristie @mi-seonha @mingy0u @shgyuie @alvanie @watermelon-sugar-things @prodsh00ky @itskkung @yelsuki @cottoncheol @hella-sirius @spiderlingh @fixonbreakoff @cupcake416 @expensive-idiot @bambam7 @seri22 @ixdelv @hopefulchick @markleeiloveu @svtfix @sunnysorasworld @bluest-sky01 @smileywonnie @notevenheretbh1 @peachyaeger @arianna-r13 @luvv4jiung @caticorn61 @sulkygyu @jhornytrash @anthropologymajorkpopmultistan @amourcheol @yogurttea @mental-hollows @byunfirstlady @tis-niki @esloao @onedumbho3 @wonudazed @marklee-czennie @listxn @shiveringgaze @luvyouchuu @taintedsorrowa5158 @sjjnx @cherimbp @jeonquilsposts @suzirumas @leclercloverbot @ilove-taeyong @na-ni @emptypromisesx @iwouldbangchan @melies-world @breadstickk @coupsgal @asyre @sanniekook @mingyusrealwife @yoonzinoooo @doyoism @turtash @lilsafsafbooyah @karlluvr @ana-marais98 @staplerrrr @kpopficsworld @diorjgguk @tojorocks @taesdior @biteme690 @seomisaho @svtcaratlove @catloafff @kyeominara @delicatewinterenthusiast

#svt scenarios #seventeen scenarios #mingyu smut #seventeen smut #svt smut #seventeen #mingyu x reader #kim mingyu #svt imagines #seventeen imagines #mingyu imagines #mingyu scenarios #svt hard hours #seventeen hard hours #seventeen x reader

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dr-spencer-reids-queen · 3 months

Text

invisible string

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~1.1k

Warnings: fluff

Request by anon: this is about to be super self indulgent but could you by any chance do a spencer reid x barista!reader maybe he keeps going back to the same cafe or something and memorizes like little facts about coffee or something lol i love your writing so much!!

Summary: Spencer keeps going back to the same coffee shop not because of the coffee but because of a certain someone that never fails to make him smile.

Square Filled: invisible string by taylor swift for @spencerreidbingo

Author’s Note: any and all comments are appreciated <3

“I need a double shot espresso and a strawberry refresher,” you call to your coworkers. You’re working the register when a tall man walks up to the counter. Man, he is super cute. “Hi, what can I get for you?”

“I don’t come here often but I hear you don’t take large cups? What are they called?”

“Venti?”

“Yeah, that,” he chuckles. “What do you recommend?”

“I personally love anything caramel. It gives me enough sugar to counteract the bitterness of the coffee.”

“I’ll do that, then.”

Man, he is clueless but he’s so cute. You’re not sure if this is a bit or if this is who he actually is but you like it.

“What kind of coffee do you want?”

“Hazelnut Americano with caramel drizzle.”

“You got it. Anything else?”

“No.”

“Name?”

“Spencer Reid.”

He pays for his coffee and you start making his order since there is no one else in line. You write his name on the cup and walk to the pickup section and call his name. The way he bounces over to the counter is kind of cute.

“Have a nice day, Spencer,” you grin and hand it to him.

“Thank you. You, too!”

The next day when Spencer comes in, he is more confident. He’s still nervous since he finds you attractive but he’s not going to let that stop him.

“Hey, I remember you. You ordered the hazelnut Americano yesterday,” you smile and greet him. You yawn and cover your mouth. “Sorry. It doesn’t matter how much coffee I drink, I am still tired.”

“Did you know that coffee was discovered by an Ethiopian goat herder?”

“I did not but it makes sense. He needed all that energy to round up all the goats. What’s your name again?”

“Spencer.”

“Yes, that was it. Sorry, I have a terrible memory.”

“I have an eidetic one.”

“What is that?”

“An eidetic memory is the ability to recall an image from memory with high precision—at least for a brief period—after seeing it only once and without using a mnemonic device. I have an IQ of 187 and can read twenty-thousand words a minute.”

“So, you’re really smart?”

“Yes,” he chuckles.

“Okay, come back tomorrow and I’ll have a fact for you.”

“Deal.”

There is a line forming behind him so Spencer quickly orders and leaves just as fast as he came. You have to wait an entire day to see him again and this time, you have a fact lined up for him.

“Hi, Spencer,” you smile. “I think I got a good fact for you today.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“Did you know that ketchup was once sold as a medicine?”

“In the 1830s, it was believed that the condiment could cure almost anything, including indigestion, diarrhea, and even jaundice,” he nods.

“Alright, smarty-pants, I’ll have to try harder tomorrow.”

“I have one for you about coffee. Did you know that bees love the taste of coffee?”

“Is that why they always fly near me when I’m having my morning coffee in my sunroom?”

“It might be.”

Another line is forming so you grab his coffee order and move on with your life. The only thing you’re looking forward to now is Spencer when he comes in. He shows up the next morning at the same time he’s been showing up, and you find yourself smiling because of him.

“Spencer! The usual?”

“Actually, get me your favorite drink.”

“Are you sure? You’re not allergic to anything?”

“Nope.”

“Coming right up.” You ring him up and accept his cash. “I have another fact, and I think it’s a good one. Did you know the Vikings discovered America and not Christopher Columbus?”

“Yes, approximately five hundred years before Christopher Columbus, the Scandinavian explorer Thorvald, brother of Leif Erikson and son of Erik the Red, died in battle in modern-day Newfoundland.”

“Okay, you’re good.”

Spencer blushes at your small compliment. “My head is filled with facts that I can’t seem to forget like coffee beans are actually the seeds from the coffee plant’s berry-like fruits. The coffee plant is a shrub that grows in tropical climates in parts of Africa, Asia, South America and North America. It produces an edible berry-like fruit known as a coffee cherry, which typically contains two coffee beans. These beans are then processed and roasted to create the coffee we know and love.”

“I did not know that.” You really like talking to him but every time he comes in, there is a line forming behind him. You have to move on so you put in his order. You turn to your coworker who barely begins to make his order. “Can you take this? I want to make his cup.”

“Sure, smitten kitten,” she grins.

You grab the empty cup and make your favorite drink for Spencer. When you’re done, you write your number on the side of it in hopes he will use it.

“Spencer?” He walks up to the counter and you smile. “Here you go.”

“Thank you. I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“I’ll be here.”

Spencer doesn’t notice your number until he gets to his car. He smiles which makes you smile because that is a good sign that he likes what you did. The next day, he comes in with someone. He hasn’t used your number yet but maybe he’s nervous. The man with the dark skin encourages Spencer to make a move on you, and he pushes him toward you.

“Hi, Spencer,” you smile.

“Hi. This is my friend and coworker, Derek Morgan.”

“Hi, Derek.” You turn to Spencer. “I got one for you. I really think I’ll get you this time. Did you know that in Ancient Egypt, the New Year celebration was called Wepet Renpet?”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Wait, really?” you gasp.

“Are you serious?” Derek asks Spencer at the same time as you.

“I’m sorry, yeah, I did.” You tip your head back and laugh. “While we celebrate New Year’s Day on January 1, the Ancient Egyptian tradition was different every year. Meaning ‘the opener of the year’, Wepet Renpet was a way to mark the annual flooding of the Nile River, which usually happened sometime in July. The Egyptians tracked Sirius, the brightest star in the sky, to time their festivities.”

“You know, one day, I’m gonna get you. I’m gonna know something you don’t.”

“I’ve been barking up that tree for years now,” Derek chuckles. You and Spencer look at him and he nods in understanding. “I’ll go wait over there.”

“What can I get you two?”

“Caramel Macchiato and a Hazelnut Americano.”

“Is that all?”

Spencer looks at Derek who nods in encouragement.

“Would you like to go on a date with me?” he stutters.

He blushes as he talks which is super cute.

“I’d love to.”

“Great. I still have your number. I was nervous about using it but I will now.”

“Don’t wait too long,” you grin.

There is something pulling you and Spencer together, something of an invisible string.

Follow my library blog @aqueenslibrary where I reblog all my stories, so you can put notifications on there without the extra stuff :)

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fourraccoonsinacoat · 2 months

Text

Faint of Heart | One Shot

Pairing: Astarion x The Dark Urge

Chapter Count: One Shot | Read on AO3

Word Count: 7,816

Summary: Takes place during the events of Baldur's Gate 3 during Act 2. Explores the romance between Astarion and the Dark Urge as Astarion struggles with a confession. Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Fluff, Humor, Idiots in Love, Confession of Feelings, Mentions of Violence, Soft Astarion, Spoilers for the Dark Urge and BG3 in general, Dark Urge as Original Female Character Rating: Mature

Author's Note: Back on my bullshit with these two. This is a one-shot based on the same Durge MC, Eli, as my other fics. I took some liberties with Astarion's confession scene, taking into account the background of the Dark Urge. It's all somewhat self-indulgent, and I wanted an excuse to write sassy Jaheira and practice writing from Astarion's POV. It's angsty, it's fluffy, it's soft and Karlach is the greatest wingman of them all! Thank you for reading my nonsense.

She stood, looking to everyone else in the Inn like a conquering hero ready to head out once more and face the darkness. She smiled with Rolan, laughed with Cal, chatted with Lia, and no one was the wiser.

Except him.

In their time together, Astarion had picked up on some of Eli’s tells. Behaviors that slipped past her mask of composure and enthusiasm, exposing the truth beneath her carefully constructed veneer.

She was exhausted. He could see it in the slight sag of her shoulders, in the way she kept having to blink and refocus on whoever she was conversing with, in her tired yet reassuring smile…the one she always had at the ready for anyone who came to her with yet another ordeal to hang around her shoulders.

A sudden and fierce burn of irrational anger flared in his chest as he continued to watch people flit around her. It brought to his mind an image of bees sucking the nectar dry from a gorgeous wildflower. They would use her until there was nothing left because that was their nature. They were desperate, all of them. The tieflings, Jaheira, Barcus, Counsellor Florrick…they were all starving for a savior, and Eli was that succor. They’d use her up until nothing was left. They’d watch her kill herself in the name of their ambitions, then hail her as a hero rather than the kind fool she was, always taking on other people’s burdens in some mad, desperate attempt to redeem whatever darkness lay coiled in her past.

Nevermind the fact that Eli’s kindness was exactly what he’d set out to manipulate from the start.

He was just as bad as the rest of them, looking to use Eli for her protection and capabilities. He was just as guilty. He’d seen her compassion as weakness and immediately dug his claws in, hooking into her like a parasite. Seducing her into his bed, stoking affection and twisting feelings – both hers and his – until he couldn’t tell truth from fiction.

And that was the problem.

Somewhere along the way, more and more truth began to slip into the words he used to charm her. He wasn’t sure when it started, but sometime between their passionate nights and hard fought days, genuine feelings began to stir every time he thought of her.

And, gods, he’d hated it.

On that first day after the nautiloid, when he’d discovered he could walk in sunlight and was out of reach of Cazador, he’d swore to never allow anyone control over him again. He’d rather drive a stake through his own heart than be a puppet tethered to someone else’s strings. And yet…here he was, allowing the very first person he’d met after making that oath to have sway over him. And he was utterly terrified he wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.

And so he sat at a far table in the bustling lounge of Last Light Inn, watching Eli and growing more and more perturbed as people buzzed around her.

Couldn’t they see how tired she was? She’d done enough for them today, breaking Wulbren and his compatriots out of Moonrise alongside the tieflings…well, those tieflings who’d survived the assault in the Shadowlands. Eli had been battered, bloodied and in desperate need of a healer, and yet the moment they’d come upon the prison, nothing else had mattered except freeing those being held captive.

She hadn’t said as much, but Astarion knew her well enough by now to recognize the shadow of devastation that drifted across her expression when Dammon described the attack that had scattered the refugees while on the road. She’d grown close to many of them, back at the Grove, often allowing conversations to drag on far past their welcome as some poor sod carried on about their insignificant struggles. It had frustrated Astarion to no end. They didn’t need to hear all about Bex’s absurd dream of owning a little orange cat with a bell on its neck! That knowledge did nothing to aid the process of driving steel through goblin guts.

It had all come to a head when she’d given Mol gold in exchange for absolutely nothing, spouting off some bullshit about wanting to back the next great thieves guild of Baldur’s Gate. Astarion had pulled Eli aside then, hissing about futile charity and asking her if she intended to bankroll every guttersnipe with a sob story.

She hadn’t missed a beat with her retort.

“Don’t worry, you’re still my favorite of all the guttersnipes I’ve come across. Thank the gods you only ask for blood and not gold. Otherwise, we’d be deadass broke.”

She’d leveled a stare at him that spoke volumes. He’d rolled his eyes and tried to hide the smirk threatening at the corners of his lips. Of course he was her favorite.

Still, it was mind-numbingly infuriating, how far Eli would go to help someone she cared for. What was worse was that Astarion knew, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that she’d do the same for him. That she’d throw herself thoughtlessly into pain, torment and suffering for his sake. At one point, he could not have cared less whether she destroyed herself for his gain.

But those days were gone, and he was now forced to reckon with the fact that he’d grown attached…that he cared. That he’d slit the throat of anyone in this room who tried to take advantage of her. That he’d once been the person trying to take advantage...

The thought now stirred something uneasy and almost nauseous within his stomach. He hated thinking about how he’d treated her, and yet it seemed to be something he was incapable of forgetting. Whatever was between them now, it was founded on something rotten. It had grown out of a lie, and regardless of how he felt now, a part of him knew that in order for anything to continue he would need to confess the vile intentions that had started all of this.

He owed her that, and she deserved it. She’d likely hate him, and all of this would come crashing to a disastrous end…but she deserved the truth, Astarion’s feelings be damned. She deserved to be with someone who would treat her with the same honesty and respect that she showed to everyone else. She deserved to be with someone who would protect her, not lie and manipulate her. She had so many burdens of her own, and yet she kept piling the burdens of others atop them. She deserved someone who would help steady her, not someone who would only get in her way and cause her to stumble.

She was going to hate him. He knew it as surely as he knew the sun would not cut through the gloom over the Shadowlands tomorrow morning. But he couldn’t keep living this farce. He couldn’t keep bedding her and enduring all those feelings of guilt and self-hatred as they mixed with the longing and ecstasy of bringing her to the brink and watching her come undone. It was too overwhelming. He wanted to be with her honestly and openly and not have their time together tainted by his wretched memories.

He wanted something real with her, built on the foundation of what he felt now rather than the putrid intentions that had started all of this.

It wouldn’t happen, he knew. Astarion wouldn’t want himself, either, all things considered. And that was okay. She deserved the opportunity to hate him for how he’d treated her. Gods knew he hated himself for it, it was only fair she hate him, too.

The fact that she didn’t already was astounding. He was a wretched thing, ugly in all ways except for appearance and so useless that he had to manipulate others into fighting his battles. He had ruined so many lives over the past two centuries. He’d been used up until there was nothing left of him to offer. And yet she was always near, never shying away and never overbearing…just always there, always at his back. She didn’t flinch away from him, didn’t pity him, and she made him feel things he’d forgotten how to feel.

The first night they’d spent together had been unexpectedly enthralling and pleasurable, something he had not experienced in he didn’t know how long. And he’d wanted more, despite his confusion and the messiness of his feelings, he wanted more of that connection. And so they’d spent more nights finding comfort and pleasure in each other. Those nights were little moments of solace in a world gone mad.

Those nights had been about more than sex; they were nights where she told him beautiful words that weren’t made for people like him.

“Seldom do I find so little fault with someone. I hope it lasts.” A cool voice caught Astarion by surprise as he sat lost in his darkening thoughts.

His head snapped around, hand instinctively twitching towards a hidden blade at his hip.

Jaheira stood beside him, arms crossed and face unreadable and she pinned him in her stare. Her eyes flitted momentarily to the hand at his waist, and Astarion brought it back to rest on the table he sat at, dagger still fastened to his belt.

