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juicedaloe · 9 months

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Mithrun and brain damage

I'm not sure if anyone is interested in this, but I wanted to make a post talking about why I think that Mithrun has brain damage from a traumatic brain injury instead of him being a representation of other neurological disorders or mental illness. I'm not that involved in the dunmesh fandom so I don't know how common this headcanon is, though I've seen a few people mention it here and there.

This is just my own opinion so if you disagree then that's fine. Some of this is just speculation and I can't say what Kui's intentions were. This post isn't meant to be that serious. I just wanted to talk about it and hopefully inform about how brain damage can affect some people in a way that I hope is interesting and relevant.

This will be kind of long because I like to talk so it will be under the cut. Apologies for the length and how much I ramble. Feel free to give input especially if I got anything wrong or if this is too confusing.

Okay let's go

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is incredibly complex. The long-term effects of a TBI include a wide array of symptoms. Each injury is different, and some people can completely recover rather quickly while others can become permanently disabled, even for seemingly "minor" injuries. What I'll cover here isn't a definitive representation of the experiences of all those who have long-term effects from TBI, nor do I speak for everyone with brain damage.

Here are some long term symptoms relevant to this post:

Alexithymia (inability to process and name emotions)

Inability to process and name physical perceptions

Mood swings and emotional regulation difficulties

Communication difficulties

Social impairment

Apathy about caring for oneself

Lack of motivation

Alexithymia and inability to process physical perceptions

This one is rather obvious. While Mithrun is shown to feel emotions and have physical sensations (for instance, describing his location when he gets lost in the dungeon as "a cold place"), he is also apathetic to how this affects him. This means that his physical and emotional perceptions are reduced in some way. He says that becoming lord of the dungeon will leave someone "empty", showing he is aware of his dulled emotional state.

A good example of this is can be seen here in a bonus comic where he doesn't give much of a reaction to burning his mouth on hot food.

(I love these two a lot, by the way. Pattadol is really under appreciated.)

He is also not able to recognize bodily signals, such as hunger or when he is tired. Despite collapsing from exhaustion and not eating for long periods of time, he still insists he is not tired or hungry.

Mood swings

Mood swings in combination with alexithymia can be an especially disorientating experience. Those who struggle to perceive their own emotions can still feel them even if they don't know how to recognize it.

Individuals with brain injuries often experience drastic mood swings, particularly anger. To those around them, they can appear to go from 0 to 100 in an instant.

This is more speculation/headcanon on my part, as the strongest emotion Mithrun has for most of his appearances is anger. However one could interpret this as being unrelated as he is seeking revenge for a traumatic experience.

Communication difficulties and social impairment

Not only can naming personal experiences be incredibly difficult with a brain injury, but other areas of communication are often affected as well.

Mithrun is not able to set boundaries for himself even if someone is doing something he would not actually want them to do, which can leave him in a vulnerable position.

People with brain injuries can sometimes have a paradoxical experience when it comes to communicating with others. They can go from being very quiet to speaking at length about one topic, seemingly without regard for the importance of each bit of information. (I see it like Newton's first law of motion. It is hard to start speaking and it can be just as hard to stop.)

I really like this aspect of Mithrun's characterization. Usually, he is very quiet because he has no reason to speak. However, once he starts talking he is shown to be overly specific and goes on for long periods of time. Kabru has to spend multiple days figuring out his story.

In a side comic, Kabru tells Mithrun he should condense some of the personal details that Kabru finds irrelevant to the topic of the dungeon.

Mithrun shares many details about himself because his desire not to do so is gone. This mirrors the experience of many people who have brain damage to overshare and not understand how their words will come across to others. Sometimes they say or do things that are insensitive or inappropriate for the situation.

Caring for oneself and motivation

In the dungeon, Mithrun becomes reliant on others for self care. He also seems especially incapable of motivating himself to take care of his body when he is particularly focused on his goals.

In these panels, thus far he had been fairly receptive of Kabru trying to take care of him. However, he could sense that the demon was close and was too focused on that to care to eat.

Refusal of care and treatment is often an effect of traumatic brain injury. This can be for seemingly no reason, even if the person knows that this will help them. Sometimes people will lie about receiving treatment or doing things to take care of themselves, either so they can avoid it or avoid having someone take care of them.

He knows that eating regularly and not pushing himself too much will help him - he's been told multiple times on-screen - but he still has to be continuously told by others to give him that motivation to take care of himself. He's very apathetic to his physical state, even if it seems his only desire is for revenge and he should be doing anything he can to achieve that.

Other things of note

I wasn't sure where to put this, but while Mithrun's sense of direction is speculated by Kabru to be left over from his time as lord of an ever-changing, confusing dungeon, having poor sense of direction in the way he does could also be indicative of brain injury as well.

While the dungeon is confusing and illogical, he is known to have a poor sense of direction and to get frequently lost by those around him, even trying to exit an entrance he just came through. He is shown to be very intelligent, but memory is greatly impacted by brain injuries which affects a person's sense of direction and location.

Something that really stands out to me about Mithrun is how much the things that help him are particularly helpful to those with brain damage. He is physically capable of performing tasks, but he needs an outside source to remind him and get him started. He relies entirely on routine, and when that regularity is taken away he shows extreme difficulty taking care of himself.

Sometimes, the care that some people need is simply someone else to encourage them or to tell them when to do things. The care that he needs is pretty consistent with a person with a brain injury who does not need a full time caretaker and would prefer to have some independence.

Also, healing magic is specified to not work with brain injury unless the person is killed and revived. Mithrun had not been revived after his injuries, so it is entirely possible for him to have sustained a TBI. I don't think this matters that much because one is still allowed to have headcanons even if there is a magical explanation or isn't really possible in canon, but I thought it was an interesting detail.

In conclusion

Because of all this I don't believe that his lack of self care is due solely to mental illness. While mental illnesses like depression or PTSD can cause a decline in self care, the reasons why the affected individual is avoidant of these tasks differs. These disorders can also cause cognitive difficulties and emotional regulation issues, but not to the same extent or in the same way that brain damage would. I think that he does have both depression and PTSD (both are common after a TBI) but those are not his only disabilities.

And on a personal note, I just think that having a character with brain damage is really cool. Most of the time I've seen it the characters are not given very much respect and they are treated as comic relief and a joke. Regardless of whether you agree with this post or not, it is still nice to see a character with a disability like this.

Thank you if you read all of this. I hope it was easy to understand and I did not ramble too much. I don't have anything else to say but I've been wanting to write this out for a while.

Okay bye

#Dungeon Meshi #Mithrun

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sonarspace · 2 months

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love cramp, choso

wc: 1.8k content: fluff (reader has period cramps and he takes care of you). nsfw (oral. fem! receiving. multiple orgasms. face riding. overstimulation if you squint.) a/n: not proofread as usual. idk why its taken me so long to write for him but here we are :D.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

the first time choso eats you out he thinks he’s in heaven. sweet taste and honey like consistency. he can never get enough of tasting you. so when you get your period it’s like his source of food is gone.

you wake up to find your underwear covered in a light shade of red. the cramps come soon after. choso comes over at night, a smile on his face — excited to be around you.

the smile is soon wiped off his face when he walks around the couch to see your eyes scrunched. your body curled up, and your hands clutching your lower abdomen, a cramp hitting when he walked in. “are you okay??” he moves over to you. his hand moves over yours holding your stomach. trying to pry them away to see if you're hurt in anyway.

"cramp," you cry in pain. he pushes the hair sticking to you back and presses a kiss to your head. you huff out a laugh "ha, that was a bad one, but yes i'm okay.. i got my period in the morning".

"ohh," choso elongates the word in understanding. he asked you about it earlier when he noticed the pads in your bathroom shelf and you explained to him what it was then. how your cycle happens once and sometimes twice if the universe was trying to fuck with you.

and sure the universe was trying to fuck with you this time cause only two weeks later your cycle starts again. having done his own research about it, choso's patient and understanding when you lose your temper or get too emotional.

as soon as he finds out your on your period he gives you a quick peck on the lips and is out the door. not because he doesn't want to be around you but because he wants to take care of you in the best way he could. "text me, if you need anything specific i'll be back in twenty minutes."

you text him a "come back quick, i wanna cuddle 😞" after he's gone for ten minutes. he replies "be back real soon sweet cheeks :)". he does a quick google search on foods to reduce menustral cramps and grabs whatever he thinks you'd like from the list: dark chocolate, bananas, avocados, chamomile tea, pineapple and some ice cream just cause, and a heating pad since you've lost yours.

you're sitting up on the couch now, knees brought up to your chest. he gives you a short haul of all the things he's got you. a smile on your face and his love gripping your beating heart as you watch him explain why he bought each item.

a happy tear slips from the corner of your eye and he notices, "why are you crying? does it hurt too much?" you shake your head and chuckle softly "i'm just really happy you're here choso". he blushes "wouldn't wanna be anywhere else, darling".

fifth day of your period and you're barely bleeding. the cramps are almost gone unlike usual. you can't help but notice how he's being a little distant. you're about to ask him but that is until you notice his hard on and connect two and two together. he's sitting beside you trying really hard to keep up with the movie instead of getting on his knees and eating you out like a starved man.

he gulps when you move your hand to his thigh. you know you shouldn't tease him but you do anyway because it's fun to see him get flustered by your touch. your hands slide further up his shorts, your nails lightly scratch his inner thigh. his breath hitches when your pinky finger lightly rubs over his boner.

you fake a yawn and competely remove your hand. "i think we should go to bed," you tell him. he follows you with a confused look. "is there something you want to tell me, choso?" you tease him. "um...can i-" he clears his throat.

he gets on his knees then. "can i please, please, please eat you out?" you're taken aback. your lips parting in a silent gasp — expecting him to ask you for a blowjob instead. "is that why you're so hard?" you raise an eyebrow.

"god yes, baby, please let me touch you. let me make you feel good, please it's all i've been thinking about for the past five days. thought i'd be able to spend the night between your legs but you got your period," he pouts. you laugh, your hand grasping his cheek, "oh choso, you're a such a needy boy, aren't you?" and he nods feverishly.

"go ahead." you tell him. and his lips are immediately kissing up a path to your shorts. his hands on your hips to keep you steady, as he kisses you over your shorts. his nose nuzzling against your clit and he whimpers. his hands make their way under your shirt, his cold fingertips cupping your boobs. you gasp your head falling backwards.

you feel his teeth nipping at the skin of your hips. you look down to see him pulling off your shorts with his mouth. determined to keep massasing your boobs he successfully pulls down both your shorts and panties. "choso," you whine at his neediness. he stands up and press a quick kiss to your lips. his hands under your shirt helping you remove it. fully nude now, he gets rid of his own clothes quickly and pushes you down on the bed. "just relax, i'm going to take such good care of you sweet girl."

he kisses his way down to where you need him the most. leaving hickeys on his way — obessed with the way your skin felt under his lips and between his teeth. his arms move under your legs as he gets comfortable. he slowly licks once from your entrance to your clit, twice, thrice until you moan out a please.

"shh sweet honey, need to take my time. been waiting for five days, you can wait a bit longer for me, can't you?" he pouts. and his pouts always have you melting. "yeah i can wait," you pant. you're so wet — all because of him, he thinks. he takes pride in having you sprawled and needy for him like this, it's rare. sometimes he can't believe he has the same effect on you like you do.

he takes a finger and gathers your wetness on his tip, smearing it all over your stomach. he moans as he bites your inner thigh and inserts a finger into your needy hole. he moves up your body to lick at the wetness he left on your abdomen. the sounds he lets out as he licks it off you are pornographic.

"clenchin around my finger so much, breathe for me baby, deep breaths," he guides you. he chuckles when you give him a blank expression. another kiss to your hips. he always had to kiss you. it's as good as oxygen for him — the taste of you on his lips, on his tongue.

his tongue pokes out and licks lightly at your clit. "that pineapple's made your taste sweeter," he hums. he loved your taste. could live off of it forever. he presses his tongue on your clit, heavy. his eyes meet yours. your lips parted in a whine. his finger plugged in you starts slowly moving in and out, curling — trying to reach that spot in you.

your eyes roll to the back of your head. his long fingers reaching deep inside of you, curling and meeting your sensitive spot. you buck into his hand. your hand makes its way into his hair, scratching lightly. he replaces his finger with his tongue. dipping in and slurping. making filthy noises.

he links a hand with your free hand. the need to hold you through this in some way. his tongue alternates between flicking and sucking your clit and dipping into your needy hole. his thumb rubs your clit quickly trying to get you to reach your orgasm. he feels your walls tighten around his tongue as you cum.

he doesn't stop though. his tongue moves over your clit sucking. desperately wanting you to cum once more. and you do with a loud cry of his name "choso, choso, god, choso".

"no god here baby, just your choso." he smiles. his chin drenched in your juices and his hair slightly undone, sticking to his face. he tries to go down on you once more but you pull him away with the grip you have on his hair. "i can't" you pant.

"it's been five days, sugar. please, please, just one more," he begs and you give in. his tongue moves over you quickly. his teeth coming out to lighlty nip. adding an extra sensation. making it harder for you to keep your orgasm in, you let go. he lays beside you, breathing heavily. he kisses you deeply, enough that you could taste yourself on his tongue. you look down to his cock, rock hard and covered in white liquid. "did you..?" you ask with knowing smile. "yeah, your pussy drives me crazy." he laughs.

still unsatisfied, he grabs your hips moving you over him. "choso?" you question. "need you to ride my face, doll. get yourself off on me, come on. please?" he asks. grabbing your ass and moving under your pussy. you clench around nothing when his breath hits your core. "it's just beggin for my mouth, peach," he pulls you down on his face.

his tongue works you to yet another orgasm. your hips have a mind of their own as they move over him. his nose pushes into your clit. his ministrations this time have you more than cumming. you gasp as you squirt all over his face. surprised that he made you reach this state, he takes it all in like a proud man. satsified groans and whines falling out of his lips.

you pant pushing yourself off him. you lay beside him, breathing heavily — too tired to move. you hiss when you feel a warm towel between your legs. he cleans you up quickly and softly. a gentle peck on the marks his nails left inside your thighs. "choso, no more. please." you whisper.

"no more baby. just cleaning you up". he smiles softly. his hair fully undone and framing his face perfectly. he lays down beside, pulling you in as close he can. "really tired you out, huh?" he pushes your hair back so he could take in your features clearly. your eyes slightly open, cheeks flushed, lips bitten red.

you take him in for the first time in hours as well. his lips flushed a darker color than usual and his cheeks warm as your palm cups his face to pull him in for a kiss. you hum a yes into the kiss. "my girl, my sweet girl. my girl. the most perfect girl. my honey bun. my sugar filled doll. i love you. thank you." he whispers against your lips.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

#✎ luna.writes #jjk x reader #jjk smut #jjk choso #jujutsu kaisen choso #choso jjk #choso kamo #choso kamo smut #choso smut #choso fluff #choso x reader #choso x you #kamo choso x reader #kamo choso smut #kamo choso x you #jujutsu kaisen smut #jujutus kaisen x reader

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luveline · 4 months

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hey! would you mind writing sirius black x reader (ole flame or something) when they meet for the first time since azkaban at a meeting for the order? thank you and happy holidays!

thank u for requesting, hope this is OK! ♡

—you and sirius both get to go home eventually, 2.2k. fem

You were still kids when Sirius… went away. You thought he hurt James and Lily, and it didn't matter that you loved him because he was evil and cruel and he hurt the people he loved most in the world, and then you were outposted thousands of miles eastward, your life a shadow.

Remus sent you letters. You always answered, even when it hurt, but his last was too much to believe. You told yourself that someone forged his handwriting through a curse or some new gimmick, and then a second arrived with a smaller envelope hidden inside.

No name written on it. No Dear anything to begin.

Things are different to what you've been told. Please come home, it said. This penmanship was shaken like a hand out of practice, but something felt familiar in the curves and dots.

If Remus’ letter (and the second smaller one too) were in fact telling the truth, it means you did something awful, and so, for a while, you don't go.

Please, the next letter says, again enclosed within a larger explanation from Remus, I'm sorry. I just want to see you again.

Getting home isn't as simple as he might think. You have to picture the destination very clearly to disapparate, and you have no sustained recollection anymore of the places you used to go. You remember silly things, slices of memories; the four of them laughing in a big green field, the sweet smell of hair oil to your left; the beige walls of a rented flat where you'd lay in bed for hours, sometimes days at a time, before things got too terrible to sleep; a string-lit garden that last summer, hands of poker on a glass table. These places aren't real anymore. You can't go back to them.

Upon your request, Molly forwards you an address and a secret code.

Trains, buses, trains again. A long walk through a cold street. Some secret this or that. You arrive in the night and a frowning face ushers you in, past a painting sealed away and up the creaking stairs. You spend hours sitting on the end of a bed coated in dust waiting for the sun to rise, your back stiff with nerves. You could slip out before anyone else knows you're here, it's not as if Moody would give you away. But why did you come, if you were going to run straight back to your outpost?

You don't want Sirius’ betrayal to be true, of course. It took your breath away imagining what it would mean if he hadn't done what you thought. If it's all lies (as it seems to be), if he's innocent as he and Remus claim, it means you turned your back on him and left him to suffer, and he's still asking you to come home.

A few people stir for breakfast. Molly, who's voice you remember, and some younger sounding ones that may be her children, or perhaps the newer Order recruits. Then comes Remus’ voice. He sounds different. Less Welsh, more tired. Homely anyways as he passes your door with someone beside him.

“...any day now,” he's saying, “try not to worry.”

“I do worry. I've worried about it every day for years.”

You freeze up.

The stairs creak, Remus’ voice moving further away. “She doesn't need worrying.”

Sirius must stay at the top of the stairs for a moment. He sounds close. “I wouldn't know what she needs.”

“Come have some breakfast.”

“I'll write her again.”

“After breakfast.”

“What if she doesn't come?”

“After breakfast,” Remus insists. “She can ignore you once we've had toast.”

“I forgot how funny you are,” Sirius mutters.

Hearing his voice fills you with doubt. He sounds nothing like he used to, no easy confidence to be heard, just fatigue.

You look down at your hands. Hearing his voice has a new emotion sprouting, too. When you first learned what had happened to your friends, you felt anger like a knife everywhere you went. How could he do that to them? How could he do it to you, be that person, ruin everything you'd loved and made together? But later, when anger faded and grief ached, you'd missed the Sirius you loved. Shamefully, in longing pangs, you'd toss and turn to dreams where things were different.

Now there's a chance he might still be that person, and you're hiding from him in his own house.

“There's someone here,” Molly says as you leave your room, her voice nearly too quiet to hear from the kitchen. “Moody's told me this morning.”

“What?” Arthur asks.

“Who?” a younger voice says.

A small intermission of quiet. “Well, I don't know,” Molly says eventually, though she must have guessed it was you from the letter you sent. “But I'll need another loaf of bread. You'd better go, boys.”

“Mum,” one whines.

“Come on now.”

The stairs whimper as you descend, the bannister sticky with old gloss under your hand. Paisley wallpaper and drapes catch your eye as you pass the overflowing shoe rack. There must be more people here than you'd thought. The coat stand is similarly overloaded.

You can see into the kitchen as soon as you take the last step down. Molly stands wringing a dish cloth between her hands, two teenage boys at the kitchen table. Remus stands near her right with a cup of tea, and when he sees you, he genuinely smiles.

“Oh, good,” he says, the scar that bisects his lip pulling as he takes a sip of tea.

The teenagers turn to see you. “Bread, boys! Arthur, you can go with them," Molly says.

Arthur doesn't complain. You falter in the hallway, quiet as the trio of Weasley's leave the kitchen in their slippers to take a quiet exit from the front door. They smile politely as they go, but the boys whisper as the door shuts behind them. You wonder if they have an inkling of who you are, and then you wonder what you might say now they're gone.

Molly remains, inquisitive to know that you need privacy but also the security of her company. She was always smart like that.

“Come in, then,” Remus says.

“I–” You clear your throat. “I'm not sure I should.”

A startle of silverware against china.

Remus gives you one of his looks. It has tears threatening to well. Why didn't I fight to see him more? you think. Suddenly years have passed and he's changed, but his reassuring glances remain. It's like he's saying everything is fine, why wouldn't everything be fine? Chin up, dove.

Sirius appears in the doorway. Dark circles beneath grey eyes, his cheeks gaunt with hunger rather than the sleek sharpness he once possessed. He's still pretty, if wounded. It's as though you've found an old photo of him that's been smudged with age. He's stepped out of one of your moulding albums to haunt you.

“Angel,” he breathes, his hand clasped low on the doorway, “you're here.”

You look past him to Molly and Remus. There isn't a reality nor dimension where they'd let him stay here if they didn't believe his innocence. Remus explained it all in the letter and still you worried if he might have gotten it wrong, and simply believed what he wanted to believe, but it's not possible. Remus loved James so much, he would've killed Sirius himself if he really thought Sirius was the secret keeper who betrayed them.

So. It's a relief to be home.

You stare at him. “You look tired,” you say quietly.

“I'm fine. I am.”

He seems alright, considering. You'd even say he was handsome with his hair pushed away from his face, a dark shadow of stubble around his mouth, but he looks exhausted.

You're expecting him to say what you'd say. How could you ever think I'd do it?

Sirius was prone to similar bouts of pride, or righteousness, justice, whatever you want to call it, but he doesn't bother with that now. He looks at you as though you're the only person on earth, gaze narrowed but eyes wide, pain between his brows as he asks, “What's wrong?”

Your hand finches up to your cheek to wipe the sudden tear away. “I thought I'd never see you again.” Your Sirius.

“Don't be upset,” he pleads.

“How can I not be? I left you all alone for so long.”

He laughs roughly. “Sweetheart, what were you supposed to do?”

“Not just give up.”

“You thought it was me. That's the only thing you could've done. Either of you,” he says, gesturing backward with his hand. “It was hard… to know who to trust, at the end. It's not your fault.”

You really were only kids together, not half as in love as James and Lily, but that doesn't mean you weren't mad for each other. He looked after you. You would've had a life, you think.

“You were just gone,” you say, looking down at the floor between you, eyes tracing lines of wood grain. “Everyone. There was nobody left. And I just let you go.”

“Do you want to come here?” he asks. You lift your head. His hand is barely in front of him, fingers open, palm up.

It's like taking a stranger's hand for the first few seconds. You keep them low between you both, unfamiliar to each other. But, you find, as his fingers wrap around yours in that selfish way they used to do, squeezing rather than intertwining to make all of them fit, he remembers you.

You step a little closer, your arm to his chest, and look up at him through your lashes. It would melt him like a candle near a furnace, this look. He'd be smug or seething about something and you'd sidle in to stand between his shoes, unsure of what to say but determined to be there for him. It's the same now.

“What's wrong?” he asks under his breath.

“I left you all alone,” you repeat.

“It wasn't your choice, okay?” He smooths his free hand from your elbow to your upper arm.

Molly says something to Remus. He chuckles and says something in return. Happier to admit it if it's only for Sirius’ ears, you say, “I'm really sorry, Sirius. I miss you every day.”

“I miss you too,” he says.

You push your arms around his waist and hide your face in his chest, feeling for the lines of who he used to be, the dip of his spine in his back or the soft cotton of one of his old t-shirts. You regret hugging him at all, until he puts his arm behind your head, a shaky breath released against your crown.

I'm scared, he'd said. But I don't want you to be scared, okay? Barely twenty, he smelled of the sticky red powder on the end of matches after a night doing things he couldn't tell you about. You could tell him you loved him, and he you, but you weren't to discuss Order business. We'll be okay.

But Lily–

Everyone's going to be fine. I promise.

“You promised,” you say to yourself. Too quiet for him to hear, but he does.

“I promised you so many things I'm not sure what one you mean,” he says with a disappointed laugh.

You pull away, taking his face into two hands. “How do you feel?” you ask, ignoring the tremble working up from your wrists.

“What?” His eyes are dark.

“How are you? Did they– I mean, are you okay? Are you sick?”

“Remus has patched me up. And Cordelia, the medwitch, you know her?”

“I don't know anyone. I've been away.”

He nods sadly. “Yeah. Well, you look the same.”

“I don't.”

“You do! You look the same,” —he almost sounds happy, his lips curling into a smile— “sweetheart. Sweetheart–” He closes his eyes.

You push his hair behind his ears. “You don't look the same,” you confess, “you have wrinkles, right… here.” You touch the corners of his eyes.

“You're still beautiful.”

“Mm. You can't even see me.”

“I don't need to see you. I knew you would be.”

You rise up to kiss his cheek gently. “It's like you're back, like– like, I always felt like you were gone. And now you're home again. You are home, aren't you?”

He covers your hand with one of his. “You're here, so–”

You laugh together nervously. “Yeah, I'm here.”

“I have stuff to do to make it right.”

“Then we'll do it.”

“Okay,” he says. He swallows a breath, and wraps you in a surprisingly tight hug. “Did you read my letters?”

I don't want anything from you. Just to see you're okay.

“I read them. I'm okay. Don't I look okay?”

“You look perfect. Just like the last time I saw you,” he says. It startles you how suddenly he sounds like he did when you were young, his flirting drawl, voice velveteen.

“Not like that,” you laugh.

He pulls you as close as you can be, rough now, his arms solid around you. “I missed that,” he says, rubbing your back. “I forgot how you sound when you laugh.”

You've led very different lives. “I didn't forget yours.”

“You wouldn't. You love having things to hold against me.”

You stroke his hair. “Maybe a little.”

#sirius black #sirius black x reader #sirius black x fem!reader #sirius black x you #sirius black x y/n #sirius x reader fluff #sirius black imagine #sirius black fanfiction #sirius black fanfic #sirius black fic #marauders era #marauders #sirius black drabble #sirius black scenario #sirius black oneshot #the marauders #sirius orion black

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iamcalmdammit · 1 year

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Sleepless night || [Simon "Ghost" Riley x f!reader]

note: this was supposed to be something completely different but then simon turned into a lovesick puppy somehow. what do you think?

Simon could only hear the sound of an explosion nearby and see the smoke from where he was, but Soap was close, he reported it was the same building you were in. His heart was racing, his thoughts wandering a little too far as he thought about the worst case scenario.

"Echo 3-7, come in," There was no response. "Echo 3-7, do you copy?" He forced himself to sound calm, but in reality he was everything but calm. He was losing his mind, getting into a thought spiral he was afraid he wouldn't be able to escape until you finally said something. "Y/N, please, say something," he tried again, this time sounding desperate.

"Lt., I have a visual on her, she seems to be okay," came Soap's voice through his earpiece.

"Are you sure it's her?"

"Positive. From here it seems like she's trying to use her radio."

Right, it must be it, it just doesn't work properly after you being so close to the explosion. Maybe you didn't even hear him calling out for you. "Must be the result of the blast," he noted eventually.

"Probably. I'm on my way there." Some time passed in silence which made him think Soap didn't feel like chatting this time around. But he was wrong as the sergeant broke the silence not a whole five minutes later. "So her real name is Y/N?"

After letting out a long sigh, Simon closed his eyes. "Yes," he replied, knowing well enough what was about to come.

"Why did she tell you?"

"She had her reasons."

"You two are close, aren't you?"

"Not anymore."

"I bet she has seen you without the mask," Soap said and it was clear through his voice that he was smiling to himself.

"She has."

"You were dating, weren't you?"

Okay, this was getting out of hand. "Don't push your luck, sergeant," Simon warned him.

"Okay, fine, I'll stop, sir."

"Thank you. What's your status?"

"Almost there. No sight of the attackers."

Good. At least you weren't in danger now. He could only hope you had no injuries of any kind, like a nasty internal bleeding you didn't notice due to the spike in your adrenaline level. He couldn't lose you, not now and not like this.

There were so many things he wanted to say after what had happened between you. He fucked up big time and it was by now crystal clear to him that you had to talk about your relationship. You had to fix it. He had to fix it.

"She's fine, Lt., only has a couple of bruises and cuts," Soap's voice came through the earpiece again. "Her radio is dead, we'll stay together from now on."

"Copy. I'll get the car and pick you up. Stay where you are."

"Understood."

The car ride back to the team's temporary base passed in complete silence. You didn't say a word, mostly focused on the city around you instead, while Soap was clearly torn between asking a bunch of questions from the two of you and keeping silent as it was none of his business. In the end he kept his eyes on your environment, making sure no one was following you.

You didn't talk to him. Aside from a short thanks back when you had gotten into the car in front of the building, you said absolutely nothing. He didn't mind as having a conversation in front of the others now would have been torture. It was hard to control his emotions and since you didn't want the rest of the team to find out about your history, it was best to keep quiet for now.

Late at night, around two or three in the morning, Simon woke up. He was staring at the ceiling for a while, thinking about you. Again. But this time he had enough. He couldn't wait any longer. So he quietly stood up and walked over to where you were sleeping.

"Hey, Y/N, wake up," he said, gently putting a hand on your shoulder.

"Why?" you asked groggily.

"Let's talk."

"Now? What time is it anyway?"

"Late, but it can't wait."

"All right."

The pair of you walked to a room far from the others and he quickly put his hands on your shoulders as he looked you in the eye. "You sure you're okay?" he asked worriedly.

"Yeah, I'm good."

"I'm glad to hear that." Biting on his lower lip under the mask, he thought about how to proceed. It was a dangerous conversation that could go wrong any second. "After seeing the place explode I thought I'd lost you," Simon admitted after some thinking.

You let out a short laugh upon hearing this. "It's not that easy to get rid of me."

"That I know."

Silence fell between you and he could see you were struggling to figure out what to say. "Is this why you woke me up?" you asked in the end.

"No, I actually wanted to tell you something," he quickly replied before gulping. "I fucked up, I know that now."

"Took you long enough."

You were right, he couldn't argue with this statement. "Every time I saw you with Alex, knowing how much he knows about you--the real you," he began uncertainly but didn't finish the sentence just yet. After inhaling and exhaling, he eventually said, "It was too much and I definitely misread the situation."

"And?" you asked expectantly.

"You're just friends, more like siblings. I get it, I have no reason to be jealous."

"Thank you. What changed your mind?"

"Time," he said. "I thought a lot about what went wrong after we broke up. Also… Yeah, it probably helped that Alex came to talk to me about it. He told me how badly I hurt your feelings."

Letting out a groan, you put a hand on the back of your neck. "I'll have to talk to him about boundaries," you said quietly.

"He was just worried about you."

A few months ago he wouldn't have thought of protecting Alex, but here he was, trying to do it. He was important to you and Simon didn't want to stand between the two of you. He had to get over his stupid jealousy.

"You know, I was wondering if we could start again," he spoke up again. "I miss you. I never thought I would ever say something like this, but I can't sleep without you next to me. I can't eat, I can't breathe, I can't focus. I can't live like that."

"I know the feeling," you noted quietly. "You left me, Simon. You said things that really hurt me. I spent days blaming myself, that maybe you're right, that maybe I let him too close."

Shaking his head, he quickly stepped closer to put a hand on the side of your neck, caressing your jawline with his gloved thumb. "You need a friend you can talk to about the things you do on the field, I didn't get that back then, but I get it now," he explained with a smile you couldn't see now.

Smiling yourself, you reached out and took off his mask. "You're lucky you're cute," you told him.

"You think I'm cute?" You nodded. "Marry me," he blurted out.

"What?"

Yeah, what? But as he thought about it, it wasn't a joke or anything. "I'm serious," he told you. "Let's get married."

Shaking your head, you stood on your toes to kiss him gently. "We barely agreed to give our relationship another shot, I think it's too soon," you said with your hands on his chest.

"Come on, in our line of work we shouldn't wait with things like this. Let's celebrate that we found someone who can understand why we do what we do, someone who wouldn't judge the other for the things they do on the field," he tried.

"How long have you been thinking about this?" you asked with your head tilted to the side.

"For a couple of hours, I guess." You laughed and put his mask back on. "Hey, I know it's not that long, but I'm serious. Think about it. Please." Before you could say anything, you both turned to the door when you heard footsteps. "Not a word!" Simon warned him.

Soap opened his mouth, but in the end decided to put up his hands and go back to the others without saying anything.

#simon ghost riley x reader #simon riley x reader #simon riley #simon ghost riley #call of duty #modern warfare

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sweetkpopmusings · 1 year

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wonwoo boyfriend headcanons <3

a/n: i am vibrating from how much cold brew i consumed on an empty stomach so i'm writing this in hopes of wonwoo thoughts calming me down but honestly i'll just end up crying <3 pics not mine~

content: fluff | wc: 1.4k | warnings: none! | pairing: boyfriend!wonwoo x gn!reader | requests: open

wonwoo is the love of my life actually. it's scientifically proven and peer-reviewed that i love and adore him with all my heart and soul, so this post is going to be long and filled with my love for him <3

sweetest softest most loving boy in the world <3

he's the type of person to show love through small, tender gestures and actions

loves playing with your hands

i can very clearly see him lying in bed, grabbing your hand delicately, and twiddling with your fingers while you both watch tv/read/scroll on your phones

he also does this absentmindedly when he’s thinking

he may be lost in thought but that doesn’t mean he’s unaware of your presence <3

your presence actually helps him think more clearly :-(

he'll always come to you with questions or problems he needs to work through because just talking to you helps him sort out his thoughts and he knows you'll always offer support and advice

he will call you or send you voice messages about this when he's away too

you are always always always on his mind

and he never lets you forget it

wonwoo so clearly loves you with every little thing he does

even the unconscious ones

walking on the outer part of the sidewalk so you're farther away from vehicles, putting his hand over your head when you enter a car, getting two of a drink/snack so you can have some, tidying up your area of the bathroom counter, and so on

taking care of you is his second nature :-((

sometimes wonwoo just stares at you with complete wonder in his eyes because he can't believe you're real

when you catch him doing it and ask if there's something on your face he just shakes his head and says in tiny "oh no it's nothing"

he looks down to his hands and he's blushing SO much and fighting back a lil smile because he's overwhelmed by how much he loves you i'm screaming

if you push up his glasses when they start to slip or straighten the collar of his shirt or fix a loose strand of his hair he will absolutely lose it

you broke his brain like he doesn't know how to contain himself when you do kind gestures like that

he's muttering and stuttering "thank you" over and over again

he's so cute and flustered so you just give him a lil kiss or pat on the head and he goes completely silent and his eyes are literally sparkling with his love for you

no thoughts head empty except for his love for you <3

wonwoo is a big big BIG fan of quality time

he adores doing things with you, and he equally adores sharing space with you as you both do your respective things

if y'all are in the living room reading different books but cuddled together on the couch, wonwoo is genuinely in heaven

he also loves having you around while he games. like if you're in his vicinity he's so at peace even when his emotions are at an all-time high during the game

and he loves just hanging out while you're doing something you love !!

he simply loves your physical proximity (or digital if he's touring/you're traveling and y'all just facetime or call while doing your own things like cooking or working)

he will let you know when he wants your undivided attention though

often he will do this by biting your shoulder :,-)

you could be making tea in the kitchen and wonwoo will walk up and give you a backhug and gently bite your shoulder so you know that he wants you to look at him and talk to him i'm sobbing thinking about this

and he's so content talking about the smallest things with you :-(

after he bites your shoulder he hums "what're you doing?" and you know he knows what you're doing but you love him so much so you answer "i'm making tea"

he proceeds to ask you lil questions about your tea, your mood, what you plan to do while drinking your tea the correct answer is "hang out with you, wonwoo"

he could actually listen to you talk for hours i'm not even kidding

he's obsessed with the sound of your voice and all the idiosyncrasies in your speech, gestures, etc

he starts picking them up and seventeen is like ?? when did you start saying/doing that ??

and then they meet you and go OHHHHHHHHH that's what it was

after that they will point out every time he acts/speaks like you and he gets a lil embarrassed but also his heart swells because he loves that you've become such a huge part of him <33

he strikes me as the kind of guy who likes to listen to podcasts with you

hear me out

walking around outside, there's a breeze in the air, you're holding hands, sharing headphones, and listening to a podcast about your shared interests

someone hold me i'm having a breakdown

he's so good at comforting you

he becomes so in tune with your emotions that whenever you come to him sad/angry/stressed/etc he is ready

even if he doesn't know exactly what to say, he will listen to you and support you however you need

he'll hold your hands in his while you speak and maintain eye contact so you know you have his full attention

and whenever you cry he will gently wipe your tears away before grabbing tissues for you <3 and sitting with you while you settle yourself <3 and then he'll ask if you want water or anything to make you feel more at ease <3

he's also the absolute best at supporting you through all your successes

he is your BIGGEST fan

he'll always be proud of you and tells you that frequently because he thinks you're so amazing in whatever you do and he wants you to celebrate yourself as much as he celebrates you

he will be walking on cloud nine if you ever compliment a song/performance he's done

like if you like what he's doing that's more than enough for him to be satisfied with it

if he's ever insecure, you telling him all the wonderful things he does makes a world of difference

also so silly with you

he loves making comments that make you laugh

he gets the proudest smile on his face when he makes you laugh

he likes to whisper lil jokes or ad-libs to you when you're hanging out in a group

because he loves when you giggle or even laugh loudly at something he added to the conversation just for you

sometimes he'll make notes of a funny story or a joke he wants to tell you the next time he sees you :,-)

he also will keep notes (mentally or on his phone) of cool things he's learned so he can share them with you !!!

few things make him happier than the look on your face when he tells you something interesting <3

speaking of notes

wonwoo loves leaving handwritten ones for you

if he leaves before you wake up, he's putting a good morning note by your usual mug or your toothbrush so you see his encouraging message as soon as you start your day

if you're going to be apart for a while, he'll write longer notes or hide different little ones around your place so you can get surprise wonwoo words while he's away :-(

any notes you write him are kept safely with his things !!!

he keeps a special one in his wallet or phone case, so you are always with him and he takes it out and reads it when he misses you or is feeling sad even though he has it memorized

if you give him a gift based on the notes you two have written each other throughout your relationship, he WILL cry

he just loves sentiments like that <3 he's a sentimental guy and he likes to show you his love through things with meaning because he thinks it's the best way to convey how special you are to him

wonwoo loves you with everything he's got, and it's clear from the way he interacts with you on a daily basis that you are an important part of his life

no matter what, he's thinking of and caring for you because you make him feel so loved and cared for that he wants nothing more than to make you feel safe and adored <3

sorry i gotta go clutch my crocheted wonwoo plushie to my chest and cry because i love him so dearly :,-( i hope everyone gets the wonwoo they deserve <3

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angelltheninth · 6 months

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Solomon Accidentally Forgets About Your Date and Makes Up For It

Pairing: Solomon x Fem!Reader

Tags: nsfw, smut, make up sex, kissing, clit stimulation, apologies, edging as punishment

A/N: Honestly I have trouble remembering important dates too, I get him.

"Do you really think that... fuck... that fucking me will make me forgive you?" He forgot your date again. Once could have been a mistake, but it kept happening. Either he would forget or he would be late, and clearly winded on arrival from running after eventually remembering it.

Worst of all was that Solomon always acted like it wasn't that much of big deal because he would always want to make up for it. Granted his apologies were always very thorough and lately he has been showing up on time more often the not, so you knew he was at least putting in an effort. But it was his almost nonchalant attitude that made you doubtful.

You grabbed his face and pulled him close, forcing the eye contact, "Do you even want to date me seriously?" Solomon's gray, stormy eyes widened in surprise at your question and the evident hurt in your voice. For the longest time he had trouble focusing because your pussy felt so good around his cock, you kept pushing back against his hips and using your leg to keep him inside but maybe that wasn't the compliment he thought it was.