The ghost of a self-satisfied smirk flashed across her face as Jaheira glanced away from him and back towards the subject of her comment. He followed her gaze towards Eli and hummed thoughtfully, settling into a more relaxed posture that he hoped did not betray the swirling mess that currently haunted his mind.

“You should tell her as much,” he mused, watching Eli as she pushed a strand of her silver-white hair behind an ear.

The sight caused his mind to pull a memory forth, unbidden. It was tactile and soft, the feel of his fingers tangling in that hair…of his lips caressing the shell of her ear as he whispered ravishing praise for only her to hear.

He took a grounding breath and dashed those thoughts from his mind.

“She thrives on pretty words and compliments,” he quipped.

Astarion wouldn’t elaborate that the reason for it was because Eli had a desperate desire to escape whatever monster dogged her broken memories. She thought of herself as something tainted and corrupt. Something unworthy. He’d got a glimpse of that darkness on the night she’d woken him, panicked and breathlessly ranting about how she feared she would harm him.

At first, he’d thought she was still in the throes of one of her many night terrors, perhaps sleepwalking. The truth had been far more grim, and Astarion was still haunted by images from that night. Images of Eli struggling against the bindings Astarion had put her in, for the protection of them both. Eyes feral as her nails dug into the flesh of her palms, mouth snarling as she spat all manner of vile insults at him. She had lost herself to whatever thing she was keeping at bay inside herself, and Astarion had come to realize that the fear which hounded Eli on both sleepless nights and in nightmares was well founded.

That fear had spread to him, too. Fear of losing her, of watching her be overtaken by this madness. He understood the depravity he saw in her eyes, the mania that was a loss of self when hunger took hold and choked all other sensibility from your mind. He hadn’t felt empathy for another soul in nearly two hundred years, and suddenly there it was, raw and wounding and utterly terrifying. His thoughts screamed back to that year of starvation and darkness, locked in a tomb as he slowly went mad with hunger. Those recollections were an undertow, threatening to pull him down and drown him.

But she’d needed him, and so he’d wrenched himself free of his clawing subconscious and watched over her until morning when she returned to herself. A lot of things changed that night. They’d been changing already, but the lies he’d been telling himself about how he felt simply could not survive the blistering reality of the situation at hand.

There was still some life left in his cold dead heart, and he had no idea how to reconcile with that knowledge.

The sound of Jaheira clearing her throat brought him out of his brooding and he turned his head to find the druid eyeing him curiously, a hand outstretched towards him. A key was held between her fingers and Astarion glanced at it before meeting her gaze, perplexed. Jaheira sighed and took a seat opposite to Astarion at the table, setting the key down on the worn wooden surface of the hightop and pushing it over to him.

“Seems Karlach was speaking truth when she said the two of you were a pair of emotionally-stunted lovesick fools,” Jaheira said, leaning back in her chair and pointing from Eli to Astarion. “You completely tuned me out, staring at her like a wolfhound salivating over a piece of raw steak.”

Astarion tensed at the remark, frowning before he slipped back into his casual and roguish demeanor.

“Yes, yes, make your jokes about the monstrous vampire. How dare he pursue the charming and morally upstanding hero.” Astarion snorted, eyeing Eli ruefully. “I’ve heard it before. Wyll likes to especially harp on the subject.”

He made a mental note to tell Karlach not to be such a gossip.

Jaheira huffed, a noise that could possibly be construed as a laugh, except Astarion wasn’t sure he could picture the stern woman laughing.

“Please,” she said, almost dismissively. “I am not familiar enough with your little band of hedonists to form an opinion on your social dramas. And even if I were, I doubt I’d care.”

The druid turned her head to gaze back towards the bar.

Bex and Danis had joined the group situated around Eli, and Astarion noted that another bottle of wine had recently been opened. Eli was turning down offers to refill her glass and Astarion felt a sudden urge to grab her and whisk her away to the quiet sanctuary of his tent back at camp. And not even to do anything sexual, though if that’s where the night took them, he’d happily oblige.

He just wanted to give her a space of reprieve, somewhere she could rest and escape all this chaos.

“What I do care about,” Jaheira continued, drawing Astarion’s attention back to her. “Is that one’s wellbeing.” She tilted her chin towards Eli. “She is our way into the cult. Our way to get close to Ketheric. She is our key to putting an end to this blight of the Absolute.”

Astarion didn’t reply. He wasn’t sure he trusted himself to open his mouth in that moment. Jaheira was loading more burdens onto Eli’s shoulders, and his desire to hide her away – to protect her – was only growing.

He knew the druid spoke truth. Eli had a connection to all of this that none of them, including her, understood. What they did know was that Ketheric Thorm recognized her when they showed up at Moonrise. He’d addressed her as a comrade, and it deeply unsettled her. What secrets were lying locked away behind Eli’s fractured psyche? A part of him honestly didn’t care…he just wanted her safe…

“So,” Jaheira said after the silence between them lingered for a moment. She tapped the key still lying on the tabletop in front of Astarion. “That is a key to a room upstairs. As well-meaning as the rabble down here is, what Eli needs is rest. The days and weeks ahead will not be easy, and opportunities for respite will be few. Make her take this one.”

Astarion opened his mouth, intending to ask why the hell Jaheira didn’t just go over there and say these things to Eli. But she was well ahead of him and held her hand up in a motion to silence him.

“I have no sway over her. I will only come off as overbearing and fussy, even if I do speak truth.” Her tone took on a hint of amusement, that of an elder and learned lioness affectionately chiding a cub. “I have been informed by Karlach that the two of you are together, yes?”

Astarion stiffened, his mind swirling around all the complications involved with his and Eli’s relationship. Guilt rose up in his throat and he swallowed it down uneasily as Jaheira eyed him curiously. She bullied past the question, not waiting for his affirmation.

“Take Eli upstairs and away from all of this,” Jaheira said, rising from her chair in a motion to leave, her piece said.

She then paused, considering something, before turning back to Astarion.

“It is not my place to say this, but I will, anyway. You seem conflicted about something concerning her. And I don’t want details,” she added hastily, noting Astarion’s discomfort at being called out. “However, I know all too painfully the grief of leaving things unsaid. This life you currently lead, it is one lived day-to-day, and those days will run out. Sometimes, much sooner than expected. Don’t wait until you have nothing left but regret.”

Once again not waiting for a response, Jaheira turned and made her way towards a group of Harpers who were chatting near the Inn’s central firepit. Astarion was left alone with the echo of her words and the key she had provided.

Something squirmed uncomfortably in Astarion’s chest as he rolled what she said over and over in his mind.

Shit.

Shit. Shit. Shit!

She was right, of course. He needed to talk to Eli about them. About whatever this was. About how he’d manipulated her.

Used her.

Astarion groaned softly and ran a hand through his hair absentmindedly - a nervous habit.

Enough! Enough thinking, you wretched pathetic cowardly moron!

Rising from his chair, Astarion grabbed the key and made his way towards the bar, stepping up behind Eli who was currently providing Rolan with a play-by-play of their Moonrise prison break. Gently, he wrapped an arm around her waist and brought his other hand up to rest on her shoulder, pressing a light kiss to the side of her neck as he did so.

Astarion felt Eli’s pulse quicken beneath his lips and smiled as she leaned back into him. He felt a smug sense of satisfaction as he caught Rolan frowning at him, indignant as Eli’s attention shifted away from him and to the vampire.

“Hello, my dear,” he whispered softly into her ear, ignoring the tiefling wizard who looked as if he wanted to set Astarion on fire. “I’m sorry to interrupt you and your adoring fans, but I have some adoring of my own that I need you for.”

It was so easy for Astarion to slip back into his charmingly seductive mannerisms, so much so that he felt a pang of guilt twist in his stomach.

Truth be told, Astarion wasn’t exactly sure how to approach the type of conversation he wanted to have. He’d never done this before, asking to talk about a relationship, so he was winging it and using what tactics he knew to get her away from the crowd and to a more private location.

Eli turned her head to meet his gaze and grinned, placing a hand on the one Astarion had at her waist and intertwining her fingers with his.

“Really, now?” she said playfully. “And what does this adoring entail? Because if a hot bath and a massage are not included, I’m not going.”

Eli’s eyes shined with mischief as her expression settled into a teasing smirk. She kissed him lightly near the underside of his jaw – a reassuring gesture. Eli would go with him, regardless, but she always did enjoy a bit of banter.

“Arrangements can be made,” Astarion quipped as he turned her in his arms and began leading her towards the staircase to the upper floor.

Apprehension was beginning to roil in his gut, but he forced the alluring façade to stay in place.

Eli allowed him to direct her towards the stairs, tossing a wave to Rolan and calling over her shoulder.

“Sorry, Rolan! We’ll chat more later, as I’m currently being commandeered.”

Astarion couldn’t help the smug expression that crossed his face when he heard the tiefling’s miffed response.

“Mmhm, you seem like a very unwilling captive,” Rolan grunted.

Eli laughed.

“What can I say? I’ve got a weakness for pretty words, great sex and a man I don’t have to share snacks with,” she said.

Astarion tried to hold back the surprised bark of a laugh that bubbled up from his throat and failed miserably. He felt eyes on them, some scandalized and others amused - and heard Rolan’s agitated groan - as he led Eli up the stairs.

They reached the second-floor landing and he pressed a hand to the small of Eli’s back, guiding her towards the room.

“Where are we going, anyway?” she asked, trying to stifle a yawn as she spoke.

Safe from the greedy, peering eyes of the mob below, the shift in Eli’s demeanor was almost instinctual. She sagged a bit, weary and leaning into his touch. Hey eyelids fluttered closed for a moment and she drew in a deep, steadying breath.

She truly was exhausted and Astarion began to second guess himself. Maybe this wasn’t a good time to broach such a sensitive topic. She needed rest, not more burdens. Was he being selfish? Trying to offload his guilt just so he could feel better?

But the way she pressed into him, slightly leaning on him in her fatigue and suddenly so disarmed and at ease the moment they were away from the crowd…it caused a gnawing self-hatred to burn deep in his bones.

She trusted him. She felt safe with him. She shouldn’t…he didn’t deserve her affection.

“Jaheira, like the meddlesome elder she is, secured us a room away from all the nagging unwashed masses so you can finally get some peace and quiet,” Astarion said, stopping in front of a door which had the same designation as the key he had been given.

“Astarion, we are the unwashed masses,” Eli chuckled, glancing down at the battered scale mail she wore which was currently spattered with grime, blood and who knows what other less-than-savory substances.

Astarion expression pinched into one of mild disgust as he considered his own leathers which were equally smeared and foul.

“Yes, well, perhaps whatever contemptuous god is overseeing our day-to-day lives has seen fit to grace us with a private washroom? You know, as a way to apologize for all the horror and trauma that surrounds us every second of every day,” he bemoaned in that haughty, vain manner that only Astarion could pull off.

Unlocking the door, Astarion held it open and motioned with a gentlemanly flourish for Eli to enter. She did so, and the pale elf had to suppress a snort of laughter when she called out to him not five seconds later.

“Holy shit! I’ve never had such an emotional reaction to seeing a bar soap before!”

“I would hope we have not become such heathens that soap merits this much enthusiasm.”

“It smells like eucalyptus, Astarion! Eucalyptus!”

-------------------------------------------

There was, indeed, a private washroom.

Eli and Astarion took turns getting cleaned up. Soaking in a tub of warm, soapy water was a scarce luxury. Most days, their motley group was resigned to bathing in cold river water with minnows nipping at their toes as they tried to cleanse themselves with whatever natural herbs and ointments Halsin was able to scrounge up into a paste.

In truth, Astarion couldn’t recall the last time he’d been afforded the opportunity to simply enjoy a bath. Cazador certainly didn’t allow his spawn such niceties, and while he’d visited his fair share of taverns and hotels with rentable rooms while prowling for victims to bring back to his master, he was never able to just…be. To relish in the comfort of it all.

The warm water was soothing, banishing the endless chill of death sunk deep in his bones that was his constant state of being since the night he turned. Eli had washed before him and was now situated on the large plush bed across the room from the tub. A privacy screen blocked their view of one another, but they’d been chatting idly throughout the evening about nothing in particular.

Now, in a lull of silence between them, Astarion’s mind was wandering as he rested with his arms and head propped against the sides of the tub, eyes closed in a moment of calm that was all too fleeting these days. He lazily imagined having Eli in the water with him, her warm body pressed up against his which, for once, wouldn’t be cold and pallid to her touch…wouldn’t be greedily stealing the heat of her skin to warm his corpse.

But, he’d still be stealing her trust to warm his dead heart…

He sighed, feeling the ease of the moment slip away like the tendrils of steam coming off his bath water. He needed to own up to his manipulative intentions. Now. He couldn’t stomach the thought of holding Eli in his arms that night while she slept, peaceful and trusting. Holding onto him like he were something to be cared for, to be cherished. Unsuspecting of the truth…that he was deceitful and lowly.

That they never would have been here, in this room, had he not set out to use her for his selfish gain.

If he didn’t approach the subject now, he may not get another chance for some time. Their days were so overwrought with hardships and schemes that finding a moment of quiet was nearly as difficult as figuring out how to subdue the shadow curse.

Resigned to what he needed to do, and with an icy weight of dread sinking into his gut, Astarion rose from the tub and towled dry. He dressed in his typical casual outfit, a black ruffled shirt and dark trousers, and rounded the privacy screen to see Eli sitting on the bed, legs crisscrossed as she drew in a small leatherbound journal. She’d picked it up in the Emerald Grove, exchanging a dagger with Mattis for it that she’d picked up off some decrepit corpse or another.

Eli had taken to writing rather extensive notes in it about anything and everything; from information about the cult to descriptions of acquaintances and even hand drawn maps of the various areas they trekked through. She’d confided in Astarion that she feared what memories she’d made since the nataloid could one day be lost to her, just as her past was lost. And so she wanted to ensure, should that happen, she had a record she could refer to in order to hopefully reclaim some of what was gone.

Eli had even showed him several pages full of details about him. She’d written down all manner of notes, from little preferences he had – such as the style of embroidery needle he liked to use – to reminders such as: “You’ll figure out he’s a vampire pretty damn quick, Astarion is absurdly terrible at keeping secrets. Don’t be weird about it, he’s cool. He can get a bit whiny and obnoxious when he’s hungry, so make sure to keep him fed, especially if there isn’t much wildlife around. The wrist is for everyday use and the neck is for sexy times. Don’t believe him when he tells you that the inner thigh provides the best tasting blood. This is a kink and he is a liar! RATION ACCESS!”

That had made him smirk.

She’d also shown him two pages of detailed notes describing his appearance, from hair to foot. Eli wasn’t much for artistic talent, but she had a flair for the written word despite the copious amounts of vulgarity that shot from her mouth like dragon fire. The attention with which she’d described him and the complimentary nature of it all had caused his breath to catch at the back of his throat. He’d read the words over and over, actually able to picture his face in his mind’s eye as described. A strange sort of familiarity settled over him as he pictured the details on the page, and when he finally found his voice he’d stuttered a bewildered thank you, unused to the kindness she’d shown.

Now, as he sat on the edge of the bed, he felt a desperate fear burn to life inside himself. What if he never got to experience something like that again? What if their time together over the past weeks was all he ever got? Just a few brief flashes of respite among centuries of misery…

“Feeling better?” Eli asked, jolting Astarion out of his thoughts.

He blinked at her for a moment before clearing his throat and running a hand habitually through his hair.

“Yes…yes, I always feel better when I’m not covered in other people’s bodily fluids,” he said with a halfhearted chuckle that caused Eli to frown curiously and set down her journal.

She could sense something was off. And so with one last internal curse to himself, Astarion launched into one of the most anxiety-inducing things he’d ever done.

“I’ve…been meaning to talk to you. About us,” he said, tone soft and hesitant.

Eli shifted her weight on the bed, turning her body to face him. Her brows had furrowed only slightly, unsure whether she should be concerned about Astarion’s sudden shift in demeanor, yet fully open to listening attentively. Trusting. It made his gut twist.