"Of course I do." He responded along with a long kiss, "If wasn't serious about you we wouldn't have gone this far. I care for you." His forehead pressed against yours, seeking more closeness then before, "I can't, I really can't help it you know. But I promise to try harder for you, I hate seeing you sad because of me."

It took all your willpower not to flip him over and punish him, but maybe you could do it in a different way. You noticed when he was undressing, he had no real patience for it, his pants were barely down his legs even now, he was almost in a frenzy as he pulled your pants and underwear down and shirt up. He was close before he even put his cock in your pussy, way closer then you were.

"Don't come." You commanded with a fistful of his hair.

"W-What?" His cock have an involuntary twitch at your words, "Why?"

"That's your punishment for tonight. You don't get to finish." You clamped down around his cock with the deliberate intent to stimulate his cock. His almost painful hiss made you grin, "If you make me come I'll give you a blowjob tomorrow morning, get all that cum you've been saving up in my mouth, down my throat. But if you can't," Your pussy fluttered again, feeling so good when his pace picked up desperately, "I will edge you for a week, I swear to God."

Solomon started pounding like his very existence depended on getting you to orgasm. In this moment that was likely how he felt, but it was his own fault for forgetting your date in the first place, you had to punish him somehow, and you wanted to have fun while doing it.

"I'll make you come on my cock so good." He panted, sweat gathering on his brow, "I'll give you all my cum as an apology. That'll be okay right? You'll accept it? My cum? All of it down your throat in the morning." His sounded like the ramblings of madman, "Come for me." He pleaded, cheating by sliding his fingers down to rub your clit in quick, frantic slides, up and down, "Come on my cock, I wanna feel it."

He wasn't this agreeable most of the time but even a man like him could be brought to his knees, metaphorically speaking, by a punishment like this. Although he looked to be enjoying it as well, no doubt from the images of your mouth filled with his thick, white cum. "Hold still. I want all of it in me." Your legs closed shut, halting all of his thrusts, keeping his cock balls deep in your pussy as it trembled and fluttered around him, your toes curling and body washed in pleasant waves at least. "Still mad at you by the way." You panted against his neck.

"Uh-huh. I know. I'll fix it." He promised and unlike his attitude before you could sense real emotion behind his words and his look, "Wanna fall asleep with my cock in you? Promise I won't fill you up." Your pussy gave a needy squeeze at his words, making his promise harder to keep, but he did keep it. And so did you, because the first thing you tasted in the morning was his cock, and soon after, his cum.

#obey me x reader #solomon x reader #obey me imagines #solomon imagine #obey me smut #solomon smut #obey me x you #solomon x you #obey me x female reader #solomon x female reader #obey me #obey me solomon #obey me shall we date #smut drabble

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steddiealltheway · 11 months

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@steddie-week day 1: hunger / pining / Somebody to Love by Queen

"I'm going to murder Steve if he tries to flirt hopelessly with another girl when he likes Eddie," Robin says with a groan.

"Keep your hands still," Nancy gently reminds Robin as she paints another black layer on her nails. "Does Steve know that he likes Eddie?" Nancy asks with a laugh.

Robin resists the urge to use her hands to speak. "No! But even you have seen the pining. I thought he was going to have a meltdown when he saw Gareth jokingly flirt with Eddie."

Nancy blows on Robin's nails before frowning and scraping off some polish that got on her fingers. "Maybe Gareth is in love with Eddie," Nancy jokes.

Robin laughs. "He's been asking me if you're single for months now."

"If only he knew..." Nancy says with a wide smile before laying a kiss on her girlfriend's hand. "But hey, I'm dealing with Eddie who is hopelessly trying to get over his crush on Steve. He would be willing to be set up with anyone, I swear."

Robin throws her hands up. "That's it!"

"Robin your nails-"

"We set them up on a blind date. Steve has been trying to get me to find someone for him forever now, and Eddie wants the same thing from you! It can be operation... Find Them Somebody to Love."

"You just got that from my Queen tape."

"But it's a great plan!" Robin says with a victorious smile. She holds out her hand to shake on it.

Nancy rolls her eyes and shakes Robin's hand. "If this works, I'll repaint your nails."

Robin's brow furrows. "What do you mean..." she trails off as she looks at them.

"There's some in your hair," Nancy says with a wince.

Robin starts to scrape the paint off. "You call Eddie while I get this off."

Nancy watches her struggle for a moment before handing her some nail polish remover. "I hope this works for our sake."

-:-:-:-:-:-

To say Steve is surprised when Robin excitedly calls him to set him up with someone is an understatement. He may be a bit clueless and naive, but he knows when she's up to something. But maybe she's excited and thinks it's just a really good match, but he thinks that's just the hopeless romantic in him talking.

He also thinks it's strange that the date is at a burger joint that Eddie really likes, but maybe Eddie helped Robin with the date? He really hopes not but doesn't know why. He also knows that maybe the burger joint is a coincidence and the Eddie thought is just because Steve can't stop thinking about him.

It's weird. He's never really had a friend like him before, but he thinks it's part of the trauma bonding that makes Steve feel so intensely about him. But it's different from Robin it's... he doesn't know.

But he doesn't have much time to think about it as he parks outside the food joint. Time to lay on the Harrington charm.

As he walks in he notices only one table that has one person at it. The girl is facing away from Steve in a booth, her long dark curly hair being the only thing visible. She's definitely Steve's type.

As Steve approaches the table he runs a hand through his hair and tries not to think about how she has hair like Eddie's. As he turns to the girl with his most charming smile, it quickly turns into a real smile. "Eddie?" Steve asks.

Eddie's head snaps up and multiple emotions cross over his face as he takes in Steve. "Steve? What are you doing here?"

"Blind date, and you?"

Eddie replies, "Same here, man. Nancy set me up."

Steve tries to ignore the way his heart seems to break. He gives Eddie a smile but it's too tight and entirely fake. "Robin set me up, but hey, that's great, Munson." Steve goes as far as patting Eddie on the back which makes him internally cringe. What's happening?

Eddie slowly glances at Steve's arm and gives it a confused look as his hand still stays on his back. "Right, sorry," Steve apologizes and feels entirely not like himself. Why is he so damn nervous? "But hey, what if I waited here with you until our dates come and we can keep each other company?"

It looks like Eddie wants to say no, but Steve is already sliding into the booth. Eddies just continues to stare at Steve as if he's the last person he wants to see at the moment. Steve ignores those signs and continues talking, "So a blind date? I didn't know you were looking for someone."

Eddie huffs and looks down at the table. "I'm not really looking for someone, I'm just trying to get over someone."

Steve feels that familiar pang in his chest. "Someone I know?"

"Like you wouldn't believe," Eddie mutters. Steve just nods because he has no idea what that means. Eddie continues, "I didn't want to like this guy, but it just kind of happened. And they're incredible and way out of my league, so here I am. But they're somehow just always around..." Eddie trails off staring at Steve.

He almost feels like Eddie is trying to hint at something, but he isn't sure what. "I've been there. It took me a while to get over Nance, but eventually with time it happened. But hey, I don't know how someone could be out of your league, man. I mean you're really uh... well," Steve takes a moment to really look at Eddie and he weirdly feels his cheeks heat up, "You've got really nice eyes, and hair of course, and nice... lips."

Eddie squirms a bit in his seat and glances away. "You don't have to take pity on me, Harrington."

"I'm not!" Steve insists a little louder than he intends to. He lowers his voice and repeats, "I'm not. I'm just stating the facts. You're a really attractive guy. Plus, you're really smart and creative, and you can play the guitar well which I'm sure other guys dig, and you're also uhh really funny and kind-"

"Please stop, there's only so many words of affirmation I can receive in a day before I combust," Eddie jokes but there's a light flush on his face.

Steve holds his hands up and says, "I'm just saying you're a catch. Anyone who doesn't see that isn't good enough for you anyways."

Eddie narrows his eyes at Steve for a moment then glances over his shoulder. "So, uh, doesn't look like our dates are here yet."

Steve glances around and notices no one is sitting alone and no one else has walked in. Weird.

A waiter walks their way and takes their drink orders and gives them a few more minutes to look over the menu. As soon as he's out of earshot, Steve asks Eddie, "Do you think it's rude to put in an order when they're not here?"

Eddie glances around and his eyes settle on the wall. Steve looks over and notices the clock. "If they're not here in the next ten minutes which is fifteen minutes after the date start time, then we can order," Eddie states.

Steve smiles but suddenly his stomach makes an obnoxious growling noise. Eddie's eyes widen. "We can make that five minutes if you'll last that long."

"I can last ten minutes it's alright," Steve replies.

Two minutes later, Steve is already giving in, "Okay, what if we just ordered when the waiter comes back?"

Eddie smiles at him for the first time that evening. "You're weak, Harrington," he jokes.

"Hey, I was strong enough to lug your body around."

"If only I was conscious for that."

Before Steve can think of a response their lovely waiter interrupts them and asks for their order. Steve ends up ordering the same thing as Eddie which has Eddie scoffing, "I thought you thought my taste in food was bad."

"If putting strawberry jelly on a turkey sandwich is your idea of food, then I stand by what I said."

"I'm going to make you try it one day," Eddie says with a wide smile.

Steve leans forwards. "Is that a threat?"

"If you want it to be," Eddie says with a wink.

Steve laughs and has the sudden thought that he really doesn't want his or Eddie's dates to show up. He just wants Eddie to himself.

What?

"What, are you traumatized by the thought of it or something?" Eddie asks after Steve has gone silent.

Steve looks up and really takes in Eddie again. You're a catch. Anyone who doesn't see that isn't good enough for you anyways.

Oh shit.

Steve glances towards the door and outside and doesn't see any cars approaching. He looks back to Eddie and says, "If our dates don't show up in the next five minutes, what if we agreed to be each other's date."

Eddie looks at him for a moment with narrowed eyes. "As in... we're just like... hanging out or...?"

Steve takes a deep breath and says, "A real date."

Eddie's eyes widen and he looks around. "The kids didn't put you up to this, did they?"

"No, Eddie, I- I would really like to go on a real date with you."

Eddie stares at him again then asks, "You swear that this isn't a joke?"

"On Dustin's mother," Steve jokes then holds out his pinky.

"You know how much a pinky promise means to me."

"I know, it's a promise that can never be broken," Steve says.

Eddie hesitates then wraps his pinky around Steve's. "I hope our dates don't show up then," Eddie says with a big smile.

"Me neither," Steve agrees.

-:-:-:-:-:-

"I can't believe it's working!" Robin excitedly shouts from the passenger seat of Nancy's car.

"Me either," Nancy agrees as she watches Eddie rant while flailing his hands and Steve laughs. After a moment, Steve rests his hand over one of Eddie's and gives it a squeeze. Eddie flushes enough that Robin and Nancy can notice from the slight distance.

"Do you think they're going to kill us when they see us?" Robin asks.

Nancy scoffs, "No, they'll probably be over the moon thanking us. I'm just surprised that they agreed to go along with the date without thinking we were pranking them or something."

"Maybe the dinguses just finally sucked it up and admitted they liked each other when they figured out the plan," Robin says with a shrug as she watches the two get up. "And it looks like it's our time to leave."

Nancy shakes her head and looks at Robin. "Wouldn't that draw more attention to us though? We should just let them go first while they're so absorbed in each other's company."

"That's a good ide-" Robin stops as she looks back at the pair. "They've spotted us. Shit."

"Like I said, they're probably going to thank us," Nancy says, praying she's right. She rolls down the window as they approach.

Steve waves with a big smile. "Hey! We thought it was you, but we just wanted to let you know that your dates for us stood us up, but that's okay. Great really because Eddie and I decided you know..."

"I finally confessed that I've been pining after him," Eddie says nearly bouncing up and down.

Steve turns to look at him. "Wait, the person you said was out of your league, that was me you were talking about me earlier?"

"Steve, I thought you realized that after I told you I've had a crush on you for years now."

"Oh. Hey, I'm not out of your league at all, if anything you're out of my..." Steve trails off and seems to realize Robin and Nancy are still there, "Well, we're going to make up for lost time, but it was good seeing you. Thank you for attempting to set us up!"

Eddie and Steve wave as they leave, laughing about something moments later.

"Oh my god, did they just...."

"Holy shit, do they really think..."

Robin and Nancy look at each other and nod. "Dingues," they agree.

They look back as Steve and Eddie seem to argue about what car to take back and Robin sighs, "They'll eventually realize, right?"

"I doubt it," Nancy says.

Steve and Eddie walk towards their own cars seeming to realize that they don't have to drive together. "Gosh, they were made for each other."

It's years down the line when Steve and Eddie are telling the story of their first date when Nancy and Robin finally get fed up and tell the truth, but Steve and Eddie still don't believe them. Once a dingus, always a dingus.

#steddie #steddieweek2023 #steve harrington #eddie munson #steddie ficlet #stranger things #robin buckley #nancy wheeler #ronance background #dinguses to lovers

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bonny-kookoo · 1 year

Text

Jungkook: 8:45 PM 🔞

Tags/Warnings: Adult, smut-heavy, making out, Idol!Jungkook, Fluff, Established Relationship, implied foreigner!Reader, not home AU though, Jungkook struggling hard, misunderstanding, angst with happy end, emotional smut, oral (fem. Receiving), protected sex bc this is me writing this and I teach you kids the true life lessons

Lenght: long.

AU-Masterlist

Languages are marked as English / Korean.

♥━━━━━━━━━━•.♡.•━━━━━━━━━━━━♥

He still can't believe your first time got interrupted by something as ridiculous as his manager calling him.

It's like a reminder that his career will always somehow wiggle itself between him and whatever happiness he tries to find outside of it- nothing ever truly personal for him, everything always meant to be well thought through so it fits into his public persona.

But he refuses to give you up, even knowing all of that.

Apologizing for it just feels.. odd now, like bringing up something awkward you did ten years ago that everyone forgot about anyway before you decided to rekindle the memory in their heads. But the problem here, right now, with you, is that he knows he should bring it up. Somehow. Because he's struggling hard to keep himself in check, even having had to embarrassingly rub one out in the shower this morning after you'd made yourself tea in his kitchen wearing nothing but a shirt and panties.

It's a problem.

He's hesitating to initiate anything now mainly because what if it happens again? He can't just put his phone on silent and ignore what could potentially always be very important calls from people who only want what's best for him in the long run- real life doesn't work like those movies where the protagonist throws it all away for his girl. He wants to, he truly does- but at the end of the day, he's also scared, because if he falls, he'll potentially take you down with him, and God knows how deep he'll fall with where he stands right now.

A drop from a height this high would shatter you inevitably, and he's sure he'd crack like delicate porcelain just as much by having to watch you suffer the consequences of his actions. You don't deserve that.

"..-ungkookie?" You try again, and he snaps out of his thought, looking at you.

"Hm?" He responds, looking at you next to him.

"I asked if you want me to cook for us tonight. Is that alright?" You wonder, and he nods, eagerly so, because of course he'd love to have you do something so domestic with him. He's always dreamed of being able to experience these things after all, despite his curse of being a public figure who's not supposed to appear unavailable. "Alright-!" You hum. "Gonna have to put pants on now though, gotta go get some groceries.." you whine under your breath as you stretch on the couch naked feet pushing against his thighs and oh, how your back arches-

No, bad brain. Not right now.

"I'll give you my card, hold on." He tries to save himself, getting up to fetch his wallet as you begin to laugh.

"Jungkook baby, I can cover some groceries, don't bother!" You argue softly, getting up as well before walking over to him. "You'll just have to survive some minutes without me, that's all." You tell him, hugging his middle as you put your chin on his chest, looking up at him. "Also, people would think I'm a gold digger for using a black card looking like.. well, me." You joke, as he can't help but reach out to affectionately brush some hair out your face, hands holding your cheeks.

"M'sorry." He mumbles, and you part a bit from him, serious at his tone of voice used.

"Hm? For what?" You wonder, and he sighs. Why did he bring it up now? This is going to be so awkward, he already dreads it. But now that he's put the noose around his neck, he might as well stand on the chair too.

"Yesterday. Or.. day before? Technically it was, wasn't it.." he rants, before sighing. "I hate that we.. had moment, you know, and then.. nothing. Ruined." He complains softly, and you can't help but look at him affectionately. He's such a soft soul sometimes, worries about so much that doesn't even need to be worried about.

"Jungkook, it's fine." You answer.

"Not fine-" he shakes his head. "Not fine, I- ugh, I want you, you know? Want to, but now, it's awkward and I don't know how to initiate it because every time I plan to I keep thinking of that moment he called and-" he groans in frustration, head thrown back before he looks down at you. "I'm sorry." He apologizes yet again, and you laugh.

"I forgot to pack socks for this trip, that's why I'm always barefoot in your apartment here." You say, and he blinks once, twice, before he looks at you, confused but amused the same.

"What?" He questions, tilting his head for a split second and you shrug.

"Now I've made an awkward moment for myself too. We're even." You explain, and he laughs.

"Thats not how that works-" he wants to argue but he inevitably leans down to kiss you- a peck quickly deepened by you, because God knows you want him just as much. But the struggle of initiating isn't solely his alone, because you don't know how to either. All is still new with your relationship, you don't even live together at this point in time, only a week more and you'll be back home trying to figure out how to move most of your stuff to his country so you can be closer. This was all a test, after all- to see if it's worth it. If you'll be okay.

And you know now, you'll be just fine with him at your side.

"Hm I need to get going now though-" you say, trying to escape him now- but he won't let you, hands firm on the small of your back as he keeps you against him, lips chasing yours making you giggle as you lean back as far as you can. "Jungkook!" You laugh, but he just playfully bites at your neck.

"No, I'm hungry." He mumbles against your skin, and you look at him, pushing against his chest.

"Yeah that's why I have to go? Get everything to cook?" You remind him, but he shakes his head, gaze making it clear that he doesn't care for that.

"Not.. that." He tells you. "Hungry for you." He says, raising his brows and you laugh at how ridiculous he's being. How can he be both so cute but also attractive at the same time? It's truly unfair.

"You're so cute." You tease, catching him off guard to escape his grasp and run into the bedroom to get some proper pants at least. But he's faster, palm slapping flat against the wood of his door before the momentum of his move slams it into the wall with a loud noise, making both of you jump for a second before he stalks towards you.

And once the backs of your legs hit the edge of his bed, you know you lost.

It's like his patience had finally snapped, his hands eagerly helping you out of his shirt, happily running his palms over your skin, warm and soft as you move around a bit to get comfortable. He sighs when his phone vibrates somewhere close- probably having fallen out of his pocket on the couch earlier, and you laugh, visibly uncaring of his misery. "Go get it." You tell him when it sounds again, and he groans out loudly as if he's in pain, angrily stomping back into the living room, where you can hear him answer the call with an annoyed tone to his voice. It surprises you when he walks back into the bedroom however, pointing to the shirt you're attempting to put back on, before he motions for you to put it back on the floor where he'd thrown it down earlier.

Just what is he thinking right now?

"Yeah, that's fine." He talks into the phone, his free hand untying the strings of your sweatpants, before he pulls on the hem, tapping your hips as if to silently ask you to lift them so he can get you out of those pants. "Not right now, but tomorrow is fine." He continues to talk to whomever is speaking to him over the phone, while simultaneously running his hand from the side of your knee, up to the hem of your underwear, the last item of clothing covering you at the moment. It's oddly exciting to see him so serious, yet clearly more focused on you than anything else.

You've never felt so adored before.

His fingers slip underneath the side of your panties, teasing you, so close yet way too far from where you'd like his hands to be most right now. And he's clearly aware of it too; if the hooded eyes and the small smirk on his lips was anything to go by. "No, right now.. I'm pretty busy. Sorry." He speaks again into the phone, thumb running over the dip between your inner thigh and your by now more than aching heat. He runs his tongue over his bottom lip for a second, before the whole thing visibly seems to edge him just as much- then tent in his pants evident.