“Is everything okay?”

“Yes, of course!” Astarion responded reflexively, instinctively jumping to make light of any tension. He bit back anymore reassurances before he could spit them out and cleared his throat, voice taking on a more serious tone.

“Except…not really,” he backpedaled.

Eli’s expression grew more worried and Astarion could see her already beginning to play through scenarios in her mind, trying to sort through what she may have done. What wrongs her broken mind may have committed. He sped forward, wanting to absolve her of any notion that she was at cause for anything.

“Look, I had a plan,” he began, turning towards her on the bed. “A nice simple plan. Seduce you, sleep with you, manipulate your feelings so you’d never turn on me,” he chuckled nervously, swallowing down the bile threatening to rise in his throat.

“It was easy…instinctive. Habits from two hundred years of charming people kicked in. All you had to do was fall for it…” His eyes dropped, unable to hold Eli’s stare as her own eyes searched his face, taken aback and confused by the sudden confession.

“And all I had to do was not fall for you,” he continued, glancing back up to her. Desperate for her to hear this next part. “Which is where my nice, simple plan…fell apart.”

Astarion paused, gazing at Eli with a mixture of trepidation and guilt as she watched him silently, stunned and not without a little hurt bleeding into her eyes as his words caught up with her brain.

“You’re…” he started, unsure how to put a voice to the storm wheeling inside of him. He wasn’t as eloquent as Eli, and never had he felt so incapable and inadequate at translating what he felt into words than he did right now. So he said what had been tearing him up from the inside out for days, and braced for the inevitable fallout.

“You’re incredible.” He couldn’t help the touch of a sad smile that came to his lips, or the nearly awed tone of his voice as he said the word like it could encase inside of it everything Eli had come to mean to him.

It wasn’t enough, he knew. No word would be enough. Nor would a thousand words. Because he didn’t understand how to express the way his heart seemed to flutter when she looked at him, despite it being cold and useless in his chest. He didn’t know how to explain the way her smile made him feel like someone worthwhile. Or how when he held her in his arms he thought that maybe…maybe some god somewhere had finally heard his desperate pleas.

“You deserve something real,” he admitted, with no small amount of shame, before adding, “I want us to be something real.”

Confessing to something he wanted, out loud and to someone else, was an experience he was woefully unfamiliar with. It was an experience he fully expected he’d come to regret, but he said it anyway and waited for the pain that was sure to follow.

Eli was quiet for a long moment, peering at Astarion with an expression he couldn’t quite read. He saw confusion and sadness, but there was something else, too. A flicker of something not unlike…understanding?

No, he was surely mistaken…

“So…” Eli said softly, working through her words before she spoke them out loud. Trying to parse through the influx of information coming at her.

“So, this hasn’t been real? Us? Everything we’ve been through. Our nights together…they didn’t mean anything to you…” she trailed off, almost as if she were talking to herself rather than asking it of him.

“Of course they did!” Astarion was quick to correct the assumption.

Gods, he didn’t want her to think that. Of course they had meant something to him, more than he’d thought they could. He’d chosen to be with her, even if it had initially been out of less than innocent desires, he’d chosen it. He hadn’t been forced to seek her out and lure her somewhere. She wasn’t a mark or some wretched experience he wanted to forget. He’d acted of his own free will, and even if the reasons hadn’t been as genuine as he’d made them out to be at the start, it was still the first decision he had made in nearly two centuries that wasn’t directed or forced.

That meant something to him. Those nights meant something to him. And, gods, so did she. That was part of the problem…

And so he explained as much, describing how he was used to twisting intimacy into something to be used rather than felt. How his past experiences with sex were bleeding over into the nights spent with her and that he didn’t have the faintest idea how to fix it. How he had trained himself to be numb, to wall himself off. And how, when Eli had finally, gently dismantled those walls he didn’t know what to do next…

“I don’t know how else to be with someone. No matter how much I’d like to…” Astarion concluded, feeling about as small and insignificant as he’d ever felt.

The silence that followed his confession made his skin crawl with ill ease. He stared at the bedding, terrified to look up and see the fury Eli surely felt. This was it; this was when she’d tell him to leave. And he would, quietly and without fuss. It was the last kindness he was capable of giving her.

“Astarion.” The calm softness of Eli’s voice nearly made the elf flinch. “Please look at me.”

Not a demand, but a request, spoken with care.

Confused, Astarion looked to her and instead of anger or hate or rage, he only found…her. Just Eli, looking back at him with thoughtful consideration. She should have been furious, but instead she simply took a steadying breath, scooting a bit closer on the bed so she could place a hand lightly on his knee.

He didn’t move, didn’t breathe as Eli looked at him and carefully began to speak.

“I care about you, Astarion.” She said it as if she were trying to convince him of the truth of her words, and he was stunned.

“Really?” he asked, breathless and unsure. But hopeful, too. Hopeful that maybe, just once, something in his miserable life might not end in disaster and pain.

“Yes, you beautiful fool!” she nearly laughed, squeezing at his knee.

Eli smiled at him and…gods above, it was the most dazzling and gorgeous thing he’d ever seen.

“Neither of us was looking for anything more than a night of comfort, and maybe some fun, when all of this started. We both had our own self-serving reasons,” she explained, before chuckling lightly. “Hells, I barely had more than a few weeks' worth of memories in my head at that point. Trying to rope anyone into a meaningful relationship was so low on my list of priorities I would have burst into flames on the spot had anyone mentioned the idea to me.”

Astarion couldn’t help the smile that grew on his face as Eli looked at him with an adoration that made him dizzy.

“But, things change. We changed. And, I’m glad that we did. I came to care about you in a way I don’t remember caring about anyone ever. And while that may not be saying much, considering…” Eli laughed and Astarion’s dead heart soared. “You’re special to me, right now. Regardless of how this started.”

This was certainly not how Astarion had expected this conversation to go, and he had never been so overjoyed to have his expectations usurped. He was entirely out of his depth, and so far outside his comfort zone that he was reeling. Words kept building up in the back of his throat and yet when he opened his mouth, he was struck dumb. He was overwhelmed, in the best way possible, but he hadn’t the slightest notion of what he was supposed to say or do next. And so he defaulted to what he knew.

“Well, I mean, of course I am, darling,” Astarion’s voice slipped into a silky tone. Anxiety was roiling inside of him and he tried to claw his way out, using the tools he knew best.

“The unyielding praise I am able to coax from your lips during our nights of passion has made it more than apparent,” he leaned in towards Eli, the tone of his words easing back into sultry familiarity.

Eli just shook her head with a breathy chuckle, meeting his gaze with a genuine affection in her eyes that made Astarion feel known in a way that was comforting.

“That’s not what I meant,” Eli chided with a tenderness that caught Astarion off-guard. “I mean you, Astarion. The person that you are. The person who cares about me enough to watch over me all night while I go mad. The person who is forgiving enough to not hate me the next morning. The person who makes me laugh after a long and painful day.”

Carefully, Eli raises a hand and gently presses it against Astarion’s cheek. He leans into the touch, expression softening and relaxing as his red eyes stay locked in to her own.

“The person who is being honest with me, right now. Who I appreciate more than I can say.”

Astarion was quite certain his brain had seized. He sat frozen, frantically searching her face for any hint of a lie and finding none, to his utter astonishment.

“That’s…” he started, then faltered. He knew he should say something, but his chest currently felt as if it was being wrenched open and no words would suffice to express his amazement.

“I don’t know what to say,” Astarion admitted after his stunned silence wore off. “Which is quite the accomplishment on your part, my dear.”

Eli smiled, warm and without expectations. It was beautiful.

“Thank you,” he breathed, closing the small gap between them and resting his forehead against her own. “For trusting me, and listening. For everything.”

His words were woefully inadequate, and he feared they always would be. But, Eli didn’t seem to mind and that brought him immeasurable relief.

“I’ll always listen,” Eli reassured him as she stroked the side of his face with her thumb. “Considering who you are, it’s kind of hard not to,” she teased.

His expression took on a somewhat sheepish hint as he took her hand from his cheek and held it reverently between both of his. He sat up a bit straighter as Eli pulled away, silently watching him run his fingers across her palm with a light touch.

“What do we do now?” he asked, hesitant and unsure.

Astarion looked to Eli for some sort of direction. He hadn’t thought this far ahead and honestly figured the conversation would have ended in tears or bloodshed or both by now. He didn’t know what a way forward with Eli looked like, but he knew he wanted her with him. Maybe he could ignore the confused and unsavory feelings that intruded upon their nights together? He wanted to enjoy her, to satisfy her without the shadows of past hurts creeping in. Perhaps he could figure out how…

“What do you want to do?” Eli responded, turning the question back onto him and taking him by surprise.

Astarion looked back to Eli, brows raised at the unexpected question. He considered her for a moment, thinking through how to answer. What did he want?

“I’m not sure…” he said honestly. “No one’s ever asked me that before. About anything, really.”

Eli waited, smiling reassuringly, though with a hint of sadness at Astarion’s words. It was freeing, somewhat, to be given the space to think about what he wanted and a chance to put a voice to it. But, it was also a little overwhelming, and truth be told he wasn’t quite sure how to figure it out.

“I know I don’t want to lose you,” he affirmed, squeezing her hand in his.

He did want something real with Eli. The problem was, he didn’t know what real looked like. This was unfamiliar territory for him, and he didn’t even know how in the hells he was supposed to get his bearings.

“I don’t want that, either. You know, we could be together without sex. For however long we need,” Eli suggested, a small smirk playing at the corner of her mouth. “I don’t think I have the best associations with it, either, considering the…things that sometimes pop into my head. Maybe we both could use time to work through those things.”

Astarion considered the idea, a cool rush of relief overcoming him as it truly began to sink in that Eli wasn’t only interested in him for his body and the way it roused it her own. They were good together, really fucking good. But it was becoming more and more difficult to reconcile what he had done in his past, under the subjugation of Cazador, with what he did with Eli now. He didn’t want to treat her like a mark or just another one of his conquests. She deserved better than that from him – to be cherished and worshiped, even ravished, fully and completely and without the haunting presence of ghosts that lurked in the corners of his mind.

“Why that almost sounds like a challenge,” Astarion said, trying to slip back into his sultry mannerisms yet failing to hide the appreciation he felt.

His tone then shifted into something quieter and more tentative as Astarion asked, “Can we…still share a bed? I think I’d miss sleeping in your arms.”

He cleared his throat, eyes darting to the side. The vulnerability behind his question was uncomfortable for him, but he thought maybe he could manage if it kept them from spending their nights apart. He’d grown fond of drifting off to sleep with her near, lulled by the low beat of her heart and the soft sighs of her breathing. It was a comfort he had never imagined himself longing for, and yet with Eli he’d quickly come to miss her warmth on the nights they slept in their own tents. Her absence at his side becoming a chill he’d rather not endure.

“I’d like that,” Eli agreed, giving his own hand a soft and appreciative squeeze.

“Well,” Astarion sighed, tension easing out of him as he leaned forward suddenly and wrapped Eli in an embrace that quickly had them tumbling back onto the bed. “No time like the present!”

Eli laughed and Astarion pulled her close, reveling in the easy solace of having everything between them out in the open rather than eating away at his insides. He rolled onto his back, tugging her up onto him so that her head was resting on his chest, just below his chin. His fingers idly stroked through her hair, eyelids drooping as the stress of the day finally caught up to him.

“This is nice,” he mumbled a bit more sleepily than intended.

A contented hum was the only response he heard from Eli before sleep took him completely.

___________________________________

In the morning Karlach gave them a knowing smirk as they descended the stairs and Eli began rummaging through the Inn’s cabinets for something that could pass as breakfast.

“You two look happy,” she remarked as Astarion took a seat across from her at one of the low tables near the central firepit. “Seems a night on your own did the both of you some good.”

The tiefling eyed Astarion pointedly as she raised a mug of coffee and sipped, eyes twinkling with more than a bit of self-satisfied mischief.

Astarion clicked his tongue and leaned back in his chair, feigning disinterest as he began to study his nails.

“You know, Karlach,” he began, flicking a speck of dirt from the tip of a finger. “For someone without a heart, you sure do seem to get invested in the romantic affairs of others.”

Karlach nearly spit coffee across the table as a boisterous laugh leapt up from her chest. She managed to contain herself, half choking and half coughing into her mug before she set it aside.

“That’s rich, fangs, coming from the likes of you,” Karlach giggled with good nature. “Honestly, I was just getting tired of the constant pining and lovesick angst between the both of you. For a pair of bloodthirsty murderhobos, you two are adorably dense when it comes to interactions that don’t involve stabbing something.”

“And for a professional killing machine from the hells, you are a hopeless gossip,” Astarion replied, shooting Karlach a sidelong glare before he glanced across the room to where Jaheira was consulting with a pair of Harpers as they studied a map.

He cleared his throat and pointedly did not look at the tiefling, speaking low for only the two of them to hear.

“Anyway…thank you. For meddling,” he said somewhat stiffly, though there was a timid genuineness to his words that made Karlach beam.

“Always happy to meddle, fangs.”

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xxsycamore · 1 year

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—𝘈 𝘚𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘙𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘺

► SYNOPSIS:

Comte finds you curled up on the couch, fighting some persistent period cramps. Naturally, he takes it upon himself to help you relieve the pain in all ways he can think of.

If only he knew what you truly need is simply... him.

▍comte x reader ▍rating: G ▍tags: Menstruation; period cramps; Fluff ▍wordcount: 1,009

▍masterlist

▍a/n: Last month's self-indulgent period cramps comfort fic with Napo was really well received, so this month I decided it would be just as nice to write one with Comte, for both me and you!

Note: The beginning is copied directly from that fic in question!

I hope you enjoy <3

It's another beautiful day at the mansion, and the sun is continuing to shine brightly outside as afternoon settles in. Your list of chores is more than half-way done now, the morning was a productive one and you pat yourself on the back for pushing through at your usual pace, even if your period surprised you early this morning. Sleeves rolled up and armed with a feather duster, you march towards the lounge room to take care of another chore.

Specks of dust dance in the afternoon sun, windows wide open, as you complete your task little by little. Soon the sections left to dust decrease and you start to tire - a minor pain in your tummy appearing as well, as if to persuade you into taking a short break. You throw a look to the grandfather clock. You've been a busy bee; not even the distraction of dusting off some of Comte's highly intriguing antiques couldn't get you late on your own schedule.

You sit down at the spacious couch area, grab a throw pillow to hug, and fall on your side - shoe-covered feet juust hanging off the couch because it won't be worth the effort of taking them off for just a minute or two of rest.

Uh-oh! The pain doesn't go away and only gets worse instead. Suddenly moving as much as a millimeter equals signing a death warrant.

"Help" You whisper to yourself, clutching onto the throw pillow.

With today's newspaper folded under his arm, Comte enters the lounge room. It's not unusual for him to finish reading what he couldn't at breakfast here, or in the garden, or back in his room. It just so happens that he comes in here exactly on time to find you like this.

"Ma chérie, are you alright?" He's at your side in the next second, worry playing on his face. You've barely managed to sit upright and smile nonchalantly, anything to swipe your apparent slacking-off under the rug, but he's fast at putting a hand on your shoulder. The touch makes your arm jolt a little but not in a bad way…

"Lay down, now. Tell me how you're feeling."

He's really good at reading your body language, alas you're over with pretending that nothing's wrong.

"I, uh… I'm having some menstrual pains. I just need a minute or two and I'll be back to work."

He nods, perfectly understanding the situation and glad that it's that and not something more worrisome. Giving you a reassuring smile that is warmer than the sun in the peak of summer, he moves to take your shoes off, a clear sign of his intentions to make you rest a little longer.

"Nonsense, you need a break. I'll tell Sebastian that you're having the rest of the day off.

"But that would be-" Before you can voice out your concern about the poor butler taking in more work than all that he already has to do, your face heats up. Having your shoes taken off for you by none other than the master of the house himself is very, very embarrassing, but reaching out to do it yourself is ensured to end with another gentle push to lay down. You simply stay put, hoping that this is the end of his caring-but-dangerous-for-your-heart acts…

"Do you want me to give you a massage?"

"No!!", you nearly shout, the mere image of him giving your feet a rub getting you to overheat with embarrassment, so you're sure you won't be alive to see the rest of it. "I mean, there really is no need! I'm afraid I'm too ticklish for that."

"I see. Well, then, excuse me for a second." He's so, so understanding and kind; for a second you grieve about the lost opportunity to see his massaging techniques put into action but you value your life too much for that. Just as you sign in relief, Comte enters anew, with a small tray of painkillers and tea - your favorite blend, your nose immediately informs you.

"Why thank you, Comte! You shouldn't have!" Sitting up on the couch, you anticipate having a sip of the warm liquid. As soon as you take it in your hands, your eyelids fall closed in bliss, and you miss the moment Comte drags the nearby ottoman closer in front of you.

"Put your legs up to rest here while you're drinking, it would be better."

"Thank you!" With a cup to hide half your shy expression behind, you oblige. It does feel better.

"Would you like me to put a pillow on top of it, as well?"

"Ah, no, no need, but thank you!"

"Then, another one behind your back?"

"No, that's alright! Thank you."

"Should I have a hot bath run for you? Or would you rather I bring you your heat patch instead?"

"C-Comte…"

Having already crossed the room towards the door awaiting to hear your decision, your voice calling him is the one thing that has him returning to your side. His brows are slightly raised in that innocent way you're preciously familiar with, features remaining elegant and deeply caring, and beautiful.

"Yes, ma chérie? Can I help you with something else?"

"There is one thing, but please, forget about the rest! It's really alright, just-"

You look up at him, fighting the guilt of posing a request even though the cramps already seem to have weakened - or maybe the man in front of you has distracted you successfully from them.

"…Stay by my side for a little bit?"

Comte's golden eyes widen in surprise, but he surely heard you right, albeit in that quiet voice. He smiles, eager to comply with your wish.

"Of course, my dear."

He sits down right next to you, and it comes so naturally to you to nest yourself against his arm. Heart racing or not, you indulge in the rare moment, able to tell that Comte indulges in it, too. Hopefully, he would understand that sometimes the right remedy is the most simple one there is.

Taglist: @arsnovacadenza @ale-teodora @kimi00twin @otomelady @privilegedpancake @g-kleran @pumpumnnnp @thesirenwashere @ravenarld @kimmy-banana @devonares @animeworldsposts @randomanimatedhusbandoseeker @galaxyprison @sadshaxk @starshards26 @pro-cat-stination @acethephoenix256 @ikevamp-shrine-2 @nad-zeta @crystal13unny @keen19thcenturygoatsstudent @lordsister @ikemen-banshou @themysticalbeing @canaria-blackwell @otome-scribbles @rhodolitesrose @salty-fed-up-bitch @coornn @kpop-and-otome @queen-dahlia @kisara-16 @chaosangel767 @ikemenlibrary @queengiuliettafirstlady @aurora-morning @aquagirl1978 @ikemenlover24 @violettduchess @mcofthemansion @tiny-wooden-robot @joy-the-reader @katriniac @ikemen-prince-writers-posts @cilokgoang @atelieredux

#Ikemen Vampire #IkeVamp #ikevam #IkeVamp Comte #ikevamp comte #ikevamp saint germain #ikemen vampire saint germain #ikevamp comte de saint germain #ikemen vampire comte de saint germain #ikevamp fluff #ikemen vampire fluff #ikevamp fanfiction #ikemen vampire fanfiction #ikeseries #ikevampire #cybird

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ultrastarbee · 2 years

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chimas🧉 here again!

my mind is going crazy. I can't stop thinking about tr boys and winter morning lazy sex. just... tons of blankets, maybe snowstorm, cuddles, cockwarming, little strokes, breeding kink... omg creampie

you feel that, bee? its my personal paradise right here

reader can't come without clit stimulation... self indulgence warning.

I feel like souya, kazutora, hakkai, inupi and draken would fit this so perfectly. their lazy deep voices I can't handle it 🥺🥴

Please bee, I'm being in my knees

If you uncomfortable with any topic, please ignore it.

I loved the fic of my last request, I've cried for 10 minutes straight. Take care of yourself and stay safe! 😷 <3

WELL WELL WELL! Hello my beloved Chimas🧉! Hope you still around after all my time away. I made it with fem pronouns based on this and on your last request, but I can change it if you want me to. I know it was still hot when you sent me this request, but now it's cold here on our country it fits waaay better! Sorry if it didn't went to well this time, being too tired lately.

Title: Hot winters Request: yesss Couple: Souya x fem!reader, Kazutora x fem!reader, Hakkai x fem!reader, Inupi x fem!reader, Draken x fem!reader Category: smut Content Warning: descriptions of sex (characters aged up, ofc) Word Count: 1367 Summary: cold mornings sex A/N: well, not what I pictured but here it is

MINORS DON'T INTERACT

MASTERLIST ……. RULES ……. SERIES LIST

Angry:

Souya is such a good husband. Even if he works all day cooking, he loves to cook for you and gets kinda shy when you praise his skills. You know he loves his work with his brother and always go there early, but today he didn't. Souya is now sitting in bed looking at his phone with a visible troubled face.

"What happened, baby?" worried, you aks giving him a caring kiss on his shoulder.

"Smiley said we shouldn't open the shop today 'cause of the snow" there's a small pout on his face "I agree, but…"

"What's it?"

"Wanted to try something" his voice is trembling and his face is red. Souya isn't talking about food and he's still too shy to go straight to the point "Do you want too?"

"Is it spicy?" you play along with his metaphors and he nods "love spicy".

"New recipe"

Before you realize you are on his lap, both of you still under the blankets. Souya always keeps kissing you non stop to try holding his whimpers, not that it works, though. His sounds are the best when his cock is deep inside you and you aren't moving. Souya's face is all red and as he leans for another deep kiss you can feel his hips meeting yours. He stops the kiss just to lick his fingers before touching your clit when you started moving on top of him. You better trust him when he says "spicy" again.

Kazutora:

Kazutora didn't expected a person like him to find heaven after ten years in jail. Even when he wakes up between your arms sometimes he thinks it's not real. Today is one of this times. You know it by the way his hands run on your body: on your back, on your thighs and on your back again, slightly touching your ass. He does it again and again and again as if it's to ensure you aren't just a dream.

"Having fun?" you ask and he just burries his face on your chest.

"Sorry. Didn't mean to wake you up" Kazutora's voice is still lazy, sleepy and a little embarrassed now. His hands aren't either of this things nor is his cock inside you all night.

"You can keep going" when you move, he moans with the friction "if you want to".

"Fucking do" with glowing eyes and a boost of energy, Kazutora looks like a puppy wanting his treat "wait, can we do that thing?"

"Sure, pelase" you know what he wants and you love when he does it "but you have to tall me when you gonna cum"

His favorite position is with you on top cowgirl style. This way he can see all your body reactions to him, the pleasure on your face, your nipples hard from the cold and his hands are free to explore your body the way he pleases. The best way to use his hands, Kazutora knows damn well, is to touch your clit in a certain way that makes all your body quiver in an orgasm. As your hands replace his, he holds your hips now trusting against you in a needy way.

Kazutora asks you to stay on your knees over him so he can see his cum dripping down your pussy. Just watching it and he needs to go another round.

Fucking paradise.

Hakkai:

"Don't wanna go" when the alarm starts, Hakkai mumbles at his phone as if time would go back.

"Then don't" at your sleepy words, he hugs you and starts to complain again just some seconds later.

"Need to"

"Then go" the play is an everyday thing on cold days like today. It usually lasts half an hour.

"Don't wanna" he rolls on bed, now holding you again.

"Hakkai!" feeling his hands on your hips, you now know where this is going.

"If I can't make you cum, I go"

"Not fair. If you can do it more than three times you can stay"

"Three? Weren't you sleepy?" with you accepting his game, Hakkai kisses you with a smile on his face.

Having you reverse riding him sure feels like heaven for Hakkai. The way you pussy swallow his cock when you move is a paradise vision, yet there's something better: when he is also sitting in the bed with you bouncing on his dick with your back to him. Let's be real, Hakkai is still a little shy even after all these years. This way he can control your movements and doesn't need to worry about his face when he moans before cumming. He can also touch your clit way easier. He is a little embarrassed to touch you there, Hakkai thinks he will mess things up, but when you guide his hand he is fucking in love. The feeling of your pussy clunching on him when you are close to your orgasm makes him cum instantly.

"You know what? Not going. I'm the boss anyway"

It was a real pain in the ass to approuch him knowing he wasn't comfortable around girls other than his sister, but he was fucking worth it. Even though Hakkai has become the Black Dragons boss and made deals with Toman, you are the one who keeps him in line, so you know damn well he need to go anyway.

Inupi:

Your husband is so calm and collected, always wants to make sure you are both comfortable before starting something. He also hates to left something half done, specially if it's you. That's why it's so strange to feel him so needy at the morning. You are not complaining, though. On cold mornings like this one, he cuddles to you for some minutes before getting up to work. Today Inupi is holding you a little tighter so you can feel his boner against your ass.

"You gonna be late"

"I'm never late" his deep voice against your neck makes your skin shiver "we have time".

Inupi knows your body as the back of his hand and is an expert on giving you pleasure. That said, it's easy for your cold morning cuddles to become something way spicier with him on top of you. Inupi is usually quiet, yet his reactions are a little louder in the morning. He's not loud, but feeling his breaths heavier with every thrust… and also the way he uses his own body to make pressure against your clit? Inupi will keep going until he feels you are done.

"Oh, Draken is not opening the shop today" that explains everything. It wouldn't be a surprise if Inupi knew it since last night "up for another go?"

You don't know where all this energy came from. Again, not complaining though.

Draken:

"Come back, you don't need to go"

"Can't, gonna be late"

"You are your own boss, Ken!" he stops and looks at you. You are right.

"That's why I need to go see if everything is okay on the shop" picking the warmest coat, Draken tries to ignore your pout "come on, it's just downstairs"

"No one is dumb enough to go out on a day like this. There will be no clients today, Ken" your words don't affect him and Draken keeps on dressing up, so you change your attack plan. "but it's your choice anyway. If you'd rather leave your wife alone on the cold than warm her up, it's on you"

He takes your words as a challenge and soon is crawling under the blankets to get to you. His hands are quick to throw away whatever clothes you are using. Soon Draken's face is between your legs working on waming his wife up. Kisses on your thighs, fingers inside you touching your sweet spot in every movement and tongue on your clit slowly moving. You could swear it was summer already when you felt your body trembling with his touches. Your husband isn't tease. When he says he will do something he does it, so you better be ready to feel him playing between your legs for a long time now.

"Now I need to take a shower" dripping sweat from his activity, Draken laughs on your face "want to come?"

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bbbrianjones · 19 days

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hiiii

Fun little game :3333

List 5 things that make you happy, then ask this question to the last 10 people who liked/reblogged stuff from you

hiiii lovely !!! im so sorrray for how long this took me to do <3 busy bee today unfortunately 🐝 but my five things are

classic motorsports !! an interest i never thought would stay this long but here we are 😌 a mutual has been showing me a rally book they have recently gotten and being able to bounce off someone with the same interest is so heartwarming

music, particularly 60s sunshine music atm <33 !! this should be the moment where i thank u all for the support you showed with my playlist list 🥹 y'all were so sweet !!

my mooties !!! so lucky to have such wonderful people who i know i can trust and adore 💘💘 none of you are just people on a screen, i would die for all of you 💘💘

look my self-indulgent fantasies are what keeping me alive at the moment. my favourite thing is to just sit and think abt my blorbos 🌸 more than a woman by the bee gees has become my song because i can't stop thinking abt *****

that peacoat coat i just reblogged was also a megaslay

#ask #tuff-ponyboy #thank u so much j!!!#hardest part abt these is that i forgot literally everything that makes me happy #and im just staring at my screen like right... what the fark makes me happy 🧐🤔🤔

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dracereads · 2 years

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A Lady for a Duke by Alexis Hall

Hello and Welcome to Drace forgets to blog about things they read because they have too many brain bees vol 3 or 4 at this point who knows. Today's edition is all about A Lady for A Duke by Alexis hall. Another of Alexis' regency works, this one more serious and less jaunty than Something Fabulous. The main character Viola, is a transwoman in a time where we wouldn't ordinarily see a trans protagonist. What's more is that the book is not focused on Viola's womanhood as the source of contention for the novel. At all. This reads as sort of a queer fantasy where everyone is accepting of Viola's truest self. It's a very sort of self-indulgent and happy fantasy that I can get behind. Alexis Hall poses the question of whether or not this sort of thing is something trans folks would like to see more of. Arguably this trans folk would very much approve of more of this story and others. Anyway, the main story revolves around Viola falling in love with her best friend since childhood, Justin de Vere, Duke of Gracewood. Gracewood has suffered a physical injury and is dealing with war-related PTSD. Like I said, this novel is a more "serious" regency, and the two have to work through years of trauma before they are able to find comfort in the new happiness they bring one another. It was a very touching and lovely book, and I highly enjoyed it. There's lots of positive affirmation and character growth in this piece. The characters aren't set on being horrible people, and I just really appreciate a regency where characters actually learn from their mistakes instead of droning on about them for about 17 chapters before they do a little bit of soul-searching and move on. Rating: 5/5 stars, if just for the concept alone.

#A Lady for A Duke #Alexis Hall #transprotag #trans books #genre: romance #genre: re-imagined historical #regency #queer authors club #taglinemode #soldierprotag #character driven #ajourneyofselfdiscovery #leadinglady #transwomanprotag

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berryshiara · 2 years

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JOKE WAS ON ME!

Today a very close friend of mine, whom I love and respect was having a hard time. And I am all about helping people with a hard time. I am about helping people see light at the end of the tunnel, and kicking the monsters we create in the teeth.

They had said something about not feeling writing today. And I was like you could defy the negative feels and write a tiny totly self indulgent scene with your favorite couple. The ones who make you happy that they simply exist on paper. We all have them.

Then I joked about the length of this said fic. And had the bright idea of a fic that fit every fandom ever. I said I was going to write a fic with two words.

I was beeing a little cheeky trying to get my friends energy adn hype up and i said READY! And then i wrote two words.

And let me tell you, I was flooded with the hugest happy feels rush I have EVER experienced in my life, short of things we do behind closed doors. And I sat there blown away.

The two words dont matter, just the absoloute feeling of having written something that was so perfectly THEM So wonderfuly intimate, and so intrinsically ME. Two words my friends. What the heckie?! I am humbled and amazed at that power. I wrote a two word fic that i started as a joke and finished with a gasp.

PS in case you wanted to read it I will post it here for you. Below the cut. XD Which actually makes my happy feels go higher. I giggle!

PPS I have had some amazing friends along my writing journey, they told me what I do is writing. The stories i tell are still stories. They let me see me, and my style, and my gifts. They brushed off the sawdust and let me see what I had made and it was good.

Dont give up <3 Get out there, and kick some monsters in the teeth.

"They kissed." ~Finis~

#wow #endorphins #humbled #words #power of words

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noxchievous · 1 year

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~✨Welcome to my girlblog✨~

this is where I post my EPIC and RADICAL art

I draw a variety of things, but mostly fan art and OCs. My art is Awesome and you will Love It Here

Frequently used tags

Fan art will be tagged but I don’t feel like listing every fandom I’ve drawn for here.

#traditional art and #digital art - whichever I am using, it will be tagged

#doodles - shitty little self-indulgent doodles

#concept art - concept art! It’s the same as the doodles but more purposeful. i do not use it frequently

#animation - for the rare occasions

#belostrap - belos x springtrap art

#Mob&Miku - all my Mob and Miku crossover friendship art

#misc - miscellaneous pieces with no particular characters or fandoms in mind

#epic answers to awesome asks - tag used for the 2 asks I’ve recieved. Thank u bitty bee ^_^

#not art - everything that isn’t art!