"Alright, yeah, just- text the schedule to me and I'll talk to you tomorrow about it, okay?" He offers into the phone, moving to stand up and search for something in the drawer of his bedside table- colorful foil package pretty obviously hinting at what he means when he's said he's currently busy. "Alright, hmhm, yup- bye." He rushes out, ending the call before he throws his phone somewhere onto the shirt you'd been wearing, his eyes rolling in an annoyed manner before he takes off his own shirt, joining you on the bed.

"Did you really hang up on him like that?" You wonder, giggling when he has to sit back to slip out of his loose grey sweats as well, jumping on one foot for a bit as his other gets stuck in the fabric for a second.

"I'm not sorry." He shakes his head, crawling closer to you on the mattress to get a hold of both sides of your panties. "I've got my hot girlfriend all pretty and ready, no one can ever blame me for being needy." He shrugs, shaking his hair out of his face before he tries to pull your underwear off. "Hey come on now!" He whines almost, a stark contrast to the tattooed, muscled appearance of him currently already flushed and fully erect, straining against the cotton of his own underwear.

"Needy." You tease, and suddenly, as if you'd pushed a button, as he suddenly pulls on the fabric with more determination, successfully getting rid of the item of clothing with a gaze that screams fake innocence. Jungkook isn't new to sex, and neither are you- but it's the first time doing it with each other, which naturally places a bit of pressure onto you.

Or maybe it usually should be like that- because somehow, it all comes naturally.

When his hand finds your heat, you're already melting underneath his gaze, no words spoken as he leans further over you, catching your lips again. Only that this time, he truly seems hungry; no longer offering you fleeting pecks but desperate kisses that try and convey just how much he wants you right now. He knows that he could never truly make it clear to you though- because he himself doesn't even know if that's possible.

He's never wanted anyone so bad.

And while usually not too fond of it, his need to prove himself as the perfect lover- emotionally and physically- makes him detach himself from you for a second, before he adjusts his position, leaning down to have you lay your legs over his shoulders, hands holding your thighs apart as he lays his mouth onto your heat.

It's an entirely new experience for you, and he knows.

But luckily, if your Impatient whining was anything to go by, you're definitely enjoying yourself as he flattens his tongue over your sensitive nerves, eyes focused on you while he has to use a little strength to keep your legs apart, especially when you grow close to your first orgasm. He's eager to see it, moving away to gain a better view before one of his hands finishes the job, gaze on you as you arch your back and come undone from his actions.

And its now that he really can't take it any longer.

"Fuck I need you." He curses under his breath, finally getting rid of the last item of clothing he still had on until now, no need to give his length any form of help to get ready for you. He can't help but groan a little under his breath at how sensitive he feels, rushing the act of wrapping the condom over as to not rile himself up too much.

After all, he wants to be inside you for his own orgasm, no matter what.

"Hm I'll go slow, ok?" He asks, and you nod, hands reaching out for him, making him chuckle. "You're cute." He comments, earning a roll of your eyes in return. He lets it go for now- giving you a pass this time, but only because be truly feels needy now.

He'd love to tease you a little, make you all whiny and desperate for him, but right now, he just wants you as close as he physically can get.

Though in his haste to get onto his own road towards pleasure, he never forgets you- pride swelling as he watches you hold onto him, wanting him just as much as he wants you. He's a little sweaty already, and the sheetsbare tangled badly at this point from all your squirming, arousal already staining some parts of them but right now he really can't bring himself to care.

He uses one of his hands to aid him in finding your entrance, positioning himself to carefully push himself inside, and at this point, he just feels as if he truly became one with you. It's the last key experience in a way he's had to have with you, and now that he's in exactly that moment, things start to feel real.

"I love you." He almost whispers into your neck while he starts to move. "I'm.. so grateful you're here." He tells you, hips moving at a steady pace. "I want you to.. stay forever." He almost asks, in a way, and while you can't give him an answer to that right now, you probably will later.

After you're back with the normal thinking human beings, because right now, with his pace and strength gaining as he chases his high, your head is definitely unable to form thoughts.

In a way, he loves the sight of you like this. It's awfully sinful, a sight only he wants to ever be able to see, no one else.

He can't control his own noises at this point, uncaring of his groans of pleasure as he chases after his peak, noticing you growing antsy as well, visibly eager to cum as well. And he will make sure you'll get your attention as well- he'd never let you down, ever.

And with his hand reaching in between you both to find where he needs to be, you're gone and out; head thrown back into the pillows while he pushes himself in deep, condom filling with his seed while he slows down into almost no movement at all.

Catching his breath, he leans down to you to kiss you once more, ticking of his clock on the bedside table coming back into the background noise, as well as the cars outside from the opened window, and your breathing underneath him. His senses return one by one as he pulls himself out, moving to get rid of the condom and start the shower.

"Come on." He asks, tapping your thigh, but you just whine all grumpy at him. "Noo get up, get up- the bed's all messy and we're too.!" He laughs, all energized from his own afterglow, while you seem to be the exact opposite, having to be physically pulled into a sitting position by your wrists. Jungkook himself can't help but simply laugh, before he takes matters into his own hands, lifting you up over his shoulder-

And of course, landing a loud smack onto your butt for good measure.

#bts imagine #bts fanfic #bts fic #jungkook imagine #bts smut #jeon jungkook x reader

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oceantornadoo · 13 days

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hii! can you do what it would be like asking price to put pads on the shopping list?? and then when price goes shopping he has to call you to ask for what size ?? 😭😭 btw i love love your work, hope u had a good day💞.

im pretty sure you're referring to this post but i decided to make this price x reader so :) enjoy!

bsf marriage pact!price x reader, he's slightly creepy but he's sweet (this is actually a bit dubcon but its in good spirit)

you had had a shit day. actually, make that a shit week. emotional the whole time, feeling lonely, depressed, and with the weirdest cravings. right when you were about to call your best friend and rant about how terrible you felt, you had went to the bathroom and- oh.

that explains a lot.

and now here you were, sitting on the toilet for the past ten minutes, contemplating. you were completely out of all period products and your flow was so heavy there was no way you were making it to the store free bleeding or with toilet paper as a makeshift pad. of course, that's when john decided to call you (let's be real, who doesn't take their phone to the bathroom. don't judge.)

"evenin', duckie."

"ugh john, i told you not to call me that. its so annoying."

john grunted a chuckle into the phone, swiping a hand over his beard. "you love it." silence. he could practically hear your eye roll. "dinner tonight?" he was pacing his apartment, uncharacteristic for a man like him. calm, cool, collected. never when it came to you.

"can't, sorry. maybe in a few days." he grunted. "could order a takeaway?" you sighed in his ear, the sound a melody he craved to hear over and over again. on lazy saturdays and in-between small fights over laundry. baby steps, though.

"its just not in the cards tonight, john, i'm sorry." you were never like this, withholding information. even when you cancelled on him, it was with a long-winded explanation with the names of about seven people he didn't know and plans you didn't want to go to. "'s wrong, duck? got a hot date or somethin'?" he mentally crossed his fingers, not allowing a physical expression. he wasn't that whipped. not yet.

"no, im just sick. and tired." his muscles relaxed. he started putting on his boots and grabbed a fleece, something gaz insisted was not too tryhard for someone like him. "i'll run to the store and grab ya medicine, hm? what'dya need?" you sighed again, rubbing your fingers to your forehead. he obviously was not giving this up and you did really need pads...

"ill text you a list when you get there. thanks john."

"anythin' for you, duckie."

list: pads, advil, that one chocolate candy you know i like, something for dinner

shit. price had been with a woman or two, but had never had to buy her pads. of course, he'd never let it get to that stage, not when he had you to take care of. but now here he was, staring at playtex and always and what the fuck was a diva cup? he'd better call you.

"all ok, john?"

"ya didn't give me a color on your pads, duck." you giggled. of course he paid attention to the green versus orange pads.

"its pretty heavy so some of the overnight and extra daytime ones would work." silence.

"...there's numbers." your cheeks warmed. you couldn't believe you were talking about this with john of all people.

"god, john. this feels so embarrassing. so weird to talk about with you."

"why? gotta know this for the rest of my life, duckie." shit. he was referring to that night a couple weeks ago, when you confessed to him you thought you'd never find love. when he said he'd marry you in a heartbeat, just say the word. when you compromised by telling him if you were still single in two years, you'd go to the courthouse then and there. when you didn't see him turn and write the date in phone, just as a reminder.

"5, john. there should be a moon symbol or something. and then 3. should be green, i think?" he grunted an affirmation, putting the respective pads in his cart. he turned around, having said goodbye and ended the call, and was subsequently greeted by three women, staring. paused in their product selection, staring openmouthed at how nonchalant he was about buying pads.

30 minutes later he was at your place, groceries and takeaway in hand as he used his spare key to let himself in. "duck?" all quiet. he stalked through your place and noticed the light on in the bathroom. one, two, three quick knocks. "john?" "'s me. can i come in?" "no i- need you to get me something." he waited patiently. "can you go to my dresser and grab a pair of underwear. something ugly, lots of coverage." who was he to say no to a free invite to your underwear drawer?

john dropped the pads outside your bathroom door and headed to your bedroom. finding your dresser, he had to give himself a second. calm down, old man. they're all clean.

that didn't stop him from sniffing a few, reveling at the scent of your laundry detergent. he almost groaned at the scent, imagining you in them. even in the "unsexy" pairs, your curves clothed in cotton and elastic, wrapped up in a lovely package. all his.

john selected a pair with "lots of coverage", whatever that meant, and headed to your bathroom. he opened the door with ease, setting your pads down on the counter. you shrieked.

"john! im half naked, you need to knock." obviously, the sight of your bare thighs and the top of your mound peaking out was most welcome, but he was more concerned about getting you off the toilet and putting food in your belly. "jus' me, duckie. come on, show me how to do it." he gestured at the pads. he couldn't be serious.

you slowly unboxed them, taking care to cover your naked body as much as possible. even while moving slowly, your shirt still shifted and he caught glimpses of your pretty pussy. an image for another day, when you weren't in pain. he focused on your fingers, deftly putting the pad on your underwear with years of practice. he memorized how you placed the pad, ensuring it stuck to your underwear before tearing the paper off the wings and tucking them on the other side. you looked up at him and he nodded, mission complete. "thank you, by the way." he kissed your forehead, so quick you could have missed it in a blink.

"turn around, i have to put it on." he sat back on his haunches, staring. "go'on. 've gotta learn somehow." you were too tired to care, ready to devour your dinner. you missed his hungry gaze as you revealed your cunt to him, wanting even though it was covered in blood. you missed his fingers twitching as you slowly pulled on your underwear, fabric caressing your skin like he yearned to. you got up, flushed, and washed your hands, missing how he tucked his fingers in belt loops and leaned back into the wall, a move he'd done many times in his tac vest.

"thank you, john. truly." he gave you a grin under the muttonchops, all satisfied. task finished, mission accomplished. you had asked him to do this, a husbandly duty. after you dried your hands, you made a move for the door, but he stopped you with a hand to the jaw. he brushed his beard against you, feeling the shiver in your bones. his mouth hovered near your ear, accent coming out low and sultry. "anythin' for my future wife, duckie."

ngl this got a bit weird but i like it??? had to struggle to not lean into my simon riley weirdness tendencies as im still learning john as a character.

#john price #price #cod price #captain john price #captain price x reader #price x reader #john price x reader #captain price #price imagine #price headcanons #price one shot #john price x you #captain johnathan price #john price x y/n #tornadothoughts

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auteurdelabre · 5 months

Text

Something to Fight For (Series) Part 18 Joel Miller x f!Reader

Rating: 18+ THIS CHAPTER'S TRIGGER WARNINGS: Emotional Abuse, Childhood Trauma, Drug Addiction, Mentions of Death A/N: I rewrote this fucking chapter about 8 times. I'm still not sure how I feel about it. It was a real hard one to write, ya'll. A lot of my own shit is mixed up in there with the story. MC is part me after all (and part all of you). So it was hard. Harder than I think I expected it to be. So I dunno how it ended up. Couldn't re-read it too much. I really need your reviews on this one folks. It's real important to me, 'specially now. I need to know how you feel, the good and the bad. I gotta get this right.

Story Masterlist HERE

You're overcome.

There's no other word for it. You've been sobbing in your shower for the last hour. After running from the barn, taking a taxi home and bursting into your suite you immediately fell to your knees, the warm water pelting down onto your back.

It's as close to being held, at being soothed that you can manage right now.

You can’t stop replaying tonight’s events. The song Joel chose. The one of longing and deep yearning.

"She may be the reason I survive

The why and wherefore I'm alive

The one I'll care for through the rough and ready years"

But also of a love gone by. A regret.

"She may be the face I can't forget

A trace of pleasure or regret"

Is that how he views you? A love gone by?

Of course he does.

Paul's engagement ring is in the velvet box it came in. It's being returned tomorrow. You'd have done it tonight if it weren't so late.

You need to end things. It's the only way forward. No matter what, no matter if Joel is in love with Tess, no matter if you'll never be with him, you *can't be with Paul.

You don't love Paul. It's obvious to everyone including yourself. It's been obvious for so long. You've wasted so much fucking time and energy on him.

You think of all the boxes packed here, the ones you were going to move to Leander. You think of how strange and sad it is that your whole life can be put into less than twenty cardboard boxes.

And even though Joel can't be yours and even though that hurts more than words can begin to say, you are so fucking grateful for him. You are so grateful you met Joel Miller because he's shown you what love is. True, caring love.

Even if it's not yours to keep.

You will never forget the way he looked singing tonight. The goodbye song from his heart to yours. You'd felt it. The bittersweet finality of your time.

More tears are coming.

"I love him," you say to the tile in front of you. You need to hear the words spoken out loud in the universe, even if it's hidden in the fall of the shower and heard only by you. "I love Joel."

You need to see Joel. You need him to hold you. Need his calming presence. You need to wrap your arms around him and press your face into his neck and just feel breathe that sweet, spicy scent of home.

He's not yours.

You don't get to see Joel. You don't get to have him. He's Tess'. You can't be his friend, you want him too much. So what does that leave?

That leaves you replaced and alone.

You pull yourself from the shower, shivering as you towel off, drying your hair the best you can. You go to your dresser and pull out one of the few remaining pieces of clothing there.

Joel's shirt.

You've washed it so it doesn't smell like him anymore. Doesn't smell like the laundry detergent he uses or that wood shavings scent he sometimes carries. But when you put it on it feels like he's there in some small way. You pull it on over your sleep shorts hiccupping a soft cry.

You remember so long ago, standing in Joel’s den as you pondered if he just played guitar or if he sang as well.

“S’weird how something can make you feel so good and then outta nowhere become the pain”

That’s how it feels now. Joel, the thing that makes you feel good has also become the pain. The wedding is tomorrow. You need to collect yourself by then. You'll see Joel and you need to be controlled. You need to be okay. You need to not ruin this for him.

Because you do love Joel. You love him in a way you never expected to love or be loved. You love him so much that you are determined to make his life better. Determined that you will not take away what he has carved out for himself.

You crawl under the covers, your face buried in the pillow.

"I l-love Joel," you whisper it again into the pillow only now it's broken by sobs. You curl up under the covers, your body trembling. "I love him I love him."

You feel lost. So hopelessly lost.

And then the phone rings.

///

It's late in the Miller house. Quiet. Sarah's been asleep for hours thanks to the sugar crash Bill's cupcakes provided.

Tommy's asleep in the basement apartment, exhausted from the evenings festivities and anticipating a long day tomorrow.

Or, as Joel glances over at the bright neon numbers of his digital clock, later today.

He's laying in bed, one arm behind his head, one hand over his sternum as he stares at the ceiling. In this pose he feels every breath in, every breath out. The studying rhythm bringing him peace. It's impossible to shake the image of you free from his mind.

He'd done it out of love for you. Out of a need for you to know how much you'd changed him. Changed his heart, his outlook, even his fucking idea on the concept of romantic love.

But the look on your face? The way it had fallen before you had dashed out?

Sarah had been bouncing up and down in her seat when he finished his performance, hugging him tightly and throwing things at him as he tried to contain his disappointment ("Daddy you sing so pretty!" And "Daddy will you teach me guitar?") Everyone was clapping him on the back, telling him it was wonderful, so romantic, that Tommy and Maria loved it.

He refused to let his eyes search for you, knowing you were gone. He refused to let his heart believe that you'd come back.

Joel knows he has to stay away from you.

Knows that singing tonight was a terrible idea because not only did he make it so obvious to everyone that he’s so deeply in love with you, but he also made you cry.

Watching your face crumple, watching the way your eyes fell to the ground at the last string. He’d thought you’d be happy singing, Maria had said how often you’d felt happy when you did. But that wasn’t happiness he saw tonight. It was pain.

Joel doesn’t know what to do. He feels so lost.

And then the phone rings.

///

"Joel, I need you."

Four little words over the phone at 2 am.

Four little words that have Joel stumbling out of bed, murmuring he'll be there before he's pulling on his jeans and a t-shirt.

He's half asleep, his mind whirring. He goes to the basement, rapping on the door. An equally tired Tommy answers, blinking in the light.

"She- I gotta go," Joel tries to explain in a rush. "I'll explain later. Can you come watch Sarah?"

Tommy gives a few bleary eyed blinks before nodding and following his brother up the steps.

Tommy settles himself on the sofa as Joel runs out the door. And all the younger Miller can think before he falls asleep is:

Finally.

///

Joel's shoulders nearly take up the doorframe. You notice this when the rap of his knuckles pulls you sniffling from the sofa and you open the door to him.

His eyes are sleepy, but wide. His hair is tousled from sleep and you can see the indent of his pillow faint in his left cheek. He scans your face, concerned.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm so sorry," you say as soon as Joel takes a step towards you. "I never should have called so late. I’m so so sorry, Joel."

"Just let me in," Joel insists, his hand coming to go to your cheek and then dropping. He doesn’t want to overstep. "Tell me what happened."

You try to make the words come out; you force them crackling and trembling out into the world.

"I don't want... I don't want to go back."

Joel doesn't have any context, but that doesn't stop him from rushing in. He closes the door behind him gently before bringing you into his arms. Your forehead drops against his sternum as he does this, your tears warm and free flowing.

As he rubs a soothing hand along your spine he realizes you're wearing his t-shirt again. For some reason this small thing makes Joel's eyes wet.

You're so warm in his arms, trembling against him as you hold in sobs. He wants to kiss away the tears rolling down your cheeks. He wants to carry you to bed and strip every bad memory and experience from you with his mouth and body.

That's not what she needs right now. She needs a friend.

He takes your hand in his, leading you to the sofa. A place where you can talk. The fireplace is on, bathing you in a warm flickering glow that makes his breathing hitch when he glances over at you.

Your eyes are puffy, your nose red and he thinks you might be the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.

He can't help himself but reach for you, bringing you to his lap as he sits. There's nothing sexual about it, just the need to hold you close, to make you feel safe there. Your arms wrap around his neck and he rocks you, his arms banding around your waist.

"Honey," Joel whispers into the crook of your neck. "What's wrong?"

Honey.

You melt into him just as easily as the word. This was a terrible idea. What had you been thinking? How could you ask Joel here?

Because of the song, your traitorous heart cries. Because you love him! Because his face is the first one you want to see!

You hold him tightly to you, unable to break from him just yet. Unable to tell him the awful ugliness. Instead your mind drifts to the rehearsal dinner. Your hand plays with the fabric of Joel's shirt, twisting it under your fingers.

"Joel . . . The song."

Immediately he tenses and you can't see his face, but you can imagine it. Eyes nervous, mouth hooked slightly to the side. The same way he’d held his face that night in his den, your hand around a glass of soda.

"Maybe one day we'll have reason to make music again.”