I have a lot of OCs to draw. Here are their tags!

#torma oc - Torma and her story

#The Living Ship - MariLynn, Lemonflower, their living ship, and the rest of their story

#Petal and Thorn - my warrior cat fanclans, and all the ocs in that story

#Marijuana wcats - my 3 weed-smoking warrior cats ocs

#Dandelion :3 and #The Tiger :]c - my fursonas, Dandelion and Tiger respectively

#Lemmy&Cateye - my steven universe ocs! Encompasses more than just Lemmy and Cateye

#Slimda - sexyman descendant. She has 3 posts

#Merk - my old moomin oc, named Merk

#Star’s Corpse - old story idea, tag contains some concept art and one full illustration

#The Little Monster - another old story that I made some banger art for

This directory will be better eventually ! But I’m not built for that today

#Not art #tag directory #Yea I finally got around to it. ID’s next!#If this is like impossible to see btw. Send me an ask or a dm and I’ll change the ourple to blue #profanity #I’ll likely update this again but I figured it’d be helpful for now

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ughgclden · 2 years

Note

stopppp you’re too sweet, i literally yelped when i saw your response- i love hearing from u and it’s literally been motivating me to go on this app i-

ghosting is the worst like! give an explanation! i may be a little tipsy but i want an explanation and i’m literally RESTRAINING myself from texting him? it’s so foul, my roommates are sick of me i asking if i should text him when i know i shouldn’t,,anyways thank u my sweet bee, i def needed the love n hugs<3 it’s just literally such a bummer & i keep saying it and i’m so sorry i sdhdhsh

i love that you bake AT LEAST once a week that’s so slay i cannot even explain,,,my fav show is the great british baking show so i love living vicariously thru bakers since i cannot, pls send all the bakes (even if theyre not “proper”) id love to hear about all of it!!

you're the sweetest ever omgosh?? you're gonna make me cry in the best way possible,, m so glad if its motivating u cause it means i get to talk to u more hehe>:)

literally!!!! like the least you can do is explain what's up?! ugh. so confusing sometimes, m so sorry, n you deserve to be upset/pissed about it! you got this,, n im sending you another round of love cause its what u deserve<3

ive just had to cancel my date today as im ill and sniffly so now i can sit around and feel sorry for myself BUT as i reply to this, ive just finished up baking!! decided to be totally self indulgent and make cinnamon choc chip cookies because i am a slut for cinnamon (will include another silly lil pic) gbbo is EVERYTHING to me omg,, i totally understand, its SO good?! the drama?! the theatre of it?! ugh. incredible.

anyways! hope you're doing good today n taking care of yourself, n happy first of october!!!

a little before and after hehehe>:)

#becca answers!#mars<3

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enden-k · 2 years

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Todays hc that lives rent free in my burned out brain: Zhongli = Dragon, and Dragons are notorious for their hoarding, right?

Zhongli/Morax wanting to "add" Childe to his hoard, draping him only in his best silken robes and nothing else, worshipping him.

(And Childe prob only beeing like "...kayy??? I guess?" *confused Childe noise*)

thats actually a hc i also enjoy: seeing childe as a precious treasure (not to objectify him, he just sees the beauty and worth in him like when you break open a geode and its so beautiful inside? breaking away childes many different masks and the abyss taint on him to see his true self shining beautifully like noctilucous jade in the dark)

so ofc he wants to dress childe in the finest silks and the prettiest gems; crafting a beautiful earring that fits his eyes so perfectly, gifting him a gorgeous scarf for his adventures in colder regions; not only bc his beautiful treasure deserves only the finest things to complement him but also to show his claim (thats why he also enjoys gifting childe some of his own things, to see it on him and have his scent on him)

childe who is more of a simple, practical man and doesnt care much about this when it comes to himself doesnt really know how to act probably haha but seeing zhongli smile in satisfaction and joy, he indulges him. pretty silk and gems dont harm anyone <3

#the idea of a god worshipping a mortal (not in a harmful crazed way) is always smth i absolutely adore so thats what i love letting #my zhongli do that to childe (esp body worship; its sooo good and flusters childe a LOT)#myountalk #reply #headcanons

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binniesthighs · 3 years

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call me babydoll | reader x chan

soooo shhhh this actually a part one shhhh but i’m just trying out writing out different things and getting out some of my ideas outta my head that i’m really excited about, this one being one of them!! for now...just pretend that this is just a regular ol’ drabble hehehehe. this part is the set-up chapter (shhh i mean drabble)

One

Pairing: self insert, female reader x bang chan

Genre: fluff, smut, and angst

Tags: (overall) bodyguard au, moderndayprince!chan, bodyguard!reader, secret agent au, royal au, action and peril, plot driven, running out of time, slow-ish burn, growing feelings, softswitch!chan, hardswitch!reader, some skz side characters, jeongin third wheel and comedic relief LOL, travelling, chan being expensive and having a lil bit of a superiority complex, flirtyyyy chan, bits of mystery, explicit language, mentions of food and alcohol, idk think like 007 vibes hehe

CWs: guns and gun violence, a shooting in a ballroom, mentions of blood

Word count: 4.6k

Parts

ONE | TWO

“I wasn’t expecting to see you here early.”

“Well, expect the unexpected.”

“Don’t turn the motto back at me. I’m sick of hearing it so many damn times.”

“What? You and I both know that it’s true. You’re here early too, so, technically you don’t get to say anything.”

Jeongin straightened his bow tie, then patted down the sides of his perfectly ironed tux with not a crinkle to be found. Knowing him, it was a miracle that he hadn’t messed it up in some form yet. He promptly took out his pocket square to clean off his glasses.

“You’re looking nice. Seems like they don’t mind spending money now on you these days.” He blew off the flecks of dust on his lenses.

“They know that they get their return on their investment. And thank you.”

You smoothed down the sides of your dusty pink dress that nearly went all the way down to your ankles. Had you any other choice, it would’ve been something different, but, dresses were really good at hiding your thigh holster compared to the slacks you usually favored. You didn’t mind the times that you would have to put on a pretty dress, it somewhat reminded you that there was normal life outside of your job. Not to mention, they had started sending you jewelry as well. You always had liked the look of a diamond necklace.

“You do your research for tonight?”

Jeongin nodded, then took from his pocket his phone to read over the details.

“I’ve done a background check on everyone attending, we shouldn’t have any issues. It’s already a low risk event anyway. Charity is never something to get too worked up over, but, you never know with the detail that some of these people come with...who they might be tied to...”

“--The only people we can trust is ourselves.” You nodded with arms crossed.

“Expect the unexpected, I know.” He slid his phone back into his inside suit pocket to adjust his cufflinks.

“--Nervous?” You took note of his fidgeting actions.

“Nervous? No. I’ve been through this before. You know that.”

You flicked your partner right on his forehead strung with his white hair. You had really wished that he had picked a less conspicuous color, but he had strings to pull that you didn’t.

Jeongin cleared his throat, “You do your once over?”

“Do you even need to ask? I did it hours ago and when we arrived. You know that I’ve done this before too.”

“I know. I know.”

Jeongin looked out at the vast circular atrium that made up the center of the hotel. Several stories down under the glass rooftop, you could hear the faint sprinkling of the intricate fountain which smelled of copper. A bit further down, you could see the tips of the tree branches from the indoor landscaping. Across the way, a door slammed with residents tucking in their ties. The two men you had recognized from the roster: a simple thing which made you feel at ease. Your young partner must’ve started to have an effect on you. A sense of unease seemed to quell in your neck. You always listened to your hunches.

“W-what do you think he thinks of us?” Jeongin broke the silence.

“Well,” From inside the room you had waited outside, you could hear his distant murmuring, so you lowered your tone. “I think that he has yet to trust us. It’s only been a few weeks. He doesn’t seem like the kind to give himself up easy. That, and I’m sure his resentment of his father must have some influence.”

“You think he hates us?”

“I think he hates his father for hiring us. I mean, wouldn’t you? His old security detail, he had them for years.”

“I guess so. But, we’re not like his old detail.”

“No. We’re not. I don’t think he gets that yet. I think he sees us as one more way his father has a hold on him.”

“It’s not like he can do much else about it when his dad’s a kin--”

“--No, no, thank you, really, it’s lovely. Some of your best work. Thank you.”

Chan swung open the door to his room, stopping Jeongin right in his sentence.

“Ah. You’re here already. That’s...punctual.”

As dazzling and showy as ever, Chan looking nothing short of a magazine model. For a prince, he had certain...appearances that he had to maintain. Today, it was a velvety and maroon suit jacket with a white button up. On the collar, two matching brooches had been perfectly placed, and they were silver like moonlight in the shape of English ivy and adorned with diamonds. On his lapel, he wore the royal insignia of the lion and the wolf. Behind him, you could see his slew of stylists cleaning up their makeup kits and obscene assortment of designer dress shoes for him to pick from. You had thought before that he even smelled like royalty: stuffy white roses with a hint of priceless cognac.

Jeongin bowed his head respectfully. “Everything has been prepared for tonight. The rest of your guards are surrounding the building, and I’ll be corresponding with them as needed, your Highness.” He tapped at his earpiece.

Chan drew his attention over to you, giving you a rather lusty glare. Over the past couple weeks, you had gotten used to it. He was a prince to every extent of the word. If there was anything that he had wanted, he simply had to ask. It drove him insane that all he could do was merely look at you. You had wondered if he harbored anything else for you besides the way that he would devour the curves of your shoulders and hips.

“Fox. Bee. You look nice tonight. I like seeing you dressed up. Makes me feel less out of place.”

You couldn’t help but let out a little sound of discontentment over his rather affectionate nickname for you. You and your partner had been introduced to him as F and B. Quickly he had figured out Jeongin’s codename as Fox, considering that he had done a poor job picking out one that wasn’t related to him at all. Anyone could tell that boy was fox-like, and he also just wasn’t that creative when it came to picking out a name for himself. B, or Bee as he had decided, was your name; as in bumblebee. After learning about Fox, he figured that there was an animal theme going, so Bee seemed to fit best in his oponion.

You tested his glare with your best, “Thank you, your Highness.”

Jeongin gulped. “Your assistant should be waiting downstairs with your itinerary. She told me that you should meet her first off.”

“You work too hard F. Have some fun tonight, hm? But don’t...drink too much. You’re responsible for my life remember?” Chan clapped his bodyguard on the back.

Your partner nervously laughed and adjusted his glasses once more: his preferred tic.

“And Bee?” Chan rose a brow to lean into close and whisper. “Stay close, alright?”

“Of course, your Highness.”

Chan let out a little scoff after getting one more proper look at your frame. “Damn. You really are stunning. Just a little too dangerous for me though.”

You rolled your eyes, dishing him outa, “Whatever you say, your Highness.”

Jeongin threw you and annoyed glare before tracing after Chan as he sauntered down the hall to the glass elevator.

“Bee? You coming? Or do you have something better to do?” Chan’s voice called down the hall with an echo and a little teasing gesture of his hand.

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

It had been seven years since you had chosen this line of work, and each time that you had to go to one of these things, you hated them more and more. Not because they were hard to control--they were easy--but you just hated how many superficial and self-absorbed people that they could fit into one room.

The air was filled with the scent of champagne bubbles and too much Chanel No. 5. From corner to corner of the room, and even next to the ice sculpture of the lion and the wolf crest, silk, satin; velvet and the best cotton could be found. Long gloves covered the arms of ladies with wrinkling skin, and tweed vests held in the guts of men who indulged in their food just as much as their mistresses. All this effort just to appear as if they had given one care about the philanthropic efforts of the royalty.

Several neatly dressed waiters passed you with golden platters of hors d'oeuvres made of ingredients so expensive, they would’ve cost the same amount as the generous donations made by the attendees. If you could’ve, you would’ve scooped up as many of them as you could, just to eat all of their copious amounts of money yourself, but, there was somewhere a rule that you had to keep your hand to yourself when you were on duty. The best that you had to look forward too was take-out to eat at 3 in the morning with Jeongin later.

Buzzing chatter filled your earpiece while each of the additional guards gave their hourly report.

“Damn. It’s fucking colder out here than I thought. It’s fucking summer.” One of them joked to the tune of the other guards laughter.

“Stay focused.” Jeongin scolded over the line. “Don’t leave your posts until your shifts change.”

While he was a timid man, Jeongin was not one to mess around. Son of the director, he knew that he had big shoes to fill. After pleading for years for her to admit him into the academy, she had agreed. Everyone knew the reason why she didn’t want him in this line of work. Too many dead. Too many missing. In some ways, he was also yours to look after.

You trailed after Chan who was busy talking to his assistant and his publicist. While he nodded at their words, you knew that he must’ve been barely listening. Chan never really was one for formality, but much rather enjoyed simplicity and pleasure. Jeongin and you had somewhat of a bet going: out of all the guests, you had liked to bet which one he would take with him to his bedroom. Since you had all the profiles of the guests, you liked to bet a little money on which one it would be.

Jeongin had guessed it to be the heiress and daughter of a tycoon who had made a multi-million won donation in the name of his company. It was ironic; his very company was a big-scale pollutor who liked to make nice with the crown. She was conventionally very pretty: long legs, a thin frame, she was educated and looked as if she could hold somewhat of a conversation...not like that mattered to him.

You had predicted it to be the foreign CEO who had just started business dealings with the crown. While she might’ve looked a bit stuck-up and prim, she was intimidating, and a challenge. Chan loved challenges. Chan also had a pension for pretty boys with a bit too much money on their hands--usually inherited--and with nothing much else to do other than dote on him. There were plenty of those attending the gala tonight.

Chan snaked through the crowd, bowing his head at all of the Good evening, your Highnesses and the It’s a pleasure to meet you, your Highnesses. Every few moments or so he would take a bite from a golden plate and then pop it into his mouth. The whole night long, he would hold his glass with him and it would get refilled for him without him even needing to ask. You sometimes liked to pretend that in some places, they must’ve assigned someone to watch him from afar to make sure that he would never need anything before it was given to him. It wouldn’t have surprised you.

“Having fun Bee?” Chan languidly rolled his head back, swirling his glass.

“As much fun as you are.” You quipped.

“Anything that I should be concerned about?”

“Nothing of concern.” You stated matter-of-factly. Had you matched his flirting tone, you knew that you wouldn’t hear the end of it for the rest of the night. “Fox. Report?”

“Nothing that I can see. No one has been tagging you.” Jeongin had staked himself up on the upper balcony of the banquet hall room, and had been watching for as long as you had been following after the prince. “You sensing anything strange?” His voice tickled in your in-ear.

“Just a bunch of the normal crowd.” You kept your tone down low. “He’s rubbing noses with the usual. You’ve seen too?”

He chuckled. “Yeah. I know what you mean.”

You followed Chan to his seat nearest the front of the room which had been fashioned into a stage with a clear glass podium in the center. Right in front there was one more crest decorating it. Chan had ensured it to be so: he had wanted everyone to know that this was all for his charity.

“It seems like our bets aren’t working out. He hasn’t talked to either of the...suspects.” Your partner changed his choice of words knowing that the other guards were listening.

From the opposite side of the room both the heiress and the CEO stood with thin glasses of wine in their lithe hands. Chan had in fact walked right past them, and didn’t even notice.

“Tonight is going to be a long night.” Jeongin sighed over the line.

You politely pushed past attendees with a raised hand and a sweet smile. You had found that when you smiled, you had appeared less intimidating.

“Oh wait...what’s this?”

“What?” You whipped your head around after Jeongin’s interjection. “What? Do you see something? What’s the call?”

“Relax! It just looks like he’s approaching someone he wants to talk to. I think both of us are about to be proven wrong.”

“Ah, shit.” You sighed. “Don’t put me on edge like that.”

“I’m only trying to entertain myself.”

“Name. Who is it? You’ve got the roster.”

You partner was quiet for a minute, and you watched from a distance as Chan approached the man leaned over a martini seated at one of the perfectly decorated tables.

“Uh, I think that he’s Lee Minho. Some kind of royalty from somewhere else. Pretty low ranking from the looks of it. I think that he made a donation himself...and it’s...damn, larger than you would expect.”

“Should we be concerned?”

“No. Seems harmless.”

“Thank you for coming,” You made out the words that Chan had mouthed. He drew a chair next to the unknown man.

From what you could tell, Lee Minho was handsome to the full extent of the word: nearly all of his physical features were exemplary and his suit appeared to have been fitted to perfect for him; likely one of a kind. He too wore an insignia on his lapel, but it was one that you hadn’t recognized before. He had immaculately styled hair that had some kind of rebellious and boyish charm to it. The man had a kind of mystery about him too: you had been able to pride yourself in being able to read people, and it had saved your life on more than one occasion. But with him, there was something that you couldn’t place.

“Do they know eachother?” You asked Jeongin.

“Not that I know of. School friend maybe? Seems like all the royals send their kids to the same schools.”

“Hm. That would make sense.”

“Enjoying yourself?” Chan said.

Lee Minho nodded, and rose his glass to clink it with the prince’s.

“Do we think that he’s our...suspect?”

The stranger dipped his head into his hand as he listened to Chan speak. A flirty gesture that you had seen a hundred times or more. Still, the way that he inspected Chan, it wasn’t adoring. Or at least, you didn’t think that it was.

“No. I don’t think so.”

“What the hell are you yapping about?” One of the other guards snapped over the line.

“Um, classified stuff.” Jeongin quickly explained. “Above your paygrade. Don’t worry about it.”

“Fox. Watch out for him tonight.” You snuck over to a corner of the room where you could watch the two of them more discreetly.

“Affirmative....” Your partner paused. “Babydoll.”

“Pffff--Babydoll??” The same guard stifled his laughter. “You call her Babydoll, Fox? Damn, you all must be closer than I thought. Didn’t know that I was missing out on some of the action--”

“--Ever heard of a codename, Three?”

“Babydoll’s her codename.”

A grin crept over your lips. “Expect the unexpected.”

You had almost gotten distracted enough to miss how Lee Minho had leaned over to whisper something into the prince’s ear. After he had done so, Chan laughed out a little, then reached his arm around the other man’s chair comfortably.

“They’re...cozy.” You updated your partner.

“I’m trying to cross-check where he might know him from.”

Chan’s assistant and publicist finally slipped away with giddy little smiles. In many ways, you were jealous of them. They could leave whenever the wanted, eat what they wanted...

Jeongin scoffed. “Well, turns out...nothing. I can’t find anything.”

“Nothing?”

“Negative. I’m not seeing any crossover.”

“So they really are strangers?”

Your partner sighed. “Looks like neither of us are cashing ou--I mean--finding the suspect.”

Under your breath, you wondered aloud, “Who are you...Lee Minho?”

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

The night drew on longer with the rest of the formalities: the formal dinner, followed by several speeches from important people while dessert was being served. It all led up to the final act: His Royal Highness, Prince Chan’s speech. On several neat notecards marked with the crest, he held them in front of him while he ate his last bits of Mont Blanc Chocolate Pavlova. Even the name of the sweet itself sounded pretentious. Granted, it smelled delicious--as many expensive things did.

You stifled a yawn from your little set up on the edge of the room. At least you should’ve been able to sit, but it turns out that sitting is also against the rules in this line of work. A couple other security and bodyguards had joined you at the edge: some of their heads nodded with sleep, and the others looked as if they had taken one too many energy shots. Luckily, your stamina had been well crafted.

A fancily dressed MC made his way up to the podium and the room filled with applause after the last speaker had said all of their correct mandatory words.

“It is my honor to introduce to the stage, our wonderful head benefactor of this organization, His Royal Highness, Prince Chan of the Crown.

Applause tenfold of before erupted through the whole room and it wasn’t even an afterthought for the every attendee to stand up from their seats in an ovation. It was a force of habit for you, but you found yourself clapping as well.

Chan rose with grace, and re-buttoned his jacket with finesse. A blinding spotlight found him and it made the diamonds adorning his beck wink brilliantly. Even more blinding was his pearl white, and perfectly trained smile accompanied by his wave.

Thank you. Thank you. He mouthed.

“It’s like he’s a frickin’ movie star.” Jeongin groaned.

“Might as well be with the way that they treat him. You know deep down they’re all just terrified.”

Chan made his way up to the stage in all of his regality, and the applause didn’t stop until he cleared his throat. A collective groaning of a couple hundred chairs squeaked when everyone sat back down.

“Thank you everyone, really. I wanted to thank you all for your generous support in your donations to this organization, as well as your association with the crown. I’m sure that all the beneficiaries of your donations are beyond thankful compared to me. Without you, this would not be possible.” Chan spoke with grandiose gestures, as usual, but this time, he had found you on the side of the room. “Listen, aside from being a prince, I’m also just a person. A person who knows what it means to struggle, to--”

“--I can’t listen to this anymore.” You whispered into the quiet room, and to your partner.

“Just a few more hours.” He droned. “I almost wish that something would happen so that we don’t have to sit though much else of this.”

“Be careful what you wish for.”

In the corner of your eye, Lee Minho shifted in his seat, but still kept his undivided attention to the stage. You figured he must’ve been just like the rest of them: enamored by the flashiness of the crown--and Chan. He had a way of putting a spell on people: it was the kind of spell that a prince of deception had crafted after years of being kept under lock and key.

“--Anyway, what I’m trying to say, royal or fanciful we all might be, in the simplest way, we’re all just people, therefore this is what connects us all. Thank you.”

Chan was gifted yet another standing ovation that was somehow even more thunderous than before.

“Yeah right.” You scoffed. “People born into money. There’s a difference.”

Chan gave his last waves, then a clamor echoed from the back of the room. At first, it had just sounded like the same raucous laughter you had heard all night, but then it shifted to something different. The sound of laugher turned into shouting, then screams: high pitched and piercing. You had seconds to respond, head whipping around the room to catch sight of the confused prince. In your in-ears, the the sound of gunshots echoed with rapid-fire speed. Machine guns. Shouting commands barked in your ear, and muddled with Jeongin’s string of demands and questions.

“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON OUT THERE? REPORT! REPORT!”

Your heart instantly started beating into hyperdrive, and your legs sprinted as fast has physically possible

“THEY’VE GOT GUNS!” A shrill and cracked voice of an older woman wailed from the back of the room.

Immediately after she had said so, shots fired into the darkened room with sparks, and the metallic sound of bullets hitting the marbled ground followed.

Chan looked around in his panic for you, petrified on the stage. You slung your gun out from your thigh holster and latched onto him with all of your might.

“TH-THEY JUST CAME OUT OF NOWHERE IN THESE VANS. THEY’RE ARMOURED, WE CAN’T--”

“Get the fuck down there and secure the exists!” Jeongin growled into his mic. “B--is the prince secure??”

“Secure!” You yelled back. Using your body as a barrier, you led the cowering prince through the mass hysteria of the crowd.

“Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Shit.” Chan shook under your iron grip.

More shots fired into the room and bodies parted like the sea and fell over each other.

From the balcony, you had caught Jeongin aiming his own gun at the chaos below.

“I’ll cover you! Fuck! There’s so many of them! Get him to the car out back--Three, Six, meet B out there! Three!? Six!? Report!”

“Three and Six are down F!” One of the guards panted. “I can provide cover out back!!”

“Who’s speaking??” Jeongin bellowed, then aimed from above at one of the intruders. Your only focus was on weaving you and Chan out of there, but you had seen one of them in a blur. Each of the men with guns wore dark grey suits with black ties and leather gloves. Each of them wore their own crest: and it was all red.

“Bee?? Bee???” Chan shouted out for you, and jumped every time the crack of a shot echoed in the ballroom.

“I’ve got you, your Highness. We’ll be out soon. Keep your head down and listen to me.” Your arm held to him tightly, and you soon found the exit nearest. There was no telling if there would be more of them outside, but you loaded your gun quickly just in case, and pointed it out.

“Jeongin, get your ass down here!”

“Jeongin? Who the fuck is that??” Chan ducked down to hide himself behind your frame.

His name had slipped on your tongue, but that hardly mattered.

“I’ll be down in a second!!!”

“Don’t fucking waste time up there when I need you down here!!”

“Two! Two Reporting!!” A man suddenly yelled in your in-ear. “I’ve made it out back and I’ve secured the exit. The car is safe!!”

“FOX! Now!”

Your partner heaved, “I’m coming, I’m coming!!”

You kicked open the exit door, gun’s still blazing, however one one else could be found on the other side.

“Thank God,” You sighed.

“Oh shit, I’m gonna be sick.” Chan had turned paler than white, then stumbled in your arms.

“Hey, HEY!” You held him upright. “It’s gonna be alright. I’ve got you. You’re safe. You need to trust me. Your life is in my hands and I’m not giving it up easy, got it?”

“O-okay.” He stammered, then attempted to straighten himself.

“The Prince is outside, repeat, The Prince is outside. Two, are you in position?”

“Yes. Yes, I am.”

Other than the fact that you had just escaped absolute peril, the evening was unbearably pleasant. Crickets chirped in the summer evening, and the humidity of the night smelled gorgeously of the lake that was near-by as well as the vast array of flowers that had been purposefully landscaped around the hotel. Chan’s uneven steps scraped at the gravel walkway.

Since you had canvassed the whole building well, you had known exactly where the getaway car was, but you were still careful.

“Bee. Bee!” Chan blabbered. “Have-have I told you yet that I-I’m in love with you?”

“No, you haven’t Your Highness.”

“I fucking am. If I die tonight, I want you to know that I am ridiculously in love with you, and fuck, I wanna--”

“--I’m sorry, Your Highness, respectfully, but now is not the time for this and you are not dying on my watch.”

Somewhere off in the distance, frogs croaked, and the splashing of fish in the lake plopped at the surface waters. You turned a corner to finally see Two waiting his his gun raised. He was a bit of a shorter and scrawnier man, but something about him told you that where he lacked in strength, he must’ve made up for in agility.

“I’m out! I’m out!” Your partner gasped, and over the in-ear you could hear his running footsteps. “I’m almost there! I’ll be there in a second!”

“Your Highness,” Two bowed and opened the car door. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you. You can call me Two or J. Either you prefer.”

Jeongin came bounding around the corner with heaving breaths and his clothes askew. His glasses which just barely held onto his face had a crack on them and his knuckles were covered in blood.

“Let’s go.” The younger man prompted.

“In the car you go, Your Highness.” You motioned for him to do so.

Chan whimpered like a toddler.

You shoved his body in, “Stop that. Get in the car.”

“I’m in love with you Bee!” He yelled out, “I’M FUCKING IN LOVE WITH YOU BEE!”

Jeongin slammed the door in his face with a bit of a chuckle.

“He’s delirious.”

“Mm.” your partner smiled. “Sure.”

319 notes · View notes

rosethornewrites · 3 years

Text

Fics I read this week!

MDZS/The Untamed, entirely. Including Tumblr fics here now, even if I shared them as well.

A lot of these are super short since I decided to embark on a journey to clear my AO3 “Marked For Later” list of anything under 3k words by reading them.

This is also a lot of fanfiction and I might have a problem. Any fanfiction addict support groups out there?

Also, I learned that I can only post 100 links. So this is going up early and I’ll separate the Not Rated, E, and M ones into a different post for next week.

Finished:

Not Rated (or Tumblr fics):

Parents, by @bloody-bee-tea

Untitled, by @mondengel

Untitled, by @cerusee

Xue Yang - The Third Jade of Gusu, by inawritingfrenzy

As Long as You're Here, by Aitheriomeraki

You are the last person I need to tell me exactly what I already know. You’re going to tell me to go back to cultivating the righteous path. You’re going to tell me that this is against the principles of a cultivator. I’m going to hear you drone on and on about what’s wrong with what I’m doing. You’re going to tell me that I’m acting like a pure disgrace, completely out of line, extremely unhinged and unruly and every other word your Lan vocabulary can muster up.” His words felt heavy but unstoppable, tears making their way to his eyes.

“You’re-” He was about to continue before getting cut off.

“Wei Ying… zhiji.” Lan Wangji breathed out like a plea, like a prayer. -------------- OR Lan Wangji talks to Wei Wuxian the day after killing Wen Chao.

Things we lost in the fire, by KatAnni

Three instances in Lan Wangji's life that involved fire. One of them certainly ends better than the others.

OR Wangxian can be cute in any situation, even when someone sets fire to their inn.

Sleep Talk, by breezebrocolis

"...But being awakened through such ungodly hours is worth it after all, because Wei Wuxian discovered that, contrary to popular belief about his boyfriend's sleeping habits, there’s a moment when Lan Zhan sleep talks, and he's the only one who knows it."

and

"...for now, after all and a year more, he'd never choose to have those lonesome minutes back. It turns out that filling the gaps with emptiness was necessary once, but it doesn't really fit him anymore. Lan Wangji has Grace on his side for now, the print of Wei Ying's delicate fingers into his skin."

In other words, a study about WangXian's sleeping habits.

Hold On, by voxnoxsox

“And really,” Wei Ying continued, “it makes no sense. Why would they not want to hug you, Lan Zhan, or, like… Do you warn them off or something? Give them the ol’ icy Lan glare?”

“No,” Lan Zhan said, when it was clear a response was required. His mind was a little preoccupied with Wei Ying’s hands still running up and down, up and down.

Rated E:

The Dreams of Youth, by Sami (25 chapters)

"Mother, I have to go, with or without you. Please come with me."

"A-Zhan, you're five years old," she says.

"With or without you, Mother," he pleads. "Please come with me."

Lan Wangji starts again from the beginning.

Rough and Tumble, by SugarMilkTea (3 chapters)

Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian are paired together for sparring, because of course they are.

Wei Wuxian is better than the rest of the disciples, because of course he is - so Lan Wangji takes him to another field to train privately.

Things escalate, because of course they do.

and if we choose to fall (who's to say it isn't flight?), by KiaraSayre (2 chapters)

Wei Wuxian has an idea and makes a talisman. A sexy talisman.

to live this way is not for the meek, by la_muerta

Yiling Laozu and his band The Restless Dead are one of the biggest names in the rock scene, playing to thousands of screaming fans in sold-out concerts all over the world.

But underneath the black leather, makeup, and untouchable, arrogant facade is a side of Wei Ying that only Lan Zhan gets to see.

Awareness, by syriala (last in a series)

Awareness is slow to come to Jiang Cheng, mostly because he doesn’t want to be aware. He’s warm and comfortable and Jiang Xiuying is bound to be still around and that is really all Jiang Cheng needs in life.

But then there’s an open mouthed kiss to the hinge of his jaw, Jiang Xiuying slowly trailing his way down Jiang Cheng’s throat, and it’s enough to get Jiang Cheng’s eyes open, however reluctant he might be.

Jiang Xiuying seemingly knows him better than Jiang Cheng does himself because he is already looking up at Jiang Cheng, his eyes sparkling and a teasing grin on his lips.

“Good morning,” Jiang Cheng says, his voice still rough from sleep and Jiang Xiuying leans up to capture Jiang Cheng’s lips in a kiss.

The heat behind it tells Jiang Cheng exactly where Jiang Xiuying wants to take this today, and Jiang Cheng can’t say that he minds too much.

yours for the taking, by SugarMilkTea

“There’s still time to back out, you know,” Wei Ying says, quiet enough that even the attendants waiting at the corners of their table won’t hear.

Lan Wangji pauses in the middle of reaching for the sash on Wei Ying’s—on his husband’s—outer robes. A pit opens in his stomach. His hand falls to his lap, and he lifts his eyes to meet Wei Ying’s. “Is that what you want?”