Joel smiles softly around his glass. "Maybe."

"Did you like it?" he murmurs into your hair. You can't help but hold him tighter, your eyes filling. He sounds so unsure of himself, so worried about what you’ll say.

"Yeah, I loved it. It was beautiful."

You feel him physically relax in your arms at this admission. The tension, the uncertainty is drained from him. You force yourself not to tilt your face to his, not to search for his mouth with yours.

"I thought you didn't play anymore,” you tell his shoulder.

"I don't. One time performance I guess. Shoulda charged for tickets."

There, the humor you both needed to break the intense spell that weaves itself when you're in Joel's arms. You're thankful to him for that. Now you can pull back, still seated in his lap, but in control of yourself.

"I hope you keep playing forever."

Joel smiles wistfully at you, nodding. You let his dark eyes search your face. You let his hand cup your cheek, his wide thumb brushing away the tears there.

"I never told you about why I went back to Chicago," you sniffle. "Why I didn't call."

"You don't have to tell me," Joel insists. "It doesn't change why I'm here. I'll stay here all night just holdin' you if it's what you need."

He doesn't want to push you, doesn't want you upset because of him. This time in Chicago, the separation, it feels like an ugly part of your shared history that he just wants you both to forget.

"No, I want to tell you," you say in a sorrowful voice. "You deserve to know everything."

Joel nods and he wants to keep you there in his lap. But you shuffle back from him, sitting across from him on the sofa. It takes several minutes of staring into the flames of the fire before you feel you can begin.

"My dad has been in and outta the hospital a lot," you explain, looking at your hands in your lap. "It's because he's waiting for a liver transplant."

Joel is shocked. The way you spoke of Chicago, of your family, he'd assumed your father was dead.

"The thing is," you continue, unaware of his shock. "He can't get one unless he stops using and, uh, he won't."

"Using?" Joel is still taken aback by the revelation, not thinking clearly.

"Coke and heroin mostly," you say with a wince. "He's a drug addict."

Your father has been a junkie for most of your life.

And it's in part because you exist.

The same year you were born he'd gone to a party without your mom. She was tired, still breastfeeding you and encouraged him to go out and have some fun.

He did.

The kind of fun that had started as a party drug passed around and ended with him burning through the family savings and growing gaunt in the coming years. The kind of fun that had him doing eight balls during your soccer games and shooting up on your graduation day.

You were four when he first went into rehab at the insistence of your mother. A few weeks before your fifth birthday he'd come home sober and ready to change his life back around. You hadn't really understood what was happening. You'd just been so happy to be a family again.

That photo on your desk, the one the flood destroyed, the one that meant so much to you is from the only birthday party of yours that your father ever attended sober.

In the passing years he turned to drugs again but he hid it well from you and your mother. You never knew the severity of it until you turned fifteen.

Until you came home one day from your part time job at the Chicago humane shelter to find him covered in piss and his own vomit and barely responsive.

He died on his way to the hospital, a full forty two seconds he was clinically dead. Until they revived him and he sputtered back to life. You remember all of this because it was you in the ambulance with him.

Your mother was at work, unreachable. Your dad's sporadic unemployment meant she worked two jobs.

So it was a fifteen year old you with tears running down her cheeks that watched this unfold, completely terrified.

You were sixteen when he got out of rehab for the second time and promised his life was changed forever. He and your mother had almost two years of no fighting - a change of pace for you who had grown up to their constant shouting matches.

You were eighteen when he relapsed at a friend's house party. Twenty two and twenty five when he went back to the various rehabs that your mother always paid for in more ways than one.

And then he just stopped trying in the coming years. Still using, but not enough for your sweet mother to kick him out.

It's like he's infected by some insidious being inside him. A forever hungry thing that takes and takes, warping your once sweet father into something subhuman. A being that is frighteningly underweight, hollowing his cheeks and making his eyes bulbous in his face. He isn't your father anymore, not really.

But he is. That's the worst part.

Because if he wasn't your Dad you could hate him.

You tell Joel all of this, it spills from you like a stream and he sits across from you, nodding and never speaking. When your voice hitches or the tears begin fresh he instinctively moves towards you on the sofa, stopped only by your raised palm. You need to get all of this out and if he holds you, you never will.

"That night you left, like, two hours later my mom called me to tell me that my dad had a really bad seizure," You shake your head, wanting to stop the memory. "And she sounded so scared on the phone and I just had to get back. I had to get there, back home to help. I was on autopilot."

Joel recalls the hollow look in your eyes when he went to see you that day.

"I know you came to see me but I don't even remember it," you tell Joel. "All I could think of was that I fucked up, that I should have been there in Chicago with my mom."

Joel is stiff, watching you without speaking.

"And I got home and it was just as awful as I thought it would be." You start to shudder at the memory. "My dad could barely talk. And when he did all he wanted to do was blame me for leaving. Telling me I was selfish for leaving my mom and him. Telling me that without me around to help pay for things that there was more pressure on him and my mom to afford their place."

You break off only to hold in a sob, breathing deeply and continuing.

"And he was right, you know. Coming to Austin for school was so selfish of me. I could've just as easily gone to school back in Chicago." A look of disgust crosses your features as you talk now to yourself. "So fucking selfish."

"No," Joel's voice is quiet but firm. "That's not true."

You're ignoring him though, so caught up in your own devastation. Your eyes are shut tightly and your head is giving short jerks.

"I just run from everything, Joel. I ran from Chicago and I ran to Austin because I thought that if I kept running far away enough that, that his ugliness could never touch me. But it lives in me, Joel. That ugliness is in me forever."

Joel's eyes have grown glassy, even now he remains sitting there looking at you with unending patience and his hands twitching to hold you.

"I stayed there for a month,” you continue, not even aware that your head is tilted so low Joel has to lean forward to hear. “A month of my dad telling me I was selfish. A month of my mom trying to tell me that it's just his disease talking. A month of seeing your name come up on my phone and wanting so badly to talk to you but just thinking about how horrible I was and how you and Sarah deserved better."

You force yourself to breathe between sentences, your air hitching in your chest. Joel is staring at you, his eyes swimming over your features. Horrible? You?

"So when I eventually got back to Austin I was just so fucking sad, Joel. So tired. I couldn't get out of bed. I didn't want to be around anyone. Not you, not Sarah. I couldn't do that to you guys." You swipe at your eyes with the wrist of your sweater. "I should have called you and seen you but I was so selfish only thinking about me and how I felt.

Your eyes jerk open when you feel the warmth of Joel's hand on yours. He's leaning across the sofa, his wide hand placed gently over yours. A thumb gently strokes your knuckles.

"No," Joel breathes in a voice of gentle warmth. "Never selfish. Never. It was me that fucked up."

"No."

"Yes," Joel tells you and you can see the way his dark eyes are damp. "You are the least selfish person I've ever met."

"Oh yeah?" you challenge, your chin wobbling. "You know why I called you tonight? Because my mom just called to beg me to come home again. Apparently my dad's saying that if I move back to Chicago that he'll go to treatment again. That he'll stop using. That he'll be able to get the transplant."

Joel's eyes widen but he remains silent.

"And I don't want to go," you say, lips trembling. "I don't want to go back there. I don't want to fucking go even if it would mean helping because I'm a horrible, selfish cunt."

The sobs that burst out of you are pure anguish that you muffle in a pillow to keep Maria from hearing all those floors above. Joel is physically holding himself back, dying to embrace you but giving you your space.

All he can do is stroke your head, desperate to convey all of his care and affection for you through the gesture.

"He was always promising he was going to get clean," you say hollowly, moving away from the pillow and Joel's touch. "And my mom, she just, she just kept carrying on like there was hope. But there is no hope. Just this endless, bleak, fucking pain."

Your eyes meet his and you're overcome. You stand abruptly, feeling the scrutiny of Joel as sharply as if he were stabbing you.

"Joel, just go. I'm sorry I called. This was a terrible idea to have you come here. This isn't your problem. I'm so fucking sorry."

Joel stands and for a moment you think he's going to leave. You think that might be a relief because you're feeling too vulnerable, too exposed.

You aren't expecting Joel to quietly close the distance between your bodies and wordlessly pull you into his arms. You're shocked more however at how willingly you allow this, how easy it is to fall back into his embrace. To tangle your arms around his neck and hold him as tightly as you can. He's warm against you, his cheek resting on the top of your head as you press your face to his shoulder.

"I hate him. I hate what he put my mom and me through." Your chin is trembling as you blink back the onslaught of more tears. "And I hate that I love him so much because he's my fucking dad."

Your hands are gripping Joel around the middle as he holds you, his broad shoulders curling, his arms tightening.

"I hate that I just want him to die," you cry through clenched teeth. "To stop holding on. To bring my mother some fucking peace."

More tears come.

Joel thinks of James and the cocaine and how upset you'd been. He'd thought you were justified in the way you'd acted, the heated punch across James slimy face for treating you so rudely. But now he realizes why you'd been shamed, so terrified of your own fury.

"And I hate that I'm just like him."

You break off as Joel's large hand is cupping the back of your head, and he's gently swaying you, the way a mother would a newborn.

"It's okay," Joel murmurs in your hair. "I've got you. I've got you."

You don't know why, but this quiet utterance from him is that breaks you, and the wall against him that you've built so high for yourself collapses. Heavy sobs break free from you, stark mournful things that you muffle in Joel's shoulder. They make your body jerk, causing Joel to hold you tighter against him.

"Shhh," Joel soothes. "Just breathe, baby. Slowly, like me."

He takes a few steadying breaths, urging you to match the slow pace. After a few shuddering exhales you do so, your breathing staggering into a steady, even rhythm.

"Good," Joel whispers. "Good."

"I'm just like him," you again whisper the words you've only ever thought into Joel's collar. "I'm selfish and horrible and -"

"You're nothing like that," Joel assures you, pulling you back so that he can look into your eyes when he tells you this. "Not at all."

"Really? What do you call what we did in your kitchen?" You scoff. "Knowing that we were with other people? Or how about when you pushed me up against that wall over there?"

Joel is silent, only his eyes move around your face while the rest of him is like a statue. He doesn't need to look at the wall to know what you're talking about.

"I can't stop wanting you," you say with a look of torment in your eyes. "I can't fucking stop, Joel. I try and I try and I can't. I'm just like my dad. I want what I shouldn't. I want what's only going to hurt other people and hurt myself."

"Honey-"

"I can't stop," you repeat weakly, trying to step back from him. "So I have to stay away."

Joel hands are on either side of your face again and he's peppering your face with soft kisses and everything in you wants to rejoice because Joel is here and he's holding you.

"Don't stay away from me," Joel's tells you as he rains compassion down on you. "Never."

You can't keep him. He's not yours.

Both of you are being incredibly selfish right now. Tess is probably at home right now taking care of Sarah and Daniel. Tess who was made to be a mother. Tess who understands Joel. What is wrong with you?

Selfish.

Horrible.

"Stop, Joel," you say twisting from him, out of his grip. "I told you all of this so that you can understand why I won't be around as much. But I'll call Sarah every other night, if she still wants to speak to me. And when I come back for visits I'll take her to the movies and-"

It's like Joel is only just now noticing all the moving boxes. He's glancing around as you talk, his eyes widening.

"You're not actually thinking of moving back to Chicago," Joel interrupts in a horrified voice. "You can't be."

"Just for a few months, just until he's settled in rehab-"

"No," Joel is wild-eyed shaking his head, his eyebrows saddling. "You can’t. You just. . . You can’t do this. You can’t sacrifice everything. Your work - that sanctuary. You won’t come back. I know you, you’ll feel like you have to take care of your dad. You’ll stay there."

"It's complicated-"

"It's not."

"Joel, my dad needs me."

"That was a horrible thing to lay on your shoulders," Joel says and he looks furious and sad all at once. "And I'm sorry for your parents, I really am, but no. You can't go. You can't do this to yourself."

"I have to go," you tell Joel. You falter, pulling back from him, needing to be out of his orbit.

Joel stands there as you pull back from him, looking so out of place in your suite with its low ceilings, the space almost emptied of furniture. He’s like this beam you can’t look away from, this tall broad angel with eyes that look at you as if you’re actually worth something.

He breaks off, uttering a pained "Jesus Christ" and you're sure he's going to yell at you about Paul just like Maria did.

You’re sure he’ll run from the room shouting that you’re selfish. Positive that he’ll tell you that you’re not worth all this hassle.

Instead Joel does something you're not expecting.

He crosses the room over to you and slips to his knees, holding you around the middle before he presses his forehead gently against your abdomen. It shocks you, this action and this pose from him. He sits like this in silence for several minutes, holding you, breathing against you in heavy shudders. Your hands are on his broad shoulders, glancing down at him in confusion.

"I'm so sorry," he finally whispers, a little murmur against you. "I'm so sorry I wasn't there."

"I didn't need you to be," you insist, your hand going to his neck, urging his face up to look at you. He won't move his face from where it is lodged against your stomach. He can’t.

"But I should have been," Joel insists, his voice a low rasp.

“It was so long ago.”

Almost six months since the awful incident. And you don’t carry it with you, not like Joel apparently has because now his head tilts back from your abdomen.

"I never should have walked away that day. I should have stayed. If I had none of this Tess and Paul shit would have happened. I would’ve gone back with you to Chicago." Joel's voice sounds thick with escaping emotion. "I ruined us."

His beautiful eyes open and you watch as tears slip down his cheek. You suppose that's what makes you freeze up, your heart sinking. You've never seen Joel cry before and the sight is as shocking as it is heartbreaking.

"Forgive me," he whispers brokenly. "Please."

You can see the anguish in his features and realize he's been living in it since you got back. This hellish landscape of grief and regret. He's been wearing it like armor weighing him down.

"Nothing to forgive," you tell him honestly, your knuckles trailing down his cheek to wipe the tears away. "Joel it was never a matter of fault. It was just how things happened."

His head drops against your stomach again and you can feel his strong shoulders begin to quake jerkily.

"I was fucking weak."

"You were human," you reply, rubbing at his shoulders, wanting to soothe him as much as he wants to soothe you. "You couldn't have known."

"I just left you there, all hollow and quiet and I walked away," Joel's voice is ragged. "I should have stayed. That's what you do when you love someone."

Love.

It hits you with a strong, visceral acuity. Starting in your rib cage and then spreading outward, causing everything in your body to wake up. It makes you breathless to hear it, though you've long suspected it, secretly hoped for it.

"Joel-"

"I'll never stop being sorry for it," Joel tells you simply, his face tilting up to look into yours. "Never."

Without thinking your hand is gently carding through his tousled curls. His eyes shutter closed as he leans into your hands. The moment is overwhelming in austerity and you need to break it.

"Not even if I asked nicely?" you say with a teasing lilt to your voice.

His eyes open and he gives you a small, watery smile before he stands. He towers over you again, taking your face in his wide hands and now it’s you leaning into his touch.

"I'd do anything you asked."

And all at once you know he's going to kiss you and that you want him to.

He tilts his head forward and lips move over yours so gently that you sigh into his mouth. Your entire body sags towards him and instead of the fervent kisses from not that long ago, this kiss is different. It’s soft and sweet and unhurried. His soft lips move over yours, taking time to memorize how your pliant mouth moves under his, the way you inhale softly when you break apart, his wide hands still cupping your face.

Tess.

Marmalade.

Selfish.

"I'm sorry I called," you sniff, tilting your face from him. "I never should have done that. You should go, Joel."

"You want me to go?" Joel's voice is a low aching sound. You can't look at him. You can't look into those intense, beautiful eyes of his so instead you face away from him.

"Yes."

You feel yourself floundering, that unmistakable voice in your head screaming to run. Run from the conflict. Run from your feelings.

Run. Run.

"You're lyin'," Joel insists.

"I'm not."

You feel his strong fingers on either side of your chin, dragging your face to meet his. But still your eyes remain closed.

"Look at me."

You shake your head the best that you can in his grip.

"I can't have you here, Joel. I'm sorry I called you, it was wrong.”

Joel's hand is flying to slide around the back of your neck. "Stop."

"You’re with Tess," you insist with a shake of your head, pulling back from his sweet touch. "She's perfect for you. She'll make the best mom to Sarah. It makes sense, Joel. You have to see that."

"I broke it off with Tess," Joel bites off. “I don’t want Tess.”

Your eyes fly open."What?"

"How could I keep dating her? I knew I couldn't stop wanting you. I never will." Joel feels his neck growing warm. "And she told me what she asked you to do, to stay away from Sarah."

You nod brokenly, feeling the tears gathering just at the memory compounded by this new guilt.

"Why would you do that?"

"Because I just want what's best for you and Sarah. A chance at a real family."

You've ruined this for him. Joel's chance at a family, something for himself. Something for his own. Selfish like your dad.

"Go back to Tess, Joel. Tell her it was a mistake."

"I'm not gonna do that."

"You have to, Joel. She wants you."

“And you don’t?”

It hangs there, the truth between you. If you admit it, it’s over. Any pretense you would have carried is gone. He’ll choose you because of this unknowable, untenable connection. But you’re not good for him. You’re not the kind of woman Joel Miller needs. You’ll take and take from him, leaving him with nothing in the end. It’s how your father operates, and you are your father’s daughter. Your engagement isn't even officially off. You're moving to Chicago. So what? You'll confess you love Joel? Make him feel compelled to follow you to Chicago? And what about Sarah? You're going to disrupt her life too? How is that not the most selfish thing in the world?

“No.”

Saying it physically hurts.

You love Joel. You love this man in front of you. And it’s precisely that love that sends you pushing back from him. But you’re stopped by his hand on the back of your neck again, holding you there.

"Don't," Joel says through clenched teeth."Don't stand there and lie to me of all people. You wanna lie to yourself? Fine, but not to me. Never to me. I don’t deserve it."

It is. It is a fucking lie.

"Tell me the truth," Joel urges gently, pleading. "Tell me to my face that you don't want me as much as I want you.”

You try to form the words that tell him exactly that, but you can't.

They don't exist.

Joel nods in understanding, his warm eyes even warmer. But he can see the fear in your expression, the panic.

"Just let me take care of you tonight," Joel whispers, his thumb stroking your cheek. "Please."

You're trembling against his palm, tears coating your lashes. "Okay."

Joel seems surprised by your easy acceptance but he nods, reaching down to take your hand in his.

"Let's go to bed."

You follow him without question to the bed. He shrugs off his jacket, watching you watching him. You're eyes are owlish in your face, the tension clear. Joel brings himself up on the bed still dressed in his jeans and shirt. He lays overtop the sheet before bringing it back for you to crawl under.

You hesitate. There is nothing more enticing than the thought of Joel making love to you right now. But it feels wrong, rushed. Too many things going on in your mind.

"I just wanna hold you," Joel explains when he sees your eyes nervously move from him to the bed. "If that's okay?"

Relief floods you and you nod, moving under the covers of your bed. And all the aching loneliness, all the terror of being lost? It’s gone. It’s gone the second you snuggle up against Joel in your bed.

His broad hand moves through your hair gently, moving it back from your flushed face before stroking it in tenderly. He stares at you, barely blinking. You muse that you could have entire conversations like this, just staring into each other's eyes. That perhaps you're having one right now.

His eyes are so soft. How can a man made up of sharp angles and broad planes look at you with eyes so fucking soft?

"How can you look at me like that?" you ask blinking through new tears. "After everything I've told you how can you lie there and look at me like I'm not a piece of shit?"

"Because you're not," Joel replies swiftly. "None of what your dad did is your fault. How could it be?"

"If I was there-"

"He'd still be using," Joel tells you simply. "And he'd have a new thing or person to blame for it."

"Even if that's true," you insist. "I'm his kid. I should go back."

"You're telling me if I told a grown up Sarah she had to move back home to take care of me, even if I'd barely been in her life, even if she had a whole life somewhere else, you'd tell her she was selfish for not doing it?"

Your eyes widen. Sarah. Sweet, genuine Sarah. No, you wouldn't blame her. But that's Sarah.

"She's just a kid-"

"Same age as when your dad started." Joel's eyes are watery. "How come you're so unkind to yourself? Why don't you think you deserve good things?"

"A lifetime of experience," you reply darkly.

///

And for a moment there is sudden clarity for Joel that hits him in such a way he's shocked he never understood it as easily before.

In the job you chose, in the immediately natural way you were with the screaming Daniel, even quicker than you were with his sweet and calm Sarah.

In the way these animals, hurt and abandoned and ignored are so much more than just pitiful creatures that pass along your desk in files.

You see yourself in them.

You see yourself in their haunted eyes and terrible histories. You see it in the plaintive cry of the frustrated Daniel. In this world that turns its back and its ears to them you want desperately to embrace them, to hold them to you and communicate a perfect, unending love for them.

Because no one did that for you.

Your mom tried, Joel is sure of it. But love is hard to share when so much of it is reserved for a husband in constant crisis. When you're a frazzled mother working two jobs to keep your mortgage and your marriage and family together. Love is there of course, but it's not overt. Not like you crave.

The kind of love that Maria gives you without question. The kind of love Joel would give to you every fucking day if you said you wanted him to be yours.

"I know I have no right to ask you to stay or demand anything from you, but, fuck, please don't do this," Joel whispers earnestly. "Don't move back to Chicago."

You're silent.

“If you do you’ll never come back,” Joel murmurs, his voice full of so many emotions it would be impossible to pick just one. “I know you. You’d sacrifice everything for him.”

“I. . . I don’t. . .”

Your eyes are so heavy, almost as heavy as your heart. You’ve shared so much with Joel, brought up so many painful memories it feels like you’ve run a marathon. Your head tilts against the pillow.

"Go to sleep, baby," Joel tells you, holding himself back from kissing you. "I'm here. Just sleep."

When you finally fall asleep Joel continues to look at you. His dark eyes travel the curve of your cheek, takes in the length of your lashes and the way your mouth looks half open in sleep. He memorizes each part of your face knowing that this may be his only chance to do so.

You’re engaged. You still have that connection to your parents in Chicago. There is so much that exists in this world to take you away from him.

He still sees it this way, outside forces wanting to rip you from him, as if he has some claim on you. He doesn't care if Paul gave you a ring. You’re his. You’re his and he has never stopped feeling this way, even though he's tried. He doesn't know he'll ever stop.

He stops himself from kissing your sleeping mouth on more than one occasion during the night, desperate for that contact if this is really the end.

It can't be the end. It can't.

You sigh in your sleep, shuffling closer against him for warmth or for comfort. Joel allows this, his eyes skipping closed at the calm your nearness brings him.

I'll never ask for anything as long as I live. Just let her be mine.

He finally falls asleep with your soft breathing in the crook of his neck

#joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x reader #joel miller smut #joel miller x you #smut #dad joel miller #fanfic #fanfiction #joel miller #pedro pascal

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keshetchai · 5 months

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Do you ever just get obsessed with how cultural Christians (esp atheist or agnostic ones) often openly choose to maintain Santa Claus for their kids?

Like think about this with me:

A group of people who don't actively align themselves with religious life, religious institutions (churches) or other traditions, and may even be total atheists STILL sometimes choose to do Santa Claus for their children, because THEY had Santa Claus as children.

The parents give their child a folk demigod (lesser deity?) of outsized importance to children SPECIFICALLY, and teach them the demigod is definitely totally real. They maintain this active belief as long as possible through childhood. They may encourage and actively engage in this belief with their children moreso than anything else involving the religion it comes from (aside from perhaps, the easter bunny). They know Santa isn't real, does not exist, and is a fiction.

They know their children will learn this demigod is a lie. Subconsciously or consciously, the child then learns that Santa Claus is really only as real as the parent intention to make him real, and the child belief in that truth. The child grows up. Knows Santa is a fiction. And then they make Santa for their children too, because that's the only real thing about Santa — parents knowing it's a fiction and then passing it on anyways.

I just like...am deeply fascinated by this unique cultural training of accepting that the Santa deity isn't dead or anything so extreme, and even though he's made up, he is still extremely important and the fiction gets passed on while explicitly knowing and acting upon the fiction. Parents have to be Santa, they can't just encourage belief and sit back. No no, they must actively CREATE Santa's existence for the belief to work. And they do this willingly!

It's not that I think believing in a myth is unusual in any religion (like we don't need to believe hundreds of thousands of Israelites fled Egypt all at once to observe passover or even to think some Hebrews did flee Egypt and the legend developed from there, or w/e), so much as like, this is an incredibly obvious and well known one that every adult Knows 100% is Not Real, not even based on any kind of reality or possible actual legend, Santa doesn't have all those powers, he does not come to your house or get your wishlist (prayers).

No adult has a pure and genuine belief that Santa is a real being who visits and brings children gifts.

I just want to study everyone who actively is like "I don't believe in God or go to church but like, I'll obviously still do Santa for the kids, that's fun."

(Regina George voice: so you agree? Religion doesn't need to be grounded in imperial facts of science in order to provide substantial benefits to people, foster positive emotions and connections within communities, and for people to derive meaning from it? It doesn't matter if God is real, if you yourself make the benefits of God being real happen for yourself and others?")

#if youre an atheist who doesnt do santa this isnt about you so dont get worked up #santa claus is important religious training wheels for cultural christians #also i feel i should say this but im actually anti-modern santa claus because of capitalism and classism #but the love and parental lying isnt my problem lol

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riririnnnn · 3 months

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It's a follow up post for this, but this post makes sense on its own too.

I have always been the younger sibling, so I can't understand an older sibling's feelings, but I wonder if Sae gets glimpses of what things used to be; if he sees Rin when the younger one isn't paying attention, and just reminiscences when they were kids.

Way too many things are going on during the U-20 arc, so it's not uncommon for the readers to miss something especially if they are binge reading it. That's why, I never actually saw people talking about the fact that we DID, in a way, get a reason why Sae chose Shidou out of all the Blue Lock-ers.

However, we didn't get this from a Narrator's POV or Sae's POV, that's why we can't FULLY trust it, so it makes me think if Sae chose Shidou because he couldn't choose Rin. Sae might've thought that there wasn't a better way to test out Rin until and unless he went against him instead of alongside.

Which brings me this panel again:

Rin in that panel just.. I don't know how to articulate it. "I saw what I came for, and I'm satisfied." Was Sae talking about Rin?

Further, I think Sae got fired up when he heard Shidou was going to play too because he wanted to rub it on Rin's face like, "Look, I'm siding with him. I'm passing to him and not you. He is better than you that's why." And I believe that he was doing it purposely.

I'll explain why, look here:

The above panel was before Rin went berserk, and you can clearly see that he was still trying to be like Sae. Like his Nii-chan.

But when he got free from this thing that was holding him back as he says, he went into his flow and ho, ho, ho, look what he said:

He became himself instead of being someone of somebody.

Also, during the time he was going into his flow state, this is what his inner monologue said:

Him going batshit crazy actually stole the spotlight from everything. It's clearly a new perspective of that flashback, and after that Sae was completely attentive to Rin. It was almost as if Sae WAS expecting this to happen, yet the intensity of it caught him off guard for a while too.

After that the focus of the game just became Sae Vs Rin, and the older Itoshi continued to rile the younger one by saying, "You still don't get it? You can't be the best in the world," and lalalalalalala.

HOWEVER,

This thing low-key took off the attention from the fact that Sae didn't pass to anyone during that time. He went along with Rin in their 1V1, and this thing was also pointed out by the news article where it said something along the line of, "The internet says Sae held the ball for too long and he should've passed." (Chapter 152)

It has to be purposely.

It was Rin who stole the ball from him and Isagi got to hit it.

Further, this:

It's giving new perspective to everything now. Also, he says, "Nii-chan." It seems like a trivial thing to point out, but if you know, you know.

That's why, I kinda think that Sae knows that his words affects Rin a lot. That's why he praised Isagi, so that Rin wouldn't forget/lose his Ego. It makes more sense since in the same chapter (152), Rin says like, "In that moment, I won against Nii-chan." Which is true, he stole the ball, but his ending words of that monologue was, "But Isagi gained everything. He (Sae) recognised him and not me."

But what if Sae had recognised Rin verbally?

I bet Rin would've lost his new found real Ego, and would've ended up like Nagi did when he scored against Isagi in the BM Vs Manshine City match.

So, I think Sae wants Rin to be Rin. Not Itoshi Sae's younger brother Rin, but the real Rin because Sae didn't want him to be a mirror image of him since he wasn't enough in world stage of soccer.

Personally, I'm sorry for mixing my own emotions, but I have went through what Rin went through. No, I wasn't completely starstruck by my older sibling like him, but I indeed felt really humiliated, and that humiliation actually helped me improve. Everything is fine now, we got more trauma in our life, so we bonded over it and we are chill af now, but, deep in my heart, a little girl will always be present with a mild, gentle resentment for being treated unkindly.

That's why I think that Sae did what he had to do to help Rin improve which sadly, costed them their brotherhood.

I know I'm slightly backtracking from this post.

But I do want to believe that whatever Sae did, he did it FOR Rin and NOT for their shared dream to be the best striker in the world.

For a sports animanga, Rin-Sae relation is actually way complicated and deep. I hope Kaneshiro-san will do justice to everything.

But in the end, they are fictional and their realities will become whatever the author wants it to be.

Till then, we can only speculate.

It'd be funny if they go into therapy together and their trauma is just:

⚽

#blue lock #bllk #blue lock theory #bllk theory #itoshi rin #itoshi sae #雪 ranting

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hd-junglebook · 12 days

Text

Does He Know?

Part 1 - Word Count 4075

Masterlist

Authors Note: before you scroll away lets pretend Vince is not a hockey player for the plot.

Summary - In this you will meet Vince and Y/N, the beginning is so cute ngl I was kicking my feet imagining this in real life. Jack is introduced later, pls lmk what you think after you read. Enjoy !

warning - cuteness, hot men, cursing, men being men. the rest I cannot write because it's a spoiler.

Next Chapter Link Here

Y/N and Vince were snuggled up on the plush, charcoal gray couch in their cozy apartment. The living room was bathed in the warm, soft glow of the floor lamp in the corner, casting long shadows across the hardwood floors.

On the television, an episode of "The 100" played, the sound of the dramatic post-apocalyptic dialogue filling the room. As the show cut to a commercial break, Vince turned to Y/N, his dark eyes reflecting the flickering light from the TV screen.

A thoughtful expression crossed his handsome face, his brows furrowing slightly as he contemplated his next words.

"Hey, I've been thinking about something lately," he said, his deep voice barely audible over the background noise of the television.

She shifted slightly on the couch, the soft fabric of her oversized sweater brushing against Vince's arm. "Mhmm? What's on your mind, baby?" she asked, caressing his curls.

Vince took a deep breath, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. "What do you think about the idea of starting a family? Of having a baby together?"

Y/N's eyes widened. A mix of joy and excitement washed over her delicate features, a rosy blush coloring her cheeks. "Really? You want to have a baby with me?"

Vince nodded, his smile growing wider, revealing a hint of the dimples that Y/N adored. "Absolutely. I can't imagine anything better than creating a life with you, raising a child together."

Y/N felt tears prickling at the corners of her eyes, overwhelmed by the love and happiness that swelled in her heart. She threw her arms around Vince, hugging him tightly. The delicate clink of her silver Pandora bracelet filled the air as she caressed the soft strands of his hair.

"I would love that," she whispered, her voice thick with emotion. "I've always dreamed of being a mom, of having a family with you."

Vince held her close, his strong arms enveloping her in a warm embrace. He stroked her hair gently, his fingers running through the silky strands.

"Just think about it," he said softly, his breath tickling her ear. "When you're tired from a long day, I'll come home and rub your feet, just like this."

He reached down and took Y/N's feet in his hands, massaging them gently. Y/N giggled, the sensation tickling her skin. The sound of the television faded into the background as "The 100" resumed, the dramatic music and dialogue a distant hum compared to the intimate moment they were sharing. Y/N giggled, the sensation tickling her skin.

"Keep going," she encouraged, sighing in contentment.

Vince grinned, continuing his ministrations, his fingers kneading the soft skin of her feet. "And whenever you get cranky or have cravings, I'll go to the convenience store and grab all your favorite snacks. I'll take care of you, every step of the way."

Y/N felt her heart swell with love for this man, for the future they were planning together. She gazed into his eyes, seeing the reflection of their dreams and hopes mirrored in their depths.

"And our baby," she said softly, "they'll have my face and your hair." Vince chuckled. "A perfect combination. They'll be the most beautiful child in the world."

They were in love, they were happy, and they were ready to start the next chapter of their lives together.

…

Four months later…

The morning sunlight filtered through the curtains, casting soft rays of gold across the spacious living room of Y/N and Vince's upscale apartment in Hoboken. Y/N stood by the window, sipping on a cup of coffee with way too much milk, her gaze fixed on the bustling city below.

"Vince," Y/N called out, turning away from the window to face her partner, who was hastily getting ready for work. The sound of Vince throwing his pajamas on the ground echoed through the room, a subtle indication of his frustration.

Y/N watched as Vince moved around the room, gathering his things and preparing for the day ahead. "Can't you stay for just a few more minutes? We barely see each other anymore."

Vince, already halfway out the door, paused for a moment, a hint of frustration flickering across her features. Vince's dark brown hair sat perfectly, catching the sunlight as he turned to face Y/N. The olive hue of his skin seemed to glow in the morning light.

"I'm sorry, Y/N," Vince replied, his voice tinged with resignation. "I've got an early meeting today. I can't afford to be late again."

Y/N's heart sank at the familiar excuse. It seemed like work always came first for Vince, leaving little time or energy for her relationship.

This became an everyday occurrence, her begging for the bare minimum and him pushing her away but always finding a way to make up for it in the bedroom. And even that had gotten boring. She forced a smile, masking her disappointment.

"That's what you always say, Vince! It's always about work with you. What about us? What about our relationship?"

Vince's eyes narrowed. "You know how important my career is to me, Y/N. I'm doing this for us, for our future."

"But what kind of future will we have if we never spend any time together? You’re not doing this for us, it’s for you," Y/N countered, her voice rising. "I feel like I'm living with a ghost. You're never here, and when you are, you're too tired or distracted to really be present."

"That's not fair," Vince argued. "I'm working hard to provide for us. I thought you understood that."

"I do understand, Vince. But I have a hard job and I’m not neglecting you. There has to be a balance. I need more than just financial security and whiskey dick every once in a while. I need a partner who is actually present in our relationship."

Vince glanced at his watch, his impatience growing. "Look, Y/N, I don't have time for this right now, I can’t stand your nagging so early in the morning. Can we talk about this later?"

Y/N threw up her hands in exasperation. "When Vince? When will you have time for me, for us? Because it feels like that time is never going to come."

Vince sighed heavily. "I promise I will come home early tonight, and we will talk. I'm doing the best I can, Y/N. I'm sorry if that's not enough for you."

With that, Vince turned and walked out the door, leaving Y/N standing alone in the bedroom. She wandered back to the office, where her computer sat waiting on the desk, surrounded by piles of paperwork.

With a heavy sigh, Y/N sank into the chair, her mind filled with thoughts of the growing distance between her and Vince.

Where had it all gone wrong?

Her eyes wandered to the framed photographs scattered throughout the room, memories frozen in time—vacations, celebrations, moments of laughter and love shared between them and Vince.

Each image seemed to mock Y/N, a painful reminder of the happiness they once shared. After a moment of introspection, she finally rose from the chair and made her way out into the hall, heading towards her office.

She busied herself with work, trying to drown out the nagging doubts and insecurities that gnawed at her mind. Hours passed in a blur, the click-clack of the keyboard the only sound in the silent apartment.

As the afternoon wore on, Y/N's phone chimed with an incoming text. Her heart leapt for a moment, hoping it was Vince with good news, but her hopes were quickly dashed. "Working late again tonight. Don't wait up. - V" the message read.

Y/N sighed heavily, disappointment washing over her. It seemed Vince was always working late these days. She couldn't remember the last time they'd had a relaxing evening together, just the two of them.

Trying to shake off the melancholy thoughts, Y/N decided a hot shower might help clear her head. She made her way to the master bathroom and turned the faucet on, letting the water heat up as she undressed.

Steam began to fill the room as she stepped into the tub and slid down until she was sitting, knees pulled up to her chest, letting the spray of water cascade over her.

The heat seeped into her tense muscles, Y/N's mind drifted to happier times with Vince. She thought back to their early days of dating, how attentive and affectionate he had been.

Weekends spent exploring the city, lazy Sunday mornings tangled up in each other, stolen kisses and inside jokes. They had been so in love, so sure of their future together.

But somehow, over the past three years, they had gotten off track. The demands of both their careers meant less and less quality time together.

At first it was just dinners cut short or date nights postponed. But soon, it felt like they were two ships passing in the night, occasionally sharing space but never really connecting.

Silent tears mixed with the rivulets of water running down Y/N's face as she sat there lost in thought. How had they let things get to this point?

Was there still a way to find their way back to each other? She wasn't sure anymore. But she knew she wasn't ready to give up on their marriage yet, even if it felt like Vince already had.

With a sigh, Y/N reached forward and shut off the water, watching the last of it swirl down the drain. She couldn't hide in here forever.

Grabbing a fluffy towel, she stepped out and began drying off, resigned to another solitary evening.

…

Y/N couldn't shake the feeling that something was off with Vince. In the week since their argument, his behavior had only become more erratic.

Late nights at the office were becoming more frequent, and when he was home, he always seemed to be on the phone, speaking in hushed tones and ending the call abruptly whenever she entered the room.

She had tried to convince herself that it was just work stress, that Vince was dealing with a big project or a demanding client. But the canceled plans and missed dinners were starting to pile up, and Y/N's suspicions were growing.

Y/N felt like a detective, piecing together clues and trying to unravel the mystery of her husband's behavior. But the picture that was emerging was not a pretty one.

Deep down, Y/N feared that Vince was hiding something from her, something that could shatter their already fragile marriage.

Amidst these swirling doubts, Y/N found herself at a family gathering, surrounded by well-meaning relatives who were all too eager to pry into her personal life. Her mother, who had never been a fan of Vince, was particularly persistent that night.

"Y/N, dear, have you met Ellens second son?" her mother asked, practically dragging a tall, handsome man over to where Y/N was standing. "He's single, successful, and quite the catch if you ask me."

Y/N's mother dragged her towards Jack, who was standing next to the piano with a champagne flute in hand. Y/N cursed under her breath as she walked hastily beside her mother.

As they approached, Jack looked up, his eyes as clear as the ocean. Y/N found herself momentarily transfixed by his gaze, a mix of confidence and intrigue.

"Hello, I'm Y/N," she introduced herself, trying to maintain her composure. "I'm sure you already know my mother." Y/N plastered on a polite smile, trying to ignore the twinge of annoyance she felt at her mother's meddling.

But as Jack started to talk, she found herself drawn in by his warmth and charm, forgetting all about the encounter.

Jack's lips curled into a small grin as he extended his hand. "Jack," he said simply, his voice smooth and inviting. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Y/N."

They shook hands, Y/N couldn't help but notice the firmness of his grip, the warmth of his skin against hers. There was something electric in his touch, a spark that made her heart skip a beat.

Her mother, sensing an opportunity, quickly excused herself. "I think I see Ellen in the crowd," she said with a knowing smile. "You two get acquainted. I'll be right back."

Y/N watched her mother disappear into the throng of guests, a mixture of relief and nervousness washing over her. She turned back to Jack, who was watching her with a curious expression.

"So…" she began, taking a sip of her margarita. "How come I haven't met you yet? I've met Quinn, but I've never seen you before."