---

The components of the marriage ceremony are easy in theory. The handfasting, the bows, the feast... and the Taking.

housed by your warmth, by wangxiians

wei wuxian may never grow to enjoy mornings but he enjoys this, he really enjoys this – stolen time together, bodies reuniting, waking up before the world.

Rated M:

Heaven Hath No Fury, by Lady Mythos (Lady_Mythos)

The two biggest mistakes Yu Ziyuan has made are as follows: assuming Wei Wuxian was the cause of all her problems and assuming Cangse Sanren was dead.

Or, Cangse Sanren has a lot of things to say to the bitch that abused her son.

weird and awkward, by sami (3rd in a series)

At the age of sixteen, Lan Zhan falls in love, somewhat against his will.

Have Your Cake and Eat it Too, by adrian_kres (4 chapters)

Like half of all sound-tied people, Wei Ying was born with words in his heart and needing the melody they belong to. It’s his soul marker, and he’s been searching for his soulmate his whole life. Things change when he hears a tune being hummed in a cafe that matches his lyrics perfectly. Except he didn’t see who was humming it! To help, his brother’s soulmate puts him in contact with the beautiful pianist Lan Wangji, who makes Wei Ying question if he wants to find his soulmate at all…

Until The End, by abCEE (40 chapters)

"When I - when I tied my ribbon around our wrists, I knew what I was doing and I privately honored it." Wei Wuxian's brows continued to meet as he tried to understand where the conversation was going until realization dawned on him. "Wa - wait! Lan Zhan, is it what I think it is?!!" "It is usually done at the end of a wedding ceremony -" "What-" "But it could have been acknowledged as an engagement." "Lan Zhan!" He cannot believe what he is hearing now. "But my ancestor revealed herself -" "And we bowed… three times. We bowed, Lan Zhan!"

In which wangxian are married since the Cold Pond Cave incident, knows how proper communication works, and had confessed in the middle of the Sunshot Campaign. Things went up and down from there.

Breaking The Ice, by aflaminghalo

“Why are are you asking for punishment?”

Bring Your Honor, Bring Your Shame, by Terri Botta (Isilwath) (21 chapters, third in a series)

Nie HuaiSang has a problem. His brother is losing his mind.

Rated T:

don't close your eyes, by howodd5ever

In which Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian actually talk about the porn book.

Another Road, by Rynne

Something in the Guanyin Temple goes wrong. When Lan Wangji opens his eyes, he's fifteen again.

Phobia, by yougetsomekisses

What if Lan Wangji had been thrown in that dungeon with Wei Wuxian?

Snow Hunt, by InsanitysxCreation

A short scene of a winter hunt.

Entirely self indulgent, in that the idea of Lan Wangji in white leather gloves arrived in my brain and wouldn't let me continue until I'd written this.

真金不怕火炼 | True Gold Fears No Fire, by adrian_kres

In the immediate aftermath of a successful Sunshot Campaign, Wei Ying is kissed by Lan Zhan at the Phoenix Mountain Hunt while blindfolded. But when the blindfold comes off, Lan Zhan is nowhere to be found. Now, Wei Ying must deal with this heartbreak on top of forced therapy he was mandated to complete due to using demonic cultivation to end the war. Through it all, Wei Ying learns he has value, and that his assumptions about what happened at the hunt may not be entirely correct.

Fantasy, by snowberryrose (3 chapters)

In which Wen Qing leaves Or: Wen Qing rescues herself

Canon divergence from episode 20

Chapter 2: Qin Su’s choice Chapter 3: Xue Yang’s end

Four Parts Honey and One Part Vinegar, by masked (6 chapters)

“You know,” Ouyang Zizhen says thoughtfully over dinner one day, “I’ve never seen Wei-qianbei get jealous before.”

Lan Jingyi pauses for the briefest second, remembers the sect rule of keeping silence during meals, and decidedly forgoes it. “What?”

“Well,” Ouyang Zizhen continues, “Hanguang-jun always has a lot of admirers everywhere we go, but Wei-qianbei never seems to mind it.”

“Why are we talking about this?” Jin Ling asks flatly.

Four times Wei Wuxian doesn't get jealous, and the one time he does.

sweet dreams, by ShippersList

Distance won’t hinder Wei Wuxian from giving his Lan Zhan a goodnight kiss.

Sugar Baby, by nirejseki

“Huaisang,” Nie Mingjue said, and uh oh, that sounded like his ‘bad news’ voice. “We need to talk about your spending.”

That was worse than Nie Huaisang had thought.

“Is the talk going to be about how amazingly economical I am in making intelligent and aesthetically appropriate purchases?” he asked hopefully, clutching his latest and most aesthetic fan.

“Oddly enough,” his brother said, “no.”

Somehow, Nie Huaisang hadn’t thought so.

He was...No, He was Incompetent, by Corundum_Creations

He was Lan Wangji, a Twin Jade of the Lan Clan and he could face anything... so how did he become so incompetent with taking his Wei Ying and hiding him away?

The Resentful Cultivator Who Cried 'I'm Fine', by Mikkeneko

"Who's possessed?" another voice joined the scrum, and Wei Wuxian moaned in despair as Jiang Cheng came marching over to join the rest of the party, glaring daggers at Wei Wuxian for being the source of all this trouble. Purple lightning crackled on his wrist as his eyes narrowed. "This idiot got possessed? I can take care of that with Zidian! Stand back!"

"Ahaha, Jiang Cheng, there's no need for that!" he protested hurriedly. "Really, I'm not possessed!"

"Ah," Lan Jingyi nodded knowingly. "That's exactly what someone who was possessed and trying to throw us off the trail would say!"

---

While on a night-hunt with his friends and family, Wei Wuxian takes a near miss from a dangerous beast. Fortunately he wasn't hurt... but for some reason, they have trouble believing him when he says I'm fine.

Why I Can’t Help But Love Red, by spiralingbutmakeitanimerelated

Lan Wangji takes a bath after a night hunt. Wei Wuxian has questions about the night he branded himself.

Not Till Then Dare I Part From You, by forgottenenvy

WangXian share a tender moment as Lan Wangji braids flowers into Wei Wuxian's hair.

Snowmelt, by sugar_shoal

Lan Zhan has been badly injured on a night-hunt. Wei Wuxian panics only a little. Jiang Cheng drags them all to a nearby abandoned hut to wait out the encroaching blizzard.

Head Empty, Only Wei Ying, by nana_banana

Wei Ying is getting married? To someone not Lan Wangji? Fuck. Not if Lan Wangji has anything to say about it.

sparrow heart, by CeliaBlair24 (fourth in a series)

They pass notes through the spaces between their desks about nonsensical, inconsequential things. About the weather and birds, romance novels, and the forest behind the Cloud Recesses where they spend all their afternoons playing.

And Wei Wuxian is smart, both by the books and on his feet. If he wanted to, he could easily play Lan-xiansheng’s favorite class pet --studious and diligent about being studious; creative besides-- but he doesn’t. He listens to Lan-xiansheng and Jiang Wanyin’s complaints with half an ear and when all is said and done, he turns his back on them both and greets Nie Huaisang with his cheeky smile.

Otherwise known as "Nie Huaisang falls into like."

Retrospective on the State of the Field: Qinghe Patron X (QPX) Studies, by bladedweaponsandswishycoats (jeweledichneumon)

"Qinghe Patron X, eh?" Nie Huaisang chuckles, noticing the heading. Licking his lips, he circles the listing for the conference panel with a yellow highlighter. Despite the moniker having become common several years ago, he still gets a kick out of it. Of course he'd have to go to that one. He takes a moment to feel the faint touch of regret that he isn't on the panel himself; it is always more fun messing with people as a panelist than trying to rely on the Q&A period to say something provocative but relevant.

In which immortal cultivator Nie Huaisang likes to fuck around with scholars attempting to study what they think they know about him, and other shenanigans he gets up to (both with and without the help of his friends) in the modern age.

The year is 2021. Lan Wangji still goes where the chaos is, though these days that can mean a lot more than night hunts. Especially when Wei Wuxian and Nie Huaisang are dedicated to making sure being immortal never gets boring.

A Story for the Ages, by Supernova_Sage

Lan Wangji saunters over to the mystery section. He can hear people whispering, but he isn’t close enough to make sense of the conversation. The lilt in the voice makes it sound like one person is asking a question. Hmm. If he can hear whispering, they’re still being far too loud. He shakes his head and continues his browsing. He pulls his phone out to check the time. It’s nearly 6p. He really should get home. He still needs to feed the bunnies and feed himself and look over emails and—

He stops in his tracks. Stops when he sees the book that he’s been waiting to check out for months now. Every time he’s stopped by, though, it’s been checked out by someone else. And now it’s finally here. Sitting on the shelf in front of him. Once he manages to collect himself, he reaches for it. His fingers don’t touch the spine of the book, though. Instead, he finds his fingers brushing against the fingers of another.

DanTian - Into the Dark (LWJ), by ArchiveWriter (fourth in a series)

Wangji's memory holds images of Wei Ying. Wangji does penance by reliving his memories, and by making sure Wei Ying is loved. Wangji burns the millet porridge he's supposed to stir whilst Wei Ying fetches water for tea.

chasing echoes, by SWANPYRE

Lan Wangji must learn to co-exist with what he has learned his entire life to despise.

Snowfall, by nightflower

During a winter storm in Cloud Recesses, Wangji's old scars ache. Wei Ying takes care of him.

relics of love, by cl410

“Oh my god. Oh my god.”

Lan Zhan pinched the bridge of his nose. “The bunnies were almost eaten.”

“Our son was almost traumatized for life,” Wei Ying said, choking on a laugh. “Lan Zhan, he almost witnessed a double homicide on our own balcony.” He wheezed with laughter, clutching his ribs.

“We will install higher locks,” Lan Zhan said grimly.

Rated G:

A-Yuan's guide to eat the rich (a.k.a. How A-Yuan single handedly stopped a siege from happening and saved everyone), by fanficaddictXOXO

A-Yuan is only three years old. But he knows many things. He knows how to write his name. He knows potatoes are better than radishes (Xian gege said so). But the most important thing he knows is that the handsome gege with a white forehead ribbon is rich.

Obviously You Hate Me, by Sarehz

Wei Wuxian leans across the round table. "Okay, this isn't going to work."

From across the very same table, Lan Wangji raises one puzzled eyebrow. "Mn?"

"This!" Wei Wuxian gestures between them.

Begotten, by ecorie (6 chapters)

“He’s mine.” He echoed what had once been teasingly said in jest, and added, “This is my son.”

Against all odds and without a choice, Lan Zhan brings A-Yuan back to Cloud Recesses. Xichen keeps his brother’s secrets, and shields the child when Lan Zhan could not.

Alone Stands the Quiet, by ecorie

The story of the Yin Iron starts with a celestial war and ends with Lan Sizhui.

A Good Plan, by nirejseki

“The…Lan sect?” Meng Yao said doubtfully. “Are you sure?”

“I am,” his mother said, her mouth tight. She looked upset, the way she always did these days when he referenced, intentionally or otherwise, the original plan that she had had to send him to join his father, sect leader of Lanling Jin. She’d raised Meng Yao on a steady diet of stories of what his life would be like when his father finally took him back the way he’d promised her he would, stories that had filled his days and nights for years and years and years, and then just last year she’d suddenly stopped talking about it entirely. It was as if the person who’d told those stories had nothing to do with her.

Meng Yao didn’t know what had happened, but he assumed it must have been pretty bad.

“It'll be a good fit,” she added.

The Late Great Custody Debate, by stiltonbasket (5 chapters)

"You owe me child support," Lan Zhan blurts, before Wei Wuxian can open his mouth to say hello to him. "Take responsibility."

Or, the one where Lan Wangji's pet rabbit has a better love life than he does, and single father Wei Wuxian develops a healthy fear of attorneys, courtesy of his next-door neighbor.

Switcheroo, by nirejseki

Mo Xuanyu thought that this Wei Wuxian person whose body he’d stolen must have been a really interesting person, mostly because he’d been here for three days so far and nobody’d noticed the switch yet.

A Kiss for you, my love, by Speechless_since_1998

"Ladies and gentlemen."

Suddenly the attention of the whole hall turned to Nie Huaisang, near the orchestra with a microphone in one hand and a glass of champagne in the other, "On this wonderful evening I would like to share with you all the happiness I feel. for a wonderful couple who got married today. " Wait a minute did he say marriage? He must have heard right, even Lan Zhan had stiffened. “Let's give him a wonderful round of applause. To Wei Ying and Lan Zhan newlyweds. " Hot shit. They weren't supposed to attract attention.

The attention of the room focused on them, whispers in the crowd, some scandalized, some excited. Nie Huaisang motioned for him to keep the game, but what was she supposed to do ?! "Lan Zhan, we mustn't ..." He didn't have time to finish the sentence as Lan Zhan kissed him. In front of everyone.

Soulmates, by Yacs_Weasley

Ever since he was a little boy, Wangji had longed to find his soulmate.

Stay with me, by KatAnni

Sizhui's memories come to him in pieces, and some of them in dreams. This time, he dreams of Wei Wuxian putting him in a tree. He runs to the Jingshi immediately, to find his Baba.

The truth, by syriala (first in a series)

“Do you even remember a single person of those you killed after the war?” he demands to know and Jiang Cheng turns his glare on him.

“Why should I?” Jiang Cheng asks and a fearful hush falls over the crowd. “Do any of you remember even a single person you killed in your lives?” he asks them and is met with a pretty telling silence.

“You’re a monster,” someone whispers, but in the quiet it rings out loud and clear.

Jiang Cheng has heard these words a lot in the past sixteen years, and so he simply smiles at them, even though they sting like always.

He reminds himself that the people that matter know the truth, that they know him for who he truly is, and that it has to be enough.

Boys, by nirejseki

“Hey,” Lao Nie protested mildly. “Who’s the father here, me or you?”

“If a-die wants a new wife, little uncle will find one that isn’t inclined to kill him.”

That sounded like a recitation.

“Then what’s even the point,” Lao Nie grumbled, and reached out to ruffle his son’s hair, enjoying how Nie Mingjue yelped when he did, glaring up at him with offended dignity.

Loss, by FlutterFyre

Lan Wangji knows something is wrong.

Hearsay, by syriala (second in a series)

“A girl went missing a few days back,” Wei Wuxian says, voice serious, and Jiang Cheng can just imagine the accusatory look on his face. “Coincidentally you were seen in that area during the same time.”

“So?” Jiang Cheng wants to know and Wei Wuxian makes a frustrated sound.

“What did you do with her?” Wei Wuxian asks him, even though he clearly already made up an answer for himself.

An ally, by syriala (third in a series)

“I just don’t want you to force yourself to face them,” Jiang Cheng finally says and Jiang Xiuying smiles at him.

“I’m not forcing myself. I am going on my own free will. It will be fine. And besides, Lan Xichen was never the reason I left.”

“But he didn’t stop you either,” Jiang Cheng mutters, and then rolls his eyes. “Fine. Accompany me, see if I care.”

“All I see is you caring,” Jiang Xiuying honestly gives back and Jiang Cheng flushes bright red.

Escalation, by syriala (fourth in a series)

“How can you lie to him like that?” Lan Wangji wants to know but it seems to be morbid curiosity more than anything else, because he goes right on. “You’re coming with me to the Cloud Recesses. There will be a trial.”

“A trial,” Jiang Cheng scoffs out, because it’s a farce and nothing more.

Lan Wangji has already decided on his sentence. And they all know it's going to be death.

Resolve, by syriala (fifth in a series)

“Regarding the accusations made against me today,” he starts and cuts his glare over to Sect Leader Yao, who has the good grace to shrink back at the venom in that glare, “I have something to say.”

“Speak,” Lan Wangji demands, but he doesn’t sound too sure all of a sudden, doesn’t seem too happy with the proceedings, and Jiang Cheng does rather enjoy the feeling of triumph it brings him.

“I am innocent. I did not kill any demonic cultivators, nor did I torture them.”

His voice rings out in the courtyard because everyone is silent for two seconds, but then chaos erupts. The voices calling him a liar are the kinder ones, and Jiang Cheng shakes his head at them.

“And I have proof,” he continues, raising his voice so that it carries over the others.

Devotion - Gather, by syriala (sixth in a series)

“What?” Jiang Cheng asks, because for once he is in no immediate danger of being murdered by the other Sects and Jiang Cheng really doesn’t think that look is fair.

“You absolute asshole,” Jiang Xiuying hisses at him and Jiang Cheng knows that if he wasn’t injured Jiang Xiuying would try to slap him over the head or shake him until he sees sense.

“What? What did I do now?” Jiang Cheng wants to know because he was asleep! There is no way he could have done something to upset Jiang Xiuying like this!

“I don’t even know where to start,” Jiang Xiuying says and starts to pace Jiang Cheng’s room, without giving any thought to the fact that this is Jiang Cheng’s bedroom and he really shouldn’t be here.

Well, Jiang Cheng is not going to say that to him, because with the mood Jiang Xiuying is in right now it wouldn’t go over well for Jiang Cheng, Sect Leader or not. Not that he actually cares anyway.

It’s Jiang Xiuying after all.

Home in Lotus Pier, by syriala (seventh in a series)

Jiang Cheng's angry frown turns into a confused frown when he sits down for breakfast and finds a box next to his bowl of congee.

“What is this?” he asks into the room, because someone is bound to be around, but he doesn’t get an answer and Jiang Cheng heaves out a sigh.

He tugs the box close and opens it and he’s surprised to find that his favourite tea is in it. It’s hard to come by lately, as it is entirely seasonal and only grown in a small spot in Sect Leader Yao’s territory, and after everything that happened at the Cloud Recesses a few months back, he already mentally said goodbye to it.

He wouldn’t be getting any more supplies from Sect Leader Yao after all, so this is more than surprising.

But the gifts don't stop there.

Parallelism, not equivalence, by DreamaholicsAnonymous

Wei Wuxian reminded him of Xingchen, Song Lan thinks, not for the first time.

Bring Your Secrets, Bring Your Scars, by Terri Botta (Isilwath) (fourth in a series)

Nie MingJue keeps his promises.

All Your Madness, I Will Tame, by Terri Botha (Isilwath) (fifth in a series)

Wen Qing in the Burial Mounds.

Puppy, by Speechless_since_1998

Returning home, Lan Zhan found his husband hiding behind the sofa and A-Yuan sitting on the ground playing with a puppy dog.

The puppy must have been a few months old, probably hadn't even been weaned. It was harmless, but Wei Ying didn't care. It was enough that it was a dog to be afraid.

“Ah, Lan Zhan! You finally arrived! Take that monster away!" Wei Ying pleaded, refusing to come out of hiding.

A-Yuan puffed out her cheeks, "Shiro is not a monster!"

Heaven, he had already given it a name.

Being Good, by ricochet

Lan Wangji tries to be good.

no shadow can touch, by sunflowersfield

When it is time to hand out the mics, Lan Zhan forces himself to lower his expectations. Their exchange will be fleeting, and Wei Ying will barely even look at him.

Or: Wei Ying is cast in a musical at his local community center. Lan Zhan is the theater technician.

make a mess (inside my heart), by avenqelic

Wei Wuxian looked comfortable against Lan Wangji’s white sheets, curled up in his blankets. Lan Wangji’s chest ached, mind swirling with possibilities – falling asleep looking into Wei Wuxian’s eyes, waking up in his arms, holding each other close as the moon shifted across the sky and the sun rose.

Finding a way home, by ThisIsWhereTheMagicHappens

Prompt idea for a less than one thousand words one shot! Lwj walks into a coffee shop and barista wwx cannot stop flirting with him while both of them are dying on the inside because the other is so handsome! Wwx writes his number on the cup! Up to you if lwj has an existencial crisis after finding the number or if he even finds the number. Bonus points if the oneshot ends with lwj going back to the cafe and wwx smiles at him when he sees him! — this is a.a. now with a prompt

DanTian - Planting Gentians (LWJ POV), by ArchiveWriter (1 chapter plus art)

Wei Ying's been up their old mountain early in the morning. Wangji does needlework and indulges in watching Wei Ying's hands. A slice of domestic contentment because I like them happy.

Tease, by annjellybean

Now, Wei Ying had long outgrown teasing his husband mercilessly the way he used to back in their childhood days, they had been through so much since then, he had honestly forgotten how to do so. That being said, it did not mean Wei Ying had completely forgotten his gremlin roots, and as a self-proclaimed gremlin husband, today he wanted to tease.

Pure Morning, by ShizunThirst

It’s on mornings like these that Lan Wangji can love Wei Wuxian the way he deserves to be loved.

deeper etchings, by fensandmarshes

“And remember, a-Yuan,” comes the voice, lowered but still loud as though it shuns the petty boundaries of the house, “you absolutely cannot tell diedie about this.”

Lan Wangji pauses, there in the middle of the portal array, halfway through setting down his bag, and tilts his head just slightly.

Caring Warmth, by MountainMist

Wei Ying is sick and lonely. Head empty only Lan Zhan.

And how Lan Zhan takes care of him.

just them, together., by adeptiwings

It was okay, now that it was just them.

the boy with rabbit ears, by dragontea

Lan Zhan got lost in an amusement park and found his way home in the company of the boy with rabbit ears.

heart-shaped knots, by twigofwillow

There’s been a ghost in Cloud Recesses for over thirty years, but no one has talked to her until now.

Setting Suns and Dawning Realisations, by wereworm

Wei Wuxian's plans for a romantic night out in Caiyi with Lan Zhan are ruined when he works late, the sun already setting by the time he makes his way home to the Jingshi. Instead, they enjoy a quiet night in and Wei Wuxian comes to terms with the peace that he'd fought so hard to earn and the life that's he's finally allowed to have.

[For the prompt: a sweet wangxian date night in]

Won This For You, by Preludian_Staves

He looks up as his husband comes into the room with something suspiciously large hidden behind his back.

A single soul (no more), by Lysdance1

The core transfer surgery goes as in canon BUT it leaves the spiritual link open between Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian and, well, what goes one way can go both ways.

"It's what keeps him (mostly) sane, a tether in this dark place where he cannot feed and cannot sleep and cannot escape; through the link he feels - trickles of love, Jiang Cheng's worry for him. It shouldn't be enough, but somehow, in this dark, dark place, it is. It reminds him, faintly, of home, and in the dark he hears the rhythm of one, luminous, far away soul."

To Need Someone, by Preludian_Staves

"A-die?"

"Hm?"

"What does mean to need someone? To want them with you?"

Approval, by Speechless_since_1998

"You look tired, "he said, sipping his tea. He shouldn't, it wasn't kind. But he couldn't resist teasing him a little.

Lan Zhan stared at him blankly, "I've been drinking."

"I saw."

"I kissed Wei Ying."

"I saw that too."

And thanks to the gods there was no uncle because he hated worldly occasions, otherwise he would have a heart attack.

"We had sex at his adoptive parents' home."

"And?"

Lan Zhan raised an eyebrow, "Aren't you surprised?"

"Oh, sorry, now I'll try again ... Really? !!"

"You're not funny."

Unfinished:

Not Rated:

An Obsidian Among Jades, by bluebeads

What happens when a sad lost mantou cheeked Lan Zhan teams up with a cheerful one to find his family in the unfamiliar streets of Yilling. A Yu Ziyuan Ultimatum AU which I submitted a while ago on angstymdzsthoughts Also a Gusu Lan Sect Wei Wuxian.

I've had enough, by pluma1007

He is ascending. They’re minds unhelpfully supplied.

Then, Wei Wuxian is gone.

The cultivators are in disarray.

“Wei Wuxian… Wei Wuxian ascended!”

“How can this be?! A monster ascended?!”

“No! My core! My powers had diminished!”

Hearing that, the cultivators checked their cores. Gasps rang out the mountains. Enraged cries are heard, cursing Wei Wuxian. There are also those who kowtowed, praying for forgiveness. There are others who praised him.

Song of Joy and Regrets, by HelloKitten

The Archery competition at Qishan this year has hit a snag. As the Sects face the wrongs perpetrated by their future selves, Wei Wuxian finds himself adopted by half of the cultivation world who are determined to save him from himself.

Baby Wangxian suffers. Adult Wangxian's job here is done.

"I'm starting to see a pattern to all his plans..."

"Do they all involve him being bait?"

"Yes" came deadpanned responses.

Hua Cheng is not amused.

Rated E:

the long way back home, by Misila

Wei Ying always knew he was the single discordant note in the Jiang household. That was why, after graduating from university, he didn’t return home. With him gone, Yu Ziyuan wouldn’t have anyone to compare her son to, and Jiang Fengmian wouldn’t have to keep avoiding his own family to prevent further conflict.

…Right?

(Seven years later, married to the man of his life and with a four year-old son, Wei Ying returns to his hometown and tries to reconnect with his siblings and befriend his nephew; but, most of all, he struggles to figure out what’s wrong with his brother and how to help him, despite Jiang Cheng not wanting to have anything to do with him anymore.)

Will You Stand Beside Me, by trashgavin

Wei Wuxian takes all his strength and spits blood in Wen Chao’s face. His eyes narrow and he speaks, though his voice is quiet and full of pain.

“Go to hell.”

It only makes Wen Chao laugh. He releases his hair and stands to his feet. “Bring me a whip.”

Rated M:

For the Dust and the Dirt, by Nyxelestia

His breath came out in shaky gasps, but still he could do nothing as the demonic copy of himself brought the blade down to the bare skin of Wei Wuxian’s uninjured shoulder. He whimpered when he felt a small cut, then when the blade lifted. He didn’t have time to even think of relief before it came back, right next to the first cut in a different direction, then again below in a line, multiple small lines in multiple directions like…like a character.

“Like I said,” the demon mused as Wei Wuxian realized what it was doing. “I’ll write it down for you.”

A brutal assault on a Cloud Recesses student leaves the Cultivation world reeling. Wei Wuxian struggles to recover, while everyone else tries to make sense of an ominous message. But since when do demons care about sect politics, anyway?

Between Wen Ruohan's rising aggression, simmering tensions across the guest disciples, and the mysterious fierce corpses still popping up all over the place, Wei Wuxian would rather ignore the confusing, horrifying visions the demon left him with.

If only the demon's taunting predictions didn't keep coming true at every turn.

I Know How Those in Exile Feed on Dreams of Hope, by rabbit_habits & saltedpin

“What does it mean, that Wen Ruohan has all the Yin Iron?” Jiang Cheng asked, dragging himself up into a sitting position – her medicines must have worked quickly, because his ribs gave only a twinge when he moved.

Wen Qing settled down beside him, head bowed as she packed away her supplies, her shoulder brushing his arm when she moved. “It means that no one in the cultivation world can oppose him,” she whispered.

—

Canon divergence AU in which Jiang Cheng and Jin Zixuan are captured by the Wens after escaping from the Xuanwu's cave, before they can return to rescue Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji.

Misunderstood, by Silver_Flame_2724

There is something called a memory ball that shows the memories of a chosen person.

In order to further incriminate the already dead Yiling Patriarch, the cultivation world decides to use this memory ball at the next Discussion Conference to show how evil the demonic cultivator can truly be.

What appears, though, truly shocks them all.

laughing shadow, by ich_bin_ein_stern

During the commotion involving Wei Wuxian, A-Ling refused little sleep. His screams carried across Koi Tower, putting wailing ghosts too shame. He was inconsolable by everyone. It was only when Jin Zixuan unintentionally passed the room holding Wei Wuxian while trying to calm down his son did A-Ling miraculously settle down. Since then, he has slept peacefully every night. Yanli expressed, in the quiet and security of their bedroom, that perhaps Wei Wuxian's spirit soothed A-Ling and continues to do so.

At the least expected times, Jin Zixuan swears he can hear the distant sound of a flute.

But when he stops to actually listen for it, he hears nothing.

Come From My Inkstone, by magicgenetek

“So your plan,” Nie Mingjue said dubiously, “is to move into the Burial Mounds to write and illustrate erotica about you and Lan Wangji seducing the Yiling Patriarch to earn his trust and sell the public on the idea that he's not a threat, then convince him to give up the Yin Tiger Seal?"

“The way I said it sounded better,” Nie Huaisang said. “And you forgot the part about me seducing the Ghost General, that is crucial.”

“I hate this, and as your brother, I am begging you not to actually stick it in a fierce corpse. How much money do you need?”

Rated T:

Here We Go Again, by Alliandra

He looked over to where the swordswoman was still fighting, but her focus seemed entirely locked onto that fight so it was unlikely that she could have had anything to do with the energy drain. He was still wracking his brain for something else to do to assist, so this thing didn’t kill them both, but now he was feeling weak, dizzy and currently not far from helpless.

~~~~~~~~~~

It has been several months since the events at the Guanyin temple and Wei Wuxian is wandering around on his own. After he helps a stranger kill a very dangerous beast he uncovers what seems to be a conspiracy aimed at ending his life. He heads back to Cloud Recesses with his new companion in tow, looking to get Lan Wanji's help in working out what is involved.

Meanwhile, Jiang Cheng and Jin Ling made a surprising discovery under Koi Tower that may well be linked to the threat against Wei Wuxian's life.

Can they all work together to find out what is going on and put a stop to it, before something disastrous occurs?

A place of Gold, by ThisIsWhereTheMagicHappens

A few days after Wei Wuxian has parted from Lan Wangji on a forest path, he gets surrounded by Jin officials in an Inn, who formally ask him to return to Jinlintai to fill in the position of Sect Leader, as is his right and duty.

Wei Wuxian thinks it is an artful prank. Until it is not.

Blossoming flowers in a full moon - 花好月圆, by ThisIsWhereTheMagicHappens

What if Wei Wuxian wasn’t able to get out of Lan Wangji’s grip at the cliff in Nevernight? What if Lan Wangji refused to let go?

All will be well when the day is done, by abCEE

The one where Yu Ziyuan time traveled but she thought that it was her visions of her alternate life.

She learned that there is a brat named Wei Ying who brought destruction to her and her family's life.

And so in her present, she vowed that she will never allow that to happen.

In which Yu Ziyuan found the four-year-old Wei Ying, newly pushed out of the inn where his parents left him, and decided that no, this child must never be associated with her, her family, and their sect at all.

And so Yu Ziyuan thought that she could bring him somewhere where someone may or may not find him but definitely far from where her husband could find him. If he's lucky, he'll survive that winter, if he's not, then death awaits the fevered child.

This is the extent of mercy that Yu Ziyuan could give a child.

With this, she'll raise her children without having to deal with a brat that brings trouble where he goes according to her visions of her alternate life.

Like the tag stated, this is definitely not Yu Ziyuan centric.

Rated G:

How Jin Zixuan Helps Everyone, by BryxcrSt

The Yunmeng Heroes, Twin Jades, Nie Huaisang, The Peacock, Cinnamon Roll Ghost General and Lan Qiren suddenly transport back to the past before the Conference in Qishan, with their very memory of how all their clans battled Wen Rouhan's and now they're all ready to prevent it from happening now that they're back to the past. Especially Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian.

Surprisingly, Jin Zixuan wants to help them instead of standing out of the front line like how he used to but what can he do?

To Repeat, Repay, and Repair, by adrian_kres

Wei Wuxian has died again and his family grieves. Lan Sizhui, now married and with children of his own, grieves the loss of both fathers, as Lan Wangji has entered seclusion. But somehow, he unknowingly sends himself back to the time he spent in the Burial Mounds at three years old. Will his family take his confused, nonsensical warnings seriously? Are they doomed to repeat the same fate?

#the untamed #mo dao zu shi #chen qing ling #cql #mdzs #wangxian #untamed fanfiction

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