He shrugged, trying to play it cool. "I guess we just run in different circles. Quinn's always been the social butterfly of the family." Jack sipped his drink, his eyes never leaving hers. "And what about you? What's your story, Y/N?"

Y/N hesitated, not sure how much she wanted to reveal to this handsome stranger. But there was something about Jack that made her want to open up, to let down her guard.

"Oh, you know," she said with a wry smile. "Just hangin around. I don’t really do much just work and sleep. Navigating life.

Jack's grin widened. "Aren't we all?" he said, raising his glass in a toast. "To the adventures that await us."

Y/N clinked her glass against his, feeling a rush of excitement and anticipation. There was something about Jack that made her feel alive, made her forget about the troubles and doubts that had been plaguing her.

He had a quick wit and an easy laugh, and Y/N found herself relaxing in his presence. Jack seemed genuinely interested in her, asking questions about her life and her interests. It was a stark contrast to the distant, distracted Vince she had been living with lately as they sipped their drinks.

As the evening wore on, Y/N couldn't help but notice the way Jack's eyes lingered on her, the way his hand brushed against hers as he reached for a drink. There was an undeniable attraction there, a spark that she hadn't felt in a long time.

But there was also something else about Jack, an edge of fun and mystery. He had a bit of a bad boy vibe, the kind of man her mother would normally warn her away from. Maybe that was part of the appeal, the thrill of a chase.

As the party wound down and Y/N said her goodbyes, Jack slipped a piece of paper into her hand. "My number," he said with a wink. "In case you ever want to grab a coffee and chat."

Y/N tucked the paper into her pocket, feeling a mix of excitement and guilt. She knew it was wrong to even consider reaching out to Jack, not when she was still married to Vince. But the seed had been planted, the temptation was there.

“I’m married, but I hope this isn't the last time we cross paths." y/n said as she took his hand in hers once more. "It was great meeting you, Jack."

"I hope not either," he said softly, meeting her gaze.

With a final squeeze of her hand and a roguish wink, Jack turned and melted into the crowd, leaving Y/N standing alone with her thoughts and her racing heart before she composed herself.

…

The soft click of the front door lock echoed through the quiet apartment as Vince stepped inside, a bouquet of vibrant red roses in one hand and a rustling plastic bag filled with Y/N's favorite snacks in the other.

The sweet, floral scent of the roses mingled with the aroma of buttery popcorn and rich chocolate wafting from the bag, creating an enticing blend that filled the entryway.

Vince's footsteps were muffled by the plush, cream-colored carpet as he made his way into the living room. The soft glow of the table lamp cast a warm, inviting light across the space, illuminating the cozy leather armchair and the intricately patterned throw blanket draped over its back.

As he rounded the corner, Vince's eyes fell upon Y/N, curled up on the overstuffed sofa, a well-worn paperback novel resting in her lap.

She looked up at the sound of his approach, her eyes widening slightly as she took in the sight of him standing there, an apologetic smile on his face and his arms laden with gifts.

For a moment, they simply stared at each other, a myriad of emotions passing between them in the silence. Y/N's gaze flickered from the roses to the snack bag, her brows furrowing slightly in confusion.

"What is that?" she asked, her voice soft and tinged with curiosity.

Vince took a step closer, extending the bouquet towards her. The crinkle of the cellophane wrapping seemed to punctuate the moment as he held them out, a peace offering.

"I'm sorry I ditched you," he said, his voice low and sincere. "I'll be home more from now on."

Y/N's expression softened as she reached out to take the roses, her fingers brushing against Vince's as she accepted them.

She brought the blooms to her nose, inhaling deeply, her eyes fluttering closed for a brief moment as she savored their delicate fragrance.

A small smile tugged at the corners of her lips, a hint of forgiveness in the curve of her mouth.

"Thank you," she murmured, setting the roses down on the coffee table with a gentle thud. The polished wood gleamed in the lamplight, reflecting the deep scarlet of the petals.

"And the snacks?" she asked, eyeing the bag with a mix of amusement and appreciation.

Vince grinned, the tension in his shoulders easing as he sensed her mood shifting. He plopped down on the sofa beside her, the cushions giving way beneath his weight with a soft whoosh.

"All your favorites," he said, rummaging through the bag, the crinkle of plastic and the rustle of packaging filling the air. "Popcorn, those little chocolate truffles you love, and..." he paused for dramatic effect, pulling out a small, familiar blue box, "your favorite tea."

Y/N let out a small, delighted laugh, the sound like music to Vince's ears. She reached for the box, turning it over in her hands, the cardboard smooth beneath her fingertips.

"You remembered," she said, her voice warm with affection.

"Of course I did," Vince replied, his tone light and teasing. "I may be forgetful sometimes, but I could never forget the little things that make you happy."

Y/N leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder, the softness of her hair brushing against his cheek. Vince wrapped an arm around her, pulling her closer, the heat of her body seeping into his own.

For a moment, they sat there in comfortable silence, the soft ticking of the clock on the mantle and the distant hum of the refrigerator the only sounds in the room.

"I really am sorry," Vince said after a while, his voice barely above a whisper. "I know I haven't been around as much as I should be, but I promise, that's going to change."

Y/N tilted her head to look up at him, her eyes searching his face, a glimmer of hope and love shining in their depths. "I believe you," she said softly, reaching up to cup his cheek, her thumb brushing gently across his skin. "We'll make this work, together."

Vince turned his head, pressing a tender kiss to her palm, the warmth of his lips a silent promise.

…

It has been two weeks since her encounter with jack, now here she sat at her desk. She couldn't deny the spark she had felt, the way he had made her feel seen and desired in a way she hadn't experienced in a long time.

But even as she replayed their conversations in her head, a nagging sense of guilt tugged at her heart. She was still married to Vince, even if their relationship had been strained lately, he had done his best to come home earlier but duty calls.

Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Y/N turned her attention to the pile of mail on her desk. She began sorting through the envelopes, her mind only half-focused on the task.

Bills, junk mail, a postcard from her sister's latest vacation...and then her hand stilled on a plain white envelope with no return address.

Frowning, Y/N tore open the envelope, her curiosity piqued Inside was a single sheet of paper, folded in half. As she unfolded it, her eyes widened in shock and disbelief.

It was a hotel receipt, dated from last weekend. The name on the receipt was Vince's, but the room was booked for two people. And there, at the bottom of the receipt, was a charge for a bottle of champagne and a couples' massage.

Y/N's heart pounded in her chest as the reality of what she was seeing sank in. Vince had been at a hotel with someone else, someone he had been intimate with. The betrayal hit her like a physical blow, stealing the breath from her lungs.

With shaking hands, Y/N reached for her phone. She scrolled through her recent calls until she found Vince's number and hit the call button.

It rang once, twice, three times before he picked up. "Hey babe, I’m really busy right now, can I call you later?” Vince's voice sounded casual, unaware of the bombshell that was about to be dropped.

"We need to talk," Y/N said, her voice trembling with barely contained emotion. "Can you come home please? It's important."

There must have been something in her tone that alerted Vince to the severity of the situation because he agreed without hesitation. "I'll be there in 20 minutes."

Y/N hung up the phone and took a deep, shuddering breath. She didn't know how she was going to confront Vince, what she was going to say.

All she knew was that their marriage, their life together, was about to change forever.

…

When Vince walked through the door, Y/N was waiting for him in the living room. His clothes were scattered around the apartment and their photos had been broken, the glass shards still remaining on the floor.

The smell of a floral perfume that definitely was not hers wafted into her nose.

She held up the hotel receipt, her eyes filled with tears and her voice shaking with anger. "What is this, Vince? And don't you dare try to lie to me."

Vince's face paled as he realized what she was holding. "A receipt?”

"No, you idiot!” Y/N cried, the tears now flowing freely down her face. "You've been cheating on me? You've been lying to me, sneaking around behind my back?"

"It's not what you think," Vince tried to defend himself, but his words sounded hollow even to his own ears.

"It's exactly what I think!" Y/N shouted. "How could you do this to me, to us? You were out getting rub downs at some hotel, Vince. I loved you."

Vince reached for her, but Y/N recoiled from his touch. She couldn't bear the thought of him touching her, not now, not after what he had done.

“I would cry myself to sleep next to you and you would turn away and complain. You didn’t care that you weren’t loving me the way I deserve to be loved!”

"Y/N, please," Vince pleaded. "It was a mistake. It didn't mean anything. I’ll end it right now, just...just please stop crying."

But Y/N wasn't listening anymore. She was lost in her own pain, her own sense of betrayal. The man she had built a life with, the man she had trusted with her heart, had shattered everything with his infidelity.

Y/N shook her head. "I don't know if we can fix this one, Vince. I don't know if I can ever trust you again. What am I supposed to do?" she questioned, her voice trembling with emotion as she looked up to meet his eyes with more emotion she had ever felt in her life.

“How long has this been going on.”

Vince's gaze faltered, his expression clouded with guilt and regret. He looked down at the cream-colored carpet, unable to meet Y/N's gaze. "Remember when I asked you to start a family?" he admitted, his voice barely above a whisper.

A flood of memories washed over her—dreams of a future together, plans for a family they had once shared.

…

Taglist <3

@rebelatbay @destineyxo13

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eliciria · 3 months

Note

Ahmmm..

Headcanons for Leona Kingscholar while being friends with benefits with Reader/yuu

Angst and fluff??

a/n : thanks so much for requesting! My first post that actually shows my writing! wow! Sorry if it's a bit more angsty than fluff, i naturally go there hehe. Hope you enjoy!

whisper to the trees... (ask box) : open

check my about me/request rules here

wc : 0.8k words

cws : suggestive but still fluff, miscommunication phase for like 2 seconds, swearing, kind of ooc leona, potentially happy ending? gn reader

song playing : this is how it feels by laufey ft. d4vd

Leona Kingscholar with a friends to benefit! Relationship

I'll be so real right now, he actually wouldn't do any type of PDA with you. Even if you lean to more of the affectionate and almost lover-type phase of your 'friendship', he won't even attempt to try and hold your hand out in the open.

That doesn't mean he doesn't want to, though.

It's just that his pride kind of gets in the way when he attempts to brush his fingers against yours a little longer.

Pride is also probably the main reason why both of you remain friends. You think he wants to remain friends, while he struggles to pour his true emotions to you.

It leads into a cycle of ghosting then love bombing. The lack of responsibility within the interactions of both of you, before finally missing you becomes toxic.

He misses your supposed first dates, before apologizing later in the night. After reconciling, you'd attempt to meet up with him again past your `nightly activities` , but he misses it again. The cycle repeats.

Frankly, you were a bit sick of it. But you gave him one last chance to talk it out with you after class. To figure it out together.

So when he notices you right after he flirts with a random student(for them to carry one of the group projects, that is). He can't help but regret to have confessed earlier.

You walk hastily, trying to avoid the awkward situation you just witnessed. You finally got your answer, but you wished it wasn't in this way.

You pretended that you weren't in denial, and your actions showed the opposite. You really were. Tears were fighting to come out, and your lips trembled in both sadness and anger.

You only snapped out of it when Leona grabbed your hand a bit too tightly, breaking you out of your train of thought.

"Are you seriously walking away?" He asked you. How funny. You scoff.

"After witnessing that? Any person would."

"You don't understand." Really? Is this how he is going to act? You roll your eyes, tears sliding.

"Just what do I not understand? That you pulled that shit on me? Just how long do you think I can handle this bullshit?" Your voice attempts to remain stable, but the broken sobs break your attempt to look like you didn't care. You were just friends, yes. But the nights where he had "loved" you felt too much now.

" Yuu--"

"What, huh? I'm tired, so tired of you treating me like a whore. Like someone with no dignity. You treat me like a friend, and I'm happy you do. But when we try to step forward, you act like I'm just a fucking bed warmer! Just what do you want from me Leona?! I can't keep up with this. I love you, but I'm tired. Please, just stop-"

You get interrupted with your face being buried in his chest. He was embracing you, with a bit too much gentleness. He was stroking your hair, muttering a "shhh...". You hit his chest again and again, your broken sobs muffled. It would happen all over again. You'd fall again, and he'd do nothing but let you.

He watched as you screamed at him. It was understandable, he had refused to show any sign that he had truly loved you. But when he picked up the noise of students' footsteps, he can't help but want this to be cut short.

Nobody can hear your cries, unless it was him.

He immediately embraced you, both in comfort, and to blur your cries.

As you hit him as he hugs you, he gripped you a bit tighter. The punches were weak, and he was too focused on stopping you from crying.

Students passed by the both of you, glaring at the scene. A couple hugging in a hallway? Out of all the places?

But they rushed on as they noticed his death stare. The second they had tried to look at your face, he was tempted to pounce at them right then or there. He fought the urge to actually commit the act; he simply moved himself so all they would see was his back, and not you.

After a few more minutes of silence, he finally spoke.

"I'm sorry. I really am. I do love you. I really fucking do. The only person I want to see is you. The only person I want to be with is you. I just...don't know how to tell you that. I acted incredibly douchey, so i apologize. For everything. For all the dates I missed. For the missed opportunities to say I love you. For not being able to give you what you deserve. I'll change. Fuck, I'll do anything. I need you, so please. Don't leave."

You remain still, before letting out a jagged breath. You held onto the side of his jacket, and he rests his hand on your neck, the other on your waist. You look at him.

"I won't."

a/n : the cycle continues! if you liked this, please like or repost it! again, my asks are open, and thanks for reading!

#twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #leona x reader #leona kingscholar x reader #leona x reader angst #leona angst #leona kingscholar angst #leona kingscholar #leona #leona kingscholar x reader angst #twst angst #twisted wonderland angst #twst #twisted wonderland #twst fluff #leona fluff #twisted wonderland fluff #the way i saw my friends go through this...#｡･:*˚:✧｡elicir's abode

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writing-in-the-impala · 4 months

Text

Secret Smokes (Part 9)

Pairing: Teacher! Remus Lupin x Reader

Series Summary: When the reader bumps into the new DADA professor on the bridge in Hogwarts she begins to build a friendship with him all thanks to their shared feeling of not belonging and love for muggle cigarettes. Their friendship blooms while they both fight internal battles deciding what is wrong and what is right leading to a lot of fluff, angst, flirting and a rollercoaster of emotions.

Warnings: Swearing, smoking, drinking, teacher-student relationship, angst, jealousy, fluff, smut.

Word Count: 5776

A/N: At the end! No spoilers here, but it's a long one so get cosy.

| SERIES MASTER LIST (All chapters) |

Previous Chapter, Part 9, Next Chapter

Christmas morning began like every year except for the owl. When you made it downstairs there was an owl under the tree from Remus, you picked up the letter and thanked the owl giving it a treat before sending it home. You hadn't heard from Remus since you got home, however you couldn't be upset as you didn't attempt to write to him either. Even though you missed him a lot and you couldn't stop thinking about him life had become quite busy with work, family and your hometown friends. This was the first time you came home and didn't want to flirt with any one or meet anyone as the only person who got your heart to race was Remus. Since you first opened his present you kept re-reading what he wrote, as if you were trying to decipher it. Maybe it was him calling you "dear" and ending it with "yours" that made your heart race, maybe it was simply just the only way to feel close to him. "What's that letter honey?" Your mum asked walking out the kitchen to see you standing holding Remus's most recent letter.

"It's from my friend, I think it's just to thank for the Christmas present I got him."

"Him?" Your mother asked. "I knew those were for a boy she liked!" Your dad chimed in from the sofa. "So who's he?" Your mum asked.

That's when the doubts hit you, you shouldn't get excited by Remus sending you a letter, he's the kind of man you can't tell your parents about. How would you explain to your parents that you got involved with your defence against the dark arts professor and that he's also a werewolf. "Just a friend who's helped me a lot this year. Anybody want coffee?" You asked tucking Remus's letter into your jeans pocket and changing the subject.

When you had a moment after the busy morning you went upstairs to finally open Remus's letter that had occupied your mind all morning. You slowly opened it while sipping on a cup of tea that wasn't as tasty as the ones made by Remus in his office.

"My dearest Y/N,

Merry Christmas. Would it be inappropriate to say smoking or listening to music alone isn't the same? Thank you so much for your present, I've been listening to the vinyl from you on repeat I can't wait to listen to it with you. I hope work is good and your family is well too. Hogwarts is beautiful in the snow I'm glad I stayed but I'll be heading home to York soon - today - so if you would like to reach me please write to:

The Luna Cottage Yorkshire YO22 5AN

No pressure to write however if you do I just don't want you to feel like I'm ignoring your letters.

Yours, as always, Remus"

You wished the letter was longer, that he would tell you more about what he's been doing why he didn't write. You wanted to have a conversation about his day, you decided it was only right to reply to him straight away.

"Moony, Merry Christmas!

I am starting to realise my record collection is boring compared to yours. I'm glad you enjoyed the present, thank you so much for passing on your fathers book, I'm happy to return it to you as soon as I read it as it sounds quite sentimental.

I adore the cigarette tin, I would be lying if I said it hasn't already been useful. The camel and bridge are beautiful however I miss the real bridge.

I'm glad to hear you're enjoying Christmas, don't run to your cottage too quickly enjoy your time in Hogwarts although I do realise how stupid it is to write that as I'm sending it to your cottage.

My family is well and so am I thank you for asking, I do miss the snow in Hogwarts I look forward to coming back after new years.

Speak soon, Y/n"

You sent the letter almost as soon as you wrote it eager to continue this conversation with Remus. You could wait to read his next letter. However it did not arrive for days. Maybe he stayed in Hogwarts you thought, maybe he hasn't had time to send you one, maybe he's too busy...

You waited each day for a letter to arrive but nothing came, New Year's Eve was around the corner and you thought wether to wish him happy new year like you wished him Merry Christmas however you decided against it. The Weasleys had invited you to a New Year's party and you considered not going however you decided maybe it would be good to spent an evening with your school friends as opposed to the home town friends that you saw all Christmas break. The party wasn't at their house but rather a house in London however they assured you pre-drinks will be spent together. You met at their house where you would be spending the night after the party, it was nice to see their parents who always made you feel at home. They asked you many questions about your Christmas break and Molly even gave you a new hand knitted scarf as a gift. You hadn't arrived at their house empty handed either as you had a whole tray of home made cookies from your mum which the Weasley boys devoured. "So what's this party we're going to?" You asked the twins.

"It's one of the order parties but it should be fun." Fred began.

"And if we hate it, it's in central London so we can jump ship." George added.

"And we'll still see the muggle fireworks from there." Fred finished their joint sentence.

"But isn't everyone in the order like 50 now, I want a new years kiss." You complained

"I'm here." George quickly interrupted.

"I'm the hotter twin and I'm here too." Fred took over.

"See you have two options!"George said with a laugh.

"Three we all know dear Percy would kill for a kiss from you." Fred almost whispered so no one else in the family would hear.

"I don't want to kiss him, or you, or you." You said laughing and pushing them away in a friendly way.

"No you want to kiss your teacher." They both said simultaneously making your face go red.

"Shut up. I prefer people my age."

"Don't lie to us the only person our age you want to snog is Sebastian and he's mostly a rebound for your profesor."

"What did you get him for Christmas?"

"It doesn't matter besides he hasn't spoken to me since Christmas."

"But he wrote to you."

"Just to thank me."

"He still thought of you."

"We've gone off topic so who's gonna be at this party or did I waste my new years by agreeing to this?" You bought the conversation back.

"We promise there will be people you'll want to kiss there, you'll have fun."

"We're sure of it."

"Only thing...."

"'Mum is coming."

"WHAT? This is going to be so lame, a party with your parents?"

"Don't worry, we'll still have fun." He said handing you a shot to drink and all three of you necked it down. You got changed and ready to go out, suddenly you were all looking a lot more like you were going to party, the boys wolf whistled you when you joined them in the living room. By this point nearly the whole family was downstairs including Hermione who was also invited as Harry and Ron were going. When you walked into the room Percy's face seemed to go red, you felt bad as you knew his feelings for you but you just simply didn't feel the same about him. You relaxed in the living room for a bit before all of you traveled to the house the party was taking place at.

It was 12 Grimmauld Place. The home of the Blacks. Sirius Black was the only one left living there however he used the house to throw very extravagant parties, that's what Percy told you anyway. When you arrived it was quite littered with people already, and there was a mix of people older and younger, you spent time with the twins at first as you were a bit shy to start talking to so many strangers. As soon as the alcohol started to get to your head you became a lot more social with everyone around, one of your most interesting conversations was with the host Sirius Black who you clicked with immediately, you ended up in quite a discussion about the London firework display and he promised you could go up to the roof for the fireworks at midnight. You were quite enjoying yourself when you noticed Sirius hugging a man who was apologising for arriving late, he was taking his jacket off when you caught a glimpse of him. Remus J Lupin. He was wearing corduroy trousers, a nice clean fresh Oxford shirt that was a pale blue with a dark vest over it and a long black trench coat. You felt the temperature of the room go up and you needed a distraction so you jumped into a conversation with the twins. "Our teacher is here." You stated to them.

"Your teacher more like." Fred stated with a grin on his face as him and George shared a look.

"You knew." You pointed a finger at them both.

"He's in the order." George explained.

"Close friends with Black. And our parents." Fred finished.

"We didn't know for sure if he would come." They both said in response to your upset face.

"He hasn't replied to my letter." You said quietly.

"Well now you can talk in person." Fred said. You could see Remus but he wasn't looking at you, he was happy, he looked a bit tired but not more than usual, he seemed in his element hugging people hello and chatting with them. After about twenty minutes you both noticed each other he gave you a slight wave from across the room and you waved back while speaking to Hermione. The next hour and a half you spent stealing glances at each other from across the room but not talking even when you stood right next to each other, it felt like an unspoken rule. It was hurting you to watch him talk to an attractive girl from the order and laugh with her, a whole body laugh. You felt jealous, and upset that he didn't even acknowledge you past a small wave.

It was only when you were outside having a smoke with Fred that you finally spoke to Lupin. He was the one who started the conversation, you heard him say "No, no, no. I can't believe that you haven't heard of The Stooges, hold on, Y/N have you heard of the Stooges" he interrupted your conversation but you didn't mind.

"Of course, arguably they were the first punk rock band." You said with a small smile, eyeing the girl he was taking to in a judgmental way.

"Thank you!" Remus said to everyone before turning around to face you. "Hello by the way." He has a gently smile.

"Hi professor, I saw you earlier but didn't want to interrupt." You said hugging him hello, he already smelt like he's drank quite a bit as did you.

"You should've." He said gently in a hush tone, eyes quickly flicking down to your lips then back to your eyes, his breath really smelt like fire whiskey.

"You look nice." You replied.

"I was going to say the same about you." The small smile growing on his lips as his eyes scanned your body.

"Who are you so dressed up for?" You pried hoping the answer doesn't hurt you.

"Sirius." He said in a stern tone and continued once he saw the puzzled look on your face. "He said he was going to hex me if I showed up in the same clothes I wear every day. I don't know if you've met him yet but I believe he genuinely would have."

"I have and I agree, I think you're a wise man." You said with a laugh.

"How was Christmas?" He asked changing the topic.

"You know same, same. Spent most of the time working. What about yours?" You said putting your hands in your pockets awkwardly. When you spoke to him it's like the whole world blurred, like no one else was around you even through your were standing outside the house on a street in central London.

"Christ Y/N, I'm sorry I didn't write back." He simply answered.

"It's okay, I'm sure you were busy." You said hiding your disappointment.

"No, no I wasn't." He said with his own frown on his face. "After Christmas there was a full moon and I was knackered, once I regained energy I had so much to do and I didn't dedicate time to writing back, when I could've, I should've and I'm so sorry." He was leaning on the wall for support as if his guilt was weighing him down.

"How's the cottage?"

"It's cosy, I've been fixing things in it, Hogwarts has meant it stands empty with no one looking after it, so things have broken in my absence." He explained.

"I wish you had time to write while you were there, I had so many questions." You said instead of saying you missed him.

"Have you seen Sebastian Sallow over half term?"

"What?" You shot back in confusion.

"Just wandering as you two are close."

"Not that close." You felt weird about his question, his facial expression was hard to read.

"Fair enough." He replied after a moment of awkward silence.

"Why do you ask?" You pushed.

"Because I thought you two were slowly growing into a relationship, you know I just want the best for you." He didn't make eye contact with you.

"What's the best for me?" You questioned.

"It's not me." He said with an intense stare into your eyes.

"So you don't want me to be with you?" You asked swallowing hard from the anxiety.

"Correct." He answered his body inching closer to you.

"But do you want to be with me?" He looked down at his empty glass after you asked him this.

"What was work like?" He asked changing the topic.

"Answer my question." You pushed.

"Answer mine."

"I asked first."

"Y/N... let's change the subject before one of us gets hurt, let's not ruin new years." He said sounding defeated as he finished the sentence you heard the front door open and saw Sirius there with two drinks in his hand.

"Remus! There you are, I made you a drink." He said in a jolly voice. "Y/N, do you want one too?" He said while handing a drink to Remus.

"It's fine I can go get it myself." You said finishing this the perfect opportunity to leave this conversation with Remus.

"Beautiful, let me show you the main reason why being a magic is the greatest thing ever." Sirius said clicking his fingers and your glass refilled itself. Remus just laughed as if this was an old trick.

"How?" You asked in shock.

"Dear old Sirius has enchanted all the glass to be self re-filling because he's too lazy to stand up and pour himself a drink."

"I didn't know this was possible." You expressed.

"It's a dangerous trick." Remus explained.

"As if you don't love it Moony." Sirius said and you have a puzzled look to the nickname but didn't ask more questions. "Now it looks like you two were having a meaningful chat I don't mean to interrupt."

"You're not, I was just about to head inside." You said.

"Sure you were." Sirius said with a wink. "Enjoy the drink moony, let me know how it tastes later!" Sirius said with a wink at Remus and head tilting to you before he left, luckily for Remus you didn't see this. A moment of silence fell upon both of you again before Remus cleared his throat. "You know all the glasses in my office have this enchantment." He said sitting down on the front door steps.

"Liar, why do you always stand up and make cups of tea if they can refill themselves?"

"I find there's something romantic about doing things the proper way, taking a moment to brew a tea and pour it. It feels like it's the right way to do it. When I'm alone I don't bother to do all the mundane but I like to do it with you." He took last sip of the cocktail he managed to already finish and you watched it magically refill itself.

"So I'm guessing you and Sirius are close?" You asked.

"How'd you guess?"

"He called you moony."

"He's my best friend from school, there's not many of us left after the war." Remus began.

"What do you mean us?"

"My friends from school and I used to call ourselves the Marauders."

"That's so lame." You laughed and he had a nostalgic smile on his face.

"I know. But we were proud of it, we were unstoppable, a force to be reckoned with. We used to preform some pranks that created new rules in Hogwarts."

"Not that pillar of morality I thought you were Professor." You winked at him and he laughed.

"Maybe not." His eyes were glued to your lips.

"So what happened?" You asked and his eyes went down to the floor, he cleared his throat and took a sip of his drink.

"We all grew up but not all of us got to grow old. You see straight after school James and Lilly got married, it was a beautiful day. Not long after Harry was born, we felt like we were on top of the world when we were leaving Hogwarts. But the wizarding war kept getting worse, I struggled for work with my condition so I focused mainly on the order, James and Sirius helped me a lot especially with money, I wouldn't have a home without them. We spent most of our days as part of the Order of the Phoenix, and we were proud, we felt like our little group was part of something special. Then the day when Peter betrayed James and Lilly came, and well you know how the story of that day goes." He said his voice breaking a bit a small tear forming in his eye. "After that day the world rejoiced, war was over, he was gone, but he took James and Lilly with them. Peter, the snitch, sold them out. It was just Sirius and I left." You placed you hand on his knee to comfort him.

"I'm sorry-"

"It's okay. I was hurt that day and I was stupid, I distanced myself from Sirius, and from everyone. I saw the world as cruel, I really treated myself like a victim, felt sorry for myself. Sirius, he saved me. Every full moon he would come to the cottage and make sure I was okay, it was only after a year that I found out when he fell asleep and when I was back to my human form he was still around. He explained he'd come in secret every month just to check in on me. He made me realise the world wasn't so cruel after all." Remus glanced back at the house behind him.

You got a glimpse at a new part of Remus, the Remus who lost friends, the Remus who used to be a boy surrounded by everyone he loved, and you understood why now being in Hogwarts he was so much more lonely than ever before. "It's funny when I met you it felt like meeting the marauders for the first time. If only you were around when I was your age, I think I would've- doesn't matter. I'm sorry for dropping my sob story on you like that." Remus said with a heavy breath.

"Moony I love to hear about your past, Sirius sounds very special... I'm glad you have him."

"I love that boy." He said honestly. "He's my brother for life." He said looking back at the house once again. A calm quiet fell upon you both before you took your cigarette tin out of your pocket, you offered one to Remus and he took it "nice tin." He said with a wink. "Where'd you get it?" He asked while you tried to light your cigarette with your lighter, he lit his with magic obviously.

"This guy got me it, I really thought he liked me because it's so special but I realise now he's just kindhearted and cares about people. It's still one of my favourite gifts though."

"What says those are mutually exclusive?" He questioned while you struggled to light your cigarette as your lighter didn't want to work.

"Can you light it for me?" You asked him gently turning around to him.

"Sure, come here." He motioned for you to get closer to him. And you shifted towards him. "Closer." He instructed. You were confused but listened, you were now inches away from him, his cigarette was in his mouth and yours was in your hand. "Put it in your mouth." He said through the cigarette. "Now come here I'll light it for you." He said quietly. So you leaned in and he lit the cigarette with the one in his mouth, your body felt like it was burning, you could smell the alcohol, you could smell him. Chocolate, cigarettes and an undertone of firewood. He placed a hand on your face to stabilise you and you felt that your cigarette was lit. You pulled away from each other and you took a drag with a shaky breath after the moment you just shared.

You felt his hand grab your chin again and turn your face back to his, his cigarette wasn't in his mouth this time, he began to lean in. "Tell me if you want me to stop." He whispered and your heart raced as you leaned into him and your lips crashed. The kiss was full of lust and longing. He had completely dropped his cigarette as both his hands were now on your face, you dropped yours and raised your hands to touch him. You felt him swoop your whole body to the side and you were suddenly straddling him on the stairs of the house. You felt him, you felt how much he wanted you, you began to slowly grind on him to tease him. His hands began to go up and down your back as you continued to make out, your hands went through his hair, something you wanted to do for a very long time. And then you heard it, the fireworks.

Remus pulled away first, shaken back into reality, you both looked into each others eyes for a few seconds. Silence. The look of complete fear and lust in both your eyes as reality crashed back in. "Happy new year dear." He said quietly.

"Happy new year Moony." Your replied and he gently kissed you on the lips with love rather than lust this time. He slowly moved you off him and stood up, reaching out a hand towards you to help you stand up. "Let's head up to the roof, the view of the fireworks is beautiful up there." He said and you gave him a sad look.

"I'm happy to miss it." You almost whispered.

"We can't. Come on." He said reaching his hand out for you to hold and you followed him holding his hand while walking up the stairs and questioning which part he was referring to with "we can't". You headed back inside and as you passed the mirrors on the stairs Remus fixed his hair, he let go of your hand and you walked side by side upstairs entering the roof quietly. Once upstairs he squeezed your shoulder and walked away from you, he started making the rounds while telling people happy new year starting from some members of the order, moving onto the Weasleys and so on. You just stood there watching him. "Happy new year Y/N. We were looking for you." Fred said. "Are you okay?" He said looking at your confused expression.

"I just kissed our teacher." You said quietly. And Fred laughed and George groaned. "Pay up." Fred said to George and they exchanged money.

"You guys bet on this? You bought me here and you bet on it?" You asked slightly annoyed but also amused.

"Only when I left you outside with him." Fred said defensively. "How do you feel?" George asked. "Relived?" Fred added.

"Horny and confused."

"Poor Percy was looking for you, wanted you to be his new years kiss, he won't be happy to find out." George added.

"No one can know." You said sternly.

"Y/N, your secret is safe with us." George said.

"However we will make fun of you for this." Fred stated.

"Constantly." George added.

"Looks Y/N is not paying attention to us." Fred pointed out as you were starring at Remus and Sirius whispering to each other and Sirius glancing over at you.

"We've lost her, next thing you know she'll be married, she won't speak to us. No time for us." Fred joked. As you continued to watch Remus, who now glanced at you, said bye to Sirius and began to walk over in your direction.

"He's coming over what should I do?" You asked in panic.

"You were the one snogging him, not us." They both said.

"Shut up." You replied and Remus was now close enough to hear. The boys turned around and smiled at him with big grins. "Happy new year professor." The both said.

"Happy new year." He replied gently. "Happy new year Y/N." He said to you pretending as if nothing happened.

"Wait so you didn't even say happy new year to each other?" Fred asked and both you and George slapped him to shut him up.

"I should've known. Sirius also knows." He said he's gesturing behind him to a smiling Sirius who waved at you as soon as you looked over at him.

"Obviously." You said with a gentle smile.

"Do you boys mind if I have a word with Y/N?" Remus asked politely.

"Just don't-" Fred began.

"Fred." You and George said in unison. "Alright nice to see you prof!" Fred said laughing and walking away.

Remus lead you off the roof and down the stairs towards one of the rooms. You didn't ask any questions. He pulled you into a room and you straight away began to make out. You explored each others lips before between kissed Remus began to speak "Let's get one thing straight, this can't happen." He then kissed you again and you tried to push out a "yes" between the kisses. "And no one can find out about this." You nodded and he leaned back in to continue. "And if anyone knew you could get expelled and I could lose my job."

"Yes professor."

"Don't. I go crazy when you call me that." He said biting your lip as he kissed you this time and moving his hands around your whole body. "Now tell me if you want me to leave this room and pretend nothing happened, tell me now and I'll leave and we'll go back to just being professional." He said looking deep into your eyes and you shook your head and leaned in to kiss him. "Good." He whispered before kissing you back, after a moment you moved your hands to his belt and began to unbuckle it. "Not so quickly my dear." He whispered in your ear. "What we're going to do is leave this room, you're going to be a good girl and mingle with your friends, while I make the rounds talking to mine. Then when it's late and everyone is saying goodbye you meet me. That way we don't raise any suspicion about both being gone all night." He explained and you nodded. "Good." He said and he kissed your lips gently before leaving the room. You stood in the dark room alone trying to process everything. After a moment you left the room and continued upstairs, on the stairs you a ran into Percy. "Y/N!" He said cheerfully. "Where have you been all evening?" He asked.

"Oh I've been floating around." You replied trying to keep it vague.

"I was searching for you." He stated.

"It's a big house." You simply replied.

"Why did you leave with professor Lupin after new years?"

"Why are you watching my every move?" You felt like your privacy was invaded.

"We're friends Y/N, I feel like this year you've been running around befriending Slytherins and doing tutoring every day we've barely seen each other." He complained.

"You're exaggerating, besides you're the one who always pushed for me to study more, now I am and you're complaining." You were getting annoyed.

"Are you and the Slytherin boy dating? Is that why you've been avoiding me?" He asked a bit too aggressively.

"Percy. Your jealousy is showing, please go home, go the bed, we'll talk tomorrow." You walked past him towards the roof, he tried to continue the conversation but you didn't turn around to reply.

Upstairs you saw Remus chatting to small group of people, he looked so handsome. You started getting involved in your own conversations however you couldn't resist to look over at Remus constantly, and he kept looking over at you. Each time he would smile, sometimes he'd lightly wink. When Molly and Arthur Weasley were leaving you and the twins said you'll come home later in the evening and they trusted you and left you behind. Finally there was very few people left behind and Remus approached you and the twins as you relaxed in the living room. "Sorry to interrupt." He began not taking his eyes off you as he scanned your body, licking his lips.

"Please do." Fred said with a grin.

"Excuse us profesor." George said pulling Fred away.

"Has anyone given you a tour of the house dear?" Remus asked you with his hands on his pockets while looking down towards you. You shook your head and he simply reached a hand out to you to help you up. He began giving you a tour from the bottom of the house towards upstairs, there were still people in the house but very few as it was nearing 4am and most people had traveled home by now. He led you all the way up before he stopped at a room. "And here is my room." He said.

"Your room?" You questioned.

"Well technically the guest room but since it's just Sirius who lives here this room has become my room, I stay here whenever I'm in London." It was mostly a simply decorated room but the small pile of books on the side table made it obvious that Remus stayed here often.

"What have you been reading?" You said picking up the top book as Remus came up behind you putting his arms around you and kissing your neck.

"Does it matter right now?" He whispered in your ear pulling you against him.

"I don't think so." You said as he turned you around to look at him.

"You drive me crazy girl." He leaned in to kiss you. "Do you want to know how crazy?" He asked and you nodded. That's when he grabbed your hand and put it against his crotch, you could feel how huge his cock was in that very moment. "Holy shit." You whispered as a genuine reaction not thinking about what's leaving your lips. Remus smiled and chuckled slightly. "Don't worry, I'll go slow." He whispered and you almost melted into his kiss. After a moment of kissing he gently pushed you against the wall where he pulled your top off and your trousers. He began kissing you from your neck down your body getting on his knees in front of you as he kissed your legs and bit your thong. "I have thought about this moment from the first time I met you. You're more beautiful than I imagined." He said before standing up and kissing you on the lips again and you ran your hands through his hair. He picked you up and lay you down on his bed as he climbed up above you leaning down and kissing you. You reached up to unbutton his shirt and he stopped your hands for a moment.

"I just want to warn you, I have scares." He said, his voice had a twang of anxiety behind it.

"I don't care." You breathed out.

"You don't understand they're bad, I can keep my shirt on."

"Remus don't be ridiculous." You said unbuttoning his shirt to reveal his chest, his scars were deep, layering on top of each other some older than others. You began to trace them with your finger as Remus watched your expression, you then leaned in to kiss his scars. He put a hand under your chin and went back to kiss you as he unbuckled his trousers slipping them off while keeping his lips on yours. He once again moved down to your underwear taking them off with his mouth as he kissed you all the way back up to your lips. "I'm going to go slow but if anything hurts tell me okay?" He confirmed and you nodded. "Dear I need you to use your words for me."

"Yes Professor." You said and it felt like his eyes darkened a little as he slowly slid into you. You could feel how large he was as began to slowly move in and out. As soon as he saw you feel comfortable he began to up the pass, kissing your neck and starting to suck and lick it as you moaned under him. "You're so beautiful." He whispered in your ear as he kissed you.

"Remus you feel amazing." You said as he picked up the pace and moaned in your ear. He held your hands above your head with one hand and kept himself up above you with the other. The kissing turned into bites with kisses as your hearts raced. "Remus I'm close." You moaned out as he was bitting your nipples and still holding your hands above your head. "I want to feel you cum for me." He said as he kissed your lips again and you moaned out in bliss. You felt him fill you right after. As soon as he pulled out he leaned in to kiss you and you kissed him back. "Happy new year." He whispered as he lay down next to you pulling you in your hug him, you skin touching his skin. "Happy new year Remus." You whispered back tracing his scars with your finger and closing your eyes as he lightly kissed the top of your head.

A/N: AHHHHHH finally! Now I can tell you this chapter was the idea that sparked everything, it was the idea of them sitting on those bloody steps and him lighting her cigarette with his own that made me want to write all this. Don't worry it's not over yet, we're only just beginning the story I hope you carry on reading a lot as there's loads more to come as they navigate this situation. Hope you like it!

NEXT CHAPTER | More stuff I wrote

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